Members of the Jewish community of Sochi and Israeli delegates to the Olympics held a memorial for the 11 Israelis killed by terrorists in Munich at the Summer Games in 1972. [from a report in The Forward, 2/10/2014]
Jews live in lots of interesting places. The largest Jewish community in the world is the one in the State of Israel, and there are large communities in Los Angeles and New York City. But there are also small communities all over the world, little groups like the one in Sochi, Russia.
Wherever Jews live we feel a connection to other Jews everywhere and in every age. Thus the Jews of Sochi feel a connection to 11 Olympic athletes who were murdered in Munich 42 years ago. This is what Klal Yisrael means: “All of Israel.” Klal Yisrael includes both the yeshiva boys and the Women of the Wall in Jerusalem, the intermarried Jews and Chabadniks in Los Angeles, the totally secular and the totally Satmar in New York. It includes the Jews of Singapore and Nashville and Auckland, the Jews of Buenos Aires and, yes, Sochi.
Rabbi Ruth Adar is a teaching rabbi in San Leandro, CA. She has many hats: rabbi, granny, and ham radio operator K6RAV. She blogs at http://coffeeshoprabbi.com/ and teaches at Jewish Gateways in Albany, CA.
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3 thoughts on “What’s Klal Yisrael?”
Yes, and the Jews in all those places may look ‘different’ from you. Yesterday a woman told me that someone had said to her, “I can’t believe you’re Jewish! You don’t look it.” My friend was too stunned to say, “Really? What do Jews look like to you?”
I hope we can all delight in the huge range of Jewish ‘looks’.
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Yes, and the Jews in all those places may look ‘different’ from you. Yesterday a woman told me that someone had said to her, “I can’t believe you’re Jewish! You don’t look it.” My friend was too stunned to say, “Really? What do Jews look like to you?”
I hope we can all delight in the huge range of Jewish ‘looks’.