Torah Portion:	Kedoshim
Synagogue:	Caulfield Shule, traditional orthodox
Walking time from home:	10 mins
Reason for going:	Two speakers
Kiddush:	Large, plentiful

Since I started this blog, I’ve been trying to go to a different shule every week and I only come back to one I’ve been to before if there is a compelling reason to do so. This week I was back at Caulfield Shule, and the compelling reason was that there were two speakers ahead of this coming week’s Israeli Independence Day.

Caulfield shule, as I have said before, is one of the most traditional and prominent shules in all of Melbourne, and the largest orthodox congregation. Yet despite that, when I first arrived soon after starting time, there was almost an embarrassingly small crowd in such a large space. Just as well the speeches were going to take place towards the end of the service.

Because it is a large shule and because it is a shule that attracts a diverse crowd, including many people who don’t really keep Shabbat but like coming to shule as part of their weekly ritual of Judaism, the shule don’t usually fill up till the Torah reading or even later in the service. This week was essentially a bog standard Shabbat: there was no festival, no celebration of any kind (ie: Bar Mitzvah) and no special Torah reading or other feature in the service to make it stand out. There were two speakers to be sure, but everyone knew they were going to speak at the end of the service, so the people who came just for them, turned up towards the end. As such, whilst the crowd was sparse at the beginning, the shule looked quite full by the time the first speaker began, and at the kiddush in the hall for the second speaker, it was standing room only for most people – the caretaker even spent part of the time brining out more chairs for some of the older people to enable them to sit.

To speed things up and to ensure that the service ran on time for the speakers, the rabbi didn’t give his sermon during the usual point in the service after the Torah reading, but did speak just before the guests, and introduced them. Since both speeches were due to be about Israel, he talked about the Israeli flag, which is based on the Talit (prayer shawl). On the flag, like on the Talit, the white represents reality whilst the blue lines and particularly the Star of David, represent belief in a higher being or a higher purpose. Or as Israel’s first prime minister said, ‘In Israel, in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.’ In a sense, this was the theme of the two speeches.

The first speaker is a retired British army colonel who has spent a significant amount of time in Israel of late working with and observing the IDF and Israel more broadly. He dispelled some myths about genocide, aid and civilian casualties, he spoke about the heartfelt care that Israel takes to minimise casualties, and he spoke about the Iranian proxies and the world media who are distorting the truth to make Israel – and by implication all Jews – look like the oppressors and the persecutors. The second speaker was a young female lone soldier in the IDF who spoke about her inspiration for moving to Israel, her motivations to join the military and her experiences in Israel since October in a senior military role intercepting bombs and targets. Both speakers were eloquent, passionate and engaging. And whilst one was Jewish and one was not, both were able to inspire a congregation who felt strengthened hearing their words, especially as we are about to commemorate Israel’s fallen on Yom HaZikaron, and celebrate Israel’s independence on Yom Ha’Atzmaut but this year in a muted way. Ordinarily, shule is not necessarily the place to hear such speeches, and neither speaker nor the rabbi mentioned the portion of the week, but this year, and this week in particular, when things feel so dire for our community as a whole, their words of inspiration felt needed and their messages of hope – which they both finished with – felt entirely appropriate in a place of prayer.