From the Senior Rabbi

Rabbi Elaine Zecher

Senior Rabbi How do we get from Passover to Shavuot? We spent Passover moving from the narrow straits of Egypt to the open pathway through the sea to the wide expanse of freedom. Our journey hardly ends here. Torah awaits. The Seder helped us move from there to here. But how do we again get from here to there — from the wild ecstasy of freedom to the guiding light of Torah?

The stepping stones come from Pirkei Avot, the ethical teachings of the rabbis of the Mishnah who lay out a plan with their counsel. They provide six chapters of inspiration, like an arrow shot from a bow piercing the air on its way to prepare us and direct us toward the ultimate instruction of Torah.

Let these words and images from these chapters guide you on this path:

1:6 Provide yourself with a teacher, and acquire for yourself a companion and judge every person in the scale of merit.

4:1 Who is wise? The one who learns from every person… 2:7…the more Torah, the more life…the more counsel, the more understanding, the more tzedakah, the more peace…

5:22 Turn it, and turn it again (the Torah), for everything is in it; And contemplate it, and grow old and grey over it, and stir not from it, for you have no better principle than it. 3:8: Know whence you came, and where you are going, and before Whom you will have to give account and reckoning.

6: 3 Those who learn [Torah] from another; a single chapter, or a single law, or a single verse, or a single utterance, or even a single letter must treat that person with honor…