July 30 - Congress - Developing our Jewish Identity

Date: July 30th, 2015
By: Samara Bell

Today we had our first official day of International Congress. We were fortunate to listen to an incredible guest speaker, Avraham Infeld. He spoke about the Jewish peoplehood, the 5 legs of Judaism--Memory, Mt.Sinai, family, Hebrew and The land of Israel/The state of Israel. Following the lecture, we divided into our "tribes" and discussed the intricate language of Hebrew. We listened to a song called the "HebrewMen", that described the relationship between our ancestors connection to the hebrew language. Then we were introduced to a panel of leaders in the International Jewish community. We were split up into smaller groups for Q&A sessions with individuals from the panel. The leaders ranged from the Diller executive staff to people who are integral to connecting the Jews in the diaspora to Israel (the Shinshinim concept). It was extremely interesting to hear their experiences; both in Israel and outside of Israel in regard to the Jewish community. All 500 fellows + staff gathered on the basketball court for a photo. We were all wearing the same Diller shirts-- at this moment we all felt united and involved in something bigger then just our Eilonto cohort. It was a long process, but one that we can always look back at with appreciation. We went back to our "tribe" rooms and spent an hour and a half learning about one of the five legs from Avraham Infeld's lecture, which was Mt. Sinai. Our groups studied the story of Mt. Sinai and what we can learn from it. A challenging part of this program was the task to taking out a commandment from the Ten Commandments, and replacing it with two modern day ones. It was a very interesting program that I gained a lot from. We ended a great day with a Ma'agal with our cohort and a chance to meet different people from the program!! Shabbat Shalom! Samara