Members of The Jewish Studio are politically engaged with a love of learning, which could explain why the community is most known for its Friday Night series.
A “synagogue without walls” serving Maryland and Washington, D.C., The Jewish Studio brings in a different guest speaker every month for discussions following a musical service and dinner.
“That’s what we’re known for: that one Friday night a month,” Rabbi Evan Krame said.
Krame was watching Mark Joseph Stern speak on MSNBC one day when inspiration struck: “I went, ‘I’ve got to get this guy to talk to my group.’”
“He was very well spoken, very knowledgeable, young, dynamic,” Krame said of the journalist and commentator. “He’s only 34 and here he is, a political commentator on major cable network news programs.”
A graduate of Georgetown University Law Center and senior writer, Stern will discuss the “perils” and current state of the U.S. Supreme Court with The Jewish Studio on Nov. 21.
On Dec. 12, The Jewish Studio will host Maryland state Sen. Cheryl Kagan, Montgomery County Councilmember Natali Fani-Gonzalez and Maryland Delegate Lily Qi to discuss how women are “leading the way” in Maryland. Both events take place at the Scotland AME Zion Church.
“We invited three women legislators from Montgomery County who are all very dynamic, very active in rescuing and protecting our democracy,” he said. “Women are really leading the way in ways I hope are fully appreciated because often they have more to overcome than men do to achieve positions of political power.”
Kagan, Fani-Gonzalez and Qi all come from different ethnic backgrounds, reflecting Krame’s desire to build coalitions both within and outside the Jewish community.
These two events center around themes of what’s of concern and interest to The Jewish Studio community, according to Krame. “Judaism beckons us to speak out,” he said. “As it says in the Talmud in Tractate Shabbat, we have an obligation to speak out to our communities and to our countries on matters of justice, and that is our Talmudic tradition.”
Krame wants to urge community members to follow that tradition.
“While we obey the law of the land, we also have an obligation to make sure that law is just and that people are free,” he added. “Often, I am compelled to bring in speakers on political topics that I think are important to us as Jews.”
The rabbi does his best to represent speakers across the political spectrum. “I do not try to favor left or right or conservative or progressive,” Krame said. “We’ve had speakers that were [neoconservatives] and speakers that were very progressive.”
He hopes that by inviting diversity of thought, community members will listen to one another.
“As a Jewish community, we need each other, and we can’t be divided by our differences in our approaches to politics or political issues,” Krame said. “We need to learn to hear each other and find our commonality and honor our differences.”
The January speaker is George Washington University professor Eric H. Cline, who specializes in the collapse of civilization. With many Americans concerned about such a collapse, Krame said he thought people could derive lessons from ancient history.
“Even though [Cline] is an archeologist and he’s going to be talking about the year 1177 B.C., I think that those who fail to learn their history are doomed to repeat it,” Krame said. “And his invitation actually fits very nicely into this theme of entraining our Jewish community to be emboldened, engaged pursuers of peace and justice.”
The theme of peace connects to The Jewish Studio’s interfaith outreach efforts, specifically with the historically Black Scotland AME Zion Church.
“We want to know our neighbors,” Krame said. “We can’t love our neighbors unless we know them.”
He spoke of The Jewish Studio’s “wonderful, devoted following” of attendees to its Friday Night series, many of whom are single, divorced or widowed and may feel a lack of belonging in traditional Jewish spaces geared largely towards young families and young adults: “They have found a space with us.”
Krame noted that some of the Friday Night regulars also belong to area synagogues.
“To my surprise, a lot of attendees who already belong to synagogues, but haven’t found enough of this kind of activity to nourish both their intellect and their souls, love that the services are musical and they sing along,” he said. “The dinners are delicious because we use a fantastic caterer.”
Krame said he tries to bring the most engaging speakers to Friday Night events, “often people who are flying under the radar but are really knowledgeable and inspiring and wonderfully entertaining.”
