“Only: [Your leader] is not to multiply horses for himself, and he is not to return the people to Mitzrayyim/ Tight and Narrow Place . . . “

Can Passover become a flagship festival for not only remembering a liberating transformation in the past, but actually creating a liberating transformation in the future?

Poetry by Juliet L. Spitzer

Each new moon we begin

with a sliver

of an idea . . .

Rabbi Nate writes, “As part of The Shalom Center’s ongoing solidarity with the forest protectors, I travelled to Atlanta two weeks ago to join the movement’s Week of Action. My experiences there were profound, ranging from deep fear of police state repression to overwhelming joy of Purim forest celebration.”

In the midst of the intense struggle of hundreds of thousands of Israelis to redefine, renew, and reawaken the democratic commitment of the State of Israel, The Shalom Center has begun sharing a wide range of varied views of how that could be done.

Read the report of Ted Glick, a committed veteran prophetic activist, on defending an Atlanta forest.

The NY Times confirmed early today an earlier report of a betrayal by President Biden of a promise to the American people, the people of the world, and all life-forms on Planet Earth to protect oil deposits in Alaska from further worsening of the climate crisis by approving leases for oil-company Corporate Carbon Pharaohs to drill for oil.

With Purim behind us and Passover on the horizon, now is the time to again take action to stop dirty banks’ funding of fossil fuels.

The Shalom Center’s Associate Director, Rabbi Nate DeGroot, has been in Atlanta the last few days. He is there to bring our opposition to destroying a forest just outside Atlanta, to turn the space into a huge training base for police.

The Shalom Center invites people of all backgrounds to join us at the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History for Freedom Seder Revisited 2023. The event, inspired by R’Arthur’s historic 1969 Freedom Seder, is held annually and returns in person in 2023 on Monday, March 20, at 6pm.

From the standpoint of Pharaoh himself, what are the implications of his own power in Egypt’s economy? Are the plagues that ruin Egypt’s economy the result of Pharaoh’s own stubbornness and cruelty in trying to protect his own wealth and power, or of God’s own triumphalist decision to show how powerless Pharaoh really is in the face of the Breath of Life?

By now you’ve heard about what’s happening in Atlanta, where the city is trying to raze a forest to build a militarized police training facility, and in the process have killed a forest defender. As The Shalom Center, we have been in touch with one of the Jewish forest defenders in Atlanta, a rabbi on the ground who has been engaged with organizers there, and a group of interfaith clergy in Atlanta who are actively figuring out what kind of support people of faith from around the country can offer and what kind of action we all can take.

The theme of economic pressure is reinforced by another less-explored aspect of the story — the transformation of God’s Name.

As we prepare for Passover and its close cousin Christian Holy Week, we face modern Pharaohs and pharaonic systems that are racist, sex-and-gender tyrannical, anti-democratic, Earth-destructive, plague-productive. We should be trying to understand the whole system of oppression and the whole body of liberation in the Exodus story. Gazing at the gaps is important, and translating them into our generation is urgent.

On the 15th day of the Jewish month of Shvat - Tu B’Shvat - Rabbi Nate DeGroot wrote about the birthday of the trees, the Atlanta Forest Defenders, our duty as Jews to protect life - human and arboreal alike, and some initial action steps to support what’s happening in the Weelaunee Forest. In this post, he shares more Torah and more opportunities to take action.

The National Council of Jewish Women has proclaimed this Shabbat the Shabbat of Reproductive Freedom.

Tu B’Shvat is famously the new year for the trees. A day, at least in our modern context, to honor trees and the natural world and the importance of Jewishly-inspired ecological care and stewardship. A day to marvel at trees - their ancientness, their roots, their branches. Alas, this year I could not inhabit Tu B’Shvat with that simple delight because I’ve been following along with what’s been happening in the Welaunee Forest in Atlanta, where trees and human life alike have been tragically and horrifically destroyed.

Next Sunday evening, on the Full Moon of midwinter, we are taught to gather for the Seder of Tu B’Shvat, the ReBirthDay of trees and of the One Great Tree of Life. Here are four brief teachings that you might introduce into the Four Worlds of the Seder, with time for conversation about each. And two brief teachings about the Four Cups of wine or grape juice that we drink in honor of the Four Worlds.

The Shalom Center for this Shabbat is offering a new Haftarah shaped from an essay by Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, written in 1964. Heschel uses the Torah text as a framework to face the everyday oppressions that racism poses to Black Americans.

His words are like the Prophetic flame of the Burning Bush — destroying nothing, not even the Bush in which it burned, but birthing commitment to make a new world of love and justice — and are just as Truth-filled today as in his own generation. We believe that reawakening them in the awe-filled melody of Haftarah is what the Prophetic readings should be.