Shabbat

Story by Jessica Goldstein This week brought another beautiful, bright Shabbat celebration. After the prayers were said and the candles lit, everyone was eager to share highlights from their week. Rachel shared that she enjoyed being home with her housemates. Daniel is looking forward to New Year’s Eve and planning to stay up late. Kevin is looking forward to going to see his family for Christmas. In this week’s torah portion, Vayigash Joseph reveals his identity to his brothers. They are worried that the shock of hearing their brother is alive and well to Jacob (who is now 130 years old) might kill him. They break the news to him gently and he is overjoyed. He asks G-d for permission […]

Story by Jessica Goldstein This week has been wonderful. There were Zoom celebrations to light the candles each night of Hanukkah. We learned that the word in Hebrew for candle is “Ner”.   The tables were decorated for Hanukkah this week and we learned YouTube is a great resource for learning how to prepare latkes! Everyone has really been enjoying the latkes this week with applesauce and sour cream. Rachel explained that the holiday is the festival of lights. Ralph shared that Hanukkah is time to celebrate miracles. He believes that the universe will have many more miracles if we all remember to be kind to one another. Stacy C. said that in order to receive kindness and respect, you have […]

Story by Jessica Goldstein  Shabbat this week began with a song celebrating Thanksgiving and sharing about how everyone celebrated the holiday with family and friends and the foods they liked the best. Together, everyone performed the blessing over the candles. Mark chanted the blessing over the grape juice and the challah. The portion this week “Vayeshev” is one of the most well-known. Andrew Lloyd Weber even made a musical about it!  Jacob upsets his sons when he favors Joseph. Joseph begins to have very vivid dreams where he sees himself ruling over his brothers. These dreams upset his brothers even more and they leave him in a pit and sell Joseph into slavery.  After some time, Joseph is imprisoned in […]

We welcomed the Sabbath together by covering our eyes and saying the blessing over the candles. Mark recited the Kiddusha, the blessing over the fruit of the vine. Todd performed the Hamotzi¸ the blessing over the Challah. There was a lot to catch up on this week. Stacy N. shared that she is so excited to be flying to Florida for Thanksgiving. Todd had an exciting expedition this week when the rabbi from Chabad took him to see the oldest synagogue in Newark. Todd shared how much he enjoyed seeing the historic building as well as his time with the Rabbi. Toda (thank you!) Rabbi for a very special day. Stacy C. talked about how much she loves her job […]