Condolences to David Weinberg and family on the passing of his brother, Jonathan Weinberg.
Times: Shabbat starts tonight with candlelighting at 8:03pm, ends Saturday night at 9:07pm. Early Shabbos candle lighting is between 7:00pm-7:05pm. The weekly Torah portion is Chayei Sarah.
Upcoming Event: Tuesday 29 November: Lunchtime lecture with Professor Shlomo Biderman and Liat Weiss-Shahaf on “Beyond the Startup Nation: How Social Business Entrepreneurship is used to fight social disparities and improve solidarity in Israel”. Lunch and Lecture at 12.30pm; Mincha at 1.45pm. Juilliard Group, Level 31, 459 Collins Street, Melbourne. RSVP for catering purposes to events@jbd.org.au by COB today. For more information click here for the JBD website and click here for Facebook.
Friday Mincha in the CBD: Friday “mincha & kugel” at Billing Bureau will be on today at 1.45pm (food from 1.30pm), using the SMS reminder system to confirm numbers.
Mincha in the CBD: Daily mincha at 1.45pm is at Billing Bureau – Level 5 South/459 Collins – until late December, using the SMS system to confirm numbers.
Study: Wednesday shiur & lunch continues on Wednesday at 1.15pm at Billing Bureau.
Kosher Food in the CBD: Nifla Kosher Catering (KA Hechsher)
Offers Corporate Catering, specialising in individual and board room lunches. 10% Discount on your first website purchase. Enter promo code “FIRST TIME”. For further details visit www.nifla.com.au
IN A RUSH CAFE-616 St Kilda Road-(Ground Floor-Lowe Lippmann Building)
Thought of the Week with thanks to Gaby Silver. In this week’s Torah reading, Avraham sends his trusted servant Eliezer to find a mate for his son, Yitzchak. His instructions are simple: she should be from a good family and she must above all embody kindness and compassion. Eliezer travels to Charan, encounters Rivka and the rest is history. Not quite “boy meets girl” but the result is much the same. From this holy union, Yaakov, and ultimately the Jewish nation, are born.
We learn from this narrative the central roles that kindness and compassion play in a successful relationship between man and woman. Of course, love is incredibly important, but without these two elements, that love can morph into a self-serving emotion that ultimately leads to friction.
The Jewish people and G-d are frequently referred to as Bride and Groom in Jewish thought. We were ‘married’ at Mt Sinai and the Torah is our kesubah (marriage contract). Somewhere along the way, we drifted apart. The result was a trial separation: galut (exile), while we attempt to iron out our differences. If our relationship with G-d had a Facebook status it would be “It’s complicated”. The only way we can rekindle the spark and return to the marital abode is to get back in touch with the kindness and compassion that originally characterised the relationship. It starts with kindness and compassion for each other. When Jews treat each other with unconditional kindness, we are being kind to our creator in whose image we were formed. If only we can focus on boundless kindness and compassion for each other, maybe we can work this out and live happily ever after.