Kids are screaming, food is cooking, it’s hot, and you’re on the phone, thinking about what you forgot to do and what still needs to get done…

Or you are with a customer who is yelling and screaming and calling you names, wants his or her money back plus restitution because they are not 100% satisfied, and there is a line of people, and it is only 10:30AM on a Monday…

Or just as you get to the frontish (not the front, but within a few people) of the line, having waited for what seems like forever, your cell phone battery drained, feet tired, arms hurting, lots of pushing and annoyance all around, when you see that two of the five tellers open are now going to take their breaks, so you will be late, or you just decide enough is enough…

Even the most unflappable person can fall apart and become excitable; it is easy for patience to wane, to feel utterly defeated by the system or the people around you. We have all experienced it from both sides—the yelling and screaming, the annoyance and irritation that comes with dealing with intolerable people. Our familiarity with these incidents can now seem comical—in hindsight we wonder how we got to that place, how we became so exasperated with our situations. Could we have taken a step back and forced a deep breath, collecting ourselves and re-composing? What might have been had we not taken steps to correct our behavior or the actions of those around us? Our intention is always to do the right thing, as quickly and efficiently as possible. When hindrances obstruct our ability to remain unruffled in the face of impediments, we resort to impulsivity, where stress and emotion take over for our stability and rational judgment.

In this week’s parsha, Chukat, we read about the finality and consequences of making decisions based on emotion in the passion of the moment. The Israelites, having experienced the harshness of the desert and becoming impatient with having to travel to the Promised Land, raise complaints to Moses about water, food, and the “suffering” of their deliverance from slavery to freedom. God instructs Moses to bring the whole community together and to speak to the rock, which will then yield water. Instead, for some reason, Moses gathers the people and proceeds to hit the rock, which of course yields water. For his failure to heed God’s commandment God punishes Moses by not allowing him to lead the people into Israel. Many commentaries attempt to better understand the harshness of the punishment that does not seem to fit the crime. Many note that Moses has had an outstanding record as the leader of the people, given the circumstances of their journey and the obstacles that Moses faced as God’s appointed representative.

This episode teaches the most simple of lessons in the context of the verses that precede the rock incident. The Israelites are unhappy and quarrel with Moses, pushing his patience to the edge as a group of children may do to a teacher in a classroom with a series of unending and overly-demanding questions. Moses is cast in a role for which others around him seem uncomfortable; they harass him with pleas and ultimatums for which he does not have answers or solutions. They not only want water, but are also unhappy with their situation in the desert, and wonder aloud if things would be better for them back in Egypt. In response to the ever-growing frustration with the people and with his own situation Moses fails to control himself. What he could have done or should have done are the lessons we learn and teach each day from this incident.

We are all faced with this scenario, whether every day or week or month. How easy it is to become so much a part of the moment that we fail to see the larger picture, the context of our actions and behaviors. The lesson, and certainly the consequences of Moses should be a reminder for all of us of our place in this world.

I hope to see you this Shabbat.
Shabbat Shalom.
Rabbi Joshua B. Cohen

Five years ago we were at Camp Ramah in Wisconsin—me, Sarah, and Sidney. Sidney was all of one year old. She would wake up each morning and come to breakfast with us and then she met her babysitter and would be taken around the rest of the day. We always knew we would see her later; there was never a thought as to the contrary.

This Shabbat marks five years. We recite a mi-sheberach each week for him and I count the number of days he has been a prisoner of war. This weekend marks a sad anniversary in that counting.

Five years ago Gilad Shalit was taken prisoner—captured by terrorists who have kept him hidden and away from proper medical care and assistance. Five years ago was the last time he spoke with his parents, his family, his friends. Five years ago he went out on patrol, probably spoke with his parents before leaving, and has not been heard from since. Imagine not knowing if your son or daughter was sick or healthy, in need of help?

Our family has traveled extensively in the past five years. We have lived in different cities, different countries, made new friends, celebrated birthdays and comforted those who have experienced death.

Five years. 1,825 days. 43,800 hours.

During the past five years we elected a new president. Michael Phelps won medals. Our shul moved into a new building in Franklin Lakes. A teenager who graduated from eighth grade five years ago is already off to college. Fidel Castro stepped down from power.

Think about what you have done over the past five years. Where have you been? What have you experienced? What made you happy? What made you sad? Who came into your life? Who is no longer a part of it?

Five years goes by quickly.

Unless you are Gilad Shalit.

Or his parents, Aviva and Noam.

Or the country that continues to not forget him.

Or us as we pray for him each Shabbat and every day.

From 1948 and the declaration of the State of Israel until 1967 and Israel’s victory in the Six Day War, Israelis were cut off from visiting the Old City and more importantly, from visiting the Kotel, the lone wall that remains from the Second Temple that was destroyed in 70CE.  For almost 20 years Jews could not visit the most sanctified site in our history.  Furthermore, even with the declaration of independence Jews were not completely free to move around their own country.  Jews living in the surrounding areas nearest the Old City were bombarded with gun fire throughout the day and night.  When one visits the King David Hotel or Hebrew Union College you can see the pockmarked walls as evidence 40 years later of the terror that Jerusalem residents endured.

Forty four years later Jerusalem is a city bustling with energy.  Streets are crowded, tourists flock to the shops and cafes, and traffic is a nightmare.  There is construction everywhere as the city continues to bridge the history of yesteryear with the evolving technologies of the 21^st century.  Men and women and children, Jews and non-Jews, move freely throughout the city and into the Old City, something unimaginable 45 years ago.  The freedom to practice religion, whether one is Jewish, Muslim, or Christian, is only made possible because Israel maintains peace and security for everyone in Jerusalem.  These freedoms did not exist 50 years ago.

Jerusalem has been at the forefront of politics these past few weeks (as always, it seems).  Will peace come at the expense of a divided Jerusalem?  No one knows for sure.  We pray for Jerusalem each day and recite her praises as the capitol of our homeland when we chant Hatikvah, the Israeli national anthem.  No one can argue against the centrality of Jerusalem as the capitol of our people’s land; who or what bodies control it is the major question.  But it must remain whole and undivided not just for the sake of Jews, but to guarantee the religious freedoms of all those who visit and live in Jerusalem.

The Psalms teach us that Jerusalem is part of our people not just in history, but a physical part of who we are as well:

אִם אֶשְׁכָּחֵךְ יְרוּשָׁלַיִם תִּשְׁכַּח יְמִינִי

Im eshka-khech Yerushalyim tishkahh yi-mee-nee

If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither.

May we all continue to celebrate living, praying, and being in Jerusalem now and forevermore.

Shabbat Shalom.

Rabbi Joshua B. Cohen

I spent part of this past week with over 10,000 delegates at the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington DC. There were over 180 rabbis from the Conservative movement as part of the conference, including many from Bergen County and greater New Jersey. I sat in sessions with leaders who discussed the imminent dangers to Israel and the United States as Iran continues the process of enriching uranium and creating a nuclear weapon. I participated with others in hearing about the technological and medical advances of Israeli companies that are shared with the rest of the world as a result of continued relationships. And I listened to expert panelists’ debate the prospects of peace and the obstacles inherent in brokering with many of these parties on the opposite side of the table. And I readied myself to lobby my senators and my congressman for support for Israel together with other representatives from our congressional district.

Most of all I came away impressed. This was my first experience at the conference and I was unprepared for the sheer numbers of people who are attracted to lobbying and supporting Israel in this manner. I came away impressed with the openness and dialogue by many of Israel’s supporters. Not everyone agrees, as we all know, on every subject and point as the peace process meanders forward. What strengthens one’s resolve and principles is being able to articulate a position and defend it. AIPAC, especially during the down times, the informal moments when people are waiting for sessions to begin, or waiting in line to get through security, affords everyone, Jew and non-Jew, Labor or Likud, Democrat or Republican—the time and materials to make a cogent argument.

This past week has seen Israel put front and center in the political forum with President Obama’s speech about the 1967 borders and then followed by Prime Minister Netanyahu’s address to AIPAC and then to Congress. How many of you know what we mean when we talk about the 1967 borders? The right of return for Palestinians? A divided Jerusalem? The Green Line? The difference between Fatah and Hamas in terms of ideology and their views of Israel? The answers to the questions above are the basic knowledge base that every Jew should know.

Every one of us should be knowledgeable about Israel, its history, and the current issues facing the country. AIPAC affords some educational opportunities for people, but it is not for everyone. But there is something for each of us, a way to get involved and strengthen our ties and the ties of our elected officials with regard to Israel. Read up on current events and different views about the issues facing Israel and her neighbors. Join a group—a political one, a cultural one—and discover with others and through others what makes Israel important to you.

Jews across America and the world should stand and be proud of who we are and what we stand for in this day and age. To quote the Prime Minister on Tuesday: “no one can guarantee that our peace partners today will be there tomorrow. And, my friends, when I say “Tomorrow,” I don’t mean some distant time in the future. I mean tomorrow.

May we all know peace, for us and for our children.

That phrase stuck with me overnight. Back to normal. Whatever that means. Each week—almost each day—something seemingly terrifying occurs that in and of itself seems tragic and disastrous, but when coupled with the other ongoing catastrophes in the world around us, it would seem as if Armageddon is wrapping its knuckles on humanity’s door. Wars throughout the world. Natural disasters. Crimes against people. Bickering and infighting amongst people and against their governments. There is drought and famine, flooding and death. One cannot pick up the newspaper or watch the news cycle without fearing what might happen next. And to miss the news means to fall behind on the latest calamities.

So what do we do? How can we take a collective breath, that sigh of relief or nervous laugh that comes from knowing it is too much, too overwhelming to even think about?

I think about blessings.

It might be cold outside, but I notice that the sun came up, and despite the undercurrent to the contrary, the world has lasted another day.

I see the robin with the red breast and know that Spring is here, another season developing from the one past, serving as a bridge to the summer.

I think back to the warm hamantaschen my B’nai Mitzvah seminar students tried to make last week (which came out as cookies! Thanks to Rebecca Lipschitz for trying to work with them!).

I hear the raucous banging of drums and cymbals and guitars and groggers trying to blot out Haman’s name at Megillah reading.

I think of birthdays celebrated this week.

And I think of the members of our shul hospitalized temporarily this week and now recuperating at home.

For each of these I offer a blessing. I thank God that I can be here today to celebrate life and the world in which we live. Perhaps that is not normal. But it gets me through today.

I don’t know what tomorrow brings, but I am grateful for today.

May we all see peace and happiness in the days ahead.

Shabbat Shalom.

Adding to the already dismal world news of nature’s continuing wrath upon Japan, this week we were all paralyzed to hear of the despicable acts not of nature, but of man. The murder of the Fogel family in Itamar, Israel is an unspeakable and barbaric horror. The cowardice of murderers to take the lives of innocent people defies words. The fact that the murders included the slitting of the throats of children is a brutality that is impossible for me to comprehend. It does not matter where the family lived, whether inside or outside the Green Line. It does not matter how religious they were, what their ideological background was, or their political affiliation. They were murdered because they were Jewish.

This week we read an extra Torah reading to commemorate Purim. Just before we celebrate we read about the Amalekites, an enemy tribe who are despised in the Torah not for only for seeking to destroy the Israelites as they wandered through the desert, but for the barbaric manner with which they attacked. The Amalekites attacked from the rear of the Israelite nation and massacred the defenseless women and children rather than attacking from the front where the soldiers were stationed. The Amalekites went for the murderous and easy kill. The Torah reading commands us to blot out the name of the Amalekites forever and instructs us: לא תשכח—Lo tishcach (Don’t forget).

Let us not forget the murders of the Fogel family. Let us not forget Udi, age 36 and his wife Ruth, age 34. Let us not forget the children, Yoav, age 11, Elad, age 4, and Hadas, only 3 months old. And let us not forget the survivors: Tamar, the 12 year old daughter who discovered her murdered family, and her brothers, Roi, age 8, and two-year-old Yishai.

May each of us look back at the past week and not forget.
But may we learn lessons from history and meet the tension of celebrating and moving forward by embracing our Jewish heritage, our culture, our history, and our peoplehood.

May Purim this year and every year be that reminder to us all.

This week we mark the transition in our Torah reading from one book to another, from Sefer Shemot (the book of Exodus) to Sefer Vayikra (the book of Leviticus). The change in the reading is apparent in the first sedra, where we note the differences from the narrative we had read throughout most of Exodus to the instructions in what is known as Torat haKohanim (the instructions and laws of the priests). The focus on sacrifices had great importance during biblical times. Sacrifices were brought by the Israelites as gifts of thanksgiving, forgiveness, or as ritual firsts to God. The role of the sacrifices continued to play prominently during the times of the Temple. Animals and fruits are brought to the priests who prepared the sacrifices in specific ways. The instructions were laid out in this book of the Torah.

Almost half of the mitzvot in the Torah come from the book of Leviticus. Yet today we cannot observe the rituals of sacrifices as demonstrated and practiced during the times of the Bible. I am often asked what role, other than perhaps historically, do these instructions play in our lives today. The Temple has been destroyed not once, but twice, most recently in 70CE (I know how crazy is sounds to say “recent history” and “70 CE” in the same sentence!). Sacrifices in biblical times were not only about animals and offerings to God. God instructs the Israelites: “When you sacrifice from yourself” (Leviticus 1:2), meaning not just the physical sacrifice, but something that you must give up. Sacrifices were gifts to God, but more importantly they represented something that had to be given from ourselves. The Israelites literally had to sacrifice something that they owned or treasured. If we continue to read the verse as such and continue to understand sacrifice as something that we must give up, we can find truth and grasp a deeper and more personal meaning of the Torah.

It is these sacrifices that I hope to be able to continue to discuss with you at services this Shabbat morning.

I hope you will join us this Shabbat at services. We have a great program on Friday night where we will honor our Jewish Girl Scouts, Brownies and Daisies. And then we can learn together on Shabbat morning.

Shabbat Shalom!

This weekend we usher in the most joyous of months on the Hebrew calendar: Adar. Throughout Adar we proclaim, “Be Happy! It’s Adar!” We prepare for the craziness of Purim. On Purim we are supposed to dress up in clothes we normally would not wear (costumes). On Purim we are also supposed to have so much fun that we cannot tell the difference between good (Mordechai) and evil (Haman—booooo!). Purim and the weeks leading up to it are about forgetting that which was supposed to occur (the hanging of the Jews on the gallows) and instead we are simply supposed to have fun. The whole month!

Why this month and not the other months? Shouldn’t we also be happy and excited when it comes to Chanukah? Or Passover when the Israelites were freed from slavery?

Some say that the celebration of the month is about leading up to Purim, and that from now until then we should only be thinking of happiness, with Purim being the culmination of this weeks-long partying. Others look to the calendar and the cycle of months and seasons. Nisan, the month that follows Adar on the calendar, is the first month of the year according to the Mishnah (there are four different “heads” of the years, with Nisan being one of them, just as Tishrei is the head of the year as well, depending on what and how we are counting). Thus, Adar is the last month of the calendar year. Adar is also the end of the season, as Nisan and Passover bring forth Spring and the end of the season of rain.

No matter how one views or chooses to understand Adar, whether for its place on the seasonal calendar or simply because of Purim, let us all take a moment or even a week to enjoy and celebrate!

Be happy! It’s Adar!

Shabbat Shalom!

When he heard of her passing a congregant mentioned to me that she lived a “full life” and a “complete life.” I thought for a moment and questioned the person what that meant. He said that someone who lived for that long must have lived a fulfilling life. That statement has made me think about how we judge fulfillment and success. More often than not we quantify success based on longevity rather than using other measurements. Someone who lives to be 96 undoubtedly lived a lengthy life spanning almost a century. But did she do everything that she wanted? Did she see everything she wanted? Did she have any regrets of what might have been?

Another way to look at this might be through the lens of someone who dies at a much younger age. We all judge rather quickly that the person did not fulfill all of his or her dreams and passions simply because they died so early. In fact we use the word tragic when describing the death of someone who dies young. The word tragic is mostly absent when we express the loss of someone who lived more than 80 or even 90 years. Our reasoning is that we rely on the most quantifiable method of judging tragic loss or fulfilling life: years on earth.

Each person is different. Each of us has different goals and needs in life. Some of us aspire for things that others do not. We each gauge ourselves and those around us utilizing different measures and means. In the end it becomes difficult to assess whether one lived a fulfilling life, or if they died with regrets. We can never know.

Each of us should take the time to determine now what course of action will best guide us to the destination of fulfillment. We are never sure what comes tomorrow, if at all. We cannot wait until tomorrow to do that which we wish to accomplish today. Because in the end, no matter how long or short a person’s life was, death is always a tragic loss for someone close to that person.

May each of us only know happiness.

The second reason I don’t observe the holiday is that I don’t subscribe to any of the Hallmark holidays that have become part of our society. For the past four weeks we have been inundated with commercials and advertisements reminding us that the one day of the year when it is okay to say, “I love you” to your wife is almost here. I am all for events that stimulate our economy– florists, chocolatiers, and stuffed animal shops all do very well around this time of year– but it seems as if everyday could be deemed a holiday to observe. We now have Secretary’s Day, Boss’ Day, and Hug a Short Person Day (about which I am not sure if I observe or even have a choice!). There are endless calendar days that we celebrate, and even more that we possibly don’t even know about.

Some may think it un-American of me not to send a card or chocolate on Valentine’s Day. They might be right. However, lest one think that I am out of touch or don’t take the time to offer gifts or words of love to my wife, I offer this simple solution: Don’t take one day a year to offer love. Each week on Shabbat I offer those same words that others might think about once a year on St. Valentine”s Day.
I give flowers to my wife each Shabbat. Yes, every week.
I sometimes include a card (yes, a Hallmark one).
But I draw the line at chocolates. I don’t just give them to her for herself.
I make her share them.

This February 14th, be reminded that we should tell those we love more than once a year how much we love them. Take time each day and each week. Mark your calendar. And be sure to observe in the way you know best.