Dear Gabbai: What do I wear to temple?

We bring you a new "advice" column that will appear irregularly in this space -- Dear Gabbai. Your Gabbai will answer questions about CBI Shabbat and holiday services and other ritual matters. Questions beyond the competence of Your Gabbai will be referred to our Rabbi for input.

To get the ball rolling, Your Gabbai has asked and answered a question. Your Gabbai welcomes your questions, which can be sent to Steve Margolin, who chairs the CBI Ritual Committee, at smargolin@digitalpath.net.

Dear Gabbai,

What is the dress code for services at Congregation Beth Israel? Can you provide some guidance to the fashionably perplexed?

Dear Perplexed,

What is the CBI dress code? In a word,

none. Some people dress up for services, but many dress casually. There are no fashion police at CBI.

Perhaps you were asking about headgear and prayer shawls, a more interesting question.

Traditionally, a Jewish man wears a kippah or yarmulke in the synagogue. Your Gabbai wears one in any place of religious observance unless asked not to. At CBI, you will find many men, women and children, Jewish and non-Jewish, sporting kippot (the plural of kippah) of various sorts and styles. None is required, and no one is told that he or she may not wear one.

A prayer shawl, or tallit, is a bit different, as the tallit has specific Jewish religious significance. The fringes on the four corners of the tallit are called tzitzit in Hebrew and are what make a shawl a tallit. The tzitzit are in observance of a specific Torah commandment, so wearing a tallit is appropriate for Jews specifically. Traditionally, the tallit is worn by Jewish men and boys over bar mitzvah age, except in some Orthodox communities in which a male does not wear a tallit until he marries (unless he is leading prayers). Because we are an egalitarian congregation, women as well as men often wear a tallit at prayer at CBI (although that might cause a problem at a more traditional synagogue). You do not have to put on a tallit unless you want to. A person who does not otherwise wear a tallit might put one on if called for an aliyah or other honor during a Torah reading. A tallit is worn during morning services only, the exception being on Yom Kippur when a tallit may be worn at Kol Nidre service on the evening when the holiday begins and at all of the services on the day of Yom Kippur.

If you do not bring your own kippah or tallit to CBI, you may borrow a kippah from the basket in the lobby or a tallit from the rack in the synagogue near the prayer books. Ask someone you see wearing a tallit if you would like assistance putting one on for the first time or in saying the blessing for putting on the tallit.

None of this should be the cause of any anxiety. Your Gabbai will be happy to see you at CBI no matter your sartorial or kippot/tallit choices.