Temple Sinai Adult Learning Schedule: February – May 2021 Upcoming Courses and Events (see page 6 for ongoing classes) • 12th Annual Jewish Poetry Festival Coordinator Deborah Leipziger Description Join us for an afternoon of poetry and community. Each year, we feature a Jewish poet and an open mic. This will be our 12th year and we are excited to announce that our guest will be poet and novelist Marge Piercy. We are looking forward to a wonderful afternoon. This event has become an important gathering for Jewish poets from throughout Massachusetts and New England. Larry Lowenthal will be the moderator. Date Sunday February 7, 2:00 pm Zoom link https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85090824369?pwd=UEN4eWZSeGgzQXNUN0dVZkhIWFowZz09 • Poems from the Prayer Book: an Exploration Instructor Jenny Barber Description Poems challenge us, delight us, and startle us into new thoughts. In this class, we will look closely at contemporary poems from the main prayer book we use at Temple Sinai, Mishkan T’filah: A Reform Siddur. As we read and discuss poems by Langston Hughes, Delmore Schwartz, Denise Levertov, Nelly Sachs, Yehuda Amichai, and Abraham Joshua Heschel, we will explore the ways that poetry simultaneously fulfills and subverts our expectations and we will deepen our understanding of poetic technique. You can download the poems in advance from this link. Dates 2 Sundays, February 21 & 28, 9:30 am – 10:50 am Zoom link https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85460562572?pwd=OCtEUEsvUExyVlVka1Y1SW9TZ0UyZz09 Bio Jenny Barber taught literature and creative writing at Suffolk University from 2004 to 2018. She has also taught at Wellesley College, Bradford College, the Harvard Extension School, and the Brookline Adult and Community Education Program. She is the founding editor of the literary journal Salamander, and her most recent collection of poems is Works on Paper (The Word Works, 2016). • Annual Cohon Lecture Instructor Rabbi Mark Sameth Description Our Cohon Lecturer this year will be Rabbi Mark Sameth, who will join us on Saturday, March 6, to co-lead our Shabbat morning community minyan. During the second half of the service Rabbi Sameth will lead and share a sermon/lecture/discussion. Date Saturday, March 6th, 9:30 am Zoom link Bio Named “one of America’s most inspiring rabbis” by The Forward (inaugural list, 2013), Rabbi Mark Sameth (he/him/his) is the author of The Name: A History of the Dual-Gendered Hebrew Name for God. Rabbi Sameth is featured in Jennifer Berne and R. O. Blechman’s God: 48 Famous and Fascinating Minds Talk about God. His interfaith work was the topic of a story in The New York Times. His essays appear in books published by Jossey Bass, Jewish Lights, CCAR Press, and New Paradigm Matrix, and in Reform Judaism Magazine, Journal of Jewish Education, and the CCAR Journal. Page 1 of 6 Temple Sinai Adult Learning Schedule: February – May 2021 • A Man of Clay: The Jewish folklore tradition of the Golem Instructor Karen Keely Description There are many wonderful Jewish European stories of the Golem, a humanoid figure created out of clay for the protection of a local Jewish community. The most famous legend is that Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel created the first Golem in Prague in the 16th century, but there are many such stories and later recreations. In some variations, the Golem is a Jew (although there is debate about whether he counts in a minyan), while in others he is more of a Shabbos goy. In most versions, the Golem protects Jews against antisemitic persecutors, but sometimes the rabbi loses control of the Golem who then becomes a danger to the Jewish community. In this two-part class, we will read together several short renditions of Golem tradition, including Y. L. Peretz’s 1893 Yiddish story of the same name.. Dates 2 Sundays, March 7 & 14, 1:00 pm – 2:30 pm Zoom link https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84667641275?pwd=eDk0ck9WaUJWYkxlcDNTOW5vOHd3QT09 Bio Temple Sinai member Dr. Karen A. Keely teaches English at Dana Hall School in Wellesley. She has a doctorate in English from the University of California, Los Angeles, and specializes in American literature and culture. • Erwin Schulhoff: The Profiling of an Artist - Target, Prisoner, and Ultimately a Victim of the Holocaust Instructor Mark Ludwig Description Erwin Schulhoff was one of the most versatile, dynamic and gifted of European composers and performers, and a virtuoso pianist; his repertoire included classical, jazz and even the extraordinarily difficult works for quarter-tone piano. His music, politics and ethnicity made him one of the great artistic targets of Nazi tyranny. Schulhoff is a study in the grave consequences of “political profiling” in support of a regime’s agenda of cleansing and genocide. Date Sunday March 14, 9:30 am – 10:50 am Zoom link https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87349331797?pwd=S013VGNaTC9NKzlQbE9JNDBFS3Nmdz09 Bio Temple member Mark Ludwig is a performance artist, activist and Holocaust scholar. He blends his musical and scholarly career with social causes, emphasizing issues of intolerance in the United States and Europe. He performs and lectures worldwide on Holocaust music and its history. A Fulbright scholar of the Terezín composers, Mark is the founding director of the Terezín Music Foundation (TMF), dedicated to documenting, preserving and advancing the resilience of the human spirit (www.terezinmusic.org) Page 2 of 6 Temple Sinai Adult Learning Schedule: February – May 2021 • Annual Passover Lecture: Returning to Egypt Instructor Dr. Joyce Zonana Description When the Jews left Egypt during the Exodus, they were told never to look back and never to return, yet a vibrant Jewish neighborhood was part of Cairo and there were other Jewish neighborhoods in the country. Most of us know nothing of modern Egyptian Jewry, which endured until their expulsion with the creation of the State of Israel. Dr. Zonana will take us back to Egypt where our history began and give us a look at the culture that once existed there. If there is time, she will introduce us to typical Passover foods that were used in the seder. There will be time for questions and answers. Date Sunday March 21, 10:30 am – Noon Zoom link Bio Joyce Zonana is a writer, literary translator, and professor emerita of English at the City University of New York. A MacDowell Fellow, she has received several translation awards, including the PEN/Heim Translation Fund Grant and the ALTA Emerging Translator Mentorship. She was born in Cairo, Egypt and raised in New York City and has lived in Philadelphia, San Francisco, Oklahoma, and New Orleans. Since 1985 she has taught writing and literature at various colleges and universities. Her memoir, “Dream Homes: From Cairo to Katrina, an Exile's Journey” grew out of her realization that all of her academic writing was really about herself, and is an attempt to give voice to the many parts of her complex identity. Dr. Zonana is the noted translator of “Malicroix” by Henri Basco and the newly published “A Land Like You” by Tobie Nathan and “The Beast and Other Tales” by Jouse d’Arboud." • Virtual Tours of Israel Instructor Uri Feinberg Description Following up on his Virtual Tour last fall (In the Footsteps of the Zionists), tour guide Uri Feinberg will present 2 more Virtual Tours: • The Second Temple Period • The Golan Heights Zoom link Dates 2 Sundays, March 21 (Second Temple) and May 9 (Golan Heights), 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm Bio Uri Feinberg has worked in Jewish education since 1995 and has been a licensed Tour Educator since 2000. His family emigrated to the US when he was 10. Uri grew up in Jerusalem, served in the IDF and traveled the world. He graduated from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 2004 with an MA in Contemporary Jewry. He also holds a BA in History and English Literature. Uri has guided teen trips in Israel, taught Jewish history at semester programs in Israel, and led a wide variety of tours. He was also the Director of Education at Temple Israel in Boston from 2007 – 2010. Currently he works for Da’at Educational Expeditions in Israel. Uri wants to share the power of the Land of Israel with others by uncovering layers of history and finding inspiration in the sites he visits and the people he visits with. Page 3 of 6 Temple Sinai Adult Learning Schedule: February – May 2021 • Surviving the Holocaust, Rebuilding Lives; Hope, Courage, and My Mother’s Diary Instructor Nora Abrahamer Description The Holocaust, now 75 years ago, is still very vivid for the few remaining survivors, and vicariously for their children. In this course Nora Abrahamer will share the personal experiences of her parents, Ada and Rafael Abrahamer, who lived through devastating years of incarceration and loss in the Krakow Ghetto, Schindler’s labor camp, Plaszow, Auschwitz and Siberian concentration camps. How did they survive and how did they rebuild their lives? One motivating force for Nora’s mother was writing her diary, to bear witness, risking her life daily to keep it safe, and then hoping to share it after the war. The original diary, considered a primary source document, is now permanently preserved at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum and available to researchers. Dates 2 Sundays, April 4 & 11, 9:30 am – 10:50 am Zoom link Bio Nora Abrahamer has been a Temple Sinai member since 2000 and is immediate past president of our congregation. Her parents’ Holocaust experiences and her mother’s diary have had an indelible and formative influence on her perspective, life choices, and Jewish journey. She looks forward to sharing these stories with the Temple Sinai community. • Reimagining Ruth: The Book of Ruth in English and American Culture From 1800 - Today Instructor Professor Sarah Gracombe Dates 2 Sundays, April 25 & May 2, 1:00 pm – 2:30 pm Zoom link Bio Since earning her Ph.D.