Servicing Our Sephardim
The Sephardic community in North America is growing, and a melting pot of kehilot of Sephardic Jews has begun to mix with each other and with Ashkenazim. Ashkenazic rabbis and congregants are not familiar with the customs of their Bucharian, Iraqi, Moroccan, Persian, Syrian, Yemenite (and other) brethren and have not been trained to perform the lifecycle events that are so important to their Sephardic congregants. The Sephardic rabbis themselves do not necessarily know the customs of their congregants whose roots are in a different Sephardic country.
The National Council of Young Israel wants to bridge this gap and bring the Ashkenazic and Sephardic communities closer together.
Our first project is The Sephardic Lifecycle Handbook, which will be an indispensable guide for both Sephardic and Ashkenazic rabbis. The text of the liturgy for each of these events, an explanation of how each ceremony is performed, including variations for the different Sephardic communities will be included.
Rabbi Yosef Sharbat, a practicing Sephardic pulpit rabbi will author this game-changing book. Koren Publishers Jerusalem, which has a true standard of excellence and has begun publishing books for Sephardic community, has agreed to publish the book.