Announcement from Rabbi Yael Splansky and Avra Rosen, President
Over the past several months, we have conducted an extensive search to identify a new Executive Director. for Holy Blossom Temple. We are thrilled to announce that lifelong congregant, Rachel Malach, has been chosen and will join us in this capacity full-time, beginning Aug. 30, 2021.
Rachel brings a wealth of operational and managerial experience, coupled with her commitment to Holy Blossom, and passion for Israel. For the past 13 years, Rachel has worked through a number of roles of increasing responsibility at the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, most recently serving as Vice-President & General Manager leading the Orchestra Operations and Education & Community Engagement departments. In this role, she oversaw a team of 10 staff, 90 musicians, and an annual budget of $14M. Rachel had the privilege of overseeing international touring, including the TSO’s first-ever tour of Israel in 2017. Rachel’s creative and collaborative leadership thoroughly impressed the Search Committee. Even through the filter of Zoom, her professional and personal skills shone through. We are confident that her ability to pay attention to detail and simultaneously see a broad vision for Holy Blossom will be admired by congregants and colleagues alike.
You may already know Rachel from her many years of involvement with Temple. Rachel is a product of Holy Blossom’s educational program, from nursery school through confirmation. Now Rachel and her husband, Jordan Silverman, bring their own children Leora, Jack, and Ely for Tot and Family Shabbat Services. Rachel has a deep love of Jewish choral music, chants Torah on the High Holy Days and Megillah on Purim. Most recently, she co-chaired the Senior Cantor Search Committee which successfully brought us Cantor Rosen.
Thank you to the members of the Executive Director Search Committee for devoting their time and talent: Ellen Cole, Tom Erlich, Tom Friedland, Eric Klein, Brian Lidsky, Marla Spiegel (chair), and Adam Stiavnicky.
We are delighted to welcome Rachel Malach as our new Executive Director and strategic partner. We look forward to bringing Holy Blossom from strength to strength. Please join us online for Shabbat morning services on Saturday, August 14 when both Rachel Malach and Ron Polster will be honoured with special aliyot.
To wish Rachel a Mazel Tov, you can reach her at [email protected]
In a letter to the small yet learned and pious Jewish community in Yemen, Maimonides comments on the idea of what makes a great nation. He teaches that while others may have bigger numbers, the Jewish people is special because of our Laws our relationship with God.
Right now the countries of the world are competing based on running and jumping, throwing, catching, aiming, and just simply holding it together/being proud when athletes say they can’t.
As a spectator, it is tremendously exciting as Canada and its many athletes compete with heart and with class. Sometimes as a nice bonus, they also bring home medals.
Of course, many of us are also watching the progress of the Israeli teams: watching José Bautista knock the bronze away from the Baseball team with a swing of his bat, and Artem Dolgopyat flip and spin to a gymnastic’s gold.
His mother made a shocking statement after the win, which talks to Israel’s greatness. She decried the fact that he can have a gold medal placed around his neck for Israel, but he can’t place a gold wedding ring around his long-time partner’s finger in Israel.
His non-Jewish Israeli mother also deserves a gold in the parenting Olympics for her statement. I could rephrase her words as, “He won the gold medal, great, but I won’t be happy until there are grandchildren seeing if my knadelach hurt their teeth in the same way to bite.”
This is a conversation, not of Law but of law. While rabbis would not marry Artem Dolgopyat here in Canada – he could easily still get married. But in Israel, mimicking the Ottoman system which was in place before the British Mandate period, only recognized religious authorities can perform marriages. So for Artem, who is not a member of any other religious group, but is not considered Jewish by the rabbis, he is unable to be married, unless he travels – which his coaches have made him too busy to do.
Things are starting to shift in Israel, and reform is in the air, especially as his mother’s pointed celebration has turned into a national conversation.
As Maimonides teaches, being a great nation isn’t about numbers – but about our relationship to Law and God.
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Founded in 1856, Holy Blossom Temple is Toronto’s first synagogue with a rich history of tradition and modernity in our religious and spiritual expression.