Activities Committee.
“It’s a time of replenishment to
start off with a clean slate, the cast-
ing away of old ideas and mistakes
with a resolution in the coming
year that we are going to try as
hard as we can not to repeat them,”
Kasky said. “And we think it’s funny
because all these Jewish birds called
seagulls swoop down, too.”
Last year, Joanna
Abramson invited
fellow members of
B’nai Israel to her
West Bloomfield
house on Morris
Lake for tashlich.
“We usually do
it
at
a little pond
Joanna Abramson
near the synagogue
but we decided to
come to the lake for
a different experience. We went over
a little bridge to a little island and
threw our bread there,” she said.
This year, the ritual will be held
back on the grounds of B’nai Israel,
which is more accessible for those
who choose not to drive on Shabbat.
Abramson remembers one par-
ticularly unusual tashlich she expe-
rienced on a river in the northern
community of Petoskey.
“There was a salmon ladder and
the fish were all coming back in to
spawn, literally leaping up the lad-
der,” she said. “It was an amazing
event and allows you to feel you are
in partnership with nature.”

NOT FOR EVERYONE

Louis Finkelman of Congregation Or
Chadash in Oak Park.
“In my youth, I always went and
then at a certain point in my life, I
stopped. It is not how I wanted to
spend my time and, after I became
a rabbi of a synagogue, I was totally
exhausted on Rosh Hashanah in the
afternoon, so I needed to recover my
strength rather than go for a walk
someplace.”
Rabbi Jeff Falick
of the Birmingham
Temple, which
observes
Humanistic
Judaism, said he is
not against tashlich
but that the ritual
“doesn’t speak to
Rabbi Jeff Falick
me that much.”
Birmingham
Temple does a ver-
sion where little children write down
things they regret or would like to
change for the coming year and
throw them in a kiddie pool.
“It’s nice for kids to physicalize
the idea. For adults, we don’t do it
as a congregation, though it’s not
out of the question that we might
in the future. I am not on record
as being against it,” said Falick,
who added that the term “sin” is
not a Humanistic idea. (The Well’s
Horwitz said he prefers to say
“shortcomings.”)
“We need to own the parts of our-
selves that are unfortunate to our-
selves and wrestle with those. They
can’t be magically cast away. That is
not how you deal with a transgres-
sion,” Falick said.
“It’s a custom I understand has
a nice, visceral connection
and there is nothing wrong
with that, but, as an adult, it
doesn’t speak to the idea that
I work with the areas I need
to.” •

Not all Jews observe tashlich, con-
sidering it a bit of magical thinking
that erases transgressions or that
it’s become too much of a
social event.
“Some rabbis are not
thrilled by this custom,
particularly the imagery
that ‘I am throwing away
my sins.’ Many think it is
nice symbolism but oth-
ers feel, ‘Don’t make it
Rabbi Eliezer
feel that easy,’” said Rabbi

Finkelman

The Well used a drone last year to
catch some remarkable shots of its
tashlich service on the Detroit River.
See it at vimeo.com/186208011.

May the coming year be filled with
health and happiness for all our family and friends.
L’Shanah Tovah!

Jack Backalar

May the coming year be filled with
health and happiness for all our family and friends.
L’Shanah Tovah!

Sheri and David Jaffa
Eden, Kevin, Skylar and Zachary Elbinger
Sabrina, Brian, Jadyn, Kendyl and Reese Kaufman

May the coming year be filled with
health and happiness for all our family and friends.
L’Shanah Tovah!

Arlene and Chuck Beerman

May the New Year
bring to all our friends
and family
health, joy, prosperity and
everything good in life.

Rosh Hashanah

2017
5778

Leon, Fay, Mike,
Liz and Sam Siegel
-and-
Dennis, Elissa, Alex, Zach
and Evan Paul

The Grosse Pointe Jewish Council performs tashlich together at Lake St. Clair in 2015.

jn

September 14 • 2017

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