On February 1st 2020, Congregation Agudas Achim was blessed to celebrate the 83rd anniversary of community member Fred Glosser’s Bar Mitzvah. At 96 years old, Fred became our oldest Torah reader and even read his original D’var Torah from his 1937 Bar Mitzvah. A transcription of that d’var is included below:
Dear Family and Friends,
We continue to read this morning the story of the ten plagues. Moses comes to Pharoah to ask that the children on Israel be released from slavery. His request is met by a haughty answer. After each plague is brought upon the land, Pharoah seems to waver. He is on the verge of sending forth the Israelites but each time he changes his mind. However, after the tenth and final plague, the smiting of the first born, the Israelites are hurried out of the land. There was no time to linger. There was no time to let the bread dough sour and they were forces to bake and eat unleavened cakes.
In short, it is the story of Passover that we read this morning and we will read it, again, when Pesach comes around.
This morning’s reading calls to our attention the slavery that is going on all about us. We are reminded of the modern day Pharoahs who enslave our people. These modern day Pharoahs do no demand that we make bricks, but they humiliate us in a thousand different ways.
On my Bar Mitzvah day I want to dedicate myself to my people. I want to serve them. I want to be one of those who will help to lift the yoke of slavery from off the shoulders of our brothers and in so doing I will be living up to the highest teachings of our religion.
I pray to God to give me the faith with which to face life courageously. I want to keep in mind the words of my Haftorah wherein the prophet Jeremiah is speaking to his people—he wants to comfort them in a time of trouble and despair—he says to them: –
“Fear not, my servant, Jacob,” saith the Lord, “for I am with thee.” It is a message of hope that the prophet brings to his people, and it was a message that was very much needed both then and now.
Master of the world,
Give me the strength to study thy Torah so that thy laws will be ever with me.
Amen.
On my Bar Mitzvah day I want to dedicate myself to my people. I want to serve them. I want to be one of those who will help to lift the yoke of slavery from off the shoulders of our brothers and in so doing I will be living up to the highest teachings of our religion.
I pray to God to give me the faith with which to face life courageously. I want to keep in mind the words of my Haftorah wherein the prophet Jeremiah is speaking to his people—he wants to comfort them in a time of trouble and despair—he says to them: –
“Fear not, my servant, Jacob,” saith the Lord, “for I am with thee.” It is a message of hope that the prophet brings to his people, and it was a message that was very much needed both then and now.
Master of the world,
Give me the strength to study thy Torah so that thy laws will be ever with me.
Amen.