 Okay, we're back. We're live. I'm Jay Fidel. This is Think Tech Community Matters here at a given Monday morning And we are joined by Rabbi Itchel Krasnjensky of Chabad of Hawaii Welcome to the show Rabbi. Nice to have you here. Good morning Jay. It's my pleasure as always. Nice to be here You look so ethereal, you know The zoom makes you look pretty good. You look like a real a real ethereal rabbi rabbi I mean the whole the goal is to look that way in real life Well, you look that way in real life, too Yeah, so I wanted to talk to you about an article which is in Haaretz this morning a piece by a rabbi in New Jersey where he said that all this virtual communication virtual prayer meetings, virtual, you know, congregational meetings of Jewish temples in Israel and the US and probably everywhere It's not good for Judaism because Judaism is a Judaism is a touchy-feely kind of religion. You got to be together the whole notion of a minion the whole notion of You know enjoying the company of the other members of the of the congregation It's a problem and he said, you know, this this works for a while It's a it's a blush thing, but after a while it's going to be damaging to the religion. What do you think about that? Well, I think that's true. You know, it's the it's the discussion That didn't just begin now Discussion of you know people who live online as opposed to people who are out there and interacting with people You know people on Facebook have lots of friends, but in real life don't So I think ultimately life is meant to be lived in real Real-time interacting with people like you say touch touchy-feely and this interaction with people Is really what gets us going sparks It sparks You know reaction within us That's that's the basis of all society and you know, it's interesting In the Hebrew language the word for City like a city the postal village in Hebrew the word is ear In English you would spell it I Why are here? now and In Hebrew also, you know, I don't remember. I don't know the exact term for the study of words You know, what are the meaning of words and how the words how the words come to mean what they mean? But the root of the word city ear It is very similar to the words in Hebrew. I are I are means. I'm sorry air Air means to be awake and alive So in a city when you have the multitude of people into the multitude multitude of people interacting with one another Then you become alive You know all revolutions Happen in big cities very seldom do they happen in you know in suburbia Where everyone is into their you know and cost it in there, you know in their home, so Obviously long-term even in Jewish law in Halacha and Jewish law We need to have a congregation in order For many many things most basic is like you mentioned a minion a Quorum in order to say the prayers to say the Khabish. We have a quorum and a virtual quorum Halakley is not Considered the quorum so you couldn't say Khabish on the zoom through zoom by gathering ten people or a hundred people They can you can you tell people what a Khabish is? Yes Khabish is the mourner's prayer that That you say for those who have passed away in Jewish tradition for the first 11 months after someone passed away a family member of parents or I'm really a parent You say the special prayer which is which begins with the words you scud all these guys are she made up of May God's name be Magnified and enlarged. It's primarily a prayer of praise to God and The explanation has given why it doesn't even mention A Depth in this prayer of Khabish, but when a person comes Confronts debt comes face-to-face to death then the real big the only consolation is Is is recognizing that God? Who's the who's script everything this world gives us life and decides when you know when one moves on to the other world So that's the prayer of Khabish and that prayer requires a million ten people now What's interesting was done practically, you know, even like in New York, I know because I'm from New York I talked to the folks back home People gathered together people from the same block come out on their porches You know every house has a porch That's how they build the houses in Brooklyn. I'm not sure. I'm sure in Queens Similar to that people stand on their porches. So they're more than six feet apart As long as you can see each other and hear each other That constitutes a quorum. You don't have to be in close proximity For a minion to happen. So that's how they do it. But but it has to be real time. It cannot be virtual Having said that I think that the fact that we have this opportunity when everything is shut down No, we can't gather together. We will cannot gather together In real in real time So this is a blessing that we can talk and people can stay together people families and There is more learning studying Torah going on today through zoom as As a result of everything that's happening more than any other time and people just plug in and they study and It's actually fantastic. Yeah, but as this rabbi in New Jersey says It's more than just a study and you you pass a culture down by by being close to people and you Freewheeling conversations with them and You ask them questions that are sort of personal and you get answers that are that are sort of profound at the moment and This is another part of education another part of a Culturation and and so forth. So I'm coming up the later this month rabbi We have shavu shavu. Oh, now when I was a kid, we pronounced it shavu. Oh, just like we pronounced the Sabbath Shabbos Shabbos, then I guess that's the Ashkenazic trend Way of saying it but there's there's There's also the Sephardic way of saying it and that that would be a shabbat and it would be Shuat to what? What's the difference? How did this happen? Well, that's interesting, you know, biblically Jewish people were divided by a tribe Our forefather Jacob had 12 children and they formed the 12 tribes of Israel the children had families and large families and all throughout their all throughout their Their being in Egypt and traveling in the desert for 40 years the Jewish people were Were identified by the tribes even till today You have a Kohane and the Levite and the Israelite The Kohane and the Levi the Kohane and the Levite are from the tribe of Levi Levi That during the times of the temple would serve in the temple They would bring the sacrifices and service in the temple. So any descendants of the tribe any person who's a descendant of the tribe of Levi Levi is a Kohane or a Levi and On the Sabbath or the holidays when we take out the Torah scroll of the week in the Torah scroll the first Honor is given to the Kohane The Kohane Aliya get called up to the Torah. So we still have that Now as you know Your name can be Kohane and that would signify you come from a lineage of Kohane And your name can be Levy and that would signify you come from the lineage of Levy but but But you don't have to be named Kohane to be a Kohane and you don't have to be named Levi Levi to be a Levi to be Levi So for example, but there are names that are That you know that are more associated with a coin or a Levy. So for example the name family name Sego or Sego, which is a common name Jewish common name in Hebrew is an abbreviation for Segan Levi So which means the Levy which was an assistant does the role of the Levy was to be An assistant to the Kohane. So someone's name is Sego Very often they are in the tribe of Levy So but then as you as you as we go through history during the time of the first temple The Babylonian king and he exiled when he destroyed the first temple in the book of Nessar We just destroyed the first temple Prior to destroying the first temple. He exiled the 10th 10 of the 12 tribes were exiled from Israel and And that is quote-unquote the lost 10 tribes What was left are the tribe of Judah and Benjamin that's why the Jewish people were are called Judeans in Hebrew, Yehudi because we are Jews today are descendants primarily from the tribe of Judah and Benjamin But then later on after the destruction of the second temple when the Jews were Exiled from Israel again and this time they were scattered throughout the nations of the world So many Jews went to the Middle Eastern countries ended up in the Middle Eastern countries Iraq Iran Morocco places like that and many Jews Went to Europe, but countries like Spain Iberia But many other Jews found their way to Germany and those Eastern European countries so Ashkenaz in Hebrew is Germany so the descendants of German Jews or And it's satellite countries Eastern Europe are called Ashkenazic Jews Safar is the Hebrew word for Spain So the Jews coming from Spain and the Middle Eastern countries are called Sphardic Jews and Today because we don't know what tribe work from So Jews are generally divided between Ashkenazic and Sphardic Jews We have different ways of pronouncing pronouncing the Hebrew Letters, like you said either Shabbos the Ashkenazic way or Shabbat the Sphardic way But what's interesting is modern Hebrew in the land of Israel one of the great miracles of the land of Israel is that the Hebrew language which was dead The 2,000 years when the Jews were exiled in every country of the world and spoke the language of their respective host countries and very few people spoke Hebrew. It wasn't it wasn't a Language that people spoke with the creation of Israel. It's become a Spoken language and that is the official language of the state of Israel anyone who is from Israel speaks English speaks Hebrew. By the way as I read somewhere, which is it's unprecedented that a language should be dead for 2,000 years and then to Spring to life and become the official language of a country. There's no other language Right and everybody in Israel is so articulate in it and it's quite amazing But you know, you don't mind if I ask you now we don't have that much time left What about the Shavuels? What is it? It's a holiday at the end of as I recall the end of May It's 50 days after Passover. I'm not sure why the 50 days And it's not it's not a high holiday, but it is an important holiday. Can you talk about it? Yes so Shavuels in Hebrew means weeks And Why is it called weeks because the Torah says doesn't the Bible that seven weeks after the Jews people left Egypt? They were meant to bring a sacrifice and offering in the temple and to celebrate the holiday So the holiday is called Shavuels but the main thing that happened on the holiday of Shavuels is that we received the Torah the Ten Commandments Moses came down from Mount China with the Ten Commandments And that happened on the holiday of Shavuels So basically in the Torah, there are three biblical holidays The first one is Passover the second one is Shavuels and Shavuels in English is called Pentecost I think which means 50 and Then you have the festival of Silke's the Feast of the Tabernacles and There's a there's a rhyme and a theme Of all these holidays on Passover we celebrate our freedom right the Jewish people while they were in Egypt were enslaved and Moses led the Jewish people out of Egypt God took us out of Egypt and made us into a free nation of three people But freedom in order for it to be meaningful Has to have direction and purpose If a person doesn't have a purpose or direction Then freedom is actually a very very dangerous tool because then you're free to do whatever and Including the structures right, so Passover is just the beginning of Our journey Immediately after Passover seven weeks later. We receive our mandate. We receive our marching orders The Ten Commandments is the Torah the Ten Commandments. This is the Jewish mandate our mission statement in this world and that would not be possible without Passover without the freedom of That that Passover celebrates however Passover without Shavuels is is meaningless because freedom in order for it to be meaningful has to is a context for purpose and and Direction then we have the Festival of Silks the Tabernacle because that represents the trust That we had in God That when we left Egypt, even though we had no provisions and no housing Nevertheless, we followed Moses into the desert Based on our trust in God So trust in God is the other pillar in Jewish life It's it's one thing to receive the Torah But in order for it to become a living document it requires for us to have faith and trust in its teachings And that's how all the three biblical holidays Comprised this idea well, there's there is an interesting trilogy there because you need all three You can't just have the law handed down to you and by the way, there's a sort of an extraordinary coincidence that May Which is the month of Shavuels. It's also, you know, Lord day. In fact, Lord day is right now and May 1st and You're an attorney, so tell me if you if you have ever heard this, I heard this from an attorney The second told me once that Our law in the United States based on British law common law and there is in common law to British law Forget the term. It's a Latin term. But when there is When there is ambiguity and it's not clear what the law is then you fall back on Talmudic law. I Hadn't heard that But you know indeed Talmudic law has to be part of the whole, you know evolution of law It existed a long time ago and Undoubtedly there are pieces of it, you know that that that paid for it Hadn't heard it, but it sounds not unreasonable to me Anyway, so so the thing about the trust I find very interesting especially in our times because you cannot have a Society of laws unless you trust in the laws and in this case the laws came You know the Jewish laws and Torah Ten Commandments came from God. They were handed down to Moses And so I you know, I think the third of those holidays is the is the is the glue that binds The one that gives life to the laws that says, you know, you you will all Trust the larger, you know the larger scheme of things God yourselves You know as the George Washington said the true administration of justice is the firmest firmest pillar of good government Well, that that really means that people have trust in the way things are being done the social Compact if you will I think that's what you're talking about When you're talking about that third holiday I can just say something very interesting two points one is that It's fascinating That the Jewish people have become a nation When we receive God's law when we receive the Torah and she was Every other nation in the world begins with the land they they share a country to share a You know Geography a country Then you need to have laws to govern how to live so the law comes After the nation is born in Judaism the law precedes Us being a nation and the law cements us being a nation because because the Jewish people really represent an idea and a teacher a teaching It's almost like America America is based on ideals the Constitution is based on certain truth That's the bedrock our society the only other nation That is like that is the Jewish nation that our identity in our Our identity as a nation was cemented on the holiday of shrews when we see our marching orders The law God's words. That's one thing another interesting point is The Torah tells us that that God came down to Mount Sinai and Moses went up the mountain and Moses came down 40 days later with the tank commandment and This wasn't the presence of 600,000 Jewish men from the age of 60 to The 20 to 60 and with women and children was over several million people were present And God came down the Mount Sinai in other words the commentaries explain that Jewish religion is not based on faith that you believe What Moses told us it's based on a historical truth Like God came down in the presence of all the people as opposed to other religions like Christianity for example Where Jesus was with his disciples and then went off to on his own and came back and said That he had a revelation and God revealed himself to him and told him what he told him So it's either you believe him or not it requires faith to accept Christianity in Judaism doesn't really require faith. It was a historical fact in the presence of millions of people If that was not true If that never happened then it would have come down to us in history That the Torah makes this claim but other people said that it never happened for example We know that George Washington was real and he lived not based on faith We know it as a historical fact because if George Washington was a myth It would come down to us in history books that some people claim he was real and some people claim he was Sometimes truth has a way of being Perverted, but let me let me ask you this though We only have a minute or two left. How do we celebrate Shavuos? It's not a holiday that calls upon us to to fast or spend the whole day in the temple But there are things that we are supposed to do on Shavuos. What are they? Right. So first of all on the holiday itself on the day of Shavuos When we gather in the temple in the synagogue, we read the Ten Commandments And that's a way of accepting upon ourselves every year the Ten Commandments It's also there's some very interesting customs related to Shavuos And that is that every holiday and every every Shabbos We have a Shabbos meal and usually Meat or chicken or whatever on Shavuos. We have a dairy Dairy meal we eat cheese blunts if you know what that is of course and everyone knows cheese blunts, don't they? And the reason for that is because we When we received the Tov, we were like newly born and babies eat dairy They nourish from their mother's milk. So that's one of the reasons why we eat dairy on Shavuos Some people are up the entire night prior studying the Torah But it's a very very celebratory holiday and It's a reaffirmation When God came to the Jewish people and Moses came to the Jewish people said the God won't forgive us the Torah. We said Nasev and Nishma, we will accept we will do and we will listen Meaning that the foundation was a we will accept it even before we know what says it what it says inside It's not based on our understanding our acceptance and not based on our understanding our acceptance is based on our faith and trust in God So Shavuos was very important holiday this year. We'll probably have to celebrate it each one shuttered in their homes But what's interesting with that is there was the tank the beginning of the Ten Commandments begins with God says I am the Lord your God who has taken you out of Egypt And the word that the commentaries point out is in the singular Even though the God was talking to millions of people. So why does he say use the singular and not? the collective Because the truth is that even though the Torah was given to everyone Everyone has a personal relationship with God everyone. It speaks to everyone on a very personal level So in that context being at home and reflecting on what the Torah Informs you personally and your personal journey to life is really what the celebration of Shavuos is all about Yeah, but it strikes me talking with you rabbi that Shavuos is is actually law day. It was the handing down of the law to Moses and to the people of Israel in the desert Mount Sinai am I right? That's where it was and and so that that is really very similar to the celebration of law and in in the American tradition It's a celebration, but yeah, and but you need that third holiday to us. I'm sorry. What is it the third one? Oh, so because that's in the fall. That's not for months yet So so because binds it together and and reconfirms that people are buying in That they they trust God and and they trust the Torah and the law It all comes together and it's the perfect time for a rabbi Thank you. Oh Well, I wish you well here Approaching circus and we'll talk again in a few weeks and catch up on whatever else is new and I I hope that Habbat as all the temples fares well under the under the shut down and that we all find a way to Be close to each other, you know, despite the distancing the best way to describe what's going on is It's like when you go through the mall and the big sign that says close for renovations So this is what God is doing. He's shutting everything down because he's renovating the world It's gonna be a new world in so many ways Rabbi that's so wise Well, thank you very much. Thank you for joining us and we'll talk again soon