Kol Ramah

Parsha Talk with Rabbis Eliot Malomet, Barry Chesler and Jeremy Kalmanofsky. The parashah this week is Sh’mini [Leviticus 8-11], but we recorded on the 5th day of Passover, the third of the four intermediate days before the concluding holiday resumes on Tuesday evening. So, Passover was still on our mind. We began our discussion by talking about Yizkor; recited on the last day of Passover [and also on the 2nd day of Shavuot, Sh’mini Atzeret, and Yom Kippur]. Our conversation meandered, taking in the story of the untimely deaths of Nadav and Avihu, the older two of Aaron’s four sons [Leviticus 10:1-7], the upcoming observances after Passover, beginning with Yom Ha’Shoah [Holocaust Commemoration Day] on Tuesday, the 18th, and continuing with Yom HaZikkaron [Israel’s Memorial Day] and Yom Ha’atzma’ut [Israel’s Independence Day] the following week, on the 26th and 27th. The Book of Job also entered our conversation. So the tone was perhaps more somber than we had anticipated when we first started to talk. W