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NELSON LEGACY
PRESENTS

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IN PARTNERSHIP WITH COHN-HADDOW CENTER FOR JUDAIC STUDIES

Rabbi Elyse Goldstein

&

A Road Map
For The Journey

Baruch Sienna

Captivating scholars, authors & teachers

KEYNOTE PROGRAM

LUNCH AND LEARN

Wednesday, June 6 at 7:30 p.m.
Congregation Beth Shalom - Oak Park

Thursday, June 7 at 12:30 p.m.
Congregation Beth Shalom - Oak Park

Women are from Genesis! Men are from Leviticus!
Does gender color the way we read the Bible?

$15 in advance, $20 at door
Dessert Reception and Book Signing

T

Making Letters Dance and Fly
An interactive workshop on Hebrew text and midrash
(Torah commentary)
Reservations Required
Bloom's Kosher Catering
$22 for Lunch and Program

Rabbi Elyse Goldstein is a Covenant Award winner for exceptional Jewish educators, an author of ReVisions: Seeing Torah
through a Feminist Lens and currently serves as the rabbi of the CityShul Toronto. Her husband, Baruch Sienna, is a skilled
calligrapher who created the first Macintosh Hebrew font. His interactive workshop will show how the Hebrew alphabet has
evolved, turning letters and words into pictures.

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50

May 17 • 2018

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his Shabbat, we begin the
reading of the book of
Bamidbar, Numbers, which
chronicles much of the journey of
the Exodus. We always begin the
reading of Bamidbar very close to
the holiday of Shavuot, the holiday
commemorating the giving of the
Torah at Mt. Sinai.
While this is a coinci-
hope and challenge us to
dence of the calendar, there
continue to put one foot
is a lesson to be learned
in front of the other and
from the connection
continue the journey. The
between the book and the
wisdom of our tradition,
meaning of Torah in our
in narrative, law or poetry,
lives.
inspires us to believe in the
If we read the words
ultimate meaning in our
of the Torah as being in
lives and not to despair.
Rabbi Robert
chronological order (which Dobrusin
The process of midrash, of
we should not always do),
commentary, gives us all
the beginning of the book
the opportunity to add our
describes the start of the
own personally meaningful
journey to Canaan which,
touch to Torah to allow it
while long and arduous, was
to become even more of a personal
intended to be a relatively direct
guide.
one. But, later in the book, we read
Many philosophers and Torah
the narrative about the people’s
commentators wondered why
rebellion in the wake of the report
the Torah was given in a desert.
of the 12 scouts sent by Moses to
I believe the lesson to be learned
report on the land. This rebellion
from this is that the vast, open
spaces of the desert can be com-
led to God’s decision to have them
pared to the vastness of the experi-
wander in the desert for 40 years
ence of our lives and that Torah
so that their children would be the
can reach every aspect of our lives,
ones to enter the land.
When a child is born, we all wish positive or negative. Torah accom-
panies us on the long and arduous
for him or her a direct, uncompli-
and beautiful and glorious journey.
cated journey through life. But, we
The content of Bamidbar is the
know that no journey through life
most varied of any book of the
is that simple and direct. While we
Torah. Ritual, law and narrative
all can see many points in life that
are woven together to produce a
are times for praise and celebra-
beautiful text. So, too, we should
tion, there are days of sadness and
weave the experiences of our lives
disappointment and maybe days
in which we might see ourselves as into a beautiful work of art by hav-
wandering aimlessly through a wil- ing Torah, in all of its forms, be our
guide along the way. •
derness like our ancestors surely
felt at times during those long 40
Robert Dobrusin is a rabbi at Beth Israel
years.
Congregation in Ann Arbor.
But, in our tradition, we have
a road map that never leaves us,
CONVERSATION
even, or one might say, especially,
How would you answer the ques-
in those difficult times and that is
tion: Why was the Torah given in the
the road map of Torah.
desert?
Whenever we feel lost, for what-
ever reason, the words of Torah are
there to elevate our spirits, give us

Parshat Bamidbar:
Numbers 1:1-4:20;
Hosea 2:1-22