DETROIT SYMPHONY ORCHESTR Con e_e te 6e1-;e..5 PRESENTED BY WRCJ 90.9 FM Congregation Shaarey Zedek 27375 BELL ROAD, SOUTHFIELD SLATKIN CONDUCTS! THURS., JAN. 10 AT 7:30 P.M. Leonard Slatkin, conductor Sara Davis Buechner, piano Mendelssohn The Hebrides Mendelssohn Piano Concerto No. 2 Schumann Symphony No. 3 TICKETS JUST $25 ($io for children under 18 and students) CALL 313.576.5111 OR VISIT DSO.ORG A UBSCRIBE TODAY, A CQNCERTS FOR $75! Southfield THURSDAYS AT 7:30 P.M. Congregation Shaarey Zedek 27375 BELL ROAD SLATKIN CONDUCTS! JAN UARY 10, 2013 BEETHOVEN AND MOZART MARCH 7, 2013 MOZART'S "JUPITER" APRIL 4, 2013 SCHEHERAZADE JUNE 6, 2013 West Bloomfield Twp. THURSDAYS AT 7:30 P.M. Berman Center for the Performing Arts ON THE EUGENE & MARCIA APPLEBAUM JEWISH COMMUNITY CAMPUS 6600 W. MAPLE ROAD BACH'S BRANDENBURG CONCERTO NO. 3 JANUARY 24, 2013 MOZART AND HAYDN FEBRUARY 28, 2013 HANDEL'S WATER MUSIC APRIL 11, 2013 MOZART'S "HAFFNER" SYMPHONY MAY 16, 2013 D(SO DETROIT SYMPHONY ORC HE STRA LEONARD SLATKIN Music Director A COMMUNITY-SUPPORTED ORCHESTRA CALL 313.576.5111 TO SUBSCRIBE TO YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD TODAY! FOR MORE INFO VISIT DSO.ORG/NEIGHBORHOOD Generously sponsored by The William Davidson Foundation with additional support from the National Endowment for the Arts. 12 January 3 • 2013 A ITV "Tw9.".. metro New Friends Jewish and Muslim groups gather together for prayer, conversation and several meals. Shelli Liebman Dorfman Contributing Writer I B eing welcomed into a mosque from the first moment with `Salaam alaikum is not proba- bly an experience that most Jewish peo- ple have said Rabbi Dorit Edut, who teaches at the Isaac Agree Downtown Synagogue in Detroit. "Having Muslims attend a Jewish Sabbath service is also an unusual expe- rience for most of us," Edut said. "Yet this wonderful, peaceful and spiritually uplifting experience is something that occurred in downtown Detroit. This actually happened in the midst of the crisis in Israel and Gaza, though it cer- tainly had not been planned or antici- pated to be at the same time" Members of the Downtown Synagogue and the Detroit Interfaith Outreach Network joined together the weekend of Nov. 16 with members of the Muslim Center of Detroit, first at Friday afternoon services at the Muslim Center and again on Saturday morning at a Shabbat service at the synagogue. The congregations were part of the fifth annual Weekend of Twinning, where across town Temple Kol Ami (TKA) in West Bloomfield and the Muslim Unity Center of Bloomfield Hills also participated with a Sunday program and tour of the mosque and the first annual Ernst Conrad Social Action Shabbat on Friday evening at the synagogue. The program, coordinated by TKA Rabbi Norman Roman, honored the late TKA founder. "Last year, we had discussed naming our Social Action Shabbat in memory of Rabbi Conrad because of his commit- ment to social action and social justice causes:' said David Henig, a member of the Social Action Committee. "He had seriously strong convictions in the social action area, and we are proud to follow in his footsteps. Social action is and has always been a strong component of Temple Kol Ami's persona" Members of the Kol Ami committee, chaired by Lisa Redmond, welcomed guests and facilitated table conversa- tions during an Oneg Shabbat. The annual Weekend of Twinning is organized by the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding in cooperation with the World Jewish Congress and the Islamic Society of North America. It includes involvement of 250 Muslim and Jewish organizations in 26 countries whose At the mosque: Lee Schottenfels and Mel Chudnof, both of West Bloomfield and of Temple Kol Ami, with Shahina Begg of Bloomfield Hills and of the Muslim Unity Center of Bloomfield Hills. members participate in prayer services, food, friendship and discussions, and learning about each group's religious practices, prayers, customs and beliefs. A New Experience At the service at the Muslim Center of Detroit, Edut said, "[We] were warmly greeted both by the congregants before the service and during the service by Imam Abdullah El-Amin, who spoke of the good relations being built between our two communities and of the need for men to treat their wives with respect so that they would also be respected in the world:' Women were given scarves to cover their heads and sat in the middle and back of the carpeted sanctuary, while men sat in the front half, with the sec- tions divided by a rope. Chairs were available for those who wanted to sit on the sides or back of the room, but most sat on the carpet. "All removed their shoes before com- ing into the sanctuary and were encour- aged to wash hands, face and feet to ensure both bodily and spiritual purity before entering the sanctuary:' Edut said. "Two hundred Muslim members of the congregation entered quietly, each one bowing and saying their own prayer silently, while the Imam gave his teach- ing in English. Then people formed lines standing up and facing the front, listening to the Arabic lines chanted that gave praise to Allah, bowing and pros- trating themselves several times, and responding with a few words in Arabic meaning: 'God is great!' At the end, everyone greeted the others with, 'Peace be with you. Salaam alaikum,"' she said. Gail Katz of the interfaith women's group WISDOM, who has attended Gail Katz and Downtown Synagogue President Leor Barak of Detroit at the Muslim Center of Detroit. other mosque services, found the pro- gram a blend of traditional prayers with a modern-day message that easily and naturally brought people of different backgrounds, ages and cultures together. Karen Knox of the Downtown Synagogue was fascinated by the new Jazz Cafe that the mosque has opened in memory of Walid Muhammad, a mem- ber who was a well-known trombonist with the Dizzie Gillespie band. Shabbat services at the Downtown Synagogue were followed by a Kiddush luncheon. "Many questions about Judaism and the service itself were answered during the friendly conversations over vegetar- ian lasagna, split pea soup and blue- berry pie that synagogue members had prepared for lunch:' Edut said. "We hope to have more opportunities to do things together, especially for the good of our city, and learn about each other's traditions in the coming months. We hope that this peaceful gathering will serve as a model to others in the rest of our world who think that Jews and Muslims cannot get along:' ❑