Beyond BT Shabbaton Report – Part 1

Over 100 Jews shared a wonderful Shabbos of Torah, music and friendship. We’ll try to describe it as best as possible with some sound clips of the first incarnation of the Beyond BT Jam Band.

Gili Houpt, Chaya’s husband led a beautiful Kabbalah Shabbos at Congregation Ahavas Yisroel to get us off to a wonderful start. His ruach and musical and vocal talents were evidenced during the entire Shabbaton and added so much to entire event.

After davening we went to our respective homes for the Friday night seudah. I’m pretty sure everybody served soup. My wife, Linda, made a tikkun for my mistake of suggesting that we skip soup by making both a chicken soup and a gizpacho. The Linn’s served Mango soup.

After the meals, we headed to the Linn’s for a wonderful Oneg. To be continued.

17 comments on “Beyond BT Shabbaton Report – Part 1

  1. Also, I want to bless you zet you should keep on chopping zeh chesed tomatoes finer and finer until your loving-kindness is mamash flowing like Ketchup! Anticipation….it’s making me wait!

  2. Holy Brahzer,

    You know in Lakewood zey were saying zet Rav Chaim’s Geoinus concealed his Tzidkus and zeh Chofetz Chaim’s Tzidkus concealed his Geoinus. I sink zet with Mark’ela tops sheb’tops hiz outer layers of Tzidkus are concealing even deeper deps of Tzidkus! You can out him till Moshiach iz coming and he’ll still be rocking on to zeh tune of “v’es Tznuim Chochma!” Zis goes for his partners in “Mitzvoseinu horabim” Holy Brahzer, David and Holy Sisters Sandy and Linda.
    From ze deepest deps of my heart I want to sank you for not only ze kind words but ze strong words and ze strong music. Gevalt waz zat a himel geshrei and a Divine sweetness giving harmony to one anozer! Brahzer I swear to you (blee neder of course) zet alzoh your maple syrup is mamash ze sweetest of ze sweet zets nothing compared to ze sweetness of your zeesa kinderlach. I want to bless you zey should find Rebbes wiz ze same soul roots and zey should grow up to be mamash Jews on fire.
    And Brahzer, (if Rav Nachman didn’t say zis zen he mamash should have) when it comes to Lamed Vovniks…it takes one to know one!

  3. what an absolutely inspiring shabbos! My first temptation is to “out” Mark as the lamed-vavnik which he apparently is (if you “out” someone do they lose their standing?) – it was a weekend of pure chesed and we were humbled to have been Mark & Linda’s guests. And yes, the gazpacho was amazing (truth be told I had a second bowl) – It was wonderful finally placing faces to the names (and pseudonyms) and even meeting the ubiquitous Steve Brizel and finding that our paths had crossed before in the 70’s(on Amsterdam Ave no less) and the incredible amount of energy and ruach that everyone brought to the table. The oneg at the Linns was superb (though I didn’t care much for the speaker) and it was a pleasure finally meeting R’D Schwartz who is not only a genuine Talmid Chacham, but more importantly, he gets it – he’s able to “bring it on down”. Over the shabbos, I felt both challenged, enervated and humbled and forced to reach into my innermost regions and bring out what was needed – I got as much if not more chizuk than I gave and we’re still glowing and without forgetting anyone I just want to thank all those who put their time, energy and “m’odum” into making the BT chesedfest a reality. Let’s go m’chayil el chayil – from strength to strength

  4. Fantastic Shabbaton!! Again, a tremendous Yasher Koach to the Frankels and Linns who made it all happen so beautifully. The ruach throughout Shabbos reminded me so much of the incredible Shabbatons we had a Havurat Yisrael with Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach z”tl. And if I’d had another 7 minutes, I could have even talked about the most extraordinary Shavous I ever had at Reb Shlomo’s tish, and how special it was to know Reb Shlomo personally. And another 7 to talk about Rebbetzin Judith Friedlander, who provided the guidance and advice to me that only a frum Jewish mother could, and an hour or so to talk about our wonderful, inspiring Rav, Rabbi Herschel Welcher shlita, whose presence was surely missed. And then there are all the Rebbeim that my husband has had the zachus to learn with/from, especially Rabbi Aharon Feldman, Rabbi Isbee (at Ohr Somayach), Rabbi Susholtz of Keren Ohr, etc. etc., and because of them, Aaron has such a deep love of learning, which he has instilled so successfully into our “next generation”. See why Mark was nervous about my speaking within my time limit!
    And to any of you who’d ever like to spend a Shabbos in the home base of BeyondBT, please just get in touch – we’d love to have you.

    Now it’s time to go back to my alias, ha ha.

  5. Hi all,

    Fantastic Shabbaton! I had to comment to Mark that maybe next time, we’ll need a bigger room for the Shabbos lunch….we literally had “wall-to-wall” people! Yasher Koach to Mark & David for pulling it off!

    Marty

  6. David-I’m waiting for the soup receipe, as patiently as possible.

    And, I do know how difficult it is to make a Shabbaton on a shoestring budget. We once had to pick up take out in KGH for a Shabbat away and got caught in a bit of traffic. We ended up picking up food from (a certain place) and it cost an arm and a leg. So, congrads for pulling it off.

  7. We attended only the lunch session and we were very impressed with the ruach and comeraderie. I am sorry if my speech was too generalized because of time constraints and I will be posting a far more detailed version which I think will fill in some of the blanks.

  8. Awesome shabbaton! Thanks to everyone who worked so hard organizing it, and especially Mark and David for everything, including driving me and Chaya back to Manhattan late last night!

    It was great singing with you all, and if you want info on my kumsitz in Central Park next Sunday, follow the link above to my website.

  9. Chaya,

    Without yours and Gili’s help, it wouldn’t have been as great as it was.

    R. Schwartz,

    We were ecstatic that you and the family were able to join us. If your wife is able to get those red ices stains out of Elimelech’s shirt, she should get a medal!

    Amishav,

    I’ll starting house hunting for you now!!

    Neil: Next time, you’ll be our first speaker and we have an eruv here in KGH, so you can enjoy your ice coffee on the way to shul.

    Everyone: Full Shabbaton recap will be up tomorrow early morning, iy”h.

  10. Virtual goes Real! It was err… something, meeting the real people behind the comments and opinions. Bravo for a blogster harmonic convergance. Rabbi Simanowitz, Jesse, Bruce, Yitzy and Dr. Halberstam all made beutiful music together and the sharing of life stories was inspiring and LOL at the same time.

    Thanks Mark and David and their families for all your planning, efforts and execution. You planned your blog and blogged your plan!

  11. Yay Mark and David! And Linda and Sandy! Great Shabbaton. Really nice to meet people in person. Thanks for everything.

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