Weekly Newsletter

Shabbat Mevarchim
Parshat Matot-Masei
Week of August 2, 2024
Tammuz 5784

Erev Shabbat, Friday August 2, 2024 (27 Tammuz)
Candle Lighting at 7:51pm

Shabbat, August 3, 2024 (28 Tammuz)
Services will begin promptly at 9:30 and will be followed by a Kiddush open to all at 12pm.

Havdalah at 8:54pm  

Kiddush this week is generously sponsored by Kressel Housman. If you'd like to sponsor Kiddush in the future, please reach out to info@stantonstshul.com.

Holiday Alert: Rosh Chodesh Av (August 5)

Important Info About Observing Tisha Ba'av:

Next Monday is Rosh Chodesh Av. The Mishnah Taanit (4:6) concludes by saying “mishenichnas Av, mema’atin b’simcha- when the month of Av begins, we decrease joy/rejoicing”. It is in the month of Av that we take the time to more acutely reflect on the many tragedies we have faced as a nation as well as the broken and unredeemed state of the world as a whole. The verb the mishnah uses, mema’atin, is an active verb calling on us to take steps that will help bring us into the solemnity and even sadness of the season. As a result, during the Nine Days, we traditionally observe additional customs of mourning on top of those we already began during the Three Weeks. 

These additional practices include the following:

• We refrain from eating meat and drinking wine. With that said, it’s permitted to eat meat and drink wine on Shabbos, at a bris, at a siyum, and at a pidyon haben. It is also permitted to drink wine for havdalah, though it is preferable to give it to a minor instead if possible.
• We refrain from wearing freshly laundered clothing. This does not apply to socks and underwear, however.
• We refrain from buying new clothes.
• We refrain from swimming and bathing for pleasure, though it is permitted to bathe or shower if you’re dirty, sweaty, etc. Swimming can also be permitted if it’s for exercise (feel free to reach out for more info).
• We avoid doing activities that involve luxury.

Traditionally, this time period is seen as inauspicious for Jews and for those reasons it’s best to avoid getting involved in court cases or starting new projects or investments if you won’t incur a loss for delaying them.

As always, feel free to reach out with further questions. 

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Birkeland

Our Annual Membership Drive Is Ongoing!

** Membership Invoices have been sent out to all who held Memberships last year (2023-2024) and have not yet paid for the 2024-2025 year. Please reach out with any questions about renewing your membership or beginning a new membership.**

Dear Friends,

As we move deeper into the Three Weeks and as Tisha B’Av approaches, I want to share some thoughts about the traditional practices of mourning during this period. Tisha B’Av can often be difficult to relate to for we are called upon to mourn a tragedy that happened just under two thousand years ago. None of us merited to see the Temple in Jerusalem, nor did our parents, nor their parents. Its destruction is a tragedy that we relate to primarily on an intellectual level rather than on an emotional level.

In an essay entitled Avelut Yeshanah and Avelut Hadashah: Historical and Individual Mourning, Rav Soloveitchik compares and contrasts the halachot and experiences of immediate personal loss (avelut hadashah- new mourning) and historical national loss (avelut yeshanah- old mourning). Regarding personal loss, he says “avelut hadashah is caused by a death or disaster which strikes a family or an individual. It is a primordial, instinctual, spontaneous response of man to evil, to the traumatic confrontation with death, to the impact of catastrophe and disaster” (Out of the Whirlwind: Essays on Mourning, Suffering and the Human Condition pg. 14). This is in contradiction to historical loss, where “there is no spontaneous reaction to some new event which has just transpired… The avelut is a result of recollection of events” (ibid.).

Rav Soloveitchik explains that this qualitative difference in experience is expressed in the halachah through a reverse image presented by the practices surrounding personal loss, and those surrounding Tisha B’Av. Personal loss precipitates the most intense practices of mourning which gradually ease up through the period of shivah, shloshim, and the eventual yahrtzeit, reflecting and facilitating the gradual return to normalcy after a loss. This is reversed during the Three Weeks where we start with a more gradual mourning that builds. When the Nine Days start, the practices of mourning parallel the year following a personal loss. When we hit the week in which Tisha B’Av occurs, the intensity builds to parallel the shloshim. Finally, Tisha B’Av itself parallels the shivah. We start slowly and gradually leave normalcy to enter into a state of loss and mourning.
Rav Soloveitchik says: “However alive the experience of hurban (destruction) might be, it is nurtured by human reflection and meditation. It is the intellect which commands the emotions to respond to the historical memories of a community.

The emotions are not aroused spontaneously but rather by meditation and concentration… they are just lit by the fire which memory brought forth” (22-23). The practices that many of us are engaged in, during this lead up to Tisha B’Av, are meant to be a tangible and meditative exercise that help to bring to life a loss that was only acutely felt by our forebears so long ago. The Gemara Taanit 30b says that “those who mourn Jerusalem will merit to see her in her joy”. May we, in our attempts to connect to this existential loss, all merit to see a broken world fixed; an incomplete world wholly redeemed.
     
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Birkeland

** Want to get in touch with me? I can be reached at stantonrabbi@gmail.com. **

COMMUNITY ANNOUNCEMENTS

Yahrtzeits
We Remember: Blanche Eisenberg, Mother of Amy Eisenberg

Misheberach 
Rachel Devorah bat Elke
Cecile Cohen זיאסל מלכה בת אסתר 
Manny Kaplan מאיר ראובן בן לאה        
Chana Mera bat Fruma Henna
Gitche bat Honcha
Ella bat Leah
Chaya Malka bat Esther Leia
Nolan Rhodes נתן צבי בן פרידה
Ashlynn Elizabeth Helen Coffman
 Moshe Asher Ben Esther Sarah
Chaim Yechezkel Ben Leah
Reuven ben Rochel
Rivka bat Miriam Sara
Eliyahu Natan ben Shayndel
Shayna bat Chana Kayla 
Yitzhak Calev ben Leetza Tzvia
Ashira bat Yosef
Malka Devora bat Chaya
Chaim Yonah ben Dubrah
​​​​​​​Efraim Ben Sore
Shimon Sumer HaLevi Ben Malka
Jim Lee
Leah Zahava Bat Elka

We pray that all who are sick may have a full recovery. We are especially sending prayers to those who are wounded and in need of healing in Israel and Gaza, and daven for the safe return of those who are still unaccounted for.
To add a name to our communal misheberach prayer list, email us.

If you have a Yahrtzeit, birthday, anniversary or other milestone coming up, please reach out!
We'd like to update our Yahrtzeit database. Please send us your yahrzeit details. If you don't know the exact hebrew date, just let us know the date of passing and we will figure it out and add it to the shul cloud calendar.

Dear Stanton Community, 
 
We are shaking from the war breaking out in Israel. Hamas has fired thousands of rockets, over 136 citizens are hostages, and over 1,200 Israelis are dead with thousands more wounded. There are also thousands dead in Gaza -- innocent civilians caught in the line of fire. 
 
This is unprecedented and the most deadly attack on Israel in a generation. We must take action.
In addition to our prayers, we ask you to consider making a generous donation to one of the listed causes.
 
The One who makes peace on high, may He bring peace down below to us, 
Dvir and Shalhevet Cahana

StantonKIDS
Shabbat Programming for 5784

Our schedule for 5785 will be released in the coming weeks.

Women's Tefillah Group

Thank you to all who have joined us for services this year. Our schedule for 5785 will be released in the coming weeks.
If you would like to layn, lead services, or give a d'var Torah with us, or if you have questions, please be in touch!

ONLINE ARCHIVES

If you missed services this past shabbes, or arrived too late to hear the drasha, you can go to our archives and read a copy! This week, find Lina Morales' drasha on Lech Lecha. 

Click here for an archive of shiurim
Click here for an archive of drashot
Click here to go to our YouTube Channel for an archive of all of our ZOOM classes