Winter and the Winter Solstice Moon
Friday gratefuls: The brit of Mt. Sinai. Of Abraham. Of Noah. Torah. Midrash. Emunah. Clouds. Mussar. This Jewish journey. Wandering with the diaspora. Rabbi Jamie. Bar Mitzvah. June 12! Shavuot. The Winter Solstice. The Fire last night. Orion and the three quarter Winter Solstice Moon. Jupiter. Darkness. Immanence. Our journey as Earthlings. All my wild fellow Earthlings. And the Earth herself, the Shekinah to Great Sol’s power.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: Gabriella, my adopted axolotl
One brief shining: Put on my kippah and walked up the sidewalk to the synagogue where Rabbi Jamie let me in (everybody has to be let in thanks to anti-semitism), he looked at my kippah, pointed at his, “We have the same hat!”
Yes indeed. A bar mitzvah boy! On June 12th, the holiday of Shavuot, I will read from the Torah with Veronica, Kat, and maybe Lauren. Finally coming of age. Shavuot celebrates the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai, the making of the Sinai covenant with all Jews of all time. We stood at Mt. Sinai, we stand at Mt. Sinai, we will stand at Mt. Sinai. We will all honor that mystical moment and be honored in return as children/adults of the covenant.
Moving sorta fast into the whole megillah. This is an adult Brit Mitzvah.* Often for those who did not have a bar/bat mitzvah when they were young, it’s also a way for converts to have the full experience of a Jewish life cycle. I’m excited to deepen my Jewish learning and to expand my circle of friends at Beth Evergreen.
If you read this and want to come, I’ll post details here later about the day of. For insight into this rite of passage you might want to watch the Adam Sandler film, You’re So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah! on Netflix. It’s funny.
We now have exhausted all the big holidays but two: Christmas and New Years. Holimonth has worked its magic on all of us whether we wanted it to or not. We’ve seen the lights. Lit the candles. Heard the songs. Tasted a cookie or two. Smiled at children excited. We’ve had a quiet moment or two wondering again whether all this bother is worth it, does it really mean anything?
I come down on the side of yes, oh yes indeed. It’s worth it and it has deep meaning. Maybe not the ones visible on the surface of the Santa Claus gauze thrown over this family holiday called Christmas. Maybe not the story of the brave Maccabees recapturing the Second Temple. Maybe not the story of light returning triumphant on the darkest night of the year.
Here are meanings I find in Holimonth. We ache for sweetness and love in our lives, for the light of others. We want to share ourselves with family and friends, have them share with us. Sometimes that’s hard to do without prompts. Like Jingle Bells. Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel. A Christmas tree. Services at the synagogue or church or living room or bar. Reasons to get together, clasp hands, hug. Be merry. Kwanza. New Year’s eve parties. We come together to see the sacred beings in our lives and to be seen as the sacred, unique being we are. These are learnings we can use later in the year during what the Catholics charmingly call Ordinary Time.
No such thing to me. It’s all sacred time, but I get what they mean. We can’t be on this high all year. Too exhausting.
So party like the climate is changing, like we’ll see each other next year in Jerusalem, like we’re all the only ones of our kind ever.
*KAVANNAH [intention]
The adult bar/bat mitzvah phenomenon is a recent and inspiring trend in American Jewish life. Since every Jewish adult is regarded by halacha (traditional Jewish law) as a bar/bat mitzvah when they come of age (12 for girls, 13 for boys), the adult bar/bat mitzvah rite of passage is completely volitional. Those who feel compelled to prepare for a Bat/Bat or Brit Mitzvah as an adult do it by choice, and for a great variety of reasons. Given the diversity of kavannot (intentions), the program at CBE strives for enough structure to be both formal and flexible — formal enough to facilitate the invaluable dynamics of a group working together, towards shared goals while rooted in tradition, and flexible to accommodate different dispositions, intentions and expectations. Congregation Beth Evergreen
