Parashat Noach D’var Torah for Parashat Noach 5781 Noah is the second portion of the Torah, Bereishit. Noah is ten generations from Adam and Eve. Hashem sees that humankind is wicked and decides to destroy them. G-d wants to spare Noah who “walks with G-d”. Noah is a righteous man and deserves to be saved. G-d tells Noah to build an ark. The ark will hold Noah, his wife, his sons and their wives. The ark will hold two of each animal, male and female. G-d then sends rain for forty days and forty nights that drowns all life on Earth. Noah, his family and the animals remain in the ark for another 150 days. Noah then first sends out a raven and then a dove to see if the earth is dry enough for them to exit the ark. The dove finally returns with a branch off an olive tree. Noah then sees that it is safe to leave the ark. It was one complete solar cycle of 365 days until the Earth dried. G-d then establishes a covenant that the rainbow is a sign that Hashem will never again destroy humankind by a flood. Noah plants a vineyard and gets drunk on wine, and falls asleep. Ham sees his father naked and tells his two brothers, Shem and Japhtheh. The latter two, without looking, cover Noah with a blanket. Ham is the father of the Canaanites, who will be slaves; Japheth is the father of Europeans and Shem is the father of Jews and Middle Easterners (“Semites”). There are seventy nations who speak the same language. Nimrod, the first warrior king, has everyone build a tower of Babel (Babylon) to reach to Heaven. Hashem sees the presumptiveness and arrogance of mankind and confounds their speech by making them all speak different languages.

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Parashat Bereisht 5781 D’var Torah for Bereishit 5781 Chapter 1 starts with the story of creation. The enlarged “Beit” (ב) that opens up the Torah has the gematria (number) of two. This means there are two beginnings: the world and the Jewish nation. In six “days”, Hashem creates the Universe. During the first day, the earth is empty and G-d creates light and darkness and separates them. On the second day, G-d creates a firmament that separates the waters, above and below. On the third day, G-d gathers the water and separates it from the dry land, which G-d calls “Earth”, which sprouts vegetation yielding fruit and seed. On the fourth day, G-d creates the luminaries in the heaven, the sun, moon and stars; these are to serve as signs for days and years, and festivals. On the fifth day, Hashem created living creatures and fowl that fly, as well as sea creatures and beings that creep on the earth. On the sixth day, G-d created animals and beasts. G-d also created man on the sixth day after His own Image. Chapter 2 starts off describing the seventh day during which G-d rested and abstained from work. Hashem planted a garden in Eden and placed man there to work and guard it. In it was all sorts of trees and vegetation. He also placed the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. G-d warned man that he can have anything in the garden except those two trees. G-d then created woman to be with man after causing a deep sleep to come over man and take part of him to create her. There was a serpent in the garden who was cunning. The serpent approached the woman and convinced her to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, saying that she wouldn’t die if she ate of it. She then approached the man and gave him the fruit as well. They now realized they were naked and sewed leaves of fig tree to cover themselves. They then heard the presence of Hashem in the garden and hid. Hashem saw that they had disobeyed by eating of the fruit and punished the serpent by making him crawl on his belly for enticing them. He took man and woman out of the Garden and told the woman that she will experience pain during childbirth. Man would now have to work the soil for it to produce food. Adam, the man, name the woman Eve because she becomes the mother of all the living. Eve gives birth to two sons: Cain and Abel. Abel becomes a shepherd and Cain becomes a farmer. Both offer their produce to Hashem. Abel offers the finest of this flock and G-d accepts it; Cain offers produce not his best and G-d does not accept it. Jealous, Cain murders Abel. Hashem sees that and he banishes Cain, making him wander the earth. Cain builds cities. Cain marries and they produce Enoch. Enoch’s son is Irad, Irad’s son is Hehujael, Mehujael’s son is Methushael, and Methushael’s son is Lamech. Adam and Eve bear another son: Seth, their third son. Seth’s eighth generation descendent is Noah. Man began to increase. G-d saw that Man had developed evil in his heart and was sad. G-d thought that He would destroy man.

https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/tefillat-geshem-the-prayer-for-rain/?utm_campaign=MJL_Prayer&utm_medium=email&utm_source=mjl_maropost YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE History of Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah SHEMINI ATZERET/SIMCHAT TORAH What is Shemini Atzeret? SHEMINI ATZERET/SIMCHAT TORAH The earth, like most living things, is primarily comprised of a transparent, odorless, virtually tasteless and colorless fluid we call water. Even though our bodies, the ground, and most of the world we experience seems solid to us, just beneath the surface, water is ever-flowing, moving blood and nutrients and earth, enabling life to grow. The complete dependence of life on water is powerfully conveyed through the Hebrew root ג-ש-ם (gimel-shin-mem), which can mean both rain and physicality. Lest we forget that we are made up of nearly three-quarters water, the Hebrew reminds us that without geshem (rain), there is no gashmiut (physicality). Or in other words, without mayim (water), there is no chaim (life). Given the centrality of water to our existence, the prominence of rain and water in the Torah and Jewish liturgy comes as no surprise. In the beginning, God created the world by “separating the waters below from the waters above. ”Genesis 1:7 Moses was saved by pharaoh’s daughter, who drew him from the water. Upon seeing Rachel for the first time, Jacob rolled the stone from the mouth of the well and offered her flock water. Genesis 20:10 Our path to freedom from slavery in Egypt went directly through water. The priests in the ancient temple sanctified themselves with water. Prayer, we are told in the Book of Lamentations, involves pouring out our hearts like water. Lamentations 2:19 Tefillat Geshem, the prayer for rain that Ashkenazi Jews recite on Shemini Atzeret, recalls many of these transformative encounters with water. (Sephardic Jews recite a different prayer for rain, Tikkun Hageshem, on Shemini Atzeret.) Recited at the conclusion of the festival of Sukkot and at the traditional start of the rainy season in Israel, the prayer calls upon God to remember the righteousness of our ancestors and to grace us with the gift of flowing water. “For their sake, do not withhold water,” we recite. “For the sake of their righteousness, grant the gift of flowing water.” For the full text of Tefillat Geshem in Hebrew, click here. Through detailing the many and varied ways that water has played a central role in the defining moments of our ancestors, Tefillat Geshem encourages each of us to consider the defining moments that water plays in our own lives. The imagery of the poem describes birth and death, trials and triumphs, vulnerability and strength, scarcity and abundance — all of which seems to suggest that we too are part of this story, part of the cycle of water, the cycle of life. Water is always in movement. Since the beginning of creation, it has continuously been flowing in an endless cycle with no beginning and no end, from evaporation to condensation to precipitation to infiltration and back to evaporation. And this cycle is a closed cycle; the rain falling outside the window right now is made of molecules that existed when Abraham and Sarah walked the earth. It is the movement of water, the flow, that supports life. The soil beneath our feet may be rich and fertile, but without water a plant can’t take up the nutrients it needs to survive. And when plants take up water and nutrients from their roots, they must also release water from their leaves. Absorbing and releasing, receiving and giving, this is the miraculous cycle that has happened every second for millions of years. We too are part of this flow. From Abraham and Sarah to all of us, the water flowing through us is part of an unbroken chain, a cycle of water that continues to move and nourish and support life. Which is why we invoke the merits of our ancestors when we recite Tefillat Geshem and pray that this same water continues to flow for us, for our children, for all of creation — for blessing, for life and for abundance. “For you are Hashem our God,” the prayer concludes. “Who causes the wind to blow and the rain to fall. May it fall as a blessing and not as a curse. May it be for life and not for death. May it bring abundance and not famine.”

D'var Torah

Ushpizin Sermon YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE Sukkot at Home SUKKOT Celebrating Sukkot without a Sukkah SUKKOT My Jewish Learning is a not-for-profit and relies on your help Ushpizin (pronounced oosh-pee-ZIN) is the Aramaic word for “guests” and refers to a short prayer recited on each night of Sukkot inviting one of seven Jewish forbearers to join us in the sukkah. Traditionally, the seven guests are the three patriarchs — Abraham, Isaac and Jacob — along with Moses, Aaron, Joseph and King David. They are referred to as the “seven shepherds of Israel” because they guided the spiritual development of the Jewish people as the shepherd guides the flock — not only in their lifetimes, but for all of Jewish history. In modern times, it has become customary in some circles to add the names of important Jewish women whose influence has been commensurately significant. The specific women, and the order in which they are invited, aren’t as universally established as the men, but often include major female biblical figures such as Sarah, Rachel, Ruth and Esther. (One version of an egalitarian Ushpizin service can be found here.) The practice of Ushpizin is first mentioned in the Zohar, the primary text of Jewish mysticism, but the custom of actually welcoming them into the sukkah seems to have emerged later under the leadership of Rabbi Isaac Luria in the 16th century. In the kabbalistic rendering, each of the seven Ushpizin correspond to one of the seven lower sefirot, the divine emanations or attributes. For Abraham, this quality is chesed, or lovingkindness. For Isaac, gevurah (strength); Jacob, tiferet (beauty), Moses, netzach (eternity); Aaron, hod (majesty), Joseph, yesod (foundation); and David, malchut (kingdship). Egalitarian versions of the Ushpizin ritual commonly pair a female figure with each of these sefirot as well. According to the Zohar, on Sukkot the Ushpizin leave their heavenly abode and reside with us spiritually in the sukkah. As the text of the prayer makes clear, all of the Ushpizin visit the sukkah on every night of the holiday, but a different one is preeminent on each night — and their particular spiritual quality is also uniquely accessible. The prayer begins with this: Sit, sit, lofty guests. Sit, sit holy guests; sit, sit guests of faith. Worthy is Israel’s portion, as it is written inDeuteronomy 32:9, ‘For the Lord’s portion is His people, Jacob His allotment.’ The main body of the prayer asks for God’s presence to reside in the sukkah, to spread out a “sukkah of peace” upon us in the merit of the fulfillment of the commandment to reside in a sukkah for seven days. The prayer also invokes the merit of “going out of one’s house” on Sukkot, which reflects a teaching that each of the seven Ushpizin undertook an act of departure that enabled them to fulfill their particular destiny. Abraham, for example, left his father’s house for a strange land at God’s command. Joseph was sold into slavery in Egypt. And Moses fled Egypt for Midian where he encountered God at the burning bush. Just as the Ushpizin left that which was familiar and comfortable in the service of God’s command, so do we on Sukkot leave the security of our homes for an impermanent hut at God’s direction. The final part of the prayer changes depending on the night, inviting the particular guest associated with that night along with all the other Ushpizin. The Ushpizin ritual also evokes the more earthly obligation of hosting guests in our homes, particular on Shabbat and festivals. Welcoming guests is a universal Jewish value. But on festivals, this obligation is especially pronounced. As Maimonides writes about the laws of festivals in the Mishneh Torah: While eating and drinking, one must feed the stranger, the orphan, the widow, and other poor unfortunates. Anyone, however, who locks the doors of his courtyard and eats and drinks along with his wife and children, without giving anything to eat and drink to the poor and the desperate, does not observe a religious celebration but indulges in the celebration of his stomach. Some Sephardic Jews even have a custom of leaving an empty chair in the sukkah for that night’s guest, a ritual evocative of the cup of Elijah that is placed on the Seder table on Passover. Some also have the custom of donating the Ushpizin’s food to the poor, sometimes in the form of an equivalent donation to charity.

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D'var Torah This week the pilgrimage festival of Sukkot (Jewish Thanksgiving) falls on Shabbat. In the diaspora, the festival is celebrated for eight days. The Torah readings for the first two days are the same as for Passover (Pesach). They are Leviticus 22:26-23:44. The portion gives a review of the various holidays throughout the Jewish year and of course discusses Sukkot as well. It states: “On the fifteenth day of this seventh month there shall be the Feast of Booths to the Lord, [to last] seven days.” The portion also instructs how to observe the holiday: “Mark, on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the yield of your land, you shall observe the festival of the Lord [to last] seven days: a complete rest on the first day, and a complete rest on the eighth day. On the first day you shall take the product of hadar trees, branches of palm trees, boughs of leafy trees, and willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days. You shall observe it as a festival of the Lord for seven days in the year; you shall observe it in the seventh month as a law for all time, throughout the ages. You shall live in booths seven days; all citizens in Israel shall live in booths, 43 in order that future generations may know that I made the Israelite people live in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I the Lord your God.” The Torah portions throughout the Intermediate days are Numbers 29:17-29:31. It states “On the fifteenth day of the seventh month, you shall observe a sacred occasion: you shall not work at your occupations.—Seven days you shall observe a festival of the L-RD. You shall present a burnt offering, an offering by fire of pleasing odor to the L-RD:… It then details the specific offerings for those four intermediate days.

Asking God for peace and protection in this evening prayer. YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE Tefilat Haderech, The Traveler’s Prayer TRAVELER'S PRAYER Jewish Prayer for the Sick: Mi Sheberach PRAY My Jewish Learning is a not-for-profit and relies on your help The Bedtime Shema or Kriat Shema al Hamitah, is an extended version of the traditional Shema prayer and is recited before going to sleep. (Most siddurs, or prayerbooks, have the full text listed in the Weekday Ma’ariv section). The Torah prescribes that one should recite the Shema “when you lie down and when you rise up” (Deuteronomy 6:7, 11:9). Nowadays, this is manifested in the inclusion of the prayer in the Shachrit (morning) and Ma’ariv (evening) services. However, an additional practice of reciting the Shema before going to sleep developed in rabbinic times. Below is the full English text of the Bedtime Shema and a video of a musical interpretation of the Bedtime Shema, followed by an explanation of the prayer’s origins and development. Find the full Hebrew text of the Bedtime Shema on Sefaria. Text of the Bedtime Shema in English Translation (Reprinted with the permission of The Rabbinical Assembly from Siddur Sim Shalom: A Prayerbook for Shabbat, Festivals and Weekdays [1985], pp. 245-249) Praised are You, Lord our God, King of the universe, who brings sleep to my eyes, slumber to my eyelids. May it be Your will, Lord my God and God of my ancestors, that I lie down in peace and that I arise in peace. Let my sleep be undisturbed by troubling thoughts, bad dreams, and wicked schemes. May I have a night of tranquil slumber. May I awaken to the light of a new day, that my eyes may behold the splendor of Your light. Praised are You, Lord whose glory gives light to the entire world. God is a faithful King. Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is One. Praised be His glorious sovereignty throughout all time. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might. And these words which I command you this day you shall take to heart. You shall diligently teach them to your children. You shall recite them at home and away, morning and night. You shall bind them as a sign upon your hand, they shall be a symbol above your eyes, and you shall inscribe them upon the doorposts of your homes and upon your gates. (Deuteronomy 6:4-9) Help us, our Father, to lie down in peace; and awaken us to life again, our King. Spread over us Your shelter of peace, guide us with Your good counsel. Save us because of Your mercy. Shield us from enemies and pestilence, from starvation, sword and sorrow. Remove the evil forces that surround us, shelter us in the shadow of Your wings. You, O God, guard us and deliver us. You are a gracious and merciful King. Guard our coming and our going, grant us life and peace, now and always. Praised is the Lord by day and praised by night, praised when we lie down and praised when we rise up. In Your hand are the souls of the living and the dead, the life of every creature, the breath of all flesh. Into Your hand I entrust my spirit: You will redeem me, Lord God of truth. Our God in Heaven, assert the unity of Your rule; affirm Your sovereignty, and reign over us forever. May our eyes behold, our hearts rejoice in, and our souls be glad in our sure deliverance, when it shall be said to Zion: Your god is King. The Lord is King, the Lord was King, the Lord shall be King throughout all time. All sovereignty is Yours; unto all eternity only You reign in glory, only You are King. Praised are You, Lord and glorious King, eternal Ruler over us, and over all creation. (These biblical verses recall God’s blessings and protection in ancient times:) Then Jacob said: “May the angel who has redeemed me from all harm bless the lads. May they carry on my name and the name of my fathers, Abraham and Isaac. May they become teeming multitudes upon the earth.” And God said: “If you will listen diligently to the voice of the Lord your God, doing what is right in His sight, heeding His mitzvot and keeping all His laws, then I will not inflict upon you any of the diseases that I brought upon the Egyptians, for I the Lord am your healer.” The angel of the Lord said to Satan: “The Lord rebuke you, Satan. May the Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you. Is not this man a brand snatched from the fire?” Behold Solomon carried in his litter — sixty of Israel’s heroes are its escort. All of them are skilled swordsmen, all trained at war, each with his sword at the ready to ward off any danger of the night. May the Lord bless you and guard you. May the Lord show you favor and be gracious to you. May the Lord show you kindness and grant you peace. The Guardian of Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps. I wait for Your deliverance, O Lord. The Lord eternal reigned before the birth of every living thing. When all was made as He ordained, then only He was known as King. When all is ended He will reign alone in awesome majesty. He was, He is, and He will be, glorious in eternity. Peerless and unique is He, with none at all to be compared. Beginningless and endless. His vast dominion is not shared. He is my God, my life’s redeemer, my refuge in distress. My shelter sure, my cup of life, His goodness limitless. I place my spirit in His care, when I wake as when I sleep. God is with me. I shall not fear, body and spirit in His keep. Bedtime Shema for Young Children in English Translation (Reprinted with the permission of The Rabbinical Assembly from Siddur Sim Shalom: A Prayerbook for Shabbat, Festivals and Weekdays [1985], p. 249) Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is One. Praised is the Lord by day and praised by night, praised when we lie down and praised when we rise up. I place my spirit in His care, when I wake as when I sleep. God is with me, I shall not fear, body and spirit in His keep. Talmudic Sources for the Bedtime Shema The source of the bedtime Shema can be found in the Talmud, where Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi asserts that one should recite the Shema before bed, even though it was also recited with the evening prayers (Berakhot 4b). In explaining the biblical source of the practice, Rav Assi brings a verse from the book of Psalms, “So tremble, and sin no more; ponder it on your bed, and sigh” (Psalms 4:5). Night was considered a time of vulnerability, when one’s soul returned to God. In attempting to understand the motivation for saying the Shema at this time, Rav Yitzchak asserts, “If one recites the Shema before bed, demons are kept away from him” (Berakhot 5a). The general consensus of the rabbis from the time of the Talmud to the time of the halakhic (legal) codes is that reciting this Shema offers not only praise of God, but a request of God’s protection from dangers and demons that may emerge at night. During the Geonic Period, the siddur (prayerbook) of ninth-century Rav Amram Gaon records that one should recite a significantly longer liturgy rather than simply the first line of the Shema. This longer form became the basis for the traditional bedtime Shema still used today. However, when discussing the nature of Kriat Shema al Hamitah, Rav states a person can simply recite the first line of the Shema and fulfill the obligation for the entire Bedtime Shema (Berakhot 13b), and this has become a popular practice. Liturgical Selections The extended version of the bedtime Shema is composed of a combination of selections from daily prayers, particularly from the Ma’ariv service, interspersed with biblical verses and other prescribed liturgies. Many of the passages recited are taken from the commentaries on the bedtime Shema in the Talmud. Following an introductory passage where one informs God that he or she will forgive anyone who has wronged that person during the day, the prayer begins with a blessing ordained by the rabbis of the Talmud, Birkat HaMapil, or the blessing of the one who brings one down to sleep. The prayer states, “Praised are You, Adonai our God, who rules the universe, bringing sleep to my eyes and slumber to my eyelids” (Berakhot 60b). It also asks God to protect the individual so that he or she may “lie down in peace and arrive in peace,” hoping that the next day will bring new light, for God’s “glory gives light to the entire world.” The middle section begins the traditional first line of the Shema. It is followed by the first full paragraph, known (for its first word) as V’ahavta, followed by other liturgical passages from the Ma’ariv service. These include most of the Hashkiveinu prayer, which asks for protection, as well as parts of from Barukh Adonai L’Olam. The one constant theme among the verses is the notion that God should protect us when rising up and lying down, no doubt bringing attention to the fact that sleep is a transitional state. Biblical Themes in the Bedtime Shema The final piece of the bedtime Shema contains a series of biblical verses that plead for God’s blessing and protection. Most notable is Jacob’s blessing to his grandsons Ephraim and Menashe, “May the angel who has redeemed me from harm, bless these boys. May they carry on my name and thus name of my ancestors, Abraham and Isaac. May they spread far and wide upon the earth” (Genesis 48:16). Other biblical verses offer a similar hope for God’s protection in a moment of weakness. The section concludes with a series of verses recited three times each, including the traditional priestly blessing that is also used in the parents’ blessing for their children on Shabbat evening (Numbers 6:24-26). Following the major portions of the bedtime Shema, the liturgy concludes with Adon Olam, commonly known for its recitation at the end of synagogue services. This addition is not found in the earliest texts of the bedtime Shema, but German rabbi and historian Ismar Elbogen concluded that Adon Olam was an older nighttime prayer. Its last line sums up the theme found throughout the bedtime Shema: “When I sleep, as when I wake, God is with me; I have no fear.

Parashat Sukkot 5781 (https://youtu.be/avsNBSk-v3M)

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