Category: Events

We invite you to visit Hebrew College’s winter art exhibit “Hope Diaries: A Collaborative Art Project” through Febraury 29, 2024.

The exhibit features diary covers created by Boston-based fifth through eighth graders, reflecting on what hope means and what gives them hope — these Hope Diaries were sent to the Jewish Israeli and Israeli Arab students at the Yad B’Yad (Hand in Hand) School in Haifa. In the midst of these very difficult times, this project will deliver a measure of hope to students in Israel through art created by students in Boston.

Read a “Hope Through the Power of Art”  | Read the press release

About the Hope Diaries Project

Shirah Rubin, a Boston artist, convened students from around Boston at four different Jewish institutions (Jewish Community Day School of Boston, Solomon Schechter of Boston, Temple Beth Zion, and Metrowest Community Day School). Through a collaborative art making process, the 50 students explored their interpretations of hope, assembling collage covers for these sketchbooks responding to the prompt: “What does hope look like for you?” The diaries were then sent to children in the Yad B’Yad (Handin Hand) School in Haifa — where Arab-Israeli and Jewish-Israeli youth learn together “hand-in-hand.” Yad B’yad is committed to building inclusion and equality between Arab and Jewish citizens of Israel through a growing network of bilingual, integrated schools and communities.  

The Hope Diaries offer a “container” for each child’s expression and imagination during this most difficult time.

Special thanks to Shirah Rubin, the Jewish day schools involved, Temple Beth Zion, Rav Claudia Kreiman, and CJP.

Samples of artwork from the exhibit

Jewish Melodies from a Carpathian Farming Village
with Hankus Netsky and Jessica Kate Meyer

Join us for our second Soul Sounds concert on March 7 at Hebrew College. Hankus Netsky and Hebrew College Rosh Tefillah & Artist-in-Residence Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer share spiritual Jewish melodies passed down to them by Morris Hollender z”l, the sole survivor of his musical village.

A survivor of Auschwitz concentration camp, Morris Hollender came to the Boston area from Czechoslovakia in 1967. A child from a renowned musical family in the Munkacs/Beregsacz region, he learned nusach and melodies from his Uncle Shloyme, Yiddish folk songs from his mother and extended family, and nigunim from his father and his Uncle Berl. Hollender’s role as Ba’al Tefile and Ba’al Koreh at Temple Beth Israel in Waltham became the cornerstone of his musical legacy in the United States and across the world. His repertoire is a rare gift among the contemporary musicians, contributing to the international resurgence of Eastern European Jewish musical culture.

6:30 p.m. — Doors open. Light refreshments available
7:00 p.m. — Concert begins

Event organizational partners: Jewish Arts Collaborative (JArts), Base Boston, and Temple Beth Israel in Waltham.

Tickets

Purchase tickets here.

Thank you to our Series Underwriters

The Rita J. and Stanley H. Kaplan Family Foundation
Kavod Boston and the Kavod Jews of Color, Indigenous Jews, Sephardi, and Mizrahi Caucus (JOCISM)
Suzanne Priebatsch
Susan and James Snider
The William Davidson Foundation and The Wexner Foundation

>> DOWNLOAD THE SOUL SOUNDS SERIES FLYER

Our Musicians

A multi-instrumentalist, composer, and ethnomusicologist, Hankus Netsky is co-chair of New England Conservatory’s Contemporary Musical Arts Department and founder and director of the Klezmer Conservatory Band, an internationally renowned Yiddish music ensemble. He has composed extensively for film, theater, and television, collaborated closely with such artists as Itzhak Perlman, Robin Williams, Joel Grey, Theodore Bikel, and Robert Brustein, and produced numerous recordings, including 10 by the Klezmer Conservatory Band. He has also recorded with Ran Blake, Marty Ehrlich, Rosalie Gerut, Linda J. Chase, Theodore Bikel, Margot Leverett, and Cantor Jeff Warschauer. He received the Yosl Mlotek Award and a “Forward Fifty” award for his role in the resurgence of traditional Eastern European Jewish ethnic musical culture. He was also awarded a New England Conservatory Outstanding Alumni award, along with the school’s Louis Krasner and Lawrence Lesser awards for Excellence in Teaching.

Listen to our Speaking Torah podcast episode featuring Hankus here!

Jessica Kate Meyer `14, Hebrew College Rosh Tefillah & Artist-in-Residence, is a prayer leader, storyteller, vocalist, and rabbi, who served as rabbi-hazzan at Romemu in NYC, and most recently, at The Kitchen in San Francisco. She has studied sacred Jewish music with masters from Ashkenazi and Mizrahi traditions and has performed as a vocalist with ensembles in the United States and Israel. In a previous life, Jessica appeared in film, theater, and television projects in Europe and the United States: most notably, as a principal role in the Oscar-winning film, The Pianist.

Itay Dayan is an Israeli clarinetist currently based in Boston, Massachusetts. Itay played with various ensembles spanning different musical worlds, such as the Klezmer Conservatory band, Meitar Ensemble and the Israel Klezmer Orchestra. His most recent endeavor, Hoffman’s Farewell, is a new and unique klezmer album drawing inspiration from traditional and contemporary sources. Currently pursuing his Master’s degree at the New England Conservatory, Itay won scholarships from the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, Ronen Foundation, Ima Foundation, and the Zvi and Ofra Meitar Family Foundation. Itay is also a recipient of the Siday Fellowship for Musical Creativity by the Jerusalem Institute of Contemporary Music.

Save these Dates!

Spring Soul Sounds Concerts

April 18, 2024: Until Love Pleases: Piyutim of Shir HaShirim and Pesah with Kedma
Featuring Yoni Battat, Anat Halevy Hochberg, and Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer
6:30 p.m. — Doors open. Light refreshments available
7:00 p.m. — Concert begins

“I adjure you, O maidens of Jerusalem!
If you meet my beloved, tell him this:
That I am sick with love.”

A night of piyyutim (liturgical poetry) inspired by the Song of Songs (Shir HaShirim) and Pesah.

>> Learn more & purchase tickets

May 5: Catalan Mahzor Suite
Featuring Ira Klein (Composer, Guitar), Rachel Linsky (Choreographer, Dance) and Beth Bahia Cohen (Violin, Yayli Tanbur)
6:30 p.m. — Doors open. Light refreshments available
7:00 p.m. — Concert begins

Inspired by The Catalan Mahzor, a micrographical anthology of psalms and medieval Judeo-Spanish poetry, this one-of-a kind music, dance, and art experience fuses influences from Judeo-Spanish and Middle-Eastern music with the contemporary sounds of jazz and folk music.

(This concert is also in commemoration of Yom HaShoah.)

>> Learn more & purchase tickets

June 6: The Rabbi’s Family Band
Featuring multi-instrumentalists and vocalists Lisa Mayer, Rabbi Sruli Dresdner and Zachary Mayer
7:30 p.m. — Doors open. Light refreshments available
8:00 p.m. — Concert begins

Steeped in tradition but with a fully modern and inclusive sense of Yiddishkeit, the trio has performed their beautiful and authentic nigunim (wordless melodies) all over the world. 

>> Learn more & purchase tickets

series Organizational partners

Support the Series

If you’d like to support more events like this, please consider making a donation here.

The Journal of Interreligious Studies and Co-Produced Religions, co-sponsored by the Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton, USA) and the University of Bern (Switzerland), are hosting an interactive webinar with experts from history, religion, and theology.

Keynote: “Religious Co-production and its Potentials for History and Theology”

Katharina Heyden, Professor for History of Christianity and Interreligious Encounters University of Bern
David Nirenberg, Director and Leon Levy Professor Institute for Advanced Study Princeton

>> View the event flyer

Co-Produced Religions seeks to provide the foundations of a new history of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as co-produced communities, a history that makes clear the many different ideas and ideals that each of these communities has formed, and continues to form, by interacting with or imagining the others.

The keynote will be followed by historical case studies of co-production from the ongoing research project. Following these two portions, the webinar will turn to theological responses and reactions, breakout sessions, and a Q & A.

Panelists presenting historical case studies

• Maureen Attali: Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Bern (Switzerland)
  Jillian Stinchcomb: Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of Advanced Study (Princeton)
• David Gyllenhaal: Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of Advanced Study (Princeton)
  Shlomo Zuckier: Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of Advanced Study (Princeton)
• Jillian Stinchcomb: Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of Advanced Study (Princeton)
• Shlomo Zuckier: Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of Advanced Study (Princeton)

Jewish, Muslim, and Christian Responses

• Rachel Slutsky: Monsignor John Oesterreicher Visiting Assistant Professor of Jewish Studies and Jewish-Christian Relations in Antiquity, Department of Religion, Seton Hall University
• Adam Gregerman: Professor, Department of Theology and Religious Studies, and Associate Director of the Institute for Jewish-Catholic Relations, St. Joseph’s University
• Lailatul Fitriyah: Assistant Professor of Interreligious Education at Claremont School of Theology (California, USA)
• Mohammed Gamal: Lecturer of Islamic theology and philosophy at the Faculty of Uṣūl al-Dīn, Al-Azhar University (Cairo); visiting fellow at the Department of philosophy, University of York, UK
• Marianne Moyaert: Professor of Comparative Theology and the Study of Interreligious Relations at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven, Belgium
• Klaus von Stosch: Schlegel-Professor for Systematic Theology at Bonn university (Germany) and head of the International Centre for Comparative Theology and Social Issues

Please join us virtually on Wednesday, January 17, 2024 at 7 p.m. EST for “Torah and Dharma: A Renewed Conversation”. The event will take place on Zoom and all registrants will receive a reminder with the Zoom link a few days before the event.

Building on the legacy of Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi (of blessed memory), His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, and other bold Jewish and Buddhist practitioners, the Miller Center for Interreligious Learning & Leadership of Hebrew College is pleased to invite you to a dialogue on Torah & Dharma. Rabbi Or Rose, Director of the Miller Center, will engage in a conversation with Buddhist scholars Dr. Judith Simmer-Brown and Dr. Amelia Hall of Naropa University (Boulder, Colorado).

Dr. Simmer-Brown is Distinguished Professor of Contemplative and Religious Studies Emeritx at Naropa University, where she has taught for over 40 years. Her areas of expertise include Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, interreligious dialogue, Buddhist chaplaincy, and contemplative education. She worked closely with Reb Zalman during his tenure as the World Wisdom Chair at Naropa University.

Dr. Amelia Hall earned her doctorate in Tibetan and Himalayan Studies from the University of Oxford in 2012 and is currently Associate Professor of Buddhism and Department Chair in the Wisdom Traditions department at Naropa University. She teaches across several degree programs at Naropa, including BA in Religious Studies, MA in Yoga Studies, MA in Contemplative Religions, and Master of Divinity.

Rabbi Or Rose is the founding director of the Betty Ann Greenbaum Miller Center for Interreligious Learning & Leadership of Hebrew College. Before assuming this position in 2016, he worked in various administrative and teaching capacities at Hebrew College for over a decade, including serving as a founding faculty member and associate dean for Informal Education of the Rabbinical School. Rabbi Rose was also one of the creators of CIRCLE, The Center for Interreligious & Community Leadership Education, cosponsored by Hebrew College and Andover Newton Theological School (2007-2017) and has taught for Hebrew College’s Me’ah Classic program.

Hanukkah is a time to celebrate light and miracles. What better way than to recognize this time than with Yiddish Hanukkah tunes?

Come light, sing, and drink together at Hebrew College’s partner organization, Lehrhaus. We’ll sing Yiddish Hanuke fare–tunes both obscure and well-trodden. Taught by Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer, Rosh Tefillah and Artist-in-Residence at Hebrew College in Newton.