Sass Brown (they/them), Rabbinic Intern, Ammud: The Jews of Color Torah Academy
A Strong Wine that Never Spoils: Connecting an Iraqi Piyyut (liturgical poem) with Ammud’s Culturally Sustaining Torah Methodology — Text-based learning (will include recorded music)
Piyyutim are a unique Jewish genre of poetry, often written to elevate the themes of our holidays or prayers. They are composed of quotations from Torah, a collage of our ancient texts read in a new way. In this session, we’ll learn about the genre, study an example, and practice making our own.
Come study the piyyut “Edut Hashem,” written for the Jewish festival holiday of Shavuot by Rav Abdallah Hanin, 19th-century Iraqi liturgical poet, with a new English translation provided by Ammud: The Jews of Color Torah Academy. We’ll learn metaphors for Torah, encounter fire breathing angels, and find out why Torah is better for humans than heavenly beings. We’ll also use some of the poem’s language to highlight the ways Ammud’s methodology allows Torah that’s been “hidden for 1000 generations” to “flourish outside and spread its wisdom.”
You might want to come if: you love poetry, you’ve never studied a piyyut (Jewish liturgical collage poem), you want to know more about this unique Jewish genre, you love piyyutim, you love midrash (ancient Jewish storytelling), you want a new text to teach on Shavuot.
