ROI120

I was lucky enough to participate in the ROI120 conference in Jerusalem this month.  It was fun.  My favorite part was a lecture given by Ruth Calderon, who founded Alma, the secular yeshiva in Tel Aviv.  She taught a piece from Bava Metziah.  I haven't read anything from Bava Metziah since I was but a young yeshiva lad.  This is my favorite line from her lesson:

כי איני יודע שיפה אמרתי

Rav Yochanan, whose spirit and health are weak, says this to a young yeshiva lad who is trying to make him feel better.  The young yeshiva lad is trying to convince the Rav that the Halacha is on the Rav's side after he has had a bitter argument with Resh Lakish, a badboy who the Rav, long ago, had won over into the study of Torah.  

Anybody want to quit work and go study at Alma? 

June

This month my parents came to visit me from Israel and stayed here three weeks. One of the weeks we went to Buenos Aires, Iguazu, and Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. We had a real good time together after not seeing each other for many months.

Also at the beginning of the month they did in Uruguay a seminar of B'nei Akiva of Uruguay and Argentina and a group of kids from Argentina stayed at our house to sleep for four nights.

Shabbas we did a meal in our house with 18 people, and the next day we had Shabbas lunch with 28 people! A week after that we did another meal with a birthday surprise party for Aron, one of our friends.

We also did two birthday parties for Yonatan this month, member of Moishe House Montevideo. I was only at one of them because I was with my parents for the other, but it was amazing and I heard the other one was too.

Waiting to have a great month like last month with a lot of activities and a lot of new people,

Lior Sztrigler
MH MVD

MHSS Alan

So I spent July 4th weekend up in NY for the wedding of my oldest friend, the girl who is practically my older sister. I got back pretty late Sunday night (after about 5 train rides and getting traded for a small poodle on the side of Interstate 95) and am trying to re-adjust to the working life. Assignments, bills to pay, a semi-empty house until our new SS Moishketeers move in...

Last month included the holiday of Shavuot. Like on all Jewish holidays, we tried to stuff our house with 30 people for a massive sleepover and meals. Why do we do this? Because we're crazy. We did it before joining the Moishe House project, and I hope to do it for many years to come. On Shavuot we organized a grand dinner the first night of the holiday, preceded by living room-style services, and followed by the classic, traditional, and ridiculous custom of staying up all night talking Torah until the coffee's got you so wired you try to play "human knot" in the middle of Mississippi Avenue. Members of the MHSS community enlightened and enlivened our night with text studies and guided discussions on such diverse topics as "Traits of Wisdom", "The History of Conservative Judaism's Understanding of Homosexuality", and "Secrets of Kaddish". Once we'd all gotten naps in the morning (after or during synagogue) we enjoyed the next two days of the holiday with the select group who chose to hang out with us for it, eating potluck meals, playing board games, talking more Torah, and trying to stay out of the 110 degree heat indexes.

My other favorite event of June was the talk by John Marks of "Search for Common Ground", but that was Rachael's baby so she can describe it.

Side comment: I just heard a rumor that MH London is going to Burning Man and I'm seriously jealous. I'll be at the Havurah Summer Institute, which is cool, but not as cool.

July- Rae- MHP

We are so busy at MHP this month. I literally couldn't fall asleep at all on Sunday night because I couldn't stop thinking and planning for these next upcoming months. While I had some fear that we'd be a bit slow for the summer considering that about half of Philadelphia goes to the shore on the weekends in the summer, we've been busy busy busy. We have some really great events coming up, like home brewing tomorrow, which I 've been wanting to try for years now, and a Salsa and Sangria party next week. I love summer in the city with MHP.

moishe/kavod color war

Normally I handle the social justice organizing and organizational development work associated with our community here at Moishe House Boston, and I enjoy that, and there's plenty of that going on this month.

But I have to say that what I'm most excited about coming up is our second annual Color War.

Evan Metter, our house's Minister of Fun, is putting the event together with his lovely wife Katie. It's coming up on Sunday, and I'm just feeling totally jazzed to hang out with a bunch of awesome Moishian Kavodniks, to run around on my bum knees, and to forget that I have any responsibilities in the world other than guarding the jail in capture-the-flag.

Doesn't sound bad at all, does it? Yay for summer!

Aliyah of Moishe House Minsk

I have celebrated many a Yom Haatzmaut in the diaspora before, but this year's was different. Perhaps because of the hardships the Jews of Minsk have endured in their recent history, and because of the relatively limited Jewish outlets here (compared to other diaspora locations where I have lived like Los Angeles and New York), I expected to feel particularly far away from Eretz Yisrael Sheli on Israel's sixtieth. But several events were held by the Minsk Jewish community, which actually brought me very close to Israel in unexpected ways.

First, a benefit concert was organized by several Jewish organizations here, at "Bronx" nightclub, one of Minsk's most popular. The concert featured a Belarusian Rock Band called J:MORS. The band usually sings in Russian in Belarusian, but in honor of Yom Haatzmaut, they added a new language to their

Second, The Israeli Embassy and Israel Cultural Center in Minsk sponsored an Israeli film festival, which began with the showing of one of my favorite Israeli films, "Ha Kochavim Shel Shlomi," or "Bonjour Monsieur Shlomi." This film has the power to emotionally transport you right into Israel, even from Minsk!

Natasha of Moishe House Minsk

В ночь с 07.06 на 08.06.2008 в Moishe House собрались любители изучения Торы по поводу праздника ШАВУОТ. Что это вообще за праздник такой и почему мы его празднуем? Шавуот мы празднуем в честь великого события: Синайского откровения. В этот день сыны Израиля получили от Всевышнего Тору и Десять заповедей - морально-этическую основу всей западной цивилизации. Тору нельзя было вручить иначе, как в "громах и молниях", в "огне и пламени", когда "вострепетал весь народ". Мы не знаем, что в точности происходило на Синайской горе, но само это уникальное духовное переживание оказало неизгладимое воздействие на характер и судьбу еврейского народа.
Шавуот, как и другие наши праздники, тесно связан со Страной Израиля. Это подчеркивается двумя другими его названиями: Хаг гакацир - "праздник жатвы" - и Йом габикурим - "день первых плодов", ибо он совпадает с началом жатвы пшеницы и сбором плодов, которые приносили в Храм в качестве благодарственной жертвы.
В Шавуот принято есть молочные блюда, собственно, что мы и делали. Существует несколько объяснений этому древнему обычаю. Некоторые считают его символом страны, "текущей молоком и медом". Другие отмечают, что до дарования Торы евреи не знали никаких запретов на продукты питания и после Синайского откровения были вынуждены ограничиться молочной трапезой, так как вся остальная приготовленная еда оказалась некашерной. Кроме того, стихи Торы, в которых сказано о принесении в жертву плодов первого урожая, завершаются заповедью "Не вари козленка в молоке матери его" (Шмот,23:19,34:26).
На самом деле, сначала я думала, что придти ночью и всю ночь изучать Тору будет очень утомительно, но как оказалось, всем очень понравилось!