Andrew Sokoler, an incoming freshman at New Jewish Community High School in West Hills and member of Temple Aliyah in Woodland Hills, won first place in the 2011 National Bible Contest, Middle School English Division. He is one of four Americans who will advance to next year’s Chidon HaTanach International Bible Contest in Jerusalem.
Lithuania\’s parliament has agreed to pay $52 million over 10 years in compensation for properties confiscated from the country\’s Jewish community by the Nazis and by Soviet authorities. The bill was passed by the parliament on Tuesday and still must be signed into law by the president.
Lior wears old-man sweaters. I feel like that’s the kind of thing I should just get out of the way as fast as possible, because it’s the first thing a girl would notice if she went on a date with him. They’re usually expensive sweaters … just not particularly hip. He’s set in his ways, but a stylish girl could fix that situation pretty quickly. Just don’t try to turn him into a hipster, because it’ll never happen.
Shavuot, unlike many Jewish holidays, does not take place on the full moon. This celebration, when we study all night to commemorate receiving the Torah at Mount Sinai, precedes the night of the moon’s peak brightness by about a week. So, along with the gift of Torah, we are given the two weeks of the moon’s greatest light for our Mount Sinai descent. This allows us to carefully examine our footing as we endeavor to decode each year’s revelation of Torah and affirm our Shavuot insights for “walking in God’s ways” and bringing holiness into the more quotidian world. Under the light of the Sivan moon, we ask ourselves whether the truths we have perceived are the voice of prophecy or self-serving assertions of our ego.
Some people live miles away from a synagogue that shares their philosophies and values. Others might have no shortage of resources but have overbooked lives that make fitting in yet another off-site commitment for their 11- or 12-year-old a near impossibility.
In 2002, director/playwright Karen Sommers heard a story on National Public Radio about the Jewish American Board of Peace and Justice, a Jewish mediation court on the Lower East Side of New York that adjudicated disputes among community members between the late 1930s and 1956. The proceedings took place in a back room of the House of Sages, a synagogue led by Rabbi Shmuel Aaron Rubin, who presided over the cases, which were recorded and carried on such Yiddish radio stations as WLTH and WEVD. According to the Yiddish Radio Project Web site, where many of the programs heard on old-time Yiddish radio are archived, the conflicts covered everything from “the complaints of abandoned parents to altercations over ill-fitting sheets.”
The Israeli-born French chanteuse adds a freewheeling style to her ethereal pop sound as she performs songs from her new solo album, “101.” Brooklyn-based folk artist Chris Garneau opens. Sat. 8 p.m. $20. Luckman Fine Arts Complex, 5151 State University Drive, Los Angeles. (323) 343-6600. luckmanarts.org.
On June 14, employees at Bet Tzedek, a Jewish legal-service organization, demonstrated in front of the organization’s office at 145 S. Fairfax Ave., calling for higher wages. Bet Tzedek — which means “House of Justice” in Hebrew — is a nonprofit that provides free legal services to Jews and non-Jews in Los Angeles. The Bet Tzedek employees — lawyers, legal secretaries, paralegals and clerical workers — want pay increases of approximately 2 percent, according to Marc Bender, an attorney at Bet Tzedek and president of Bet Tzedek Legal Services Union, which has 54 members.
Rabbi Jonathan Klein stood at the entrance to Albertson’s supermarket in Los Feliz and handed a supermarket manager a blown-up letter expressing his support for workers in their fractious contract negotiations with the major chains.
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