By Jill Zimmerman (5-14-09)

Today is thirty-five days, which is five weeks of the Omer.

 

It is a tradition to count the days between Passover and Shavuot, as we mark our freedom from slavery and celebrate our freedom to accept Torah. This is called "counting the omer." This year we will observe the tradition of "counting the omer" by sharing stories about the many different ways that we have been turned on to Jewish learning, and through Jewish learning to Torah.

I credit Rabbi Larry Kushner for opening up the universe of Torah to me, and thereby changing my life.  After the family camp In Seattle where we first met him, Ely and I became "Kushner groupies" for a few years, following him to URJ Adult Learning Summer Institutes (Kallot) for more time to study with him.  One summer in Colorado Springs, we actually studied the Zohar, Judaism's mystical text in Hebrew and Aramaic.  I hardly even knew Hebrew! 

We generally spent around an hour on just five words of the very dense and rewarding text.  Larry gently encouraged us, like the master teacher he is, to push ourselves a little bit harder to gain the satisfaction of unlocking this sacred text, which had been previously accessible to us only through translation, if at all.  We were all scared -- accomplished professionals in our "real lives" - scared of feeling stupid for so slowing sounding words out that we didn't even understand.  However, the text was mesmerizing to me, and in order to gain real access to the jewels within, I would have to take that next step to improve my faltering Hebrew.

Fast forward to June 2008 - the summer before my last year of rabbinical school.  Larry was the guest scholar.  Guess what we studied?  Selections from the Zohar!  But this time, we read whole chunks of these stories in the Aramaic and Hebrew with which I had gained moderate proficiency in my five years of schooling. 

As we delved into texts whose beauty now unfolded before my eyes, I could hardly see the page, because my tears blurred my vision, sometimes dropping to the page.   This, I said to myself, This is why I went to rabbinical school - these were the amazing words and stories that shone so brightly to me that I was willing to change our entire lives to pursue...and then hopefully, one day, to teach. 

How could this be, I asked myself, that I am sitting here, about to be ordained as a Rabbi, and I came from a place (not too long ago) where I knew so very little.  This is what a really good teacher does:  believes in you, helps you see abilities in yourself that perhaps you might not believe were even possible. 

 

By Jill Zimmerman

These stories are brought to you by the Temple Emanuel RE-IMAGINE project, an 18-month initiative sponsored by Hebrew Union College, devoted to re-thinking and re-structuring our religious school.