Adult Learning

Raise your hand and speak up!

Shir Tikvah offers an evolving selection of adult classes and courses taught by Rabbi Cari, specialists, and inspired educators. Classes have included revitalizing holiday traditions, Jewish music in America, introduction to the New Testament, perspectives on Jewish feminism, Yiddish literature, and writing spiritual autobiographies. Most classes are free or a fee is charged to cover materials.

There are also many informal learning opportunities, including book discussions, guest lecturers, and family workshops. Check the calendar for upcoming events.

Classes for 2023-24

What Makes Sondheim Great, Act II (6 weekly sessions starting October 15, in-person)
This is a sequel to Gail Leondar-Wright's popular series What Makes Sondheim Great, offered last spring. This lively and interactive course will explore how Sondheim has elevated the genre of musical theater, ushering in its modern era. We’ll focus on Into the Woods, A Little Night Music, Merrily We Roll Along, and Pacific Overtures, explore Sondheim’s complicated female characters, and see how Sondheim’s identities as a white, gay, Jewish man crept into his work.
Learn more and sign up here to attend 

Archaeology in the Land of the Bible (5 weekly sessions starting October 16 in-person)
Bible studies researcher Nate Ramsayer will present "Archaeology in the Land of the Bible." Questions he explores include: What kinds of artifacts have been found that relate to biblical stories? When was writing developed in the ancient world, and why do we still use some of the same letters in our alphabet that the Canaanites did? Can archaeology be used to prove the Bible is true? What do scholars do when the Bible is at tension with what is found in the ground? Was the Exodus from Egypt a historical event?
Learn more and sign up here to attend  

Gender and Judaism (5 weekly sessions starting November 20 via Zoom)
This course will address the theme of gender in Judaism in a chronological historical order with biblical material, and then moving to the Talmud, Kabbalah, and concluding with the modern period: the counterculture, feminism, reform Judaism, women of the wall etc.
The instructor for this course, Simon Zeldin, has two Master degrees in Jewish studies and has begun his PhD in Religious Studies at Boston University.  Gender studies in Judaism is part of his research. Simon Zeldin comes to us through the auspices of Scholarium.
Stay tuned for info on how to join online!

Fragile Branches: Communities in the Jewish Diaspora.  (2 weekly sessions starting January 21 via Zoom)
James R Ross, former journalist and Northeastern professor, explored a number of remote small Jewish communities in unexpected places like India, Africa and South America. Some of these are communities that claim long ago Jewish roots, and some came to practice Judaism independently through their careful reading and following of the Old Testament. He wrote the book Fragile Branches (which is in our temple library) about these groups. He will present some of the history of the diaspora, and delve into more detail about two of these groups: a community of descendants of people who left Portugal in the Inquisition, and now live in inland Brazil, and a group in northern India who have found their way to Jewish practice. We will consider as a group the question “what does its mean to be a Jew? 
Stay tuned for info on how to join online!