The Jewish perspective on one’s life progression involves both linear and cyclical elements. While Judaism and Jewish ritual help ritually mark life events such as birth, puberty, marriage, and death, they also echo timeless meaning by weaving contemporary experience into an ongoing chain of shared Jewish experience. Birth rituals invoke imagery and language from the Bible, Talmud, and medieval texts to place each newborn into a transcendent frame of Jewish birth. Lifecycle rituals serve to bring thousands of years of meaning and wisdom into our lives and offer language to help mark important passages. They bend time forward with a vision of desired future, as well as backward with a perspective of history and foundation.

Religious ritual continues to meet a variety of needs that relate to life markers: The need for the individual to be recognized by the community, the need for the community to weave itself into the life of the individual, the need for bonding of family and friends, the need to actively remember the great stories and wisdoms of tradition that shape our identity and perspective, and the need to offer a predictable structure to convey stability and meaning even in times of tremendous change and instability.

Congregation Rodeph Sholom seeks to offer meaningful encounters with Jewish lifecycle to each congregant in their life passages. Whether weaving a baby naming or B’nai Mitzvah into Shabbat services, officiating at weddings or funerals, or helping families craft services and rituals to mark many other celebrations or challenges, the clergy of Congregation Rodeph Sholom work to enable the intersection of Judaism, community, and the individual. The pages in this section will provide you with basic information on Jewish lifecycle events, both ancient and new.

If you have a clergy emergency, please call (917) 902-6103