Wise Words
Writings of reflection by the Stephen Wise Temple clergy.
Each Monday morning, members of our mailing list receive the weekly email “This Week at Wise,” and on Fridays, a “Shabbat Shalom” email from Rabbi Yoshi which include messages of thought, inspiration, and contemplation from our clergy, along with a schedule of events. Sign up and don’t miss out!
Wise Words – Monday, April 20, 2026
Israel’s Memorial Day – Why it is Uniquely Meaningful With tomorrow’s setting sun in Israel, the nation begins its solemn observance of Yom HaZikaron— Memorial Day. This day honors those who gave their lives in the War of Independence and in all of Israel’s wars, as well as victims of terrorism. For 24 hours, the country pauses. Stories of fallen soldiers and their heroism fill television and radio. Theaters, restaurants, and entertainment venues close. At 8:00pm, and again at 11:00am the following morning, a siren sounds across the country. Life comes to a standstill as people rise in silence and reflection. Memorial candles are lit—in homes, schools, synagogues, and army bases. It is a day observed by the entire nation. While many countries honor their fallen, Israel’s remembrance is uniquely expansive. In 1998, the Israeli government changed the name of the holiday to Yom Ha’Zikaron LeHalalei Ma’arkhot Yisrael ul’Nifge’ei Pe’ulot HaEivah – [...]
Shabbat Shalom – Friday, April 17, 2026
Rabbi Yoshi is currently in Poland leading the 40 person Stephen Wise Temple delegation on the March of the Living. This Shabbat he shares some reflections from their visit to Auschwitz. On the morning of Yom HaShoah, this past Wednesday, we visited the Kraków Ghetto. Then we walked to the factories just across the river, where Jews were marched each day as slave laborers, including the factory of Oskar Schindler. Jewish Ghetto Memorial From there, we boarded our buses and drove to Auschwitz. We walked beneath the infamous sign: Arbeit macht frei. Forty of us, representing Stephen Wise Temple. Then we marched on, 1.5 kilometers, to Auschwitz II-Birkenau. As we passed through the main gate, each of us gently placed a small sign bearing the name of someone we were remembering on the train tracks. On my sign was the name Mnashe Davidovits, my cousin. He was [...]
Wise Words – Monday, April 13, 2026
From a young age, my cantor, Stephen Richards, was a steady presence who quietly and definitively shaped my life. Through his encouragement, I found my way into Jewish life—drawn toward Hebrew, toward prayer, and ultimately toward trusting that my voice mattered. He created a culture where everyone—boys and girls alike—was invited not only to participate but to lead and to belong. Though women were only officially ordained as cantors beginning in 1975, he was already nurturing a generation of young singers who might one day see themselves as prayer leaders; like me, many of today’s cantors serving the largest Reform congregations were shaped by his mentorship. I carry deep gratitude for the way he helped me find not only my musical voice, but my Jewish voice. As the psalmist teaches, “Ivdu et Adonai b’simchah, bo’u l’fanav birnanah” — עִבְדוּ אֶת־יְהוָה בְּשִׂמְחָה, בֹּאוּ לְפָנָיו בִּרְנָנָה — “Serve God with joy; come [...]
Shabbat Shalom – Friday, April 10, 2026
Passover is our time of joy and liberation. It's a time of release, of going forth from bondage to freedom. It's a time of hope, a time of “l'shana haba'a b'Yerushalayim!” This makes the tragic loss this week of the Gershovitz family all the more heartbreaking. Vladimir Gershovitz, the family patriarch, had just come home from the hospital after an extended stay. The family was together when the Iranian ballistic missile struck their apartment building in Haifa. Several of the floors collapsed, crushing the family in their first-floor dwelling. In addition to Vladimir, his wife Lena, their only son, Dima, and his wife, Lucille-Jane, were all killed. This one family's story is in many ways the story of our people. The parents immigrated from Ukraine in the early 1990s. They wanted to live in dignity and freedom in their ancestral homeland. And they did. They built a beautiful life there. Vladimir [...]
Wise Words – Monday, April 6, 2026
We are more than halfway through the festival of Passover, in these days that are known as Chol HaMoed. Meaning the “everyday of the festival,” these in-between days offer us a beautiful contradiction. Neither entirely sacred nor entirely ordinary, these days invite us to dwell in both and ask ourselves: What does it mean for something to be both ordinary and sacred? In the Torah, when we first leave Egypt, the journey isn’t neat or linear. There’s no straight line from slavery to freedom. There’s fear and complaining and moments of clarity, and long stretches of just… walking. The middle is where the Israelites learn who they are becoming. Chol HaMoed of Passover lives in that same space as the wilderness. Not Egypt. Not Sinai. Just the stretch in between—where nothing is fully clear, and everything is still becoming. I’m writing this while driving through the Mojave—the wide, quiet expanse in every [...]