Tuesday Morning Torah – December 19, 2017
Happy Hanukkah everyone! I wanted to take a moment to extend a big thank you to all of our volunteers who helped to make our Hanukkah party on Sunday such a great success. Thank you to our greeters, and volunteers from Membership, Men’s Club and Sisterhood who helped out in so many ways! For pictures, check out our Torat El Facebook Page.
One of the central messages of Hanukkah is that it is a holiday in which we publically demonstrate our pride in being Jewish. Carefully placing our Hanukkiyot in the window sill, or using our giant electric Hanukkiyah in the front of our synagogue- we spend eight days proclaiming that we are proud of our history, our values, practices, beliefs, and traditions. This practice of pirsumei nisa, publicizing the miracle of Hanukkah, is somewhat different than many of our holidays that are often centered around the home and synagogue. It is with this in mind that I invite you to consider the following on these last days of Hanukkah.
What is it about being Jewish that gives you a feeling of Jewish pride? What part of being Jewish inhibits you from expressing Jewish pride and why? In what ways do you regularly express your pride in being Jewish? As always, I would love to hear your answers to these questions.
Videos:
For some Hanukkah fun and celebration, check out these two new Hanukkah videos that were put out this year.
Six13- “A Nice Jewish Boy Band Chanukah,” a parody of ’90s tunes “I Want it That Way”” by The Backstreet Boys, “It’s Gonna Be Me” by *NSync, and “Wannabe” by The Spice Girls.
Maccabeats 2017 video, “Candles on the Sill,” a Hanukkah melody based on Ed Sheeran’s “Castle on the Hill,” to celebrate their tenth year of bringing us Jewish acapella hits
Hag Urim Sameach! Happy Festival of Lights!
