No prerequisites, but ideally a student who has knowledge of (or has completed) Classical Hebrew, Liturgy, Practical Rabbinics and Death & Dying
This course is 1 credit towards smicha
Course Description
In this course, you will learn the very technical aspects of Jewish lifecycle officiation.
While we are all likely great at crafting our own groovy rituals, we may not know what goes into a classical Jewish experience and may feel “imposter syndrome” around officiation. I’m here to help eliminate those fears.
We will be taking a very egalitarian, Reconstructionist style approach in this course, by assuming that the use of certain rituals in a lifecycle are a matter of choice, and that this choice is not simply aesthetic, or a matter of convenience, but intentional. Traditional Judaism has a vote, and a powerful one at that, but not a veto. However, it’s important for you to know what you are reforming before you Reform it, hence teaching you everything.
Since this course does not focus on halacha, but rather on the writing and delivery of ceremony, we ask that you take the majority of your Hebrew, liturgy and practical rabbinics. The additional Death and Dying course will fill in your knowledge about those rituals from a text, history and philosophical view.
The course takes the following, three-fold approach to understanding and perfecting your lifecycle officiation:
- Judaics. You may know what takes place at a bar mitzah, but do you understand what those elements mean? Do you understand why we may or may not choose to use those elements? Or why someone may think they like or dislike an element, but would change their mind with proper guidance from you?
- Practical Rabbinics. How do you charge for a wedding? How do you work with a student? What are the unspoken rules of a funeral? How do you do the business of any of this?
- Officiation. How to write and deliver amazing lifecycle services. This is about turning A PERSON’S Jewish experience into THEIR Jewish experience.
Learning Verification Method
For each unit, you will write a sample ceremony that you could use in your rabbinic practice. You have a choice as a student to either work on this with me, or to do this in advance and present it to me each week. Additionally, you will “officiate” these ceremonies (similar to sermon practice) for an audience of one!
By the end of our course, students will have written their own rabbi’s manual, and posted it in the #prs Slack.
Please note that while most ceremonies will be a standard template, the areas where you are sharing your uniqueness must be entirely your own. Please no “copying and pasting” from Ritualwell or ChatGPT and calling it done!
Note: your educator will need to fill out this form below for you. Please provide it to them if they do not already have it.
What Students Will Learn
What Students Will Learn
- The practical and liturgical elements of each lifecycle (filling out a ketubah, Torah service for b’nai mitzvah, etc.) and how to officiate these elements of the services
- How to choose what elements are included and what are excluded (and why)
- Meeting the often unique needs of those you are serving
While there are infinite parts of life we can focus on, for the sake of brevity we will focus on baby naming, b’nai mitzvah, weddings, funerals and conversion. The extra session will be left open to give the student the opportunity to have time to focus deeper on one of the lifecycle ceremonies they feel they need more time on.
Materials Needed
Required
- A USA Conservative and Reform rabbis manual (Moreh Derekh, CCAR or Maagalei Zedek, respectively) of your choice
- On the Doorposts of Your House, another Reform handbook
Optional (but highly recommended)
Typical Meeting Times, Availability & Course Price
Typical Meeting Times & Availability
Monday – Friday before Noon Eastern Time (NYC Time). Students will have six (6) sessions with me, each session is sixty (60) minutes.
Course Price (USD)
$1,200.00 USD. 100% of fees go directly to PunkTorah Inc. to support PRS and our sister website Darshan Yeshiva.
Payment Methods Accepted
Payment runs through the Pluralistic Rabbinical Seminary Paypal system.
Getting Started
Reach out to the educator via email at: pbeaulier@jewishpluralism.org
