Jewish Reconstructionist Federation

Purim Kiddush

(To be chanted in a stately and serious manner)

Baruh ata Adonai, elohaynoo meleh ha-olam, boray p’ree ha-gafen.

We praise You, Adonai our God, who together with the blessed sages of our people –

the Manishewitz brothers,
Baron Edmond de Rothschild,
Johnny Walker Red
Jack Daniels
Jim Bean
and Old Grand-Dad --

created the fruit of the vine, and made us holy through Your commandments and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, fraternite, egalite, Sleepy, Grumpy, Sneezy and Doc.

You have given us this festival of Purim, in one of your better moments, and enjoined upon us to be brave, reverent, clean, and loyal, to stay in the right lane except while passing, and to put the toilet seat back down when we’re finished.

May it be Your will to grant us peace and blessing,
kasha and varnishkes,
Laurel and Hardy,
hops and schnapps,
great taste and less filling,
Rogers and Hammerstein,
Minneapolis and St. Paul.

May long life and prosperity be granted to all the members of this congregation, including those already loaded to the gills,
to the community in which we live,
to the young and the old
to Democrats and Republicans -- but especially Democrats --
to those who bake hamentaschen and those who eat them,
to shlemiels and shlimazels.

We praise Adonai who has freed us from the bonds of sobriety, sustained us and brought us to this time, six sheets to the wind, off the wagon, feeling no pain, up a lazy river, with liberty and justice for all. And let us say:

Amen!

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To the tune of Somewhere over the Rainbow

Somewhere over the rainbow there is a shul,
that fills to capacity every shabbat.
The kiddush plates are always full, the rabbi's sermons never dull,
it's just that from Yom Kippur on there is such lull!

Somewhere over the rainbow there are Jews,
who believe twice a year to visit the shul really is too few.

Ambivalence and apathy are the not words that they would choose, they just decide they will refuse to not to be Jews.

Somewhere over the rainbow, just past the mall, there are Jews who when they hear Mishnah and Talmud their jaws don¹t fall.

Kashrut, torah, and shabbat rest, nothing for them but the very best, they celebrate each and every fest ...ival.

Somewhere over the rainbow there is a Jewish community, that acts like Jewish life continues after 13.

It¹s not as if I need to explain, from Moses on the Jewish people have complained.
Why do we have to do this? Does it have to be so long?

Somewhere over the rainbow there is a place so fine, but for now -well- so let¹s have glass of Manishevitz wine.

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You can also check out the West End Syngagogue's 2004 Purim Cabaret.