Welcome to Temple B'nai Brith in Somerville!
We are an independent egalitarian congregation. Our membership reflects the wide variety of choices people make in living Jewish lives, and we are respectful of those differences. We welcome all who care about enriching Jewish life in Somerville and surrounding towns.
Join us for...
Kabbalat Shabbat Services: 6pm every Friday
Shabbat Morning Services: 9:15am every Saturday except Shabbat Together weeks
Shabbat Together: a different Shabbat service, one Saturday monthly at 10am
Tot Shabbat Services: 10am one Saturday monthly
We are an independent egalitarian congregation. Our membership reflects the wide variety of choices people make in living Jewish lives, and we are respectful of those differences. We welcome all who care about enriching Jewish life in Somerville and surrounding towns.
Join us for...
Kabbalat Shabbat Services: 6pm every Friday
Shabbat Morning Services: 9:15am every Saturday except Shabbat Together weeks
Shabbat Together: a different Shabbat service, one Saturday monthly at 10am
Tot Shabbat Services: 10am one Saturday monthly
Eternal Life
by Dara Horn Immortality has always fired the human imagination. Homer’s Odysseus spurned eternal life so that he could go home to his wife. The Christian parable of the Wandering Jew sees immortality as a curse: a Jew who mocks Jesus is punished by being unable to die until the Second Coming. Today, high-tech leaders in Silicon Valley are pouring billions of dollars into anti-aging research, hoping to defeat death. A novel both adventurous and wise, Eternal Life imagines two immortals as old as the Wandering Jew who dwell among us today. Their lives retrace the journeys of the Jewish people, from Jerusalem to Antioch to Pumbedita, in Alexandria and Aleppo, through Spain and Poland, to America and Israel. Yet this is no allegory—it’s a love story, or many love stories, with the same conflicts and joys and heartbreaks that are part of any life. Click here to RSVP (appreciated but not required). Erev Tisha B’Av Services
Saturday, July 21 at 8:45pm at TBB in Nissenbaum Hall Please join us as we gather to daven ma'ariv, the evening prayer service, and read the Book of Lamentations, in observance of Tisha b'Av, the day of mourning that falls on the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av commemorating the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. The Book of Lamentations begins with the word eicha poetically translated as alas, but which literally means how. It is both an exclamation (How devastating! How unfathomable!) and a question (How can this have happened? How do I cope with this disaster?). At the same time, it is a prompt for self-reflection: How can we understand our own complicity in the destruction of our place of intimacy with God? In Eicha are all the voices with which we cry out in times of pain. And yet there can be tremendous comfort in the experience of reading the Book of Lamentations together. Sitting on the floor by candlelight and facing one another in a circle, we chant the Hebrew text in a haunting melody and sing kinot, poems on themes of communal grief and destruction. When the notes have faded away, we leave in silence, as mourners do, to begin a day of remembrance and reflection that inaugurates the period of consolation and teshuvah leading up to the High Holy Days. Tisha B’Av Public Lament at ICE Detention Center 5–6pm Sunday, July 22 10 New England Executive Park, Burlington, MA 01803 Click here to join a carpool or offer to drive Join us and many other area congregations and organizations on the saddest day of the Jewish calendar, when we fast in remembrance of destruction and exile. We will come together at the ICE office in Burlington to mourn the brokenness of our American immigration system. As children are separated from parents—not just on the southern border, but every time a parent is put in detention for months on end—we lament. As people who seek asylum from violence and economic devastation are denied refuge, we lament. As Muslims are denied access to their family members in the U.S. simply because of their national origin, we lament. In the face of the fear and uncertainty plaguing our immigrant communities, we lament. Community members are invited to this public lament in the closing hours of Tisha B’Av, as we share stories, sing laments, offer support to those most impacted, and call for a new vision of healing and justice. 
The Saturday Morning Murder
by Batya Gur With sly, affectionate humor and acute insight, this flawless mystery by an Israeli literature professor traces the parallel processes of police detection and psychoanalysis. Chief Inspector Michael Ohayon is called to the Jerusalem Psychoanalytic Institute on a quiet Sabbath morning when Dr. Eva Neidorf, a highly respected senior analyst, is found dead shortly before she was to have given a lecture on ethical and forensic problems in psychoanalysis. As the intelligent, somewhat sorrowful Ohayon interviews the institute staff, Gur deftly and subtly inserts red herrings in her plot, at the same time investing her characters with remarkable depth and individuality. Following his investigation through Jerusalem's commercial district and into the ranks of the military as well, Ohayon exhibits the patience and attention to detail of an experienced analyst. A complex, fully satisfying resolution wraps up this masterful American debut. 
Song of the Heart
with Rabbi Eliana 7:30pm Tuesday, August 28 According to the midrash (homiletic interpretation of Jewish text) every part of creation, even the earth and the stones, gives praise to God in the form of a song. This singing is so pleasing to God that it is identified in one midrash as the reason why God created the world in the first place. The human prayer, known also as the song of the heart, is how we join the rest of creation to praise the Creator. Come sing with us. We will meet in Rabbi Eliana’s air conditioned office to learn a variety of melodies including old and modern melodies, Sephardi and Hassidic melodies, melodies from Jewish text and liturgy. This class is for everyone, regardless of whether you come to services or not, and regardless of whether you think you can sing or not. All texts are transliterated. Click here to RSVP (appreciated but not required). |
Remember to bring your donations of kosher raisins and kosher canned fruit for Family Table!
SIGN UP for Shabbat Minyan here. To receive our emails or newsletter drop us a note at tbb@templebnaibrith.org 
Accessibility
Temple B'nai Brith is proud to be wheelchair accessible. Our accessible entrance is at the rear of the building and equipped with an intercom system. The accessible restroom is located at the front of the building on the ground level. Our elevator provides access to all three levels. 
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Do you like receiving the TBB newsletter in the mail?
Should the TBB Shofar go electronic?
We are considering discontinuing the paper newsletter after this summer, in favor of an email version. We may also continue to send the Shofar by mail to those who wish to receive it that way. Please share your thoughts with us on how we should distribute the Shofar, as well as your personal delivery preference, at templebnaibrith.org/newsletter.
Should the TBB Shofar go electronic?
We are considering discontinuing the paper newsletter after this summer, in favor of an email version. We may also continue to send the Shofar by mail to those who wish to receive it that way. Please share your thoughts with us on how we should distribute the Shofar, as well as your personal delivery preference, at templebnaibrith.org/newsletter.
To receive our emails or newsletter drop us a note at tbb@templebnaibrith.org