A reminder: This Thursday, April 25, you are invited to join The Shalom Center for an online webinar featuring Shaul Magid, author of the new book The Necessity of Exile, in conversation with Rabbi Arthur Waskow, on the transformative notion and practice of a deliberate new Diaspora Judaism to help guide us in the years ahead.  

An invitation/call from Jewish Voice for Peace, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, and IfNotNow

Today let us pause on Shabbat HaGadol, heed the words of the Prophet Malachi, and invite ourselves to shoulder the task of Elijah by taking active roles in the world for healing Earth, not devastating the next generation.

A prayer and call to outlaw climate pollution

Rabbi Shaul Magid, a Dartmouth scholar and public intellectual, author of the new book The Necessity of Exile, will be leading a webinar on “New Diaspora Judaism” from 7:30 to 9pm Eastern time (4:30 Pacific time) on Thursday evening April 25, the fifth evening of Pesach.

Our wise forebears realized that intimate experience of death might so deeply traumatize people that they would need a ritual reentry to communal activities. So we have midrashically drawn on the ritual of the Red Heifer to precede the Seder.

A Call for Grieving and Healing

Authored by the Foundation for Ethics and Meaning, a Project of We the World dedicated to Michael Lerner and to the memory of Peter Gabel

We share with you an excerpt from the JTA /Forward article announcing a major step by a major Jewish organization against the Corporate Carbon Pharaohs who are burning Earth for the sake of their own profits.

R’ Arthur writes: “Chava Alberstein, a premier Israeli singer, took the traditional Pesach song Chad Gadya and in Hebrew and Aramaic, bewailed its cycle of violence. Juliet Spitzer turned it into an English that is singable, chantable.”

Join people of all backgrounds for this long-running and beloved annual event at The Weitzman Museum in Philadelphia, inspired by R’ Arthur’s original Freedom Seder. A lineup of speakers (including R’ Arthur), storytellers, and musicians reflect on traditional Passover themes such as freedom, renewal, transmitting traditions, and welcoming the stranger.

The Shalom Center joins with the Jewish Climate Action Network of Massachusetts to Turn Out the Pro-Earth, Pro-People Vote, beginning properly enough in high-stakes Pennsylvania on Pesach!

R’ Arthur writes, “We have done what we could to send biblical passages, Palestinian poetry, etc., to help in creating a Truthful Seder [this year]. We also invite you to buy Liberating Your Passover Seder to heal and hearten your heart.”

R’ Arthur shares “Notes toward a Haggadah” for this season, not the haggadah itself — with an invititation to add or subtract and to let us know what emerges.

How can we celebrate in the face of so much death and so much trauma amongst the living? The biblical tradition offers us a way.

April 22 is the night of the first Seder. The day before, April 22, is Earth Day. We are making available two possible Sedarim. The first one is this, from a couple of years ago, called Earth & Justice Freedom-Seder.

R’ Arthur explores the differences between Purim and Passover, with the question in mind: How should we celebrate Passover this year?

Dvarim (Deuteronomy) 25: 17-19 (to be read specially on the Shabbat before Purim, called Shabbat Zachor [Shabbat “Remember”]

In “From the Desk of Rabbi Arthur Waskow”, R’ Arthur shares some responses, and his own answers, to his earlier essay, There Is No “Jewish” State.

We are all — all of us whose hearts are open and tender enough to grieve both Palestinians and Israelis — in a state of prolonged and bone-deep grief. This Thursday, on Ta’anit Esther, you are all invited to mourn with us. Wherever you are, on your own, and for those of you in the Bay Area, in person, at our Tent of Mourning.

We are happy to announce that our previously postponed event has been rescheduled! Join us on Sunday, May 5th at 7pm ET (4pm PT).