September 16, 2022

Ki Tavo

Hello!

I'll be sending newsletters out weekly through the end of September (right before Shabbat Shuva) to make sure everyone's got the high holy days resources they need, then I'll be switching to monthly so i have the energy to work on this and also other projects as they come up.

Also, content notes this week include homophobia and child abuse. No prizes for guessing the topics they're attached to.

Jewish Calendar

Parshat Ki Tavo

Look, I'll be honest. I didn't study the parsha this week. The hebcal page for it has a lot of links to commentaries and drashes and more from a variety of perspectives at that link, though!

High holy days and associated preparations

Since I'm adding to the holiday resources and events week after week rather than wiping them clean each time, new additions are bolded much like new events are bolded in the event list.

Selichot

It's Sephardic tradition to recite Selichot daily during Elul, and Windy Meadow Homestead is hosting online creative selichot services daily this year. See also: Hadar Cohen's Selichot Project, a website with hebrew and english text alongside audio recordings.

We're now at the point where ashkenazim recite selichot as well, so you might see opportunities like Hinenu's musical selichot tomorrow popping up.

High Holy Days

Don't forget to get your bivalent covid booster if you're eligible (and you probably are, if your last booster was 2 or more months ago) so you have some immunity built up before the high holy days!

Here are some resources, such as ritual guides or other supplements:

• Nishmat Shoom's days of awe ritual guides

• Reboot's High Holiday Resources

• Rosh Ashana Simanim Seder Booklet (Also, learn more about the simanim seder from this Atlanta Jewish Times article!)

• Zemirot HaMizraḥ sephardi/mizrachi egalitarian machzor

Many shuls are doing online services! If there's a particular type of service you're looking for, or if you want your shul linked here, let me know by replying to this email.

Jews Behaving Badly

Yeshiva University Pride Alliance lawsuit

Yeshiva University's LGBTQ club's supreme court case attempt got "un-stayed", aka punted back down to the state level. My (extremely layperson) understanding is YU tried to skip a few steps, which is sometimes ok and sometimes not, and the court decided it was not ok. Molly Meisels, one of the pride club's members, tweeted an official response. More from Ian Millheiser at Vox here, or from Amy Howe at SCOTUSblog here. If you are an alum or otherwise affiliated (past or present) with Yeshiva Univeristy and want to chime in asking the school to stop this BS, there's an open letter you can sign. See also: this letter of support for YU Pride Alliance from Modern Orthodox clergy.

NYT Yeshivas Article

The New York Times article about ultra-orthodox yeshivas (kids' schools, not the university) sure did come out on Sunday in both english and hasidic yiddish. Per the Forverts, the yiddish article got a lot of clicks. The Forward has a couple articles about it: one focused on why they had it translated, and one on why the translator remains anonymous that is actually an english translation of a yiddish forverts article.

Anyway, the NYT article discussed the absurd corporal punishment and under-education, including revealing that 99% of boys at these yeshivas failed to test at grade level. The girls schools for the same communities did much better, as they (and apparently the boys in special education) get more secular education in addition to studying Jewish topics and texts.

I want to be very clear that this is decidedly not about all orthodox jewish schools or even all "ulra orthodox" jewish schools; this is about one subsection of ultra-orthodox private schools. Which, for the record, does not include chabad.

Regarding responses, of which there have been MANY of varying quality and content, I prioritize people who are familiar with the culture and have experienced these schools personally, including twitter users @trayne_wreck, Elad (and Rivka!) Nehorai, Rabbi Abby Stein, Shulim Liefer, and more. There's also people like Beatrice Weber, who filed a complaint so her son would get a better education, and others supported or promoted by hasidic educational reform organization YAFFED. For a more academic deep dive, check out Matty Lichtenstein's work, or this blogpost roundup about it from scholars of the Haredi Research Group.

Miscellaneous

A historical jews behaving badly for ya: click through to the thread to learn more about Sa'id Sarmad Kashani, who was difficult to categorize religiously but he at least started out jewish! Ends poorly for him though.

Shane Burley interviewed Anthony Lerman for Jewish Currents' newsletter about the source of IHRA and similar ideas: the "new antisemitism" of the 90s.

Even better, though--by which i mean, if you click only one Jewish Currents link make it this one--is hannah baer's Therapy was never secular: Reclaiming the religious roots of mental healthcare. It's got everything: a university i have a sneaking suspicion is mentioned elsewhere in this newsletter! freud and kabbalah! critique from within!

Events and classes

As always, bolded means it's newly added.

9/17 Change Like the Wind: A Musical Selichot Service

9/18 Queer Yiddishist Shmueskrayz

9/18 Iraqi High Holiday Hits from Loolwa Khazoom

9/18 Out of the Closet and Into the Libraries: Book Launch for Liberating Gender for Jews and Allies: The Wisdom of Transkeit

9/18 Sephardi-Mizrachi Rosh Hashana Seder (register here)

9/19 Rosh Hashana melodies from Morocco and Gibraltar with Isaac Montagu

9/21 Jews of Eastern Europe Series: Book Talk with Saul Noam Zaritt (Jewish American Writing and World Literature: Maybe to Millions, Maybe to Nobody) and Samuel Spinner (Jewish Primitivism)

9/25 evening-9/26 Rosh Hashana

9/25 Rosh Hashana/1st anniversary party with the Pink Peacock

9/28 Tzedakah as Mutual Aid and Jewish Values of Communal Care from JOC Torah Academy (Jews of color only)

9/29 Be Fruitful! The Etrog in Jewish Art, Culture, and History

9/29 "Sutzkever Essential Prose," with translator Zackary Sholem Berger

10/1 Shabbat Shuva shacharit on zoom with me!

10/2 Yom Kippur Morrocan Nusach lesson with Laura Elkeslassy

10/4 evening-10/5 Yom Kippur

• Kanisse's Multicultural Yom Kippur Services livestream

Jewish Pet of the Week

The Jewish Pet of the Week this week is Lulu the bulldog!

See you next week!

<3

Meli