In Parshat Pinchas, Moses empowers Joshua to succeed him and lead the people into the Land of Israel. Now that's how a leadership handover is supposed to happen!
We also learn about Tzelafchad's daughters who petition Moses to inherit their father's portion of land. This inclusion and recognition of women has been a source of many feminist interpretations of the Torah and ties in nicely to the topic of our Kiddush lunch discussion this week:
"Making Women Count, the Halachot of Minyan."
Friday's Kab Shab Tefilla begins at 6pm, and Shabbat morning at9.15am for a shiur and then Tefilla at 9.45am. The shul is sponsoring the Kiddush lunch, and we thank Annette, Mandi and Ari for volunteering to make salads for the meal. After a good fress, we will hear from Ellyse Borghi as our guest speaker.
Ellyse has spent the past few years of her life studying all types of law: Australian, international, Ghanaian, Israeli and lots of Jewish law. Ellyse has studied and worked at finding halachic solutions to issues regarding egalitarianism and communal inclusion. She has recently completed her Arts/Law degrees and will be promptly moving overseas. We will really miss her input to the shul community, and have really enjoyed all her great talks and stories over the past year. Wishing you and Adam lots of Mazal!
New JMA course: Joel Lazar, Community Education Coordinator at Jewish Aid Australia, is running a 7-week adult short course as part of the Jewish Museum of Australia's short course Winter Series. "Jews Pursuing Justice in a Broken World" runs July 23 - Sep 3, every Tuesday night. Sign up here: http://www.jewishmuseum.com.au/education/short-courses
Shabbat shalom!