REFLECTIONS ON OUR NEW LOGO

 הַצִּ֧יבִי לָ֣ךְ צִיֻּנִ֗ים שִׂ֤מִי לָךְ֙ תַּמְרוּרִ֔ים שִׁ֣תִי לִבֵּ֔ךְ לַֽמְסִלָּ֖ה דֶּ֣רֶךְ

Erect markers! Set up signposts!

Keep in mind the highway, the road that you traveled.

Jeremiah 21:31

If I asked you to draw the Temple Sinai logo, could you? For most of us, we might remember a rectangle of blue and green but that’s about it.  To jog your memory, it is a drawing of green mountains, topped by a blue sky with a grey Star of David floating among the clouds.   It is a fine drawing, very Vermonty, and it has served our temple well, but just as we have changed and grown, now is a good time for us to find a new logo to represent us, one that is simpler, more graphic, and conveys to those who see it something about who we are and what we value.  This is all made more pressing because we don’t have up-to-date high resolution digital files of the current logo, and the original artwork is lost.  With a new website and increased interest in our temple community, I asked the Marketing Committee to explore ideas for a new logo, and for the past several months, a small committee has been working with an experienced graphic artist who specializes in logo development, and we are very excited to unveil the logo we have chosen.  

The Process we Used. 

Several months ago, the Marketing Committee conducted a representative survey of the community and leadership that asked people to find words, images and phrases that reflected who Temple Sinai is and what it represents in their lives.  Over the past two months, Administrator Stacie Gabert, President Susan Leff, Vice President of Marketing, Michael Rosenberg, and marketing expert Pat Sears have met several times with a consulting graphic artist, sharing with her the responses we received in the survey.  We also surveyed the logos of the other synagogues and Jewish organizations in our area for context.  With that information, our artist worked up a handful of rough concepts for feedback, and with each meeting we narrowed and fine-tuned the options until one emerged as the unanimous favorite of the committee and the Executive Board.   

 The Logo

The Meaning of our New Logo  

Honoring our History.  To honor our temple history, we put the word “Sinai” in bold in our logo design.  Our temple’s name was decided at a meeting on Shavuot, 1966.  On Shavuot, we celebrate the giving of the Torah at Sinai, and so our founders chose a name that was a bridge between past and present, one that reflected the covenant that is central to Judaism.  Our logo emphasizes Sinai graphically, and the image of the candles in the word shows us that the light of the Torah now glows each Shabbat evening in our homes and our sanctuary.  When we look at our new logo, may it always remind us of the beautiful teaching of Proverbs, “the commandment is a candle-lamp, the Torah a light.”  

Shabbat Candles:  When we think of images of Judaism, no image is more iconic than the Shabbat candles. We give Shabbat candlesticks for b’nei mitzvah and weddings. They are captured in paintings, on countless social media posts, websites, and greeting cards.  In Jewish films like Fiddler on the Roof, Yentl, and Schindler’s List, blessing and lighting the candles is how the directors chose to convey the spiritual beauty and depth of Jewish tradition.  Closer to home, brightly glowing Shabbat candles are quilted into our beautiful parochet (ark cover) at Temple Sinai.   Indeed, as soon as I was confirmed to be the new rabbi here, the one issue I started getting emails and phone calls about was from people asking me to please be sure to return Shabbat candle lighting to the Friday evening service.  “Nothing,” one person said, “makes me feel more connected to our tradition and to my ancestors than when we light the candles together as a community.”  Our ancient tradition shines at us through those two simple candles.

What you might not know is that the lighting of Shabbat Candles was one of the defining (and radical) innovations by which the rabbis defined what we call Judaism.  Exodus 35:3 famously prohibits fire on Shabbat.  Other proto-Jewish movements like the Karaites and the Samaritans interpreted that verse to mean no candles or lamps could burn on Shabbat, but the rabbis argued that Shabbat should be a time of beauty, joy, and light.  They ruled that we must light the candles so that their glow would elevate our spirits and create a beautiful way of entering the sacred time of Shabbat.  

That means that the Shabbat candles not only represent our ancient tradition but also the importance of innovation in keeping Judaism alive and meaningful century after century.  As Reform Jews, those candles remind us of the beauty and light kindled by the creative friction of tradition and innovation.   

It is worth remembering that for the “hidden Jews” of Spain hiding from the Inquisition and antisemitism in Latin America, The Caribbean, Deep South, and elsewhere, the one practice that many secretly kept, passing down through the generations, was the lighting of the Shabbat Candles.  There are countless stories of grandmothers going every Friday evening into the basement, or a closet, or a pantry, and lighting two candles.  Often, they couldn’t explain why they did it but just that it was their family tradition.  In this way, the Shabbat candles in our logo remind us that we are not in hiding, that as Jews in America, we can still let our light shine, and be proud and open about who we are and what we believe. The flames in our logo lean toward the future, inspiring us to take our light forward into the world through Tikkun Olam, especially in darker times. 

Flames or Leaves?  It is also meaningful that the candles’ flames can also be seen as leaves.  In Vermont, the beauty of the landscape burns with its own holiness.  For us, the candle flames like the trees all around us remind us of the miracle of creation and the spark of the divine that imbues it.  It also reminds us of the burning bush that Moses encountered at the foot of Mount Sinai, a bush that can be found glowing in the stained glass of our sanctuary

The Hope:  The Prophet Jeremiah exhorts us to set up signposts and markers in order to honor the road we have traveled.  Today, a logo serves as one of our most visible markers, and so I hope you find the new logo as uplifting as I do.  One of my key prayers each morning, when I put on my tallit, is this line from Psalm 36: 

כִּֽי־עִ֭מְּךָ מְק֣וֹר חַיִּ֑ים בְּ֝אוֹרְךָ֗ נִרְאֶה־אֽוֹר׃

With You is the fountain of life;  by Your light do we see light.

We are a spiritual community that sees sacred light in one another, in community and in this miraculous world around us.  For me, the light we see is a reflection of the Divine Light that suffuses creation and burns within each of us.  If this new logo conveys even a spark of the light that shines through our temple community and our luminous tradition, then I’m certain it will inspire us to grow from strength to strength.  

QUOTES ABOUT LAMPS AND LIGHT

כִּ֤י נֵ֣ר מִ֭צְוָה וְת֣וֹרָה א֑וֹר וְדֶ֥רֶךְ חַ֝יִּ֗ים תּוֹכְח֥וֹת מוּסָֽר׃

For the commandment is a candle, the Torah a light.      Prov 6:23

And God saw the light and it was good.   Genesis 1: 

כִּֽי־עִ֭מְּךָ מְק֣וֹר חַיִּ֑ים בְּ֝אוֹרְךָ֗ נִרְאֶה־אֽוֹר׃

With You is the fountain of life;  by Your light do we see light.  Psalm 36:10 

כִּֽי־אַ֭תָּה תָּאִ֣יר נֵרִ֑י יְהֹוָ֥ה אֱ֝לֹהַ֗י יַגִּ֥יהַּ חׇשְׁכִּֽי׃

It is You who light my lamp;the LORD, my God, lights up my darkness.   Psalm 18:29

 נֵר־לְרַגְלִ֥י דְבָרֶ֑ךָ וְ֝א֗וֹר לִנְתִיבָתִֽי׃

Your word is a lamp to my feet,a light for my path.   Psalm 119:`105 

מִצְוַ֥ת יְהֹוָ֥ה בָּ֝רָ֗ה מְאִירַ֥ת עֵינָֽיִם׃    

 Psalm 19

The precepts of the LORD are just,rejoicing the heart;

the instruction of the LORD is clear,giving light to our eyes.