Sinai Stories

Richard and I joined Temple Sinai about 30 years ago, moving from another congregation in the area, primarily because we were drawn to Rabbi Lipman as an intellectual and spiritual leader. Our sons had
already celebrated their Bar Mitzvahs and Confirmations so there was no chance of our becoming involved in and meeting people through the religious school. At the time we knew only two couples who were
members, one of whom invited us to join Kallah Chai. What a gift that invitation has been!

Today – 30 years later – we consider this small group our central temple community and in many ways part of our extended family. We do everything possible to be free for our meetings held on the third Sunday
of the month (except when it changes!) when we engage in provocative discussions on topics that have ranged over the years from Torah study to Jews in the arts to finding spirituality — a perpetual search for “Kallah Chai-niks,” as we call ourselves. We celebrate holidays, and happy family events together and provide comfort and support to each other during illnesses and at times of mourning.

While I feel part of several “communities” at the temple – as a board member, as a member of the most recent B’nai Mitzvah class and as a participant in the WRJ retreat -the members of Kallah Chai remain my core community.

-Elaine Binder

Ten years ago when my wife Kathryn and I joined Temple Sinai, I would have said that the chances that by 2014 Temple Sinai would be at the core of our lives, and that I would be serving my second term on
the Temple Board of Trustees, were only slightly greater than the chances that we move to an Ashram in Vermont or to Kathryn’s home state of Texas where I would study to be a rodeo clown. I grew up in a virtually agnostic family; Kathryn is not Jewish (although we decided to raise our boys Jewish); and I never considered myself to be in any way religious or spiritual.

Yet, I knew for many years that I had a longing to explore Judaism and spirituality. Temple Sinai has given me that opportunity, and, at the same time, has provided me and my family with a community that I now cannot imagine living without.

This journey began with a simple question that I posed to Rabbi Fred Reiner ten years ago at a cocktail party to welcome new members: “what is the best way of getting integrated into the Temple community?” Rabbi Reiner offered a simple answer: “volunteer to get involved in something that interests you.”

This opportunity presented itself several months later at a meeting for parents of new students in the Religious School. Then-Chair of the Religious School Committee Rosann Wisman spoke, and encouraged parents to sign up to volunteer to assist with a variety of Religious School activities and programs. I filled out the form, and, at the end of the meeting, introduced myself to Rosann. I told her that I was interested in serving on the Religious School Committee. Slightly surprised (I think), but unfazed, Rosann encouraged me to attend the first meeting, and told me that the makeup of the committee would then be solidified.

So I attended the first meeting, and then the second, and then the third, having decided to just keep attending until Rosann told me to stop. The meetings were great: I found the committee members to be thoughtful, smart, and extremely dedicated to doing whatever they could to make the school as good as it could be. But perhaps more than anything I enjoyed the opportunity to get to know members of the temple that until then I’d had no contact with, and to begin to feel – just a bit – the sense of community that was a large part of what I was hoping to find at Temple Sinai.

I ultimately solidified my position on the committee, and extended the path that I had found myself on by volunteering to assist Rosann in preparing and presenting to others the Religious School budget: a job for which I was utterly unqualified, but which Rosann and I muddled through together, and bonded in the process.

Since then, I have worked with fellow lay leaders on a number of task forces and committees; I have ushered at services; I have sold coffee and bagels at the Kesher Café; and I have been just one of the many foot-soldiers who keep Temple Sinai working, and growing, and thriving. It has sometimes been challenging to balance my legal career, family, and work on behalf of the Temple and each has sometimes paid a price in the process.

However, what I have gotten from my investment of time and energy on behalf of the temple has been infinitely greater than I have given. Through this investment I have discovered a community in which I have close friends, including among the clergy and other lay leaders, and a place where, more than anywhere in the world other than our home, I have come to feel is a place of welcome, of comfort and, indeed, a place of sanctuary. And it all started, ten years ago, with a simple question, and the simple act of getting involved.

-Ed Schwartz

I’d never heard it before: someone singing the Torah. A woman, no less! I didn’t know chanting existed, had never heard of trope. It was mysterious and beautiful. It was awesome. But this story isn’t really about chanting Torah. It’s about singing at Temple Sinai.

My husband Sherm Edwards and I had joined the synagogue when it became time to give our young children a religious orientation. Years later, with the children launched, we considered joining the choir. For us, it was an empty nest move. It also provided an answer to our lessened sense of connection to the synagogue once our children were no longer “bringing us” there for Religious School. A key to our decision: no audition. While both of us had played instruments as children, neither of us is trained in voice. Not only that, the High Holy Day music fills several binders. It’s daunting. But we were warmly welcomed into the choir, and assured we would eventually get it—after a few years! And so it has proven true. We mostly know the music, six or seven years into it. And I now sit next to that very same “chantress,” Nelly Urbach, whose voice had long ago drawn me in.

Rehearsing with the choir as the holidays approach instills in us a sense of preparing for the Days of Awe. It has increased the spirituality of the season for both of us. Rehearsals are hard work, but we are carried along by a wonderful camaraderie and good laughs. We love hearing the beautiful voices of our fellow choir members. And when I attend services at any other time of the year, I have the pleasure of knowing many more of the songs.

In addition to the High Holy Days, the choir sings at Shabbat Shira and other special events. Recently, we joined choirs from 22 metro area congregations to commemorate Kristallnacht at Strathmore Hall. Singing in the choir at Temple Sinai is one of the best kept secrets. To my mind, it’s the very best way to experience the High Holy Days, and a wonderful way to be part of Temple Sinai.

-Melinda Salzman

In 2008, my older brother died after several years of illness. A close friend, a temple member, asked if I would be sitting Shiva. I was initially taken aback at the suggestion. Although my wife, children, and I had long been members of the temple, I was not then Jewish and my deceased brother wasn’t either. Wasn’t a goy sitting Shiva for a deceased goy somehow, well, inappropriate?

A practical consideration then began to sway me. Because the funeral would be out of town, none of my local friends would be in attendance, and so it would be convenient–”nice,” I thought–to have a local opportunity to see them and take comfort from them. I talked with Rabbi Portnoy, and she assured me that there would be nothing inappropriate about it, and so I decided to do it. Rabbi Portnoy came to the house, and conducted a Shiva service with 30 or so of our close friends, many of whom were temple members.

“Nice” turned out to be a far too inadequate word. As Rabbi Portnoy led my family, friends, and me in the blessings and the prayers, I felt comfort and solace. The service was warm, supportive and moving. Sharing my grief lifted my sense of loss. Perhaps the most remarkable thing was that I drew this comfort from a ritual that was not part of my personal tradition. But it resonated with me nonetheless, and it was exactly what I needed at that time.

From this experience, I learned that the purpose of sitting Shiva is not to provide some kind of testimonial to the Jewishness of the deceased or his survivors–obviously inapplicable in my situation. It is rather the exercise of a lesson learned over the centuries, that what a mourner needs most of all is the collective strength of a congregation through a ceremony by which, through shared participation, the members reassure the mourner that we feel your loss, we share your pain, we are here for you. It is a precious gift.

Although my Shiva experience would have stood on its own in life, it was, in fact, a key factor in a decision that I had been contemplating for some time. Shortly thereafter, I converted to Judaism, and this past summer, I became a Bar Mitzvah.

-Bob Loesche

R. Yochanan ben Zakkai, known for his powers to heal, got sick one day. R. Hanina visited him, held out his hand, and R. ben Zakkai stood up. A student asked why, if R. ben Zakkai was such a great healer, he couldn’t heal himself. The Rabbi answered with the metaphor: “Because the prisoner cannot free himself from prison.” Babylonian Talmud, Berakoth 5 One month after celebrating my Bat Mitzvah with my Temple Sinai Dibrot class I suffered a unexpected heart attack. The shock of it, the fear and confusion of living in a formerly fit, now weakened body, and the emotional isolation were all there, and very overwhelming. Also there were my classmates—visiting, feeding, shopping, driving, even gardening for me. And the clergy. They were all my R. Hanina. Judaism views illness as a spiritual teacher and community as the comforting, compassionate healing presence of the other and this was undoubtedly my experience, not only then but again and again with other related medical situations. The Sisterhood, the clergy, the staff and lay leadership, and always the Dibrot. This is what Temple Sinai has come to mean to me – a wise, thoughtful, caring, compassionate community.

-Marcie Solomon