Religion

Sabbath Times

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 4:33 P.M. on Friday, November 6, and concludes at 5:28 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region. Sabbath candles should be lit and prayers recited at 4:15 P.M. and completed before sunset at 4:33 P.M. Wednesday, November 11, is Veterans Day in the United States and U.S. territories, originally marking the anniversary of the armistice in World War I, but later expanded to honor American veterans of all wars. The same anniversary on November 11 is marked in the United Kingdom as Remembrance Day and in Belgium and France as Armistice Day.

Secret Order behind Jewish Holidays

Secret Order behind Jewish Holidays

by Rabbi Eric Coopersmith, September 17, 2026

The Jewish calendar follows an arc that consists of a seven-stage journey, starting with a broken relationship and ending with the joy of reconciliation.

The Jewish holidays aren’t isolated celebrations scattered across the calendar. Together, they form a carefully structured system of spiritual growth. Each holiday marks another stage in the development of our relationship with God.

We begin with distance and brokenness, gradually rediscover our longing for closeness, recommit ourselves to serving God, remove the barriers separating us from Him, and ultimately arrive at reconciliation, joy, and intimacy.

This journey has seven stops, beginning with Tisha B’Av and culminating in Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah.

1. Tisha B’Av: The Relationship Is Broken

The journey begins on Tisha B’Av, when we confront the painful reality that our relationship with God is in crisis.

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Sabbath Times

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 4:47 P.M. on Friday, October 30, and concludes at 5:41 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region. Sabbath candles should be lit and prayers recited at 4:29 P.M. and completed before sunset at 4:47 P.M. October 31 is Halloween, or All Hallows’ Eve, the evening before the fast on All Saints’ Day, November 1, in the Christian calendar. The holidays were intended to honor collectively the early Christians martyred by the Roman Empire who were called saints.

Sabbath Times

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 6:02 P.M. on Friday, October 23, and concludes at 6:55 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region. Sabbath candles should be lit and prayers recited at 5:44 P.M. and completed before sunset at 6:02 P.M.

Delegation of Rabbis Visit Lithuania

Delegation of Rabbis Visit Lithuania

A delegation of 80 rabbis from the Dirshu organization recently visited Lithuania. They visited the graves of the Vilna Gaon and Rabbi Baruch ber Leibowitz, then visited the grave-site of Chafetz Chaim. The kosher kitchen of the Lithuanian Jewish Community played a role in their visit in receiving the rabbis and catering to their needs. Members of the delegation were thankful for their sincere concern over their kosher needs. The LJC also organized a Sabbath celebration. Three rabbis from the same organization were the victims of an anti-Semitic attack in Vilnius last summer.

Šiauliai Jewish Community Visits Kupiškis

Šiauliai Jewish Community Visits Kupiškis

Members of the Šiauliai Jewish Community and guests from Germany took a trip to Kupiškis, a town with a deep and rich Jewish legacy. There they visited the Kupiškis museum and learned about the town’s cultural and historical heritage. Then they took a guided tour of Kupiškis’s central square where once three synagogues operated. Two of the synagogue buildings remain standing. They learned about Kupiškis before the Holocaust, Jewish life, traditions and history there, and that Lithuanians and Jews lived next to one another in peace before the Holocaust.

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Australia Delays Release of Report by Royal Commission on Anti-Semitism

Australia Delays Release of Report by Royal Commission on Anti-Semitism

Photo: Richard Dobson/News Corp Australia

Commissioner Virginia Bell has defended her push to delay the release of her final report of the anti-Semitism inquiry, saying she did not want to cause a “distraction” for the Jewish community on a “solemn” day of remembrance.

On Wednesday [August 26], the final day of the Antisemitism and Social Cohesion Royal Commission’s public hearings, Bell said the findings would be released on December 18. Commissioner Bell said she is required to present her final report to the Governor General and the governors of all states no later than December 14, but will request a “short extension.”

“December 14 is the anniversary of the massacre. It will be a solemn occasion marked by memorials,” she said. “I’m aware of concern within the Jewish community that delivery of the report on the anniversary would be a distraction. I fully understand that concern and to avoid that distraction, I have asked for a short extension of the term with a view to the submission of my final report on Friday, December 18.”

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State Media on Litvak’s Visit to Žagarė

State Media on Litvak’s Visit to Žagarė

Photo: Joanne Fedler by Vilmantas Raupelis/LRT

Lithuanian state radio and television on their website LRT.lt featured Sydney-based writer Joanne Fedler’s visit to Žagarė, Lithuania, in spite of her family’s injunction never to set foot in Lithuania.

Fedler is the author of 17 books and teaches creative writing. She operates a small publishing house called Joanne Fedler Media. She was born and raised in South Africa to a family of Litvak immigrants before coming to Australia in 2001.

In fall of 2025 she was at a month-long writing workshop in Finland and decided the family hearth, Žagarė, was too close not to visit. She told LRT a dream of her grandfather as a young man was the sign for her which sealed the deal. She decided she would honor her family by travelling to Lithuania rather than avoiding it.

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Sabbath Times

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 6:18 P.M. on Friday, October 16, and concludes at 7:10 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region. Sabbath candles should be lit and prayers recited at 6:00 P.M. and completed before sunset at 6:18 P.M.

First Sunday in October in Žagarė

First Sunday in October in Žagarė

On Sunday descendants of Jews from Žagarė who live now in Šiauliai, Vilnius and other Lithuanian towns and cities gathered in front of the statue to Rabbi Israel Salanter aka Yisrael ben Ze’ev Wolf Lipkin along with Shimon Pesach from the Israeli embassy and Rabbi Kalev Krelin.

This is an annual event. On the first Sunday in October they come together to remember the Jewish history of Žagarė, to honor the Jews who lived here and to preserve their memory. Participants also visited the mass murder sites in Naryškinas Park and at the old Jewish cemetery.

The meeting then moved on to a local café where the discussion continued.

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Natalja Cheifec on the Power of Speech and Silence

Natalja Cheifec on the Power of Speech and Silence

Natalja Cheifec continues her internet lecture and discussion series with a presentation of Jewish views on gossip and cursing, based on Chafetz Chaim’s book The Will to Live. What are the consequences of foul language? What is slander and gossip? How can staying silent lead to a longer life, and when is it absolutely forbidden to keep silent? Tune in and find out. To receive zoom credentials, click here.

Time: 6:00 P.M., Thursday, October 15
Place: internet

YIVO Studied a Living Yiddish Culture. What Happened When That World Was Nearly Destroyed?

YIVO Studied a Living Yiddish Culture. What Happened When That World Was Nearly Destroyed?

Photo: YIVO reading room at 1048 Fifth Avenue, ca. 1958. (YIVO Institute for Jewish Research)

by Andrew Silow-Carroll October 11, 2026

Kalman Weiser’s new history follows the institute from Vilna to New York where it had to preserve a vanished world and cultivate a future.

When YIVO was founded in Vilna in 1925 its mission was to study a living people.

The Yidisher Visnshaftlekher Institut was meant to be a national university for Jews scattered across Eastern Europe and increasingly the world. Its scholars studied Yiddish language and literature, but also Jewish sociology, psychology, history and contemporary life. YIVO was interested in how Jews actually lived and in helping them navigate modernity.

When the Nazis destroyed much of that world, YIVO’s surviving caretakers were forced to ponder how and why to keep their efforts going in a new world haunted by unimaginable loss.

Their efforts are explored in Kalman Weiser’s new history “Yiddish Scholarship Comes to America: The YIVO Institute at 100.” After World War II a relocated and heartsick YIVO had to become a guardian of a nearly vanished culture, a rescuer of its texts and artifacts and an institution which could somehow make that culture meaningful to Jews who were rapidly shedding Yiddish and embracing a distinctly American, English-speaking identity–all simultaneously.

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Christian Tourists Buy West Bank Goods Protesting European Trade Restrictions

Christian Tourists Buy West Bank Goods Protesting European Trade Restrictions

Photo: Christians visiting a West Bank settlement during the International Christian Embassy’s annual conference. Courtesy International Christian Embassy

ICEJ visitors turned purchases into a show of solidarity as Ireland and the Netherlands enforce new restrictions, and Norway weighs a broader trade ban.

by Gabriel Colodro, Media Line, October 13, 2026

“This piece of legislation written by the Irish parliament shall not stand,” said Paul Coulter, national director of the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ) in Ireland, as he held up a copy of Ireland’s new law restricting imports from Israeli settlements. Then he tore the document up in front of the camera.

The gesture came during an ICEJ visit to Israeli communities in the West Bank, also known as Judea and Samaria, where Christian visitors traveled through Samaria, Gush Etzion and Efrat and were encouraged to shop at local businesses. The tour organized during ICEJ’s annual Feast of Tabernacles gathering in Jerusalem was intended as a direct response to a growing set of European measures restricting trade in products from Israeli settlements. Some of those measures are already in force; others are still just proposed legislation.

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From Sukkot to Artificial Intelligence: A Meeting with Students

From Sukkot to Artificial Intelligence: A Meeting with Students

Last week Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky visited the Martynas Mažvydas Pre-Gymnasium in Vilnius and held an open-format discussion with students there in a tent erected outside the school. The students and the chairwoman spent several hours in the sukka discussing Jewish life after the Holocaust and today, the importance Judaism places on learning, artificial intelligence and its influence on our opportunities, as well as a number of other topics.

We’d like to thank sincerely the teachers for their invitation to come and speak and for their attention to Jewish history and identity. Likewise we are grateful to the wonderful students for their interest, keen questions and the delicious latkes they served. True friendship begins when we have the courage to question, listen to and recognize one another.

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Sabbath Times

Sabbath Times

The Sabbath begins at 6:35 P.M. on Friday, October 9, and concludes at 7:26 P.M. on Saturday in the Vilnius region. Sabbath candles should be lit and prayers recited at 6:17 P.M. and completed before sunset at 6:35 P.M. Monday, October 12, is Columbus Day.

Sukkot Celebration in the Courtyard

Sukkot Celebration in the Courtyard

The Lithuanian Jewish Community celebrated Sukkot Thursday in the courtyard shared with the Litvak Identity Museum of the Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum in Vilnius. Cantor Shmuel Yaatom from the Choral Synagogue performed the prayers. A great big thank-you to all who came and made the event a success.

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Sukkot Celebration at the LJC

Sukkot Celebration at the LJC

There will be a joyful gathering for Sukkot in the courtyard of the Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Litvak Identity Museum of the Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum on Thursday at 5:00 P.M. Cantor Shmuel Yaatom is master of ceremonies. Registration is required by clicking here.

Come enjoy, sing and sample the hot food and drink in the sukka. All are invited. Entrance is free. Organized by the Art of Shabbat, Moishe House Vilnius, Cvi Parku“and the Pylimo 4 Café.

Time: 5:00 P.M., Thursday, October 1
Place: Pylimo street no. 4, Vilnius