First Encounters
An Afternoon of Learning
Sunday, August 24th, 1-4pm
@ Congregation Netivot Shalom
Congregation Netivot Shalom and the journal
Sh'ma are co-sponsoring an afternoon of learning focused on "First Encounters" to ready ourselves for the month of Elul and begin the process of preparing for the High Holidays. Join Stuart Kelman, Sarah Lefton, Deena Aranoff, Dan Schifrin, Robert Alter, Menachem Creditor and Susan Berrin for an afternoon of facilitated discussion around themes of "first encounters" with: God, art, death, birth, the opening lines of Torah, and the book of Joshua.
1:00 - 1:30 Opening
Rabbi Menachem Creditor will teach about Elul as preparation for the new year and the theme of "first encounters"
1:45 - 2:30 - First Session Block
Sarah Lefton on first encountering the Land: When the spies, and then later Joshua and the people, first enter the Land, what does that encounter look like? Sound like? Try out the approach G-dcast uses-storyboarding and voiceover-to make sense of the story in a new way that slows down your reading and flexes your midrash muscles.
Rabbi Stuart Kelman examines what to expect when you're not "Expecting": Before entering the tahara room for the first time, one conjures up all kinds of thoughts and images. Is this what it's really like to encounter the 'meitah'?
2:45 -3:30-Second Session Block
Robert Alter examines the opening words of the Torah, Breishit Barah Elokim, In the beginning, God created the world: What does the grammar and vocabulary of this sentence tell us about the writer's conception of creation and the world?
Deena Aranoff explores the metaphor of birth coursing through the shofar service: Hayom Harat Olam, Today, the world is born. This session will explore the social, ethical, and theological implications of the use of birth imagery in our account of creation of the world.
Susan Berrin and Dan Schifrin on having sacred experiences in "unexpected" places. "God was in this Place, and I did not know..." (Martin Buber walks into a museum...) We will explore the ways art and museums can function as a "holiness accelerator," and how the experience of responding to art can help us shift from a materialistic "I-It" orientation to the more spiritual "I-Thou" in the rest of our lives.
3:30 - 4:00 shmoozing and refreshments