Shalom my friends, Eliana Light here. Welcome back once again to the Light Lab Podcast. So glad that you are able to join us as we play with prayer and hold the gems of our liturgy to the light. I'm recording this at 10pm, which, for those of you who know me, and I'll tell you if you don't yet not really a night person, this is later than I usually stay awake, certainly the latest I have ever gotten my microphone out and my headphones on. But that's because I'm about to embark on some really exciting travel, at least for me, because I love conferences. Anytime we get to gather together, to learn to sing, to be to meet each other and be in community is exciting for me. So I'm doing this now, late at night, good to hear me headed tomorrow to a gathering that the Covenant Foundation is putting on, really grateful that they are supporting the first ever T'fillah Teachers Fellowship that the Light Lab is doing, bringing in 15 amazing fellows from all over the country to immerse in and explore our t'fillosophy, and what that means for themselves and what that means for the students that they teach. Then, after some lovely being with friends, I'm going to Hava Nashira, the incredible song leader and prayer leader gathering that really kind of kick started my song leader journey before I went to have a 10 years ago, I didn't know what a song leader was, or that it was a job you could have. And now it's my job and I love it so much. I'm so so excited. I'll be with Cantor Ellen Dreskin in person. We're going to miss Josh very much we're going to photoshop him into to the picture we've decided. But speaking of Cantor Ellen Dreskin. She was the one who first brought today's guest to my attention. Already last year she said, you know Rabbi Toba Spitzer has this amazing language around metaphor and God language and these different metaphors that might replace the dead metaphors that are prevalent in our liturgy. If you're like, what's a dead metaphor? What does this mean? Well she goes into it, in our conversation, our interview today. Rabbi Toba Spitzer has served congregation Dorshei Torah (correction- Dorshei Tzedeck) in West Newton since 1997. She is a past president of the Massachusetts Board of Rabbis, the co chair of the Massachusetts chapter of T'ruah, the rabbinic call for human rights. She is a popular teacher and writer on a wide variety of topics, including new approaches to Jewish theology, the sacred use of money in our everyday lives, and changing the conversation around Israel/Palestine. For more information about Rabbi Spitzer and her amazing book God is Here, you can visit Rabbitobaspitzer.net. Of course, we're going to link to it in the show notes. I have recommended this book to almost anyone and friends, you might know that I have a bit of a thing for God language and the way that she talks about it, weaving in such incredible philosophy but also her own life lived experience. Every chapter ends with practices, we're gonna get to experience one together on the pod but if you don't already have a copy of Goddess here, go check it out. I hope you enjoy the conversation that Cantor Ellen Dreskin and I had with Rabbi Toba Spitzer.