Community Learning Project - signup

Seder Moed 2009-2010: A Community-Wide Learning Project

Join us as we begin a year-long project to learn all of Seder Moed—the section of mishnah that follows the path of the Jewish ritual year and is intimately concerned with our daily lives. 

As a community, we will learn the entire seder. You yourself can learn the highlights, specific sections, the entire thing, or anything in between.

We’ll be holding weekly classes, integrating our learning into existing community events, and celebrating significant milestones in between the kick-off at Shavuot 2009 to the culminating siyum at Shavuot 2010.  To read more about the project, click here.

Sign up using the form below to let us know how you would like to participate. 

Please e-mail moed[at]kehilathadar.org with any questions.  We look forward to learning with you!

Seder Moed Learning Schedule: Entire Seder over the Year

Hadar's Learning Team has designed a schedule for those interested in learning all of Seder Moed over the course of the year in an order that will allow us to prepare for each holiday as it approaches.  For example, by the end of the summer, we will have learned the sections of Seder Moed pertaining to the fall holidays.  This calendar parallels the schedule of topics and/or Massekhtot covered in the weekly Beit Midrash.

Please visit the Resources page for resources and information about Seder Moed, including links to the full text of Seder Moed in English and in Hebrew. 

For more information about Hadar's Community-Wide Learning Project, click here.  Please e-mail moed@kehilathadar.org with any questions.
 

Seder Moed Learning Schedule: Five Mishnayot Per Week

Hadar's Learning Team has designed a schedule for those interested in learning five "core" mishnayot a week (about 1-2 hours/week) in an order that will allow us to prepare for each holiday as it approaches.  For example, by the end of the summer, we will have learned the sections of Seder Moed pertaining to the fall holidays.  

This calendar follows the same schedule of topics and/or Massekhtot covered in the weekly Beit Midrash and is set up to include learning part of every Massekhet of Seder Moed over the course of the year.

For resources and information about Seder Moed, including links to Seder Moed in English and in Hebrew, visit the Resources page. 

For more information about Hadar's Community-Wide Learning Project, click here.  Please e-mail moed@kehilathadar.org with any questions.
 

Seder Moed Learning Schedule: Ten Mishnayot Per Week

Hadar's Learning Team has designed a schedule for those interested in learning ten "core" mishnayot a week (about 3-4 hours/week) in an order that will allow us to prepare for each holiday as it approaches.  For example, by the end of the summer, we will have learned the sections of Seder Moed pertaining to the fall holidays. 

This calendar follows the same schedule of topics and/or Massekhtot covered in the weekly Beit Midrash and is set up to include learning part of every Massekhet (tractate) of Seder Moed over the course of the year.

For resources and information about Seder Moed including links to full text of Seder Moed in English and in Hebrew, visit the Resources page. 

For more information about Hadar's Community-Wide Learning Project, click here.  Please e-mail moed@kehilathadar.org with any questions.

Seder Moed Resources

This page contains links to the full text of Seder Moed in English and in Hebrew, divided by tractate; introductions to Seder Moed; commentaries, downloadable source sheets from the weekly Hadar Beit Midrash, and other resources.

Introductions to the mishnah in general are available from Rabbi Simchah Roth, Joshua Kulp, and Rabbi Neal Loevinger. Joshua Kulp also provides an introduction to Seder Moed, and there is also a foreword by R' Joseph Hertz, and an introduction by R' Isidore Epstein (editor of the Soncino translation).

Notes:

The English links are for a translation of the entire Talmud (Mishna plus Gemara), but the sections comprising the mishna are always prefaced by "MISHNA" and followed by "GEMARA."

The Hebrew links above (MM) do not have vowels. Other than these links, everything else in this table is in English (the Simchah Roth links do have the Hebrew text of the mishnah, but also have translation and commentary in English).

The Kehati mishnayot are grouped by week, with more recent weeks near the top, so to start from the beginning of a tractate, scroll to the bottom of a page. Unfortunately, the weeks are still arranged top-down (i.e., most recent at the bottom), so check the mishnah numbering when using these links.

The Joshua Kulp files (called Mishnah Yomit on the website) are arranged in chronological order (they are daily emails with mishnah text and commentary in English). The link for each massechet (tractate) is the first mishnah in each of them, and then you should be able to click on "previous (more recent) message" to find the next mishnah and so on. You can also use the main link at the top of the table to look at all of the posts in a given month (after you click on a month, click on "Sort by date" or the posts will appear out of order).

The Rabbi Simchah Roth files are from a weekly mishnah study group set up in memory of Yitzhak Rabin z"l (RMSG stands for Rabin Mishnah Study Group).

Many thanks to Josh Greenfield for the above table of links and information, which were assembled for learning in memory of Josh's grandfather, Joseph Greenfield z"l.

Other resources:

Jastrow Dictionary online

Seder Moed Wiki (English)
This source has English translations of the mishnayot in Seder Moed, but it is only partially complete, and you can help by adding your own translations.

Seder Moed Wiki (Hebrew)
This source has the Hebrew text of all the mishnayot in Seder Moed, plus traditional commentaries including R' Ovadia miBertinoro, Tosafot Yom Tov, and the Vilna Gaon.
 

 Source Sheets and Discussion Questions from the weekly Hadar Beit Midrash

Summer 2009 Beit Midrash Schedule

Every Tuesday, the Hadar Beit Midrash features a guided class on a section of Seder Moed with hevruta learning (in partners) and discussion.  Come with your own hevruta (learning partner), or let us match you with a hevruta.  Join Yeshivat Hadar students in the Beit Midrash, and Yeshivat Hadar faculty will be available to answer questions as you study.  We also encourage those who sign up to learn a section of Seder Moed independently to come and learn at the Beit Midrash.

When: Tuesdays, June 16-August 4, 7:30-9:00 pm
Where: Yeshivat Hadar, 190 Amsterdam Ave., at 69th St.
Cost: $5 per class, $35 for the series
Pizza dinner provided!

June 16 - "From Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur: How Feeling Remorseful Was Stretched from One Day to Ten"
Taught by Rabbi Judith Hauptman
Seder Moed Project: Rosh Hashanah

June 23 - "Power and Authority on the New Year: Selected Mishnayot of Rosh Hashanah"
Taught by Rabbi Elie Kaunfer
Seder Moed Project: Rosh Hashanah

June 30 - "Overlapping Boundaries in Mishnah Succah: Between Law and Life, Between Sacred and Secular, Between Scholar and Servant"
Taught by Shira Billet
Seder Moed Project: Sukkah

July 7 - "Ananei Hakavod ("Clouds of Glory")"
Taught by Amanda Pogany
Seder Moed Project: Sukkah

July 14 - "The Other Messiah"
Taught by Jason Rubenstein
Seder Moed Project: Sukkah

July 21 - "Honi's Long Sleep in the Bavli and Yerushalmi"
Taught by Professor Jeffrey Rubenstein
Seder Moed Project: Ta'anit

July 28 - "When do we ask God to intervene in nature? - and when do we NOT ask God to intervene in nature?: Some reflections from the third perek of Masechet Taanit"
Taught by Jonathan Lopatin
Seder Moed Project: Ta'anit

August 4 - "Everyone is obligated in Re'iya* – except for…" (Hagigah 1:1)
Taught by Tanya Zion
Seder Moed Project: Hagigah
Our learning will focus on the obligation to see and be seen, and we'll explore the spiritual meaning of "seeing."  In addition, we'll ask how a mitzvah can be a requirement for "everyone, except for…" – and we'll discuss issues of inclusion and exclusion in our communities.
(* lit. "seeing"; the mitzvah of visiting the Temple three times a year)

Bios

Rabbi Judith Hauptman is the E. Billi Ivry Professor of Talmud and Rabbinic Culture at the Jewish Theological Seminary. Author of three books and many articles, she reads rabbinic texts in context and traces the evolution of Jewish law and practice over time. In her most recent volume, Rereading the Mishnah, A New Approach to Ancient Jewish Texts (2005), she rethinks the relationship of the Mishnah and the Tosefta, two early rabbinic works. Her book, Rereading the Rabbis, A Woman's Voice (2008), has been called a founding work of the new Jewish feminism. Since 2001, Rabbi Hauptman has served as volunteer chaplain to the Jewish patients at the Cabrini Nursing Home in Lower Manhattan. She is also the rabbi and founder of Ohel Ayalah, a free, walk-in High Holy Day service aimed at people in their 20s and 30s and at interfaith couples. Ohel Ayalah also runs low-cost Passover seders--on the first night for all ages and on the second for people in their 20s and 30s. Via this outreach project, Rabbi Hauptman connects with hundreds of unaffiliated young Jews.

Rabbi Elie Kaunfer is the co-founder and executive director of Mechon Hadar, and teaches Talmud at Yeshivat Hadar. He was ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he also completed an MA in liturgy. A Wexner Graduate Fellow, Elie is a co-founder of Kehilat Hadar, a flagship independent minyan committed to spirited traditional prayer, study and social action. Elie is pursuing a doctorate in liturgy at the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he received ordination. He was selected as an inaugural AVI CHAI Fellow, known as the “Jewish Genius Award.” He is the author of Empowered Judaism: Independent Minyanim and the Future of Jewish Life (Jewish Lights, forthcoming). In 2008, the Forward named him one of 50 Top Jewish leaders, and in 2009, Newsweek named him one of 50 Top Rabbis in America.

Shira Billet, a 2008 Yeshivat Hadar alumna, completed her BA from Princeton University with a degree in Religion and a Minor in Judaic Studies. She has a strong interest in the dynamic links between religion and law, and she wrote her senior thesis on the shared concerns of modern Jewish thought and contemporary legal theory in the context of the political, social and intellectual crises of the Twentieth Century.

Amanda Pogany teaches 8th grade Judaic Studies and Hebrew  language at the Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan.  She is also the middle school Student Life Coordinator. In addition to her teaching, she serves as a mentor to new teachers is several capacities, as well as a  consultant on pedagogy and curriculum.  She mentors for the Davidson School at JTS, the Pardes Educators program, and Schechter Manhattan.  She is  trained as a mentor through the Jewish New Teacher Project.  She is a  graduate of the Pardes Educators Program, has a Masters in Jewish Education  from Hebrew University and a BA from Barnard College.  She is co-founder of Altshul, an independent egalitarian minyan.  She lives in Brooklyn with her husband Aaron Bisman and their son Asher.

Jason Rubenstein is the Sho'el Umeshiv (a resource during Talmud seder) at Yeshivat Hadar and coordinates the yeshiva's group process programming. He is a fourth-year rabbinical student at the Jewish Theological Seminary and holds an MA in Talmud from JTS and an AB in Social Studies from Harvard College. An alumnus of Yeshivat Ma'ale Gilbo'a, Jason has led three trips for the Nesiya Institute, and is a recipient of a Wexner Graduate Fellowship, a Legacy Heritage Rabbinic Fellows Fellowship, and a Graduate Fellowship from The Center For Jewish Law and Contemporary Civilization at Cardozo Law School.

Jeffrey L. Rubenstein is the Skirball Professor of Rabbinic Literature in the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies of New York University.  He received his B.A. in Religion from Oberlin College, his M.A. in Talmud from the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he also received rabbinic ordination, and his Ph. D. from the Department of Religion of Columbia University.  He has taught at Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania and the Jewish Theological Seminary in addition to New York University.  His first book, The History of Sukkot in the Second Temple and Rabbinic Periods, was published in the Brown Judaica Series (1995).  In 1999 he published Talmudic Stories: Narrative Art, Composition and Culture with the Johns Hopkins University Press.   Rabbinic Stories was published in the Classics of Western Spirituality Series in 2002, and The Culture of the Babylonian Talmud was published by Johns Hopkins University Press in 2003.  Dr. Rubenstein has written numerous articles on the festival of Sukkot, Talmudic stories, the development of Jewish law, and topics in Jewish liturgy and ethics. 

Jonathan Lopatin, a former Partner at the Goldman Sachs Group, expects to complete an MA in Talmud at the Jewish Theological Seminary in May of 2009. He is the founder of not-so-simple-productions and producer of Eyes Wide Open (www.eyeswideopenisrael.org), a documentary film about the experience of American Jewish visitors to Israel. Jonathan serves on the boards of several institutions involved in Jewish and Israel education in the US and in Israel.

Tanya Zion Waldoks is the Kehilat Tzedek Community Organizer responsible for the Orthodox and unaffiliated (Secular) communities, organizing communities to engage in social justice in Israel. Prior to her work with Kehilat Tzedek, Tanya served as Director of ATZUM's Task Force on Human Trafficking, as Educational Director of Mavoi Satum, a non-profit dedicated to the plight of Agunot, and as Project Director of the "Trembling Before G-d" Israel Outreach Project. She is an educator and published author/editor of Sippurei Reshit, a pluralist international anthology about human issues in the book of Genesis (Yediot Ahronot, 2002). She also serves as an active leader and board member of the Orthodox "Shira Hadasha" congregation in Jerusalem. Tanya holds a BA in Jewish Philosophy and Gender Studies from Hebrew University and is currently studying towards her MA in Gender Studies at Bar Ilan University. She is married to Ehud, and is the mother of Lia Revaya.