Category: High Holy Days

Passport

This Passport grants entry to all major Pardes Hannah High Holy Day services for non-Pardes Hannah members. The cost is $180 for the first member of a household, and $54 for every adult individual in a household beyond that (anyone under age 18 is free). All services will be livestreamed on Zoom, but interactivity will be limited to sharing names in the chat during the Healing Prayer and the Mourner’s Kaddish.

Rosh Hashanah Day 1
Tuesday, September 23, 2025 10 am-12:30 pm ET 
St. Aidan’s 

Celebrating the birth of a new year and spiritual renewal. This year’s theme will explore What is a Good Heart? (See Washtenaw Jewish News article or Reb Elliot’s letter to the community for details), followed by potluck lunch at 1:00 pm (location TBA), with Tashlich to follow.

Rosh Hashanah Day 2         
Wednesday, September 24, 2025 10 am-12:00 pm  ET
St. Aidan’s

A special meditative service featuring sacred chants, heart-centered community offerings and the opportunity to both go inward and to flow outward.

Kol Nidre                               
Wednesday, October 1, 2025 6:30 pm ET
St. Aidan’s

Upon arrival, there will be quiet time to complete a personal ritual of entry prior to the 7:00 pm chanting of Kol Nidre. This ritual, focusing on introspection and practices of forgiveness, will be incorporated into the next 24 hours of sacred time and communal prayer. 

Yom Kippur                          
Thursday, October 2, 2025 10 am – 8 pm  ET     
St. Aidan’s

A day of deep prayer, while moving through worlds of Spiritual Awareness. With several touchpoints as follows:

• Shacharit through Musaf (main service)              10 am – 2 pm

Followed by a Meditative Entering into the Holy of Holies

• Spiritual practices for the Day                               2-5 pm
• Mincha (Jonah and prayers for the earth)          5-7:50 pm 
• Yizkor (connecting to those who have departed this earth-plane)
• Ne’ilah (culminating service and Shofar blast: Tekiyah Gedolah!)

Visa

This Visa grants entry to all additional Pardes Hannah High Holy Day offerings for non-Pardes Hannah members. These are a series of beautiful excursions into the spiritual and intellectual aspects of Judaism at this time of year. The cost is $100 for the first member of a household, and $36 for every adult individual in a household beyond that (anyone under age 18 is free).

Pardes Hannah Singers    
Sundays, September 7, 14, and 21, 2025 3-5 pm ET               
Location TBA

Three sessions to familiarize yourself with High Holy Day melodies both traditional and new, all with guitar accompaniment. No ability to read or understand Hebrew is required; all lyrics provided in English transliteration, and taught as needed. (in-person only)

Selichot          
Saturday, September 13, 2025 8:00 pm  ET           
Location TBA

This gathering supports spiritual preparation for the Days of Awe. Includes chant, spiritual practice, teaching and meditative prayer. (Also offered on Zoom, and is interactive)

Study Session   
Saturday, September 20, 2025 3-5 pm ET             
Location TBA

Interactive, kabbalistically-informed deep study. Practices for the Days of Awe. Monthly Study Sessions are available to PH members. (Also offered on Zoom, and is interactive)

Shabbat Shuvah   
Saturday, September 27, 2025 10 am – 12:30 pm ET
Location TBA

Our customary vibrant Shabbat morning service…plus. Because of its place in the middle of the High Holy Days, special themes are explored and woven into the prayers: Shabbat Shuvah as a time of deep Return and Re-creation. Includes participatory discussion and sharing from the heart-mind-body. (Also offered on Zoom, and is interactive).

Service	Date	Time	Location
Selichot (and Havdallah)	9/13/25	8:00 PM ET	*
Rosh Hashanah Day 1	9/23/25	10:00 AM – 12:30 PM ET	St. Aidan’s**
Rosh Hashanah Day 2	9/24/25	10:00 AM – 12 noon ET	St. Aidan’s
Shabbat Shuvah	9/27/25	10:00 AM – 12:30 PM ET	Beth Israel Annex
Kol Nidre	10/1/25	6:30 PM	St. Aidan’s
Yom Kippur	10/2/25		St. Aidan’s
Shacharit & Musaf		10:00 AM – 2:00 PM ET	St. Aidan’s
Afternoon Activities/ Spiritual Practices		2:00 – 5:00 PM ET	St. Aidan’s
Mincha, Yizkor, & Ne’ilah		5:00 -8:00 PM ET	St. Aidan’s

* Contact Rabbi Aura Ahuvia, PsychedelicRabbi@Gmail.com, for location details.

**All services will be livestreamed on Zoom, but except for Selichot and Shabbat Shuvah, interactivity will be limited to sharing names in the chat during the Healing Prayer and the Mourner’s Kaddish.

Please note – Pardes Hannah requires a contribution from non-members who wish to attend. See High Holy Days Passport and Visa for more information.

---

Selichot & Havdallah
Saturday, September 13, 2025 8:00 pm  ET           
Location TBA

This gathering supports spiritual preparation for the Days of Awe. Includes chant, spiritual practice, teaching and meditative prayer. (Also offered on Zoom, and is interactive)

Rosh Hashanah Day 1
Tuesday, September 23, 2025 10 am-12:30 pm ET 
St. Aidan’s 

Celebrating the birth of a new year and spiritual renewal. This year’s theme will explore What is a Good Heart? (See Washtenaw Jewish News article or Reb Elliot’s letter to the community for details), followed by potluck lunch at 1:00 pm (location TBA), with Tashlich to follow.

Rosh Hashanah Day 2         
Wednesday, September 24, 2025 10 am-12:00 pm  ET
St. Aidan’s

A special meditative service featuring sacred chants, heart-centered community offerings and the opportunity to both go inward and to flow outward.

Shabbat Shuvah   
Saturday, September 27, 2025 10 am – 12:30 pm ET
Location TBA

Our customary vibrant Shabbat morning service…plus. Because of its place in the middle of the High Holy Days, special themes are explored and woven into the prayers: Shabbat Shuvah as a time of deep Return and Re-creation. Includes participatory discussion and sharing from the heart-mind-body. (Also offered on Zoom, and is interactive)

Kol Nidre                               
Wednesday, October 1, 2025 6:30 pm ET
St. Aidan’s

Upon arrival, there will be quiet time to complete a personal ritual of entry prior to the 7:00 pm chanting of Kol Nidre. This ritual, focusing on introspection and practices of forgiveness, will be incorporated into the next 24 hours of sacred time and communal prayer. 

Personal ritual: 6:30

Candle Lighting: 6:57

End time: 9:30

Yom Kippur                          
Thursday, October 2, 2025 10 am – 8 pm  ET     
St. Aidan’s

A day of deep prayer, while moving through worlds of Spiritual Awareness. With several touchpoints as follows:

• Shacharit through Musaf (main service)              10 am – 2 pm

Followed by a Meditative Entering into the Holy of Holies

• Ne’ilah (culminating service and Shofar blast: Tekiyah Gedolah!)Followed by a Meditative Entering into the Holy of Holies
• Spiritual practices for the Day                               2-5 pm
• Mincha (Jonah and prayers for the earth)          5-7:50 pm 
• Yizkor (connecting to those who have departed this earth-plane

Additional Activities

Study Session   
Saturday, September 20, 2025 3-5 pm ET             
Location TBA

Interactive, kabbalistically-informed deep study. Practices for the Days of Awe. Monthly Study Sessions are available to PH members. (Also offered on Zoom, and is interactive)

Pardes Hannah Singers    
Sundays, September 7, 14, and 21, 2025 3-5 pm ET               
Location TBA

Three sessions to familiarize yourself with High Holy Day melodies both traditional and new, all with guitar accompaniment. No ability to read or understand Hebrew is required; all lyrics provided in English transliteration, and taught as needed. (in-person only)

Pardes Hannah’s High Holy Days this year will be co-led by rabbis Elliot Ginsburg and Aura Ahuvia, as it explores the theme Lev Tov, “Good Heart,” taken from a story in Pirkei Avot.

According to the story, Rabban Yahanan ben Zakkai told his five disciples to try figuring out the “right path” in life. “Go out and observe,” he directed. They did, and upon their return, they each had a different answer: a good eye; being a good friend; being a good neighbor, having foresight, and lastly, having a good heart. Ben Zakkai favored having a good heart “because it includes the others.”

We might ask ourselves today: What is good-heartedness? Where does it come from? Is it worth cultivating, and if so, how?

Pardes Hannah explores its thematic questions through prayer, reflection, teaching and discussion. This year, PH welcomes Ahuvia, a musically gifted singer and guitar player ordained in Jewish Renewal over a decade ago, to co- lead.

Ahuvia was enthusiastic about remaining local for this year’s holidays. “I have learned so much from my travels around the country,” said Ahuvia of her stints leading High Holy Day services in San Francisco, Portland, and Dayton over the last five years, “but Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti is where my heart is. I can’t wait to reconnect with spiritual community here in my hometown.”

High Holy Day services mix tradition with innovation. For example, two Yom Kippur services, the Avodah service (close to the end of the morning service) and Yizkor (late afternoon), offer unique options for deep practice. Firstly is PH’s Avodah service, typically a word-filled liturgy recapitulating the dramatic biblical scene in which the high priest entered the central chamber of the temple.

Drawing upon the Zohar, the masterwork of Jewish Mysticism, Rabbi Ginsburg brings reflection, meditation and chant to the question of what it means to enter the Holy of Holies. The goal is to translate the energy of this powerful moment to today’s communities. Later that afternoon Yizkor, a service honoring the memories of those who no longer walk the earth, will offer opportunities for personal sharing in a sacred setting.

Under the devoted spiritual guidance of Rabbi and University of Michigan Jewish mysticism Professor Elliot Ginsburg, Pardes Hannah has become an established Ann Arbor-area institution, anchoring Jewish Renewal within the larger Jewish community of Washtenaw County. Rabbis Rob Dobrusin and Nadav Caine have generously allowed PH to hold its services in the G&S 2010 Building at Beth Israel. PH offers monthly Shabbat morning services, which are co-led by Rabbis Ginsburg and Ahuvia, as well as monthly Torah study, Rosh Chodesh gatherings, and other special events. All practices are taught; new members are not assumed to know either Hebrew or meditation.

The name Pardes Hannah is multi-layered. While it translates as “Ann’s Orchard,” a nod to Ann Arbor, the Hebrew words Pardes and Hannah also have independent meanings.

Pardes is an acronym for multiple levels of Torah interpretation: “P” stands for p’shat, contextual meaning; “R” for remez, allegorical or philosophical meaning; “D” for drash, homiletical, midrashic meaning, and “S” for sod, mystical understanding. Taken together, this PRDS suggests Judaism’s commitment to multi-layered truth, tolerating complexity and diversity while remaining connected to Torah. The second word, Hannah, was the name of a biblical figure who knew how to pray from the heart. We as Jews follow her example today.

PH’s High Holy Day services are open to the public; they are free for PH members, whereas non-members may gain access by purchasing a Days of Awe Passport and Visa, which includes in-person and online access to all High Holy Day services, choir rehearsals and the specially-designed Renewal machzor, or prayer book. Those who decide to join PH after attending its services may apply the cost of the passport to membership.

Since Pardes Hannah nurtures spiritual experimentation in Washtenaw County, it would find your support meaningful whether or not you were to personally join.

Dear Members and Friends of Pardes Hannah: 

Warm greetings as we welcome a new spiritual year. We invite you to be part of our community and to join us in our offerings this coming year.

Each year the Pardes Hannah community selects a theme to guide us through the Days of Awe and provide background and spark for our year- long study.  Community members will have opportunity to reflect on this theme and cultivate practices. In addition to the traditional themes of turning and renewal, this year’s theme will focus on resilience and hope. And so important given the complexities that we are working with.

Pardes Hannah’s services and activities are open to members and non-members alike.  Most of our offerings are hybrid – in person and/or online.   Contributions for participation in the service are much appreciated, as are contributions to help support the ongoing work of Pardes Hannah. We ask you to please renew your membership in Pardes Hannah or consider joining for the first time. The cost of membership is $360 per person or $720 per family, payable by check or PayPal. Adjustments can be made based on need. 

Your membership and donations support Pardes Hannah events: Shabbat morning services, Kabbalat Shabbat, monthly study sessions, meditation, Rosh Chodesh celebrations, holiday events, Counting the Omer, and many others. Your generosity goes directly to the costs of our programs, such as Zoom, our website, and most importantly, our rabbis. We have no building and no paid staff – all the work is done by volunteers who give generously of their time to make our events happen. Please support them, our community, and those who cannot contribute but need our community, by giving generously in the spirit of the new year.

As noted, this year Rabbi Elliot will be teaching on the theme of resilience.  This past year, we have completed 30 years of Pardes Hannah.  Who would have thought we would know such longevity, so many gilgulim, different spiritual life-times! Our small and mighty minyan has seeded and supported many on their Jewish spiritual paths. Please join us in helping to nurture continuing Jewish spiritual life, practice and experimentation both in Southeast Michigan and beyond!

Shanah tovah umetukah, may 5785 be a year of Renewal, of good health, of deep connection and brachah, lifted up by joy and moments of radical amazement.

May we be inscribed for life 
in the coming year. Le-Chayyim!

For more information, explore this website
or contact Renee Robbins at 734-761-5325.

September 12, 2023//26 Ellul 5783

Dear Members and Friends of Pardes Hannah:

Warm greetings as we prepare to welcome a new spiritual year. We invite you to be part of our community and to join us in our Second day High Holiday Rosh Hashanah service led by Rabbi Elliot Ginsburg. This year, we will be celebrating the New Year in person at the home of Jody Platt.  We will be surrounded by spacious grounds – the perfect setting for our contemplative practice. We will provide zoom access for those people who cannot join us in person and/or live beyond the greater Ann Arbor area.

Each year the Pardes Hannah community selects a theme to guide us through the Days of Awe. Community members will have opportunity to reflect on this theme and cultivate practices. In addition to the traditional themes of turning and renewal, this year’s theme is “Shivvitti: Keeping the Divine Before Us at All Times,” encouraging us to reflect on moments of spiritual insight, on the teachings and practices that allow us to glimpse the ultimate in things large and the small, to see the divine in another’s face (be it a beloved, a stranger, or even an adversary), and to recalibrate our lives in accord with what really matters.

This High Holiday theme will provide the background and spark for our year-long study, whose title derives from  the book of Job 19:26, Mi-B’sari Ehezeh Eloha: From my flesh—my embodiment—will I see God, subtitled: The Senses as Pathway to the Divine. A description of this theme, in all its richness, follows this letter. 

Pardes Hannah’s services are open to members and non-members alike. Contributions for participation in the service are much appreciated, as are contributions to help support the ongoing work of Pardes Hannah. We ask you to please renew your membership in Pardes Hannah or consider joining for the first time. The cost of membership is $360 per person or $720 per family, payable by check or PayPal. Adjustments can be made based on need. 

Your membership and donations support Pardes Hannah events: Shabbat morning services, Kabbalat Shabbat, monthly study sessions, Rosh Chodesh celebrations, holiday events, Counting the Omer, and many others. Your generosity goes directly to the costs of our programs, such as Zoom, our website, and most importantly, our rabbi. We have no building and no paid staff – all the work is done by volunteers who give generously of their time to make our events happen. Please support them, our community, and those who cannot contribute but need our community, by giving generously in the spirit of the new year.

As noted, this year Reb Elliot will be teaching on the theme of the senses. And this coming spring will mark 30 years of Pardes Hannah.  Who would have thought we would know such longevity, so many gilgulim, different spiritual life-times! Our small and mighty minyan has seeded and supported many on their Jewish spiritual paths. Please join us in helping to nurture continuing Jewish spiritual life, practice and experimentation both in Southeast Michigan and beyond!

Shanah tovah umetukah, may 5784 be a year of Renewal, of good health, of deep connection and brachah, lifted up by joy and moments of radical amazement.

May we be inscribed for life 
in the coming year. Le-Chayyim!

The Senses as Pathway to the Divine: What happens when we behold the face of a beloved? When we glimpse the divine in a homeless person or in an enemy? What happens as we breathe and feel ourselves being breathed by the divine? Or when we cradle the Torah: what unfolds in that moment of touching and being touched? Over the course of our monthly study sessions, we in Pardes Hannah will explore how the sensorium—as well as our orifices, skin, and neuro-sensory imagination—serve as gateway to and metaphor for spiritual practice, and for the embodied cultivation of joy.

We will draw on an array of select Jewish mystical and midrashic-rabbinic sources, as well as cross- cultural and cross-species example—think: the echolocution of bats, the 360-degree vision of mallard ducks—to spark our religious and sensory imaginations. Each session will engage a particular sense modality: including deep seeing; the spirituality of aroma, olfaction and breath; and kinesthetic practices and ritual gesture, from sacred dance to stillness, from becoming a more enlivened self to melting into the divine. We will also explore those moments where quieting the senses (hashqatah) and dis-identifying from the body may be exactly what’s called for!  In the final session, we will activate the synesthetic imagination, weaving together our senses, potentially leading to a special Shabbat program, in which we experience Shabbat as a day of multi-sensory delight.

This class will combine close text study, alongside freewheeling conversation, niggun, and experimental spiritual practices that both engage and modulate (intensify and quiet) the senses, so that we might, in Job’s words, “encounter the divine from our very flesh,”  מבשרי אחזה אלוה. You are all so invited on this exploratory journey!

Reb Elliot