We were up and out early this morning - 8:30 a.m. - to get to shul at the Wolfson Center - where the final Israeli Army officers were commissioned/sworn in in 1948. An Orthodox service (as all are in Tsfat), the women sat in the back. The service was quick, but not too hard to follow once I found a prayerbook (everyone had their own book so all were different). The Torah service was interesting in that they lifted the Torah before the reading. Allan was given an aliyah during the service and said that the gabbai was signaling the b'al korai as to the trope being sung. The men weren't shy about correcting the reader as he chanted for not only the words, but also the trope. It had to be perfect.
We returned to the Artists' Colony Inn whee Jeff and Benay had set out a lovely brunch of vegetarian cholent, hard cooked eggs cooked in the cholent, various fish, cheeses, fruit, yogurt with fruit int he bottom topped with dry oatmeal and ate spread - delicious. We held up the mitzvah as Jeff called it of finishing the bottle of kiddush wine and then talked about all things with Jeff, including an Ilan Ramon story and the meaning of Avraham Kaplan's "Double Hey." The double hey stands for yud-hey-vav-hey, as well as ahava. Love comes from God and God provides love. In the piece of art, the top has a white background with a black hey and the bottom a black background with a white hey. The top/white represents us being giving of ourselves without expecting anything in return. The bottom/black represents us getting and giving. The goal is to work to get the white hey from the bottom to the top creating totally white space where we are always at our best and focused on Tikkun Olam without expecting anything in return. We also talked about Jeff's guide experience - a five hour test with only a mp as a reference. Many attempt to be licensed guides, but only 33 from Jeff's class passed the test.
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