Adults

The 5 Megillot

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The Five Megillot: Text, History, and Interpretation with Dr. Daniel Picus

Starting Sunday, February 22, 2026 at 1:30 pm in the Beit Midrash

In this series of classes, we’ll explore five often under-studied books of the Hebrew Bible, known as the Five Scrolls, or the Five Megillot—Esther, Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, and Ecclesiastes. In Jewish tradition, each of these books is associated with a specific holiday, and we’ll study them at the appropriate time of year.

Alongside close reading of the texts themselves, we’ll examine their historical context, composition, and early reception, and consider how and why these works came to be read on particular holy days—and what that might mean for us as readers today.

For more information or to register, click here. This class is free.

World Zionist Election Results

By in Adult Programs

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Thank you for voting!

In spring 2025, we were collecting ballots for voting in the 2025 World Zionist Congress election, which occurs every five years. The results were just certified this week.

The elected delegates will convene for the World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem from Oct. 28 to 30 and deliberate on how to spend more than $1 billion in annual funding directed through the World Zionist Organization, Jewish Agency for Israel, Jewish National Fund-KKL, and Keren Hayesod.

First convened by Theodor Herzl in 1897, the congress is expected to be marked by battles that center not only on financial allocations but also on competing visions of Jewish identity, religious authority, and the future of Israel itself.

The Reform movement’s Vote Reform slate remained the largest single faction, winning 47,648 votes and 33 delegates, a sharp increase in votes but still a modest decline from the 39 seats five years ago.

Read more about it on the Jewish Telegraphic Agency website.

Torah Study

By in Adult Programs

We have Torah study almost every Shabbat morning, from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m., in Congregation Beth Israel’s Beit Midrash.В  Torah study is different every time; it can be fun, challenging, instructive, personal to the participants, inspirational, infuriating, confusing or enlightening. We welcome everyone’s participation.

Author Interview/Q&A

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Author Jonathan Ned Katz talks about his newly released book (May 18, 2021), The Daring Life and Dangerous Times of Eve Adams. Congregant and Katz’s longtime friend, Emily Weiner, interviews Jonathan and moderates a Q&A (watch above). Historian Katz uncovers the until-now forgotten story of radical lesbian Eve Adams and her long-lost book Lesbian Love, which led to her arrest, deportation and eventual murder by the Nazis at Auschwitz.

To purchase The Daring Life and Dangerous Times of Eve Adams from Village Books (and simultaneously support Congregation Beth Israel’s education program), click here.

This CBI Programming Committee event is co-sponsored by Village Books and two units of Western Washington University: Western Libraries’ Heritage Resources and The Ray Wolpow Institute for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity.

Author/Poetry Reading

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CBI congregantВ Richard Widerkehr reads from and discusses his latest collection of poetry, “At the Grace Cafe,” on May 10, 2021. His new book of poems is available at Village Books.
“Widerkehr’s writing has been described as having: a freshness and ease of manner . . . and at times a kind of other worldly aura, ‘that strange gift from the other side’ ” (Gayle Kaune, author of “All the Birds Awake”)

Women Of the Wall

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Sunday, April 4 at 10 a.m. Anat Hoffman, executive director of the Israel Religious Action Center, spoke with Congregation Beth Israel via Zoom about the fight for gender equality in Israeli society. Hoffman founded and has led the advocacy organization Women of the Wall for the past three decades. Her talk to CBI is titled, “The Cracks in the Wall Let the Light In: The Battle for Equal Rights at the Western Wall.” For more information about Anat Hoffman and her work, see the front page article in the March/April Shul Shofar.

Watch a recording of the April 4, 2021 event here:

Biennial

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Join with thousands of Jews from across North America and around the world to learn, pray, share ideas, dance and sing, hear from inspiring speakers and the leaders of our Movement; reunite with old friends, create new connections, and make decisions about the policies of the Reform Movement.

URJ Biennial 2019 is over, but you can still view videos of the experience — 5,000 Jews from across North America and around the world gathered to learn, pray, share ideas, dance and sing, heard from inspiring speakers and the leaders of our Movement; reunited with old friends, created new connections, and made decisions about the policies of the Reform Movement.

Watch the videos of the 2019 URJ Biennial plenary sessions, services and Shabbat song sessions at urjbiennial.org

Make sure to watch the Friday morning plenary session where the URJ and the RAC launched our 2020 Civic Engagement Campaign and vote on social justice resolutions, including one on reparations for U.S. slavery and ongoing racism.

Make plans toВ В join us at the next URJ Biennial, December 8-11, 2021 in Washington D.C. (National Harbor)!

Reform response to Jan. 6

By in URJ

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Reform Jewish Leaders on Capitol Insurrection and White Supremacy (click image):

Central Conference of American Rabbis Statement condemning assaults on American Democracy (click image):

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Shabbat Times

Yom Rivii, 10 Shevat 5786

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