Bath Jewish History

March/April 2023
Adar / Nisan / Iyyar 5783

Rabbi’s Message

Like many of you, I’ve been enjoying this snowy winter on my skis, skates, and spikes. And at the same time I’m preparing with excitement and anticipation for our joyous spring festival of Passover. At Beth Israel, our community seder will provide us with an opportunity to share a meal, tell stories, connect with friends, meet new people, and engage ourselves and our children in asking questions.

Indeed, asking questions serves as the centerpiece of our seder ritual. In fact, our Passover mandate to teach the next generation about the Exodus from Egypt happens much less through clear answers and much more through fostering a culture of asking questions. This kind of curiosity is built right into the ritual: the youngest amongst us recites the “Four Questions” and we all tell the story of the Four Children who themselves ask additional questions. At the seder we wonder and ask our own four questions such as: What’s your favorite charoset recipe? Why do we eat matzah again? Who is enslaved today? What can I do to help?

On the topic of the importance of questions in the seder, scholar Erica Brown teaches:
“Questions breed humility. Answers tend to foment arrogance. The seder advances our master narrative through questions that lead to (knowledge) transmission. We sing four questions but, in actuality, so much of the (haggadah) text prompts curiosity.”

Alongside our children and youth, who naturally approach the world with wonder, the Passover seder provides each of us an opportunity to be curious and to bring our questions to light. Our ability to ask questions and truly listen to those of others, is a sign of our freedom.

Although it may be hard to imagine, the longer days of April will be here soon. The ground will be covered in mud, the trees full of buds waiting to blossom and we’ll be cooking dishes to share at our seder meal. As we prepare to gather this year, in addition to matzah ball soup, and our favorite charoset recipes, let’s also bring our questions, our curiosity and wonder in the service of building a stronger future for ourselves and our children for years to come.

L’Shalom,
Rabbi Vinikoor

Chloe Zelkha

by Marilyn Weinberg

Friday March 3, 5:30 pm
Souper Shabbat followed by a Kabbalat Shabbat service

Saturday March 4, 9:00 am
Torah Study followed by Sabbat Morning service

Come together as Rabbinical Student Fellow, Chloe Zelkha, returns to Bath for the weekend of March 3-5.

On Friday she will be joining us for a Souper Shabbat meal followed by a Friday night service that she will co-lead with Rabbi Vinikoor. On Saturday morning she will also co-lead both Torah Study and a Shabbat morning service followed by a nosh of bagels and cream cheese.

She is thrilled to be working this year with Beth Israel in Bath!

Purim Celebration

by Marilyn Weinberg

Monday, March 6
5:30 pm - Megillah Reading at Minnie Brown
6:15 pm - Pizza & Hamantaschen
Minnie Brown Center

Prepare to laugh and clap your hands for our Beth Israel “players” who will be presenting our own Purim Spiel; a family-friendly retelling of the Purim story, Megillah reading and Purim singing.

Come in costume, bring a gragger (or box of pasta), to make lots of noise evey time we hear the name of that dratted villain Haman. Meet your favorite Purim characters! Pasta will then be donated to the local food bank, and prizes will be given out for the best costumes.

Sounding Trauma, Mediating Memory:
Holocaust Economy and the Politics of Sound

by Janet Marstine

Wednesday March 29
7:00-8:30 pm
Bowdoin College

As we continue to struggle with the horrors that comprise the Holocaust, a new generation of research is providing insight into how the Holocaust is represented through museums, memorials and film. Musicologist and Holocaust studies scholar Dr. Kathryn Huether, Visiting Assistant Professor at Bowdoin College, is on the leading edge of this research. Her innovative cross-disciplinary approach is to examine the ways that sound impacts our understanding of the Holocaust. Her study of sound includes but is not limited to music, such as that that composed for or chosen for Holocaust films, survivor testimony and Holocaust museum audio guides. It also comprises ambient noise, such as the wind, the wildlife and the traffic around Holocaust memorials; the effect of diverse video soundtracks in a Holocaust museum gallery space; and the sound of the narrator on an audio guide.

Dr. Huether comes to Bowdoin directly from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum where she was a post-doctoral fellow. We are fortunate to share Dr. Huether with our friends at the Jewish Community Alliance and Bowdoin College for a talk to be held atBowdoin on Wednesday March 29, 7:00-8:30 pm, Moulton Union Lounge. The presentation will be multi-sensory with a key audio component and there will be ample time for discussion afterwards. This event promises to inspire new insights on a very difficult topic.

Adult Learning Session
Unpacking the Passover Seder

by Rabbi Vinikoor

Looking to deepen your Passover seder experience? Join us for conversation and learning about the history and content of the Passover seder as well as innovative approaches to seders today.

Community Passover Seder

by Marilyn Weinberg

Thursday, April 6
5:00 pm
Minnie Brown Center

It’s finally time to be together again for Beth Israel’s Community Passover Seder.

We will provide all the items you need for the seder including matzoh, charoset, eggs, horseradish, and parsley. Our seder meal will be pot luck.

Reservations required by March 24.
Sign up here.
Once you sign up we will be in touch with you to finalize what you can bring to the pot luck.

To cover expenses:
$10 per person/$20 per family for members
$15 per person/$35 per family for non-members
You can pay online
or in person.

Kulanu - Facing Antisemitism Series

by Joanne Rosenthal

Beth Israel Congregation, in partnership with St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, sponsored a three-part series in January and February entitled “Facing Antisemitism.” Held via Zoom, series participants included five Jewish individuals and five non-Jewish individuals. Materials for the series included videos, news articles and a segment from the Ken Burns and Lynn Novick documentary series about the Holocaust.

Participants reflected deeply on the information presented and shared their new understandings of how antisemitism is expressed, experienced, and looking forward, how to work to end antisemitism in our communities and institutions. We look forward to offering this series again as a member congregation of the ADL’s Kulanu initiative.

Please contact Joanne Rosenthal at kulanu@bethisraelbath.org with questions or to be placed on a waiting list for the next session.

Beth Israel Hebrew School

by Marilyn Weinberg

Our Hebrew School students have been busy this winter with multifaceted learning of Hebrew, holidays, prayer and a variety of projects with equal amount of joy and enthusiasm. They helped prepare and participate in a Tu’B’Shevat seder and have been enthusiastically preparing for Purim with games and making Mishloach manot (gifts of food or drink that are sent to family, friends and others on Purim.)

The words Tikkun Olam (repair of the world) they know well through words and deeds. They recently prepared four full course meals to deliver to congregation members who have been unwell. Thanks to Beth Israel’s wonderful teachers and parents who help make this happen.

A Social Action Committee Shout Out

by Phyllis Wolfe

The Social Action Committee is emerging from its Covid cocoon.

In 2021 the Synagogue’s Board of Directors developed a strategic plan that over the course of three years provides the congregation with a framework for progressive and inclusive worship, learning, and cultural engagement within our community and beyond.

A component of this strategic plan was the formation of an engaged Social Action Committee that focuses on racial justice, food insecurity and hunger prevention and healing the environment. The committee co-chairs, Thyle Shartar and Phyllis Wolfe, are eager to begin working on these issues with a group of like-minded individuals who feel that these three areas are critical to our physical, emotional and spiritual well-being not only as individuals and but also as a community.

Hosting guest speakers, films, discussion groups, and intergenerational activities are all possibilities for the committee to consider. Working with local, regional, state, national and maybe even international organizations will add meaningful impact in any one or all of these areas.

Sound exciting? Interested? Please join the committee and be part of the “design team” by emailing Thyle and Phyllis at socialaction@bethisraelbath.org

Shabbat Winter Hike

by Rabbi Vinikoor

Beth Israel members enjoyed a multi-generational Shabbat Winter hike at Woodward Point Preserve in Brunswick.

Refugee Shabbat

by Michelle Lisi-D'Alauro

Beth Israel celebrated HIAS's 5th Annual Refugee Shabbat on February 3rd and 4th. Though the temperatures were frigid, we gathered Friday night for a Souper Shabbat Potluck and evening service with Midcoast New Mainers Group Board Member Odette Zouri speaking about the power of community in action. We reconvened Saturday for a morning service and panel discussion featuring attorneys and organizers from Hope Acts and the JCA, followed by a delicious African luncheon catered by Bath area sisters, Jeanne Karambiri Kontogomde and Rachel Kazumba Kontogomde.

Havdalah

by Marilyn Weinberg

For the past two months we have gathered together with a special braided candle, spices, wine/grape juice and song, to help us savor the end of Shabbat and look with hope towards the coming week.

Each week Rabbi Vinikoor has shared thoughtful notes about this meaningful ritual, and we have ended our gathering with delicious food and good conversation. It has been a wonderful way to get through our cold and dark winter evenings.

We hope this will become a regular winter activity.

REMEMBRANCES FOR MONTH–MONTH YEAR

May their memories be for a blessing.

BIRTHDAYS AND ANNIVERSARIES

Listing the birthdays and anniversaries of those in our immediate family creates a wonderful opportunity for our community/shul family to have an excuse to celebrate with each other.