“אם אשכחך ירושלים תשכח ימיני“ — טעם ימיני בעבור כנורותינו כי בימין נגון היתרים 

– אברהם אבן עזרא על תהילים קלז:ה

“If I forget thee O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither” — The meaning of “right hand” has to do with [playing] our violins (or musical instruments) because you use your right hand to play the strings

– Rabbi Abraham Ibn Ezra (12th Century, Spain) on Psalms 137:5

 

Dear Hevreh,

If you’ve ever been to Jerusalem, you’ll notice that there’s music always in the air. It’s not the kind you hear on the radio or in a beautiful sanctuary, but the kind you hear within your soul. It’s music that’s been playing since the moment God saved Isaac on the top of Mt. Moriah, the eventual home of our holy Temple. It’s music that calls to us no matter how close or how far away we are. It’s music that plays to us as softly as a still small voice or as loud as the sound of the shofar to “come home, come home.”

Read a letter from our Jewish Federation on what’s happening in Israel, including a statement from our local Rabbinic Association

We’ve been through a lot as a people and there are times, like after the destruction of our temples (586 BCE and 70 CE), as if the music imploring us to “come home” rings silent. But the spirit of Israel has never broken and every year at the end of the Passover Seder we exclaim, despite all evidence to the contrary, that we will return once again to Jerusalem. But only if we never forget Jerusalem. Only if our home of homes remain constant in our hearts.

On this Shabbat of Unity with the People of Israel in the face of Palestinian terrorism, let us affirm with a clear voice that we will never forget Jerusalem so that its music will continue to play in our hearts and those of our children and our children’s children, imploring us to “come home.”

Join us this Shabbat for special prayers, anthems (Hatikvah) and teachings as we stand in solidarity with the People of Israel. 

Please bring short prayers on post-it notes or little pieces of paper to hang on our Israeli flag in the chapel, and then we will send them to Israel to be placed in the Western Wall.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Ari Saks

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