Congregation Or Hadash

Rabbi Lauren Henderson helps us to lean in to each of our senses as we take in the glory of this festival of spring. 

Join us to explore the Tanakh's celebration of embodied love - joyful, free, and unabashed, a force that can overpower any other. Reading this ancient text that models mutuality, awareness, affirmation and consent alongside that raw passion, it's hard to see how our own culture can get so turned around about it. How do our theological options expand if we think of the animating force of Shir HaShirim as God? What if we try on the rabbinic allegory that the young lovers are God and Israel? Rabbi Lauren and Amy dig in.

As we face another Passover where large in-person gatherings are not in the cards, Rabbi Lauren Henderson and Dr. Amy Robertson discuss what it means to us to create a meaningful home seder. We raise up the question "Why are we gathering?" -- and how does this answer shape the kind of seder you'll create? We talk about gap between our ancestors' experience and our own, and the need to dive into that breech with some intention. We talk about the great and overwhelming tool of the Haggadah - part seder script, part complex work of rabbinic scholarship - and when you might want to put it down. We know - and we name - how intimidating it can feel to do the seder "right" if you are not usually the leader, but we are with you as you create the seder that is right for this moment. Next year in Jerusalem!

As we read this last double portion of the book of Shemot, Rabbi Lauren Henderson and Dr Amy Robertson look at bigger messages that the mishkan texts suggest but never quite articulate. Can we have a relationship with God that is both within history and outside of it? How does the realm of ritual meet real human needs that we have today? And how do we think about Shabbat, mentioned at the start of this parsha, fit into all of this? 

The making of the golden calf is probably *the* paradigmatic biblical sin. What did the Israelites think they were doing - what need were they trying to meet? What exactly is idolatry, anyway? And how could it be that the sons of Aaron go on to become the priests after Aaron molds this golden calf? Rabbi Lauren Henderson and Dr. Amy Robertson dig in.

This week, Dr. Amy Robertson and Rabbi Lauren Henderson explore the complex role and even more complex vestments of a High Priest in ancient Israel. What can we learn about the relationship between Priest, Mishkan, Israel and God, simply from looking at the decorated body of a priest? And in what ways is the priestly role akin to modern clergy?  

Rabbi Lauren Henderson and Dr. Amy Robertson begin the Tabernacle Texts this week with Terumah. What are these texts? What are they asking of us, and what are they offering? Rather than reading them as instructions, we bring them into the world of ritual, visualization, and meditative practices. If this text was written during exile as many scholars propose, it becomes a sort of love letter to a holy space they could not access. And as people who have not been able to gather in our sacred space for nearly a year now, we can relate.

This week, Rabbi Lauren Henderson and Dr. Amy Robertson read Mishpatim. Discussing a parsha that is really all about laws and "rules" without any plot to speak of, they have a surprisingly vulnerable conversation about the high bar Torah sets, the ways in which the meta-conversations in our heads get us all turned around, and the grounding weight of obligations that we understand not only intellectually, but in lived relationships. 

Rabbi Lauren Henderson and Dr. Amy Robertson discuss one of the most jam-packed Torah portions out there, and ask: what exactly was revealed at Sinai ... and to whom? 

Rabbi Lauren Henderson and Dr. Amy Robertson wade through the most famous of Torah stories, the crossing of the sea in Exodus 15. Why do we read this ancient poem as part of our daily liturgy? What does it say to us today about faith, and what is the role of warrior/protector in our own ideas of God?