The January Leadership Retreat: Pointing Towards Renewing Our Future
by The Leadership Planning Team: Malka Stover-Kemp, Marcie Rubel, Anna Martin, Joel Kreisberg, Rabbi Dev Noily and Michael Saxe-Taller During the first weekend of February, a group of almost 70 Kehilla members gathered for the first Leadership Retreat. With the four stated goals of making connections, creating a shared narrative, better understanding leadership, and envisioning […]
An Interview with Kehilla Member Anna Couey
by Bill Lazarus [Editor’s Note: We will, from time to time, be publishing interviews with Kehilla members, so we all can get to know each other better. If you know of a member who you think would be a good interview subject, please let us know! Contact Sasha at sasha@kehillasynagogue.org or (510) 547-2424 x100.] Kehilla […]
Darkness, My Home
by Lynn Bravewomon My/our heart beats, into the expanse of dark warm pulsing, Spreading, reaching into the possibility, extending into and within the infinite Living spirit in dreams, pulsing into dreams, birthing visions of the yet to come. Into fecund darkness of our sacred seasons and always, May our candle light be not […]
A Spark of the Messiah: A Message for Passover
by Rabbi Burt Jacobson Enslavement is not just external. The Ba’al Shem Tov taught that it was not only the bodies of Israelites who were enslaved, but their consciousness, their awareness as well. What does this mean? It means that the people had internalized their slavery and had come to accept it. And this internalization […]
Eulogy for Susan Schacht
by Rabbi Burt Jacobson Losing Susan has been a shocking blow to all of us who were privileged to know her. I am so glad that family and friends have assembled here today to remember and honor her memory. I’d like to share with you some of the significant details about her life. I want […]
Niggun Contemplation by Rabbi Burt Jacobson (High Holydays 2013/5774)
Good evening and L’shanah tova . . . This High Holy Day season we’ve been emphasizing the notion of teshuvah, the process of personal change and transformation. But teshuvah is not always good or praiseworthy. There are some harmful ways of attempting to change. Let me tell you a Hasidic story about a simple man […]
A Sermon for High Holydays by Rabbi Burt Jacobson (5774/2013)
The Ba’al Shem’s Teshuvah As you probably know, the Hebrew concept of teshuvah has to do with personal and communal change and transformation. This afternoon I’d like to speak with you about the place of teshuvah in the life of the Ba’al Shem Tov. Many of you know who the Ba’al Shem Tov […]
A Sermon for Kol Nidre by Rabbi David J. Cooper (High Holydays 5774/2013)
Tzedakah, Right Conduct, and the Face of the Other Unetaneh Tokef, a prayer only said on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur morning is a really scary prayer. I remember almost 30 years ago Rabbi Burt and I preparing for some High Holyday service and talking about the love hate relationship we had with it and […]
