American law establishes that a person who cannot vote in person does not forfeit his or her right to vote. Rather, they can vote early by mail or other means.
In Israel, the citizen must appear in person at the polling place on Election Day. In Israel, if you are absent on Election Day, you forfeit your right to vote. What does Judaism say? If I can’t make a seder on Passover is there a make-up date? Amazingly there is! The Torah records (Numbers chapter 9) that in the desert, Jews who were impure or too distant complained to Moses that they did not have the chance to bring the Passover offering and G-d gave those people a make up date one month later. There is a caveat, however. If someone just couldn’t bother to bring the Passover offering on time, there was no make up date offered. Only if the mitzvah was important to you but for reasons beyond your control you could not make it was there a make up date for you. Voting is an important calling for each of us. Whether it is in person or by mail or online you show that this country’s direction is important to you by voting. G-d bless America (we need it). Mendel (Menachem) Bluming
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Adam is created by G-d himself and placed in the Garden of Eden, Paradise.
G-d then declared that it is not good for Adam to be alone, he must get married and so G-d created Chavah/ Eve. What exactly was not good about Adam's life? He lacked for nothing. There was no pollution, no elections and plenty of everything. Why does G-d say that it is not good for him to be alone? Rashi, the classic Biblical commentator, responds strikingly by saying that it was not good for him to be alone because he may start thinking of himself as a god! In marriage your spouse reminds you that you are not G-d, hopefully kindly :) One learns to consider another, to be questioned by another and to grow toward a mission and purpose bigger than oneself. Even Paradise, and a perfect world, does not compare with being deeply challenged and transcending oneself. Mendel (Menachem) Bluming The Torah is our guidebook for life studied by scholars for the past 3,300 years. The breadth and depth of Jewish scholarship has spawned thousands of brilliant published works deciphering and applying every word and nuance of Jewish law and teaching. Jews are not meant to just memorize and repeat words robotically but rather to plumb the depths and intellectually grasp their wisdom.
Yet on the day on which we celebrate the completion of the annual cycle of the Torah, Simchat Torah, we celebrate by dancing and rejoicing rather than by studying. Doesn't that seem incongruous with the purpose and focus of the Torah? Here are some thoughts for you to consider: If you had two employees to hire and one of them had great enthusiasm and joy for your company and its mission would you see that as an advantage? In what way does our celebrating demonstrate our acceptance and commitment more than study? Beyond an intellectual pursuit, the Torah is a marriage. We stick together through the vicissitudes of life and we never let go. At a wedding you dance and celebrate not just discuss the nuances of married life. Dancing unites us, study categorizes us into different levels of intellectual ability. Every one of us have a connection with the Torah because it is our inheritance and even a child of one-day old inherits equally with a much older sibling. Anyone can dance but not everyone has the intellectual ability to study a deep page of the Talmudic tractate of Yevamos or Uktzin. On Simchat Torah we celebrate our unity because no one owns the Torah more than you do. So let's dance and celebrate our eternal treasure; the Torah! Mendel (Menachem) Bluming The four species that we bless on Sukkot correspond to the four letters of G-d's Hebrew name. Waving them in all six directions signifies our faith that G-d is everywhere.
Specifically, we are saying that on every level, at every stage of life, in all that happens to us, G-d is there. Right and left represent Chesed and Gevurah, the power of love and the power of discipline. G-d, like a parent, can be loving and can also be strict. Sometimes G-d's light shines on us and we feel close to Him, other times He seems distant, we feel left in the dark and have to find our own way through. Whether we receive G-d's closeness and love, or whether He gives us space to grow on our own, it is all coming from G-d. He knows exactly what we need, and that's what we get. Up and down symbolize the highs and lows of life. When we feel we are on top of the world, we need to remember that G-d enabled us to get there. When we feel down in the dumps, we need to have faith that G-d is with us there. There is no success without help, and there is no failure without hope. Forward and backward stand for the future and the past. We don't know what tomorrow holds, but we have faith that G-d will guide us through whatever lies ahead. And as for the past, all that has happened to us is a part of the plan. All our past experiences, even those that we would rather forget, made us who we are today. We are where we are now because that is exactly where G-d wants us to be. Our entire past was a lead up to this moment. G-d brought you here for a reason. So the four species are waved in all directions, to recognize that G-d is everywhere, in the good and the bad, in the ups and the downs, in the uncertain future and the turbulent past. And in the middle of all that is you. You are doing the waving. Because G-d will be there for you in all you do, if only you let Him in. Chag Sameach! Rabbi Mendel (Menachem) Bluming and Rabbi Moss |
AuthorRabbi Mendel Bluming also dedicated six years to serving on the board of directors of the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington, where he received the Matthew H. Simon Rabbinical Award for exceptional communal leadership. Archives
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