A Taste of Torah - Shemot

We begin a new book of Torah this week, Shemot, or Exodus. Just eight verses into the book of Exodus, we see a major theme present itself: "A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph. And he said to his people, "Look, the Israelite people are much too numerous for us. Let us deal shrewdly with them, so that they may not increase; otherwise in the event of war they may join our enemies in fighitng against us and rise from the ground'" (Exodus 1:8-9).

Pharaoh decides, in his effort to suppress the Jewish people in Egypt, that the male children born to the Israelites should be put to death. Moses' parents decide to try to save him. His mother puts him in a basket, floats him down the Nile. Miriam, his older sister, hides nearby to see what will happen to her baby brother. When she sees Pharaoh's daughter rescue Moses, she makes sure that her own mother, Moses' mother, will be the one to nurse him. With his parents' faith and his sister's watchful eye, Moses survives. But not all children who find themselves cast out from their parents' homes are so lucky. Some end up on the street of their own volition. Other's are cast out by their parents. And their are those whose parents' choices force them out. Check out this Torah commentary from Martin Rawlings-Fein and this recent article on youth homelessness in the Star Tribune.

Fortunately there are plenty of people working to end homelessness, and even youth homelessness, in particular. Each year, my teenage congregants partipate in Night on the Street, a sleep-out aimed at raising awareness about homelessness in Minnesota and to fundraise to eliminate it. Last year, roughly 400 teens participated and Temple Israel sent more teens than any other group.