World Events Supply Sermon Topics for Jews’ High Holy Days

The problems faced by Jews leaving the Soviet Union and the conflict in the Middle East will be among the topics of rabbis across the San Gabriel Valley during the Jewish High Holy Days, which begin this week.

“We pray for our American hostages and the many thousands of other hostages,” said Rabbi Elisha Nattiv of the Temple Shalom of the East San Gabriel Valley in West Covina. Their plight, he said, is relevant to the High Holy Day theme of “soul searching, and how to improve our lives in the coming year as individuals, as families, as a community, as a country.”

Rabbi Gilbert Kollin of the Pasadena Temple, the largest in the San Gabriel Valley, will speak on “The Best of Times and the Worst of Times.”

“In the beginning of the year we were so euphoric, the (Berlin) Wall came down, the ‘Evil Empire’ was gone, and then suddenly on Aug. 2 the Middle East blows up and suddenly we refocus on the problems of our world,” Kollin said.

Meanwhile, the 150,000 Soviet emigres expected to arrive in Israel by the end of 1990 have to surmount obstacles that come with restarting one’s life from scratch, said Freddie Rambaum of Operation Exodus, an organization spearheading many of the resettlement efforts.

Aid is needed there because an additional 300,000 Soviet Jewish emigres are expected by the end of 1991. About 250 Soviet Jews live in the San Gabriel Valley, about 1% of all those who have resettled in Los Angeles in the last few years, she said.

The High Holy Days have been targeted for a sweeping appeal by Operation Exodus because “it’s the time of year when the whole Jewish world gets together,” Rambaum said.

“Operation Exodus represents for the Jewish community a historical opportunity to do today what we could not do during the Holocaust” she said. “The Jewish community is going to make sure that with these gates open, the opportunity will not be lost to rescue these Jews.”

The Jewish High Holy Day season will begin with Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year 5751, at sunset Wednesday.

The 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement marked by prayer and a 24-hour fast, are intended as a time for introspection and setting goals for the coming year.

Yom Kippur begins at sunset Sept. 28 and concludes at sunset Sept. 29.

Other High Holy Days sermon topics:

* At Temple Beth Israel in Pomona, Rabbi-in-Residence Fred Krinsky will speak on “Sin and Forgiveness in the Modern World.” Krinksy, a former professor at Pomona College, lectures frequently on Judaic history.

* Rabbi William J. Gordon at Temple Beth Torah in Alhambra will speak on “Born-Again Jews” and “Making the ‘You’ of the Bible into ‘I.’ ”

* Temple Beth David of the San Gabriel Valley in Temple City will use Rabbi Alan Lachtman’s sermon, “The New Year--A Time for New Beginnings” to help kick off the temple’s new hunger-fighting program. Like many synagogues, Temple Beth David is asking High Holy Days participants to bring groceries, money or clothes on Yom Kippur for donation to local food banks and Jewish charities.

And back at the Pasadena Temple, workers were busy last week outfitting the gymnasium for an expected 1,100 worshipers. “Everybody feels the need and obligation to come to the synagogue” during the High Holy Days, particularly on Yom Kippur, Kollin said.

“You know how people run down to the post office on April 15, just in time to get their tax returns in? Well, this is like a chance to get your prayers in before the gates close,” he said, referring to the Kol Nidre service, which signifies the start of Yom Kippur.

Swissler is a Los Angeles free-lance writer.