IN THIS  ISSUE: 

• MUSLIM RELIGIOUS LEADER VISITS HAIFA CONGREGATION

• ODESSA CONGREGATION TAKES DELIVERY OF "SANTIAGO" REPLACEMENT SCROLL

• US REFORM RABBI TO SERVE WARSAW CONGREGATION

• HISTORIC B’NOT MITZVAH CELEBRATED BY HAMELN CONGREGATION

MUSLIM RELIGIOUS LEADER VISITS HAIFA CONGREGATION

Emir Muhammad Sharif, leader of Haifa’s Ahmadiyya Muslim community, spoke of the need for peace and coexistence last month during Kabbalat Shabbat services at Or Hadash, one of the city’s two Progressive congregations.  Or Hadash’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Edgar Nof, is active in local interfaith efforts, and the congregation is planning to hold joint events with Haifa’s Ahmadiyya community in the near future.  The emir’s talk on March 17 marked International Anti-racism Day and was facilitated by the Israel Religious Action Center.  In it he said the Ahmadiyya Movement, founded in 1889, emphasizes the use of original religious texts.  Later interpretations, or “misinterpretations,” as he called them, have led many Muslims to turn toward hatred rather than love and mutual respect.  According to Dr. Jesse Lachter, immediate past president of Or Hadash and translator for a visiting delegation of Boston-Haifa partnership programs, Emir Sharif also dwelt on more serious issues.  “Not shying away from the hard stuff, the emir explained the concept of Jihad.  The very word, he said, makes many people who misunderstand it anxious.”  Lachter said Emir Sharif explained that “Jihad” consistently appears in the Koran as meaning a great, devoted and sincere effort, and never in the context of war or enmity, and that the Koran says a Muslim should feel more love toward his fellow man than a mother feels for her child - even if the other person considers the Muslim his enemy.   Lachter adds that the aforementioned Boston-Haifa partnership has supported various projects aimed at promoting pluralism and brotherhood among the city’s varied communities.

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ODESSA CONGREGATION TAKES DELIVERY OF "SANTIAGO" REPLACEMENT SCROLL

Members of the Progressive congregation in Odessa, Ukraine, recently welcomed the arrival of a new Torah to replace a scroll stolen just before Rosh Hashana.  “It was a remarkable celebration, attended by the representatives of Jewish organizations, as well as by the JDC’s director and the director of the Israeli cultural centre in Odessa,” says Rabbi Alex Dukhovny, chief Progressive rabbi of Ukraine.  “The youth leaders brought out the Torah scroll under the chuppah and into the sanctuary, and the ‘marriage’ between the Aron Kodesh and the scroll began.  Songs and speeches and dances and chocolates were part of the joyful evening.”  Also present at the celebration were members from Temple Shaaray Tefila of Bedford Corners, New York.  The group was led by Rabbi David Greenberg and Dr. Joel M. Hoffman, and had come to Odessa to visit a local orphanage.  “Rabbi Greenberg spoke on our behalf, telling the group that his grandfather had left Ukraine with nothing in his hands, but Torah in his heart,” says Hoffman.  “How proud and perhaps astonished would his grandfather be to know that his grandson was physically welcoming Torah back into the lives of Jewish Ukraine.”  The scroll was donated by Templo Or Shalom and Congregation Yakar, both of Santiago, Chile (see WUPJnews #200); its transfer was facilitated by Jerry Tanenbaum, chairman of the World Union’s Yad B’yad Task Force, which supports the development of Progressive Judaism in Latin America.

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US REFORM RABBI TO SERVE WARSAW CONGREGATION

Rabbi Burt Schuman of Altoona, Pennsylvania, has been appointed senior rabbi at Beit Warszawa of Warsaw, Poland, an affiliate of the World Union.  When he assumes the pulpit this summer, he will become Poland’s second full-time congregational rabbi, and the first to serve a Progressive congregation in that country since World War II.  According to World Union vice president for development Rabbi Joel Oseran, “this is a critical development in the life of the congregation and will help ensure its continued growth and success within the worldwide community of Progressive Judaism.  The World Union will work closely with Rabbi Schuman and Beit Warszawa to ensure maximum cooperation and assistance."  Schuman has been serving as spiritual leader of Temple Beth Israel in Altoona since being ordained at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York in 1995.  Before beginning his rabbinic studies, he was executive director of the Jackson Heights-Elmhurst Kehillah in the New York City borough of Queens.  He called it “an honor and a privilege” to serve Beit Warszawa.  “For me, this position completes a circuit begun when my Yiddish-speaking grandparents emigrated to America from the regions of Krakow and Lwow, and instilled in me a profound love of Judaism, Yiddish culture and Yiddish literature.  What an extraordinary experience it is to return to these roots.”

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HISTORIC B’NOT MITZVAH CELEBRATED BY HAMELN CONGREGATION

The Progressive congregation in Hameln recently celebrated its first double bat mitzvah by calling to the Torah Evelina Boraschanska and Greta Golbereg, both recent immigrants to Germany from the former Soviet Union.  Held on Shabbat Trumah, the service was led by Rabbi Irit Shillor (with the girls in the photo below); Shillor visits the Hameln congregation four times a year thanks to a grant from the World Union’s European Region.  The girls prepared for the historic b’not mitzvah under the supervision of Orly Kenig, the emissary to Germany for the Netzer Olami youth movement.  The service was attended by some 100 congregants and guests, and was conducted in Hebrew, German and Russian.  According to congregation leader Rachel Dohme, the girls spoke in their Drashot about the importance of building a new synagogue in Hameln, emphasizing that it is people who make a synagogue valuable.  “With a younger generation like this,” says Dohme, “we are sure Jewish life in Germany will grow and prosper.” 
 

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