Kobi Bloom – Jewish Life Teacher

The following was shared by Kobi Bloom with our High School students during Kabbalat Shabbat, on the day of our school celebration of Yom HaAtsma’ut.

Rabbi Daniel Siegel

Here we are, at the end of Term 1 2018. Year 12 is about to start the 1^st  exam block of their HSC. Year 11 is about 11 weeks away from becoming madrichim and the leaders of our School. Year 7 students are one term in and beginning to settle into High School

This term, we have celebrated Tu Bishvat by planting trees in our special House programs, highlighting our commitment to the environment and welcoming our new Principal, Andrew Watt, to Emanuel. We partied on Purim and considered the moral imperative of fighting injustice where we find it by “entering the arena”.  We engaged in our Year Group sedarim where we celebrated our freedom and discussed the responsibility that comes with it. Over the last 2 days we have commemorated the lives lost in war and terror in the defence of the State of Israel and the unfathomable injustice and murder of 6 million Jews and other victims of the Holocaust. Over the last 2 days we have lit candles in memory of those lost, we have created light to illuminate the shadows and once again today, we light candles, this time for Kabbalat Shabbat.

But candles are only candles, they flicker and melt and eventually are put out. At most birthday parties, we light and blow out candles. Why do we do this? The light comes into the room, we sing and then the candles are blown out by the person whose birthday it is. I have never thought about this strange tradition until today. If candles are supposed to represent light, hope and memory why do we have a birthday boy or girl blow them out? Maybe, it is because we celebrate somebody because they themselves bring light into our lives. When I celebrate a loved one’s birthday, I don’t need to have artificial and temporary light burning on a cake because the loved one is the light in the room. But more than that when someone blows out the candles on their birthday, it doesn’t matter that the candle is blown out because the feeling of celebration, love, friendship still exists all around them. In the same way that the person we celebrate gives light to the people around them, we give our light in abundance back to them.

So today, we celebrate. We celebrate 70 years of the State of Israel. A place that can be a light to all of us. Like all sources of light, its strength is determined not only by its own power but also by its surroundings, the surfaces it reflects off and the other light sources that add to it. The Prophets of our Jewish Tradition said that Israel’s destiny was to be a light unto the nations (Or LaGoyim) and like any light, Israel can at times seem brighter and at times darker. So today, on the day that we dress in blue and white, eat falafel, dance and sing we need to remember that it is our responsibility to add to the light of the nation that our people call home. It is our responsibility to not forget the light in so many that was cut short in the Shoah and wars protecting Israel. It is our responsibility to remember how we can provide light to those who are oppressed and enslaved in our modern world as we were in Mitzrayim. It is our responsibility to consider our actions’ impact on the world’s environment. It is our responsibility to help Israel’s light burn brighter and as Zionists help make it a place that we can continue to be proud of.

Every week on Shabbat, people in synagogues around the world recite the prayer for the State of Israel.

My prayer, my hope, my tikvah for the nation of Israel, Am Yisrael, is this: I pray that Am Yisrael’s light continues to burn bright so that our collective power can help illuminate the world.