On Sunday, November 13 Jews all over the world participated in a Global Day of Jewish Learning coordinated by the Aleph Society; and supported by many organizations including the JDC.  Over 200 communities in 40 countries studied the Shema and its power as a prayer to unite Jewish communities.  The event fosters Jewish learning through text and encouraged participation from Jews with varying backgrounds, from the Torah scholar to the beginner.  For individual Jews, this engaging opportunity creates an awe-inspiring connection to the Global Jewish Community that examined the same text; and our local communities we learn and grow with.  

At the Jewish Community in Riga, Latvia, several events took place in support and participation of the global day of learning.  At the School of Madrichim, the teenagers looked at the text of the Kriat Shema to determine the significance of the prayer as a communal obligation.  Commanded to say it twice a day, the Shema is a foundational prayer of our tradition.  It is our proclamation that we, as Jews, have only one God and reminds us that Hashem took us out of Egypt.  Each paragraph was looked at and interpreted independently and then collectively.  At the end of the discussion the importance of community became explicit with retribution of no rain and the reminders that we must make for ourselves.  Mezuzot, tefilin, and tziztit, which are find origins from in Shema, are physical reminders for the community to love and keep the mitzvot.  Reminders became the theme of the discussion, with points ranging from their necessity   and visibility in our everyday life.  However, the prevailing idea from our conversation is that just as the Shema is a cornerstone of Judaism, so too is the importance of community in our tradition.