Blessed shall you be in your comings and blessed shall you be in your goings (Deuteronomy 28:6).In the Talmud (Ta’anit 5b-6a), we are taught: When Rabbi Nahman and Rabbi Isaac were about to part, Rabbi Nahman asked Rabbi Isaac to bless him. Rabbi Isaac replied: “Let me tell you a parable. To what may this be compared? To a man who was traveling in the desert. He was hungry, tired, and thirsty, when suddenly he came upon a tree whose fruits were sweet, its shade pleasant, and a stream of water was flowing beneath it. The man ate of the tree’s fruits, drank of the water, and sat in the tree’s shade. When he was about to continue his journey, he turned to the tree and said: ‘Tree, O tree, with what shall I bless you? Shall I say to you may your fruits be sweet? They already are sweet. That your shade be pleasant? It already is pleasant. That a stream of water flow by you? A stream of water already flows by you. Therefore, this is my blessing, ‘May it be God’s will that all the shoots planted from you be just like you.’” “So it is with you” [Rabbi Isaac said to Rabbi Nahman]. “With what shall I bless you? Shall I wish you Torah learning? You already have learning. Wealth? You already have wealth. Children? You already have children. Therefore, this is my blessing: May it be God’s will that your offspring will be will be like you.”
Similarly, Anshe Emet is blessed with so many things: a community that looks out for one another, a community with great adult education, an outstanding religious school and youth program, various types of tefillot (services) for people of all types, and more. So what blessing can we possibly add? That our children will receive those blessings and pass them on to others.
We are lucky to have two people who recently joined our team to help transmit our passion for Jewish education for children. Rabbi D’ror Chankin-Gould just began this past week as our synagogue’s youth director. He is a brilliant and caring person, and we are so excited to have him on the team. We also have Shaqued Gavriel, who just arrived from Israel as our shinshinit, which stands for shnat sherut, meaning year of service. Shaqued will be bringing her passion for Israel and Jewish life to all of our youth programming over the coming year.
I hope that you will join us this week at Shabbat is Awesome, September 13th, so that you can meet Rabbi Chankin-Gould, and spend time with Shaqued, as we bless our community with the gift of transmitting Jewish values to our youth.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi David Russo
