An Instant In An Eternity

There is room at the table for everyone. Last night I was at a Masorti Movement dinner celebrating, honoring, and thanking the rabbinic interns who have engaged with and supported the Masorti communities throughout Israel. There was much discussion of the challenges that Masorti Movement and pluralistic Judaism face in Israel. It is an ongoing conversation that was heightened as a result of a " Tag Machir " (price tag) attack on one of the Masorti communities in Jerusalem this week. Additionally, in the car to and from Jerusalem my companion and I had a lengthy discussion about the current state of affairs both within our community and our larger municipality vis-a-vis our newly established religious presence. Having grown up in the Reform Movement , trips to Israel heightened my sense both of individual Jewish identity and the challenge of losing that on a daily basis in American life. Therefore, I chose to incorporate more observance into my life - keeping Shabbat, pla...

That would be greed. It's out there, it's everywhere, and it's not only tempting and addictive, but highly dangerous. Right, enough hyperbole and superlative. At my core I find myself as being a bit of a socialist. I think that everyone should have what they need and not at the expense of others, and I view the socio-economic disparities that we see in the US and Israel (among other places) to be indicative of having at the expense of others. I would argue that this goes up to the level of nationhood as well (although that's for a post on politics and not economics), whereby every "people" is entitled to at least a little slice of land to call their own. I have no problem with capitalism, but rather I think it should be tempered with a dose of socialism. Or maybe vice versa. We're thinking about buying a plot of land. That in and of itself is a huge undertaking in Israel. What we're looking at is half (a quarter dunam) of a two-family p...