Havurat Shalom

Havurat Shalom is a small egalitarian chavurah in Somerville, Massachusetts, best known as the first such lay-led Jewish community in the United States. Founded in 1968, Havurat Shalom emerged out of a youthful, 1960's enthusiasm for what has since become known as Jewish renewal. Not surprisingly, then, it is not affiliated with the major Jewish denominations. The community also served, during the Vietnam war draft, as a seminary for the study of Judaism. As pioneers in contemporary American Judaism, the founders and many members of Havurat Shalom turned into leaders in Jewish scholarship and practice, including Arthur Green, Everett Gendler, Michael Fishbane, James Kugel, Michael Strassfeld, Arthur Waskow and Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. Located in a large yellow house, the havurah was known for its experimentations with liturgy and ritual, the seating of participants on pillows rather than pews, an aron made of a wicker basket ("The Jewish Catalog" p.7), and its political tendencies. Indeed, Havurat Shalom has gone through several political stages. In the 1980's, the community served as a sanctuary for a refugee from El Salvador. The community shifted toward a strong Jewish feminism, introducing pervasive changes in liturgy and gradually producing its own siddur. The havurah also worked on access for the disabled and several lesbian couples held commitment ceremonies or weddings. In 2006, it affiliated with the National Registry of Conscientious Objection. Today, scholars recognize "Havurat Shalom" as a pioneering step toward the national havurah movement, Jewish feminism, and Jewish renewal.

Sources

"Havurat Shalom Siddur"

Official website of [http://www.thehav.org/ Havurat Shalom]

Prell, Riv-Ellen. "Prayer & Community: The Havurah in American Judaism". Wayne State University Press, 1989. The publisher states: "Riv-Ellen Prell spent eighteen months of participant observation field research studying a countercultural havurah to determine why these groups emerged in the United States during the 1970s." [http://wsupress.wayne.edu/judaica/folklore/prellpc.htm] See also, the [http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-4189%28199107%2971%3A3%3C458%3APACTHI%3E2.0.CO%3B2-7 book review] in "The Journal of Religion"

Sarna, Jonathan. "'With-It' Judaism: The havurah movement and The Jewish Catalog blended Judaism with the 1960s counterculture" in "American Judaism: A History" (Yale University Press, 2004). [http://www.myjewishlearning.com/history_community/Modern/ModernReligionCulture/Counterculture.htm Internet reprint]

Profile of Havurat Shalom. [http://www.pluralism.org/research/profiles/display.php?profile=74837 The Pluralism Project] at Harvard University.

Strassfeld, Michael and Sharon and Richard Siegal. "The Jewish Catalog: A Do-It-Yourself Kit" 1973