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Temple Beth-El Adult Education Program 5785 (2024-2025) Celebrating 100 Years of TBE!

 

Ongoing study of Jewish tradition, history, literature, and thought is a critical component of Jewish life, and a central, dynamic element of Jewish experience. Under the inspired leadership of Rabbi Emeritus Scott Glass and now Rabbi Caleb Brommer, our community has developed multiple opportunities and venues for us to engage Jewish texts and ideas.

Adult Education classes are open to all members of the TBE community free of charge. Contributions to the Adult Education Fund support this program and are deeply appreciated.

Registration is required, just click HERE to sign up electronically.  If you prefer, you may also call the Temple office at (607) 273-5775 any time and tell us which classes you'd like to attend.  Additional programs are being planned, so be sure to check back!  Questions?  Just email us at: adulted@tbeithaca.org

 

One Day Classes

American Jewish Fiction is Alive and Well

In the late 1970s, Irving Howe predicted that American-Jewish fiction would disappear after the deaths of Bellow, Roth, and Malamud. Happily, he has been proven wrong many times over. Four subjects we keep writing about--and why they never get old.

Joan Leegant
Sunday, September 8 2024 @ 7 PM in the Social Hall and via Zoom


Jews and Arabs in British Mandate Jerusalem

Rebecca Lesses
Wednesday, November 6 @ 7 PM in person at TBE and via Zoom

Registrants will receive the Zoom link via email before class.


The Kosher and Halal Status of New Food Technologies

Joe Regenstein
Sunday, November 10 @ 7 PM


Lee Gordon
Sunday, March 9 2025 @ 7pm

In the midst of the Hamas attacks and subsequent war in Gaza, Hand in Hand continues its important work building Jewish-Arab partnership and shared society in Israel. With over 2,000 Jewish and Arab students in its network of integrated and bilingual schools across Israel, Hand in Hand is a model of what Israel can and should look like.

Come meet Hand in Hand co-founder Lee Gordon and learn how over the next ten years, Hand in Hand aims to create a network of up to 10-15 integrated bilingual schools, supported and enhanced by active communities, involving thousands of Israeli citizens.  For more background on Hand in Hand, visit: www.handinhandk12.org
 


 

Ongoing Classes

Chanting the Tanakh

Cantor Richard Rosenfield
Sundays @ 10:00 AM beginning in Fall 2024.

This class is for all adults who are able to read Hebrew, understand the text (with the help of a translation), and want to learn to chant Torah or Haftarah using the cantillation symbols in the Chumash or Tikkun. We will be learning the musical motifs of A. W. Binder, Cantor L. Avery and Cantor E. Schleifer. For more information, please contact Richard Rosenfield HERE.


Prayerbook Hebrew

Cantor Richard Rosenfield
Sundays @ 11:15 AM beginning in Fall 2024.

This class is for all adults who would like to learn how to read and understand prayerbook Hebrew. We shall be using the textbooks Teach Yourself to Read Hebrew (revised edition), Prayerbook Hebrew The Easy Way (3rd edition), and The First Hebrew Primer (3rd edition) all from EKS Publishers. For more information, please contact Richard Rosenfield HERE.


The Art of Biblical Narrative: Reading the Book of Samuel

Ross Brann
Wednesdays, September 11, 18, 25, October 9 @ 7pm

Participants should bring to class a Jewish Publication Society Tanakh.


Jewish Books into Movies: Confronting Modernity

Elliot Shapiro

Short story: Samson Raphaelson. “The Day of Atonement” (pub. 1922)

Movie: The Jazz Singer (dir. Alan Crosland 1927)

Thursday, November 21st @ 7:30pm

 

Novella: Abraham Cahan. Yekl: A Tale of the New York Ghetto (pub. 1896)

Movie: Hester Street (dir. Joan Micklin Silver 1975)

Thursday March 27th @ 7:30pm

 

Short story: Isaac Bashevis Singer. “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy.” (pub. 1963: in Yiddish, then in English)

Movie: Yentl (dir. Barbra Streisand 1983)

Thursday, May 8th @ 7:30pm


The Jewish Studio Project

Susan Arnsten-Russell
Sundays @ 2 PM in the Social Hall, December 22 2024, January 19 and February 2, 2025

Join Susan Arnsten-Russell to cultivate creativity in a Jewish context using  The Jewish Studio Project’s methodology, the Jewish Studio Process (JSP). Art is not just for artists and Jewish texts are not just for scholars.  JSP programs combine practices from the field of art therapy with a reimagined approach to traditional Jewish learning to help activate the creative potential that lives inside each and every one of us.  The methodology includes textual inquiry/biet midrashhavruta learning pairs, intention setting, art making and witness/reflective writing.  For more information, please email Susan at: sarnsten@gmail.com


 

Jewish History through Literature: A. B. Yehoshua's Mr. Mani

Deborah Starr
Thursdays, January 16, 23, 30 February 6, 13, @ 7pm

Participants should bring to class a copy of Mr. Mani (1993 pb)


The Book of Esther

Jason Mokhtarian
Thursdays, February 20, 27, Mar 6 @ 7pm


Participants should bring to class a Jewish Publication Society Tanakh


The Art of Biblical Poetry: The Book of Amos

Ross Brann
Wednesdays, March 19, 26, April 9, 16 @ 7pm

Participants should bring to class a Jewish Publication Society Tanakh


Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel and the Rebbe of Kotsk

Jonathan Boyarin
Mondays, April 21, 28; May 5 @ 7pm


Tue, December 3 2024 2 Kislev 5785