photo © 2015 Egidijus Jankauskas

The Klaipėda newspaper Vakarų Ekspresas reports the city mayor and representatives of the Chabad Lubavitch movement in the Lithuanian port city held a ceremony on central Lietuvninkų square to light the first Hanukkah lamp on the menorah erected there.

Full story and photo gallery here.

Members of the Kaunas Jewish Community gathered on the afternoon of the first Sunday of December, 2015, at the cafe and music club Punto Jazz to light the first Hanukkah candle and celebrate the start of this eight-day holiday of light and miracles. One of the most senior and most active members of the Community, Šmuelis Šragė, was supposed to light the first candle, but he unexpectedly left us just a week before Hanukkah. His widow Basia Šragienė was called upon by her sons to light the first candle in his place. Despite the somber circumstances, participants managed to have fun at the event, aided by guests from Vilnius Michail Jablonskij and Leonard Zenkevič, musicians from the Fayerlakh musical ensemble. There was a latke-eating contests for the men and a doughnut-eating contest for the women, and a general quiz to test the participants’ knowledge of Hanukkah. Rabbi Efraim Piryampolski and his family who currently live in Kaunas attended and the rabbi addressed the participants. Their visit pleasantly surprised the audience and added spiritually to the Community’s holiday gathering.

Snapshots here:
http://www.lzb.lt/kauno-zydu-bendruomene-uzdega-pirmaja-chanukos-zvake/

On December 6 the Lithuanian Jewish Community gathered at the Choral Synagogue in Vilnius to light the first Hanukkah candle and enjoy some treats. Israel’s ambassador to Lithuania Amir Maimon and all embassy staff were there, as well as Israel’s honorary consul V. Bumelis and many other honored guests. Rabbi Izakson greeted the assembly. Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky lit the first candle and ambassador Maimon lit the second. Traditional Jewish music was played.

Photographs by Milda Rūkaitė
Facebook photo album here.

RCA resolution on female ordination ‘political and unfortunate,’ says Riskin.

“I believe the resolution they made wasn’t halachic as much as it was political,” the rabbi said.

Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, the chief rabbi of Efrat and one of the most prominent leaders of modern Orthodoxy, has criticized a recent resolution adopted by the Rabbinical Council of America that banned its member rabbis from giving any form of ordination to women or hiring women in a role of religious or spiritual leadership.

The RCA resolution said its members may not “ordain women into the rabbinate, regardless of the title used,” or “hire, or ratify the hiring of, a woman into a rabbinic position at an Orthodox institution.”

It appeared to be mostly aimed at institutions associated with the liberal-Orthodox movement loosely defined as Open Orthodoxy, including Yeshivat Maharat in Riverdale, New York, founded by Rabbi Avi Weiss, which gives ordination to women to serve as spiritual guides and to give rulings in Jewish law, or Halacha.

Riskin, along with other rabbis in Israel, is himself an RCA member and oversees the Susi Bradfield Women’s Institute for Halachic Leadership (WIHL) at Midreshet Lindenbaum in Jerusalem, which gives women a qualification that amounts to ordination, although it is not labeled as such.

The World Jewish Congress website reports Pope Francis, the head of the Catholic Church, has issued a strong condemnation of anti-Semitism as he met with over a hundred leaders of the WJC Wednesday. During a private audience in the morning with WJC president Ronald S. Lauder, Francis made it clear that outright attacks against Israel’s existence is a form of anti-Semitism.

“To attack Jews is anti-Semitism, but an outright attack on the State of Israel is also anti-Semitism. There may be political disagreements between governments and on political issues, but the State of Israel has every right to exist in safety and prosperity,” Pope Francis told Lauder and the delegation.

Jews and Catholics today marked the anniversary of the 1965 declaration Nostra Aetate, which condemned anti-Semitism and improved and completely transformed relations between Jews and Catholics.

VILNIUS, Oct 05, BNS – Six synagogues across Lithuania have been listed as cultural objects protected by the state.

Under a decree signed by the minister of culture, state protection was granted to synagogue complexes in Lygumos (the Pakruojis district), Alytus, Cekiske (the Kaunas district), Kaunas, Alanta (the Ukmerge district) and Kurkliai (the Anyksciai district). The synagogues are protected due to architectural and sacral features.

The Festival of Sukkot (Sukkos in Ashkenazic Hebrew) begins on Tishri 15, the fifth day after Yom Kippur, or starting on the evening of September 27 this year. It is a drastic transition from one of the most solemn holidays in the Jewish year to one of the most joyous. Sukkot is such a happy holiday that it is commonly referred to in Jewish prayer and literature as Z’man Simchateinu, the Season of our Rejoicing.

Sukkot is the last of the Shalosh R’galim (three pilgrimage festivals). Like Passover and Shavu’ot, Sukkot has a dual significance as both historical and agricultural. Historically, Sukkot commemorates the forty-year period during which the children of Israel were wandering in the desert, living in temporary shelters. Agriculturally, Sukkot is a harvest festival and is sometimes referred to as Chag Ha-Asif, the Festival of Ingathering.

The word “Sukkot” means “booths,” and refers to the temporary dwellings in which Jews are commanded to dwell during this holiday, in memory of the period of wandering. The name of the holiday is frequently translated “Feast of Tabernacles,” which, like many translations of Jewish terms, isn’t very useful. This translation is particularly misleading, because the word “tabernacle” in the Bible refers to the portable Sanctuary in the desert, a precursor to the Temple, called in Hebrew “mishkan.” The Hebrew word “sukkah” (plural: “sukkot”) refers to the temporary booths that people lived in, not to the Tabernacle.

Sukkot lasts for seven days. The two days following the festival, Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah, are separate holidays but are related to Sukkot and are commonly thought of as part of Sukkot.

The festival of Sukkot is instituted in Leviticus 23:33 et seq. No work is permitted on the first and second days of the holiday. (See Extra Day of Holidays for an explanation of why the Bible says one day but we observe two). Work is permitted on the remaining days. These intermediate days on which work is permitted are referred to as Chol haMo’ed, as are the intermediate days of Passover.

You will dwell in booths for seven days; all natives of Israel shall dwell in booths. -Leviticus 23:42

In honor of the holiday’s historical significance, Jews are commanded to dwell in temporary shelters as their ancestors did in the wilderness. The temporary shelter is referred to as a sukkah (which is the singular form of the plural word “sukkot”).

The sukkah is great fun for the children. Building the sukkah each year satisfies the common childhood fantasy of building a fort, and dwelling in the sukkah satisfies a child’s desire to camp out in the backyard. The commandment to “dwell” in a sukkah can be fulfilled by simply eating all of one’s meals there; however, if the weather, climate, and one’s health permit, one should spend as much time in the sukkah as possible, including sleeping in it.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community would like to inform you that the Jewish organization Yachad is not connected with the Lithuanian Jewish Community, the Vilnius Jewish Religious Community of the Lithuanian Jewish Religious Association. On the organization’s webpage, they say they invited everyone who so desires, without regard to ethnicity, belief or place of residence, to become members and participate in Jewish religious life. The Lithuanian Jewish Community does not support this invitation and does not support the establishment of this organization because we believe it violates the principles of Judaism. This organization seeks to establish itself in the Choral Synagogue in Vilnius, although no permission has been given for this.

We would like to remind them the synagogue is the property of the Vilnius Religious Jewish Community.