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| Adam Karol, Rob Tananbaum, Samantha Tananbaum and Larry Karol at Congregation Beth Torah in Overland Park, Kansas on February 18 |
In
the second week of February, our Wednesday Torah study session and our weekly
Torah reading focused on an almost identical passage without being in the same
book of the Bible! The Ten Commandments appear in both Exodus (our
Shabbat reading on February 11) and Deuteronomy (which we reached on February
9). There is a difference in “pace” between our encounters with this
central text of our tradition based on our concurrent cycles of reading and
study. The weekly Torah readings have a set schedule that takes us through the
Torah in a year (some congregations read a third of the portion each week and
spread it out over three years). The Torah study group approaches
each chapter on its own time, without a need to quickly move on. We take more
time on a particular set of verses when we feel they need more in-depth and extensive
discussion. Either path or pace enables us to fulfill the purpose
of Talmud Torah—learning and/or discovering the insights of our
tradition.
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| At Rose Hill Cemetery |
On the third weekend in February, I joined our son Adam and our niece Samantha
(daughter of Rabbi Steve Karol and Mary Karol) and Samantha’s husband, Rob
Tananbaum, at the bat mitzvah of a cousin in Overland Park, Kansas.
Among our goals was to take Rob on the “family roots tour” for my
family. Adam and I spent a night in Topeka before the
weekend, visiting with friends and treading many of the paths we had taken
during our 22 years there. Much of the city and the people were the same,
except for the young people for whom Adam had served as a babysitter who are
now as tall as he is! The theater in which Adam had performed in
many musical productions looked the same, but its brand new office looked
totally impressive (it was now under the auspices of the county instead of the
city, which likely influenced the upgrade). Once back in the Kansas City
area, we noted the growth of our youngest cousins and the growth of the city
itself: continued expansion of many neighborhoods, the completion of an
impressive performing arts center near the revitalized downtown, and a
remodeled Kauffman stadium, home of the Kansas City Royals. Many of the
places may have been new, but the routes on which I drove us on our “roots
tour” were the same ones I had taken for years. We passed by two homes
where my parents lived and the apartment complex which was their last place of
residence; the elementary school and high school that my brother and I
attended; and the cemetery where my parents are buried, where we paid our
respects for a few quiet moments. After the Saturday Bat Mitzvah party, Adam,
Samantha and Rob went to meet some of Samantha’s blogging friends near
downtown, so I was on my own in driving back to the hotel. I could have
taken any route I wanted, including a quick ride on I-35. I chose to
leisurely drive along the roads by which the public bus took me home from my
summer job at City Hall back to my neighborhood in the southern part of Kansas
City, and then I drove past the shopping center near my old house (it has a
Trader Joe’s!) and another shopping center where I had bowled in a league
during elementary school. Then I made my way back to the hotel. I
had selected the path that enabled me to revisit many memories from my past,
but I readily recognized the changes that had occurred throughout the years.
Change does happen, and we move forward, at whatever pace seems best for
us. We look behind us mainly to see what can help and support us on the
road ahead. Congregations also undergo changes as they grow from
their original purposes for joining together to an ever-expanding vision that
fits the new realities of the membership at any given time. In Judaism,
it is often the journey, not the destination, that is most important, including
how we get there, what questions we ask, and the recognition that reaching any
stop along the way is only temporary, because the cycles of our faith and our
lives beckon us towards greater achievement and progress. As a reading in
Mishkan T’filah states, “there is no way to get from here to there except by
joining hands, marching together.” May our journey take us through
a process that will continue to help us grow together as one community!
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