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From the Desk of Chancellor Shuly Rubin Schwartz

Dear JTS Community,  

Earlier today, the JTS community came together to mark one year since the horrific attacks of October 7. Students, faculty, staff, and special guests gathered for a deeply moving tekes.  

  • The ceremony began with Cantor Rabbi Shoshi Levin Goldberg, Rabbi Annie Lewis, and Cantor Shimon Smith, Romemu Music Director, singing “Return Again,” a powerful Carlebach tune.   

 

Cantor Rabbi Shoshi Levin Goldberg, Rabbi Annie Lewis, and Cantor Shimon Smith

 

  • Rabbi Lewis then recited Psalm 121, followed by Rabbi Ayelet Cohen’s emotional and eloquent remarks, which I invite you to read here 
  • We again heard from Cantor Smith who sang Tachzor/“We Will Return,” a song by Idan Raichel.  
  • Rabbi Gordon Tucker shared a heart wrenching poem by Asaf Gur entitled Kaddish and Cantor Rabbi Levin Goldberg led the community in El Maleh Rahamim. 
  • The ceremony ended with a reading of a Hebrew poem from Rabbi Luciana Lederman and a communal Minhah service.

 

Tekes

 

Marking this painful anniversary together provided us with needed comfort and support. Collectively, we could feel rays of hope for the future emerging from the darkness. 

As we close out this difficult day of remembrance, I invite you to read this collection of writings in JTA, which includes my own reflection. In this symposium, writers, thinkers, and rabbis shared a Jewish text that has held special meaning for them—and how that meaning has shifted since October 7. The question posed was: “Is there a prayer — or a proverb, a song lyric, a quotation, a poem, or piece of prose — that became harder to say or more difficult to believe? Is there a verse that has become particularly resonant, or a phrase that has taken on new important meanings?” The responses, including mine, speak personally and viscerally to the moment. 

May 5785 usher in a more hopeful and peaceful future.

G'mar hatima tova,   

Chancellor Shuly Rubin Schwartz 

JTS


The Jewish Theological Seminary | 3080 Broadway, New York, NY 10027 | www.jtsa.edu 

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