Twenty-five teens gathered from five cities for the most recent Asian Progressive Judaism (APJ) Teen Leadership weekend, held in Singapore from 11-13th May. Communities in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Bali and Jakarta were all represented by their young people, accompanied by their rabbis and lay leadership. The group were treated to a tour of Jewish […]
More than 30 years ago, modern Reform Jewish life began in the Former Soviet Union. Since then, the Reform Movement has flourished, establishing strong roots in the FSU and offering a wide variety of activity in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and the Baltic States. The more than 40 WUPJ-associated congregations in the FSU receive professional staff […]
More than 350 delegates from 28 countries assembled in the beautiful city of Prague to celebrate the Biennial Conference of the European Union for Progressive Judaism (EUPJ). Beginning on Thursday 26th April, an opening ceremony was held in the Smetana Hall within the Municipal House and included welcoming messages from the President of the Jewish […]
On March 18, more than 200 members of the Jewish communities as well as representatives of Christian congregations, non-governmental organizations, diplomats, schoolchildren, students, foreign visitors and residents of Grodno gathered at “March of Remembrence” in Grodno to honor the memory of Grodno ghetto demolition that happened 75 years ago. The event began with prayer led […]
This Torah portion is known for its story of the Golden Calf, built when Moshe failed to return from the mountain on exactly the 40th day as expected. The people panicked, thought Moshe was dead, and that God had abandoned them. Aaron, ever the peace-lover, reasoned that the people needed a visible symbolic representation of God to reassure them. The People were not denying the God of the first commandment, but rather broke the second commandment prohibiting the building of idols. When Moshe returned with the tablets, he was indignant and smashed the tablets to show that the covenant between God and the Children of Israel had been shattered.
Twenty representatives of six Asian Progressive communities met in Hong Kong in late January for the 2018 Asian Progressive Jewish Summit, and were joined by World Union leaders Carole Sterling, Chair, and Rabbi Daniel H. Freelander, President. Delegates from Shanghai, Singapore, Myanmar, Bali, Tokyo and Hong Kong were joined by Rabbi Fred Morgan, Regional Rabbi […]
(in alphabetical order) Suzanne Anderson | Great Britain I grew up in North London and now live in Sussex. I got married in 2016 and live with my husband on the South Coast of England by the seaside. I am a Qualified Social Worker and my career has specialised in mental health and criminal justice. My role current […]
2017 was a significant for Netzer Olami. As a movement that’s been actively engaging youth in Reform Judaism and Zionism for more than thirty years, our snifim are reporting growth and vibrancy in responding to the changes taking place across the Jewish world. Read our annual review here.
The role of the WUPJ representative at the UN is to share the international take on Judaism. Due to progressive Judaism’s ever changing involvement in relation to social justice, the representative is held responsible to report the efforts made by the WUPJ that relate to the social justice efforts in the respective UN committees. The WUPJ serves as the only Jewish voice on some committees the representative sits on and on others, the only progressive Jewish voice. It is considered one of the main contributors to religious freedom around the world.
It is reasonable to assume that no one reading our weekly Torah portion, Vayeshev, will consider these innocuous lines of Torah to be of any particular importance. Coming as they do inside the dramatic first part of the Joseph story, the narrative which will continue until the end of the Book of Genesis, there seems no reason to take special note of this rather curious mention of “a man” meeting Joseph on his way to find his brothers and giving Joseph directions. Rather, the camera is fixed on Joseph, the major protagonist of the narrative, whose tragic life story begins to unfold in our Parasha. Tension mounts as we read about Joseph’s narcissistic dreams, his visions of grandeur, his preferential status in his father’s eyes and his antagonistic relationship with his brothers ending in his being sold into slavery and his eventual imprisonment in Egypt. With all these action scenes to cover in the Parasha, who would possibly pay attention to the few lines describing “the man” giving directions to Joseph.