From the Desk of Rabbi Marcelo Bater  October 16/17, 2009   22 Tisrei 5770

Last Saturday night was an incredible Simchat Torah evening at Temple Beth Israel!   More than 100 people - grandparents, parents, and PLENTY of children - danced and sang with the Torah scrolls.  Following this, Shel King, our able Torah Reader, ceremoniously finished this year's Torah reading cycle as the children surrounded the Torah and had their opportunity to see the Holy text "up close and personal".   Then, last Sunday, we formally finished the year's Torah reading cycle for the entire congregation by calling up Phil Seal and Alex Weinberger as Chatan Torah ("Bridegroom of the Torah") and Chatan Bereshit ("Bridegroom of Genesis") - honoring them with these Aliyot whose readings are the last verses of Deuteronomy and the beginning verses of Genesis.   Yes, just as life is a cycle, so too is the reading of the Torah's Holy text, a cycle.   But this begs the question, "Why is it that year after year we read the same text?"   True, the text does not change.  Instead, it is we who change and we do so depending on the way we approach the yearly readings.   Consider the following beautiful interpretation of our sages...   They noted that the last word of the Torah is Israel, that the first word is Bereshit, that the word Israel ends with the Hebrew letter Lamed, and that Bereshit begins with the Hebrew letter Bet.   Now, putting the above two Hebrew letters together, we get the word Lev, which means "Heart".   They, however, "played" further with the remaining Hebrew letters of Bereshit, Reish, Aleph, Shin, Yud, and Tav - and, lo and behold, observed that the Reish, Aleph, and Shin letters spelled the Hebrew word Rosh, which means "Head".   In other words, the Torah teaches us that in order to better comprehend its teachings from beginning to end, we need to use our hearts and our heads!   As we begin our new Torah Reading cycle with Parasha Bereshit, I pray that we'll all use our hearts and minds - our feelings and intelligence - to better understand the valuable Etz Chaim ("Tree of Life") legacy that has been passed down to us!   Shabbat Shalom!