Remarks on the occasion of the dedication of the Stained Glass Window August 15, 2025

Thank you and Hello. I’m David Plachte-Zuieback and this is Michelle Placte-Zuieback. As our Rabbir pointed out, we are the stained glass artists. who have created this work.

Rabbi asked us to speak this evening briefly about the process of making these windows and it is altogether fitting and proper that we do this.

The first step is to create the design. Fortunately, rabbi gave us a lot of clear direction specifying elements he wanted to include in the design, Rabbi even made a very vbery simple sketch and that essentially, became the basis for the design.

The design is a vision of the tent of Abraham sitting on the edge of the desert wilderness. There is a pillar of fire, by night and a pillar of cloud by day.

Speaking to Abraham, God says, Lech Lecha. “Go forth , and to complete the thought, go forth from your native land and from your fathers house to the land that I will show you.”

This is our native land.

Before us, no object no tree, not even a rock occupy this vast and empty plane. There is nothing inviting about it. In the distance, at the end of the desert, yet, still, the beginning of the mountain wilderness,. what is that flame, by night and cloud, by day? We advance toward it over the distance-collapsing plane, but, as we follow, it seems that, no matter how far we go, we never get any closer to it.

its a mystery

it's a midrash, its a story we all know.

And in this version of the story, the wilderness is a main character.

It's terrifying in its beauty its vastness and in its indifference. The sun, the moon and the three stars, our sense of time. All symbolize the eternal but indifferent nature of the earth and the universe. The Sun is large. The heat is on. The moon is in its final phase, Time is running short…for us.

Go forth is a call to action, a call one could say, to confront the challenge of our collapsing environment. It brings up some questions

Is this wilderness we see before us a vision of our future?

Is this vast indifferent planet ours to scour?

Aren't we supposed to be the stewards of the earth?

Can we give up the comfort of our many colored tents in order to make the whole earth the whole people our native land the land that no one needs to show us because wπe have already seen it and its only up to us to embrace it?

That’s what I wonder.

Thats the design.

So, Once Michelle and I had the design created and approved, the next step was for Michelle to enlarge the design to make the full size patterns for the nine panels. It's a tricky process and despite what I think, Michelle totally knows what she is doing.

Next, Michelle chooses all the glass colors and sheets of glass to be used. Its a very exacting process and I do my best to steer clear of it.

Probably, the biggest part of the whole job is the cutting of the glass. Michelle picks the exact color and the exact sheet and cuts each piece of glass in each window and lays it out on a second copy of each pattern.

Any preparation for sandblasting such as Lech Lecha, or preparation for painting like the two words on abraham’s tent, falls under Michele’s purview, also.

You might be asking yourself, at this point, what exactly falls under David’s purview? Well,.This is where I come in. First, I do the actual sandblasting and the painting and kiln work. My main job is assembly.

I pick up the glass pieces, one at a time, from the pattern and assemble them with pieces of lead channel to hold it all together. Once it was a whole panel, it needed to be soldered and glazed, on both sides. Then, it only needed to be cleaned, crated, delivered and, finally, installed, a process which we completed with the help of Lon and his crew, Danny and Cole a couple weeks ago.

So thank you so much for your attention Michelle and I are very proud of this work. We are so glad to see these windows installed where they belong, here at Beth Abraham instead of leaning against the wall in boxes in our studio. And we hope that they may be an inspiration to the now and future generations of the Beth Abraham community to go forth, with purpose and determination, to love beauty, to love judaism and to love our mother, the earth.