Passover, Emily's Birthday and the Continuing 4th year.

So how I always forget how hard the second semester is, even in a year when it is not overloaded with classes. It seems to drag on and on and on.  At the moment I am back home in Stoke because its Passover, or will be the 1st night Sader is tonight. But the semester did go right up till the end. In fact we still have a week of classes left after the Peasch holidays. Plus some catch-up classes.  Fortunately the assessments this semester are relatively light. I have a fairly major essay for Rabbinic Texts, a major presentation of Megilot, a presentation (and I think a report) for spirituality and finally a report for Tikkun Olam.

Then there are both of Biennials to attended, one for LJ and one for the MRJ. Kol Bo in the summer and the LBC Day of Celebration and finally Ordination. And then my Fourth Year is over. It somehow seems like a lot and like a little simultaneously. And i have as always taken things for limmud, which somehow I also always manage to forget how much work they will actually be. Although I am sure I will enjoy them as well.

As busy as the year has been I have managed to see a few friends. Matthew and others and last week it was Emily's birthday, which is always a lot of fun.

My extra reading lesson continue, and I am pretty sure that they are making a difference which is great. I am also continuing to meet and train with my personal trainer and I am sure this is making a difference. Last week was the first time that we have been able to properly train out of doors. Because the weather was finally nice enough.

Oh I almost forgot that one marker on the year that is still left is the College Dinner.  Anyway this is just an update and really a very profound one at. Things are carrying on much as they have before. And as of today I have 447 days to go until ordination.

A Day of Spring

One sunny day and our small garden has come to life.  The grass seems green and there are small buds on the trees. A number of small insects have appeared on the breaches of the bushes and tress.  This in turn has brought a number of birds (pairs of birds actually) into the garden.  Great Tits and Blue Tits, the crows are also showing signs of spring; carrying twigs and blades of grass.  I spent some happy if quiet moments just sitting out there in the almost warm sunshine enjoying not doing the work I should be, and a hint of spring.
The weather must have had, an effect on me as well because after I had gone to get some stationary, and to get some grifts and party stuff for Emily I decided not to go straight back to the apartment but rather have a morning out (in London proper), I ended up in the British Library where I had a look at their current exhibition (as it turns out it was its last day).  I then had a coffee in the court yard before just going for a walk around and about.
I then did head back but I enjoyed at least a morning away from the flat.  I have enjoyed passover but will be pleased when I can eat bread again tonight.

Assessments-1

Its time for one of my 'assessment' posts, early in the year I know but thats because this semester I have what can only be termed a ridiculous amount of essays.  Seven in all, as well as other formal and semi-formal assessments.
I haven't had anything like this volume since I was in high-school (and that gave me a serious case of the screaming ab-dabs!) oh Happy days.

Anyway I have already been working like a mad thing and have sucessfully finished three of them. So far I have done.

Prophets-this was based on my presentation last semester and it seemed wise simply to get on with it. I think that this is pretty good essay far from great but certainly good.

I have also written my Liturgy essay. (This is either mad or brilliant) so it will be interesting to get this one back when marked to see what side of the insane/brilliant line it will fall.

The final essay that I have written is for Piyyutim. This I think is a very solid essay boarding on very good. So all in all I am happy with these so far.  I am working hard on the background reading/research for my long essay on Rabbinic Literature its interesting but its also going to be hard work.  The other essays that need to be done are one on the Rambam (should be okay), on for education (not sure) and one for Midrash (I am feeling a lot happier about this one than I was even a few days ago).

Then I have the day to day preparations for each class, a report I need to write (largely in order to help future generations of rabbinical students but nevertheless really necessary).  The normal stuff of living/running the apartment, and continuing to act as one of the two gabbyim for the student-led morning services. Also all in all BUSSY!

The next point on the calendar is of course Emily's Birthday (as well as Yom Ha'atzmaut a little later in the month).

This academic year is starting to begin to draw to a close and I still have so much to do before it does. At the moment I am enjoying what is left of my Passover holiday (resting up, organisational stuff and of course academic work.)

sermon

This was my Passover Sermon sent out via Leo Baeck College email. (You can sign up to receive other Diveri Torah by students and members of faculty:

Speaking as something of a Limmudnik I have always found Limmud to be an intellectually stimulating experience:  one that leaves me buzzing with ideas for many weeks after the conference itself has ended.
I normally endeavour to attend as many different sessions on as many different topics as possible.  This past year I attended one session in particular that has stayed with me.  Partly this is because it upset me greatly.  It distressed me as a man, as a Jew, and perhaps, most of all, it distressed and troubled me as a passionate Zionist.

The session concerned was led by Rabbi Levi Lauer and concerned the plight of women who have been trafficked into Israel for the purposes of sexual exploitation.

This Passover is the 150th since the emancipation declaration by Abraham Lincoln which freed the slaves in the Southern States of America.  It is also the 180th  since slavery was made illegal in Britain and the British Empire.

If only things were as simple as that, and yet we know that they are not.  Slavery remains a real and contemporary problem.  Many of the consumer goods and clothes we use and buy are manufactured by workers in conditions which come close to slavery.

And even more troubling the trafficking of women and children for the purposes of sexual exploitation and slavery is endemic: it is a major problem in almost all industrialised counties but it is especially acute in Israel.

Partly, this is a result of geography.  Israel's border with Sinai is a difficult one to police and as well as weapons, and drugs, armed gangs also smuggle women across the border.  But it is not just a problem of geography it is also a political problem.  In Israel security will always, and understandably, be given the highest of priorities and sometimes this means that things which should not be neglected, sadly, are neglected.

Rightly Israel is an open society, one to which asylum seekers are attracted and, moreover a country which facilitates Aliyah by Jews from across the globe.  Criminal organisations have taken advantage of all of these factors in order to traffic women into Israel and then, often, onward to the rest of the world.

But things are far from being entirely negative.  Israel has tough laws on its books to deal with the problem of human trafficking, it is simply a matter of finding the political will to enforce these laws.

This is where we Jews of the Diaspora can help; there is an established campaign to push this issue up the ladder of political consciousness in Israel.  And all it takes is sending one email once a week!
If enough of us were to email enough members of the Knesset on a regular basis then the problem of trafficked women would no longer be a neglected one.  If the leaders of Israeli society are convinced that we in the Diaspora care about this, then they will care about it more and accord it a higher priority.

We are currently celebrating Passover as a community.  To my mind Passover, the Seder and the Haggadah are among the greatest and most enduring innovations of Rabbinic Judaism. The Rabbis of the Mishnaic period transformed what had been in its essence a cultic rite totally bound to the Temple into the home-based inter-generational celebration that we know today.  They more than succeeded in their endeavours.  With its subtle use of texts, songs and rituals Passover is, now, the near perfect mixture of communal and individual.

There is a tradition that one of the objectives of the readings, rites and songs is to gain a personal and embodied feeling of what the Exodus from Egypt must have been like:  at least in part really to feel as if we personally had taken part in that momentous event.  As if we had really been released from slavery in Egypt.

Peasch is the quintessential festival of freedom.  Freedom is what it is really all about. Towards the end of the Seder it is a custom to sing, ‘We were slaves in Egypt', and then go on to declare that if the Eternal had not redeemed us from slavery we might still be enslaved.

This Passover we should all take the opportunity of thinking about those women and children who are currently enslaved and also take some simple steps and actions, even as simple as writing the occasional email, to create pressure for their cause to become high profile and main stream. We will only truly be free ourselves when none are enslaved.

Student rabbi Adam Frankenberg

Passover break

It is very near Passover, I'm back in Newcastle-under-Lyme for the festival.  In fact we have just done our search for Chamezt.  I am still very busy although I have although I have almost finished another essay (Piyyutim). And I am busily working away on my other subjects as well. But generally things are going well academically at least smooth sailing.  But I am very tired.  It was a tough close to the semester. Finishing with a trip to Ravenswood Village as part of our (Emily and my) Jewish-Care/Norwood placement.
This was amazing however, getting there via public transport provided very difficult and required an early start and three trains. (Plus lots of phone calls when inevitably we missed a connection.) But it was well worth it when we got there.
I am enjoying having a bit of break from LBC and the opportunity to catch up with some work and take it a little easy.

Passove

Its my passover hoilday although I have so much stuff to do its not reLLY going to feel much like a hoilday, and the year is simply rushing towards its close which I am finding sad as i am really settled hear now. Well i guess that it was always going to be like that that. I am looking forward to Sader night at Yoki's (he is one of my professors) and Emily and I are going to do a second night sader yes I know that you don't really do second night in Israel but we plan on doing a sci-fi themed one so that should be amazing if we can pull it off.