Hear Our Voice

When civil rights protesters in the 1960’s prepared for the inevitable confrontations that would come from marching the streets of southern towns, sitting at lunch counters, using water fountains, etc., they were taught that in the moment of conflict, they should envision their opponents as the babies they once were – innocent and free of the instilled hate borne out of others’ irrational vengeance.  Not only were they taught...Read more...

Yes, the rumors are true.  Rosh Hashanah is coming to visit just a bit “earlier” this year than we’re used to.  Monday of Labor Day weekend is quite a surprise, but not really. 

See, Rosh...Read more...

They call us the people of the book and indeed we are. Books, whether physically bound or digital, are central to what it means to engage as a Jew in the world. That doesn’t mean that every one of us is incredibly well read, or that we might win some literature trivia contest, but what it does mean is that we take words, written words all the more so, seriously.

In Hebrew, the word for prayer book is Siddur, from the root samech,...Read more...

I know that I am not the first to decry this phrase but occasionally it needs to be done: “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me.”  There is so much wrong with this aphorism, both in terms of the far too common way in which mean and nasty words always carry the undeniable potential for the hurling of sticks and stones, not to mention the fact that a significant portion of the “oeuvre” of psychologists,...Read more...

We live in a time of ever-extreme polarities.  And with that polarity is a concomitant presumption of “thought purity” just as bit as dangerous as all-out anarchy.  As I shared recently in a sermon, who has ever heard of a healthy, lasting marriage in which each partner must agree with the other on every issue, be on the same page with the other on every issue, especially those that are at best, tangential to their relationship?...Read more...

Memo

To:       Central Student Government Leadership, University of Michigan

From:   Rabbi Scott Hausman-Weiss, Houston, TX

Until three days ago, I had never heard of any of you. I mean, if I had been asked if there is a student government at my son’s university, I’m sure I would’ve said of course. But, as I imagine is the case for most parents of college kids, my focus is most...Read more...

Pharaoh looked down into Goshen and instead of seeing the industriousness and creativity of Joseph’s progeny, he discerned a threat.  With no noted precursor or precedent that might raise suspicion, the Israelites were a risk he wouldn’t abide.  Israel, to his mind, was too successful, growing too quickly. They were different and thus they were “other.” Those who were at first threatened refugees from a blight in the...Read more...

I’ve always loved this not so well-known movie called “Pleasantville,” in which a brother and a sister from the color-filled 1990s accidentally fall through the television set into the black and white 1950s. Their presence in the 1950s infuses a tremendous amount of w'rldliness.  They are in color, while the rest of the world around remains in black and white. However, their “roygbiv” color has a way of “infecting” the...Read more...

OK, so I’m in the Ozarks. I’m on “vacation” this week with Natalie as she and the Woods Project Team scout out a new site.  So it’s kind of like vacation because I’m not working, at least officially, and she is. But it isn’t bad in the least. I’m in the middle of nature, hiking and camping with lovely weather and Wi-Fi. Who could ask for more?

Well I could, because...Passover is around the...Read more...

Many of you have heard about, read about or even studied a famous psychological test called “The Marshmallow Test,” performed at Stanford University in the 1970’s by Walter Mischel.  Simply put, “The Marshmallow Test” studies delayed gratification in children.  A child is brought into a room with a table and a marshmallow sitting on a plate.  The child is told that she is going to be left alone for a few minutes, and...Read more...