Wisdom of our Sages: Making it Set Practice
Thursday, May 9, 7:30pm — 9pm.
During the six weeks between Pesach and Shavuot, Jews everywhere study Pirkei Avot, the Ethics of our Fathers (or: Wisdom of our Sages) ; a common-sense guide to being a mensch. For five weeks in April and May, BCC members will have an opportunity to study Pirkei Avot more closely with Kevah Teaching Fellows. Inspired by a verse from Pirkei Avot, Kevah, meaning set practice, Kevah aims to engage Jews in meaningful discussions about classic Jewish texts in order to seek new and engaging ideas that apply to our lives today.
Join BCC and Kevah’s extraordinary Teaching Fellows (including BCC member Kadin Henningsen) in making the study of Pirkei Avot a set practice. Free. No rsvp necessary, drop-ins welcome. Kevah’s Los Angeles based Teaching Fellows have been meeting monthly at BCC.
As an organization, Kevah’s mission is to make classical Jewish texts accessible to Jews seeking a spiritually and intellectually meaningful Jewish learning experience by helping organize small learning groups and providing an educator to help lead discussions.
Click here to visit Kevah’s website. Future dates: 5/16, 5/23
What is Pirkei Avot?
Atop Mount Sinai, over the course of forty days and nights, G‑d taughtMoses the entire Torah. The Torah was a two-part study: the “Written Torah,” transcribed in the Five Books of Moses (and later extended to include all the 24 books of the Scriptures), and the “Oral Torah,” a commentary on the Written Torah. The Oral Torah was orally transmitted from teacher to student for many generations. In the 2nd century CE, Rabbi Judah the Prince felt that the Oral Law would be forgotten unless it was transcribed. So he compiled the basics into a six-part document called the Mishnah.
The Mishnah contains 63 volumes (tractates) which discuss all areas of Jewish law: agriculture, holidays, civil law, family relations, sacrifices, ritual purity, and much more. One of the tractates, however, is completely devoted to Jewish morals, values and ethics. This tractate is called Avot—literally translated as “Fathers.”
