Dear Friends,

Shavua Tov! Yesterday, Oct. 20th, we read Parashat "Lech Lecha". Our sidra opens the second part of the Book of Genesis (chapters 12-36), where we find the stories of our ancestors, Abraham-Sarah, Itzhak-Rivkah, Yaacov-Rachel and the founders of our Tradition. The commandment "Lech Lecha" (="Go! Begin Your Journey") is very deep and is addressed to every one of us today, as individuals and as a community.

Last Friday morning 300 people filled our synagogue, among them 70 second graders from the "Reali" School who "Received the Torah" (see attached picture). It is a "new tradition" that takes place at every public school in Israel. It marks a step between the Baby Naming/Brit Mila ceremony at birth and the bar/bat mitzvah at adolescence when the teenager has an aliyah to the Torah. This ceremony is named in Hebrew "Kabalat Sefer Torah" and usually takes place at the teenagers' own schools; but in recent years we have established a strong relationship with several public schools in Haifa and as a result of that, for thousands of children this is not only a school ceremony but is also connected to our synagogue life and to our community. Also this year, hundreds of second graders in Haifa will celebrate this Jewish ceremony at our sanctuary. We know that many of these children will celebrate their bar and bat mitzvah at Or Hadash in six years from now.

A different Awraham joined us for Kabalat Shabbat on Oct. 19. It was Rabbi Awraham Soetendorp from Holland, currently President of the Jewish Institute for Human Values. Rabbi Soetendorp and I have been friends for the past 15 years. Choosing Or Hadash among all the Progressive congregations in Israel, as the synagogue in which he gives his last sermon before retiring from the active rabbinate, is a great honor for us. We cherish his manner of identifying with Reform Judaism in Israel. Awraham filled many roles leading the Liberal Rabbinate in Europe and he is very active with the WUPJ.

Next Friday, Oct. 26th, a group of 30 friends from Westminster Synagogue in London under the leadership of Rabbi Thomas Salamon will visit Or Hadash. It is a well known synagogue because they have already given Torah scrolls that "survived" the Holocaust (from Czechoslovakia) to almost 1,200 synagogues over the world. Or Hadash is one of the only Reform synagogues in Israel that received a Czeck Memorial Torah Scroll (No. 978). Our scroll was sent from London to Israel in 1964 along with 50 other Torah scrolls. Ours is the only one that was sent then to an Israeli Reform Synagogue. We were fortunate to have received it because the Minister of Religion in 1964 refused many times to hand it to us. This Friday we will have a "Historical Reconstruction" of Receiving Our Torah Scroll, when the actual President of Westminster Synagogue will re-give the Torah to the Or Hadash Chairman, Dr. Yuri Kligerman. It is the same Torah that was the center of the ceremony for second grade children who receive the Torah, it will be the renewed connection (after 43 years) between Or Hadash and our friends in London.

Wishing you a good week from Haifa.

Edgar