Rabbi Marc D. Rudolph

Doing Things Backward? Last year, as we were sitting down to eat lunch after the Rosh Hashanah services, a question arose that I thought would be interesting to look at today. That question was, “Why do we celebrate Rosh Hashanna first, and then observe Yom Kippur?  Wouldn’t it make more sense to observe the Day…

Opening Our Eyes   I’ve been thinking about how the sense of sight, the sense of seeing, plays such a prominent role in our Torah readings for Rosh Hashanah.  Let’s take a look at two of the stories we read on this Rosh Hashanah holiday and ask ourselves what the text is trying to teach…

Yom Kippur Morning, 5771/2010  Forgiving Others One of the major themes of these Yamim Noraim is asking for and granting forgiveness.  Why is it so difficult to ask for forgiveness?  It is difficult because it requires that we take stock of ourselves. It is difficult because it requires us to overcome the shame that often…

Kol Nidre 5771/2010 A Puzzling Question   I received the following email from a very thoughtful and sensitive young person in our congregation.  He agreed that I could share it with you this evening.  He wrote:  Rabbi, a puzzling question has been plaguing me recently.  My mother is not Jewish, but my father is. Does…

Next week we will celebrate Rosh Hashanah, with its stirring and evocative prayers and melodies.  In our Amidah prayer we will add the verses “zachrenu le hayyim, melech hafetz bahayyim, vchatvenu besefer hachayimm”  — Remember us for life, sovereign who desires life, and inscribe us in the book of life.”  The imagery of a “Book…

  In the August 7 edition of the New York Times, G. Jeffery McDonald, a minister in the United Church of Christ serving a congregation in Swampscott, Massachusetts, wrote a guest editorial on clergy burnout.  Yes, he wrote, clergy work too hard, and therefore are prone to burnout.  But he felt there was a more…

 Parasha Shoftim: Community This week’s parasha is Shoftim.  In it, the Israelites are commanded as to what kind of institutions they will need to set up when they leave their life of desert wandering to settle in communities in the Land of Canaan.  These institutions include courts, police, armed forces and a political system with…

How does Judaism help us become more independent in mind and spirit? Traditionally, after a bar mitzvah has completed the recitation of the aliyah, the father of the youngster recites a blessing known as “she-petarani“, after the first major word in the prayer – “Blessed is the One who freed me (she-petarani) from the responsibility…

We are fast approaching the New Year.  The editor of our newsletter, Brad Kolar, assigns us “regular columnists” a topic to write on for each newsletter.  The topic chosen this month is “What Jewish values do you most want to carry with you into the New Year.”  I wondered  about the concept of Jewish values,…

  This week marked a first, I believe, in Naperville history – the placement of a menorah next to the Christmas tree on Naperville’s Riverwalk.  Newspaper reports, ever on the lookout for the sensational or controversial to sell their papers, highlighted the perceived threat of a lawsuit should the Park District not acquiesce to Chabad’s…