Ohr Chadasch Synagogue in Vienna
My month of Friday nights began on October 24 at the Montclair Golf Club. There, I attended the Bat Mitzvah of Sydney, a student at the Jewish Cultural School in Montclair. At age 11-12, Sydney already had a vision of her Bat Mitzvah, which was antithetical to her school’s plan that only included community service. She dreamed of chanting Hebrew prayers and reading from the Torah. But first she had to learn how to read Hebrew and daven! That’s how our paths crossed.
Her personalized “siddur” included family photos, English readings and transliterations of some Shabbat prayers. The 45 minute service began with candle-lighting and the presentation of her Tallit. Accompanied by a keyboard player and drummer, Sydney and the celebrant led us in prayer. Quotes from Aesop and Shel Silverstein filled the spaces between Lecha Dodi and the Barachu. Sydney chanted an aliyah, and offered a D’var Torah. Sydney had become a Bat Mitzvah!
On October 31, as I paid careful attention to the waxing of the moon, I found myself lighting candles at Ohr Chadasch, a Progressive synagogue on the Robertgasse in Vienna. Progressive? Andy and I weren’t exactly sure what that meant but we immediately felt at home in an egalitarian congregation that welcomed strangers. Rabbi Walter Rothschild, a visiting Rabbi from Berlin (he comes once a month), and congregants warmly welcomed new and old faces. For example, three American college students, currently studying in Prague, were visiting. One young man had just applied to rabbinical school in L.A. The other was majoring in International studies with a concentration in the MidEast. The third was Catholic but exploring his nascent Judaism.
The 40 congregants and visitors sang the familiar Hebrew melodies accompanied by a piano. The flow of German, Hebrew and English from the Rabbi’s D’var Torah and from the sermon, given by a Holocaust survivor visiting from Israel, kept us either rapt or confused. But one thing was clear. This congregation was determined to strengthen Progressive Judaism in Vienna and to expand it to Israel. We left the synagogue sated from the Oneg, strengthened by this growing Jewish community, curious about the three Torahs we did not see (two on permanent loan from the Czech Republic and one from Israel), yet haunted by the 65,000+ Jews in Vienna killed during the Holocaust.
We followed the waxing moon to my cousin’s Orthodox synagogue in Kfar Saba, a city in Israel near Tel Aviv. On November 7, I welcomed Shabbat from the women’s balcony while Andy was part of the sea of white shirts closer to the bima. Although I have no sense of direction, surrounded by my cousins whom I had not seen in seven years, listening to the resonance of the Shabbat melodies, and picturing our previous four days in Jerusalem, I found East.
Challah at Bat Mitzvah
The festive Shabbat meal began with the Kiddush and the motzee, recited on challot shaped like the number thirteen and baked by a neighbor. We feted Yuval, the Bar Mitzvah, between zmirot and Israeli delicacies. We re-connected with relatives across the religious spectrum and met new family members. In a few months, there will be even more new members to greet. The hospitality of the community reflected the week’s Parasha – Vayyera – and Andy and I felt like we were home.
My mother always used to say, “It’s good to go and it’s good to come home.” She was right, well, sort of. What a joy it was to return to Shomrei on Nov. 14, under a full moon, and to behold Siona Ely leading us in Kabbalat Shabbat. Then Rabbi Greenstein blessed his tallit and davened Maariv. But if truth be told, we were also “home” on our month of travelling Friday nights. It didn’t matter what Google Maps told us. When we welcomed the Sabbath Bride and sang psalms of praise to God, when we heard the familiar melodies that tugged at our heartstrings, when we joined in making Kiddush and reciting the motzee, when we were strangers and a community welcomed us, we were home.
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There’s no place like home! Beautiful article!