OGDEN — The public is invited to a special event to be held March 17 at Ogden’s Jewish Congregation Brith Sholem, 2750 Grant Ave. in Ogden.

The event, called a Shabbaton, will feature two study sessions on the book of Proverbs. The sessions will be separated by a lunch.

While such events are common in other parts of the country, organizers say it’s the first time Congregation Brith Sholem has held such an event.

Congregation President Judi Amsel said she’s hoping to draw to the event a diverse population that will bring many different translations of Scripture, which will add various insights into the meaning of the ancient book to be studied.

“When you havea Shabbaton, you try to immerse yourself in a day of contemplation and community and sort of getting closer to God,” Amsel said.

“It’s like when you take poetry in high school, you learn ways to look at a poem,” she said. “It is the same way. We’ll study what that context tells you about what it says, and then you get into the text itself.”

She said the study will look at the text from various aspects, such as when it is written and how it applies today.

The event will officially begin with a Shabbat service at 10 a.m.

The Shabbaton will follow, starting at approximately 11:30 a.m. and running until about 3 p.m.

“We’d like to invite interested nonmembers of our congregation to be part of it,” Amsel said.

The charge for nonmembers to attend will be $24.

Participants may RSVP by Thursday or send questions to president@brithsholem.org.

“We have our core group, but it will be nice to have others to bounce things off,” Amsel said, noting that the book of Proverbs will lend itself to a broader group and multiple interpretations that the synagogue likely will get as people of other faiths join the study.

“I’m hoping that we’ll have a critical mass, so people don’t feel like they are going to be called on. “If we could wind up with a group of 20 or 25 people that will be really lovely,” she said.

Leading the study will be Rabbi Gerald I.Weider, who is the director of the Rabbinic Cabinet of The Jewish Federations of North America.

Weider lives in New York but also lives part time in Park City and offered to help the synagogue with the event.

Among Weider’s activities as director of the Rabbinic Cabinet have been developing a new strategic plan for the cabinet that is now being implemented.

He supervises a weekly d’var torah which is sent to more than 1,000 rabbis and federation executives. He organizes missions to Israel for rabbis and an annual meeting of the Rabbinic Cabinet.

For 28 years prior, Weider served as the Senior Rabbi of Congregation Beth Elohim in the Park Slope section of Brooklyn.

He is credited with sparking revitalization of that synagogue through innovative programming and services which have met the needs of urban Jewish families. Under his leadership, Congregation Beth Elohim grew to become the largest and most active Reform synagogue in Brooklyn, states his biography.

Weider’s last sabbatical was spent studying rabbinic literature and the Hebrew language in Jerusalem at the Hebrew Union College.In addition, he studied Islam at the Hartman Institute in Jerusalem.

Weider was ordained in 1973 from the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati and served two congregations before he was assigned to Congregation Beth Elohim in Brooklyn.