Rabbi's Chayva's Chat

After several months of planning and preparation, tomorrow night we will have our installation. I look forward to introducing you to my mentor and friend, Rabbi Evon Yakar, who will join me in leading services and will officiate the installation. And though the attention sometimes makes me feel a little bashful, I am deeply moved by the conversations I have had as this occasion approaches. Tomorrow night will be a meaningful moment. I’m bringing tissues.

There are many jokes to be made about what it means to “install a rabbi,” as if the rabbi were a dishwasher, a work of art, or a software program, and I’m sure we’ll tell some of them. They speak, however, to an underlying question of what we’re doing and why we put so much work into it, so I think it might be worthwhile to step back and consider what, exactly, this occasion is.

The installation of a new rabbi is a congregational lifecycle event that celebrates the shared commitment of a congregation and its rabbi to their shared future and to Jewish tradition. If “celebrating commitment to a shared future and Jewish tradition” sounds like a wedding, you’re not wrong; one of the ways I think of this is that when a new rabbi starts a congregation, that’s the moment of engagement, and the installation is the wedding celebration. Since neither rabbi nor congregation exists in a vacuum, the installation will be a moment to bring many different parts of ourselves into the space at one time: many congregant participants, attendees from outside of Am Tikvah, the guest clergy to lead the service, and family and friends. One of the best things Rabbi Evon taught me was how important it is to be fully, authentically yourself, and I hope we can all bring that feeling into the room tomorrow.

Whether you will be there or not, I want you to know how incredibly grateful and thrilled I am to be at Am Tikvah. A few months ago, I looked back at the spreadsheet I had made of different opportunities last year, and next to Am Tikvah I had written, “#1 Choice.” That is even more true now that I know you - know us - with all of our compassion, love of music, love of learning, clarity of thought, and our strong sense of peoplehood and ethics. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for the honor and privilege of being your rabbi. Shabbat shalom.