Interviews

I now know my timetable for my interview(s) next week...and I must say it looks really rather heavy. I have four panel interviews where I will be interviewed by two people. Each of these last around an hour. In addition to these four interviews there are two group interviews where myself and the other candedates interact with eachother and with some of our interviewers...as part of one of these I have to perpare and give a presentation. Then we have some session where issues are presented to us. Oh and I almost forgot that I have to have a session with a analysist..so in short a very busy week indeed. (And even getting everything sorted for it in advance has proved to be a bit of a headache.

Quiet times

I have had a very quiet and peaceful shabbat...we didn't go to synagogue but rather stayed at home. I had known how tired I was and I don't really know why I should be so very tired I haven't done all that much. After havdalah I did some more work perparing for my up coming interviews...I think that I am going to as ready as I can be which is really all that I can ask of myself. I am still reading this amazing Anthopological study of Hasidic girls, well young women really, growing up in Crown Hights in New York. It is one of the most intersting books I have read in long time.

Rabbinic School Interviews

Yesterday I got the letter from the rabbinic school it was a fairly standard letter but my time table wasn't included. So I gave them a ring and it got sorted quiet quickly. They simple sent me a copy of my timetable by email...it doesn't look to bad main focused on the second and third days but that isn't a bad thing in and off itself.
So I know have a good idea of what is going to happen during my interviews in the rabbicinic school...I am still exploring any other options though. So sorting all the adminastive stuff for the interviews took up most of the day.

inbetween times

Well I have now made contact with the nice people who run the MA.ed that I am interested in the opening emails have been really quite friendly so I have re-written my CV and I have sent that in asking for an informal per-intereveiw type thing. I have also been doing some research on the web-(what did we do before research was so easy?)-and given the moduels on offer and the great teachers it is looking like a better and better option.

Not that I have given up on my other plans not by a long way I am in the midst of prepartions for my interviews which are coming up. As mentioned in earlier blogs. Three long days of different types of interviews but I am detrimed to make a better job of them than I did last time around. So it will be nice just to have a proper plan B.

But with all that going on I haven't had anytime really to make head way with my studies of the Mei Hashiloach. But I am starting to get a grip on the major outlines of his thought and Torah. I am also reading as a rather tangental part of my PhD research an anthopological study of the lives of Hasidic girls. (The topic is about as far away from my own as it is possible to be but within Jewish studies but some of the methods are much the same.)

It is a very interesting book and it is eye-opening how much the Tanya (a work of Lubavitch philosophy) is intergrated into their day-to-day life. It is called 'Mystics, Mavericks, and Merrymakers' and is worth a read.

Forward planning

I am really not looking forward to March I don't think it is going to be a good one. Month that is rather then March that is. For one thing I have a three day interview in the first week of the month which is not really something that I am anticipanting with much joy. I also have a couple of hosptial oppontments again that is not something to fill one's soul with happiness is it. But then I have been waiting an age for this appontment so it is a good thing in a sort of way. There are a few other things that are set for march but I am not going to go into them here and now.

I am enjoying studying the Mei HaShiloach-but it is very radical. I can really see why it got its author into such trouble. But I still am nowhere near getting a handle on the ideas behind it.

Again looking forward I am giving somethought to doing an MA.ed (but it is at a very early stage).

Sci.fi

While I was in London I was reading "Neverwhere" by Neil Gailman...which is funny and scary and interesting all at the same time. Although reading it on the tube was a little nerve-racking. In the end i devoured the whole thing in a little over a day and I was rather sorry went it came to an end. I often feel that at the end of a book but it was espially true with Neverwhere I would really have liked to spend more time with Door, Richard, the Marquis. I also wanted to learn more about the whole world of London Below.
In a little when I am less busy I will go back and make myself re-read it but this time slowly picking up on more of the details. I really wish there were a sequal to Neverwhere not just because it would mean more time with them all but there are bits of London Below that were mentioned but not visited and I would like to 'see' them'. On a brighter note I have found a new author to pursue. (I will also, well maybe, get the DVD of the T.V sereis).

Torah, itlian food, and friendship

The shiur on Polish Hasidic thought was even better this week than it had been upto this point. This was the second week we spent on the Isbitz. And having looked at his life story and relationship with the Kotzker last week we were now studing just two sections from the Mei Hashiloach. The passage concernd with the spies and the one about Pinhas.
The later is probably the most radical Jewish teaching I have come across, and I can see why it was oftern omited or even torn out from the book. Anyway I went straight out and got a copy of the Mei Hashiloach (in translation.)
I had agreed to meet somefriends the next day so i had sometime to kill in london...I went to G.Green and got some surplies for shabbat. Then I had a look around the charity shopes...I found a copy of the No'am Elimeelch (Hebrew) for just a couple of pounds which was nice becaue i was about to get it anyway. I then ate lunch in a kosher Italian.
I still had sometime to kill so i stoped off at the British Libaury and had a look at their expo on human rights, before heading to the National Gallary to meet up with my friends. I still got there a bit on the earily side so I had a long look around the early paintins 1200-1500. I then met one of my friends who run though her talk on a picture 'an experiment with an air pump' on me-it was very good and even though it is one of my favourite pantings she had spotted things that i had always missed. We then met up with our other friends and went to get some dinner. Central London looked very bautiful under a light dusting of snow. (It was Itlain food again but then who can get to much Itlain food can you?)

Polish Hasidic thought

I am in the middle of a six-week course at LSJS (I know what is a nice ‘reform’ Jewish boy doing at LSJS). It is taught by Rabbi Belovski who is an amazing teacher and has the ability to make the complex and challenging ideas of the Polish Hasidic Rebbes accessible.
I don’t know why anybody hasn’t mentioned them before. Its not as if I am new to Jewish studies but I had not come across the thoughts and works of Rebbes like Rabbi Simham Bunim of Przysucha, and Rabbi Mordecai Yosef Leiner of Izbica. Although I had of course not only heard of but also studied, at least to some extent, the Kotzker.
I have always felt drawn to Hasidic ideas but the ideas that we are beginning to explore in this course are like a breath of fresh air. Really unlike anything I have come across before either within Judaism or outside of it. The focus on truth and authenticity is really challenging. I can see why it got these Rabbis into such trouble with the other leaders of Hasidic Judaism. It also provides an antidote to the false characterisation of Hasidic Judaism as being all about mysticism and tells of wonder working Rebbes. Not that I am going to abandon either my very minor readings in Jewish mysticism or the stories of the Hasidim.
But I am enjoying the course so much that I have ordered a couple of books by and about these very interesting religious thinkers.

In the end we decided that we would risk it and headed off into the snow we had packed a spad and some blankets just in case we got stuck but as it turned out the heavy snow was very local and although there was some light snow it wasn't settling. In the end we got to synagogue rather early (which is just a danger of living at a distance). The room where we had the Tu B'Shavet meal was lovely with one big table and the walls decorated with pictures of trees. I am not sure that any of the more mystical elements of the evening came though, but it was a fun event nevertheless.

snowy Tu B'shevat

Today (well from sunset onwards) is Tu B'Shevat and we should be about to head off to synagogue to do the Tu B'Shavat sader. This is based on the passover sader but it is customary to eat lots of frui, 12 different kinds (including the 7 fruits of Israel). Tu B'Shevat is full of kabbalistic meaning and is generaly a very postive event. It is sometimes said that Tu B'Shevat is the day when the trees wake up from their winter slumbers. Although given how snowny it is I don't think that they will be waking up. I also don't know if trying to travel to synagogue is a good idea as it is snowing quite hard. But that said the roads seem to be running quite well.