Join us for a creative, spiritual journey from Exodus to Revelation, with weekly workshops taught by rabbis, poets and spiritual leaders. Workshops include meditation, poetry writing and spiritual practices connected to the kabbalistic theme of each Omer week. We will use this powerful time on the Jewish calendar to journey toward our individual and collective revelation.

“Journeying to Sinai: Seven Workshops for the Omer” is offered as part of Ritualwell’s annual Omer fundraising campaign. Our goal is to raise $18,000. Your support allows us to continue to provide hundreds of free resources that make Jewish life meaningful to thousands of visitors to our site. A minimum donation of $36 is suggested to attend the workshop series and gain access to all the recordings. We encourage you to donate as generously as you are able, using our kabbalistic ladder of giving as guidance. 

All workshops take place on Tuesdays, 12:00–1:00PM EDT.

March 30th, Hesed: Lovingkindness Meditation for Ourselves and the World | Led by Rabbi Ari Lev Fornari

Hesed is the connective tissue of the universe and the first sefirah of the Omer. Join us for an hour of guided and silent meditation as we explore the sefirah of Hesed, tracing its beginnings in our own hearts noticing the path as it radiates beyond. In this session we will draw on the Vipassana practice of metta.

Rabbi Ari Lev Fornari is a White, queer, trans person, of Ashkenazi, Sephardic and Italian descent, ordained by Hebrew College, and has been practicing meditation in the vipassana tradition for 15 years.

April 6th, Gevurah: Trusting Yourself to Know What You Need| Led by Sabrina Sojourner 

People reinforce who we are by rewarding the behaviors they want, and we grow to believe the narrative that they shaped. When the narrative does not work for us, it can feel like we are wearing shoes that are too tight, causing our whole being to hurt. We may fail to feel good about ourselves and not trust our own feelings or perceptions. Using Torah and poetry, we will explore possibilities for connecting Within and Without as a path toward healing and creating an authentic narrative, enhancing our ability to trust ourselves.

Sabrina Sojourner is a Shaliakh Tzibur and Community Chaplain who has been leading services, teaching, and cultivating curiosity within Judaism for nearly 20 years.

April 13th, Tiferet: Poetry as a Spiritual Experience | Led by Jake Marmer

Poet Denise Levertov famously wrote: “To contemplate... means, not simply to observe, to regard, but to do these things in the presence of a god ... So—as the poet stands open-mouthed in the temple of life, contemplating his experience, there come to him the first words of the poem.” Poetry had always been a gateway toward the spiritual -- and because of its penchant for contradictions, it is in poetry's domain that we can bring together, with gusto, vision and music, piety and sarcasm, traditions and subversions, holy rage and deep empathy. In this workshop, we'll come together to discuss, explore, and compose poetry as a spiritual practice. No previous experience with poetry necessary!

Jake Marmer is a poet, performer, and educator; the Education and Programming Director of The Bronfman Fellowship; and the author of three poetry collections.

April 20th, Netzach: Jews in the Wake: Black and Jewish Poetry of Endurance | Led by Rachel Neve Midbar

Drawing from Christina Sharpe’s In the Wake, a book that interrogates Black history and raises questions of citizenship and responsibility "in the wake" of slavery and systemic racism, we will ask these same questions from a Jewish lens. Who are we in the wake of the Holocaust and the founding of the State of Israel? Has anti-semitism (or lack thereof) changed us? How can poetry offer us language to examine who we are as a religion, a nation, a people? Let's join together in this week in the Omer of Netzach (Endurance) and look at the poetry of both Black and Jewish poets, to talk about how to begin to form these questions for ourselves: how have "we" endured? Then let's write some poems together and see where our own work takes us.

Rachel Neve-Midbar is a poet; the author of Salaam of Birds and What the Light Reveals (Tebot Bach); and a PhD candidate at The University of Southern California.

April 27th, Hod: The Splendor and Radiance of the Divine | Led by Hadar Cohen

Join us for a teaching on the kabbalistic sefirah of Hod – the Divine aspect of Majesty. Hod teaches us about the diverse radiance of Divine creation and we can find this quality everywhere we look. The session will include a meditation for direct experience as well as a talk and discussion on how to cultivate this aspect in our life.

Hadar Cohen is a Mizrahi feminist multi-media artist, healer, mystic and educator, originally from Jerusalem with Sephardic roots, working to build decolonial frameworks for worshiping God.

May 4th, Yesod: Creating Connections through Ritual | Led by Dor & Ophir Haberer

This workshop will be dedicated to Yesod or foundation/bonding. In this workshop, Dor and Ophir will create a space for connection and introduce a Jewish ritual in which everyone will feel seen in a deeper sense of belonging. This ritual will include elements from both their Moroccan background and from their work with earth-based Judaism. Expect dancing, altar creation, and authentic relating activities.

Dor & Ophir Haberer are Jerusalem-born, identical twins who have brought together many different communities both in person and online in an authentic Jewish setting.

May 11th, Malkhut: Listening for the Shekhinah | Led by Joy Ladin

In Jewish tradition, the Shekhinah is the female, immanent aspect of the Divine – the aspect that dwells among us, experiencing what we experience, suffering what we suffer, rejoicing when we rejoice. But tradition tells us little about how the Shekhinah, who knows us inside and out, speaks to us, what she asks of us, how she answers when we call. In this workshop, we will look at the Shekhinah's emergence from a verb in the Torah to a full-blown theological presence in rabbinic and kabbalistic thought, read some poems about her, and do writing exercises designed to help us imagine and locate the Shekhinah's presence in our lives, and hear what she is saying to us.

Joy Ladin is a teacher, widely published essayist and poet, literary scholar, and nationally known speaker on transgender issues.

All sessions will be recorded and shared with registrants afterward. 

About Ritualwell

Ritualwell is the most extensive online resource that curates original Jewish rituals for Jews and fellow seekers. We publish rituals, ceremonies, prayers and poems to mark sacred moments in Jewish life. Through creating and sharing rituals, hosting Ritualwell Immersions (online learning experiences), curating an online Judaica shop and hosting Rabbi Connect, Ritualwell fosters a supportive environment for Jewish creativity, spiritual growth and discovery. Learn more at www.ritualwell.org.

Ritualwell is committed to offering an accessible space to our community members. We commit to:

1. Providing participants with all the session materials ahead of time
2. Providing automated captions on all live sessions
3. Providing subtitles for all recorded sessions
4. Using the chat function and read it aloud during the sessions
5. Asking for participant accessibility needs and doing our best to accommodate them. Please feel welcome to contact us at ritualwell@reconstructingjudaism.org.