Hadassah Magazine hosted a “spiritual check-in” with Rabbi Dov Linzer and journalist Abigail Pogrebin on September 19, co-authors of the book “It Takes Two to Torah: An Orthodox Rabbi and Reform Journalist Discuss and Debate Their Way Through the Five Books of Moses.”
In a discussion moderated by Hadassah Magazine Executive Editor Lisa Hostein, Rabbi Linzer and Pogrebin talked about the genesis for their book, as well as what the year since October 7 has been like for them and how they are approaching this year’s High Holidays.
“This year has been really very intense for me in a very personal way,” said Rabbi Linzer, whose nephew was killed in Gaza earlier this year. As the head of a Modern Orthodox rabbinical school in Riverdale, NY, he found solace in his connection to 150 rabbis out in the field, including on college campuses. “Working with them and supporting them in all the support they were giving made me feel like I was really contributing this year,” he said.
Pogrebin said while she has really struggled this year, “my lifeline has been frankly my fellow people. It’s not that I don’t want to be with non-Jews, but no one else seems to have the same burden, carry the same burden, that we’re all carrying right now.”
“What was so unifying over the first couple of months has dissolved to a certain extent,” Hostein noted, adding that it’s hard to imagine celebrating the High Holidays right now with the one-year anniversary of October 7 falling between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
The October 7 massacre took place on Simchat Torah, Pogrebin noted, a day in which the mandate is to feel joy.
“The idea of choosing life that we hear so much from our rabbis, it’s not easy,” she said. “I sit in my synagogue every Friday night, and we sing the Mi Sheberach and we go right into Shehecheyanu. How many times in our tradition … do we do that? We move from Yom Hazikaron to Yom Ha’atzmaut … Within hours, we go from incredible mourning to a barbecue.”
“It’s the Jewish discipline to hold both things … to hold everything and to find the joy again,” she added. “That's how we got here. Generations upon generations getting through persecution and still having another party in some way.”
At the time of year when the shofar is sounded every day, there is an ongoing debate of whether the true mitzvah is to blow or to listen, Rabbi Linzer said.
“I think we’ve all had a huge wakeup call. October 7, protests, the antisemitism, the way the world reacted to the acts of Hamas; it’s been unending wakeup calls. I would like to focus on another meaning of the shofar,” he said. “I think we have to be coming together and raising our voices. Raising our voice to God, raising our voice to politicians, raising our voice to effect change right now.”
“Hadassah is a perfect example of an anchor, a buoy in the storm,” Pogrebin said. “We’re in a new wilderness right now, we just are. And I have not seen anyone shy away…. And that to me is the glory of our tradition.”
“This is a period of new beginnings,” Rabbi Linzer added. “I think that’s the point of Yom Kippur, that we get to have the weight of our past lifted from our shoulders so that we can have the energy to start fresh.”
Following the program, Tracey Drayer, co-coordinator of Hadassah’s Philanthropy Division, talked about the work Hadassah has been doing to help with the healing process this year, including the creation of underground hospital wards, accelerating the opening of the much-needed Gandel Rehabilitation Center and caring for displaced students and families at Hadassah’s youth villages.
“An unprecedented situation requires an unprecedented response, and that is what Hadassah has been committed to since October 7,” she said.
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