“The Honor of 36 Years,” Rabbi Elaine Zecher’s Shabbat Awakenings
April 10, 2026 | 23 Nisan 5786
Welcome to Shabbat Awakenings, a weekly reflection as we move toward Shabbat and this coming week, Passover.You can also listen to it as a podcast.
Welcome to Shabbat Awakenings, a reflection as we make our way toward Shabbat. This week I share with you my words of gratitude for our community I offered at Stepping Out. I look forward to celebrating with the community at our Annual Gathering on June 11, 2026.
My gratitude and joy in this moment hold no bounds. When I look around this room, and know there are thousands more beyond these walls, when I see my beloved colleagues, clergy and staff, past and present here and elsewhere, when I gaze at my husband gazing at me with his loving support and my knowing my adult children and their spouses, in absentia in San Francisco, Vancouver, Canada, and Brooklyn, I recognize that my cup doesn’t just overflow, I am standing in a pond of joy and love.
And since I have the honor of being honored for my 36 years here, I offer some thoughts in my 3+6 minutes of time allotted which is just enough.
Four stories that speak to my experience.
Story ONE: I’ll never work in a synagogue!
When I met my husband, David, at a Torah study class in Sudbury, Massachusetts, I told him I would never work in a synagogue. Oops. What I meant was not a synagogue without a willingness for innovation and creativity. I shared with my mentor, Rabbi Larry Kushner, my vision of my ideal congregation: great mentors, a place to apply my own creative energy where I could be an agent of change, and large enough to enable new possibilities. He knew exactly where. And then the phone rang and Rabbi Ronne Friedman of Temple Israel of Boston was on the line. I am grateful that David has been the best partner and supporter my decision to say, yes!
Story TWO: A Female woman rabbi!
When I started, Temple Israel was 138 years old. Fran Putnoi was President, the first female volunteer leader, and no woman had ever been a rabbi. Though Rabbis Mehlman and Friedman took me to lunch for my interview, where I not only drove them there but had to parallel park, I still was chosen to be a rabbi here–who also happened to be a woman. At my installation, many of the women in the front rows cried. Their work on founding and strengthening feminism had paved the path for someone like me. I continue to be grateful for their wisdom and friendship and so many others over the years.
But not everyone was used to a woman as rabbi. One member, Mike Grossman, of blessed memory, would see me running around the Brookline reservoir each day in the early morning. We would pass each other coming from different directions. He was always happy to see me, but he really didn’t know how to regard me. One day, I saw him standing outside the chapel and he explained to me as if he had just solved a puzzle. “Rabbi Zecher, I know what you are. You are a FEMALE woman rabbi.” So true!
Story Three: The synagogue has always been my home.
I am a strong advocate and believer of the power of the synagogue. My life growing up revolved around our synagogue which my parents’ founded. My mom sang in the choir for more than four decades and my dad stood in the back and ushered as a reason to talk with everyone. And even though once, they went out separate doors and left me at the synagogue, they did come back for me. We were usually the last to leave and usually locked the doors. My parents made it clear about their priority to my brother, sister, and me: we are responsible for a strong and vital Judaism and the synagogue is the pathway.
There is no question in my mind and I hope yours, too, that it is the synagogue where Jewish life and our future matter. It is here, in this home, in our home, how we share together where life has taken shape, where life happens with ups and downs, where we navigate together how to understand the world around us, where we find solid ground through instability, and where we find meaning and matter-ness in life’s joys and complexities.
Story Four: Fire in the Soul
The Torah teaches that it takes effort to keep the fire burning. Leviticus 6 speaks of the need to have the fire on the altar and emphasizes this desire 3 times, adding more information.
First, the fire must be kept going. Then it clarifies that the fire must not go out. Then comes the key description: “A perpetual fire shall be kept burning on the altar, not to go out. אֵ֗שׁ תָּמִ֛יד תּוּקַ֥ד עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּ֖חַ לֹ֥א תִכְבֶּֽה”
The ancients modeled how crucial it is that a perpetual fire metaphorically takes us all to ensure the flame and the fire it produces remains strong and ignited. We are all here because we care about this eternal flame that is Temple Israel of Boston, the place and the people. We are blessed with amazing leaders. My 36 years has exposed me to 18 (chai) sets of Presidents, officers, and leaders. I cherish you all.
In this congregation, I have held your babies up high in blessing and accompanied you in moments of sorrow. Creativity and innovation course through this synagogue while we continue to honor our past and our future. I am grateful you have believed in me and what we are able to do in community.
I believe in you, too.
Let us ensure that the fire that glows and radiates love, compassion and justice of Temple Israel of Boston continues to burn in perpetuity, as the guarantor, kept going by each of us as an agent to kindle and rekindle the beauty and vitality of this home and the Jewish life we experience together.
Your presence and support for this congregation makes all the difference.
Shabbat Shalom! שבת שלום
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Rabbi Elaine Zecher