Sermons of Rebuke II: Vayelech and Yom Kippur with Shabbat Shuva

by Rivka Schwartz

Announcements
No more Shofar blowing in the shul hallways. Benjamin. You know you can't blow. The Gabai didn't ask you to blow for the shul this year, for a reason. We also suggest you don’t blow with the windows open to your home either. Too much anti-semitism has been caused, due to your poor Shofar blowing abilities. Your neighbors already hear you screaming at your kids. Your children not helping take out the trash has already caused much hatred.
 
If you haven’t repented yet, the rabbi will help you after services with the Shabbat Shuva Drasha. He will tell you how annoying you are and how much God doesn’t like you right now. The message of the rabbi’s Shabbat Shuva Sermon will be, ‘If you listen to me and stop talking in shul, H’ might love you too… When you are thinking of sinning, think of what Bernie would do and don't do it. And listen to your rabbi.’
 
There will be no huge meals for kids in shul this Yom Kippur. These kids refuse to eat at school. They come to shul on Yom Kippur and gorge. The rabbi has decided it's wrong to focus on food when he is hungry.
 
Rabbi Mendelchem’s Sermon Excerpts
Shabbat Shalom My Pupils...
(Devarim 35:2) 'Six days you shall do work.' That means to do stuff... Coming to shul is doing stuff. It means don't be lazy. Don't be like the board... I worked on this Drasha. I worked, Bernie. I wasn't lazy... A message to you all to change. To not be you. This Shabbat Shuva, return to not being you...
It's Yom Kippur. Just repent already. For crying out loud. Repent.. It's the Ten Days of Repentance. Focus... You need a year. Bernie...

'And the seventh day shall be holy to you, a day of complete rest to the Lord. Whoever does work on it shall be put to death.'
How many of you are required death? That's not the question... The question is how to be holy. Holy. When I come to shul here, I feel like holiness has been taken from me... The way you guys drone the davening. Holiness gone... You kileed my Rosh Hashana...
Moshe gathers the people and this is the first thing he says to them is to keep Shabbat... Telling you to rest is easy. You sleep all the time. The problem is you come up with ideas when you rest...
Why can't the board just rest. Do nothing. Is it that hard to understand to do nothing??? To not ruin the shul??? Just rest and do nothing while you're resting.
The Chazin should rest on Shabbat. Please… All of your work kills the shul
Are we proposing death to those who come up with dumb shul ideas?...
Moshe's talking about Milacha. Work done for the MIshkan. Doesn't mean to not walk to shul.

The board is lazy and does stuff… They should have nothing to do with Shabbis or the shul. They should do other stuff. Stuff during the other six days... Stuff that doesn't have to do with the shul. You're a board. Start up a grocery. Anything outside of the shul.
If you treated the week holy. Maybe showed to Minyin. I would understand your laziness, Mark... It's not holy to not help… In the board’s case it is.
'Holy to you.' It shall be holy to you. You've got to make it holy... By not being around Bernie and the board...
 
Yom Kippur. The day of total rest. The day where we must be cleansed is coming.
Viduy, confession, is how we repent. Regret, confession, and saying you will never do it again. I understand it's hard for Bernie to not be himself anymore. But that is how he makes it holy... Total rest would be for us to not have to deal with Bernie. Atonement...
There's a time for everything. A time to sleep... That's not during the sermon. Michal.

Yom Kippur is a time to fast. A time of total rest. A true Shabbat. I will not be here. On Yom Kippur...  
A day to fast. To repent for your messed up help…
I understand they're kids. Fasting though… They should fast a bit.
Last year, Shmuli pulled out a brisket. It’s not fair to those who are fasting… The kids don’t need a catered Yom Kippur lunch at shul… We want them to enjoy the holiday. I understand. But maybe focus on them enjoying Sukkot and Simchat Torah, and cook a decent dish for once... Work before the holiday. 'Six days you shall work' Rachel. Mike and Rachel. Work before Sukkot to put together a decent dinner for the kids.
I know the Chazin kills it for us all… You can't sleep through that stuff...
 
We rest to repent. Think about where we went wrong. Atonement.
Repent for your bad shofar blowing. It's pathetic Benjamin. It’s embarrassing...
Every preShabbis you scream at your kids… Then shower Thursday night. We know the hot water runs out on Friday. But you don't need to scream at all the kids... I've had your neighborhood showing up to my office, asking if 'shower' is a Hebrew word meaning 'I am going to spank you'... They didn't know if they should report your preShabbis showers to the authorities... Child services should come to shul and run youth groups. 
 
(Devarim 35:5-6) 'Take from yourselves an offering for the Lord. Every generous hearted person shall bring it... gold, silver, and copper, and blue, purple, and crimson wool. And linen and goat hair. And ram skins dyed red, tachash skins, and acacia wood. And oil for lighting, and spices... and shoham stones and stones for the ephod and for the choshen...'
Nowhere does it say a community quilt... We will be putting in the Yizkur appeal. Offer money. Nobody wants your leftover books... Anything in a cardboard box should not be donated. I you sealed it when you were moving. Don't donate it to the shul... If it's an old cracked shofar... Why did you give it to the shul?... You don't have room in your home for a shofar?! If you don't have room in your home, the shul doesn't want it...
It's not generous to have a garage sale and then to drop off what you couldn't sell.
Repent for that donation, Bruce. For that donation, not being holy and not keeping Shabbis...
I can't explain the Ephod  and Choshen now... It would say 'you are wrong'...
No. Don’t donate a quilt… There is a list. A list of what to donate. 
Don’t come up with your own ideas. It kills the shul… This is a message for the board.
 
And stop volunteering. Do useful stuff... You're wise. But not wise-hearted. You're booksmart. That doesn't help with building the shul's Sukkah...
(Devarim 35:10) ‘All wise-hearted among you shall come and do as H’ commanded.’ Talented people… He can play the violin. He’s not making violins. Is he? We love Menashe. We just don't want him volunteering... There is a reason the Torah doesn't say to volunteer the other six days... Because it's a job that nobody wanted to hire you for. There's a reason. There's a reason the board is messed up. All volunteers... Repent for volunteering...
Know your talents. Volunteering is not one of them.

That is what you have to do this Yom Kippur. See your talent and focus on that. Stitching is not your thing. And you have no idea how to work with acacia wood… The president’s talent is not leading our congregation.
Show up and rest. Just rest correctly. If this congregation learned how to rest right, we wouldn't have to deal with messed up stitching and quilts… The Torah says the wise-hearted. This Torah cover is not wise. Get rid of all non-wise-hearted... It's better off than having a board.
 
Shabbat Shuva is now here. Repent.
Repent and don’t do anything. That’s it. Don’t do anything. That is your Mitzvah. Do nothing… Just learn to rest… Don’t do stuff. You ruin it. Everything you do is a sin… It kills the community. 
Confess for trying to help.
 
Scary Simanim are not a way to help. The Rosh Hashana fruit and vegetable signs for killing enemies scares the kids. You scared the kids at the Rosh Hashana Seder, Shlomo. Telling the kids to that our enemies should die like a lemon... They don't know that a lemon is a messed up car... They're afraid to eat cantaloupe now... Pinchas ran, screaming, 'He's got a cantaloupe bomb'… A stroller parking area would be smart… Don't help... It's not work to help. That's volunteering. If you're not wise-hearted volunteering is a sin.
 
As the Chazin. Don’t make Yom Kippur more painful than Rosh Hashana… It's a day of rest... I can't repent when I'm thinking about killing you...
 
Rivka’s Rundown
That strong message of 'don't be you and repent already, for crying out loud' didn't touch the congregants. They figured they won't feel bad anymore. After feeling bad every year and still sinning, they realized they're going to mess up again.
The law of confession hasn't worked for the people of our shul yet. They said that their resolutions to not do are never followed. Sidney said that he has said he'll never eat chocolate again. Every year. And he eats it every year. He now said that he'll never do proper confession again, as he believes 'it's wrong to have a commandment to lie.'
 
The whole sul did repent for volunteering. And they agreed that none of them have a decent talent for stitching. It was discussed, and the board agreed that nobody is talented.

Doing stuff ruins the shul. That’s the message of the Shabbat Shuva Drasha. It's also the rabbi's message for Yom Kippur. Do nothing please. That is how you do Teshuva. You repent by not doing stuff.
If the congregation would do nothing, we would be better off. Other congregations, with talented people should be encouraged to help. But our members just ruin everything. Even the new paint job on the youth center is messed up.
I think the rabbi wants the board to do stuff. Just not with the shul. Outside of the shul. It's just a beautiful message that our congregants need to hear. 'Stop volunteering. The shul would be better off.'
If they did something helpful during the week, OK. But on Shabbat. They just kill everything.
 
And the artwork. We have a lot of very untalented people doing that stuff. They don’t buy it. They paint it. They think they are the wise-hearted called upon to bring fingerpaint to the shul.
And the walls are messed up. The new youth lounge walls. And it's not the kids painting. It's parents who think they are helping. The rabbi had to write a letter to the congregation defining what is helpful. And none of it had anything to do with anybody from the shul participating.
Though he did say that money is helpful.

Don’t be you. That’s how you repent. That was the message. Don’t be you and don’t help. Please. I hope the parents of the youth get this message.
 
The Chazin kills the shul experience for the High Holidays. He'll never repent for focusing on the words and bringing out the meaning with song. So painful.
 
The shul created a stroller parking lot. That was the only good idea. Donating that sign was useful. And I think it was made from acacia wood.
 
In Youth groups, kids expressed how fearful they were of eating fruit, after the Simanim. The signs are scary. After the congregants didn't show up for the second day Shacharit, due to fear of sleeping after eating gourds and saying that enemies should die by a witch who has a nose like a gourd, it was decided that our community isn't ready to curse our enemies with vegetation.
Rosh Hashana dunking of the apple in honey is now the only shul Siman tradition again. The scary Simanim have scared the kids too much. Getting them back to Kiddish and eating carrots dunked in Chumus will take time.

The High Holiday seats this year are messed up. They moved everybody around. It's like musical chairs for this board. Nobody was in their Makom Kavuah, set seat. There's a reason it's called a set seat. I think they feel that it will lead to better decorum, to have people sitting in 'not their seat that they paid for.' One of the board members is a teacher, and they said that it's better for classroom management to mix up the seats sometimes. She said nothing about the High Holidays and shul, and people getting angry and starting fights. I don't think she teaches eighty year olds who've been sitting in the same seat since their Bar Mitzvah.
When the congregants show up on Yom Kippur, when three quarters of the membership pops in for their yearly visit to make sure their parents are in the Yahrzeit book, they will not be happy. They won't just be asking what page we're on. They're going to be asking where their seat is, and how their family's seats got lost.
What a dumb board. Who loses family seats. I think they have to bring back the lifetime memberships. How they got rid of the first ones is an anomaly. To get the members to pay for another lifetime membership, will be a tough sale.
 
Some people are happy they have no seat. They hate their lifetime seats anyways. They’re happy the lifetime memberships are now gone.
 
The High Holiday between paragraph moan was by accident. Bernie was sitting and it just came out. It was a perfect drone. And then he fell back asleep.
 
Shofar blowing was off. An eight second Tekiah Gedola. A letdown. I will be surprised if anybody comes to shul next year.
Chazin was new. Did tunes nobody knew. Mark protested and started singing the correct tune for Areset Sifataynu after the shofar blowing. The community spoke up. The Chazin tried doing his tune. One woman said, 'Keep quiet. This is our tune. We don't need you.' The Chazin was silent the rest of the time. You couldn't hear a thing. It was the only time the rabbi smiled all Rosh Hashana. He’s not going to mess up the vChol Ma’aminim prayer again
There was no Kiddish on Rosh Hashana and nobody came the second day.
 
Rabbi’s Sermons for Rosh Hashana:
Talked about how Avraham did the journey and fulfilled his part of doing his Mitzvah of the binding of Yitzchak. And how nobody in our shul even walks half a mile to shul. He then said that H’ can stop stuff, like congregants being annoying. But even so, we have to do our part. It's the journey of the Mitzvah and having to deal with Bernie. And even though he's been dealt a messed up shul and board, he does what he can. So he still get the Mitzvah, even if they can't paint.
He then said that people with disabilities get the reward for the Mitzvahs they can do. And pointed out that nobody in the congregation at that moment had a disability and they are just lazy and unhelpful. 
There was a Frum Jew there for the one of the sermons. The rabbi used the word Hishtadlus, so the other guy wouldn't think we're Apikorsim (heretics). The rabbi tried throwing in Yiddish, but all he knows is Zei Gezunt. He said Zei Gezunt thirty times. And the other guy the Frum Jew thought our rabbi is an Apikores. Truth is he used it well when the guy sneezed. I think that's the right time to say Zei Gezunt.
The rabbi is onto something. I've noticed that the smart people in the shul always throw in a Hebrew or Yiddish word. When you use Hebrew or Yiddish, it’s a proof. Once they use that word, they win the Halachaik argument about Jewish law. Even if it’s not Torah, just throwing in a word like 'it's a Bayit SheNofel' wins you the argument. I know that was more than a word, but I needed it to make the point. They said 'a house that falls' in Hebrew, and the argument was over. They won. They were discussing how long the Shofar blow was. Nothing to do with houses. but it was Hebrew, and with the Brooklyn Yeshiva accent, it sounded Yiddish.
He started this new way of preaching where there is a call for action. He treats the congregation now like a social media post. He also used props the next day. Thank Gd that stopped after a while. He was bringing huge props. One speech he brought in a twelve gallon pot of Matzah balls, to show how important it is to feed people. His back went out, and he stopped with the props.

Thanks to the board's new focus on youth there's nothing for old people. All they talk about are the kids. Old people are not wanted in the shul's new programs, and I think the board is going to cost the shul a lot of money lost off death. If you can't tell people that one of their family members died, you can't pull in donations.
I believe they’re trying to find members that don’t lick their fingers before turning pages. The pages of the Siddurs have been hard to move recently. It's quite disgusting. And I see them licking their fingers to turn the pages.

And the Haftorah on the first day was messed up. Charles didn't prepare. He messed up so many words, but people were cheering for him at the end. He came out of the Haftorah like a champ. After the Pesukim about Chana, when he went into the Brachas, he had gustto. 
No self-awareness. Just went out like a star.
 
And nobody understood the Shabbat Shuva Drasha. The whole idea about resting on Shabbat being not resting, went over everybody's head. And the board still messed up the shul. But they were all mad at the Chazin.