Diary Entry

Monday 11th May - Lag B'Omer night
There might have been massive festivities on Mount Meron in the north of Israel, as every year - but we also celebrated this day in Muswell Hill. Over forty people attended a barbeque at the Simons house next door to Synagogue. There was plenty of meat, pitta and other delicacies, and a real communal spirit was felt by all. There are at least two other members' gardens that have put themselves forward for next years barbeque, so this will become an annual communal meet...with meat! Thanks to the Simons for hosting, and many thanks to our ever wonderful Adrian for getting the barbeques going and managing them.

Tuesday 12th May
We had a guest at our home this week, a young lady from Krakow in Poland called Maya. She will be getting married under a Chuppa in June - and recently with her husband to be met a group of chidlren and madrichim from Immanuel College in Bushey. The school group began a project to help the married couple to be and brought Maya over so that she could come back with a wedding dress and other goodies - and the Immanuel College families through a Kalla party for her. All great stuff - Elisheva volunteered to house Maya for the time she was in London and helped her get around. She really was a pleasure, and we wish her and her Chattan Jakub a warm mazaltov. When you see what it is like living a religious life in Krakow, you cannot take for granted the facilities that we have day to day. Maya was most excited about taking back a loaf of kosher bread to Krakow!

Wednesday 13th May
This morning began a new chavrouta - or learning partner, with a Rabbi colleague of mine. Chavrouta is the staple structure of learning in the yeshiva schools of learning Torah. One learns with a partner and prepares the sources that the Rav has given out. Then there is a shiur or class by the Rav on these sources. My Wednesday morning chavrouta will be without shiur, but we had some interesting learning, looking into the ideas and laws behind the mitzva to have children - all very fascinating. How many children should one have? Who is obligated to have children? What if one cannot? Does one really need large families? What is the reasoning behind this commandment? Are non-Jews commanded in it? And more.
Tribe club was much fun as usual, and is continuing to be a great success. The children are being taught how to carry out circus talents such as spining plates and the diabalo.
In the evening I unfortunately had to miss the whisky club hosted by Michael Rose and sponsored by family member Simon Lurie. The word got out quick that there were some rare single malts - even an Indian malt! If you didn't make it and would like to come to this great communal event, check e-thos for the next one.

Thursday 13th May
At the Talmud shiur we had a spirited discussion on the topic of having faith in the Sages that wrote the Talmud - those Rabbis we call Chazal (Chachamim zichronam l'vracha). Is everything they wrote in the Talmud to be open to legal analyisis or not. I studied in a yeshiva where most if not all the Rabbis had been pupils of the late Rabbi Yosef Soloveitchik of Boston, USA. Rabbi Soloveitchik comes from a dynasty of Rabbis known as the Brisk dynasty (from Brest-Litovsk of today) and known for their analytical approach to Jewish law. So if in the Talmud, a position is put forward but then rejected, a Brisker approach would still maintain this rejected position in case it impacts on law in another related situation. In other words, everything recorded in the Talmud may have legal impact potentially somewhere else. Rejection does not mean complete rejection. Joost kindly sent me a link to an article on the topic of having faith in the Sages (Emunat Chachamim) which I have been looking at - here is the link if you are interested: http://www.hakirah.org/Vol%205%20Rabinovitch.pdf

Saturday 16th May
We had the chance to wish a warm mazaltov to Rita and Norma who have both turned eighty years, but who both did not look a bit of this age with their wonderful attitude to life. Norma has done such tremendous work building up the Rosh Chodesh group and Rita has so many wondeful stories to tell for anyone who is in conversation with her...which of course could be in fluent French or Italian!
The sermon this week stressed the importance of treating the poor with dignity and the idea that it is better to prevent the movement towards poverty than to move someone back out of poverty - the latter requires so much more effort and resources.

Sunday 17th May
The Cheder had its annual Lag B'Omer barbeque with some much appreciated help from some of the Dads - thanks also to Sara for her help in arranging.
In the afternoon there was a Mother and Daughter Pre-Batmitzvah programme arranged by Niki and myself. We had six girls and their mums and we had some really interesting discussions on the woman's role in the religion, in shul, and in comparison to the male figure. Lots of difficult but important questions were asked. Texts were prepared for reading and learning by the mum and daughter couples - and there were some welcome refreshements from Daniels. Altogether an enriching afternoon.