a time and a place

About six weeks ago, at our first Saturday morning service in our new building, one KT member voiced a unique and resonant concern. Without multi-stall bathrooms, where will the teens hangout? I laughed out loud. She was only half-kidding. A significant motivating factor to move to a building of our own was the need for accessible, clean, functional, single stall bathrooms. Despite knowing that all change involves loss, it had never occurred to me that there was in fact any loss this particular change.

In an instant, her question transported me back to my own childhood synagogue memories. I remember the deep red carpet in the low-lit vestibule outside the bathrooms, where women sat on stools that swiveled to put on makeup and tweens waited for them to leave so they could exchange first kisses.

Some of my most formative memories of being Jewish took place in my childhood synagogue. Hebrew school twice a week, youth group meetings, Shabbat dinners, B’nei Mitzvah parties, Purim carnivals and the list goes on. It was a place I felt comfortable. I loved to discover the secret staircases that connected one corner to another, probably the result of different generations' attempts to update and expand the building. More than sermons or prayers, what I remember of synagogue is how I felt in the building. 

To this day, decades later, these memories remain vivid and sweet. I remember playing hide and seek in the coat closet, burying myself in mink coats and wool top hats, checking the aisles to be sure services had not let out. I remember fogging up the glass case in the Judaica shop, waiting as the notably gay member showed the latest broach or mezuzah to my father, who can’t refuse a chance to shop for jewelry. And I remember many moments spent staring at the yahrzeit wall in the chapel, rows and rows of names with little lights beside them. Who were these people and who turned on and off the lights? I would read the names, trying to render these Jewish ancestors fluent on my tongue. 

For me, being Jewish has always been visceral, a felt-sense of knowing in my body. We know from the many chapters in Exodus that detail the building of the mishkan, that the contours of the places we gather greatly impact our experience of the sacred. But we also know that so much of what is sacred is invisible, ineffable, intangible. 

So how important is the physical plant? 

Rabbi Michelle pointed me to the commentary of R. Isaac Abravanel (15th cent. Spain) on Exodus 25:8 where he asks,

“Why did The Holy One command the building of the mishkan, when The Holy One said "that I may dwell among them," as if The Holy One were an object demarcated and limited in space — which is the opposite of the truth!... After all, The Holy One spoke these words through the prophet Isaiah (66:1): "The heavens are my throne, and the earth is my footstool; what kind of house can you build for me?"

This suggests that space is only one axis of our experience. Our ability to access the Divine is also about dedicating the time to do so. It is fitting then that this week’s parsha, Emor, includes within the Jewish sacred calendar. It is where we learn how and when to mark sacred time in space together. 

Leviticus 23:4 reads, 
אֵ֚לֶּה מוֹעֲדֵ֣י יְהֹוָ֔ה מִקְרָאֵ֖י קֹ֑דֶשׁ אֲשֶׁר־תִּקְרְא֥וּ אֹתָ֖ם בְּמוֹעֲדָֽם׃

“These are the set times of יהוה, the sacred occasions, which you shall celebrate each at its appointed time.”

These words are not just a preamble to the holidays in Torah, but they are placed in our festival liturgy, and we sing them before reciting Kiddush on festival mornings. 

The answer to both mine and Abravanel’s question is both/and. We need both a time and a place to cultivate holiness in our lives. We are a community bound together across time and space; across generations and time zones. 

For the first time in the life of Kol Tzedek, and the first time in 40 years in West Philadelphia we have the opportunity to access the Divine in the nooks and crannies of our own synagogue. I can already tell you the coat closet isn’t as big as the suburban shul I grew up in, but it does have a sacred back recess that I think would make a great hiding spot. 

Now we have a sanctuary in the cloud and a sanctuary on Whitby Ave, holy places to observe our sacred calendar together. Knowing how much of Judaism is transmitted in the act of being together, it is precious to have a place we can gather to learn, connect and reveal the Torah of our times.