July 18, 2025

Throughout the summer I have written to you with thoughts about our congregation, Jewish life, and how we as a community can navigate our way through this bumpy and complex moment in time.

I outlined six core Jewish values that are the engines of Jewish life:

1. B’tzelem Elohim

2. Love your neighbor as yourself

3. Love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt

4. Jewish Peoplehood

5. Zionism

6. Community

You can also watch the video of my presentation about our future from our Annual Meeting.

With these values in mind, we might be asking ourselves how we can live our values. I have always been moved by Rabbi Hillel’s famous teaching in the Pirke Avot, a first century compilation of ethical texts. He said, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, then when?”

Hillel’s first two questions invite us to think about how we might act in a given moment. First, there is an invitation to remember that if we do not take care of our own interests, there is not necessarily an obligation upon others to look after our unique interests. The second question echoes the foundational text in our Torah to care for those among us who are marginalized.

For years, I have felt pulled towards helping those who are marginalized. Since October 7, my heart has been drawn to teaching about Israel, Jewish identity, and Jewish Peoplehood. We have had to grapple with rising antisemitism. As a result, some of the commitments we held towards justice work have been pushed to the back burner.

Hillel’s third question, however, reflects the tension I have been feeling. “If not now, then when?” has often been interpreted as a call to act now. Perhaps though, the experiences we have faced in these last 21 months open up the possibility for us to look at the third question as a response or modifier to each of the first two. Perhaps Hillel is saying, “Okay, if you are going to focus on advancing Jewish interests, then when will you work to take care of others, if not now, when?” And perhaps, “If you are going to focus on working to support others, okay fine, when will you work to advance Jewish interests? If not now, when?

This moment calls us to do the sacred work of advancing our own interests while also caring for those who are marginalized. The essence for Jewish life moving forward will be creating a balance between the universal and the particular. We cannot solely lean into one while ignoring the other. Perhaps for too long, we have leaned into the universal, and that work needs to continue, but we need to find a balance and move forward in taking care of the particular as well.

How can we do this?

In order to answer this question, we might begin with an analysis of our vision statement:

We empower people to live and learn Jewishly and make the world a better place. 

The vision statement contains four verbs and several direct object pronouns and adverbs. Though this is not a grammar lesson, each of these parts of the sentence can help us understand what we might do. 

To empower someone is to give someone the tools to act on their own. 

To live is to carry out your life in a particular way. In this instance that way is Jewishly. 

To learn is to acquire the knowledge to make decisions and discover our history and story. 

To make the world a better place, is to shape the world around us and to help live out the Jewish values that will help to bring about the vision God sets forth in creating. It is to recognize that we are partners with God in perfecting creation.

At the conclusion of the adult learning course I taught from October 2024 through January 2025 entitled “Together & Apart,” a learning series created by the Hartman Institute’s iEngage program (the course focused on strengthening Jewish Peoplehood), I thought about five key areas for us to focus on that could strengthen the Jewish community moving forward:

1.   Telling our story

2.   Living our Values

3.   Making Judaism and Jewish life come alive (ie. live Jewishly with joy!)

4.   Create Partnerships

a.   Israelis and Americans together

b.   Americans and Americans together

c.   Israelis and Israelis together

5.   Strengthen Institutions

As we move forward, we will immerse ourselves in these focus areas finding new ways to engage and connect to one another.

It is remarkable to think that I am beginning my 15^th year serving Congregation Beth Tikvah. We have always worked to grow and become the best community we possibly can be. As we move forward and navigate complexities, realize that we are in a strong position. Today, we are even stronger than we were just a few weeks ago. Tonight, we will have a welcome oneg for Rabbi Karen Martin, our new Assistant Rabbi! As we work together to serve our sacred community in partnership with our wonderful staff, we look forward to seeing how we can build on these values and implement new ideas so that we can strengthen our community even more. I hope you will join us tonight as we welcome Rabbi Martin and her family to our community!

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

July 11, 2025

Summer camp has shaped my life; I do not think I would be the person I am today without summer camp. The truth is that one perk of being a rabbi is you still get to go to summer camp well into adulthood.

I realized this summer that I have spent 21 summers at a URJ Summer Camp either as a camper, Counselor, Unit Head, Education Director, or Rabbi. That does not include the two summers I was a camper at another sleepaway camp, or the many years I spent at day camp. I have spent well over 30 summers at camp. My daughters each spent several summers at URJ Camps. Shira just finished her third summer at the URJ 6 Points Sports Academy. One of the phrases I heard growing up was “ten for two”, meaning we live ten months of the year for the two during the summer. Summer camp is transformative as we gain independence, learn important skills, and push our horizons. As a camp leader, we view the kids as our own. Parents entrust their kids in our care, and we realize the immense responsibility we have to care for a child other than our own. I will be honest, when I have hugged my kids goodbye, my only hope is for them to have a wonderful summer and experience the community and friendships that camp is meant to nurture.

I know firsthand, however, that being at camp can come with risks or tragedy. When I was ten years old, it was a beautiful summer afternoon, and my cabin group was at the pool down the hill, only 100-200 yards from our cabin. Suddenly, I heard someone yell out, “John’s bed is on fire.” John was one of the staff members who lived in my cabin. Our cabin was a U-shaped structure that included three separate cabins, physically joined together. All three cabins burned down that day. A couple of boys were in one of the cabins and everyone escaped without any physical harm. The fire started because a counselor was smoking in the cabin and an ash got caught in one of the clip-on fans. Thankfully, no one was hurt and all that had to be replaced were clothes and items.

When I awoke to the news about the flooding last week and the incredible loss of life, I was heartbroken. Every death is a tragedy, but I cannot stop thinking about the young children of Camp Mystic and their counselors who arrived at Camp with dreams of friendship and fun. The Bubble Inn was the cabin that housed their youngest campers, just 7 years old, and it was closest to the Guadalupe River. Dick Eastman, the longtime owner and director of the camp, was killed trying to rescue his campers. Paige Sumner, a former Camp Mystic camper said in the San Antonio Express-News, “Eastland’s last act of kindness and sacrifice was working to save the lives of campers.” She also said he put campers first in every situation. Whenever a camper sustained a minor injury, he would bolt from the office in a golf cart and race to the scene. Program Director, Elizabeth Sweet shared in the Houston Chronicle that Camp Mystic is the most magical place filled with laughter and love. She awoke at 3:11 AM to help rescue campers and by 4:00 AM, she stood on the roof with water rising up to her level. “Yesterday, I left a camp that was demolished and destroyed, but that is not the place I will remember for years to come,” Sweet wrote. “I will remember the place where we laughed on our way to our activities, sang as loud as we could in the dining hall, and cheered our hearts out for our respective tribes.”

Silvana Garza Valdez and María Paula Zárate, 19-year-old camp counselors from Mexico did what they were trained to do. As they were kept awake by the rain, they decided to act quickly and wrote the names of every child on their arms so that in case they were lost, they could be identified. When the waters began to flood in, the girls all began to panic. They were able to keep them together and they saved their campers.

The truth is that it takes an entire community to make camp the magical place that it becomes for campers. Eastland, Valdez, Zárate and the rest of the staff are all heroes. May Eastland’s memory be for a blessing.

As I reflect on this moment, I am drawn to a text of the Talmud (Sanhedrin 73a) where it says if you see a person drowning in a river, you should jump in and save them. The Talmud asks, how we should know that this is the correct action, and cites Leviticus 19:16 where we learn, “You should not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor.” The Torah and Talmud are clear, when we see our neighbor suffering, we are obligated to act and help them in their time of need. While it is a safe guess that Dick Eastland was not familiar with the Talmud, he lived its words up to his last breath and risked his own life to save young girls that parents had entrusted in his care. We might ask ourselves; would we have the courage to act in the same way?

Summer camps are places filled with magic. Many of us send our kids to camp each summer and they come back experiencing growth, creating new friendships, finding new community, and learning from their counselor role models. Camp does amazing things for children. Shira and I are already counting down the days until we return to “The 6” (that’s what we call 6 Points), and I know many of our Beth Tikvah kids are counting down until they return to their summer homes.

May the memories of all those lost in the catastrophic flooding of the Guadalupe River be a blessing and may our leaders learn from this tragedy so that we can be sure the proper systems are in place to minimize further loss of life in the future.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

July 1, 2025

Rabbi Rick Kellner’s Speech at the Community HIAS Vigil in Support of Immigrants & Refugees

One morning in the fall, I had an epiphany. I had spent much of the last year focused on telling the story of our people, our history—how we were strangers in lands far from our own. Our story spirals through the generations; it echoes the stories of ancestors that live in the recesses of our mind, like a tel, a layered archaeological site. We traveled from place to place, searching for freedom. I knew we needed to continue to tell our story. But what does it mean to be a Jew? We know we have been lost and lonely, and it was not until we arrived here—or returned to our homeland in Eretz Yisrael—that we ever felt at home. I knew that our story was also filled with an obligation to serve the other, to help shape the world into the one that it ought to be. It is a world envisaged by the prophets, one which cares for the orphan, the widow, and the stranger.

As a 13-year-old on a Bar Mitzvah trip to Israel, I stood looking at a picture of the St. Louis, and the grandmother of one of the Bat Mitzvah girls on the trip looked at it too and said, “I was on that ship.” I wish I had asked her more. We now know many of the stories, but I didn’t know her story. Those passengers sailed filled with hope for safety and freedom.

The story of the American Dream lives in our hearts and minds—that we come for a better future, that the streets are lined with gold, that the fire lives within our bellies telling us we can work and make our lives what we want. But that’s a fantasy passed on from one generation to the next. While a truth may emerge from that dream, the challenges and the hardships immigrants face are only fragments of the story and, in reality, are like mountainous speedbumps impeding the days of those dreamers.

In early March I received an email from my rabbinic colleague who works at HIAS. “There is a single man coming to Columbus in a couple of weeks on an Afghan Special Immigrant Visa. Would Congregation Beth Tikvah be willing to sponsor him and help him get settled?” I wanted to get to yes—how could I say no? Someone needed our help, but I needed to know what our responsibilities would be: find an apartment, furnish it, arrange health appointments, set up government assistance, and find him a job. A financial commitment and a team of volunteers to help support rides and other daily basic needs. Great, we got this!

Obaidullah was scheduled to arrive in two weeks, but two days later we learned he would arrive that evening before a potential travel ban set in. In reality, that travel ban would come several weeks later. He arrived in the middle of Ramadan, and we learned his story. He held two master’s degrees in Business Administration and Agriculture. He was a translator. We learned his brother lived here and that he had not seen his wife in five years—she was still in Kabul. He believed she would join him here this year, but that dream is now made more difficult because of the travel ban now in place by executive order.

Since mid-March, our Beth Tikvah team of volunteers has not only supported this young man, but we have become an extended community for him. We could not have supported him without the incredible guidance of the refugee resettlement team at Jewish Family Services. We connected him to doctors. We got him the benefits he would need. He took initiative and, within weeks, got himself a learner’s permit and then his driver’s license.

We thought finding him a job would be easy. He worked with JFS; he worked with one of our volunteers who spent her career coaching people on résumé writing and interview skills. Hundreds of job applications went unanswered, and many interviews came and went without a second one. We explored fields in translation, agriculture, and more. Sometimes serendipity helps—and after several inquiries within the congregation, we found a connection and, last week, after 3+ months of searching, Obaidullah had his first day of work. Yet his journey doesn’t come without further challenges. We are now supporting his brother in his efforts to find a job—we are trying to stabilize the house. Can you imagine being away from your beloved for five years? And her life is still in danger. We still need to find him a car, and we are looking to see if someone has one in good working order to gift to him so he can get to and from work without relying on others.

This journey continues, but our friend Obaidullah is now part of our family. So many have stepped up to help.

We hold so many concerns in our hearts about immigration policy, ICE raids, and executive orders, and we often do not know how to help. While we may not be able to change public policy with the stroke of a pen, there is work we can do to save lives. Jewish tradition teaches us, “If you save a life, you save an entire world.” God willing, in thirty years, we will look back and our friend Obaidullah will be sharing the stories of how he came to America and found his way—much like we share now about how our ancestors came here a century or more ago.

We all may be asking what our role is in this crisis. There are many ways we can take action to support the rights and needs of immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers right here in our community.

You’ll see here [on the screen behind me] a QR code plus several links to social media pages for what is called the Community Response Hub. The Community Response Hub supports efforts to defend communities at risk of deportation and detention in Central Ohio. The hub does this through advocacy and mobilizing ally organizations and community members. In the spirit of working in coalition, the hub facilitates communication among diverse groups, working across different communities and issues, and uses diverse tactics. Their mission includes holding decision-makers accountable, including government and enforcement agencies.

Please use your smartphone right now to take a picture of the QR code or of this screen, or look for representatives of the CRH after our program is over for some take-home materials. Thank you in advance for taking action at this critical time for our country.

Let us remember, “If you save a life, you save an entire world.” We, too, can save people’s lives.

July 4, 2025

Shabbat Shalom and Happy 4th of July! Several weeks ago, I wrote to you during the 12-day war with Iran. At the time, three of our young women—Gabi Sanderow, Sylvia Shafran, and Alaina Towne—were in Israel participating in Birthright and Onward Israel. They spent several nights hiding in bomb shelters before relocating to the Negev, a quieter region for the rest of their trip. Thankfully, they returned home about 12 days ago and are resettling. I know their families deeply appreciated the outreach they received from our community.

Jewish community is the essence of Jewish life. One can be a Jew, but it is hard to live Jewishly when you are alone. Several years ago, I worked with a young woman nearing college graduation who was interested in conversion. She had accepted a job assignment in China and hoped to be placed in a city with a Jewish community. However, her placement landed her 90 minutes from the nearest one. We spoke about the challenges of living Jewishly as the only Jew in your environment. Unfortunately, we lost touch, and I’m not sure how her journey unfolded.

When God created Adam, God said, “It is not good for a person to be alone.” God knew we are meant to be with others. As a people, we walked hand in hand through the parted waters of the Sea of Reeds. That experience was not only about freedom—it was about shared freedom. At Sinai, we responded to God’s teaching with one voice. God made a covenant not just with the individuals present but with every generation to come. The rabbis teach in Pirke Avot that when two people study Torah together, God’s presence dwells among them. When we pray, we form a minyan—a gathering of souls creating shared spiritual space.

More than community alone, we need to become a kehillah kedoshah—a sacred community. Sacred communities unite in joy and in sorrow. After the building of the Golden Calf, Moses called the people together. This gathering helped them heal. They used the same materials from the idol to build the Mishkan, and that act of collective building brought wholeness. We need community to say Mourner’s Kaddish, to become B. Mitzvah, and to marry. We need one another to celebrate and to grieve.

When we pray together, something powerful happens. The shaliach tzibur (service leader) invites us: “Barechu et Adonai ham’vorach,” and we respond: “Baruch Adonai ham’vorach l’olam vaed.” This call and response becomes a symphony of voices—speaking to God and to each other. Ahad Ha’am once said, “More than Israel has kept Shabbat, Shabbat has kept Israel.” I believe this teaches not only about Jewish law but about the sustaining value of community. On Shabbat, we come together to eat, pray, celebrate, and study. Through these sacred acts, we invite God’s presence into our lives.

On Wednesday, Rabbi Karen Martin officially joined Beth Tikvah as our Assistant Rabbi. This is truly a shehechiyanu moment! We are excited to get to know her more in the weeks and months ahead. Her presence will enrich our community in many ways. Join us tonight for our recorded Shabbat prayers. Next Friday, Rabbi Martin will lead services, and on July 18, we’ll hold her official welcome celebration.

Have a wonderful 4^th of July weekend!

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

June 27, 2025

As I sat in the Charlotte airport Wednesday evening, patiently awaiting a flight home that was significantly delayed, I turned to my right and there were two ultra-Orthodox men sitting there. I debated whether to turn to them and say, “Hey, I am an MOT (Member of the Tribe).” The only thing that might have given it away was my Bring Them Home necklace. We never said anything to one another. As the delay increased, two women sat next down next to me, and I was convinced I heard Hebrew. But then it wasn’t Hebrew. Maybe it was Russian; and then there was English, then Hebrew again. One of the women wondered why there was no plane. I turned to her and said there was a plane. I had my opening… “Aten meYisrael? Are you from Israel I asked?” I am sure the last thing they expected out of my mouth was Hebrew. Surprised, one of the women answered, “I was born there but I now live in Canada.” I told her I was a rabbi, and she then said, “It’s nice to be with some of our people.” The moment reminded me of a song I would sing growing up in religious school written by my friend and colleague, Rabbi Larry Milder, “Wherever you go there’s always someone Jewish, you’re never alone when you say you’re a Jew.”

We’ve been living in a time where it has been so challenging to be Jewish. These moments echo the prophet Balaam’s words that we are a people who dwells alone. The silence of friends in some of the most challenging moments has only further emphasized these emotions. However, the time when I least feel alone is when I am at Beth Tikvah or in other Jewish settings. I can be my authentic self without worrying about judgment from others. Of course, there are moments when I might find myself in disagreement with others about Jewish law or the best future for the State of Israel; but at the end of the day, I know that we stand together in times of grief, pain, and sorrow.

Therein lies the essence of Jewish peoplehood. We are a family and a people that share an eternal covenant. Our origins come from being a family in the book of Genesis, and quite the dysfunctional one at that. Even though the individuals are deeply flawed, they are all part of the family, and regardless of what they do, they cannot be cut off. In the book of Exodus, Pharaoh first calls us a people, and he is afraid of us. We share pain in bondage, joy in our freedom, awe as Torah is revealed, and responsibility as we share in the covenant.

As I think about these last 20+ months, I think about how I have once again found my people. Together we have felt pain, we have celebrated moments of joy, we have joined for learning, song, and prayer. While I wish it would not take turmoil to bring us together, perhaps it is in the moments of turmoil that the ties which bind us together become stronger.

When I graduated High School, I went on my NFTY in Israel trip, but first we stopped in the Czech Republic to explore our history and visit Terezin, the model Concentration Camp that was used to show off to the Red Cross. While there, we sang the song The Last Butterfly, based on a poem by Pavel Friedman. At the end of the song we sing, “But I have found my people here…” It is a powerful reminder that there are so many moments that bring us together.

Rabbi Donniel Hartman teaches us that we are the sum of the stories we tell about ourselves. As a Jewish people, we must know our stories and we must share them. Ask your family members about their stories. Where did they come from? What is important to them? Why did they bring the sacred objects they brought? Whether we come from Buenos Aires, Brussels, Brooklyn, Be’er Sheva, or Be’eri, or Central Ohio, we are part of the people. We stand together in times of great need. It is why we felt such deep pain and concern when ballistic missiles fell on our cities in Israel in these last several weeks. And it is why we are called together to bring healing and hope to a future that desperately needs us. As we move forward, we will learn our stories, we will learn our tradition so that we can fulfill what is perhaps our most important obligation l’dor vador, passing on our tradition from generation to generation.

In the last twenty months, one of the best symbols describing  Jewish Peoplehood was a poem written by Israel poet Racheli Moshkovits entitled a Coat of Many Colors.

My son returned from battle, his duffel bursting

With things that I had not packed for him.

Socks donated by the Jews in Argentina.

A quilted blanket smelling like someone else’s home

A blue towel from a family from the Moshav,

Tzitzit from Jerusalem.

A fleece jacket, gifted by a high-tech company,

A scarf knitted by an elderly lady,

Undershirts purchased by online shoppers,

A sheet that was given to him by a friend,

Gloves bought by teenage girls,

A jacket from the closet of someone who

Came and requested to give.

I spread out all those garments

And weave together a new coat of many colors.

See, Yosef, your brothers were there for you.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

This is the fourth installment of my reflections on Jewish values that will shape the future. 

For my previous reflections, please visit my Rabbi’s Blog

June 20, 2025

It continues to be a challenging moment for the Jewish people. In addition to being on faculty at camp, tending to work emails and commitments from afar, I have been called to continually check in on family and friends in Israel. To quote the 12^th century poet Yehuda HaLevi: “My heart is in the East, and I am at the edge of the West.” I am not sure if there has ever been a time in my life when I have thought as much about Israel as I have during these last twenty months—except for when I was living in Jerusalem, walking the streets and alleyways, surrounded by buildings of Jerusalem stone that shine in the hot sun.

When I arrived at Beth Tikvah, I started a discussion group about Israel. Over several years, we met monthly at Panera; I sent out articles and we discussed our opinions. Rarely did we speak about Zionism or its origins. Though I had traveled to Israel before entering high school and felt an immediate connection to the land and the people, I am not sure I truly understood the concept of Zionism. I had an incredible 10^th grade social studies teacher who, for extra credit, encouraged us to watch historical films and write reflections on them. I remember watching “The Life of Emile Zola”, a film about the infamous Dreyfus Affair when French military officer Alfred Dreyfus was wrongfully convicted of treason. A young journalist, Theodor Herzl, covered this case and because of the antisemitism he witnessed, he knew that Jews needed to have a Jewish State of their own.

When I teach young people about Zionism, I tell them that “Zionism is the national movement of the Jewish people to establish a Jewish home and to have sovereignty in the land of Israel – the ancestral home of the Jewish people from the time of Abraham.” The concept of Zionism emerged because Herzl knew in the late 1800s that Jews would never be fully accepted living in another land. We needed a home of our own. I also now must teach people that any definition of Zionism outside of this definition has been created by others to delegitimize the Jewish community and the Jewish state. Much of what our young people learn today on TikTok reflects such a distortion.

This week, I learned of a quote from Walter Russell Mead, an American academic, who said, “Zionism was not the triumphant battle cry of a victorious ethnic group, but a weird, desperate stab at survival.” Teaching about this quote, Noam Weissman (Jewish educator and CEO of Unpacked for Educators, an incredible resource for Jewish learning) reflected that now, more than 77 years after the founding of the State of Israel, the fact that we still have to make these desperate stabs is both heartbreaking and awe-inspiring. In the immediate aftermath of the attack on Iran, Rabbi Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein HaLevi reflected that these attacks are the ultimate expression of Zionism. Why? Because when facing an existential threat—as derived from Iran’s many decades of rhetoric against Israel and the Jewish community, Israel acted to preserve the existence of the Jewish people.

Perhaps these scholars have uncovered the true essence of Zionism. It is not about power; it is not a means to denigrate or be superior over another group of people. Zionism is an attempt at Jewish survival. And for 77 years after we established a state of our own, we have been fighting for our survival. For decades, we have faced external threats from foreign militaries, terrorist organizations, and dangerous ideologies. That continues to be the story of the Jewish people. Even with our own homeland, we must continue to fight for our survival.

This is the third installment of my reflection on our values. Please visit my Rabbi’s Blog to read about the values of B’tzelem Elohim, loving the neighbor, and loving the stranger. In some ways, Zionism is also an expression of love—love of our own community and the Jewish people. In these fragile moments, we pray for the safety of our people, the courage of our IDF soldiers, the return of the hostages, and a hope that peace will come speedily in our day to all the inhabitants of Israel.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

June 13, 2025

Rabbi Rick Kellner’s Sermon starts at 9:58

June 13, 2025

Last evening, we learned that the Israeli Air Force, launched a preemptive defensive military strike on Iranian nuclear sites along with Mossad efforts to disable Iran’s ballistic missiles. Israelis spent the night in their bomb shelters preparing for a response from Iran. Iran has called for the destruction of the State of Israel numerous times. We pray that this will limit their nuclear capabilities so that will never happen. With the words of Psalm 122 on our hearts, “we pray for the peace of Jerusalem.” Our thoughts and prayers are with all those in Israel, especially our Beth Tikvah members, family, and friends, who have spent the night with fear on their souls. We pray for the brave IDF soldiers who are defending Israel and our people. We send them our love and strength.

L’shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

The message below was the original message for this week.

How can we be commanded to love? This question is one we ask if we believe that the Torah is commanding us to hold an emotion. Love, however, is a verb, it calls us to act. There are moments when we gather to pray and sing, olam chesed yibaneh, the world was built from love. If the building blocks of the world come from love, we need to take those building blocks to build a sukkah of shalom to embrace the vulnerable and send hope to those in pain.

Jewish tradition commands us to love our neighbor – Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Hillel, both teach us that this commandment is the most important commandment in the entire Torah. In order to understand its lesson, we need to look at the Hebrew – ואהבת לרעך כמוך – v’ahavta l’reiacha kamocha. Hebrew grammar would come to teach us that the word that would typically follow the command to love would be את – et, indicating the object of the verb. However, here, the preposition “ל-l’” indicates moving towards something, towards a vision for the future. That vision is one that includes loving our neighbors. We do this through actions, including tzedakah or other acts of loving kindness. Jewish tradition defines neighbor in a multitude of ways. We might begin thinking about those most like us, our family, the greater Jewish community, or Jews living around the world. However, the Talmud offers an alternate opinion. It teaches us that we can help those living close to us whether they are Jewish or not. The notion to love a neighbor ties directly to the notion that we are created b’tzelem Elohim – in God’s image. To behold another’s face places a demand on us that calls upon us to recognize that person as sacred.

Our love does not only extend to our neighbor, but a core command of the Torah is to love the stranger. The rabbis of the Talmud remind us that the command to care for the stranger appears 36 times in the entire Torah including in Deuteronomy 10:18-19 where God is extolled for being might and awesome, upholding the cause of the orphan and the widow, loving the stranger by providing food and clothing, and concluding with the command to love the stranger. It is not limited to Deuteronomy, but the purpose is to sensitize us to the plight of the foreigner and refugee who lives among us. We were strangers in Egypt and our ancestors were once strangers seeking refuge from antisemitism and turmoil in their homeland. In every generation, we live and relive the Exodus. We see ourselves as if we came forth out of Egypt. Rabbi Shmuly Yanklowitz reminds us, “To be faithful is to orient our lives around the needs of the most vulnerable. The stranger, widow, and orphan can be understood conceptually. The mitzvot that are articulated with reference to widows, orphans, and strangers apply to all those who are marginalized, alienated, oppressed, and suffering.”

As I sit this week and see those who are strangers and immigrants suffering, I am heartbroken by their pain. In my communications with a Los Angeles colleague this week, he reminded me that there are Latino members of the Jewish community who are impacted by this. Why did he feel the need to do that? Sometimes we tend to think such moments affect other people, but they affect Jews as well. We should not need that reminder, however. Shouldn’t the fear of being separated from one’s family and being swept off the street be enough to tug on our heart strings and make us want to support those in need? Such a moment transcends policy; it causes us to think about how policy impacts human beings. When human beings need our help, Torah is revealed to us calling on us to act. Click here to see the CCAR’s most recent statement.

While we have a core responsibility as Jews to tell our stories and immerse in Jewish ritual and Jewish learning, the ideals of Torah remind us, repeatedly, to reflect on our core Jewish responsibility to think about how we might act to make the world around us better. We begin as individuals within our own community and extend outwards. The Torah reminds us again and again that human dignity matters. As Jews, we are called on to be a light to the nations. Thinking about our vision moving forward: upholding human dignity, loving our neighbor, and caring for those who are marginalized are key components of building our world from love.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

Read Rabbi Rick Kellner’s previous post on being created in God’s Image.

Watch Rabbi Rick’s Annual Meeting Update: A Vision for the Future.

June 6, 2025

J’accuse – I accuse much of the world of turning its back on Jews, the Jewish people, and the Jewish community.
J’accuse – I accuse much of the world of succumbing to the algorithmic mind-shaping of the media.
J’accuse – I accuse much of the world of molding modern-day Israel into the fold of historical perceptions of the evil Jew, as happened in much of historical Europe.
J’accuse – I accuse much of the world of accusing every Jewish person of being responsible for the actions of a corrupt Prime Minister, with whom nearly 70% of Israelis disagree.

J’accuse is, of course, a reference to the famous open letter written by Emile Zola, a French writer, published on January 13, 1898, on the cover of a French newspaper. In the letter, Zola argued that the conviction of French army officer Alfred Dreyfus, who was also Jewish, was based on false accusations of espionage. He highlighted the poorly conducted investigation and showed that if the investigation had been done properly, the evidence would have shown the guilt was from another officer, not Dreyfus. The Dreyfus affair was a watershed moment for the Jews in Europe. For Theodor Herzl, an Austro-Hungarian Jewish journalist and the founder of modern-day Zionism, that was the moment he realized that, for Jews to be safe, they needed a state of their own. Jews were never safe in Europe, and 40 years later, Herzl’s fears came to life with the genocide and mass murder of our six million.

Jewish life in America was always different. The United States of America, in addition to breaking off from the King of England, also sought to deviate from the Anglican Church of England. This was so important to our Founding Fathers that the First Amendment to our Constitution guarantees that our “government shall not make any laws respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibit the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” Freedom of religion was a primary pillar of the establishment of our country. While these amendments were ratified in December of 1791, President Washington, in his famous letter to the Temple of Newport, Rhode Island, wrote a year earlier in 1790, “May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants—while everyone shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid.”

And none shall make them afraid… but 230 years later, we are afraid. On the first night of Passover, in the name of Gaza, a terrorist burned Gov. Josh Shapiro’s Governor’s Mansion hours after their seder. Two weeks ago, two young Jews, Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischintzky, were murdered outside of an American Jewish Committee event for young diplomats to encourage interfaith efforts to bring aid to Gaza. The perpetrator, Elias Rodriguez, when arrested, yelled “Free Palestine” and railed against the war online. He not only waited outside the event to shoot these young people—he pursued Sarah, who tried to crawl away, and shot her countless times. Just 10 days later, at a walk for the hostages in Boulder, CO, an Egyptian man, in the name of “Free Palestine,” firebombed a crowd of mostly seniors. Yelling “Free Palestine” and hurting American Jews will not free Palestine. It will not bring about an end to the war, and it is most certainly not an American way of behaving.

One of the victims in Boulder was Barbara Steinmetz, an 88-year-old Holocaust survivor from Hungary, who said in an interview this week, “We’re Americans, we are better than this. That’s what I want them to know. That they be kind and decent human beings.” She added, “The attack has nothing to do with the Holocaust, it has to do with a human being that wants to burn other people. It’s about what the hell is going on in our country, what the hell is going on?” Her father fought for Jewish assimilation in Hungary, but Jewish wisdom and ritual were a huge part of her life. Her mother was a chemist but had to sit in the back of the class because she was Jewish. Her father spent many years running a hotel in Croatia. When he saw what was coming, he reached out to many former hotel guests for help, but no one would help. The family finally escaped to France, Spain, and then Portugal, where he worked to find asylum in many countries. Finally, they journeyed to the Dominican Republic.

Moments such as this activate the inherited trauma we experienced, our families experienced, or that which we read about and know happened to our people. Antisemitism in America is at an all-time high—up nearly 900% from a decade ago. And the vision of America is that “none shall make them afraid.” Washington’s vision can only hold true if Americans collectively join to denounce such hateful actions.

For months, leadership in the Jewish community raised concerns about slogans appearing at rallies which included “Globalize the Intifada” or “There is no solution except intifada revolution.” When these phrases are put into action, they look like murder, firebombing of Jews, and attacks on Jewish institutions. The massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue changed Jewish life in America. For Jews, we saw it as a different form of antisemitism that never occurred here before. For many Americans, who saw this as another attack on a house of worship and denounced it then, they also aligned it with the treacherous wave of gun violence and mass shootings that has marred 21st-century American life. Those who see this as another mass shooting risk never seeing it for what it is—a man who was solely motivated to kill Jews and was informed by antisemitic conspiracy theories.

I am struck by the deep sadness, anger, and fear that has consumed my soul this week and the alignment with Parashat Naso where we read the Birkat Kohanim, the Priestly Blessing: “May God bless you and protect you. May God’s light shine upon you and be kind to you. May God lift up God’s face to you and grant you peace.” May God protect you. Protection is a word we come to associate with security. Our community is all too familiar with asking for protection from our wonderful police officers who stand with us in our hour of need. Bekhor Shor, a 12th-century French commentator, likens these words to the 121st Psalm in which we read God will guard us from all evil. In response to such horrific acts of violence, we might wonder where God’s presence is. God’s presence relies on Barbara Steinmetz’s vision of America—and really the world—in which there is hope for goodness to prevail over wickedness. God’s blessing requires all humanity to do their part. Perhaps this hope is underscored by Nachmanides, a 12th-century Spanish commentator who compared God granting us kindness to a midrash in Genesis Rabbah that says, “O My World, O My World! Would that the quality of grace be before Me at every moment.” It seems that the rabbis recognized God’s secret hope and prayer: that God’s hand in creation would bring compassion, love, and peace to the world.

American Jewish life has traveled a path that has wound its way from being a minority on the outskirts to being accepted into the most important aspects of society. We have been elected to high offices, served as leaders of major corporations, and been appointed to the Supreme Court, and yet once again, we recognize our fragility because we realize we are a minority. Our commitment to learning and work ethic brought our immigrant ancestors into the fold of American life very quickly. Yesterday, as I stood at Plum Street Temple in Cincinnati, a synagogue built by Isaac Mayer Wise in 1866, I learned from Rabbi Neil Hirsch, the senior rabbi, that there are only three Stars of David in the entire synagogue—one atop the ark and two that frame the Ten Commandments high above the ark. The other stars in the building are five-pointed stars mimicking the American flag because Wise was deeply committed to Jewish life in America. He wanted the synagogue to be American. As we do this dance between acceptance and outcast, perhaps what we need is something new. We often speak about Tikkun Olam—repairing the world—but maybe we need something different. Maybe we need a Tikkun N’fashot—an effort to repair souls. The great modern Mussar teacher explains that the nefesh, one of the words for soul, is the aspect of the soul most visible to us. It is where all of our character traits like anger, love, trust, worry, and kindness reside. Morinis explains the nefesh part of our soul registers all the good and bad we do in our lives. What would it mean to repair it? It would require a profound effort for every individual to examine themselves and ask profound questions.

I began tonight referencing Zola’s J’accuse. Israel and the Jewish people have been accused of horrible things. And when we claim that being called colonialists and committers of genocide is antisemitic, those who claim it say they love Jews and deny it. Maybe the accusers need to study more history and recognize their claims align with the blood libel of the past. And maybe they will realize that, like every generation before now, the Jew has become what is considered most evil in society. And this has happened again!

We hate being the victim. We hate what the trauma does to us. When the world looks to us and says, “We accuse you of destruction and starvation,” will the world believe us when we say Hamas stole the aid, Egypt closed its borders, Hamas put its operatives in schools and hospitals and ensured their families would be right next to them? Would the world remember that part of Hamas’ strategy is harming its own civilians? All this is a forgotten part of the story. Perhaps it is intentionally ignored. Every death is a tragedy. When a child dies, it brings me great sadness. I want nothing more than for our hostages to come home, this war to end, and for Hamas to never pose a threat to Israel again. But harming Jews in America will not bring that about. Our Tikkun Hanefesh will come when we wonder if we did all we could to bring home the hostages. It has come when we recognized the mistakes that were made during this war. And it will continue to come when we strive to build Zechariah’s vision: when the old shall be in the squares and the young shall be able to play in those squares.

In 2024, Rabbi Oded Mazor, a Reform rabbi in Jerusalem, shared a vision of the future. He sends his children to the Yad b’Yad school, a multilingual school where Jews, Arabs, and Palestinians come together—they are students and teachers. He was told an incredible story by one of his kid’s teachers. “In another class, the Jewish teacher was teaching, and the Muslim teacher was there with her. One of the grown children of the Jewish teacher walked in the room in uniform, having come back home from the army. He asked his mother to go out with him for a coffee. His mother told him, ‘I can’t go. I’m teaching now.’ And the Palestinian teacher said, ‘Of course you should go with him! He’s your son! He came home!’” She understood that as a mother, even though that son came into the class in uniform—and one can only imagine what that meant for the Palestinian teacher—that mother had to go with the son who came from the battlefield. What they didn’t know was that the reason he came to get her to go out for coffee was that, at the coffee shop, the other son, who came home from miluim (reserve duty), was waiting. He concluded by saying that after Purim ended, he would have an Iftar dinner in his synagogue courtyard for the children in his daughter’s class.” That is the day he waits for.

The day I am waiting for is the day we do not have to have a police officer in our lobby because the world realizes that Jewish lives matter too. The day I am waiting for is knowing that I don’t have to think about where I might go if I had to pack my bags. The day I am waiting for is not having to wonder who will hide me if the world turns its back on me again. The day I am waiting for is for all to recognize that we are part of the fabric of America, where we can all sit beneath our vine and fig tree and none shall make us afraid.

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Rick Kellner

June 6, 2025

June 6, 2025

As a Jewish leader, I spend time immersed in Jewish life, Jewish history, and the profound lessons of Torah. I also spend time listening and speaking with many of you, along with learning from other Jewish leaders. I have spent much time immersed in what the future of Jewish life will look like.

October 7^th changed Jewish life in the 21^st century. After twenty months of war, we are filled with deep questions about what it means to be in a perpetual state of war. We know that antisemitism is rising, and we know that participation in Jewish life around the United States, including in Columbus and at Beth Tikvah, have surged since the war. We are looking for community, we are looking to be heard.

My own questions have centered on our own community and what we can become. I have thought about:

• How can we enrich our Jewish identity?
• What are our values?
• How do those values play out both within and beyond the walls of our synagogue?
• What is our connection to Israel and the Jewish People?
• How can we live out our Zionism?
• In a world in which we feel deep loneliness resulting from antisemitism, what can we do to make the world a better place?

Over the course of these next several weeks, I want to begin to share with you my responses to these questions. During my February sabbatical I spent time in study and reflection and crafted what I would call a “living and fluid vision” for the future of Jewish life and how Beth Tikvah can immerse in that vision. For the first six weeks, I would like to reflect on the Jewish values that can be the fuel that fills the engine of Jewish life. Subsequent to a conversation on values, I would like us to think about how we apply those values to our lives and our community.

We begin with B’tzelem Elohim to be made in the image of God.

In the beginning of God’s creating the world, the Torah teaches us that we, human beings, are created in God’s image. With this distinction of the highest esteem, it serves as a calling to us to see others with a divine spark of creating. The value is repeated several chapters later when God creates the world anew; starting with Noah and his children. Even as God realized the depravity of humankind prior to the flood, God began the world again with the same value. The failure of human beings to behave in the aspirational manner reflecting the divine spark within all humankind was not enough for God to eschew this value in the reboot. To underscore this point, God makes a covenant with Noah and his descendants – a promise about the future built on care and respect for one another. The Rabbis of the Talmud enumerated this covenant as they established the Noahide laws. In tractate Sanhedrin (56a) the Rabbis begin to envision what such a covenant might look like. To live this covenant is to recognize this universal vision for all humanity: The children of Noah were commanded with seven commandments: [to establish] laws, and [to prohibit] cursing God, idolatry, ensuring sacredness in our relationships, bloodshed, robbery, and caring for animals and all God’s creation.

The rabbis in Tractate Sanhedrin also wonder why Adam and Eve were created alone. They conclude that it was for the purpose of maintaining peace among people so that one person cannot say to another, my ancestor was better than your ancestor. This text in Sanhedrin is a foundation for a Jewish pursuit of equity between people. So much of the world is built on false notions of superiority of gender, race, status, or class. The rabbis teach us that this cannot be true because we all derive from Adam and Eve, the first human beings. We want to be seen in this light and we also must see recognize the divine spark in others.

As we enter this Shabbat and we continue through Pride month, I ask all of us to consider what this value comes to teach us? How can we live by it? And how can we remember it when we interact with others?

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rick Kellner

June 3, 2025

I am sitting down to write this message to you on Monday afternoon, which is the afternoon of Shavuot—the day we celebrate standing at Sinai to receive the gift of Torah. It is also 24 hours after the heinous antisemitic attack in Boulder, CO, on Jews walking to encourage the release of the hostages. My heart goes out to the victims as we pray for their recovery. It is the second attack on Jews in American streets in the past two weeks, and this one has left me reeling because the emotions of the two are compounded. I am also saddened by the lack of outreach from anyone, anywhere, in the interfaith community.

Yelling “Free Palestine” and “End Zionists” while hurling explosives at Jews should fill every American with anger and inspire all of us to stand up and say, “We won’t let that happen here ever again!” When anti-Israel and anti-Jewish protesters gathered on college campuses and said “Globalize the Intifada,” this is what they were talking about. I lived through the Second Intifada. I know what it’s like to walk next to a bus or into a supermarket or sit down at a café in Jerusalem, always looking over your shoulder, fearful that it might explode. Killing or hurting Jews in America will not “Free Palestine”; it will not help Palestinians. The victims in Sunday’s attack were between the ages of 52 and 88; the 88-year-old was a Holocaust survivor. Can you imagine? She endured the worst evil humanity has ever known, and on the free streets of America, she was terrorized again for being Jewish.

In this moment, I am reminded of a Midrash (a story or interpretation about something in the Torah) about Abraham and a test of his identity and faith. The rabbis tell us a story about Nimrod, who challenged Abraham and said they should worship the fire. Abraham responded, “Perhaps they should worship water, which quenches fire.” Nimrod acquiesced and said, “Let’s worship water.” Then Abraham challenged him again and said, “Let’s worship the clouds, which hold the water.” The seemingly circular conversation continues and frustrates Nimrod, who scolds Abraham for piling on words, before saying they should bow to the fire. Nimrod said to him, “I shall cast you into the fire, and let your God come and save you from it.” Abraham was thrown into the pit for his belief and identity, and he survived. On Sunday, Jews were literally thrown into the fire of a Molotov cocktail, and we ask ourselves: will we emerge like Abraham?

The Midrash tells us that it was God who saved Abraham. For us, it might be God who will come to save us, but perhaps it will be the choices we make. When we are thrown into the fiery furnace, it is easy to run away from the flames and retreat to our own homes. Judaism has prevailed for centuries because so many of us chose not to hide. Conversos hid their identities from the public but still practiced Judaism at home. Other communities decided that even amid the fears at the hands of Czars or other oppressors, they would not give up. On Sunday evening, I taught such a lesson from Rabbi Kalonymos Kalman Shapira, the Rabbi of the Warsaw Ghetto, who illegally brought his community together inside the ghetto under the threat of death. In February 1942, he taught about how the hope for immediate salvation might actually make us hopeless, and he reminded us that salvation may just come later, and we should keep hoping and keep living our lives Jewishly.

It is my hope that we, as a Jewish community, will continue to show up! Please show up for Shabbat on Friday to honor our board. Please show up for Shabbat on June 13th to celebrate Pride. Please show up to watch the film October 8 on June 11th. If we are offering a program, please consider showing up! Safety and security are our top priority. If you have questions or concerns about our security protocols, please reach out to Debbie Vinocur, our Executive Director. We do not publicize our plans for security reasons, but she would be happy to speak with you.

These are difficult times that stir in us profound emotions and deep questions. We are all navigating these uncharted waters—hopefully together. May we all have the strength to step forward with love and not with anger.

With profound sadness and filled with prayers for all the victims,

Rabbi Rick Kellner