“Wake up!” blasts the shofar, our ancient, animalistic alarm clock. It’s time. Time to take all your interpersonal drama, your inner turmoil, your spiritual angst and put it under a microscope. “Not now,” you grumble, hitting the snooze button. But the shofar is smarter than your smartphone. It blasts again, refusing to be silent, pushing you into wakefulness. Each year, we’re startled by the sound of the shofar. It’s the High Holidays again? Already? This year, with so many of our...

Maple-Glazed Vegan Challah by Miri Rotkovitz on Spruce Eats    Ingredients  For the Challah: 1 1/4 cups lukewarm water 2 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast 6 tablespoons sugar 1/4 cup oil (neutral-flavored such as grapeseed or canola, plus additional for oiling the bowl) 4 to 4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons salt (kosher salt or pink Himalayan sea salt) For the Glaze: 1 1/2 teaspoons pure maple syrup 1 1/2 teaspoons soy milk (or other non-dairy milk substitute) Instructions Hand or...

Erev Sukkot by Julia Knobloch The moon stood high over Yaffa Road. Why take a photo, my companion asked, behold the moment and enjoy the night. Shabbat was over. An old chazzan greeted us from the doorway of a small shul near the shuk. For a while, he joined our walk into the quiet new week, singing of gold, copper, myrrh and roses. Dates and jasmine filled the air after bare and sour pilgrimage. My olive harvest was destroyed. I didn’t...

Erev Yom Kippur by Julia Knobloch  To those who sat around my table: What you vow is vowed. To those who promised, I won’t forget: What you bind is bound. To those who said, I love you: What you swear is sworn. A crow lands on the lawn in Blumfield Garden. As a girl, I hear my mother say, you jumped like them, it made you laugh. A silent windmill overlooks the valley. My head hurts among the masses at the...

"When a person doesn't have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity. A person can almost be defined by his or her attitude toward gratitude."   Elie Wiesel In Judaism, gratitude is an essential part of the act of worship and a part of every aspect of a worshiper’s life. People believe all things come from God and our prayers are filled with the idea of gratitude. "O Lord my God, I will give thanks to you forever," and "I...

We’ve done lots of looking backward, but now is the time to think forward. What are we hoping to accomplish in the coming year? What are we afraid of, and what are we excited about? What is one thing we hope to have accomplished by next Rosh Hashanah? Go around the table and lay out some goals for the year to come.

There are stars whose radiance is visible on earth though they have long been extinct. There are people whose brilliance continues to light the world though they are no longer among the living. These lights are particularly bright when the night is dark. They light the way for humankind.

The following blessing is a feminist blessing that parallels traditional masculine language used by the majority of Jews. In using feminine language for God, we acknowledge the role of women in our ancestral tradition and the centrality of their place in our future. בְּרוּכָה אַתְּ יָהּ אֱלֹהֵינוּ רוּחַ הָעוֹלָם אֲשֶׁר קִדְּשָׁתְנוּ בְּמִצְוֹתֶיהָ וְצִוָּתְנוּ לְהַדְלִיק נֵר שֶׁל שַׁבָּת Barucha at yah, eloheinu ruach ha-olam, asher kidishanu bmitzvotav v'tzivanu l'hadlik ner shel shabbat v'yom tov. Blessed are you, sovereign, our God, breath of...

Be patient. Expand your sense of the possible. Expect no more of anyone than you can deliver yourself. Concern yourself with what is right rather than who is right. Never forget that, no matter how certain, you might be wrong. Learn the needs of those around you and respect them. Avoid the pursuit of happiness. Seek to define your mission and pursue that. Understand humility. Foster dignity. Endure. 10 of the 25 "Principles of Adult Behavior" by John Perry Barlow

May healing waters pour forth over us all.  Every one of us. Everywhere, speedily and in our days. May healers the world over be blessed with a well-spring of strength. Part the seas before our nurses and doctors and health care workers. As you turned the sea into walls of water for our ancestors, raise up mountains of protection around our healers, send them all they need, so they may walk through the torrents in safety and in health.  And as...

Poem for the Disappointed by Deanna Neil For those who worked for years for a moment a culmination that passed and deflated before their eyes an alveolus wheezing a balloon sputtering wailing grossly from its untied belly button until an even more frightening silence For when the whole word reached out for a hug and the only thing to grasp was thin air For when the calendar postponed but time marched on, sweating in our living rooms For when we tried...