糖心出品

Standing Together: Prayer, Presence, and the Power of Community

The High Holidays invite us into a season of profound reflection鈥攏ot only on who we are as individuals, but on how we show up for one another and the world. This three-part webinar series explores the emotional and spiritual heart of this sacred time, focusing on the themes of vulnerability, responsibility, and connection.聽

JTS High Holiday Webinars 2025

Jul 14, 2025

The High Holidays invite us into a season of profound reflection鈥攏ot only on who we are as individuals, but on how we show up for one another and the world. This three-part webinar series explores the emotional and spiritual heart of this sacred time, focusing on the themes of vulnerability, responsibility, and connection.

Together, we鈥檒l consider what it means to pray with presence, to engage meaningfully with others鈥攅ven across difference鈥攁nd to see these days not just as a personal journey, but as a call to collective transformation. Whether you are returning to familiar rituals or seeking a new way in, this series offers space to reflect, connect, and prepare with intention.

Alex Friedman – Senior Sermon (RS ’25)

Nov 13, 2024 By JTS Senior Sermon | Commentary | Senior Sermon | Vayera | Rosh Hashanah

Alex Friedman’s Senior Sermon on Vayera

Sacred Words in Liturgy and Life

Oct 11, 2024 By Shira Billet | Commentary | Rosh Hashanah | Yom Kippur

Human communication, the commitment to taking words seriously and to viewing the words we write and speak as serious commitments, has become even more imperiled in an age where our words are mediated through the technologies of social media, artificial intelligence, and the crippling social phenomena of political polarization and widespread mistrust.

Seeking the Hiding God: A Personal Theological Essay

By Arnold M. Eisen | Public Event video | Video Lecture | Rosh Hashanah | Yom Kippur

To mark this period of spiritual atonement and reflection, Dr. Eisen discussed his rich, original, and moving work and invite us to ask,聽perhaps for the first time, what we actually believe about ultimate matters of faith and doubt. Those of us searching for ultimate meaning will find reassurance that the search itself can be a source of personal fulfillment,聽vibrant community, and聽great joy. The book鈥檚 three chapters include a Passover Seder聽with its theme of past and future redemption;聽the Yom Kippur liturgy that guides worshippers through the difficult work of atonement,聽forgiveness and return;聽and the day-to-day responsibilities,聽personal and communal,聽of covenant,聽mitzvah,聽and love.聽

Crying With God

Oct 1, 2024 By Gordon Tucker | Commentary | Rosh Hashanah

In an essay some years ago, the Israeli teacher and poet Sara Friedland ben Arza asked us to focus on the prayer Hayom Harat Olam (Today the World Stands as at Birth) in the Rosh Hashanah liturgy. She asks why, in a religious tradition that moved away so notably from ancient mythological motifs, is there a rare reference to the 鈥渂irthing鈥� of the world? And why is that short prayer placed just after the shofar
is blown?

Where Did Moses Go鈥攁nd Why?

Sep 27, 2024 By Walter Herzberg | Commentary | Nitzavim | Vayeilekh | Rosh Hashanah

Keli Yekar (Rabbi Shlomo Ephraim Luntschitz, 1550鈥�1619, Prague) articulates our question as follows: 鈥淎ll the commentators were challenged by this 鈥済oing鈥� because the text does not mention where he [Moses] went . . . 鈥� But before I get to his teshuvah (repentance)-centered interpretation and how it can inform our own behavior as we approach the Days of Awe, I will share the explanations of three other commentators.

Shattering Our Idols

Sep 20, 2024 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Ki Tavo | Rosh Hashanah

Judaism tantalizes the senses with the sights, sounds and fragrant smells that characterize its observance. Rosh Hashanah is certainly one of those times when we are overwhelmed by the richness of Jewish symbolism. At the heart of our New Year observances, however, lies the piercing cry of the shofar. What is the meaning of the shofar?