TBE Bar/Bat Mitzvah Commentary: Sydney Eben on Mikketz

At the beginning of this Torah portion, Joseph is called upon to interpret Pharaoh’s two very strange dreams. The first was about 7 fat cows being eaten by 7 lean cows. The second one was about 7 healthy sheaths of wheat being devoured by 7 wilting sheaths of wheat.

Many of my friends and family think of me as a creative person and an out of the box thinker.   Joseph was too.  He took the opportunity of interpreting the dreams and turned it to his advantage.  By the end of his meeting with Pharaoh, he had not only interpreted the dreams, but he was given the position as second in command of Egypt.  He came from the bottom of society – a slave, a prisoner, and rose to the top of the nation.

Having studied these dreams in great detail, what if there was another angle?  What if Joseph wasn’t so much an out of the box thinker as just really lucky?  More of an opportunist? I’ve come up with several other plausible interpretations for these dreams that Joseph overlooked.  Here they are:

Maybe the fact that skinny cows devoured fat cows meant that the people would have to drink skim milk for seven years.  Or maybe even become lactose intolerant, as so many people in this room are.

Maybe the skinny cows represented a new nation that would some day overthrow the great kingdom of Egypt.  Little did Joseph know that that would actually happen hundreds of years later and it would be his descendants who would cause great Egyptian turmoil.

              Another interpretation could be that it was a prophecy to Joseph that his brothers were fighting amongst themselves, like the fat cows and the skinny cows, and they needed him.  After all, Joseph had an odd and awkward relationship with his brothers.

             Although I don’t have a coat of many colors, I feel that my Torah study at school has encouraged ME to be an interpreter of MANY things. Whether it’s Hebrew text or how I interpret directions from my parents, like when to go sleep, to make my bed and clean up my room, or how to get out of the house on time in the morning, it all comes down to interpretation!

              For my mitzvah project, I am raising funds for the Israel Guide Dog Center for the Blind. I combined my love of dogs with my wish to help out in some way in Israel. This organization raises funds for puppies to be trained as dogs for the blind and even dogs that don’t make guide dog status are still used for people with other disabilities, so no person is turned away if they have a need. MY dream would be to have all 27,000 people on the wait list to have a guide dog for their independence and companionship!

TBE Bar/Bat Mitzvah Commentary: Noah Finchler on Mikketz (Hanukkah)

Shabbat Shalom!  And thank you for coming here today from far and wide as we celebrate my bar mitzvah.

This week, we also celebrated a once in a lifetime holiday: Thanksgivikkah.  Today is also a special day for other reasons: it’s Shabbat, my dad’s birthday as well as mine, and of course, my bar mitzvah.

Many things have contributed to my being here today.  As most of you know, I am a black belt in karate.  What you may not know, is that my karate skills are very similar to the skills I have learned in preparing for today.

No, I am not going to chop through the torah or anything!  Because in karate, I have learned that there are many was to be strong. I have also learned it from being Jewish.

In karate, in fact, being strong is not the most important thing. It’s more important to be focused and quick.  You must also be patient, calm not only in your head, but your soul as well.

The same is true in scouting, which I also love. The scout Oath is “On my honor, I will do my best, to do my duty, to God and my country, to obey the scout law. To help other people at all times, to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.”   Physical strength is not enough.  

The message of Chanukah is very similar. You have the Maccabees, who possessed great physical strength. But the message from my Haftarah is different. It says, “Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit.”  This means that I would not have learned everything today by might or power, but by my will to learn as much as I can and then, when it would be easy to stop, to keep on going.

The key is to be strong in many different ways.  For me, a way to be strong is through self control.  Self control came to me through Karate, as we have to be very mature, and not fool around when we are sparring or anything else that we are doing during the class. We have to focus all our energy into each move, and not to have any distractions.

In my Torah portion, Joseph had to show self control to not reveal himself to his brothers, and in teaching the Egyptians to store the food during the 7 years of plenty, so they would have food for the 7 years of famine.

On Thankgivukkah we had to have self control to not eat too much turkey and potato latkes.

As I grow into an adult, I am hoping to use the lessons that I have learned from my grandfather, who unfortunately has passed on. He was a man who has extremely strong moral character and physical strength too.  He was able to fix things so easily.  He even fixed the ark upstairs in the chapel.  Whenever when I go into that chapel, I think of him.  I know he is smiling down on me today.

For my mitzvah project, I volunteered at Person to Person and helped sort all kinds of food and then put items on the shelves.  I’m also donating a part of my bar mitzvah money to the food bank of Hawaii. The organization donates mass quantities of both perishable and non-perishable goods to 250 charitable agencies on Oahu. The Food bank of Hawaii now feeds over 183,500 people in Hawaii. That is over 14% of the population of Hawaii. This includes children, the elderly, the homeless, the disabled, low-income families, and the unemployed.  

Joseph and Wikileaks, Transparency, Government and the Press

See this week's Parsha Packet, to be used during our discussion at services. The topic is WikiLeaks, government and the press, with a focus on the ethics of transparency and privacy. Joseph does some pretty underhanded things in the portion, framing his brothers for spying. What would have happened if WikiLeaks had exposed this corruption? Were his actions justified? Check out our discussion guide here.

Hanukkah: National or Family Needs - Which Comes First?

Which comes first, national or family needs? Click here to see how that plays out in the Hanukkah story.

Parsha Packet for Mikketz - Hanukkah: Sweet Vengeance

After all the calamities of Jewish history, and in particular the Holocaust, how should Jews respond? By seeking revenge or reconciliation with former enemies? Click here for "Sweet Vengeance," with a focus on the story of Joseph and his brothers, as well as the Hanukkah story and the film, "Inglorious Basterds."

TBE Bar/Bat Mitzvah Commentary: Sarah Lederman on Mikketz

Shabbat Shalom and Happy Hanukkah!

This morning I’d like to tell you about a people who fought off their oppressors to gain freedom after a lengthy struggle, only to finally emerge victorious but battered. When they won, one of the first major events that happened was an important miracle, unlike anything they had seen before. They returned to their main temple and listened to their spiritual leader – then they cleaned up the place that that had been hit hardest by the occupation.

Of you’ve guessed what I’m talking about. No, it’s not the Maccabees and the Hanukkah story.
It’s “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.”

My mom introduced me to “Star Trek” when I was seven years old, with “The Next Generation,” and I’ve loved it ever since. How much do I love it? Everyone knows that Tribbles are giant fur balls that eat everything, breed and annoy Klingons. But did you know that the Klingon armada obliterated the Tribble home world? Or that even shape-shifting aliens, called Changelings are easily wooed by those furry creatures. If you’ve never seen a Tribble, I brought one in.

Star Trek DS9 and the Hanukkah story have a lot of similarities. For example: they both have villains that oppress a people, resistance fighters who opposed them, and in both cases the resistance wins and that victory is followed by a miracle. In the case of Star Trek, that miracle is the arrival of the emissary of the prophets and the discovery of the celestial temple, the home of the Bajoran gods.


As with Hanukkah, the weak defeated the mighty. A small Shakaar resistance cell, which
included Kira Nerys, a Judah Maccabee – like figure if there ever was one, did whatever it took to get rid of the Cardassians, who wanted to destroy their way of life – and actually did destroy it. When the war was won, they were able to restore some of their ancient glory. They did this in the same that Jews rebuild communities today – with the help of the Federation.

One of the ancient practices that they brought back was a month-long fast called the Time of Cleansing, in which they cleansed themselves of sins in a way very similar to Yom Kippur. Their services, held every day, included special prayers to the prophets, asking for forgiveness.

They even have rabbis, called Vedeks, who lead the services, meditate and study the visions of the prophets and their interpretations. People come to the Vedeks to ask advice or seek blessings. They do not have any dietary laws, as they often had no food and had to eat whatever they could find.

However, they have something like bar or bat mitzvah. As children, they begin to wear special earrings that contain the crest of their family. They are passed down from generation to generation.


And to mourn the death of a loved one, they even have something like a yahrzeit candle, called duranja.

Of course there has to be a villain to this story. In this case, his name is not Antiochus, but Gul Dukat. He was the head of the occupation during its final years. Like Korach, who battled Moses in the wilderness and was swallowed up by the earth, Dukat eventually met his end when he was thrust into a giant pit of flames.


As you can see, the faith of the Bajorans is truly what holds them together especially during the long occupation. Without their faith, they would have given up a long time ago, and their culture would have been lost. As Kira said, “That’s the thing about faith. If you don’t have it you can’t understand it. And if you do, no explanation is necessary.”

I feel the same way about being a Jew. As I become a bat mitzvah, I hope that I will be as secure in my faith as Kira is in hers. One way that I can do that is through service to others. For my mitzvah project, I did a series of bake sales to raise money and awareness for Heifer International. Heifer International is an organization that makes families that can not support themselves self-sufficient, by giving the families animals, like cows, that they then take a product from, such as milk, and the family uses some to feed themselves, and they sell the rest. When the animals have babies, the family has to give some of the offspring to another family that needs them. The new family is taught how to take care of the animals, and they promise to pass on the gift to another person.


I hope you can see how fitting it is for me to support an organization that works to end hunger, when my portion is about how Joseph prevented starvation during a famine. And how did that all happen? It all began with Pharaoh’s dreams about skinny cows and fat cows. It all begins with heifers, but heifer International doesn’t just do cows. It also provides families with goats, sheep, chickens, llamas, alpacas, honeybees, water buffalos, ducks, rabbits, geese, and, if I could say it in a synagogue, pigs.