Rosh HaShanah: Family Activities
What's Happening in the Torah? Rosh HaShanah Activities for Families
A Rosh HaShanah Family Activity: Make Your Own Bee Hotels
Torah Readings for Rosh Hashanah
The Torah and Haftarah readings for Rosh Hashanah all connect with, and illustrate, one or another of the themes of the holiday. I use the plural advisedly here, because there have been a variety of readings from early on-long before the onset of modernity and the Reform movement.
The Shanahtini: A Rosh HaShanah Cocktail
Entertain your Rosh HaShanah guests while enjoying the traditional holiday nosh of apples, honey, and pomegranate seeds in a new way.
What Goes on the Rosh HaShanah Seder Plate?
A Ruckus on the Bimah on Rosh HaShanah
The early American synagogue occasionally reflected its frontier environment. Fist fights, defending the honor of women congregants, and even duels were not unheard of. Perhaps the best known of these riotous events involved a rabbi and the president of the synagogue in Albany, New York, in 1850. And not just any rabbi, but the future founder of the American Reform Movement, Isaac Mayer Wise! The president was Louis Spanier, wealthy, charismatic, and the brother-in-law of Samuel Mayer, the chief rabbi of Hanover in northern Germany.
Nine Rosh HaShanah Foods to Prepare in Advance for a Stress-Free Holiday
Mishkan HaNefesh, Rosh HaShanah Morning and Torah Reading Options
The most traditional texts for the Torah reading on Rosh HaShanah morning are Genesis 21 and Genesis 22. In many congregations that observe two days of the holiday, it is most customary to read 21 on the first day and 22 on the second day. Genesis 21 begins with the notion that God remembered our matriarch Sarah and enabled her to have a child. The idea of remembering is tied to a name of Rosh HaShanah in the Bible: the Day of Remembrance. This is the lesson: God remembers us as God remembers Sarah. To paraphrase a very different cultural artifact: “God knows when we have been bad or good so be good for goodness sake.
6 Ways Your Congregation Can Be Even More Welcoming at Rosh HaShanah
Let’s treat every person who connects to our communities like both a family member coming home and an honored guest. Here are six ways to do just that.