Rabbi Rachel Barenblat was ordained by ALEPH in 2011. She is the author of 70 Faces (Phoenicia, 2011), a collection of Torah poems, and serves Congregation Beth Israel in North Adams, MA.
When we visit the sick, it is our job to be present, kind, and ready to listen, all of which can be more challenging if the person we are visiting is part of our family.
Human beings have been paying attention to the ebb and flow of daylight for a very, very long time. Stonehenge, that iconic circle of stone slabs in Great Britain, was built sometime between 3000 BCE and 2000 BCE.
I walked to Jerusalem's Ben Yehuda Street toward the end of Shabbat, thinking that I was going to wait on a park bench until Shabbat ended and the stores opened, in order to try to buy a Spiderman kippah for our son.
"Take a moment to settle in to being here," I say aloud. My eyes are closed, but I know there are three other people in the room this morning. I heard them walk in, each to their own place in the sanctuary, and I waited until the sounds of their arrival had...