Posted on January 23, 2026 by Rabbi Noah Diamondstein
Dear friends,
As we brace ourselves for Saturday night’s/Sunday’s Winter storm, I wanted to begin with a brief announcement: Our programming for Friday and Saturday will move forward as scheduled! Snow should begin to fall later Saturday night into Sunday, and you should look out for an announcement about Religious School tomorrow evening.
This week’s Shabbat will be a meaningful one. Our evening will start with a pot-luck dinner in support of Ladles of Love, a TBE initiative bringing warmth and healing to our congregants. Afterward, our Shabbat service will feature additional prayers of healing, as January is a five-Friday-month, but next Friday is Shabbat Shirah, at which our Cantor and musical leaders will lift our hearts in song.
Our Torah portion includes the Plague of Darkness, which Torah tells us was a darkness so thick that you could feel it, touch it. While Egypt was blanketed in the dark, however, God provided us a pocket of light in which we could prepare for the next leg of our journey and prepare our doorposts for the next and final plague.
These recent weeks have held much darkness. The actions of our government and its agents against American cities and immigrants, the actions of the Iranian regime against protesters, rashes of deadly diseases once thought eradicated, and other scary news has many of us feeling shaken–to say nothing of our own personal/familial challenges and darkness.
Still, there is light. Though our former governor failed to sign two of the three immigration bills that came to his desk, he did sign the Safe Communities Act, which passed in the New Jersey legislature with bipartisan support, and will help ensure that New Jerseyans seeking access to sensitive locations, including synagogues and other houses of worship, can do so regardless of their immigration status. In Israel, we are hearing reports that a potential coalition is forming that would rival the diversity of the Unity Government formed back in 2021, the most diverse in Israel’s history. And, this Shabbat, we will get to witness three teens read from the Torah, demonstrating the aliveness of our tradition! There is hope out there to be found, if we have the will.
It is my hope that TBE will be a similar light in the darkness for you when things get hard. That’s what these quarterly healing services are all about–leaning on one another and taking strength and hope from community. I hope to see you tonight.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Noah Diamondstein