Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda Silverman's Blog

Shabbat Toldot: Legacy - Opportunity and Burden, delivered Shabbat morning, 11/26/2011

2011-12-01T08:37:00.000-08:00

It is difficult for me to find much redeeming in the narrative that makes up the bulk of our Parashat Toldot. I can’t help but read the portion as an example of dysfunctional family dynamics. Parashat Toldot is filled with sibling rivalry run amuck and parents contributing to the drama through their own actions of deceit and denial. It seems that the best we can do with it is accept it as a painfully true depiction of humanity; and as such, recognize that even our beloved patriarchs and matriarchs (or at least the authors of these stories) were entirely human and subject to the same emotions and insecurities that we are. The story of Isaac imitating his father by passing his wife off as his sister to Abimelech and the Philistines, for instance, challenges us to consider the natural tendency towards following in our parents’ footsteps, even if when it means unintentionally repeating their mistakes. Legacy can be both an insightful teacher and a burdensome yoke. The story of Rebecca’s manipulation of events at the end of her husband’s life unsettles us and challenges us to consider how we treat our own loved ones, perhaps especially our children who rely on us as role models. Do we respond appropriately to the differences in our children? Do we help them overcome, or do we encourage their rivalries? Do we help them forge their own paths, or do we burden them and use them for our own gain or for the fulfillment of our own goals? Rebecca is a curious figure to be held up as a matriarch. Yet, she is. Despite all of the challenges of the story, it is part of our Biblical canon. We accept it as part of our sacred historical narrative.

One significant lesson that can be drawn from this portion is that, despite dysfunction, all can come out okay. We aren’t doomed by our human failings. Our destiny isn’t necessarily plagued by the mistakes of our parents or ourselves. At the end of our Biblical narrative, the Israelites will still receive the benefits of the covenant made originally with Abraham. Their descendants will still get to stand at Sinai and ultimately enter the promised land of milk and honey. Unfortunately, though -- and perhaps my frustration in the portion lies right here: implicit in this lesson is the deeply troubling message that deception, Divinely mandated deception no less, is necessary for the covenant between God and Israel to be brought to fruition.

This dilemma is not a new one, and our generation is not the first to recognize it. The traditional Rabbinic exegesis offered on Parashat Toldot redeems the deception by expanding on the limited characterizations of Jacob and Esau provided in the Biblical text. Accordingly, as typical in Jewish commentary, the peshat, the simple rendering of the text, must be coupled with the later layers of oral tradition in order for the reader to understand why the deception is acceptable, indeed necessary. In the Rabbinic mind, Jacob doesn’t just yoshev ohalim, sit in his tent, but rather is portrayed as a pious and devoted student of Torah while Esau’s outdoorsman character is painted as a wild fan of idolatry. Jacob is compared to a rose’s sweet fragrance while Esau to its thorns. Rebecca’s behavior is thus forgiven, even celebrated, because she was ultimately forwarding Torah, and God’s agenda, in her actions. Rebecca apparently needed to resort to deception in order to assure God’s plan.

Unfortunately, outside of the most traditional circles, the midrashic apologetic no longer fully satisfies. I doubt that I am alone in not being so easily placated by the traditional rabbinic explanation, an explanation that raises a difficult theological dilemma: what are the ramifications of a theology that grounds the continuation and longevity of the covenant between Israel and God on deception?

I don’t have many useful answers this morning. I, like you, have been busy digesting turkey and caring for my children who were off from school the latter half of the week. However, I mused on these questions as I sat with my family – between my aging parents on the one side and my teen and almost teenager on the other -- and celebrated Thanksgiving. In musing upon them, it dawned on me that perhaps answering the question is far less important than being aware of it. We needn’t reject the text or God simply because the text unnerves us. As liberal Jews, we believe that the Torah and the additional layers of Oral Law, were written by the human hand. As such, the story reflects the entire gamut of human strengths and weaknesses. Our sacred narrative reflects the experiences of its authors; and, we have the ability, perhaps responsibility, to add to the layers of Oral Law by engaging with the dilemmas raised in the text and creating our own generation’s commentary.

We elevate the story to canonical status, and in doing so create very high expectations for the text and the early commentary that is coupled with it. Expecting unrealistic perfection from humanity only prevents us from taking away valuable lessons from the text and adding new ones to it. It also prevents us from seeing ourselves in the characters. Isaac and Rebecca are held up in our tradition as our parents. We will make some of the same mistakes they did. Hopefully their example will also lead us to some better choices as well.

We Did it Right! Shabbat Noach & the Dedication of our Outdoor Chapel In the Woods

2011-11-03T07:47:00.000-07:00

God may very well be smiling today!

I don’t use anthropomorphic language to imagine God very often. I’m too much of a rationalist, and I doubt too much. But indeed, if this week’s Torah portion parashat Noah is meant as lesson – a guide- for how the human race is supposed to build and sustain our world, then we at Temple Emanuel got it right. We got it right with the building of our outdoor sacred space, a sacred space we dedicate this morning in honor of Nathan Lawless and his parents, who brought us together in this wonderful project, and in memory of Joseph K. Rosenblatt, Jr. whose family has ensured that this space will be maintained in a beautiful and accessible fashion well into the future.

Too often we read parashat Noach with children’s eyes; it’s easier that way. The animals gently herded into the ark by Noah becomes a charming story of seemingly patient salvation as opposed to the devastating narrative it was meant to be. Excuse my blunt language, but the essence of the story can be summarized succinctly, and in a manner I believe Joe would have appreciated: we screwed up, God is pissed, and God’s starting over! We know the destructive power of endless and constant rain. I can’t imagine this story was ever intended to be as cute as we’ve made it out to me.

The stories that follow the flood narrative, the first we hear of the generations that follow Noah, indicate that destructive punishment doesn’t lead to learning or positive change. Take the Babel story, a story that has become a charming midrash for the myriad of human languages that exist in our world. It is a story that on the surface reads as a productive and communal building project, כל הארץ שפה אחד the entire nation was speaking the same language; they were on the same page. Unfortunately, the page they were on was the wrong one. Their singular, and thoroughly misguided passion, according to Rabbinic tradition, was building something tall and grand, a skyscraper, that would in the Torah’s words, נעשה [להם] שם, establish for them a name. The failure of this early building project? It was celebrated for its grandeur and its size, not for what it could provide for the community.

God is smiling today. We got it right with the building of our outdoor chapel!

The seeds of this project were planted many years ago by AJ Benjamin. These early plans were put aside for various reasons, but when Nathan expressed interest in furthering this project, those plans were generously shared by the Benjamins so that he could build upon their early vision and work. Nathan, with some gentle assistance of his parents, motivated our entire congregation to build and create this chapel for our congregational community; and in doing so, he earned the well deserved rank of Eagle Scout. Yasher Ko-ach to him! Though the project and effort involved was certainly grand -- it was a tall order: it involved all of us participating: from the challenges of fund raising and physical planning (not so easy on our grounds) to the last layer of mulch being spread across the chapel floor; yet, the goal of the building project was never about size or establishing “a name” for those involved, it was all about working together in order to provide a sacred gathering space for learning and worship.

Nathan’s work did more than to inspire the creation of the chapel. His efforts inspired Doris and her family to continue the work of creating and building upon this space into the future. Working with TESCA and the Lawless family, Doris has ensured that we can continue Nathan’s efforts; and in doing so, has reminded us all of Joe’s legacy. An life-long participant and leader within the Boy Scouts of America, Joe would be proud to be remembered and honored by the continuation of such a grand and special project.

Yup – God is smiling today, despite the rain and snow (maybe God is simply overcome with emotion …how’s that for anthropomorphic imagery), we got it right! In appreciation of their efforts, we invite Nathan and his parents and Doris and her children up for the aliyot to Torah. And, though we formally dedicate the chapel this morning, we look forward to following up in the spring when the weather will allow us to carry out the Torah for study and worship in this wonderful outdoor space!

The Limits of Perfection, Delivered Rosh Hashanah morning, 5772

2011-10-21T07:57:00.000-07:00

What if we suddenly found out that we could do anything? It is certainly a compelling plot for both book and movie: what if there was a pill that could give us the ability to maximize our brain’s productivity so that we could accomplish anything, literally anything towards which we directed our mind and attention. Limitless, a movie released this past year based on the sci-fi thriller, The Dark Fields by Irish novelist, Alan Glynn, raises and strives to answer this very question. Now, in order to make it a compelling thriller, the story line of both book and movie portrays this magical drug as being inherently and extremely dangerous, emotionally and physically dangerous; so much so that the characters who take it ultimately suffer greatly and die. The danger is perfect for the movie. It adds tragic conflict and offers a powerful lesson about unmonitored drug use: the attainment of cognitive perfection at an enormous price -- one’s own very well-being and the security and well being of anyone connected with them. The story raises the challenging, yet important, question of what we are willing to sacrifice in order to feel a sense of productivity and perfection. Remove the element of danger, and, though we lose some of the thrill and drama and that all- important lesson regarding the dangers of drugs, a potent question still remains: what if we could always be super-productive? What if we could consistently and constantly work at our absolute fullest potential 100% of the time? What would you choose to accomplish with such increased intellect and energy? (Go ahead…think about it for a minute…we have time; this isn’t a long sermon.)

We who live in our modern achievement-driven world, I fear, too often equate one’s individual productivity with success and perfection. We hail those who seem to get everything done efficiently. Has anyone else been called a “super-mom” or “super-dad?” These common monikers, still used more often for moms, evoke super-hero status for the parents who juggle professional careers with all of the primary tasks of parenting. I get called that, not because I’m necessarily exceptional at anything, but because I am able to balance (more often juggle) many tasks and appear incredibly productive. It is assumed that I’m “super” at it all. Far from it. America is a very achievement-oriented culture. We don’t just equate success with achievement, we demand it. We want, we expect, to succeed, to be the best at everything; and, we are often willing to do or pay, almost anything to get a taste of that sense of success for ourselves and our children. Rarely do we consider the cost of these attempts, and rarely do we consider if the constant striving for success and achievement is anywhere near perfection at all.

Our modern English word perfection comes from the Latin terms, perfectio and perfectus, which refer to concepts associated with “finishing” and “bringing to a conclusion” respectively. These Latin roots to our English word did not have the superlative connotations we commonly associate with perfection today; rather, “perfectus” was all about bringing something to fruition. According to an article about perfection in the journal Dialectics and Humanism, the concept of "perfection" as we understand it today reaches back, beyond its Latin origins, to Aristotle and the Greek term “teleos.” Teleos, like the Latin “perfectus,” indicates a sense of finality and purposeful conclusion. Though human flourishing was indicated by entirely different Greek word, Aristotle, in his work Delta of the Metaphysics, added the abstract and superlative connotations to this Greek concept of teleos, connotations that have become associated with our modern sense of “perfection” but connotations that remained a secondary definition of the Greek “teleos” in Aristotle’s own time.

While I have never formally studied Latin or Greek, it seems to me that the implications of these early concepts of perfection have more to do with the natural journey towards completion of any action than any singular moment of perceived success or accomplishment along the way. Nor is it about being The Best once completion is reached. There is no inherent competition in the origins of perfection. Rather, perfection was about seeing something through to its logical conclusion or helping an action become complete. Sadly, I don’t think we have a decent English equivalent for conveying this original idea of perfection.

The Hebrew concept, however, of Shleimut, which shares the same root as the commonly known word shalom, seems a very useful synonym to these original concepts of perfection. Shleimut: wholeness or completeness. The word engenders a sense of satisfaction, not necessarily one of betterment or superiority, a sense of satisfaction that has become lost in our modern pursuits of perfection. Take for example, the Hebrew phrase refuah sh’leimah, which is used to wish someone well when they are sick. Refuah sh’leimah can literally be translated in English as “a complete healing,” but “a complete healing” isn’t really a satisfactory translation. To say, “a complete healing” in English simply doesn’t convey the phrase’s intent. Unlike our English ‘complete,’ the Hebrew sh’leimah doesn’t mean that the illness will necessarily be fixed or that there will be physical healing, a full recovery. Shleimah, instead, implies a sense of wholeness and coming to terms with the entire journey of healing, even if that healing entails acceptance, emotional healing, in the face of not being able to be physically healed. Perfection isn’t about being the best, it is about being whole even when what we may view as the “best” outcome is impossible.

Aristotle provided three definitions to the concept of “teleos:” that which is complete thus containing all of its requisite parts; that which has attained its purpose; and finally, that which is so good that nothing of the kind could be better. There it is, the definition that has, for better or for worse, struck our fancy and endured as our modern definition of “perfection”: that which is so good that nothing of the kind could be better.

Ironic, isn’t it? That our modern conceptions of “perfection,” a word whose linguistic roots convey a sense of finitude, now implies an endless, limitless, seeking of that which is ultimately un-definable. How can we ever know if something is so good that nothing else could be better? They keeping coming out with the perfect computer and the best phone with the most convenient apps…how could we ever know when nothing else could be better? If the Iphone 4 was ‘perfect’ why do we need the Iphone 4S? We’ve lost five pounds, how do we know that 10 won’t be better? The movie title, Limitless, is apt! The striving becomes constant, and perfection becomes an elusive and unrecognizable endeavor all to its own. There is no completion. We’ve lost the capacity to simply feel “perfectus,” complete.

So back to the original question that initiated this whole, possibly mundane, even boring for many, foray into language: what would we choose to accomplish if indeed our capacity to accomplish was limitless? How many of us thought first of the myriad of items on our “to do” list? Or, in our desire to accomplish and achieve anything or everything, did we think in today’s parlance, of our dream filled “bucket list,” of all of those things we want to do and accomplish in our life times? New York Times contributor, Carina Chocano, noted in her assessment of the movie Limitless that, “in all its pulpy glory, [the movie] represents the logical terminus of a certain pattern of modern thought, endlessly fueled by our culture [namely] if you can theoretically become perfect, then it follows you should at least try.” The assumption: that perfection comes from limitless strivings.

Indeed, our goals for perfection today tend to be consumed with the ongoing process of self-actualization. We start our new year with resolutions; and, as Jews we take advantage of January 1st to re-set and re-formulate those resolutions. Goals are extremely useful. And, Rosh Hashanah and the entire season ahead of us, all the way through Simchat Torah, is about repentance and renewal, a process which must start with the self, and -- committing, to be and do better. It is not enough to beat our chests and say Al chet shechatanu l'fanecha! At the same time, The High Holiday season, as it is known in English, is not about actualization solely for the self. It is not about putting ourselves on some higher plane above others. On the contrary, these days of Awe are about strengthening our connection with God and community and about striving for a sense of shleimut, of wholeness, in those relationships.

אם אין אני לי מי לי וכשאני לאצמי מה אני?, Hillel reminds us: If I am not for myself, who am I? The importance of self is evident in Jewish tradition. As Rabbi Reuven Balka, a contemporary commentator on Pirkei Avot, from which Hillel’s lesson is drawn, astutely argues, “No individual can step out into the world with a poor self-image and expect to make important contributions to human betterment. The neglect of self makes the neglectful person a poor choice for helping others.” But, Hillel doesn’t stop there, if I am only for myself, what am I? It is clear that we risk losing our very humanity - מה--What am I? - if all our goals are focused inward on our own potential.

What if we suddenly found out that we could do anything? As Jews, such a question must be followed by: what would we contribute to our world? How would we nurture our relationships and function in such a way as to help make this world a better place for all? Of course, such a question is fodder for the imagination; the reality is we are limited. We are limited by the extraordinary condition of our humanity. Moreover, as my cursory digging into the origins of the word reveals, the very essence of perfection has limits. Too often we seem consumed by the limits of our humanity while forgetting about the limits of perfection. Our brains, generally speaking, function just fine. It is our expectations that could use some tweaking. There is much we have to offer, as individuals and as a community, to our world even without the fantasy of being limitless.

The protagonist in Flynn’s fantasy of limitless potential states at one point, long after discovering his magic elixer, “I finally had my shot!” His failure is that he never quite answers that question, ‘shot to do what?’ Instead, the character is consumed with self-preservation, self preservation that backfires. The pursuit of perfection becomes dangerous when we remain consumed by the betterment of the self while forgetting about taking care of the world around us and the people with whom we share this world. Truth is, we don’t need to be limitless for that. We have our shot to perfect the world and make it a place of Sh’leimut, so let’s get to it!

Atem Nitzavim: Why Bother! Delivered Erev Yom Kippur 5772

2011-10-21T07:47:00.000-07:00

Atem Nitzavim ha-yom kul’chem! “Today, you stand here – all of you”, our Yom Kippur morning Torah portion reminds us, to accept the covenant given by God. It is an ancient scene, yet one which our Rabbinic sages understood to be eternal. The Covenant made there that day between God and the people on the border of Canaan was made not only with those who stood there in that moment, our sages teach, but with all of their descendents, and the descendents of their descendents, and the descendants of their descendents – indeed, to every generation yet to follow. This agreement, this brit, was, accordingly, made for us as well.

According to traditional exegesis, the commentary, on this text, we are to abide by Torah’s commandments because of this very deal made generations ago; and the kicker, it ain’t optional. In the simplest sense, our observance is payback. As the Spanish Medieval commentator Abravanel describes, we are obligated to re-pay a debt that was owed by our ancestors for the act of redemption, namely the Exodus from Egypt, that God enacted on their behalf. It is, in his view, no different than making good on an outstanding financial obligation, except in this case, the principle is never entirely fulfilled. God brought the Israelites out of Egypt and into Canaan, and now we, in each subsequent generation, must pay God back by abiding by God’s law, Torah. So much for the personal autonomy that I discussed a few years ago.

We are constantly reminded of God’s enacting redemption, and by extension this debt. The first words at Sinai aren’t “I am God who created heaven and earth.” No. God introduces Godself and the laws that follow by reminding us, “I am [the One] who brought you out of Egypt!” Our liturgy, too, repeatedly reminds us of this outstanding obligation. Morning and night, we sing, Mi Chamocha, an excerpt from the very song apparently sung by the Israelites upon their first taste of freedom. We refer to this act of redemption when we bless the wine on the eve of the Sabbath and festivals. Redemption is considered a cornerstone of Jewish history and theology. Without it, our story would have ended in Egypt.

Talk about one hefty and enduring obligation. No wonder so many of us are compelled to opt out. The guilt that arises with not fulfilling the expectations of this inherited covenant can often feel like it is simply too big a burden to bear. Isn’t religion supposed to be a construct that enriches and helps us navigate our lives, as opposed to a burden to shoulder?

I’d argue that the traditional understanding of אתם נצבים היום כלכם as an imposed, eternally binding and non-negotiable covenant may no longer be useful in our modern American culture. I stand by my words of a few years back: personally autonomy is a must. And, I’ll say it again, we all must be Jews-by-choice in order to make the most of our engagement with Jewish life and the world. At the same time, reconnecting to that sense of obligation may not be entirely such a bad idea.

Horace Kallen, in a 1915 study of American Nationalism, wrote, “Men may change their clothes, their politics, their wives, their religions, their philosophies, to a greater or lesser extent; they cannot change their grandfathers….” Now, Kallen was discussing the challenges of assimilation at a time when large waves of immigrants were coming to join the melting pot of American life as it was understood at the turn of the twentieth century; but, his observation can be instructive for those of us striving to identify fully as Jews in the modern world. What was understood as a challenge at a time when assimilation was a priority can, and perhaps should, be understood as a goal at a time when assimilation has been so fully achieved that too many of us have forgotten, or consciously set aside, the values of our grandparents. When we may have achieved exactly what the Jews of Kaifeng, China, about whom I spoke on the Eve of Rosh Hashanah, achieved. We are so well acculturated as Americans that our Jewish identity is barely recognizable.

In past generations, part of what made it so difficult to ‘forget our grandparents’ was, frankly, anti-Semitism. Yes, for all of its horrors, the upshot of anti-Semitism was that it worked to prevent Jews from shaking off the inherited obligations of Torah, of being a Jew. Our distinctiveness was imposed on us by others. The covenant, the responsibility associated with being a Jew, however, is no longer imposed upon us by State or society. Thank God for that. However, one of the ramifications of our full acceptance into society is that it is left up to us to decide. We have to make a conscious decision as to whether we are going to bother opting into the covenant or not.

The successes of assimilation and acceptance into American culture have made it fairly easy for any of us to slip on and off the cloak of our Jewish identity. One Shabbat on, one Shabbat off. Synagogue affiliation for a few years, unaffiliated for too many others. Jewish education a priority until age 13, everything else a priority after. Commitment to Jewish causes, well only if nothing else is more compelling. Brisket and latkes on Chanukah, ham on Christmas. Be clear, Jewish identity isn’t a sweater. It may seem easy to slip in and out of our Jewishness, but that doesn’t mean we should.

So why bother at all? I left the question unanswered a week ago: Is the model offered by the ancient Jews of Kaifeng a success or failure? Is complete assimilation to the point of disappearance a failure worth lamenting? It isn’t an easy question to answer, for any of us including me; and, ultimately while I can stand here and tell you why I think you should bother with Jewish life and observance, the answer for each individual must come from within oneself. The motivation must ultimately come from you, not me. But, since my sermon would be far too short for such an occasion as Erev Yom Kippur if I end here, and since I promised I would ten days ago, I’ll go ahead and preach anyway. Here’s why I think we all should bother!

1) It’s relevent. Despite its ancient history, Judaism remains relevant. Yes, our primary text, the Torah, is old – very old, and one can argue (as so many have) that its language and context are dated – they are; but, contemporary lessons can continually be drawn from it. There is a timeless aspect to Torah and all of Jewish literature. However, that being said, it won’t remain relevant without us. It is up to us to make it timeless. The text requires our engagement. Rituals require our engagement. If we stop studying and interacting with our history, then indeed, Judaism becomes static and archaic, as do all of the traditions that come out of it. But, if we continue to interact with our unique history, then the traditions and rituals can remain beautiful, compelling, and relevant to contemporary life. They can serve to elevate our lives and give our lives meaning.

2) We have a responsibility to Torah. It is our responsibility to keep the text vibrant. As liberal Jews, we have an extra mandate. We must continue to engage with Torah in order to keep it from becoming monopolized by the Orthodox. Torah is ours as much as it is theirs. From the earliest public readings of Torah, the text was open to translation, commentary, and interpretation. Certain opinions, in the form of commentaries and pointings, endured more than others, but there was, and still is, room for a diversity of opinion. This diversity is, however, dependent on us bothering. Once we give it up, it fails to reflect diversity. Torah becomes a monolithic and closed document. Judaism becomes rigid and inflexible.

3) We have a responsibility to God. We may view the obligation of אתם נצבים הוים כלכם as a burdensome obligation, but according to the French Medieval commentator, Rashi, it was no picnic for God either. The Covenant is a contractual agreement between two parties. The redemption of our ancestors from bondage may have put us in a position of eternal debt, but this everlasting burden of the Covenant is placed equally on God. It really isn’t all about us! According to Rashi, the implication of the verse, והוא יהיה לך לאלהים כאשר דבר לך , “that God will be a God to you, as promised,” included just before the extension of the covenant to all forthcoming generations, is that God cannot abandon or disassociate Godself from any of us. Arguably God’s very existence is dependent upon our bothering.

4) We have a responsibility to our world. Simply put, Jewish living makes the world a better place. The mandate of living our lives with an eye towards doing mitzvot and treating our neighbor with derech eretz makes all of our lives sweeter. שמצוה גוררת מצוה.. הוי רץ למצוה , Run to do a Mitzvah, Ben Azzai is recorded as saying in the Mishnah, for one mitzvah leads to another. We often translate mitzvah too simply as “a good deed.” The Hebrew root of the world mitzvah,צוה , is much stronger; it is a command. Doing mitzvot, are not be left to whim or chance. Mitzvot, the righteous deeds that are the cornerstone of Jewish tradition, are mandated and are the responsibility of every Jew. If we don’t bother, mitzvot don’t get done.

In 1492, when the only world this generation of Spanish Jews knew literally kicked them out of their homes, the community developed a theology that mandates all of us to fix the world and make it better. This Lurianic concept of tikkun olam, of fixing the world, that developed in the Northern Israeli town of Sefad in the decades following the 15th century expulsion from Spain compels us to bother - to focus at least part of our energy on working to making the world a better place for us and all peoples.

5) We have a responsibility to each other. Judaism has the remarkable potential for enriching our relationships with each other. Jews worship within the context of a minyan, a community. Jews study in chevruta, in partnership and friendly debate with others. Jews work together and with others in order to do gemilut chasadim, acts of love and kindness. Simply put, Judaism requires community to thrive. Even our most personal confessions, recited together as part of worship on Yom Kippur, are done within the protective embrace of the community. Historically, during periods of persecution, Jews looked out for other Jews. Today, thankfully, there is less need for such hands on protection from outside forces – but the help and support is still present in many forms. Many of the organizations that were set up to step in to help when others turned away still remain and still serve our community. We are a community that takes care of itself and others – that is, if we decide to bother.

6) We do have a responsibility to our ancestors. We may not like Abravanel’s metaphor of eternal debt, but anyone who was in this building on the second session of Sunday school when our students were making their ushpizin/ancestor strips for our “Most Beautiful Sukkah in the World” witnessed first-hand the power of history and the remarkable sense of legacy that comes from remembering those who came before us.

Our history is vital. Atem Nitzvaim hayom kulchem. Our ancestors stood at the foot of Canaan and made a decision to enter into an agreement that would impact us immensely. Of course we have a choice as to whether to accept the mantle of this agreement or not. Our Yom Kippur morning Torah portion makes the choice clear, choose life or curse. We’ve learned that despite the fears of the Deuteronomic writer, complete assimilation is no curse. However, it is no blessing either. To quote my dear friend and local journalist, Dr. Neil Rubin, “Jews have always brought goodness into the world. Jews will continue to do so. We will continue to succeed at doing so without you; but, we need you and want you involved.” I, frankly, am not as confident as Dr. Rubin. There is no question that Jews have brought goodness into the world and can continue to do so, but I don’t believe that we can continue to do it without you. We need you to bother!

The mandate of atem nitzavim, of accepting and forwarding Torah meaningfully in the world in a manner with which all of ancestors would be proud, from which we will be nourished and engaged, and from which our children can learn is vital to our modern expression of Judaism. Atem Nitzavim ha-yom kulchem -- I hope you will all choose to stand with me, as an actively engaged Jew, today and everyday in the year to come.

Assimilation: Success or Failure? The Example of Kaifeng Jewry

2011-10-05T10:58:00.000-07:00

[MP3: Aaron Avshalomav: Rebecca at the Well]

An example of assimilation and acculturation at its best, this piece, entitled “Rebecca at the Well” by Aaron Avshalomov, is a remarkable synthesis of Chinese, Jewish, and Russian cultural elements.

A number of years ago, I took a class that explored the broad span of Jewish communities in the Diaspora. Specifically, we studied the history of Jewish settlement and life beyond Israel and America, the two geographic areas that serve as home to most of the world’s Jews. Each student in the class had the opportunity to direct their attention to a specific region; I chose China, and in doing so, I discovered an extremely rich yet complicated situation: a situation I discussed in a sermon-in-song presentation at the time I took the class; a situation which bears revisiting as we start this new year of 5772.

Aaron Avshalomov immigrated to China after Russia’s October Revolution in 1917 and remained there, save for a few years spent in America, until just before the founding of the People’s Republic and the rise of communism. Though he may seem an anomaly, Avshalomov was far from the first Jew to arrive in China. It is difficult to pinpoint exactly when Jews first arrived into China, however, it is clear that there was an awareness of its prominent economic position in the ancient world among Jews. Lest we forget, China’s powerful position as a global force today is, in a very real sense, a re-emergence. Prior to a steady decline beginning in the 18th century, China was a leading economic force in its region and beyond. The literature of the Rabbinic period reveals knowledge of China and points to the popularity of its silk no later than the earliest years of the common era. By this time, trade contacts were firmly established between China and the Middle East, and Jews were active participants in that economy, travelling along the silk road and firmly settling themselves into China.

By the mid-10th century, a town now known as Kaifeng (then Bianliang) served as host to one of the first settled Jewish communities in China. Pockets of Jews were scattered throughout China, but Kaifeng appears to have been the strongest and most enduring of those communities. It was a booming urban capital city during the early medieval period, a commercial hub for trade that drew and welcomed Jewish traders. Known by their neighbors not as Jews but as the “scripture teaching” ones “who remove the sinews” from their meat, they were treated like any other Chinese sect and were made to feel fully welcome into Chinese society.
Perhaps too welcome.

By the 17th century, the Jewish presence in China had virtually vanished. Jews assimilated so well into Chinese society that they left little trace of their existence. Of course, the assimilation of the Jews of Kaifeng did not mark the end of Jewish life in China. Soon after this community faded, new groups of Jews entered, Sephardim from Baghdad in the mid-19th century, Ashkenazim, such as our composer Avshalomav, from Russia in the early 20th century, and during WWII, up to 25,000 European Jews found refuge in the then Japanese occupied sector of Shanghai. Most Jews left China soon after the rise of communism leaving behind only remnants in the neighboring Hong Kong.

Since the end of its Cultural Revolution and the re-opening of China’s borders to foreign influence, however, Jews have again sought out economic opportunity in China; and likewise, China has welcomed Jews, among many other foreign groups, into its borders. Modern China’s Jews, virtually all expatriates from N. America, England, Israel, Australia, and S. Africa, have built thriving Jewish communities within this Asian power house. In contrast to the early Jews of Kaifeng, today’s Jews in China are pointed to as foreigners, as Jews, residing in the land. Ironically, while these relatively new settlers are labeled clearly as Jews, a few hundred residents of modern Kaifeng who claim to be Jews, who trace their roots back to those earliest Jewish settlers in China, are not recognized as Jews. No one, particularly not their own government, recognizes them as Jewish. The official response of the Chinese government made in 1953, and reiterated in 1980, to representatives of this community lobbying for recognition states that the Jews of Kaifeng have completely assimilated into the majority Han Chinese culture and have disappeared. In large part, this lack of recognition exposes an internal political issue, for minority status in China entitles a group to valuable economic and social privileges; yet, and perhaps more revealing, is that this lack of recognition extends far beyond China. These residents of Kaifeng are ripe for Jewish outreach, and no one, not one single organization, is biting. Not even Chabad, an organization internationally known for their outreach efforts, has recognized or reached out to the Kaifeng community in order to foster Jewish life there. Chabad continues to grow in China; there are currently 8 Chabad houses in China, 5 in areas with negligible numbers of Jews, but none in Kaifeng. The Jews they serve are clearly identified as foreigners in China. Even with the heightened awareness in America in recent years due to research and publications that have appeared since my first discussion of this community, formal recognition has remained elusive.

Which begs the question: has this community crossed some boundary that exists between acculturation and assimilation – towards a point of no return? Certainly communism and global politics are at the root of the sorry neglect of this community, but this predicament within China was ultimately created by the forces of acculturation. Indeed, Kaifeng Jewry was a model of acculturation into a new society: they designed their synagogue according to Chinese standards; they drew on Confucian values and ideals and accepted Chinese lineage patterns; they even modeled their religious leaders, their rabbis, on the Chinese sect leader whose responsibilities were different and far wider than those traditionally associated with a rabbi’s. Moreover, scholar Irene Eber, an expert on the Jews of Kaifeng, argues that any remnants of Jewish identity that remain among these residents is actually a product of the process of acculturation itself. The emphasis on family and lineage in Chinese culture allowed for the retention of some level of Jewish identity to remain intact despite the disintegration of the Jewish community.

The Kaifeng dilemma should unsettle us. What differentiates us, the liberal American Jewish community, from them? We build our synagogues according to American building patterns. We have adopted the values and social mores of American culture – such as personal autonomy - and have allowed them to infuse our liturgy, rituals, and customs. We’ve modeled the religious leaders of our adopted country by expanding the role of Rabbi far beyond that of teacher and decisor of Jewish law. Could we be heading towards that same boundary which the Kaifeng Jews seem to have crossed, a boundary into complete assimilation?

Bernard Wasserstein in his study of post-World War II Europe, using Kaifeng Jewry as an example, proposes that peoples disappear in history more often by suicide than by murder. Harsh. But, implicit in his remark is that Jews cause their own demise by failing to hold onto whatever crucial elements of distinctiveness we have.

A tremendous paradox exists.
The ability to acculturate, to blend in, is viewed as a sign of success. Being able to adopt the values and symbols of the world in which we live implies that we are accepted – no small feat in the context of Jewish history. It means we’ve made it, and this is home. In America, in particular (as perhaps the Kaifeng Jews felt in their day), we are comforted by our ability to achieve economic prosperity (at least as best as any of us can in this challenging economy), and we cherish the protections afforded us by our country’s democratic values. Few Jews have any desire to live in even the most modern of ghettos, that is in areas populated only by Jews. We desire to be welcomed and to live out in the world; we expect to participate fully in society. Jewish survival, however, is dependent on a level of distinctiveness, and arguably, of remaining uncomfortable -- not so at home despite being at home. The situation of the Jews in China reminds us that the desire to acculturate fully can lead to a gradual disappearance within that same community that so welcomes us, a disappearance which most Jewish leaders would label a failure. I ask you, however, is it? Is our complete and thorough absorption into a culture, so much so that we vanish, a failure? I leave you to consider the question. I will return to it on the eve of Yom Kippur when perhaps I can convince you that indeed it is!

Shema: Listen up! Delivered Shabbat V'etchanan, 8/13/2011

2011-08-17T08:32:00.000-07:00

Parashat V’etchanan is a literary masterpiece! We so often isolate the various passages, the Rabbinic method often encourages us to do so, analyzing the Ten Commandments, the Shema passage that has entered our liturgy, Moses' opening description of his ineffectual plea to God, the appointment of cities of refuge. The Rabbinic method so often demands that we seek what is hidden. In many of our Torah portions, such an analytical approach is required in order to make sense of the varied contents. Our Torah is far from an orderly document. The pre-canonized editing that took place often confounds contemporary comprehension, so we strive to read meaning into the minutia. Yet occasionally such a study method prevents us from seeing the bigger picture – when the peshat, the simple understanding of the narrative arc of the text can provide the most useful lessons.

In V’etchanan, Shema is key. Not simply the familiar passage to which we are so easily drawn due to its placement in the siddur, but the verb, Shema. We see it at the start of chapter 4, towards the beginning of the portion, after Moses retells of his attempt to change God’s mind about letting him enter the Land,
ועתה ישראל שמע אל החקים ואל המשפטים אשר אנכי מלמד אתכם (Dev. 4:1). Now, Israel….Listen! I almost hear Moses imploring the Israelites not to repeat mistakes, even his own, that were made in the past. The temporal “v”, so often translated as “and” indicates an attempt to move forward, onward to the next stage: Now it’s time to pay attention Israel to the rules that have been taught! The rules have been laid out, now it’s time to Shema! As contemporary commentator, Robert Alter, notes this letter “vuv” stands out to mark the start of a “grand sermon.”

At the start of Chapter 5, Moses again summons the entire Israelite community with Shema,
שמע ישראל את החקים ואת המשפטים אשר אנכי דבר באזנכם היום ולמדתם אתם ושמרתם לעשות (Dev. 5:1)
Listen up Israel – pay attention to the laws and precepts that I’ve proclaimed (literally) into your ears today - study and do them!

Shema has become a refrain to the narrative, a narrative which now proceeds to lay out the basic outline of the law again as Moses re-iterates those basic commandments revealed on Sinai and as we will read aloud in a few moments. This is the instruction, Moses reminds the masses. Then, again:
שמע ישראל יי אלהינו יי אחד ואהבת את יי אלהיך... (Dev. 6:4…)
"Listen up Israel, Adonai is our God, Adonai is One; and You should love Adonai with all of your heart, soul, and being..."

In case you weren’t listening, Listen up! God is one, and you are supposed to honor God by doing all of these instructions AND -- here is what is new – you are to teach it to your children, so that they too can follow the rules that accordingly will assure prosperity and safety.

I’m always struck that it is this final Shema of our portion that gets held up as “the watchword of our faith.” Sure it makes a good poetic sound bite, and it reinforces the rabbinic idea that it is the first commandment – the "I am the Adonai You God… and there are no other Gods besides me" from which the rest flow forth. But, taken by itself, it has the least substance. This final Shema of V’etchanan never quite tells us to study or do the commandments. It says were are to hold onto them as symbols – literally לטטפת- and to teach them to our children, but how on earth can we, with any integrity that is, pass on an instruction without observing it ourselves? It isn’t enough to just hold onto symbols.

The last Shema of V’etchanan, the one that has been incorporated into our liturgy, is fully dependent on the first two Shemas of our parasha. ישראל שמע, we must first listen up to those who have come before us. We must hear what they have to say about the mistakes they have made and the lessons, the chukim u’mishpatim. Notice – these aren’t mitzvot, religious commandments, these are basic rules viewed as vital to the functioning of society. שמע ישראל , we must then pay attention to what has been place before our ears. We must study – learn - and take action in order for us to keep our community in shape. It takes a bit of attention and effort! Finally, שמע ישראל , only once we have absorbed it and made it a habit for ourselves, can we pass it on to those who will follow us. To do any less makes all of the symbols that we make – those on our doorposts, synagogues, and home, no matter how beautiful, thoroughly hollow.

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Comment about Haftarah:
Nachamu, nachamu …. First of the seven Haftarot of consolation that lead us in our calendar cycle form Tisha b’Av to Rosh Hashanah. Historically, Reform Jews have had an ambivalent relationship with Tisha b’Av, a day of mourning over the destruction of the First, and later Second, Temple in Jerusalem, as we don’t even feign to seek a return to such a centralized notion of civil and religious power. At the same time, we must recognize the amount of devastation and trauma these events brought to the Jewish community and their neighbors during this time. Isaiah’s moving poetry compels us to remember these painful episodes in our history and mourn the losses that ensued. Our modern sensibilities require us to celebrate the strength of those who were able to continue building upon traditions that would serve as a foundation for modern Jewish life. The very fact that we are here to remember is a testament to those who survived and worked to restore that which was most important.

Reflections on my visit to TENYC - A lesson in investing in worship, Shabbat Hazon, 5771

2011-08-08T07:40:00.000-07:00

I have been working full time during the last four weeks on this manuscript (hold up dissertation). As you, our regular Shabbat worshippers, have been perhaps most directly impacted by this change in my typical work habits, I thought I’d share …. (begin reading…The liturgical rubric known as the Seder Avodah recited on the Jewish Day of Atonement provides ...) No one has gotten up to leave? Well, no one can say Temple Emanuel members don’t have good manners. I’ll spare you the rest, at least for now.

This past month has been – thankfully – remarkably productive. A draft of my dissertation is done and ready for proof reading, revisions, and the tedious process of committee review. As my work time was productive, I celebrated with a trip to New York, my first trip to New York City in a number of years that did not involve any library visits or research. Generally, there is no dearth of shabbat worship opportunities in Manhattan, but like so many other communities (like our own), summer time is not typically the time to see a congregation at its best. Typically, attendance is low, clergy are away, services, if they are held at all (often synagogues implement a reduced schedule) are not held in the main worship space. I recall an eager summer visit to the beautiful Sephardic style sanctuary of Central Synagogue to hear the cantor and choir only to find myself in their basement being lead by a less than experienced song leader. That is the reality of summer in the American synagogue. Last Shabbat, I took my chances and chose to visit our sister congregation, the historic Temple Emanuel on Fifth Avenue. Services were held in their chapel – though, chapel is hardly an adequate description for this cathedral styled room that is fully fitted with bema, choir loft, and organ, that albeit smaller than their grand sanctuary, is still a stunning example of architecture; yet otherwise, the Shabbat service was a typical Temple Emanuel of New York City experience, and one from which there is much to learn.

Temple Emanuel New York City was founded in 1845 by a small group of German immigrants to America. By 1868, it had built, though not in its present location, the “largest synagogue structure in America.” Perhaps not a qualification towards which we at Temple Emanuel of Baltimore wish to strive, but a qualification that speaks to the grandeur and stature of the place in terms of the history of Reform Judaism in America. Temple Emanuel of New York City has historically been viewed as the bastion of Reform Judaism, and it remains, even if its worship no longer reflects mainstream Reform worship practice, and even if the Union of Reform Judaism was perfectly happy to make its move further, literally and metaphorically, to the right of this congregation – it remains a vibrant, and based on conversation with its clergy, fiscally sound, 21st century Reform congregation.

Since a 3+ hour field trip is not high on everyone’s Saturday morning to-do list, I thought I’d share my thoughts, my devarim, if you will, on my experience this past Shabbat.

First, their prayer book – The Union Prayer Book, not Gates of Prayer, blue or grey, certainly not Mishkan Tefillah, old UPB. Now, first a disclaimer: in large part due to my youth (yes, my youth – I love saying that), I have no emotional connection to The Union Prayer Book. By the time my family made the leap to a Reform synagogue, GOP was the gold standard. UPB is an historic, and as such fascinating, text for me, but it has never served as a worship text for me. The only time I have ever ‘prayed out of’ UPB, outside of TENYC, is during earnest, but frankly lacking, attempts at recreating the past. Just as NFTY services don’t translate well outside of camp and youth conventions, UPB services often don’t do well out of their original context either.

I am glad the Reform movement has moved away from UPB. The little, literally little, book was a nice change, but the language was difficult – I stumbled over the “Thee”s, “Thou”s, and “Thy”s which in turn interfered with my appreciating the prose. While the trend can certainly be taken too far, I’m glad we’ve injected a sense of informality into our worship. I don’t think God cares whether we use “Thee” or just “You.” To most of us born after WWII, “You” is plenty formal enough. While formality can create an atmosphere of worthy respect, it can also create distance, distance between worshiper and text and between us and God. I prefer language that balances the disparate images of God: that of God as a transcendent and distant force (the “Thou” image) against that of God as part of each and every one of us (perhaps the “hey you” image).

I am also grateful for the Reform movement’s success at adapting our traditionally male centric language to a more gender inclusive experience. Recall, it wasn’t until the publication of the 1994 ‘interim’ "Gates of Grey" that Gender inclusivity formally entered our worship. Gender neutral language has now become normative, and I want it to be for generations who follow. And, even though male centric language was the norm until I was close to 30 years old –the male language used last Shabbat was jarring and felt entirely dated.

While using UPB reinforced my appreciation of the positive changes in worship that have developed in the Reform movement, the worship service generally reminded me of what is perhaps our greatest failure. The Reform movement has a lot to learn from the sheer aesthetics of worship at TENYC. A professional choir of 17 voices regularly enhances their Shabbat worship. During the High Holidays, this group swells to 25 professionally trained singers. In addition to the choir, their worship staff includes an organist and choir director (who mans a newly restored 3000+ pipe organ), and an administrative assistant whose entire job is devoted to the maintenance of the choir. And, of course, TENYC employs a cantor who pulls all of these pieces together in exquisite form while sharing her own mastery of liturgy, Jewish music, and nusach.

Now please be clear, I am not arguing that TENYC’s style of worship should be replicated here or elsewhere. A 20-25 person choir and pipe organ is fitting for their cathedral like structure. Our sanctuary (let alone our budget) couldn’t possibly contain such sound, and we prefer a musical style that balances the performative with congregational singing (of which there isn’t much of going on at TENYC), but the ATTENTION PAID to the expression of worship is worth emulating.
Many Reform congregations across the country are facing budgetary challenges by eliminating those very professionals trained to deal with worship, namely cantors. Worship expression becomes the easy budget cut. Throw in a guitar player and few poems and presto – worship. Even our own Temple Emanuel has had to make choices – the cantor is often replaced by the rabbi. Luckily, we get along most of the time (and the ‘new’ rabbi gets to work with a cantor who has 20 some odd yrs of congregational experience). Indeed, it is a credit to our Temple Emanuel leadership that the cantorial, the chazzanut, the expression of worship and liturgy, was not disposable when tough choices had to be made; yet, there is no question that my attention to the rabbinic function has impacted the amount of attention I devote to the expression of the liturgy. And I certainly couldn’t do both tasks if I had been new to both at the same time. My experience as a congregational cantor was vital to my being able to do both roles seamlessly.

I don’t believe there is a “one-worship-model- fits-all” approach to successful worship. TENYC’s model works beautifully for them. Reform congregations need to invest in worship in order to figure out what works for their own communities. That doesn’t mean mimicking what may have been successful elsewhere, it means working to understand one’s own community. It means making an investment of time and resources into worship. We’ve begun a serious exploration into worship at Temple Emanuel, and I hope it continues. Worship must be a priority of Jewish life. In the Biblical period, the journey to Canaan was the glue that held the Israelites together (assuming the community was as cohesive as the Biblical text would like us to think. The scolding we are about to read throughout Devarim suggests otherwise.) Torah has become that glue in the post Biblical period. The observance of Torah, of law and ritual, works as a cohesive element among Orthodox Jews. The study of and continued interpretation of Torah as a mandate for social justice holds the liberal Jewish community together. Can Torah survive without worship? I doubt it. Al Shelosha D’varim ha-olam omeid: Upon three things does our world stand, Torah, WORSHIP, and acts of loving kindness – our early sages doubted it as well.

A Message to our Temple Emanuel Confirmands: B'ha-a-lot-cha!

2011-06-11T06:39:00.000-07:00

Though our festival cycle calls upon us to read the Ten Commandments on this holiday of Shavuot when we recall, Matan Torah, the giving of Torah at Mount Sinai, the opening verses of this upcoming Shabbat’s Torah portion remind us that being a Jew requires far more than a nodding approval, a confirmation, of a general, albeit important, list of commands.

בהעלתך את הנרות , “when you light the menorah... 7 candles will give light, will illuminate,” It is an odd instruction that God asks Moses to give to Aaron. What else would happen when you light the candles? Aaron is not told how to do it per se, but rather is told, when you do it, the Temple will be illuminated. As I shared with those who attended our congregational meeting this past Sunday morning, it is a ‘duh!’ moment in Torah – one that compels us to comment on it. Why do we have to be told that when we turn on the lights, there will be light?

The light that comes forth from those candles is certainly not for God’s benefit. ואין צריך לאורם, the Midrash reminds us,“[God] does not need [Israel]’s light.” “Nor, however, are the candles lit solely for the actual light they provide human beings. Rather, the lighting of the lamps is, according to Midrash, לזכותכם לכך, “so that the people will acquire merit.” Never is Aaron actually commanded to light the lamps, the text assumes it will be done, “When you light…" When you put forth the effort and do what needs to be done, light will illuminate from that work. Moreover, the verb used for the work of lighting has the very real connotation of lifting up (the same verbal root as in the familiar word – aliyah, a word we use to describe the ascent we make to the bema for Torah, or the ascent we make when traveling to Israel). The act of lighting, of making sure the task gets done, literally lifts us up and gives merit to those who do it.

Revelation at Sinai was a definitive moment in Israelite history. Torah continues to ground us as Jews. The 10 Commandments you read as a class continues to provide ethical and meaningful, arguably vital, guideposts, not just to Jews, but to those who adhere to all mainstream religious doctrine. But Torah is only one leg upon which the world stands according to Rabbinic tradition. Being a Jew requires more of you than observance of the 10 Commandments.

There is evidence that the 10 Commandments were recited as part of the blessings that surround the Shema in the ancient Temple. Notice, the 10 Commandments do not appear anywhere in the traditional liturgical order today. That exclusion of the 10 Commandments from our order of prayers is by design. Our early prayer book editors and Rabbinic sages wanted to be sure that the community understood that being a Jew extended far beyond a commitment to, as I like to call them, those “Big Ten."

בהעלתך, when we lift ourselves up and do the work, it will get done. Being a Jew demands not only a commitment to the basics of Torah, it demands a commitment to the people around you and to the institutions that support the Jewish community and the world beyond it. The benefit of the lighting our lamps isn’t for God, and it isn’t just for us as individuals. The only way in which we will create light in our building and beyond into our communities is the same way in which Aaron created light in the Temple. Someone must be present and willing to do the work, whether it’s making sure the hardware is functional, the light bulbs are replaced, and the on and off switch is used appropriately. It isn’t magic. It is about our accepting the aliyah, to make it happen. In the Biblical period, those who served the Temple and kept it functioning received their mandate by virtue of biology. Those who were born into the Levitical class were born into service. Today, we rely on a mix of professionals and volunteers. The professionals, like myself, all of your teachers over the years, and the office staff, many of who, have become your second family ("Mom" Abbe!) - we aim to provide all the tools you need for the substance of Jewish life – the Torah (we are here to help you see the difference between that resh and dalet); yet, if you don’t choose to be among those who Be’ha-a-lot’cha, whom we can assume will raise themselves up to being full and active participants in Jewish life, then the candles of our lampstand will fail to illuminate. I hope that we here at Temple Emanuel and the broader Jewish community can depend on each of you to be among those who step up, turn on the lights, and help illuminate our world.

Israel - Our Homeland?

2011-05-16T11:09:00.000-07:00

Implicit in the laws regarding the Shemita and Yuval, contained in this week’s Torah portion Behar, is a reminder that even if we own the land, per economic standards, it is not ours to keep. Every seven year, the land must rest. Every 50 years, וקראתם דרור בארץ , the land must be ‘released.’ In actuality, these laws are virtually impossible to enact. While convoluted loop holes are built into the halachik system today in order to enable, at the least, a symbolic re-enactment of the shemita and yuval in modern day Israel, it remains unclear if (and most believe improbable that) these laws were ever fully applied in the land. Yet, this attempt at tempering our sense of sole proprietorship of the land serves as a lesson from which all those living in the region today – both Israeli and Palestinian should learn.

One of the greatest challenges with regard to Jewish religious identity vis a vis the state of Israel, in my opinion, has to do with the terminology we use with regard to Israel. The sacred attachment Jews feel with Israel is often described as one of returning home to the land of our ancestors (the land to which Avram was called, lech l’cha, "go forth!"). Israel is identified -- it is qualified -- as our homeland.

Permit me a personal anecdote. The first time I visited Israel was to live there for an extended period of time. All first year students of the Hebrew Union College were (and still are) required to study at the HUC campus in Jerusalem. My very first visit to Israel, thus, required my securing an apartment, making new friends and acquaintances, getting settled into a new neighborhood and learning where the post office, phone and utility companies (in those days, bills were paid in person), bank, shops, and bus stops were all while immersing myself in a new language and culture. It literally required my making a home for myself. I was not a tourist or religious pilgrim. This home in Israel, by the way, was the first that I had ever set up and lived in all by myself – no family, no roommates, just me, myself, and I. This adventurous experience of picking up and moving to Israel as a younger woman was extraordinary; but despite the wonder of it all, despite the very fact that I was creating a home in what I was raised to understand to be the Jewish homeland, I was still a foreigner: an American student living on a extended, but temporary, visa. I loved living in Israel. I long to do it again, perhaps as part of a study sabbatical; but, it isn’t my home. America is, currently, Pikesville.

This sacred concept of ‘homeland’ is underscored by our liturgy – the prayers we regularly recite, our festival cycle (specifically our pilgrimage festivals of Pesach, Shavuot, & Sukkot), and of course, all of Rabbinic literature. Our hearts and mind are constantly directed where towards Zion,המחזיר שכנתו לציון. The power of this sacred concept of “homeland” has its roots in the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple and the forced dispersion of our ancestors from what was literally their home. Recall that the Temple was not only a centralized place of worship. It had far more meaning than a local synagogue. The Temple was a symbol of independent sovereignty. Long before the separation of church and state, the Temple, in Hebrew literally, mikdash – holy thing/site, stood in Jerusalem as the seat of both religious and temporal power. The Temple, this holy site, represented Jews having full power over Jews. It wasn’t solely the religious component that made the Temple so enduring, rather, this coupling of religious and political sovereignty is at the heart of what makes its memory so compelling. The Babylonian and later Roman conquest of this seat of power had huge implications for the Jews of that period, implications which have extended to us, the inheritors of Rabbinic Judaism.

In lieu of this physical structure representing power and cohesion among the community, Rabbinic tradition fostered and nurtured the memory of it and the constant yearning, back (חדש ימנו כקדם, "renew our days as before") and yet at the same time forward, towards this sacred place. Moreover, though the Temple, the mikdash, no longer stands, sacred place is still attainable; it is within our reach. The Rabbinic sages specifically identify the home as the mikdash me’at. Each of us has the capacity to create a microcosm of the Temple in our own homes through the practice of ritual and mitzvot. It wasn’t until the 19th century when German Reformers dared to use the word Temple to refer to a Jewish institution outside of Jerusalem; and indeed, its pointed use brought with it controversy that remains, though far less so than in its day, today.

A challenge faced by the American Jewish community, particularly the liberal Jewish community, is how to maintain this sense of Israel as homeland when faced with the possibility of religious autocracy in place of democracy and pluralism. If we truly consider Israel ‘homeland,’ than we cannot continue to pray and yearn towards Jerusalem without a firm commitment to furthering democratic and pluralistic values within her borders. Vital to this commitment is that we – and by ‘we,’ I mean both Jews living within Israel and without her borders – must be cognizant of the ‘other’s’ narratives regarding the land. Though Israel may be the Jewish homeland, it isn’t solely ours. It is sacred space to others who have a stake in its history and a stake in its future. The only way it can remain a sacred, and even viable, space for us is if we, and more importantly those who live there both Jew and non-Jew, figure out how to respect the narrative of others who lay claim to it.
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In honor of Yom ha-Atzma-ut (Israel's Independence Day) which was marked this past week in Israel, I share a few examples of Israeli poetry which I hope will serve to challenge us to reflect on Israel, not just as our homeland, but as a land that serves as home to many.

Each of us has a Name: written by the poet ‘Zelda.’ Zelda was born in the Ukraine in 1914, moved to Jerusalem with her parents at the age of 12 and died there at the age of 70. She had a traditional religious upbringing and did not devote herself fully to writing and teaching until after her husband’s death. Her work began to appear in 1968 and immediately became popular among religious and secular Israelis alike.
(Read Each of us has a Name)

After the fall of 1956 – written by Dvora Amir, a sabra, born in Jerusalem in 1948. Her parents were Polish immigrants who became very active in the agricultural workers’ movement. She began her study of Hebrew literature, Jewish philosophy, and kabbalah after the 6-day war. As her life, much of her poetry reflects the backdrop of war.

Two poems by Ayman Agbaria, a Palestinian-Israeli (his self-identification) poet and play write: Everyday and Debate.

I conclude with one of my favorite poems by Yehuda Amichai, one you’ve heard me recite before. Amichai, who lived and wrote throughout the latter half of the 20th century in Israel, is one of Israel’s most popular and well-known modern poets. His poem Jerusalem succeeds in relating a painful honesty in its utter simplicity.

Osama Bin Laden's Death & Justice: Really? Thoughts on Shabbat Emor, 5/7/2011

2011-05-09T13:46:00.000-07:00

It’s unsettling. Osama bin Ladin’s death and the subsequent responses to it. Despite the initial expressions of unbridled joy, enthusiasm, and patriotism that erupted almost immediately early in the week, most of us are left feeling unsatisfied with bin Laden’s death - an event we long hoped would bring some element of closure to the tragic events of 9/11 and the incredible sense of loss and pain American citizens have felt since the fall of 2001.

Objectively, we can pin our uneasiness on the reality of the unknown. News analysis and after analysis reminds us that bin Ladin’s death may or, more likely, may not signal a decline in terrorism. It certainly won’t serve to change the anti-American sentiment that is promoted by many other Arab leaders as an excuse for inciting violence. But, subjectively, our unsettled-ness is far more difficult to compartmentalize and attribute to political uncertainty. Tom Pyszczynski, a social psychologist quoted in yesterday’s New York Times, in his description of the dramatic reactions to the news of bin Ladin’s death as “pure existential release,” touches on the reality that our celebratory response has less to do with bin Ladin and far more to do with our own feelings of insecurity. “Whether or not the killing makes any difference in the effectiveness of Al Qaeda hardly matters,” he explains. “…defeating an enemy who threatens [our] worldview and core values…is the quickest way to calm existential anxiety.” The problem is that quick is not necessarily lasting. When we respond in like manner to violence, our existential anxiety may in the long run be heightened. As Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote in the middle of the last century in a book entitled, Where do we go From Here: From Chaos to Community,
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence, you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder the hate. …" The copious postings of this quote this week on Facebook and the like reminds us of the thick layer of uneasiness that lays just below the surface of Sunday night’s celebration.

Now, I willingly leave the continued objective analysis of our national security to the various news media pundits, but I offer three examples from Jewish tradition that perhaps can help us formulate a way in which to navigate through the morass of emotional responses to Osama bin Laden’s death.

First, an analogy drawn from the holiday of Purim - yes, Purim. At first glance, the holiday appears to celebrate the downfall and murder of the Jewish community’s arch-enemy number #1 – Haman, the prime descendent of Amalek and the embodiment of all evil. But, looking past the children’s festivities of dress up and carnival that have risen up around this holiday, we find evidence of great discomfort in the hanging of Haman. Our noise making isn’t entirely celebratory, it is intended to erase our memory. We want to block out Haman’s name, and the very fact that he ever existed and harmed us. The Talmudic mandate (Meg 7b)to drink wine until any discernable difference between the names Mordecai and Haman disappears underscores our desire, perhaps our need, not to celebrate Haman’s death, but to forget the entire episode completely. Moreover, when we chant the passage from the story of Esther that lists the ten sons of Haman killed in battle, we do so, not in the festive melodic trope reserved for Purim, but in a mournful tone and in one singular breath that is held during recitation as if to subdue or prevent any feelings of joy from interrupting the moment.

Second, according to Rabbinic tradition, the moment of redemption from Israelite bondage was not entirely one of joy and celebration. Rabbinic tradition notes the narrative of the Israelite enemy, namely the Egyptians. The Midrashic imagination portrays God shedding tears as the waters of the Reed Sea close behind the newly redeemed Israelite nation. Additionally, the sages imagine the angels beginning to rejoice at the deliverance of the Israelites only to be scolded by God for celebrating so quickly. Even the death of an enemy constitutes loss.

Finally, we come to our Torah portion for this Shabbat, Parashat Emor. Continuing the Holiness Code begun in Kedoshim, the author strives to set clear boundaries with regard to manslaughter. The attempt is made to categorize crime and punishment into an equitable and orderly construct: שבר תחת שבר עין תחת עין שן תחת שן, "a fracture for a fracture, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." . The poetic symmetry of the biblical Hebrew forwards the neat package; but, the poetic symmetry also serves to confound the intent. As Emma will share in just a moment, Rabbinic commentators and sages from all ages have struggled with the language and its intended meaning. Perhaps, however, lack of clarity is just the point. The attempt to package justice so succinctly highlights the very challenge of implementing justice in such a simple and equitable, let alone, satisfying manner. It's as if the author understood the complexity of exacting justice and thus left us with this poetic gem, the seeming simplicity of which opens it up to a wide breath of interpretation. It can never be as simple as it sounds (chant: שבר תחת שבר עין תחת עין שן תחת שן)

Even though bin Laden’s death by American forces brings a modicum of comfort to some and a sense of American empowerment to others, his death can never serve as full retribution for all of the loss and pain suffered on 9/11 and thereafter.

I doubt anything can.

Shabbat Kedoshim – A celebration of Adult B’nai Mitzvah, TE 5771

2011-05-01T09:57:00.000-07:00

דבר אל כל עדת בני ישראל ואמרת אלהם קדשים תהיו כי קדוש אני יי אלהיכם

What does it mean to ‘be holy’? In the Torah, being holy is connected with abiding by law and by extension living according to the covenant outlined, presumably, by God. The earliest reference to the people being qualified as holy appears in Exodus just before revelation of the ‘big 10’ at Sinai. Being holy is conditioned on action, "you’ve seen what I can do," God informs the masses (recall just a few chapters earlier God is credited with the other ‘big 10’ – those nasty plagues – and the subsequent splitting of the Reed Sea). "Now," God continues, “IF you truly listen to me and keep my covenant, THEN (implication being, 'only then') you will be my most treasured people, a גוי קדוש, a holy nation."

Fast forward to parashat Kedoshim. Presented here in the text is what is known as The Holiness Code, what most classical commentators view as a fleshed out reiteration of the 10 Commandments. Here too, the litany of laws and rules are prefaced by the qualification of the people as holy. This Levitical qualification, however, is strikingly different than its earlier iteration (clearly written by a different quill). .קדשים תהיו כי קדוש אני יי אליהכם – Holy you will be, because holy [am] I, Adonai, Your God. The conditional language is gone. Action is still a vital part of the equation - the covenant between God and the Israelites; but our holiness appears as a given. And perhaps even more significantly, rather than a consequence of, our holiness functions as the primary motivation for, proper action. As the laws unfold, we are constantly reminded: “Ani Adonai Elohechem.” It’s almost a refrain (chant:אני יי אלהיכם or later in even shorter form אני יי ). Now, I’m no creative writer (academic, yes…but artistic writing is left better to other hands, such as Jill’s), yet I can’t help but think the author is using this refrain as a poetic sound bite to remind us of the entire opening statement: קדשים תהיו כי קדוש אני יי אליהכם. Lest we forget why we are to do all these things, we are repeatedly reminded why we are holy, because: אני יי אליהכם. Proper action is incumbent upon us because our Godliness propels us to it.

Few of us feel “holy.” Well maybe Donald Trump does (oh, never mind…that’s full of himself, or full of something else altogether), but for most of us, the idea of kedoshim feels foreign or something set apart from us. Jewish tradition reinforces this concept of separateness in the marked division between the chol & kodesh, the ordinary & the sacred, with regard to time, space, and ritual. The Medieval Midrashist, however, in his elaboration as to why The Holiness Code appears where it does in Torah provides a different model of understanding ‘being holy’ that may be more useful. Kedoshim, and its Holiness Code, appears immediately after a section of text that discusses forbidden sexual relations. It’s placement here according to the Rabbinic imagination is to remind us that in every case where there could be a possibility of immorality, there is also the possibility of sanctity. Our choices and our behavior play a large part in whether something leans towards holiness. Moreover, despite the most stringent attempts at creating legal constructs, the boundaries between what is holy versus what is mundane, let alone profane, aren’t always so clearly delineated. Perhaps this is why the discussion of holiness often flounders into vague and subjective notions of spirituality, a term in and of itself difficult to define.

I can say with certainty, however, that I have experienced kedoshim in being able to share in the sacred journey of these four students sitting here on the bema. On the one hand, our time together could be viewed as quite mundane: informal lectures and discussions (me talking a lot – talk about mundane, hopefully it never crossed over into the profane), watching a movie; heck, one week we sat around wrapping string and tying knots. But, this journey of studying Jewish history, discussing the challenges of assimilation, immersing ourselves in Torah and liturgy, engaging in philosophical explorations of God and practice, and tying tzitzit together was sacred, kadosh, because of the very intention and sincerity brought by teacher and student to the journey.

Burt, Shelley, Jill, and Shanna – אתם קדושים, you are holy. You have created and modeled a sense of holiness throughout this year of study and personal reflection. And, אנחנו קדושים, we are holy, because you are have chosen to share this milestone with us in the context of our Shabbat worship. Our Torah’s sound bite, אני יי אלהיכם, reminds us of the Divine element in holiness and the fact that according to Torah, we are made b’tzelem Elohim, literally in the image of God and thus with the capacity to be holy. I believe, however, that we are truly holy, davka, because we are human. I thank each of you for sharing your humanity with us, and thus enabling us all to share in kedoshim this Shabbat!

April 22, 1861: The Legacy of Rabbi David Einhorn, delivered Erev Chol ha-Moed Pesach, 4/22/2011

2011-04-22T12:44:00.000-07:00

Rabbi David Einhorn. Perhaps he is best remembered, if remembered at all, by the Baltimore Jewish community as our neighboring Har Sinai Congregation’s first Rabbi. A German born and educated Rabbi, Einhorn came to American shores in 1855, at the behest of Har Sinai’s leadership, just six years before the outbreak of the Civil War and the events that would send him fleeing from Baltimore on this very day, April 22, 150 year ago.

David Einhorn is generally labeled as “a radical reformer.” Now, I generally resist the temptation to assign such simplistic labels to historical figures. Such labels so often fail to relay the historical context in which they developed. What does it mean to be ‘a radical reformer’ without an understanding of what was being reformed and what communal structures were working for or against such reforms? David Einhorn, a student of Rabbi Abraham Geiger, a prominent 19th century German reformer, advocated for worshipping in the vernacular. Recall that until Geiger, the vernacular was only offered as reduced translations not as texts to be used for worship themselves. He advocated also for the cutting out of all references to a restoration of the sacrifices and to a Jewish state. Recall that the restoration of the Temple and its cultic observances had been a central thematic fixture of the liturgy since the destruction of the Temple (it remains so in many non-Reform prayerbooks). Einhorn also argued, along with Geiger, that Talmudic law had no Divine authority. They were the first to do so publically. Considering the social and religious milieu of his time, radical is a fitting descriptive.

Einhorn is also celebrated within the Reform movement as the author of the prayer book Olat Tamid. Einhorn’s book, written for Har Sinai’s predominately German speaking congregation, along with a lesser known prayer book published just prior to Einhorn’s by Rabbi Leo Merzbacher, provided virtually all of the source material for a working draft of a prayer book submitted to the then nascent Central Conference of American Rabbis by Isaac Moses. Upon completion, this draft would become the beloved Union Prayer Book that served (albeit with a couple of significant revisions over time) as the Reform movement’s official prayer book from 1895 until the publication of Gates of Prayer in 1975. And though not well-accepted to date, UPB continues to find a small audience with its 21st century revision known as the Sinai Edition of the UPB.

During this season of Pesach, and particularly on this Shabbat chol ha-moed Pesach that falls on the heels of the anniversary of his being forced out of Baltimore, Einhorn should be celebrated also – perhaps even more so - for his willingness to take a public stand on important social issues that in his day where highly controversial to say the least.

On April 12 of this year, our country struggled with how to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the outbreak of the Civil War at Fort Sumter. While we can objectively understand that the Civil War was over far more than slavery, slavery was one of the most tangible issues and one that remains a highly sensitive sore spot in our attempts at commemoration, particularly here -- south of the Mason-Dixon Line. How do we mark such an event without condoning secessionist thinking or the mentality, shared by so many in the south at that time, that viewed the ownership of other human beings as an acceptable institution? Slavery was a sensitive issue in its day as well, and David Einhorn was one of the few rabbis (perhaps only rabbi) in Baltimore willing to denounce it publically and vehemently despite the fact that doing so put him and his family in physical peril.

A striking and often overlooked footnote to Einhorn’s history in Baltimore is that his stay in Philadelphia, to where he fled, was initially meant to be temporary. His plan was to take his family to Philly and then return to Baltimore alone in order to fulfill his professional duties. Indeed, on May 12th, just a few weeks after his departure, Einhorn received a letter from the lay leadership of Har Sinai stating that the city had settled and that they eagerly looked forward to his return of their rabbi. However, the letter continued,
“We have been commissioned by the Congregation to represent to you most respectfully…that it would be most desirable – for the sake of your own safety as well as out of consideration for that of your congregational members – for you to avoid, from the pulpit, in the future everything touching on the exciting questions of the day, and we beg you to please regard this observation as due only to our sad circumstances.”

We all know what “the exciting questions of the day” were, don’t we? Again, it bears repeating, Einhorn was the only pulpit rabbi in the area speaking out against slavery at this time. Har Sinai was becoming known as the ‘one led by the abolitionist rabbi;’ and it was a qualification that clearly made its members uncomfortable. Einhorn responded with his resignation and served Philadelphia's Keneseth Israel, better known as KI, until his death in 1879.

Now Einhorn often found himself embroiled in controversy, his personality and manner seemed to draw him into conflict; but, in this case, his stubborn stance and unwillingness to bend were commendable. Einhorn’s demand for the freedom to speak openly from the bema drawing on biblical teachings while addressing timely problems of social order set a standard to be modeled by liberal rabbis throughout America. It is customary today for rabbis to demand freedom of the pulpit. Our role is to challenge, even if at times, it makes you uncomfortable.

Einhorn was a tough character, for sure. But that tough character enabled him to remain true to his values despite the professional and physical risks he took in voicing his opinions Olat Tamid¸ Einhorn’s title for his prayer book, reminiscent of the biblical burnt offering from which he takes its names, reminds us of the Union Prayer Book’s recognition that we can only know God:

When Justice burns within us like a flaming fire,
When love evokes willing sacrifice from us
When, to the last full measure of selfless devotion,
We demonstrate our belief in the ultimate triumph
Of truth and righteousness. (UPB, p. 39)

On this festival of Pesach, and on this 150th anniversary of Einhorn’s forced evacuation from Baltimore, let us ask ourselves – on what values are we willing to take a stand? On what values are we willing to speak even if doing so brings about controversy? Answering those questions requires us to feel that burning sense of justice, even if just a taste of it. There are plenty of social ills facing our world today. Where is our passion to conquer them?

A Pre-Pesach thought...

2011-04-17T07:45:00.000-07:00

I have a book on my shelf entitled, 300 Ways to ask the Four Questions. It’s a book that was lent to me by a friend, I'm embarrassed to admit, a couple of years ago -- I’ve been far too lax in returning it (BTW, if it’s owner is reading this public confession – my apologies, I haven’t forgotten that it’s yours. It’s sitting quietly in my office ready to be returned).

When the book was first offered to me, I was so excited -- 300 variations on the Four Questions! Wow. My excitement was palpable...yet that palpable excitement was quickly replaced with disappointment. It is a fascinating book, mind you. It presents the Four Questions in, literally, 300 different languages along with nuggets of information about the languages, each community represented, and the translators; and, the book is accompanied by two educational DVDs. What more could one expect? But, I thought it was going to be a book that offered 300 textual variations, not just translations, on the standard Four Questions that have been recited by the youngest Jews present at our seder tables at least the since the Middle ages.

The Four Questions are intended to draw out the telling of our story of redemption, so that the story and its lessons can be taught to the next generation. My daughter was recently asked by one of her Judaic Studies teachers, “If the Rabbinic sages were given the opportunity to add a ritual or object to our contemporary Passover seder that would further its meaning, what would you suggest?” My daughter's response, "a dictionary!" "Why?" I asked her. "To represent constant learning." (yes, I'm a proud mama!) The first thought that came to my mind: "have the adults ask the questions!"

What would you ask? The task of formulating questions requires a certain degree of curiosity and learning in and of itself. So, what questions would you ask in order to better understand our ancient and modern history? And, what lessons do you want your kids to learn from this history and from you? I look forward to the variations that arise during your seders!

Parashat Shemini & the Centennial Anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, delivered 3/26/11

2011-04-01T08:16:00.000-07:00

Perhaps there is simply too much trauma in the world taking up our collective consciousness to allow for any significant attention paid in the print media to recollecting a tragedy from a century ago. Japan, Egypt, Libya, Israel – the devastation, turmoil and violence in the mid and far East and North Africa are all vying for our attention. We must be on tragedy overload. What else could explain why in yesterday’s New York Times, Liz Taylor and Madonna took up more print space than any significant mention of the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire that took place on that very day, in that very city, exactly 100 years ago. Thank goodness for NPR! Certainly, there has been some attention paid throughout the week leading up to the anniversary, such as an article on the history of the ‘shirt waist’ and how this fashion innovation liberated women and an article highlighting the efforts of labor activist Clara Lemlich who spoke up for herself and fellow co-workers. But little attention has been paid to recalling the event itself and more importantly remembering its victims – primarily young (ages 14-23) Jewish and Italian immigrant women who worked long hours in unsafe, sweatshop conditions, six days a week in order to support their families.

A tragedy. One that far too easily could go (and has gone) largely unnoticed in modern day history books. It is hopefully mentioned in textbook discussions of the unionization of industrial America that took place at the turn of the 20th century; and, it should be mentioned in any decent survey of immigrant Jewish history in America. But, based on the blank stares I received from so many to whom I mentioned this planned sermon topic, and the growing effort in our country to limit, if not remove entirely, the ability of workers (particularly those in the public sector) to bargain collectively, I’d say we need to do a better job at remembering! There is far more to learn from the Triangle Factory tragedy than the change in hem lines that the “shirt waist” engendered!

The Triangle Shirt Waist factory was located on the upper three floors of a building in Greenwich Village just off Manhattan’s Washington Square that in its day, like the Titanic that sailed a year later, was a ‘state-of-the-art,’ safer than ever before, and ironically fire-proof building that still stands today. The innards of those top floors that housed the factory, however, went suddenly, quickly and violently up in flames late in the work day on Saturday, March 25/1911. Within a half an hour, the media reported, it was over. One hundred and forty six garment workers perished. Compounding the tragedy was the horrific fact that perhaps not all, but many of the fatalities were preventable. The fire was deemed an awful accident, the result of a not fully extinguished match or cigarette accidently tossed into a waste basket full of fabric scraps. The inability of fire fighters to reach workers (ladders were simply not high enough in those days to reach the upper floors) was a tragic, apparently unforeseeable, contributing factor to the disaster. But the entrapment, yes physical entrapment of so many workers on these high floors which lead to horrid human incineration as well as many fleeing out the windows to their death on the pavement below, was in large part a consequence of unacceptable and unregulated working conditions.

It makes us uncomfortable to remember tragedy, but we must remember this incident that still 100 years later is considered “the deadliest industrial disaster in the history of New York City [and which] resulted in the fourth highest loss of life from an industrial accident in all of US history.” To do anything else is to do a disservice to those young women and men who lost their lives trying to make a better life for themselves and their families. The owners of this shirt waist factory were themselves immigrants who had, at first glance,achieved success. But at what cost. Fully understanding the immigrants’ desperation to find jobs, they took advantage, employing newcomers at low wages, and literally locking them in during their long shifts at one of the largest shirtwaist factories in the city. Two years earlier, in 1909, these owners had managed to withstand a 13-week industry-wide strike aimed at achieving better conditions and union representation. Sadly, it took this terrible fire and the resulting deaths to galvanize the needed support for organized labor and mandated humane working conditions.

There are those who argue that the need for collective bargaining, for unionization, has passed: we’ve learned the lesson and unions are by nature corrupt. I’m sure the system needs to adapt to the changing needs of both employers and employees of the 21st century; and I’d bet there are enormous inequities within the system that must be addressed; but, to argue that the need for a voice that speaks up and on behalf for the worker has become irrelevant is short-sighted. There are some of us who may feel we don’t need such representation but there are members of our society who do. And,those who do often fall into the most economically needy strata of our society.

Contrary to what has been voiced on the congressional floor in Wisconsin and elsewhere, our economic woes are not due to the pension plans and various protections our public sector employees generally receive. Our economic woes are due to far more complex issues including financial mis-management coupled with the abuses – or perhaps woefully idealistic wishful thinking - within the banking and lending sector of a few years back. Stripping workers of the ability to bargain collectively – particularly those workers who are taking care of educating our children, for example, or making sure our public facilities work - will not balance any state’s budget in the long run. It may just strip individuals of the basic right to work effectively in a safe environment for a decent and sustainable wage.

Parashat Shemini contains the troubling story of Nadav and Abihu, the 2 sons of Aaron who perish in fire due to their rogue efforts at worship. Could that disaster been prevented if communal and collective concerns were taken into consideration? Perhaps. Certainly there is an abundance of Rabbinic debate regarding how to understand Nadav and Abihu’s failure, debate that Mathew, in honor of his being called to Torah as a Bar Mitzvah, will now take a moment to discuss.

To Change or not to Change: the Lesson from Verizon

2011-03-20T07:29:00.000-07:00

By nature, we humans are not very adaptable. I was recently reminded of this reality of our general character last Shabbat when The Baltimore Sun announced, brace yourself, Verizon’s plan to discontinue their weather and time hotlines. Big news. These must have been national services provided under the grand ma-Bell system, for these services were a mainstay of daily life in Philadelphia, too, where I grew up. “Mom,” I remember shouting, “How cold is it outside?” “Pick up the phone and call the weather,” she’d respond with an irritation I didn’t fully understand until I myself was a parent. She was a mom, not a local meteorologist. And, the time hotline – how else would we know to what time to set our clocks after a power outage? How many of us called over and over again to make sure we had it just right? Well my detail oriented bordering on OCD Dad did; though, to his defense these were pre-digital age clocks. The very act of winding them to the proper time could shave seconds, maybe even a minute, off its exactitude. Having a the TI-4 hotline kept our clocks in line.

Like I’m sure many other kids of at least my generation, and perhaps beyond in both directions, my friends and I would pass time dialing these services. Was it really true that any four digits when coupled with “We-6“ or “Ti-4“ would bring up the weather or time? A silly occupation for sure, but recall dialing the phone – yes, the experience of dialing short versus long digits on the rotary wheel – and then waiting for the connection from that anonymous place on the other end was actually compelling. And the prospect of debunking this known truth? We may never have succeeded, but that wasn’t the point. The prospect of it held our attention.

Though I frankly had no idea these free services still existed (and apparently they haven’t in my hometown since 2008), my first reaction was of reminiscent disbelief. How could they disconnect these basic – even fundamental - community services? How comforting it was to know that the weather and time were just a phone call away! Common sense quickly replaced my nostalgia. The very fact that I still know these numbers by their archaic call letters, WE & TI, points to the last time I dialed them with any regularity. By High School, my home phone number, Wilson-7 – 5916, was so well replaced by 947-5916 that I barely thought about its regional predecessor. It took a few more years before I stopped having to think “Hi-6” in order to find the numerical equivalents for my cousins’ less often dialed numbers, but it happened eventually. I vaguely recalling having to learn the numerical equivalents of WE and TI, I must have had a phone without letters for a time, but beats me what they are. Those phones numbers are firmly and perhaps perpetually engraved in my memory with their historic alphabetical exchanges.

We no longer need these services anymore – that’s clear. When my daughter needs the weather, she pulls up an app. If she asks me, I pull up an app (sometimes more than one - don't ask me why, but I have three weather apps on my phone). We haven’t needed these services in decades. There are a myriad of ways in which to find out the time when our power goes out, from our battery operated digital alarm clocks to our highly sophisticated smart phones. There are, and have been for a long time, far more convenient, and at least as accurate, sources for this information. So what has taken the phone company so long?

We don’t like change. Our Torah holds out an extraordinary example. Truth be told, the sacrificial cult most likely lost meaning for most long before the destruction of the Temple, but it took the Roman conquest to substantiate change in the primary and preferred, methods of worship. One can imagine that without the events of 70 CE, the Temple and its rites may just have gradually fallen away, losing significance in people’s lives. Without something clearly formulated to replace it, Judaism may have disappeared. The brilliance of Rabbinic Judaism is that it innovatively packaged and delivered a compelling replacement for the Temple at just the right time. Certainly, crisis forced change – change that lead to renewed vibrancy in part because there was no choice. But, that change would not have happened or succeeded without an openness to new ideas and constructs that had to have long preceeded the fall of the Temple.

Are our synagogues any different today? I’d argue that (as I have often in our various working committees) one of our failures is that, in large measure, we function as we did in the middle decades of last century. Despite parents’ changing work patterns, we hold religious school at virtually the same hours, though fewer of them due to the competition with other activities. We make cosmetic changes to worship, moving the time, creating a kid friendly environment, trying new melodies and band arrangements, bringing in speakers; yet despite mediocre interest, as reflected in attendance, in these changes, we remain wedded to the Friday night worship model of the Reform movement. On the other hand, attendance on Shabbat morning, once an embarrassment to the Reform movement, at least at Temple Emanuel is remarkably healthy. Our auxillaries too struggle with lack of participation in activities that were extremely popular decades ago and with finding activities that will be compelling to today’s busy families.

We must be open to change. At the same time, the fact that we read about the sacrificial cult year after year in our Torah cycle even though we have no intention of recreating this system of worship should remind us that we must always remain cognizant of our history as we remain open to new ideas and visions. Indeed, many of our members and committees are doing just that. TESCA, for example, our Temple Emanuel Studio of Cooperative Artists is not only innovative but it creates excitement, interest, and energy while remaining fully grounded in Torah, Avodah, and Gemilut Chasadim, the three tenets of Rabbinic Judaism. A few members of our board are beginning to look forward to the aging of the Jewish community (a phenomenon parallel to the aging of America thanks to the baby boomers) and how we as a synagogue must respond. This conversation is vital to our future.

Change need not, should not in most cases, be revolutionary, but let’s be sure that we don’t take as long as the phone company does to respond to change. Let’s be more like our ancient ancestors, the early rabbinic factions, in particular, who were willing to make change. That willingness – the ability to respond to modernity - ultimately served to preserve Jewish life through tremendous crisis. And it serves as a worthy model of emulation as we strive to make our congregation and Jewish institutions generally responsive to the 21st century.

Shabbat Vayakhel: A Lesson in Community Building, delivered 2/26/2011

2011-02-28T12:37:00.000-08:00

It is striking that the Torah spends so much time and energy on the details of the Tabernacle. For the past three weeks, we’ve been reading about the details of this enormous building project. Any one ready to move on yet? Due to the Jewish leap year, parshiot Vahakhel and Pekude are read separately this year. So, we have another week to go. Anyone else want to speak about the building of the Tabernacle? After this Shabbat, I think I'm done.

The big events in Biblical history, the ones we recall regularly in our liturgy and celebrate in our festival cycle -- Creation (כי ששת ימים עשה יי את השמים ואת הארץ וביום השביעי שבת וינפש); Exodus, redemption, from Egyptian bondage; and Revelation of law and the forming of covenant at Sinai – don’t take up a lot of space in the Torah. They don’t have to. The drama of these events speaks for itself. We’ve experienced, as best as we can from our reading and study, the drama of, for example, revelation. Its presentation in the text is so extraordinary that it is hard for us to wrap our modern, rational minds around the episode. Redemption, too – come on, a splitting sea? No, we can’t explain it. We can try to rationalize it as unexplainable miracle or complete myth; but, regardless of how we as liberal readers come to terms with the text, the dramatic presentation helps imprint the episodes on our communal memory. That moment is ours as much as it was our ancestors who stood in the midbar at the foot of a mountain called Sinai, and the editor didn’t need an abundance of space to get that vital point across. The building of the Tabernacle, on the other hand, isn’t particularly dramatic, and it shouldn’t be. Those of us who have built anything know that drama in construction projects usually means trouble. More to the point, however, Judaism celebrates formative events in the community’s, namely the Israelite community’s, development, not buildings.

So then, why all this attention to building materials and instructions? Why the tedious, meticulous, and frankly repetitious, detail regarding how to construct the Tabernacle and all that goes into it? As I’ve reflected on other occasions, these are not simple, IKEA-style ‘one man or woman can do it,’ instructions. With regard to the planks, for example, our text instructs “...The length of each … was 10 cubits, and the width, a cubit and a 1/2. Each shall have two tenons, parallel to each other...make 20 planks on the south side, making 40 silver sockets under the 20 planks, 2 sockets under the one plank for its two tenons and 2 sockets under each...” and so on. I consider myself pretty handy. I’ve put together my share of IKEA-do-it-yourself type furniture. I know how to use a drill. However, if anything came with instructions as convoluted and demanding as these apparently dictated by God; sorry God, the project wouldn’t get done…certainly not by me alone.

The Biblical narrative doesn’t give the Israelites that choice, the choice to say, ‘no thank you, God, we don’t need a Tabernacle.’ But, perhaps we are assuming that they had no choice. Imagine if the Tabernacle didn’t get built. This week’s Torah portion is a repetition of instructions. Earlier the instructions are given to the community, Parashat Vayakhel reports how they were done. And this is precisely the point; for, if the Tabernacle didn’t get built, the entire story of the Israelites would end here. Just as important as redemption and revelation is the building of the Tabernacle - not a miracle performed dramatically by God and experienced by the people due to Divine grace; but rather, a miracle performed by the determined and cooperative labors of the people.

The Tabernacle - the mishkan - the first formal place of worship, of gathering for the community. A place that is to serve as symbol of both God’s presence and communal unity. Certainly, we are not defined by the buildings we build. The text makes it very clear that it is not the material gifts that determine the success. We read that so many gifts were brought, so many material offerings, that Moses was forced to proclaim to all: "אלֹ־יאשוּ עוד מלאכה לתרומת הקדש" - stop making further effort toward gifts for the sanctuary. Stop your individual donations. We should be so fortunate as to have to stop individual gift giving.

What is needed is community action, not more stuff. All the materials - the blue, purple & crimson yarns for example, the dolphin skins, the gold, the talents of silver described at length - none of it matters if the Israelites are unable to work together to get it done. No matter the amount of material riches bestowed on any community, our synagogues included, not a penny of it is worth a damn unless the individuals work together towards a unified goal.

The Israelite saga - their growth from a vagabond group of slaves into a people with a shared identity and mission is begun with redemption and revelation, but it is solidified by accomplishing this great and awesome task. Only now, not as passive recipients of God’s interventions, but rather as active partners with God and the community, can the Israelites continue their journey. Yes, a lot of textual space is given to the descriptions regarding and the building of this first mishkan, and the descriptions are at times dull, but we will learn that they finish. Finally next week, we will read, “וַתֵּ֕כֶל כּל־עבוד֕ת משכּ֖ן א֣הל מוע֑ד” “Thus was completed all the work of the Tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting. No splitting sea, no smoke and thunder, but the level of cooperation and mutual respect required in order to complete this task is just as, if not more, miraculous. It is certainly worthy of emulation!

Shabbat Tetzvah: a Reflection on BJC Advocacy Day 2011, Delivered Shabbat Tetzaveh, 2/12/2011

2011-02-20T08:19:00.000-08:00

You shall further instruct the Israelites…. This week’s Torah portion, parashat T’tzaveh, continues to outline details of the tabernacle. Specifically, this part of the narrative gives instruction regarding Aaron’s cloths, the attire for the priesthood, and the consecration ceremony for Aaron and his sons, who will serve as High Priest and priests respectively. What should we make of the attention to clothes? At first glance the focus on outerwear seems frivolous – really, is all this chazarai necessary? Beautiful yes – gold, blue, purple & crimson yarns, precious stones and metals – but aren’t there are far more important matters with which we should be concerned? The detailing of Aaron’s attire, however, highlights the weight of responsibility his role as High Priest engenders.

The breast plate – I imagine a weighty hunk of metal and precious stone (see Ex 28:15 ff), served as a tangible (if not burdensome) reminder of history that helped guide Aaron in leading the people towards their future. Also included on that plate of metal that was fastened to Aaron’s garment, were the Urim and Tummim, two items that defy any definite translation and thus remain fodder for commentary. Rashi explains that the Urim and Tummim “הוא כתב שם המפרש was an inscription of the Proper Name of God.” Accordingly, God, via the urim and tummim, literally enlightened the correct path, or in other words gave foresight to decisions, for the leaders of the community (i.e., the High Priest).

Leaders are a necessary element of any organized and functional society. At the same time, so are the people who are lead. The details provided in the narrative surrounding the ceremony of consecration/ordination of Aaron’s sons into the priesthood make it clear that the community’s presence is vital; it is not private, but public, ritual. The entire community bears witness to the responsibility that Aaron takes on when he lays his hands on that animal about to be sacrificed. It is a heavy moment weighted down, not only by the ornate clothing described moments earlier – can we imagine overseeing this messy ritual dressed as he must - but by the responsibility the community places on Aaron and his sons. The medieval commentator, Nachmanides, notes that Aaron’s sons are named at the start of this portion so that it is clear that their role as priests is not taken for granted. They may have been born into the opportunity for this role; but they, too, like their father, must accept the mantle of leadership their birthright offers them publically, in plain sight of the community.

This past Tuesday, I along with a group of members from Temple Emanuel, visited the State Capitol along with other representatives of the Jewish community in an effort to make our voices heard in the state legislature. Organized by the Baltimore Jewish Council (BJC), this annual Advocacy Day gives us – the Baltimore Jewish community - the opportunity to meet our legislators and speak out regarding issues that impact not only the Jewish community specifically but the welfare of all Marylanders.

Our leaders bear a burden on our behalf. The sacrifices they are required to make in order to forward their legislative agenda are often far less public than those made by the House of Aaron; yet, they make as indelible an impact, and it is up to us to remain present, supporting their efforts even if through debate, and holding them accountable for their work. We must, like our biblical ancestors, bear witness to the decisions and actions of our leaders. It is easy to avoid this responsibility. In the biblical period, the smoke and fumes must have made it almost impossible not to participate in the events performed by the priests even if one wanted to avoid them. But today, we must make a conscious effort to be present and participate – our senses won’t be so easily seduced by the rituals of governmental process.

This year, I was invited by the BJC to serve as a group leader for Advocacy Day. Basically that role entails taking the lead in opening the discussions within in our small group visits with our legislators. My first thought, “no thank you. I'll be happy to take a back seat.” Luckily, I resisted responding automatically (which for those of you who know me well know is not an easy feat for me). For all of the times I stand on this bema and commend our confirmation students for their efforts on Capitol Hill each winter, for all of the times I encourage others to actively participate in the political process at the very least by staying attuned to issues that impact our community, how could I refuse taking such a role? So, I followed my second, more reasoned,thought and accepted.

I lead two visits while in Annapolis on Tuesday evening. The first to Senator Karen Montgomery, coincidentally enough from Montgomery County (District 14), the second to Senator Ronald Young of District 3 representing both Frederick and Washington Counties. Both senators were already quite supportive of the legislation for which we were advocating on behalf of the BJC, thus our discussions broadened out to include the realities of public service and leadership. Senator Young, for instance, shared with us how he very much supported the Lorraine Sheehan Health and Community Services Act (better known as the alcohol tax bill) and hopes it passes, but at the same time can’t vote for it due to his commitment to a campaign promise he made to his constituents, a campaign promise that helped him win office against a candidate with decidedly more conservative views, a candidate who would not be supportive of the issues valued by the BJC and much of the Jewish community. By the way, this bill is supported by the Baltimore Jewish Council because of the many important and vital communal services this tax can support in the community.

We discussed the costs and benefits of a Senate Bill that would enable children born to illegal immigrants, assuming they meet certain qualifying standards, to be eligible for in state tuition to Maryland colleges and universities. We discussed the very real budgetary challenge of maintaining necessary public services that serve the elderly and victims of domestic violence, among others. Laying one’s hands on a bull and readying it for slaughter may be far more visceral in the moment, but the impact of being involved in making the kinds of fiscal decisions our legislators must can be just as lasting as taking the life of a living and breathing animal.

Both of the Senators with whom we met were co-sponsors of the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Act, legislation that was on the forefront of everyone’s mind in Annapolis on Tuesday due to the legislative hearings on the topic that took place that day. As a representative of the BJC, I was not able to thank Senators Montgomery and Young for their support of what I consider to be necessary legislation. The BJC represents the entire Baltimore Jewish Community, and as I was delicately informed, there simply “isn’t consensus within the Baltimore Jewish community,” thus, the BJC cannot take a stand. That being said, I did thank the legislators on my own behalf, making it clear that I was speaking as a representative of the liberal Jewish community and not of the BJC on this issue.

The BJC must speak on behalf of the entire Jewish community and thus can only speak out on issues on which there is consensus. As individuals, however, the power of free speech allows us (perhaps should compel us) to voice our opinion on any issue of import to us. One disconcerting observation from my participation in Advocacy Day over the past few years: the Reform community is simply not well represented. We proudly send our kids to the Religious Action Center – hundreds of teens representing congregations throughout the country descend on Capitol Hill repeatedly (the RAC runs 6 or 7 L’Taken well attended seminars each year), and yet how many of us as adults have ever taken the opportunity, whether on a local or national level, to participate in the legislative process. We should. And recent events in Egypt serve to remind us to appreciate and take advantage of the opportunity we, as Americans, have in this legislative process.

Luckily our political leaders don’t have to be weighted down physically with the kind of garb that decorated our biblical High Priest, and thank goodness our senses no longer need be assaulted by the rituals and smells of the sacrificial cult. But just as the priest’s garb can serve as a tangible reminder of the importance and responsibility of the leadership role, those now seemingly barbaric rituals witnessed by the community should serve to remind us of the need for our presence at least, and perhaps our active participation, in the rituals that serve to bring guidance and cohesion, civility and democracy to our nation.

Shabbat Shira & our Communal Responisibility, delivered by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman on 1/14/2011 (MLK Weekend)

2011-01-17T05:24:00.000-08:00

Shabbat Shira. This Shabbat, Jews around the world are recalling and celebrating freedom and redemption. Tomorrow morning during our Torah reading, we will rise up and stand for the recitation of the Shira, as if we too were being led in song by Moses and Miriam on freedom’s side of the Reed Sea. This year, the remarkable confluence of Martin Luther King weekend and Shabbat Shira has inspired the Religious Action Center of the Reform Movement to mark this Shabbat as Shabbat Tzedek, the Sabbath of Righteousness and Justice, in honor of their 50 years of activism on behalf of American Jewry. At the same time, despite the desire for rejoicing these events evoke in us, a heaviness hovers over this Shabbat Shira v’Tzedek .

Last Shabbat, as I expect we all are aware by now, six people were senselessly gunned down and others seriously wounded including Arizona Representative Gabrielle Giffords, who was the apparent target of this rampage. During a week leading up to the celebration of the constant effort that our movement puts forth towards the pursuit of social justice in this nation, during a week when we are preparing to celebrate an historical moment of redemption from oppression that takes on mythic proportion in Jewish tradition, it is unthinkable that we also buried, among others, a nine year old who was already at her young age so passionate about and interested in our nation’s democratic ideals and the political process. It’s absurd to me that on a weekend when we are to celebrate the righteousness and rightness of justice over tyranny and oppression, we are instead mourning the loss of innocent life and praying for the recovery of a woman who has chosen to serve her community in an effort to make this nation more just. Especially as I sat with our teenage confirmation students in the Capitol Hill office of Senator Benjamin Cardin at 11 AM this past Monday, the very moment when our nation’s Capitol paused for that moment of thoughtful silence, I was struck with an inability to respond. Our students who had, davka, an 11 AM appointment with Senator Cardin’s staff were impacted directly as they waited through this moment of reflection in order to participate in the very legislative and democratic process that was attacked just days before.

Perhaps the scene on the shores of the Reed Sea and the communal experience of redemption can offer us some insight regarding how to formulate a meaningful and sensible response. Our Torah does not inform us of the individual experiences of redemption. Those individual experiences must have been interesting (by nature we humans are interesting individuals), but these stories weren’t worthy of retention in our sacred canon. When it comes to establishing a sense of community and a civil society, the focus must be on communal responsibility. We have to take care of each other. The Jewish concept of redemption is less about the individual; rather, it is far more about working together towards making the world a more perfect place. The communal – the shared - experience of crossing of the Reed Sea and leaving Egypt coupled with the revelation to come at Sinai will not only define this community but will give it cohesion, structure, and most importantly, a moral imperative.

In the wake of this past week’s events, Sarah Palin, in a response that was, IMHO, thoroughly and inappropriately self-serving, quoted Ronald Reagan stating, “we must reject the idea that whenever a law is broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker.” Speaking out against the concept of collective responsibility, Ms. Palin added, “we must restore the precept that each individual is accountable for his or her own actions. Acts of monstrous criminality stand on their own. They begin and end with the criminals who commit them…” On the one hand, Ms. Palin is correct. There is no question that individuals must be held responsible for their actions. However, at the same time, we cannot, we must not, stand idly by and ignore our collective culpability in a crime of this magnitude. We, as an American community, must shoulder some responsibility for creating and supporting an environment where such behavior was deemed acceptable, even if only by this one individual, and for making the tools available for him to act on his horrific impulse.

Civility requires us to bear some of the responsibility of this individual’s actions. Sarah Palin isn’t necessarily to blame (though, personally I don’t think her rhetoric of “reloading” is useful in any context outside of hunting or target practice), but our society’s current valuing of the individual over community is. The New York Times reported today that many, including friends, teachers, and administrators at the community college Mr. Loughner attended, had considerable concern regarding his attitudes and behavior. Yet save for a suspension from class, no action was taken. A college spokesperson, in explaining why further action such as mandating a psychiatric evaluation, admitted that Loughner’s behavior on campus though “disturbing, [was] not a crime.” How do we respond to such ‘disturbing’ behavior without trampling on the individual rights of the individual so that intervention occurs before ‘disturbing’ becomes not only criminal but lethal? A challenging question indeed to which no simple answer arises, yet a question with which we must struggle for the sake of the civility and righteousness of our society.

The Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., in an address to the 47th Biennial gathering of the then UAHC in 1963, stated as only he could,
“All I am saying is this, that all life is interrelated. That we are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, it affects all indirectly [and] I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.”

It is no accident that The Shira was intended to be sung by the entire community. It is not a celebration of individual achievement or honor. It provides a means of expression for the group. God has acted on behalf of an entire people and this song now allows that entire people to offer gratitude and accept responsibility accordingly. Commentary has certainly developed, and continues to develop, that works to fill in the gaps allowing us to peer into the individual experience. The midrashic poem, Leaving Egypt, by Merle Feld, offers a lovely example:
The night is so dark
And I am afraid.
I see nothing, smell nothing,
The only reality –
I am holding my mother’s hand.

And as we walk
I hear the sounds
Of a multitude in motion –
In front, behind,
All around,
A multitude in motion.

I have no thought of tomorrow,
Now , in the darkness,
There is only motion
And my mother’s hand. (published by the URJ in The Women’s Commentary)

It is also no accident that this multitude is depicted as singing The Shira. It seems to be a strange time to sing. Yes, the group has arrived safely through their arduous journey after years and years of bondage; but, you’d think they’d be too tired and emotional distraught from their flight (let alone the trauma of watching the waters crash down upon their enemy, their former neighbors) to sing. Yet, the biblical redactor forces us to stretch our imagination by incorporating this ‘song’, a literary piece decidedly older than the narrative in which it is embedded into the narrative. The song works to imprint the entire episode onto our communal memory. The Shira, is an extraordinary work of poetry that is used to make sure that we never forget this episode in OUR history. The song reminds us and compels us to act justly in the world and to indeed continue our work towards making this a safe, civil, and democratic nation -- one of which Martin Luther King, Jr. would be proud.

Who's Serach? A D'var Torah for Parashat Vayigash in Honor of Sylvia Eisenberg's 80th Birthday

2010-12-13T09:20:00.001-08:00

One of my favorite biblical characters, a matriarch of sorts – though not a familiar one as those made famous by their roles in the patriarchal history and their association with Abe, Isaac, and Jake – is Serach daughter of Asher. Serach. Who’s she, you might ask.

Serach, according to the biblical text is quite simply, the daughter of Jacob’s son Asher. Serach is far from a major character in our biblical text which frankly makes her all the more interesting to me, and to the Rabbinic mind, makes her mention significant. Recall, the traditional rabbinic approach to Torah study views every detail, not matter how small or seemingly insignificant as vital to our proper understanding of Torah. Serach thus calls attention.

Serach is mentioned twice in Torah – included in family listings with no additional detail, no additional narrative. In this week’s parashat Vayigash, Serach appears in a genealogical listing of Jacob’s progeny. Amongst all of Jacob’s grandsons listed as entering Egypt is Serach, his one named granddaughter (see Gen 46:8-26, spec. 17). According to the biblical narrative, Jacob will be blessed with another granddaughter born while in Egypt, one of whom we are very familiar: Yocheved sired by Levi who grows up to be mom to Moses, Aaron, & Miriam. Serach is thus not unique in her role as granddaughter to our patriarch Jacob; however, remarkably Asher’s daughter Serach is remembered here in this listing of those who enter Egypt AND again later among those counted in the census taken bamidbar, in the wilderness, some 400 years after descending into Egypt! Moreover, the way in which she is listed in this second accounting is striking. This census is taken by clan, למשפחתם (Numbers 26:4 ff). Everyone is listed per their group identity, by family, save for Serach. She alone is remembered as an individual, ושם בת אשר שרח (Num 26:46) – by name.

On the one hand, we can scold the hand that authored the Torah for failing to give us the back story to this extraordinary remembering of Serach; but, at the same time this lack of detail here leaves open a wonderful opportunity for the Rabbinic imagination. And the Rabbis don’t let us down. Serach is imagined to be the longest living individual of our Jewish history. Longevity a reward for sensitive honesty; for according to midrash, it is Serach who delicately informed Jacob through song that Joseph was still alive. Talmudic legend imagines that it was Serach who showed Moses were Joseph was buried at the time of the Exodus from Egypt so that his bones could be returned to Canaan (B. Sotah 13a). Serach is viewed as a font of wisdom as well as compassion in Rabbinic literature. The medival Midrash Rabbah (Genesis Rabbah 94:9) places Serach in role of Secretary of State negotiating with David’s army chief, Joab. Another midrash imagines Serach, not unlike the prophet Elijah, as a reconciler of disputes. Though, whereas we must wait for redemption in order to hear Elijah’s judgements, Serach offers astute resolution in the moment to Rabbinic disagreements. You see, Serach is generally consulted to resolve conflict over past events. Remember she apparently was there to witness these events and thus is able to provide wise and insightful comment. Even our mystical tradition elevates Serach to great heights. The Zohar, that great mystical work that came out of medieval Spain to serve as a spring board for later Kabbalism, particularly Lurianic Kabbalism, teaches that Serach is among the few who have entered heaven alive where she remains teaching Torah.

Serach is an extraordinary figure, almost too extraordinary. Perhaps because there aren’t many female biblical characters, Serach’s shoulders get burdened by the full weight of creative possibility. She is wise, independent, and capable of rendering a serious and accurate judgment in a world not generally inhabited by women. She is at the same time nurturing, caring, and always present giving – teaching – to others. Indeed, the Rabbis have burdened Serach with being that 'superwoman', multi-tasking exemplar that we thought only stood as an unattainable role model since the mid- late 20th century.

Our biblical and rabbinic literature needs Serach! There simply aren’t enough strong female characters in our ancient and medieval literature to serve as inspiration for our young students studying Torah today. Too often, we have trouble finding those figures even in our modern history for their stories, like Serach’s, haven’t been documented in primary accounts. But strong, wise, and capable women have always been present in our history.

Sixty-seven, sixty-eight years ago, it wasn’t customary to celebrate a young girl’s coming of age with the kind of educational and leadership demands with which the majority of Jews do so today. Be clear, Rabbinic literature discusses a girl’s coming of age in the same detail as a boy’s – it is a maturational milestone; but due to differing gender roles of the ancient and medieval periods, the celebration of this milestone took on very, very different qualities. This Shabbat, we celebrate an important milestone for one of those strong, wise and capable women, and that milestone is far more than the 80th birthday of a beloved and remarkable member of our congregation. Sylvia’s journey to the bema this morning serves as exemplary a model of wisdom and compassion as our rabbinically imagined Serach, and even more so, because we know Sylvia is real! She is right here.

It is not for me to share details of Sylvia journey, that is for her to share as she pleases, but her kindness, her dedication to pursuing her education when and how she did in particular, her generosity of spirit which she brings into the congregation every time she steps into worship, study, and/or volunteer, her strength of character which has served her through challenge, and her ongoing and steadfast commitment to Torah -- these qualities serve as a continual inspiration to me personally and should to all of us blessed to know her. Thank you, Sylvia, for sharing your special birthday with us in the manner in which you have. Thank you for inspiring us to Torah.

As Reform Jews, it is incumbent upon us to continually grapple with text and tradition even when it challenges, perhaps all the more so when it challenges our modern sensibilities. How do we understand an ancient text that at first glance places women at best on the margins of community? As exemplified by Serach, Rabbinic tradition, even early medieval Rabbinic tradition already starts the process of challenging tradition. As exemplified by our modern midrashic poets, such as the one whose work I will share in a moment, that process continues. I conclude with a poetic midrash included in the 2008 URJ publication of The Women’s Commentary, a book that inspires the women’s Torah study group that Sylvia helped to organize in our community. This poem furthers the voice and discussion of Serach and ultimately challenges all of us to model both Serach and Sylvia as we work to find our voice in Torah and Jewish tradition.

Serah bat Asher, by Hara E. Person
Entranced by the swirling colors of his tunic
I crept behind Joseph when Grandfather sent
him to find his brothers.
Hidden behind a bush,
I watched my father and Reuben and the others.
Young and female and powerless
I could do nothing to stop them
But I saw the cruel truth behind the lie.
Trapped between the responsibility of a
daughter’s loyalty
and the heavy guilt of my secret knowledge,
I could not bring forth the words
That would have revealed my father and his
brothers
for what they became that day
and released my grandfather from his suffering.
Instead I withdrew into the safety of silence,
learning to whisper through the music of my
harp
while my refusal to speak
mocked my father’s now empty authority.
They were relieved to let me stay with Jacob
in his tent,
hearing only the endless anguish of an old man
and the stubborn silence of a useless girl.
I played and he remembered,
recounting the travels and wanderings of our family,
the pains and joys and dreams of each
generation.
He spoke of love and treachery and
Misunderstanding,
and I created a soothing idiom of song.

It was I who was chosen to tell Jacob that
Joseph lives still.
Upon hearing the news he granted me eternal
life.
Endless life, for Joseph’s life.
I became the family historian,
the keeper of tales,
the finder of bones,
the weaver of loose ends.
That is my gift from my grandfather,
to revisit the sufferings and joys and wanderings
anew with each generation,
to observe endless cycles of loss and hope and
pain,
of births and deaths,
never to rest, never to finish, only to witness,
to drag these weary limbs through epoch after
epoch
and to wonder until the end of time
if this gift is a blessing of thanks for solace in
his loss
or a curse for having kept the truth from him all
those long years.
(Ezkenazi, Tamara Cohn & Weiss, Andrea L., eds. The Torah A Women's Commentary. NY: URJ Press, 2008, p. 280)

Responding to Israel's need... Shabbat Message 12/10/2010

2010-12-08T08:27:00.000-08:00

One of the most extraordinary stops during my recent trip to Israel with the Maryland Clergy Initiative was the Yemin Orde Youth Village. Founded by visionary educator, Haim Peri, Yemin Orde is an absorption and educational center devoted to making sure every child in Israel has a safe environment within which to live while having access to education. Be clear that I did not say “Jewish child.” Yemin Orde is committed to providing resources to any child in need. One of their largest populations is orphaned Ethiopian children, but they strive to take in any child who is orphaned, abandoned, or simply in need. Haim Peri’s vision, which is still central to the values of the center, encompasses providing “trusty representations of parental roles” so that the students learn to feel safe, cherished, and able to rely on adults. This foundation of care and trust enables these students to move forward becoming functional and productive members of society. At the same time, Yemin Orde always remains home for all the students who have spent time there.

Tragically, due to its geographic location, Yemin Orde suffered horrific devastation during the fires that have just struck northern Israel. Luckily no one was killed, yet over 500 children have been displaced, children for whom this was not their first displacement. I expect that you have already received requests for aid to Israel to help offset the costs of this devastating fire. I ask you, if you are planning to make a donation to Israel at this time, please consider sending your donation directly to The Yemin Orde Youth Village in order to help them rebuild and continue to provide the extraordinary services they provide to the youth of this region.

Yemin Orde’s website is below. Please explore the website so that you can learn about them. Specifically, I encourage you to look under the “News” menu tab and compare “snapshots from the village” with “Israel wildfire update.” Thank you for considering this act of tzedakah!

www.yeminorde.org

A Comment on the Rally for Fear &/or Sanity, Parashat Toldot, 11/6/2010

2010-11-08T07:30:00.000-08:00

Yes, I’m going to talk about it. The Rally for Sanity &/or Fear. How can I not? Here we sit reading parashat Toldot the tale of sibling rivalry that was so fundamental that it started in the womb; a rivalry that can easily be likened to partisanship due to the striking differences in their core values; A rivalry that sadly serves as too familiar an example of the level of animosity that exists in our country between the right and the left.

We could dismiss this rally as entertainment. A comic display presented by two very adept performers joined on stage (or at moments by satellite) by a myriad of big name musicians and actors. They even gave out crowd pleasing awards! It was an organizational feat of production from assuring security, sound, visuals, and the plethora of necessary porta-potties that added to the hundreds already present but on reserve for the Marine Corps Marathon scheduled for the next day. And, thankfully, they succeeded in this feat -- it was thoroughly entertaining and went on without any serious glitches, a few clogged subways and a lot of crowds, but all in all, a peaceful and well executed event.

Of course, entertainment was the vehicle, the guise if you will for a rally that was planned with a clear and and very serious (and well organized) political agenda. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert were not two random comedians seeking an audience and a laugh on a beautiful Shabbat afternoon to boost their ratings. Satirists, they each host shows that while aired on Comedy Central offer at least as much news and far more pointed commentary than many of our mainstream news outlets.

In character last Shabbat, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert could be likened to our biblical pro - and antagonist. Mr. Stewart to the peaceful Jacob seeking a reasonable, calm, even studious way in which to function in the world and Mr. Colbert to the quarrelsome and rancorous Esau determined to make his way fully armed and ready for battle. If we trust the biblical story, we know that reason will win out. Jacob, not Esau, earns the distinction of patriarch in our tradition. But, biblical narrative while sacred, it is still story. Are we confident, particularly after the anger displayed on both sides of the political table in the days leading up to Tuesdays election, that our country won’t fall victim to Esau’s (or Colbert’s) hostility and overt animosity?

When I first heard of this rally for “Sanity &/or Fear” marketed on their respective shows during the days immediately following Beck’s luke warm Tea Party rally, I assumed it was a well- executed joke. This was the comedy channel after all, and well, Beck left himself open to be the brunt of at least a few jokes. I doubt I was alone in thinking they were just after a laugh; and yet, clearly this wasn’t a joke. Stewart and Colbert have touched on a very real and open nerve in our society. Many of our politicians are behaving badly, and they often work to incite and divide the public rather than working towards bringing us together. Moreover, we are getting fed up and frustrated with this status quo. As the New York Times reported, “Some in the crowd expressed regret that it was comedians, not politicians who were able to channel [our] frustration.” America needed this rally, and its timing just days before an important election in our country couldn’t have been better chosen.

We must not fall victim to our politician’s and the media’s attempt to divide us into angry camps motivated to action primarily by fear of the other. Rather, we must continually remind ourselves that when we get down to it, we all are seeking the same results: a healthy economy, equitable access to health care, a safe, clean, and decent living environment, good schools. Ensuring these and other expectations requires not fear laden and quarrelsome behavior but rather compassion and, to quote the rally’s writers, ‘reasonableness.’ Based on the attendance, the reaction by the media, and the number of people I know who tuned in on TV, we Americans are doing just that – living, doing the best we can, and most importantly respecting each other’s opinion. And, let’s hope our politicians were paying attention!

Living Fully - the Lesson of Chaye Sarah, the life of Sarah, delivered on 'New Member Shabbat' 10/29/2010

2010-11-01T08:04:00.000-07:00

ויהיו חיי שרה מאה שנה ועשרים שנה ושבע שנים שני חיי שרה
It is an interesting start to this section of Torah that spends a so much time narrating death. Sarah’s and Abraham’s death both are accounted for within the verses of parashat Chaye Sarah.

ויהיו חיי שרה מאה שנה ועשרים שנה ושבע שנים שני חיי שרה
Sarah lived - 100 years and 20 years and 7 years…These are the years of Sarah we are told. But then, despite the fact that this is the only time a matriarch’s age is reported at the time of death, and it is done so in such an unusual and elongated manner, no other details of her life are reported. That’s it. After that first sentence, the text continues immediately to her death, the arrangements Abraham makes for her burial, and perhaps more significantly the arrangements he makes to ensure – as best as he is able - his (and Sarah’s) future progeny.

There is no shortage of Rabbinic commentary on this opening verse and specifically on the unique notation of Sarah’s age (100 years & 20 years & 7 years). Midrash Rabbah, for example, explains that her life span is notated as such because Sarah’s years on earth were unblemished. Accordingly, “at the age of twenty she was as at the age of seven in beauty, and at the age of a hundred she was as at the age of twenty in sin.” In this scenario, youth is the gold standard for measuring a good life: Sarah’s life is exemplary because even in old age, she exuded youth in appearance and behavior. In contrast, and in my mind far more satisfying, others explain that her life span is expressed in this extended manner, in this additive equation, 100 + 20 + 7, to underscore not only the length but the richness of her years – in short, this presentation is used to highlight Sarah’s ability to live fully through each stage of her life, so fully that to compact the years into one number would somehow diminish her life and the goodness she brought to the world.

Common to both of these midrashic explanations is a desire to get to know and understand Sarah beyond a simplified number. To state that her life was simply 127 years may have been too easily passed over by the reader, rather, 100 years + 20 years + 7 years makes us stop and take notice. It makes us consider the person, the human being behind the number.

Despite a Jewish reticence to counting people directly, the Jewish community seems obsessed with numbers. Tradition has us go to extremes to avoid counting or pointing out individuals using, for example: ‘not 1, not 2…’ or the words of Mah Tovu when counting a minyan for worship instead of the far more direct, “1,2,3…” ; yet, for all other purposes, we are intent on taking a numerical count. Not so unlike the biblical or national census, we too implement demographic surveys of our community. We count the number of families on our congregational rosters and take pride in increasing membership numbers. We count the number of students in our religious schools rejoicing when the numbers swell. But I wonder,how useful is this celebration of quantity?

There are many good reasons to know how many of us there are. Certainly we need to know the size of our community so that we can ensure that resources are in place for the proper care and support of each and every member of our community. But, far too often, our numbers are used instead to make a judgment of quality or success. 127 years - Sarah’s life was, at least according to our modern reckoning, long. But the text coupled with our rabbinic understanding of the text makes it clear, the number of years – the quantity – is far less important than how she lived them.

This Shabbat we celebrate and welcome our new members including the number of whom could not be present this evening. Of course, we are excited when our numbers increase. But, far more than being happy about in increase to some numerical tally, we are thrilled to have each new member family become a part of our Temple Emanuel community. We take in being a small and caring congregational community devoted to Torah, worship, and social justice. We have to count our numbers. Like any organization, we can’t avoid the business of numbers. The building, the staff, the programming and materials we use – all of this requires the counting of numbers in order to ensure survival; but as best as we are able, and perhaps to our detriment when it comes to finances, the leadership of Temple Emanuel is far less interested in the size of our congregation than in the human beings that join and participate together in our synagogue community.

As I noted at the start, Parashat Chaye Sarah, this portion known in hebrew as, The Life of Sarah, narrates paradoxically, the deaths of both Abraham and Sarah. At the same time, the portion also offers a glimpse into the future. Isaac is paired with Rebecca – literally, in Sarah’s tent no less – before the end of the narrative and Abraham’s progeny with his other wives is listed. Noteworthy is that numbers are not offered in this tally of future progeny, rather individual names are listed. The Torah is clear. Sarah and Abraham’s legacy will continue; but, numbers will not ensure that legacy, people and their actions will.

As new members of Temple Emanuel, you have a choice. You can remain counted solely as a listing on the congregation roster, as part of one lump sum, remaining virtually anonymous; or, you can get involved and be counted by the fullness of your actions. It is my and the Temple leadership’s hope that you will choose the latter, for in that way, we get to know you, you get to know us, and together we can ensure a long and extended legacy of Reform Jewish life here in our community.

Starving in a Environment of Abundance, delivered Erev Yom Kippur 5771

2010-09-29T12:26:00.000-07:00

The choice to fast. A choice many of us feel compelled to make as we observe this yontif of Yom Kippur. Fasting goes hand in hand with the observance with Yom Kippur, a biblically rooted and weighty expectation of this holiday. The Levitical hand reminds us that this should be a day in which ועניתם את נפשיכם, we practice “self affliction.” (Lev 23:27) According to the Mishnah, fasting is but one of five ways in which we are to practice ‘self-affliction.’ We are also to abstain from bathing, the use of soaps and perfumes, wearing leather shoes, and sexual relations. (M. Yoma 8.1) Yet, for most of us, fasting has become the primary and most identifiable way in which we put ourselves in that temporary state of self denial intended to help us focus our full attention on the task of t’shuvah, of repentence. How fortunate we are to be in such a position that we can choose such self affliction!

Fasting has always been associated with religious expression and can be found as a form of ritual observance in all mainstream religions. In the ancient world, fasting was considered a direct means to spiritual enlightenment -- to God. In his critique of unintentful fasting, the prophet Isaiah (as we will hear tomorrow morning) forwards fasting as a vehicle for self-improvement. It should lift us and propel us towards working for the betterment of the world!

Fasting as a tool for spiritual enlightenment has now become popular outside of mainstream religious life, so popular that it became subject matter for journalist David Rokaff who experimented with fasting for a segment of National Public Radio’s This American Life. Despite its Norman Rockwell-esque title, Baltimore born Ira Glass’ This American Life offers a far more realistic peak into the corners of our American quirks and obsessions.

Fasts are marketed and popularized on the notion that the human body requires detoxification, an eradication of the apparently unavoidable build-up of toxins in our systems. Self improvement perhaps, but far from the type of t’shuvah our Biblical Isaiah envisioned! Many who embark on such fasts are motivated not only by the physical purge, but also by the role that fasting has played in most religions – namely that promise of spiritual enlightenment - that sense of physical and spiritual uplift not so different from what many of us seek over the next 20 hours or so.

Mr. Rokaff’s journey was enlightening for sure. Not in the way in which we might expect, yet in a way that can help us approach our Yom Kippur fasting with appropriate purpose. First, Rokaff noted the narcissistic elements of fasting. “[it] was one of the most self-obsessed things I’ve ever done in my life, and I say that as a first person journalist,” he remarked. This is a man who, as he reminds us, makes his living by being self-obsessed - experiencing life and reporting on it from the vantage point of “I”, the self. For him to acknowledge the potential for self-absorption in the exercise of fasting should serve as warning to us.

His second relevant observation surfaced after encountering a woman begging for food on the subway. Not money, mind you, but specifically food. Mr. Rokaff had no food in his bag; but, as he noted, though he might not have had food on him anyway, "no clarity or serenity in the world gave [him] the chutzpah" to admit why he didn’t have food on that particular day. His encounter underscores how fortunate most of us are that we are indeed in such a position that we can choose such self affliction.

Many are not as lucky; and the irony of the situation is that while some of the wealthiest members of our society are striving for enlightenment through the purposeful avoidance of available and plentiful nutritious offerings, the poorest members of our nation are starving in an environment of incredibly shallow abundance. The US Farm Bill’s over-funding of and prioritizing of certain crops (a result of placing corporate America over and above the needs of the consumer) has created and fostered a market saturated by an over-supply of nutritionally depressed foods in our nation and an abundance of what have been termed ‘food deserts’ in many urban areas including Baltimore.

A ‘food desert’ is a large geographic area with either no or extremely limited access to grocery stores. The residents in these areas generally have an imbalance of food choices available to them due to their dependence upon fast food outlets, convenience and liquor stores for the bulk of their shopping; they have virtually no access to affordable fresh or whole food. Public health studies have documented that residents of such ‘food deserts’ suffer physically and are at significantly increased risk of documentable diet-related health concerns such as diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and ultimately premature death. And, I’d bet they are as susceptible to a variety of other diet related stresses that are less documentable such as compromised immune systems and depression.

Those of us who have access to and thus can choose to eat, not to eat, and what to eat from a wide-range of options, may not fully comprehend the seriousness of this situation. One can argue that there is no supply in these areas because of a lack of demand. If the residents would buy it, it would be there. Yet despite the seemingly simple logic of this economically grounded argument, there are those who would remind us that the continuous lack of supply of healthy food to these areas has created a situation where the conscious ‘demand’ for anything other than nutritionally compromised foods has been virtually erased.

Anthropologist Sidney Mintz, a research professor at Hopkins who has devoted the bulk of his long career to the study of food systems, notes that we, that is human beings, are the only animal species that no longer naturally knows what to eat and moreover consciously eat foods that have the potential to do us harm. In other words, we are easily susceptible to adapting to changes in what’s offered, what’s supplied. Of course, such ‘food domestication’ as scholars call it – the fact that our mind can trump biology, is what separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom. And for all of its challenges, doubtful any of us would trade in this hallmark of our humanity. We can eat both for survival – for pure nutritional needs; but we can also savor our foods and take delight in them. Who would give up that rich chocolate bar that has little useful value beyond sheer pleasure? Those who are privy to the various chocolate stashes in my office know that I’m no advocate for removing joy from eating. But when offered only certain options, such as inexpensive, overly processed foods saturated with sugar, fat, and salt as the mainstay – what’s offered in the corner markets in these ‘food deserts’, we humans adapt quite quickly to fulfilling our hunger with food that simply won’t sustain us physically or emotionally in the long run. Our urban neighbors dwelling in these food deserts are fasting with no awareness of the magnitude of their hunger.
Awareness is the first step in challenging this complex cycle that dictates the utter lack of wholesome options in these areas and in turn distorts demand for such options. And my goal in this sermon is just that – to raise awareness about this issue, an issue that in my opinion should be on the forefront of our consciousness as liberal Jews. It is not to judge anyone’s dietary habits (I’m certainly in no position to do that: has anyone seen the chocolate stashes in my office?), but rather to help us become aware of the food options being offered to us and to our urban neighbors, the business behind those offerings, and the ultimate impact such offerings make on our society as a whole.

Awareness. “Agribusiness” -- the business behind farming and an extremely powerful lobby that greatly impacts the supply side of our food offerings due to its influence on the Farm Bill an important piece of renewable legislation that dictates government subsidies to US farmers. Under the current Farm Bill, 80% of farm subsidies go to grains that can easily be made into inexpensive, not necessarily healthful, foods; 80% goes there as opposed to fruits and vegetables. It is precisely these unbalanced food subsidies that dictate the relatively high prices of fresh food as opposed to the inexpensive prices of packaged processed food. And it is these unbalanced subsidies (and our demand for inexpensive food) that create an environment where wholesome options become simply too expensive and unavailable to many in our society. Our most nutritious food offerings have become a luxury instead of the necessity that they are.

The impact of agribusiness on the nation’s farm bill ultimately impacts our nation’s health care industry as well. To quote Journalism professor, author, and New York Times Magazine contributor, Michael Pollen, “The American way of eating has become the elephant in the room in the debate over health care.” (NYTimes 9/10/2009) Yes, our first lady has committed herself to planting an extraordinary garden on the property of the White House and to educating our nation’s youth about the importance of whole foods (kol hakavod to her for her efforts), but food system reform has not formally entered the conversation about health care; and it should. The government’s gross subsidy of convenience over whole foods leads to a situation where our tax dollars are in a very real sense contributing to the high costs of health care. As Mr. Pollen writes, there’s a ton of money to be made selling an over abundance of fast food and then treating the resulting disease that this over abundance causes.

Perhaps most frustrating is the historical lack of interest in changing the system. As an older colleague of mine reminded me this past winter when we were studying together, the lack of equitable access to wholesome food is far from a new problem. Certainly the issue gets more publicity than in the past (most likely due to our nation’s gross obsession with diet in general), but it is a problem that dates, as she recalls, at least to 1969 (to put that year into perspective, I was 3 yrs old in 1969!). One would think we’ve made some significant progress by now.

An example of how little progress has been made on the public need for affordable wholesome food? Our public school subsidized meal programs. The ideal behind government sponsored meals in our nation’s public schools can be summarized by Napoleon’s motto, “An army marches on its stomach.” Literally. America’s school lunch program began in 1946 under the tenure of President Truman in response to malnutrition in young people who were enlisting into the armed forces. Paradoxically, today’s subsidized meal programs, which now include breakfast and after school snacks in many schools, might be causing or at least reinforcing malnutrition in many cases.

I had the less than tantalizing experience of sampling a typical subsidized breakfast offered in our Baltimore city schools recently at a study session on this issue in which I participated. Every item made available to us was an example of a pre-sweetened, processed food. Not a single fresh fruit or vegetable– whole or in juice form - was offered. It was all beige: cereal, pre-sweetened waffles, sugary muffins, pop-tarts, and either chocolate or strawberry milk. No white milk. When asked why white milk was not served? We were told there was no demand for it by the students. An example of the complex cycle of supply and demand – which really comes first? And what’s our responsibility to challenging it and making sure there is white milk available to our kids, particularly the very kids who may need it most because they ain't getting it elsewhere?

Poverty is certainly a factor. “There will never cease to be those in need,” the Deuteronomist reminds us. Poverty, however, is not the entire problem, an easy scapegoat perhaps; yet, the biblical text makes it clear that we are not to accept these circumstances as unchangeable. Rather, it is incumbent upon us to identify those in need and to address the situation with an open and generous hand.

The production, preparation, as well as the eating of food is a holy occupation that impacts our very sustainability. It is not enough to approach food solely as consumers. Perhaps the ideal of kashrut can be informative. Few of us give much thought to kashrut – we either routinely accept or more likely dismiss the minutia of the ritual standards, standards codified for the most part in the middle ages and accepted as immutable due to the Orthodox hold on the institution. But the idea of creating a modern expectation of sanctity and wholeness – a sense of kasher, of fitness - surrounding the production and marketing of food is compelling.

To do so, we must recognize the impact of agribusiness and our role as consumers. We must do our part to pressure the food industry towards considering what is best for humanity by demanding healthy, sustainable options that are as available and as inexpensive as those supported by the current Farm Bill. We must support those farmers who remain committed to growing produce not currently valued by our Farm Bill while pushing for changes in future Farm Bills (the current Farm Bill is up for renewal in 2012, by the way). We must celebrate small advances such as the fairly recent innovation which allowed recipients of food vouchers to purchase fresh produce at neighborhood farmer’s markets. We must support local efforts at education and community gardening such as those currently being made in Baltimore by the Food & Faith Project of the Johns Hopkins Center for a livable future.

On this Day of Atonement, a day when so many of us are choosing to fast, let us be sure that our fast not become a narcissistic, self-absorbed occupation. As Isaiah demands, “הלוא זה צום אבחרהו” : “Is not this the fast that I have chosen: to unlock the shackles of injustice, to loosen the ropes of the yoke…” Indeed, let us not take for granted how easy it will be for us to break our fast. Not everyone has that choice. Tzom Kal – an easy -- yet thoughtful & intentful fast to you.

Does the 21st century Synagogue Need God? Delivered Rosh Hashanah morning, 5771 by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman

2010-09-13T12:31:00.000-07:00

A palpable paradox exists in our nation. As the religious right grows more powerful, or at least more vocal, in their desire to impress the masses with their theologically based and often rigid political views (at least IMHO), there is a growing move towards secularism and atheism among many that is often blamed for the lack of religious affiliation among young Americans. Evidence of this trend appeared late last fall in four billboards strategically placed and marketed by the nascent Baltimore Coalition of Reason that read: “Are you good without God? Millions are.” The Baltimore Coalition of Reason is part of a National Coalition of Reason that has sponsored similar marketing campaigns nationwide. This past June, for example, commuters in Austin, TX were treated to this slogan on their ride to work: “Don’t believe in God? Join the club”. Philadelphians and Floridians: “Don’t believe in God? You are not alone.”

The existence of non-theists is nothing new – there are and always have been those who actively and publically reject the notion of a God, and there are those who do so even though they are intimately connected to religious organizational life, even synagogue life. As the research of Daniel C. Dennett, a philosophy professor at Tufts University underscores, personal belief does not necessarily go hand in hand with organizational and denominational commitment. In a study summarized in a recent issue of The Wilson Quarterly, Dennett identified and investigated what he calls, “the invisible phenomenon” of non-believing ministers, ministers who expressed skepticism over religious doctrine and at times outright atheism yet who still remain committed to their respective church institutions. Such a coordinated and well-funded organizational attempt (by an anonymous Philadelphia based businessman, by the way) to raise awareness and increase acceptance and visibility of atheism, of non-belief independent of political ideology on such a wide scale perhaps is new. This isn’t Marxism mind you, which demanded liberation from religion as part of its social and political agenda. What is striking to me is this Coalition’s reliance on reason as their mantra – that is, reason replacing God and theology as the movement’s unifying tenet.

As an inheritor of the values of Reform Judaism, a movement birthed in the social and intellectual atmosphere of the European Enlightenment and nurtured during the 19th and early 20th centuries when the critical historical method was first being applied to biblical and liturgical studies, I view reason as central to religion. The application of reason, from the Latin ratio, to judge, to think – understood in its European context as wissenschaft – was and is still critical to discerning the difference between, as well as, the intersection of history and theology. What claims are our religious texts making? What was the agenda of our Biblical writers and editors, and how do we reconcile that agenda, particularly the declaration and promulgation of a singular God, with modernity? These questions require the application of reason.

Despite, however, my rationalistic, academic sensibilities and the fact that as so many in my generation I too vacillate between periods of agnosticism (that is doubt in the ability to understand God), atheism (that is doubt that there even is a God), and theism (faith in a supreme and transcendent God), I view both God and reason as necessary ingredients to religion, particularly Judaism.

Do you? As we embark on a new year, when we are tasked with the introspective work of t’shuvah, how many of us are taken by a billboard that not only reassures us that we are not alone in our theological doubts but more importantly in our frequently all-too-ready desire to shed the burdens of responsibility to our religious faith and institutions? Let’s be honest with ourselves. It isn’t easy to support a synagogue: to make the time and commitment to attend worship services, to prioritize religious instruction in our lives, whether for our children or for ourselves, among all of the other activities available to us, to pay dues and support Temple fundraisers particularly in economically trying times. These tasks require conscious commitment as does carving out the time to gather together here in order to pursue social justice through a Jewish lens. Yet, we do it! Those of us who are present today celebrating the beginning of 5771 within the context and embrace of our synagogue community do it.

Why? Is God part of our motivation? Is God a necessary factor to our commitment to synagogue life? The popular punch line is familiar, shared from this pulpit on a number of occasions: “Max comes to shul to speak with God; Sam comes to speak with Max” Does the synagogue depend on us believing in God, or is being a Beit K’nesset, a place simply to gather enough? No question that the social connections we form within these walls are vital, but I wonder, if that conversation ‘Sam’ seeks to have with ‘Max’ is enough to keep synagogue life thriving well into the 21st century.

According to a study reported a year ago in The New York Times Magazine, a study by the Pew Forum, a non-partisan research think-tank that strives to understand the juncture between religion and public affairs, 75% of Americans report that they pray at least once a week while only 39% attend a worship service on a weekly basis. Now prayer doesn’t necessitate a belief in God; however, arguably this interesting statistic suggests that most Americans believe in something greater than themselves, something toward which to pray. Call it God, a Higher Power, The Divine, Adonai, Elohim, Shechinah, Jesus, Allah – whatever ‘its’ name, there is something towards which prayer can be directed for most Americans. Yet only a minority of those who believe in and actively pray towards some form of deity seem to require an organized communal outlet for this God seeking. At first glance, this study seems to suggest that God trumps the social connections we make within these walls.

It isn’t our lack of faith or our doubts about God, our atheistic and agnostic tendencies if you will, that keep us from connecting more fully, more actively to the synagogue. Clearly, as the Pew Forum’s research indicates, there are many who believe in God but still choose to remain outside the institutional walls of organized religion. And I’d bet, that a number of those who choose to come inside and engage in organized religious practice have a belief in God that is far less secure.

So if it isn’t our theological doubts that prevent us from connecting more fully to religious life, what is preventing so many? One possibility is our insecurity regarding our ability to pray and engage despite theological struggles. Prayer is a skill. As the Rev. Daniel Henderson, a Baptist minister and former head of a suburban mega-church in Minneapolis who now leads a non-profit organization that runs how-to worship seminars, notes “…people just assume they know how to pray. But … Prayer is a lot more than reciting words. It requires a [mastery of] both theory and technique.” Few of us are cognizant of the level of skill development required for prayer which leads us instead to assume that we can’t or don’t want to engage in liturgical recitation. The comparison between prayer skill and physical fitness, one I make often, offers a useful metaphor. One cannot expect to run a 10-mile race without skill and endurance training. The muscles, particularly the brain, need to be prepared for the activity. We know this; we expect to have to work towards physical goals, yet we have difficulty transferring this understanding of preparation to less physically demanding, more mindful goals such as prayer. Instead, we grow quickly impatient and give up assuming there is little or no meaning in the task.

One of the greatest challenges of Reform Judaism, frankly, is our overall liturgical illiteracy. We may balk at the keva, the routine and fixed nature of the traditional liturgy. We liberals emphasize kevanna, that is spontaneity over rigidity, but here is an area in which we could learn a few pointers from our more traditional brethren. It is that adherence to the structure of the siddur that enables Orthodox Jews to at least know what to do when they walk into the doors of their synagogues and to have the endurance to focus on the task at hand for an extended period of time regardless of whether they fully understand what they are saying or why, for that matter. The skill set is in place; it’s rote. Mind you, I wouldn’t trade our tendency toward kevanna or our responsiveness to modernity for that skill set, nor would I relinquish our movement’s commitment to the highest aesthetic expression of worship; yet, it would behoove us to learn from that commitment to skill development by acknowledging that prayer requires a certain level of literacy and skill.

The development of prayer skills need not be all that difficult, but it requires attention and mindfulness. To quote Rabbi Marc Gellman, a Long Island Rabbi made famous by his appearances on ABC’s Good Morning America throughout the 90’s, “when you come right down to it, there are only four basic prayers: Gimme! Thanks! Oops! And, Wow!” “Gimme” - expressions of petition; “Thanks” - expressions of gratitude; “Oops” - requests for forgiveness; “Wow” -- wondrous expressions of praise. I’d bet we all can and have used these expressions of prayer often in our daily lives. The challenge for the modern synagogue is helping each other to recognize and then communicate these colloquial (and comfortable) expressions of prayer through the language of our siddur within the context of our congregational community – a community comprised of many generations with rich yet incredibly diverse backgrounds. Far easier said than done, for sure. Communal prayer requires that we set aside some of the individualism for the sake of communal cohesiveness -- again, no small task, but one that is vital to the sustenance of communal prayer and the synagogue community.

Communal prayer demands a bit of vulnerability and perhaps unreasonableness. To recite prayers that may indeed challenge our own personal theological struggles, and to do so in a public setting among friends and acquaintances, seems counter to our modern desires for individual integrity. Our fear of being vulnerable, our fear that we have to check our reason at the door, these may be more likely factors that keep some from entering those doors than issues of belief. Our fear of fundamentalism on the one hand – unchecked theology that leads to unbridled religious passion; and our resistance to using our reason thoughtfully, that is taking the time and effort to formulate for ourselves a workable and well-reasoned theology on the other (in other words using our brains), both of these extremes can prevent us from taking steps that would connect us to the very community that could support us in so many significant ways through the valleys, heights, and plains of life.

God & Reason – both are necessary for worship and for the sustenance of synagogue life, and both can be found in the sense of community that gathers here whether around Torah, worship, a TESCA event, or even a highway clean up. Perhaps the joke about Sam coming to talk with Max isn’t far off the mark. God isn’t necessarily found in some tightly held theological belief system. God can often be found simply in our presence, our actions, and our willingness to bring our modern sensibilities – including reason – into our religious pursuits.

The Hebrew word for face offers us a beautiful and compelling metaphor. Panim, face – those familiar with the rules of Hebrew grammar will note that it rests in the plural. Indeed, it only appears in the plural form, panim. In theory, it has a singular root ( פ-נ-ה ), though, in practical usage, the singular is non-existent: ‘face’ never appears panah; it always appears as panim – ‘faces’, plural and inclusive. The Hebrew implies that our ‘face’ ceases to exist in the singular. For all our post-Enlightenment interest in the sanctity of the individual, our humanity still requires us to interact with others. Moreover, the Midrashist adds, in a commentary to the Priestly Benediction, that only when we greet each other directly פנים אל פנים ‘face to face’ is God’s countenance lifted upon us (Numbers Rabbah Naso. Accordingly, God becomes present in Sam’s conversations with Max even if, and perhaps all the more so because Sam isn’t consciously seeking God. It is within our effort to connect with others, to honestly engage with each other, what 20th century Jewish philosopher Martin Buber identified as our I-Thou moments, that Divinity, that God, even has a chance of entering.

The rhetoric of the Religious Right in our country gives us plenty of reason to want to avoid God completely. And, there is no question that God without reason has the tendency to lead to fundamentalism on the right and at the same time, untamed mysticism on the left; yet, let us not be so quick to throw out the baby with the bath water. A willingness to at least contemplate God’s existence coupled with the activation of our hearts and minds is required in our modern day synagogues. Recall that in the ancient world the lev, the heart was understood as the seat of our intellect as well. We need both heart and mind to fully activate our intellect, and we need our reasoned intellect in order for us to develop a well-honed and flexible theology, God-system, that can help us navigate through our daily lives.

Israel: Tourist Destination or Homeland, Delivered Erev Rosh Hashanah 5771

2010-09-13T12:04:00.000-07:00

play just before sermon: http://www.we7.com/#/song/Teapacks/HaTikvah

As long as deep in the heart,
The soul of a Jew yearns
Towards the East
And eye looks to Zion
Our hope is not yet lost,
The hope of two thousand years
To be a free people in our land
The land of Zion and Jerusalem.

‘Our hope – tikvatenu – is not lost!’
Allow me to share a story about which I read recently. Perhaps you’ve heard or read about it too. It’s about two girls who have attended the same school and have become good friends but who are now required by a locally sanctioned order to be separated. In school, they are required to wear uniforms of (to be marked by) different colors, and they have been forbidden to come into contact with each other. In order to make the prohibition concrete, a fence covered with an opaque cloth (a michitza of sorts) has literally been stretched between them. They preserve their friendship by passing notes through a hole in the fence. These girls did nothing wrong. This forced segregation is no punishment for bad behavior; rather, this segregation, which was reported and discussed by Israeli author and civil rights activist Sami Michael in Haaretz this past June in an article entitled “The Colors of Racism,” is one that is now impacting an entire community and perhaps, tikvatenu, our hope as well.

Mind you, Michael was not reporting on the days of South African apartheid, pre-civil rights America, or even the segregation and discrimination pointed directly at the Jewish community throughout much of Europe during World War II. Rather, he was reporting on what is becoming a disturbing trend within Israel today. The two schoolgirls wearing uniforms of different colors are both Jewish girls from the Israeli settlement of Immanuel in the West Bank. Immanuel (spelled w/ an ‘I’ and double ‘m’), a religious settlement populated by both Ashkanic and Sephardi Jews is, as Michael reminds us, flourishing under the Israeli flag and armed protection of the IDF, the Israeli Defense Forces, and the school these girls attend is a public school. It was at this public school that a significant number of parents of Ashkenazic descent refused to allow their children to attend classes while those of both Ashkenazi and Sephardic descent were allowed to study together. They demanded that the school, a public, government funded school, be completely segregated along these lines, and shockingly, they took the case to the Israeli Supreme Court in an effort to have their 'religious freedom' protected.

A reminder -- the only difference between an Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jew is one of regional descent: Ashkenazi, a term used to refer to those hailing originally from the regions of the German Rhineland that was later extended to those from areas of Eastern and Central Europe as Jews migrated out from Germany after the Medieval period; Sephardi instead refers to those whose ancestry can be traced to countries in and around the Iberian peninsula. Differences in custom and practice have certainly developed over time between these two groups, but let’s be clear, the distinction being made in Israel is ultimately one of race as well as practice.

Thankfully, Israel's highest court did not rule in favor of the parents’ demands and insisted that the integration of Ashkenazi and Sephardic students continue at this school. However, in response to the Supreme Court’s action, not only did the Ashkenazi parents proceed to reject the court’s decision, refusing to allow their children to return to school, but they organized a mass demonstration which, according to Militant Ginger, an admittedly left wing blog…perhaps rant), drew 100,000 supporters of such forced segregation within the Jewish community, that’s a lot of people for this small Jewish state.

I can only imagine the outrage Michael feels, an Israeli whose own grandchildren are both Ashkenazi and Sephardi at the same time, a product of the integration of both of these rich cultures that exist and thrive in Israel. But, we should feel outrage too. Just imagine our reaction if such a large assembly gathered here in defense of any type of formally imposed public school segregation! Would any of us be anything less than appalled?

It might be easy to dismiss the situation in Immanuel – a town whose name is as is ours despite the difference in spelling, inspired by Isaiah’s prophetic imagination: “God is w/ us,” -- as simply a reflection of the geographic hot bed of ultra Orthodox haredi attitudes that have settled into the West Bank; but sadly, Israel is increasingly becoming less welcoming of democracy and more hostile to liberal and pluralistic values. And this should concern us.
Perhaps we should have expected that it would only be a matter of time when the forced segregation of men and women based on a fundamentalist reading of Jewish Law would extend now to the creation of mechitzas, ritual barriers, based on other criteria such as race. As I shared on earlier occasions this year, forced segregation is no new phenomenon in Israel. The government backed expropriation of the Western Wall by the ultra-Orthodox, for example, lead to the arrest of a woman last November whose official crime was wearing a tallit, a not entirely uncommon feature of women choosing to daven together at the Wall but one which violates the Orthodox mandated and government enforced dress code of the Kotel area. Of course, the real issue of contention between the Women of the Wall and the Orthodox establishment is less about clothes and far more about who gets to define the parameters of Jewish expression. But when those in leadership roles call women “stupid” for coming to the wall to pray with a tallit as did Shas party spiritual head, Ovadia Yosef in November, any prospect of open dialogue between liberal and traditionalist factions seems far, far off on the horizon if not sheer fantasy. And, are we surprised then at the level of vitriol Yosef and those of his ilk express towards the Palestinians in his region when he levels such indignations to his fellow Jews.

So far, despite the success of those Ashkenazi parents in the West Bank community of Immanuel to rally support among their own, the government has wisely refused to submit to their pressure. But, with the growing influence of the right wing fundamentalist faction in Israel, can we be so sure that the Israeli government will remain on the one hand, so level headed, but even more importantly, effective in implementing this expectation that the public schools in this Haredi conclave remain integrated?

The case of Israel’s public bus system stands as an uneasy case in point.

Beginning in the 1990s, Egged, Israel’s primary mode of public transportation, began offering segregated bus service to areas heavily populated by Haredim, the most fervently Orthodox, in order to encourage their use of public transportation. What started as a limited practice to accommodate a minority population has expanded to the extent that, according to IRAC, Israel’s Religious Action Center, there is no choice but to use segregated buses on at least 5 intercity routes. Moreover, where there are still options, the segregated alternative is often the cheapest and fastest. As I shared in a sermon on this issue this past February, a trip from Jerusalem to Petach Tikva (a trip I took regularly 20 some odd years ago w/ no challenges) now requires two buses with a 15 minute layouver between and a fare of over 28 shekels, that is unless I don’t mind a segregated bus. The segregated bus still offers a non-stop ride costing under 20 shekels. Travelling from Ashdod to Arad? The segregated choice offers a 2 hour ride for 24 shekels. The non-segregated option demands a 4 hour ride at a fare of 60 shekels! (is that a choice?)

While the High Courts in Israel scolded the transportation minister last February for not following committee recommendations that segregation be fully voluntary and not at all compulsory on any public bus, no attempts have been made by the Israeli government to outlaw or even curb this practice. As long as there are options, the government’s resistance to enforce integration may seem harmless; but, we know better. We’ve experienced segregation in America. A reminder of what a segregated bus looks like: separate entrances in this case for men and women with women seated squarely at the back of the bus. And for those Rosa Parks of Israeli society who resist such degrading treatment, there are those who have taken it upon themselves, using physical force when necessary, to enforce this supposed ‘voluntary’ segregation.

The Israeli government claims to be a democracy and as such has a responsibility to protect the rights of all of its citizens, yet, as in this case, it far too often allows its hand to be forced by the religious right. How can we remain confident that despite official censure, the demands for religious and racial segregation in Immanuel (or elsewhere ba-aretz) won’t succeed in practice? And perhaps a question being pondered by many of us as we sit comfortably in our American, liberal congregations, why should we care? We live here, in America – by choice… the difference in spelling may be no accident: our vision of Emanuel is clearly different than theirs.

The most recent conversion bill raised in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, this past summer by a leader of the right wing Yisrael Beitenu party reminds us that we must care and we must remain full of hope. Such divisive efforts to further empower the Chief Rabbinate in Israel in their attempts to define who is a Jew by their limited yardstick impacts not just Israeli Jews, but American Jews and all of world Jewry and could frankly have disastrous implications for the relationship between Israel and the diaspora. This bill which was actually originally aimed at expanding conversion rights in order to help the multitude of Russian immigrants in Israel gain legitimacy quickly became a political lightening rod with the ultra-Orthodox objecting to any leniency or broadening of power and the American Jewish community then fearing invalidation.

The bill has been tabled until winter – sent to a committee tasked with finding compromise between factions. In the meantime, there has been no dearth of commentary in the dense world of blogosphere. In his anger over the controversy that arose over this bill, for instance, former Knesset member and Israeli peace activist, Avraham Burg, pointed to us, the American Jewish community as having some culpability in the growing authority of the religious right in Israel, a powerful force that is beginning to threaten the values of democracy which we hold dear not only as Americans but as liberal Jews. Burg may often spout seemingly radical ideas –if you’ve read any of his literature: his vision of Zionism involves replacing the ideal of Israel as a “Jewish State” with Israel as a “state for the Jews,” and he is passionate in his concern for the Palestinian agenda (one could argue overly-passionate). However, whether we choose to agree with him on these sensitive hot-button issues or not, we must take significant note of his accurate observation regarding the lack of involvement and concern for the future of Israel among most liberal American Jews. That’s us by the way!

Several studies over the past number of years have revealed that support for Israel is declining among non-Orthodox youth in America. While these studies have generally focused on college age cohorts, I doubt the outcomes would be all that different taking a look at not so youthful non-Orthodox Jews in America. Peter Beinart, a not too young, but not so old (I believe nearing 40 years old) journalist and former editor of The New Republic wrote a compelling analysis of the situation for The New York Review of Books this past June (6/10/2010) noting that “ …fewer and fewer American Jewish liberals are Zionists; [and] fewer and fewer America Jewish Zionists are liberal.” Rather than actively engaging with the many challenges that face Israel – both religious and political – most liberals have opted out thus allowing the Orthodox to define American Zionism. Beinart, himself an Orthodox Jew is, as we should be, gravely concerned about the future if such a trend continues. He imagines all too clearly an American Zionist movement that does not even, in his words, “feign concern” for the for the impact of a fundamentalist religio-political agenda; and, he fears a broader American Jewish population that does not even “feign concern” for Israel.

Certainly, we must not check our modern sensibilities or our liberal values at the door when it comes to supporting Israel. We must demand of her what we expect in our own country namely a fully democratic state that recognizes the validity of Progressive Judaism and the plurality of Jewish life. Religious pluralism has marked Jewish life since its inception and has enriched Judaism leading to the growth of a wealth of literature, differing point of views, and cultural expressions. As Reform Jews in particular, we must, as Rabbi Amy Perlin so eloquently expressed in a recent URJ commentary, “…be the voice of social justice and fairness, [teaching] and [defending] the values of Torah, promoting gender equality and communal civility…" in Israel. At the same time, we cannot simply abandon Israel when it doesn’t meet our ideals and expectations.

Tikvatenu - we must remain hopeful, and we must speak out with the confidence in knowing that our voice matters. Yes, our American Jewish voice matters. As Americans, we may feel un-entitled to a voice when it comes to Israel. True, what happens there doesn’t impact us in nearly the same manner it does to Israelis. We don’t live there. Yet, even as we make our homes here in America, Israel is far more than simply a tourist destination for us. We do have a stake in this land – in part because we are Jews and have an historical connection to (as do others), a covenantal relationship with, the land. In part because we know too well from experience that there is a need for a place that will open its borders to any Jew in need. But also, we must care about Israel because despite Hezbollah’s opinion to the contrary, as Theodore Herzl reminded us in the 19th century, the world benefits from Israel’s participation in international dialogue.

We may not be Israeli citizens. Few of us will ever make aliyah. Yet, still, despite our frustration with much of what we read, we must continue to care and engage. And, we must continually work to remind ourselves of all that this young country has to offer despite its current challenges – all that never makes headline news. Tikvatenu. We must support our Jewish homeland. There are a myriad of ways in which we can support Israel from here. Three stand out:

• First and foremost, remain or if not already, become informed. Read, pay attention – seek out information, take note of what is happening in Israel and form an opinion. Be capable and more importantly willing to speak intelligently and lovingly about Israel even when disagreeing with her actions. Like our own children, we must not abandon Israel when we disagree with decisions and policies made; rather, it is incumbent upon us to work harder at trying to understand so that we can help inspire compassion and change.

• Two: include Israel in your Tzedakah budget - give, generously as able, but wisely. We must do our homework and research the organizations to which we give, so that the monies we send to Israel don’t serve to further a right-wing religious or political agenda. As Reform Jews, we must be careful to support institutions that forward, as oppose to silencing, the progressive voice in Israel.

• Three: support Israel’s economy. Whether through buying Israeli products – of which there are a plethora available in various American retail outlets and on-line - or by picking up and travelling to Israel. Tourism is one of, if not the major, industry in Israel. Israel needs us to visit. But, as importantly, we need to visit. Supporting Israel requires activism on our part. It requires of us – the diaspora Jew, the liberal diaspora Jew – to not just pay lip service to Israel, but to make the commitment – financially and physically to get on a plane, and take advantage of all that this rich country has to offer. It isn’t about making permanent aliyah, but it is all about showing Israel that not just the Orthodox are willing to visit and spend time there. We must also. It is imperative that Israel be more than a region about which we read about in the paper or in textbooks – we must experience the land, taste the food, try out the language, meet those who live there – engage with the land and the people.

I hope there will be enough interest in our congregation so that we can again travel together to Israel in June of 2012. Whether for the first or umpteenth time, visiting Israel is a remarkable experience and to do so in the context of a congregational family trip is nothing short of a treat. There really is no other way to fully appreciate the incredibly rich history and culture of this land that Theodore Herzl dubbed, The Promised Land save by going and experiencing it firsthand among friends and family. I hope you’ll join me in going – please look forward to an informational meeting in early spring and in the meantime, please feel free to talk to me personally about your interest in going or about any questions you may have.

Hope. How fitting that the words penned by Naphtali Herz Imber in the late 19th century in a poem entitled Tikvatenu, our hope, became the foundation for Hatikva, a song universally accepted despite the fact that it has never been officially sanctioned as such by the Knesset, as the national anthem of Israel. Its haunting folk melody and hopeful lyric stirs the heart of almost all who hear it. Though it was originally written and set to music with the ideals of national restoration in mind, on this eve of a new year, 5771, may the lyrical strains of our beloved Hatikva remind us that despite the difficult challenges contemporary Israel presents for the liberal American Jewish community, we must remain committed to the possibility – the Tikva - the hope - that Israel can become an example of a more perfect democratic and pluralist state.

Yamim Noraim - The Fear - full Days, delivered Erev Shabbat Ki Tavo, 8/27/2010

2010-08-30T06:57:00.000-07:00

Erev Shabbat Ki Tavo – 18 Elul, 5770

One of the feature articles in the most recent Reform Judaism magazine discusses the challenges of reading ancient text in translation. Joel Hoffman, the author and an expert on semitic languages, encourages us to think twice before accepting the pshat, the simple meaning, of the English placed before us even in our valued Plaut translation and commentary and to consider the context and nuances of the original language – Hebrew. A challenge for most of us even those among us with a certain facility and comfort level with the Hebrew language. A challenge made all the more interesting, as Dr. Hoffman points out, by the fact that Biblical Hebrew is no longer a living language…it is strikingly different from the modern Hebrew spoken freely in Israel today.

Reading through this article this past week – during these final days of preparation leading to our yamim hanoraim and when we are reading parashat Ki Tavo in our Torah cycle – caused me to ponder on the word Nora…this word for AWE that we use to describe these days ahead of us.

Awe: Nora – is drawn from the root yarei ירא – to fear, to dread. ירא is not the only Hebrew word for fear, however, pachad פחד also connotes fear or dread.

So why are the upcoming days understood in Hebrew asימים נוראים and not פחדים ימים ?

The difference in meaning between these words for fear is subtle yet significant, and our Torah portion, Ki Tavo, and indeed the entire work of the Deuteronomist, can give us insight into our task during these days.

Now,I have not done a detailed lexical study – that is comparing the use of these two words throughout the biblical text; yet from my initial perusings, I sense that a primary difference in these words has to do with our behavior in response to whatever is provoking fear. Pachad appears to imply a paralyzing fear, one that can be so thoroughly overwhelming that that it cause physical symptoms of dread, but at the same time, sticks us to our place/immobilizes us. And, used as an adjective, pachadim can imply terrifying and unfit for action.

Yarei, on the other hand, appears to be used in situations that on the contrary require action. The fear – most often used in connection with God – is to inspire doing!

The author of our Deuteronomic text understood the motivating power of fear. The litany of curses contained in this week’s portion, as dreadful as they are, were not intended to paralyze the community with trembling, but rather were intended to inspire proper behavior and commitment to the centralized leadership of the day (expressed through commitment to God).

Yamim Noraim – These days of Awe, these fear filled days, should be difficult and perhaps cause fear. The process of tshuvah of looking inward at ourselves and evaluating how our actions have impacted others is challenging; it can freeze us in our places. Recognizing our faults and that we have hurt ourselves and others can cause us so much pain and fear, that we are prevented from moving forward. But that is precisely NOT the point of this holiday season, rather the goal is for that ‘awe’ that ‘fear’ yarei, to propel us to action – to seek repentance from those we hurt, to recommit ourselves to communal goals even at the risk of trumping a few of our individual ones, to strive to do better.

Nothing wrong with a little fear as long as we use it and respond to it wisely - may the upcoming ‘Days of Awe’ be a little 'fear filled' - just enough to inspire us to meaningful action and change.

The Right to Choose: A VIew on Intermarriage

2010-08-09T08:02:00.000-07:00

Parashat Re’eh opens with an interesting imperative:
ראה אנכי נתן לפניכם היום ברכה וקללה

Take note!! I am placing before you today blessing and curse: blessing if you obey God’s commandments and curse if you do not obey. The imperative expressed by the verb ראה – literally, see or look here! – is in actuality the implied message “choose!” A rigid system of divine retribution is presented, but free will is always present - ultimately the choice is ours.

Let’s be clear that the biblical author was most concerned with idolatry. As we’ve discussed before, when viewed in light of historical events that took place at the time when scholars believe the Deuteronomic tradition was written down, the text can be read as a “how to consolidate the masses” manual. The centralization of the worship cult and the eradication of all idolatry were the primary and necessary goals; so much so, that this understanding of the text has endured over time. Even as late as the medieval period, Rashi understood the verse, if you do not obey the commandments of God as referring specifically to one who serves idols.

Today, the word “choose” when used within the context of Jewish tradition and תשמעו אל מצות יהוה אלהיכם ‘guarding God’s commandments’ rarely conjures up images of idolatry or any form of the cultic worship described in our portion; yet, still the word “choose” particularly when used within the context of the Reform movement’s mandate of informed autonomy, compels us to consciously formulate our public and private expressions of Judaism. No one can be Jewish for us – it will not be mandated for us - the free will is ours; yet, we must be cognizant of the consequences of our actions. And, in a very real sense, for Judaism to remain compelling in the 21st century and beyond, we must all become Jews by conscious choice.

This past week, our nation has been fixated to a large degree on the marriage of former President Bill and current Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s daughter Chelsea to Marc Mezvinsky. It was dubbed by the Huffington Post (among other media outlets) as “America’s Wedding.” Now perhaps the marriage of a former President’s daughter is always big news (particularly when said daughter has dealt so gracefully with the less savory events of her dad’s presidency), but it seems to have consumed our attention – particularly our Jewish attention - in part due to the fact that Chelsea’s beau is Jewish and she, of course, is not.

Intermarriage has always been a touchy subject among us Jews. How many of us were raised with warnings of getting too involved with a non-Jew…ok to be friends, maybe to date, but to marry? Shame, shame. Two messages seem to be contained in that sense of shame. One, ‘they’ will never truly accept ‘you/us’, and two, ‘your’ action may bring ruin, albeit slow painful ruin, to the entire Jewish people. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA), the self subtitled Global News Service of the Jewish People, echoes such sentiment in its commentary this week on the Clinton wedding with what reads to me like a scolding tone of concern, “Is it possible that the first iconic Jewish picture of the decade is of an interfaith marriage?”

Honestly, isn’t it time we get over it? Choice. The power to choose. In the 19th century period of European enlightenment that followed on the heels of the French revolution, Jews worldwide demanded the rights of national citizenship. We chose and fought hard to leave the ghetto, and we succeeded! We chose to be a part of mainstream society even when others didn’t want us there. When we came to America, we consciously liberated ourselves from the constraints of the Gemeinde, the state sponsored body of authority over religious matters. As contemporary Reform Jews, we demand the right of informed choice in all religious and ritual matters both here and abroad, and we expect the separation of church and state to protect this right to choose. And yet, when we discuss the prospect of intermarriage, there still often arises a swell of panic. Yes, we want to participate fully in American society and culture, but if we intermarry, we fear we may be swallowed up whole (not unlike Jonah) by that same choice.

Our Torah portion is clear, choices have consequences. No debate here. But the choice to intermarry need not be followed by choices that lead to the evaporation of Jewish life. There are more choices to made after that brief wedding ceremony, and it’s those choices that the Jewish community should be concerned about not only for those who chose to marry non-Jews, but also for Jews who marry Jews. Far too often, we view marriage as an end point. A Jewish wedding marks success, and interfaith wedding, even if unspoken,feels on some level to be some sort of failure. On the contrary, if we are truly concerned with Jewish survival and the opportunity to pass on the blessings of Jewish life to future generations, then we should be less concerned with condemning marriages that frankly are a natural outgrowth of our choice to live and participate fully in an integrated and pluralistic society and instead provide welcoming and supportive opportunities for those couples to get involved. Every marriage that involves a Jewish partner should be viewed as an opportunity to create a new and vibrant Jewish household. A marriage should be viewed as the start – an open door, not the end.

Choices have consequences. Our choices and the choices of those who come before us have enabled us to live well and with little persecution (particularly when compared to state-sponsored anti-semitism of previous generations). Indeed, Chelsea Clinton and Marc Mezvinsky’s very public wedding can be viewed, as sociologist Steven Cohen notes, as marking “the full acceptance of Jews by the larger society…” In what other generation could such a wedding take place with really so little fanfare, and as far as I can tell virtually no criticism accept from the far religious right (the Jewish righ)?

The tough choices are still ahead for this young couple, as they would be for any young couple – Jewish, non -, or as in this case, one of each. Hopefully, they will approach the choices they have in front of them with sensitivity, reason, and a look both to past history and future posterity. To quote the Union of Reform Judaism’s head Rabbi Eric Yoffe, with whose sentiment I most fully agree with regard to all couples married under a chuppah, “I hope they will make a choice to raise their children in a single religious and tradition, and second, as a Jew and as a Rabbi, I hope it will be Judaism.”

Re’eh – Look! We have choices. Those choices demand thoughtful, open, and informed conversation – only then will we and our future progeny be blessed with the opportunity to choose a life of Torah, Avodah, and G’milut chasadim.

In honor of Richard Fishkin on the Occasion of his Retirement, delivered Erev Shabbat Naso 5/21/2010

2010-05-27T08:22:00.001-07:00

וזאת תורה הנזיר ביום מלאת ימי נזיר יביא אתו...

This is the ritual for the nazirite on the day that his days as a nazirite are fulfilled: The person shall be brought to the Tent of Meeting, and shall make an offering לחטאת as an atonement offering.

Why, we might wonder – as plenty of Torah scholars before us have – would the nazirite be required to bring an atonement offering on the occasion of his retirement from service? A thanksgiving offering would be understandable, a general, all-purpose olah perhaps, but atonement? Why after a period of dedicated service would an individual need to make atonement?

In his trying to understand the perplexity of this seemingly odd requirement, Moses Maimonides, that well-known Medieval commentator who hailed from Cairo, in his Guide of the Perplexed comments on the difference between the nazarite, about whom we read in this week’s parashat Naso, and the sage. Separating themselves from the community and consciously refraining certain basic pleasures and comforts, the nazirite chooses an ascetic form of divine service. Such dedication to self-denial might be viewed as commendable, exemplary even (particularly in our Western culture of over-abundance), but as Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, the Chief Rabbi of the UK, notes in his comments on the text (cited in this week's Dov-Ray Torah compiled by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins), such pursuit of self perfection is not at all exemplary in the context of community.

In stark contrast, the sage remains fully engaged with society in his effort to perfect it. The sage, as Maimonides explains, recognizes and remains involved with others as he seeks to serve: he remains involved with members of one’s own family; he works together with his colleagues; he participates along with the fellow members of his community; he recognizes the need to defend and serve his country in addition to his own people.

Accordingly, one could argue that the nazirite requires atonement upon the completion of his days of service because of his eager willingness to pursue such a solitary life exclusive of family and community. Mainstream Judaism demands that we serve God by actively participating in the world. Liberal Judaism adds to this model that by doing so, we naso, we lift ourselves up as God’s partners in the ongoing creation of our world. To do so requires that we strive to create a balance among the conflicting pressures on us, working not to focus on some while neglecting others. To do requires a valuing of communal cooperation over and above the solitary pursuit of perfection.

There is no question that Richard exemplifies Maimonides’ sense of a sage. Did anyone notice that even in his remarks this evening, Richard drew attention not to [excuse the Kennedy-esque language] what he has done for Temple, but what our community has done together. He draws pride not from his solitary achievements but from that of which he has been an integral part. One of Richard’s greatest strengths is his loyalty and devotion to the Jewish community; and we should be so grateful that for the past 8 years, Temple Emanuel – both the building and its people – staff and congregants, we have been recipients of his steadfast devotion.

More significantly, the lesson that we can all learn from Richard is that like the sage model, he expresses his commitment to his task without secluding himself from the very people who form that community. Yes, he loves his work, his professional activity. As those of us share office space with him know, Richard is not eager for a leisurely retirement, he wants to work and to be involved. But, work alone does not define him. A devoted husband, father, and in more recent years, grandfather, Richard balances both family and vocation. Actively involved in Baltimore Hebrew Congregation, his home congregation, where I understand he will be installed as member of the Board for an upcoming term, active in Brotherhood – the Men of Reform Judaism, not just at his own congregation, but in quad-Temple activities and on the regional and national levels, a regular giver of blood and platelets – these are just a few of the many ways that Richard eagerly extends his hand out far beyond himself and into the community.

The Psalmist, in his quest to define מי האיש החפץ חיים, "who is the man who desires life?" notes, אהב ימים לראות טוב...ועשה שלום ורדפהו, "one who loves days so that he may seek good…seek peace, and pursue it.” One traditional understanding of this text is that the author was urging the community to do just that – to use one’s days towards the pursuit of goodness, peace, and the betterment of their lives. I don’t think the Psalmist had a better model than Richard Fishkin. Indeed Richard is one who, at least from my vantage point, uses his days to pursue goodness, to foster community, and to strive towards making this world a better place. Mi ha-Ish he-chafetz chayim - to you Richard, in honor of all that you have given us in your pursuit of goodness.
Temple Emanuel's volunteer choir, Kol Zemer, concluded my presentation by singing Mi Ha-Ish (music: B. Chait/arr. C.Heller)

Congratulations to the Temple Emanuel Confirmation class of 5770 - Remarks delivered Erev Shavuot

2010-05-20T07:15:00.000-07:00

Swimming, swimming in a swimming pool, when days are hot, when days are cold, in a swimming pool…
The Talmud teaches, gentlemen, that among the obligations a father, and by extension at least I’d argue in the modern world at least, both parents have towards their sons is to teach them to swim. Yes, to swim. In a fairly well-known passage in tractate Kiddushin of the Babylonian Talmud it states, האב חייב בבנו למולו, ולפדותו, וללמדו תורה, ולהשיאו אשה, וללמדו אומנותֹ וי״א: אף להשיטו במים “The father is bound in respect of his son, to circumcise him, redeem (him if first born), teach him Torah, to get him wife, and teach him a craft; and there are those that say, to teach him to swim.”

While the Talmud then goes on to provide fairly detailed commentary and explanation of each of the other obligations, obligations that may on the surface seem more self-explanatory, the text provides just two Hebrew words regarding the command to teach our children to swim, “חיותיה הוא” ‘it may indeed save his life.’

There has been much discussion throughout the ages regarding why the Talmud choose swimming from a number of other very useful skills upon which to focus. One could argue that our lives may depend on a number of physical skills or test of endurance. If someone is pursuing us on foot, running – indeed sprinting - would be a far more useful skill than swimming, no doubt. So why the specific mention of swimming?

It is quite possible, that our sages were referring to the actual physical skill of swimming. I learned to swim as a very young child. I was taught by my mother – well she actually took me to the local Y - indeed because my physical existence may have been threatened otherwise. No, both my mother and father were hardly familiar with the Talmudic injunction regarding swimming, rather, my parents had just bought a house with a pool in the back yard that went up to 10 feet deep. There was a concern about my physical safety. While the geographical region of the middle east is surrounded by various bodies of water, no archeological evidence has shown that there was a sudden rise in pools or watering holes in Babylonian neighborhoods of the 2-4th centuries that would have made parents feel like mine did. It seems much more likely that our Talmudic sages were offering a metaphor for living.

Swimming is one of those rare activities that takes us fully out of familiar territory (it is one of the reasons I still love to swim) – surrounded and literally suspended solely by water, we have to teach our limbs an entirely different set of tools for mobility and survival. Moreover, swimming is a skill that requires a range of skills beyond sheer athleticism; it requires balance, trust, endurance, and consistent & steady rhythm - all necessary skills for successful living. Certainly there are basic tools, a skill set that is required to swim – how to cup one’s hand so it functions efficiently as a paddle, how to turn or lift one’s head for a good breath, how to kick in useful manner that actually serves to propel and not just splash, … but what really makes someone a confident swimmer is the ability to trust the density of the water and allow oneself to balance or float instead of panic and to pace oneself in a consistent and confident rhythm that enables one to get where they are going even if they can’t always see the way through the murky water.

You have been given a skill set – it’s called Torah! You have learned the basics over these many years of religious school and synagogue involvement that can serve to keep you afloat if you nurture them and use them. There may be times in your life when you feel like you are drowning. One of the first rules of swimming is to replace panic in those moments with a calm use of learned skills. Draw on the skills that you’ve been taught. Use Torah as a resource. Draw on the Jewish community to support you and to provide you continual skill development and nourishment.

There is no question that a good swimmer must continue to work on those basic skills – in swimming they’re called drills. They can, frankly, seem dull and cumbersome, but they are necessary for continued growth. So too with Jewish learning. You’re not done. You have each reached an incredibly important milestone of which you should take a great deal of pride. This evening’s Confirmation ceremony is an opportunity to pause, reflect upon, and celebrate your achievements, but it is not a time to stop. It is incumbent upon you to continue learning. Don’t stop practicing the skills that will enable you to not only be confident in your Jewish identity in future months and year, but that will also help to keep you afloat as you venture further and further out into the world.

You have each expressed the ties that you have to our congregational community, so I invite the entire congregation to rise and join me in offering blessing from our tradition upon you. Words to the priestly benediction can be found on the back cover of your supplements, please join me in these ancient words of blessing.

BaMidbar: The Need to Plug-in, delivered Shabbat morning 5/15/2010

2010-05-17T10:16:00.000-07:00

I love my iPod. That’s probably no surprise. As a music lover I simply can’t imagine living without it. It keeps me motivated at the gym during those indoor workouts when I don’t have the scenery, sounds of nature, or my running buddy Alan, to inspire me. It keeps me company in the car when the talking heads on NPR have tried my patience. It provides me a convenient way for me to keep up with various podcasts that no one else in my living or work space really cares to listen to. It really is an ingenious invention. Do parents today ever have to yell at their kids for having their stereos too loud? And, like, I’m sure, many sitting in this sanctuary this morning, my ipod allows me to always have tons of music and information (perhaps way more than I ever really need) nearby whether tucked in a small pocket of my purse, jeans, or gym shorts. No records, no CD holders, no bulky players and accompanying components that were so popular a generation (or two) ago when those battles over music volume and style were so commonplace.

But as an article in Monday’s New York Times noted, there is a significant cost to all of this digital portability and the cost isn’t just the reduction of friction between parent and child over music played in the house. As the article noted, “the ease of loading songs onto a computer or iPod has meant that a generation of fans has happily traded fidelity (aesthetic quality) for portability and convenience.” Perhaps more troubling is that our ears have been trained to accept such mediocrity – we are, generally speaking, no longer interested in having the quality restored. Audio engineers have found that portability is a far more revered quality than sound quality. In other words, we consumers will pay big bucks for convenience and compactness far more than we will for increased quality. Pity, really. And it is not just the aesthetic quality of sound that is lost in our desire to perpetually be on the move; portability of our music has greatly impacted the quality of the listening experience itself. How many of us just sit down and make listening to music its own activity (outside of a concert hall). I for one am someone who treasures music, listens often and considers myself a critical listener, yet more often than not I’m doing something else while listening: cooking, running on a treadmill, driving,… I am old enough to recall when just listening to music, perhaps while analyzing and perusing the album covers and lyrics was an activity all to its own. Ok – it was the late 70’s -early 80’s, maybe we got up and danced, but you get the idea. Gathering around our music was not saved for the public concert hall or stadium. We gathered with our friends in our homes where daily music appreciation was far from the private ear plugged affair it is today. And while we 21st century parents may rejoice in the peace and quiet, there just may be a vital aspect of relationship building that is lost along with those conversations, even arguments, over sharing musical space in the household. A disturbing down side to the digitization of music is that so much of music listening has become an activity for not only for the individual, but for the individual who no longer needs a home to plug into.

Bamidbar. This Shabbat we begin recalling our journey through the wilderness. Scholars who study the bible from a critical, scientific lens argue that the Book of Numbers/Bamidbar was originally the final book of a canon known as the Tetrateuch. According to this theory, parts of the original Numbers were moved to the end of Deuteronomy by the final editor in order to make the entire canon a seamless literary unit after the addition of the Deuteronomic text. This is a compelling editorial hypothesis (particularly if we accept its assumption regarding dating); for, at the end of the book of Bamidbar we are eager for, we expect the Israelites to get to Canaan – that Land of milk and honey they’ve been promised and for which they’ve been waiting. Let’s face it, nobody would read all of the regulations of Deuteronomy if the fulfillment of that land promise was placed at the end of Bamidbar. What would be the point? The drama would be over. This period of wandering in the desert of which we now read for a number of weeks is a temporary destination, the goal is Canaan; the goal is to make permanent roots – to get some place and stay there. Yes, Abraham was instructed to lech l’cha, to go forth, back in Genesis, but that command had the full intent of propelling Abe and his family to a settling place.

How ironic -- now that we are so settled, that we have established roots not only in Israel (that historic land of which the text speaks) but also in communities throughout the world - that we seek to fight against that which roots us. We want to unplug, to go wireless – to free ourselves from what we define as the burden of permanence.

The opening portion of the Book of Bamidbar, about which our Bar Mitzvah, Matthew, will speak in a moment, gives us a glimpse into the desire for roots, a desire for a sense of connectedness and home during a period when in a sense the entire community is unplugged – in a state of wandering with nothing more than a verbally stated – one could say ‘wireless’ promise of future rootedness. In truth, we, as humans, require a balance. Even as we strive to cut the cords that connect us to our homes and offices, and perhaps all the more so, we demand to be connected – I’d say even hyper-connected. Who among us doesn’t feel even a mild sense of frustration or anxiety when our wireless gadgets are disabled for whatever reason or when we simply choose to turn them off.

The example of the current state of the music industry underscores that the ability to free ourselves from that which keeps us rooted is not without consequence. As we continue to seek those wireless conveniences that free us from being bound to our homes, offices, and physical structures, let us allow the wanderings of our Israelite ancestors to remind us of the value of seeking a grounding place to settle and establish roots…even if it means plugging in every once in awhile.

Parashat Behar: A Lesson in Materialism, delivered Shabbat Behar/Bechukotai 5770- 5/8/2010

2010-05-10T06:24:00.000-07:00

Of all our readings in our cycle, particularly our Levitical cycle, its the earlier chapters of Leviticus with their emphasis on the sacrificial cultic system that we so often think of as providing the greatest affront to our modern sensibilities. The idea of schlepping animals to and slaughtering them on the Temple altar as a form of worship or spiritual cleansing ritual certainly flies in the face of our modern concepts of worship. We certainly don’t think of Parashat Behar containing the well known verse וּקְרָאתֶם דְּרוֹר בָּאָרֶץ לְכָל-יֹשְׁבֶיהָ, ‘Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the Land unto all the Inhabitants thereof’ as its translated on the Liberty Bell as offensive to our modern values. On the contrary, this verse’s appearance on such an icon of American history has made this biblical mandate a symbol of the American values of liberty and democracy.

Yet, I’d argue that the rules of the shmita and yuval outlined here force us to confront our modern sensibilities as readily if not more so than the details of the Temple worship system, specifically with regard to the American values of materialism and capitalism.

Parashat Behar recognizes the inherent value of work. שֵׁשׁ שָׁנִים תִּזְרַע שָֹדֶךָ וְשֵׁשׁ שָׁנִים תִּזְמֹר כַּרְמֶךָ וְאָסַפְתָּ אֶת-תְּבוּאָתָהּ: “Six years you may sow your fields, and six years you may prune your vineyard and gather its yield.” Recall, this was an agrarian society, a society fully and directly dependent on the land; our biblical ancestors’ survival depended on their agricultural skills, skills applied in a manner in which made them and the land productive. Yet contrary to our contemporary capitalistic notions, parashat behar places clear limits on material productivity. וּבַשָּׁנָה הַשְּׁבִיעִת שַׁבַּת שַׁבָּתוֹן יִהְיֶה לָאָרֶץ שַׁבָּת לַיהוָֹה שָֹדְךָ לֹא תִזְרָע וְכַרְמְךָ לֹא תִזְמר ….. “but in the 7th year, the land shall have a Sabbath of complete rest, a Shabbat to Adonai; your field, you shall not sow, and your vineyard, you shall not prune.

We are commanded to stop, to stop working the land. Remarkable in and of itself, but all the more so when read in context with that verse that appears just before it: שֵׁשׁ שָׁנִים תִּזְרַע שָֹדֶךָ וְשֵׁשׁ שָׁנִים תִּזְמֹר כַּרְמֶךָ וְאָסַפְתָּ אֶת-תְּבוּאָתָהּ: “Six years you may sow your fields, and six years you may prune your vineyard and gather its yield; but in the 7th year, you must not sow or prune.” Note the pronouns (you know from my passion for such details that the grammar matters). While the text refers to the field and vineyard as being ‘ours,’ (שדך\כרמך – your field, your vineyard), the yield, the product, of our field and vineyard is not. It would have been far more poetic to continue using the 2nd nominal pronoun: תבואתך (read it aloud) but rather our writer chooses to break the poetic pattern and uses the 3rd person: תבואתה. The use of the 3rd person stands out in this sentence that otherwise is fully personalized by the 2nd person: you shall sow your field; you shall prune your vineyards, so that you can gather ITs yield. No matter how much work and effort is place in tilling the land, its produce remains beyond ownership. It isn’t ours, it belongs to its source – the land and by extension, ultimately God.

Now, doesn’t the first story of creation in Bereshit tell us that we have dominion over the earth? “Look,” the first chapter of Genesis imagines God saying, “I have given you all the seed-bearing plants on the face of the earth, and every tree that has in it seedbearing fruit.” (Genesis 1:29) It’s all there for us, for our taking, no? The Levitical hand reminds us that dominion has limits, and these regulations outlined in parashat behar not only underscore these limits, but offer a vital even if seemingly counterintuitive lesson to our capitalisitic, material based, 24/7 mind-set that has become normative in America.

We can stop. Despite our fears that we may no longer be able to sustain ourselves without constant effort, we can. I imagine the text telling us to take a deep, cleansing yoga breath! Of course, it isn’t all about taking the break. There is a vital unspoken message in the text. The unspoken message of the Sabbatical year is that consumption must be monitored in the years leading up to the Sabbatical year in order to insure our sustainability during our work stoppage. This requires of us conscious planning and conservation during the productive years in order to make best use of the resources available during the land’s rest. The land has not been given to us for reckless use. Working it and deriving sustenance from it are privileges that require accountability and care.

Perhaps the text is warning us also against the dangers of taking too much pride in our work, our productivity, so much so that it bleeds over into the domain of undue proprietorship. Pride in our labor is a wonderful and important motivator, yet this prohibition against working the land for a full year every 7 years can serve to remind us that the world will keep revolving without constant attempts at controlling or manipulating it towards our goals, no matter how lofty those goals may be. We are not commanded to refrain from taking advantage of what the land offers; we are commanded to refrain from working it toward our advantage. Eleventh century French commentator Rashi imagines God telling us through these regulations, “I do not forbid you to eat it [the produce during the Sabbath year ] or otherwise benefit from it. What I am forbidding you is to treat it as if you owned it. Rather everyone should be equal with respect to it.”

Immediately on the heels of the regulation regarding the shmitah, this Shabbat for the land that comes every 7 years, comes the mandate perpetualized on the Liberty Bell, the mandate of the yuval, after 7 weeks of 7 years – 49 years, we are to:
וּקְרָאתֶם דְּרוֹר בָּאָרֶץ לְכָל-יֹשְׁבֶיהָ, ‘Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the Land unto all the Inhabitants thereof’. This King’s James translation fits our modern American sensibilities with regard to freedom, a freedom we equate with being able to pursue what we want, when we want – to be able to work as we wish and claim ownership over all that we produce. The Hebrew implies a different connotation. Dror at its essence refers to ‘release’ or ‘emancipation’ from that which makes a claim on us or from that which we claim as our own. Capitalism values work and productivity, and as Americans we are incredibly fortunate to be free to be able to pursue any occupation, and we are accordingly taught that hard work rewards us with well- deserved material plenty. U’kratem Dror ba-aretz, however, offers an equally valid lesson that is necessary for our modern world – it teaches us the importance of releasing ourselves from this sense of material entitlement.

The lesson of parashat Behar is to work, to put forth our full effort – this is necessary for us to sustain ourselves physically, emotionally, and spiritually; but then to also to pause and remind ourselves that we are not to be defined by what we produce but rather how we care for the land and this earth that has been but lent to us.

Metzora: A Lesson in Public Health? Delivered Shabbat morning, 4/17/2010

2010-04-18T06:22:00.000-07:00

Tazria/Metzora. These just may be the most dreaded Torah portions among young students studying to become Bat or Bar Mitzvah, not only because of their detailed descriptions of infections, discharges, and various other eruptions that make us uncomfortable, but also because of the procedures that were applied in response to such tza-ra-at.

According to the text, the Priest is tasked with the role of diagnostician. It is up to the Priest to identify and evaluate if and when such infections qualify as tza-ra-at, as ritually impure. It is also, of course, up to the Priest to implement and enforce the required treatment, to evaluate the progress of healing and when appropriate to facilitate the ritual by which a person returns to their status of tehara, a full participating member of the community.

As Nehama Leibowitz points out in her detailed study of the parashah, some view these portions as biblical recommendations for the prevention of the spread of disease in the community, a medical handbook of sorts used to ensure public health. Other commentators focus on the obscure and seemingly supernatural elements in the text highlighting these diseases as a form of direct retribution from God in response to ill behavior. The rationalist in me certainly leads me to prefer the former understanding; I simply cannot accept a theology of divinely gifted affliction. Regardless, what remains clear, however, is that this text resists clear understanding in a modern context – our questions may have to be left unanswered. We may simply have to live with our discomfort in not fully comprehending the biblical procedures. As Meshekh Hokhma, a late 19th century commentary by Rabbi Meir Simha ha-Kohen of Dvinsk, reminds us ‘The preoccupation with these plagues, entrusted to the judgment of Aaron and his sons, is one of the mysteries of Torah…” (see N. Leibowitz, Studies in Vayikra, p. 185)

Lessons in the text abound, however, despite our inability to comprehend the details with certainty. This year, in light of the national debate regarding health care reform, one verse stands out. If, however, one is poor and without sufficient means… (Lev 14:21). After outlining the offerings one is expected to bring to the priest before being deemed fully recovered from affliction, the text provides an alternative for those who cannot afford. Verses 21-32 of chapter 14 detail the manner in which the one with insufficient means can still make appropriate offerings in line with that person’s means. Consideration is made for all; no one in the community is left ostracized by illness due to financial constraint. Everyone is given a path back into the community. The system doesn’t turn away those of lesser means; it accommodates to them. And more importantly, at a time when healing is most in need, the opportunity to return to a state of ritual purity – a state we may not fully understand today but which was clearly a significant status in the biblical period – is not withheld from those with insufficient resources.

Regardless of where we each stand on the current status of health care reform legislation, one thing I hope we can all agree on is that no one who is suffering from affliction, particularly treatable illness, should be left on the outskirts of society simply due to insufficient means. Access to quality health care is a public health issue, and we cannot allow our health insurance companies to serve as our priests, as the sole decisors of who is granted access back into the community and who is left alone without communal support. No question one of the greatest challenges of our current administration, but our health care system must find a way to recognize the humanity and entitlement to good care of each and every individual in our society.

Tazria, Childbirth, & The Reality of Gender Differences, delivered Erev Shabbat 4/16/2010

2010-04-18T06:06:00.000-07:00

This week, the Facebook Group, “If you were a little girl in the 70’s” has been making its way around my “Friends’” pages. Other than making one feel a touch nostalgic with its list of all things popular in the 70’s from Mrs. Beasley dolls, The Love Boat TV series, banana bicycle seats and even Dorothy Hamill haircuts, this list -coupled with an upcoming birthday- reminds me that though it was a lovely era in which to be a child, I wouldn’t want to return to it. And, I’m glad I am not raising my own children in it. The 70’s contained within it some exciting times of ‘coming out’ for women. This was the decade of among other achievements, Title IX, Roe vs. Wade, the opening of US Military Academies to women, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, and the Women’s Educational Equity Act. And, as I’ve expressed from this bema before on more than one occasion, I am so grateful for the efforts of the women and men of that generation that worked to make such important changes from which my and later generations benefit. But that being said, it was also a time when those little girls who were raised then were given extremely conflicting messages. It was okay to play with the GI Joe at my neighbor’s house (he was a boy, by the way), but no one would dare buy a girl any male doll besides Barbie’s slick and equally perfect sidekick, Ken. We were taught to think beyond traditionally female careers – the work place was opening to us - ‘you don’t have to be a teacher like your mother and grandmother before you,’ we were told. Marlo Thomas, Mel Brooks, and Alan Alda in their Free to Be You and Me collection taught us that we didn’t need to follow convention – girls can like fire engines, and boys can like dolls, yet in the next breath most of our parents warned us girls not to forget to wear the little white gloves, cross your ankles, act lady-like and demure in public, and most importantly do as you are told. ‘Boys are made of snips & snails and puppy dog tails, while girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice” still rang true as a mantra. Perhaps it still does today; equity among the sexes is extremely difficult to establish even with the best of intentions.
Parashat Tazria opens with a difficult passage regarding childbirth against which the feminist in me wants to rail against. That is used to want to rail against. That was the feminist who was raised in this hot bed of conflicting messages that characterized the 70’s, that was the feminist who had yet to experience first-hand the full reality of childbirth and early parenting. That was the feminist who saw a hierarchy of inequality in all aspects of unequal expectations and roles. To be fair to myself and to others who like myself may seem reactive, those differing expectations have historically been used to limit women often unfairly; and thus, many of us do remain a bit defensive when faced with such a text that on its surface smacks of disrespect. Fortunately, our relationship with Torah changes as we age; and, if we allow ourselves to be open to study year after year, we can experience the blessing of our own notions being challenged again and again. The beauty of our Torah cycle.

This passage is messy. Childbirth is messy; and fair or unfair it is not in any way a gender equitable endeavor -- despite the popular tendency a few years back for couples to announce, ‘we’re pregnant!’ Absurdity. ‘We’ may be expecting a child, but no man has, to my knowledge outside of the imagination of Hollywood, experienced pregnancy and childbirth. The opening passage of Tazria gets to the heart of this reality – that childbirth, the primary, particularly in the biblical period, method of becoming a parent, is not at all an Equal Rights Experience. Perhaps this is why still in the 21st century many if not most couples still have a tough time creating an equitable division of labor when it comes to home and family despite the fact that so many households are supported by two-careers outside the home.

Tazria demands a period of separation for either 33 or 66 days after childbirth depending on the gender of the child, a separation that is often read as punishment due to the priestly hand’s language of t’meiah and t’hara - words that stretch the English capacity for adequate translation - and the requirement of a ritual offering at the end of these days of separation. Ritually impure and pure are the best we can do, perhaps, but sadly these phrases are loaded with such subjective qualitative connotations in english that to translate them may skew the intent of the text. In short, t’meiah and t’hara are ritual categories. In this case, the state of t’meiah ensured a period of healing for the mother and initial bonding between mother and infant. Yes, in the biblical period the after-birth blood flow was most surely feared and thus deemed contaminating; yet, the ritual category of t’meiah can be understood as a means of protecting this time of healing, shielding the mom from other responsibilities. During this period the new mother was released from all sacred and marital obligations – this state of t’meiah set a boundary around her allowing her much needed emotional and physical space.

Today too, it is standard ‘ritual’ procedure to have a period of separation after childbirth (we call it maternity leave) and to then subsequently visit our medical priests, if you will, during the early weeks after childbirth to make sure that mom’s bleeding has ceased, healing has progressed appropriately, and that child is thriving. We have privatized much of the affair, but for many, if not most, women, these early medical visits are the first significant ventures out into the world after childbirth. Unfortunately we’ve privatized the affair so significantly that many women today feel isolated as opposed to feeling supported by the rituals of our community. This labeling of the period following childbirth as t’meiah recognizes an important reality of our modern society namely that in our attempt to make all things equal between men and women, we often forget that childbirth is an awesome physical and emotional feat for the mom, one that requires a very different period of recovery and healing than is required of the dad.

Understanding the text in this manner compels us to ask an important question: why the period of t’meiah was reduced, cut in half, for the birth of a boy? Certainly gender doesn’t impact the amount of time a woman needs to heal and adjust to the new addition. Rabbi Helaine Ettinger, in her thoughts on this portion published in The Women’s Torah Commentary published in 2000 (the Jewish Lights volume not our newest WRJ work), notices that there are two ritual processes that take place after childbirth. The first was gender specific and focused on the need to differentiate between the sexes. On the 8th day, the boy was circumcised which ended the initial period of the mom’s t’meiah. The second ritual was solely about the mom’s relationship to God. Regardless of gender, she shall bring two offerings: an olah and a chatah to the priest at the Tent of Meeting these offerings formal marked the conclusion of her maternity leave and could participate fully in society.

Gender matters. We know this truth – the unfinished work of the 1960’s and 70’s has taught us this well. Rabbi Ettinger notes that the ceremony of circumcision required on the 8th day for boys may have been as much about acknowledging this truth – publically marking the child’s maleness and formally allowing the important processes of father-son bonding that would have been critical in the ancient world where gender roles were so definitive. The period of t’meiah for the mom in the case of the birth of a boy is shortened in order to allow the father to enter. Notably, according to Jewish law, it is incumbent upon the father to circumcise his own son and bring him into the covenant, a task that still today is formally and ritually delegated to the mohel as part of the ceremony. According to such an understanding, there is no need for such a separation ritual between mother and daughter. There the bond had already begun and it was thus allowed to continue on its own; there was no need for the interruption of ceremony.

Today there is (and should continue to be) opportunity for both mothers and fathers to be intimately involved in the rearing of both sons and daughters. While gender matters, we have learned that we need not fall victim to assumptions about gender roles based on the past. One of the ways liberal Jews challenge gender role assumptions is to encourage welcoming ceremonies for all Jewish children, male and female. Male and female are different – but both are worthy of celebration, both are worthy of the full involvement of both parents in their rearing, and both are worthy of a public affirmation of their presence in the community and their relationship with God. Just as both young women and men are called to Torah to mark their coming of age in Jewish tradition as will Morgan tomorrow morning.
Ken y’hi ratzon.

The Counting of the Omer: A Lesson in Patience, Erev Shabbat Shemini

2010-04-10T06:37:00.000-07:00

Here we are, this Shabbat Shemini, marking the 11th day of the Omer. 38 more days of counting, checking off the days until reaching the final summit at Sinai. 38 more days until the next festive celebration, Shavuot. It takes patience to count our days of wandering. It takes patience to sit back and wait for the harvest to grow. It takes patience to prepare for a moment as significant as revelation is understood to be.

I admit, I am probably the worst person to give this sermon. I need to hear it, to heed it – and take it to heart, for one of my greatest faults is my impatience. I am impatient to the point of being labeled ‘impulsive’ at times; though, to my credit, impulsivity implies not thinking through an action, and believe me, I think through my actions (perhaps over think – just ask those closest to me) despite my impatience at getting those deeds done once I’ve set myself on a course of action.

But I, as all of us, can learn from this biblically mandated period of counting. Counting the Omer reminds us not only of the value of patience and thoughtful attention as opposed to active doing and celebration but of the challenge and indeed stamina required for such attentive patience.

Parashat Shimini contains one of the more disturbing stories of our Tanach, the story of Nadav and Abihu. Perhaps they too could have learned something significant from this idea of biding time through steady counting.

The story is familiar. Aaron and his sons are at the end of their week long ordination period. Bayom ha-sh’mini, on the eighth day, from where the name of our portion comes, they are commanded to bring up offerings to the altar in a ritual which will conclude the ordination procedure. Aaron, assisted by his sons, brings up the various offerings, blesses the people with what we assume is the priestly blessing, after which: ותצא אש מלפני יהוה ותאכל על המזבח את העולה, “fire came forth from Adonai and consumed the burnt offering upon the altar.” Powerful stuff and the text is clear to remind us that this fire-ry scene of Divine presence was not for Aaron, nor his sons, alone, rather it was a moment – וירא כל העם to be seen by all of the people.

Apparently two of the sons who witnessed this dramatic and very public episode - didn’t appreciate such attention paid to Moses and Aaron (or at least their offerings) during this heady ritual and attempted to offer up their own gifts – not of calf, lamb, he-goat, ram, ox, or even meal such as was required of Aaron, but of אש זרה – commonly translated as ‘strange’ or ‘alien’ fire. No sooner had Nadav and Abihu lifted up their pans of incense and fire, and again, ותצא אש מלפני יהוה, fire come forth from Adonai. But, instead of consuming the offering itself, the אש זרה offered up by Nadav and Abihu, ותאכל אותם, God’s fire consumed them.

The nature of Nadav and Abihu’s crime has been a source of Rabbinic discussion and commentary since the earliest days of Rabbinic scholarship. What did they do that was so wrong, that warranted such violent punishment? Was it their evil intentions that laid at the heart of their crime – a desire to undermine Moses’ and Aaron’s authority and assume the mantle of leadership for themselves? As Samson Raphael Hirsch, for example, summarizes, perhaps it was Nadav and Abihu’s desire to have their offering used as a tool to fulfill their own self-centered needs and wishes as opposed to using the offering to serve God and by extension the greater community (see citation in Leibowitz, p. 125).

Many traditional commentators argue that the root of Nadav and Abihu’s crime lay, however, not in their intentions, but rather in their choice of offering – this אש זרה, an offering that was ‘strange’ in that it was never asked for, never commanded by God. Their fault lay not in the fact that they were moved to make offerings to God, but how and what they offered – these triggered God’s rage.

אש זרה, alien fire. A grammatical analysis allows us another avenue for understanding this אש זרה. זרה in this context is commonly assumed to be derived from the root ז-ו-ר, meaning ‘strange’ ‘alien’, or even ‘illegitimate’; but what if we read, זרה as rising out of the root, ז-ר-ה, a root which connotes the idea of ‘scattered’, ‘spread out’, maybe even ‘haphazard’. The offerings for Aaron’s ordination ritual involved painstakingly detailed procedural functions. There was nothing disorganized or scattered about the procedure: bring the offering, make expiation upon it, slaughter it, deal with its blood in a specific ritualistic fashion, burn certain parts into smoke on the altar, burn other parts outside the camp; and ‘rinse & repeat’ for each successive offering. The tasks of the offering required physical effort, olfactory stimulation, and a messy face off with the death of a living and breathing creature all experienced within a clearly organized structure and pattern, one that we can assume for all of its detail ensured a level of safety for all involved.

Compare these cumbersome (and perhaps tedious) procedures with Nadav and Abihu’s fire offerings. They each took a pan, lit a fire on it, placed some incense on top of the fire and poof, they were consumed. There is no evidence of any patient procedure of precautions taken to ensure the fire remained contained. Perhaps the word zara was chosen to teach us that what made the fire zar, illegitimate, was its capacity to zarah spread (and consume) due to the impulsivity by which it was offered with no regard for public safety. Moreover, their choice of fire is interestingly in and of itself. Fire is never presented in our biblical text as an appropriate offering in and of itself. Offerings are burned routinely, but it is not the fire that God finds pleasing; it is the smoke and odor. So soon on the heels of witnessing God’s fire consume Aaron’s offerings, it appears that Nadav and Abihu’s choice of presenting fire was less about challenging Moses’ and Aaron’s authority but God’s through mimicking God’s miraculous fire show.

There is no question which offering is presented as most pleasing to God. Hands down the offering created out of intense focus and intimate effort; the one that required attention to detail and ultimately more patience. Nadav and Abihu’s passion may appear to be good intentioned on the surface, but the kevanna, the intention God demands of us requires far more than eager passion. Reading this story during our period of patient waiting and counting underscores the tragedy of Nadav and Abihu’s succumbing to their own impulsive behavior.

Our offerings, too, require thoughtful, even disciplined, patience. Without thoughtful attention to content, even the most energized and flashy worship productions can easily remain vapid. We must learn to pour our spontaneous passion into well-intended kevanna. Parashat Shemini reminds us that even the most well intended spontaneity becomes not only meaningless but ultimately harmful, deadly even without proper patience and attention to substance.
It is no easy task for those of us so accustomed to the value of immediate gratification so commonly forwarded in our culture to calm our ‘do it now’ impulse. Moreover, we need the passion and glow of spontaneity in our worship offerings, but true kevanna, meaningful intention, requires patience and attention as well as spontaneity.

Kevanna, proper intention, is vital to worship; it has always been viewed as a necessary counter to the keva, to what is fixed in tradition. Indeed, Jewish midrash and folklore remind us repeatedly that God responds to intention as readily if not more so than content. Yet, charismatic spontaneity without regard for tradition or for others in the community is not typical of mainstream Judaism and is not a model promoted by the biblical authors – certainly not the Priestly writer of Leviticus. Here we are reminded that proper intention is a learned skill that can and must be nurtured.

Does spontaneous charismatic prayer ever have its place in Jewish life? Perhaps. Our mystics of course would say so. And the biblical voice might say so as well. The editorial references to the story of Nadav and Abihu found in the book of Numbers indicate that Nadav and Abihu’s error lay in the timing of their offerings, בהקרבם אש זרה לפני יהוה in ‘when they brought this aish zarah.” Accordingly, there can be a time and place for such expressions, but certainly not in a public moment tied so closely to the ordination ritual, a ritual whose intent was to confer leadership on an individual as means of centralizing and solidifying the community.

In our modern world, most of us are offered too few moments to simply sit back and count the days that pass allowing ourselves the necessary breathing space required for true kevanna and ultimately spiritual growth. Nadav and Abihu in their haste to act missed out on the opportunity to step back and reflect, a mistake that cost them dearly. This period during which we count, when we mark time between two festive occasions, gives us an amazing gift. It gives us the opportunity to step back, observe, and reflect on the planting and learning season that has passed as we continue to step forward with impassioned intention as we seek to bring our gifts into the world.

The Democracy of the Temple & the Value of Dirty Dishes, Delivered Erev Shabbat ha-Gadol, 5770

2010-03-28T08:43:00.000-07:00

It finally happened. No, I’m not referring to the signing of the new Health Care bill, though for the record, I’m a huge proponent of change in our health care system and believe this momentous legislation is an important albeit first step towards change. No, I’m referring to the fact that this week my number came up! Yep, for the first time in my close to 26 years of being eligible, I was called in to sit and wait with a crowd of other dutiful, if not abit bored, Baltimore County citizens for jury selection this past Wednesday. My first reaction to my summons notice was perhaps like many, “I am way too busy for this. How am I going to carve out time in my week for this, the week before pesach no less…I wonder if I can get out of it…can clergy get special dispensation from jury duty?” But as I walked into the courthouse with my cup of ‘joe’ that served sadly as my breakfast (instead of my well earned post workout oatmeal and yogurt that got skipped along with the workout) and sat through the necessary but tedious educational video that reviewed the details and importance of our civic duties, my sense of American identity was heightened.

I listened to the opening remarks offered by the judicial chief charged with administrating the system: the recognition of the inconvenience of the task and the tedium and boredom of waiting but also the importance of our presence whether called for a trial or not and the importance of using our intellect and our basic common sense if indeed called upon. I was reminded of the unique, though not without fault but certainly democratic American system of justice – where else in the world do regular citizens, all of us, take such a vital part in such a critical and defining part of society?

In hearing these comments, I recognized a number of parallels between our democratic judicial system and the sacrificial cult outlined so thoroughly in Leviticus. Certainly, like I did, the ancient Israelites likewise must have thought it a huge inconvenience to find the time to make pilgrimage to the Temple altar let alone while finding and then schlepping their blemish free animals and the choice flour necessary for their service to the community.

At first glance, the ancient Temple system of worship hardly seems democratic. The hierarchy of the priestly caste in and of itself is the antithesis of democracy. This was not an earned or elected societal position but rather one gained solely by biological destiny. Indeed, so contrary to the democratic values of the modern western world, the removal of the division of the community into classes of Kohanim, Levi’im, and Yisraelim, was one of the most significant (and sometimes controversial) changes that Reform Judaism instituted in response to European enlightenment. Yet, as a system of worship in the ancient world, the Temple cult may offer an early example of the values that would later come to be labeled as ‘democratic’ and can serve to remind us of the role of leaders in a democratic society, namely to function on behalf of the demos in democracy, the people.

According to Merrian-Webster’s online Dictionary, the only resource available to me while waiting to fulfill the American privilege of serving on a jury (thank goodness I could bring a laptop instead of a blemish free bull), the word democracy has roots that extend back to the Greek: dēmokratia, from dēmos: people and kratia: rule. Democracy – the people rule, as opposed to aristocracy for instance, where the aristo, or the ‘best’, the ‘upper echelons’, rule.

While the Kohanim and the Levites had various powers of administration not shared with the rest of society (no so unlike our appointed judges and elected political leaders today), the power of worship in this system resided fully with the people, not with the priests. It was up to the people, the general population to bring the offerings to the priests in the Temple. The entire system was based on the ability of the common folk to get to the Temple with their offerings. Their participation was not optional; it was vital, not only for supporting but also for the proper functioning of the entire worship system. It was those physical offerings that supported the Temple and the priestly caste. Furthermore, though the priests benefited, the goal of the system wasn’t to service people, but rather the entire system is framed as worship and service to God. And, not so unlike our judicial system, was equally intended to centralize and bring cohesion to the community in the name of that service. Be clear, even the Torah reminds us that God doesn’t care about the specifics of the offerings. How often do we come across that repeated refrain: אשה ריח ניחח ליהוה? The sacrifice is turned to smoke of pleasing odor for God. No matter into what economic category one falls, and what one is required and/or able to bring – whether meal, goat, bird, or bull – all are ultimately reduced to smell and ash, smell that God apparently finds pleasing and ash that needs to be cleaned up.

What’s fascinating about the workings of the Temple – and perhaps a lesson to us living in apparently democratic societies - is that while the common folk bring the myriad of offerings up to the altar, to support it, it is the upper echelons of society, the priest no less, who continually feeds the fire and cleans up the mess. It doesn’t get more democratic in terms of division of labor than that!

A few weeks ago, I participated in a workshop that is part of a series on Food & Faith co-sponsored by the Institute for Christian and Jewish Studies and the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. The goal of the series in large part is to raise awareness about the reality of inner city food deserts and to encourage the participants, primarily faith based leaders, to brainstorm ways in which to raise awareness in our own communities and to help coax change. One of the participants in my break out group a few weeks ago noted the general failure of those with plenty to recognize the holiness in dirty dishes. You heard that right – the kedusha, the inherent holiness of our mess – the ashes left over after we cook our food and eat it. Just as the ashes on the Temple altar, the remains of our feast tell a sacred story, and like the priests, those of us who have plenty due to the work of others often also have plenty of dishes to clean.

The Temple has a very democratic system. Who cleans up? The Kohen, the priest. The ashes, the mess is considered a sacred task. Rabbinic tradition likens our homes, our tables to mikdashim me’atim, miniature Temples. It is easy to curse the mess in the kitchen, but when we sit down this week at our seder tables, at our sacred altars, to celebrate our history and our inherited freedom, let us not take for granted the dirty dishes and the mess that we leave behind. Let those dishes remind us of our bounty and the wonderful experience of the seder we were able to enjoy with family and friends. Moreover, let us allow the sacred task of cleaning up after ourselves remind us of our responsibility to all of those in our world who simply don’t have enough in order to leave such ashes behind.
Reform Judaism, in its effort to counter the traditional hierarchical system inherent in the biblical text, elevated us all to priests. Accordingly, it is all of our responsibility to tend the fire that will serve the community; it is all of our responsibility to help bring about redemption for all humanity.

As the writers of the early Union Prayer Book and their subsequent editors so eloquently express:
When justice burns like a flaming fire within us, when love evokes willing sacrifice from us, when, to the last full measure of selfless devotion, we demonstrate our belief in the ultimate triumph of truth and righteousness, then Your goodness enters our lives, and we CAN begin to change the world… (p. 39 UPB, p. 117 MT, caps mine).

This Z’man Cherutenu, this Season of our Redemption, may we be inspired to act like priests in this world – tending the fires of social justice and helping the world become a place where everyone has dirty dishes.
Ken y'hi ratzon!

"Why do Mitzvot?" Delivered Social Action Shabbat, 3/12/2010

2010-03-19T09:04:00.000-07:00

Since the last decades of the nineteenth century, social action has been a hallmark of Reform Judaism. Inspired by our prophetic tradition, Reform ideology – and in particular American Reform ideology - placed a premium on the mandate of ethical behavior as a way to identify itself not only as distinct from Orthodoxy but from Unitarian Christianity. To paraphrase Michael Meyer, a renowned scholar of the history of Reform Judaism, the practical application of social justice and the principles of morality greatly overshadowed and even replaced ritual and law as the basis of Reform religious expression. This impulse for elevating social action over and above Jewish law may seem like an outgrowth of Reform Judaism’s emphasis on rationalism as well as its theological concept of the messianic age and our role in bringing it about. Taking care of the world and each other is certainly a reasoned approach to enabling redemption. Yet, mysticism has its own brand of social action grounded in the 16th century Lurianic Kabbalistic theology of tikkun olam, a phrase which has become the most popular Jewish catch phrase for social action. These mystics, recently exiled from Spain, understood the need for human action in the form of mitzvot as a vehicle of repair for the world as well as for God – both of which in Kabbalistic thought are viewed as shattered, as broken.

I find it compelling that the Lurianic Kabbalists of 16th century Safed, despite their traumatic experiences, did not abandon God. Viewing God as in desperate need of human intervention, for sure, though they created an understanding of God that not only correlated with their experiences but that could also bring cohesion to the community. According to Robert Wright, author of Three Scientists and their God and a recent guest on NPR’s Speaking of Faith series, the intention of religious doctrine throughout history has been to keep chaos at bay. Lurianic Kabbalism adapted an existing religious system keeping God at the center while mobilizing the community to action. It wasn’t an absence of God that failed them, it was human failure. Accordingly, God needs mitzvot. In this system, social action, Tikkun olam, translated to conformity and abidance to Jewish law - that was the manner in which humankind could redeem both God and the world for this school of mystics.

While no longer, by choice of course, defined by halacha -- by the bounds of Jewish law, we too believe that our actions matter, and that it is our mandate l’taken olam, to fix the world. But, with the loss of a legal definition of social action (or mitzvot), must we lose the sense of God as a unifying and motivating factor in our mitzvot? I’d bet most of us engage in social action not because of a Divine impulse per se, but because of what we would define as our heightened sense of social consciousness, a value no doubt inherited in part from the early giants of the Reform movement such as Isaac Mayer Wise, David Einhorn, and Kaufman Kohler.

God, however, was central to the Reformers’ vision of the mandate of social action, and I’d argue that despite our individual beliefs (or doubts) regarding the existence of a personal God, a Divine impulse from outside of ourselves must be central to our own motivation for social justice. This is not an easily stated assessment mind you. I struggle with the existence and presence of God in our world as much as any other modern Jew living in such a predominately secular culture. As a whole, Jews are not particularly comfortable discussing God. In my years at Hebrew Union College, the seminary for the training of our Reform leaders, I rarely experienced a discussion about God (and this was typical). The richest discussions that I did have about God were for the most part an outgrowth of my chaplaincy training which was under the auspices of an interfaith, not a specifically Jewish, internship program. While anecdotal at best, my experiences working as a chaplain intern in a hospital setting underscored this observation. It was my Christian patients who sought out dialogue about and with God. My Jewish patients were far more content with playing Jewish geography. It seemed they were far more interested in a relationship with me, a kind visitor, than with God.

Our discomfort in discussing God which I believe stems in large part from our doubts about God’s presence need not translate into an abandonment of the ideology of God as a motivating factor behind social action. There need not be such a direct correlation between ideology and faith, in my mind. Here there is much to learn from our early Reform theologians.

Emil Hirsch, in his poetic translation of his grandfather David Einhorn’s Yom Kippur Avodah for the innovative 19th century siddur, Olath Tamid, writes:
“The yearning after Thee and the thought of Thy salvation, the assurance that Thou, O God, wilt refresh those that cry unto Thee in the drought. Yea, this is our spiritual patrimony, Thy love which worketh wonders, hath marvelously preserved for us amidst the destructive storms and from the raging billows of millennia. The survey of the ages which stretch from the hoary past of our weak beginnings to the young days of our present fuller strength may well fill us with wonder at the triumphant preservation of the fundamental truth, the underlying thought, in the ceaseless whirl of changing forms, customs and circumstances; but this fact should also be an incentive unto us to contribute in due measure….” (p. 181)

It isn’t enough to be awed by God and the wondrous workings of the world, rather this sense of something larger and more profound than ourselves should propel us towards organized action. Recall Robert Wright’s notion of religion as a balm against chaos. A God concept at the very least can serve to unify us in mission. Even Baruch Spinoza, the 17th century philosopher who was excommunicated by the Dutch Jewish community for his then heretical ideas regarding the nature of God understood the power of God as a motivating force for justice in the world, “The very essence of religion is belief in a Supreme Being who delights in justice and mercy…. and whose worship consists in the practice of justice and charity toward our neighbors,” he wrote.

God mandated action smacks of fundamentalism, yet, without God as an outside motivating factor for our deeds of social action, we run the risk of losing an important barometer of moral sense. Our early American Reformers understood this need for something profound, beyond ourselves, to encourage us, to help us push ourselves to be the best selves we can by acting justly in the world.
20th century philosopher and activist, Abraham Joshua Heschel, taught that “a mitzvah is where God and man meet.” An anthropomorphic image, of course, but one that can offer us a metaphor for our engagement in social action today. I don’t believe that God acts directly upon the world, but perhaps as Heschel suggests, it is through our acts of love and kindness, through the pursuit of social justice, that we can rise out of our mundane world to a level of divinity.

What Ki Tisa Teaches us bout Anger Management, delivered Shabbat Parah, 3/6/2010

2010-03-08T12:12:00.000-08:00

Parashat Ki Tisa is best known perhaps for the famous story of the golden calf contained within. It’s a great story with lots of material for discussion. What struck this year upon studying the parasha is the lesson Ki Tisa offers about anger management. God has just witnessed the scene at the base of the mountain. This people that God (him, her, itself?) has liberated and given law to – law to which the Israelites just agreed to כל אשר דבר יי נעשה ונשמע all that God says, we will do and listen - has now in their impatience created an idol of ba-al worship. Moses has yet to descend from the mountain with the tablets representing that law and already they are challenging it. To put it bluntly, God is beyond mad. If you’ll excuse my language, God is pissed. ועתה הניחה לי ויחר אפי בהם ואכלם..., “now let me be,” God says to Moses, “so that my anger will blaze forth upon them and consume them.” (Ex. 32:10). The biblical Hebrew for this anger provides a wonderful visual metaphor, literally “‘my nose’ became ‘hot’ or ‘inflammed’ at them.” Whenever I see this phrase ויחר אף I imagine an angry fire breathing dragon (nice image for God, no? – but there it is in the text). More subtle but perhaps more significant is how God now refers to the Israelites. No longer referred to by God as עמי, my people, as they were throughout their experience in Egypt, but now as “עמך” ‘your people’ – Moses people. God seems to be distancing, removing Godself from the relationship, the covenant. This isn’t ‘my people’, Moses, they are ‘your’ problem now.

At first glance, the peshat, the plain meaning of the text, tells us that Moses refuses to ‘let God be’ and proceeds instead to successfully convince God to rethink acting out such anger. Verses 11-13 of chapter 32 (pp. 588-589) narrate Moses imploring God not to let anger dictate action, but to think about the consequences.

But of course, Jewish textual study never leaves the peshat, that first glance, alone. The Rabbinic literature struggles immensely with the idea of God losing it so completely. Exodus Rabbah, for instance, a collection of midrashim gathered over time but codified in the early medival period, offers more than one opinion on this scene in parashat Ki Tisa. On the one hand, God is depicted in dire need of intervention while Moses is the ultimate conciliator. After Moses recognizes the extent of God’s anger, the midrash imagines him thinking to himself; If I leave Israel to their fate …they can never survive. I will not stir from here before I have sought mercy for them. Whereupon Moses begins to urge God, pleading with God – who in the midrash needs quite a bit of convincing – not to act harshly against the people. In the very next midrash in the compilation, however, a different scene is imagined. Noting the change in God’s language to Moses from the imperative לך רד, GO DOWN! to the softer preterite form, such as ויאמר, the midrashist comments, “God began to open up to Moses paths for pleading mercy for them.”

Another tactic of commentators who seek a kinder understanding of God is to reflect on this phrase ועתה הניחה לי now, let me be. This phrase is understood by many commentators not as a dismissal of Moses, but instead as an invitation to intervene. According to the 11th century Rashi, who himself draws significantly from the Midrash, ועתה הניחה לי is God’s cue to Moses to rally on their behalf. God’s behavior now depends on Moses (‘let me be’ Moses. These are ‘your’ people now; their fate at this moment is in your hands. Implicit in this understanding is God’s challenge to Moses, “so what are you going to do about it?”). Accordingly, God doesn’t want to act hastily, God wants Moses to act, to pray on their behalf, to care deeply about this people.

Moses apparently learns the lesson. He does intervene. God’s anger cools, and the Israelites are saved. Happy ending, right? Or perhaps not. Actions do speak louder than words, and God’s heated moment of anger made a far stronger impression on Moses then his ‘now, let me be.’ What happens when Moses descends the mountain and sees for himself what God has been talking about? As soon as Moses came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, ויחר אפ משה, (there’s that fabulous metaphor again) he becomes enraged and throws down the freshly engraved tablets of law. Then he proceeds to not only make the Israelites drink the molten stew left after burning the Golden calf, but he rallies the men of Levi to attack their fellow Israelites.

Ooops! So much for that lesson of taking a moment to step back and think through the consequences of acting out of such rage. Moses took in God’s va-yichar af, the initial heated moment apparently far more than God’s v’atah ha-ni-cha li. Yet, perhaps there is a positive lesson in Moses’ heated reaction. Moses’ anger could be understood as a sign that he does accept responsibility for this people. Their actions make him angry because indeed he does care and wants the best of them and for them. In that sense he has modeled God.

God gets the reality of anger. God understands how emotionally heated one can get when those we love act badly. After this episode when God is sending the Israelites out on their continued journey, God says, (Ex. 33:3) “Since you are a stiff-necked people, I will not go in your midst, lest I destroy you on the way!” Sometimes we have to recognize our own limitations and that may require giving ourselves some space to reconcile our emotions before acting hastily upon them. It is unclear if Moses ever learns this part of the critical lesson. Anger is a valid emotion that can rise to the surface pretty quickly, but we can learn to recognize it and take a moment to consider how we express that anger.

In this week’s portion, both God and Moses have experienced the same pain and frustration resulting from the actions of ‘their’ people. They have each confronted such anger, panim el panim, face to face. Their ultimate reactions, the outcomes of their anger, were however gravely different and serve to remind us of the challenges and responsiblity of taming our humanity in the face of heated emotion.

A Response to Marc Rosenstein's Galilee Diary, delivered by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman on Shabbat Zachor, 2/27/2010

2010-03-01T11:22:00.000-08:00

In his Union of Reform Judaism on-line column, Galilee Diary, Rabbi Marc Rosenstein, an American (HUC trained) transplant who made aliyah to Israel in 1990, offers his opinion that while the “status of liberal Jews” is an issue of import in Israel, our energy should not be focused so much on their plight but rather on “[standing] up for those other groups in society whose lot is significantly worse than ours.” He is, of course, commenting in large part on recent events encountered by the Women of the Wall demanding us, the reader – by and large American liberal Jews – this is a URJ column, to keep, and I quote him, “the persecution or disenfranchisement of liberal Jews in perspective.”

Rosenstein acknowledges the challenges the liberal community faces in Israel, but he underscores the gradual progress that has been made noting the opening of non-Orthodox synagogues despite opposition from the right (and apathy from the majority of secular Jews) as well as the increased demand for non-Orthodox wedding ceremonies, ceremonies that require a civil license from abroad as non-Orthodox rabbis are not recognized by the Israeli government. Despite the added bureaucratic task of obtaining a non-Israeli license, hundreds of Israelis do choose this option instead of conforming to the Orthodox standards required by the state.

Rabbi Rosenstein’s view is not uncommon among Israelis. We heard it ourselves directly from Rabbi Maya Leibovich of Mevasseret Zion during her visit this past November. Not only as a liberal Jew, but as a female rabbi, she felt the demands of the Women of the Wall simply unrealistic. She believes they should stop pushing the issue and focus their energies elsewhere. Of all the challenges Israel faces, many view the failure of the right, the Orthodox establishment, to recognize religious pluralism, let alone Progressive Judaism proper, as far less important than the security of Israel and a humanitarian solution to the Palestinian conflict.

There is no question that Rosenstein raises a compelling point. How can the liberal Jewish community demand recognition for religious pluralism in Israel while in its struggle to maintain its very security, Israel must deal with the manner in which it treats non-Jews, and non-Israelis living within its borders in particular. Rosenstein doesn’t argue that the lack of legal status and protections for liberal Jews within Israel is acceptable, far from it; but, the point he makes is that it shouldn’t be, in his words, “the most urgent” concern.

I disagree. If the Women of the Wall cannot expect to be treated with dignity and respect, than how on earth can the majority of Israelis be expected to treat anyone viewed as ‘the other’ with any level of dignity and respect? The recognition of religious pluralism, the full acceptance of non-Orthodox Jews in Israel, is equally important as the sundry of other issues this young nation faces and more importantly, sets a standard of humanitarian treatment for all.

Rosenstein dismisses the persecution of the Women of the Wall as a “symbolic offense” noting that most liberal Jews do not experience regular episodes of discrimination or persecution. Perhaps gender obfuscates the issue for Rabbi Rosenstein. The Kotel is not the only place where liberal values are being threatened, and in each place where liberal values are being scratched away, women are increasingly being forced to subject themselves to discrimination.

Anyone who has spent a reasonable amount of time in Israel has taken an Egged bus. The Egged bus system is Israel’s primary mode of public transportation. Until recently it was accessible, affordable, and generally safe. Beginning in the 1990s, Egged began offering segregated bus service to areas heavily populated Haredim, the most fervently Orthodox in order to encourage their use of the public transportation. What started as a limited practice to accommodate a minority population has expanded to the extent that, according to IRAC, the Israeli Religious Action Center, there is no choice but to use segregated buses on 5 intercity routes. Moreover, where there are still options, the segregated alternative is often the cheapest and fastest. A trip from Jerusalem to Petach Tikva (a trip I took regularly 20 years ago with no challenges) now requires two buses with a 15 minute stop between and a fare of 28.50 NIS, that is unless I don’t mind a segregated bus. The segregated bus offers a non-stop 79 minute ride costing 19.70 NIS. Travelling from Ashdod to Arad? The segregated choice demands a 2 hour ride for 24 NIS. The non-segregated option demands a 4 hour ride at a fare of 60 NIS!

One could argue, ‘what’s the big deal, take the segregated bus!’ Well, we’ve experienced segregation in America, haven’t we. A reminder of what a segregated bus looks like: separate entrances in this case for men and women with women seated squarely at the back of the bus. And for those Rosa Parks of Israeli society who resist such degrading treatment, there are some who have taken it upon themselves, using physical force when necessary, to enforce this supposed ‘voluntary’ segregation on the buses. While the High Court of Justice in Israel just this week scolded the transportation minister for not following recommendations by an investigatory committee that segregation be fully voluntary and not compulsory on any public bus, no attempts have been made by the Israeli government to outlaw this degrading and “voluntary” form of segregation.

The Western Wall, the Egged bus system,… what’s next? I hesitate to imagine, and frankly I don’t need to. There is at least one Haredi neighborhood in Israel that has actually established segregated side-walks. A company, admittedly privately owned not public, has started marketing personal michitzas, boundaries, for the Orthodox to use when travelling to prevent any unintentional and potentially inappropriate encounter. Perhaps Rabbi Rosenstein doesn’t feel persecuted by such changes, but I’d bet lots of Israelis do. Certainly lots of women do.

The recognition of religious pluralism by the Israeli government is vital to Israel’s growth as well as to its security. To state that the demands for recognition by progressive Jewry, while important, are not pressing, or to imply that the Women of the Wall are somehow needlessly pushing the envelope in the public square and thus creating unnecessary static, is to ignore a troubling reality and to even forward a misogynistic agenda. More significantly, such advances of the religious establishment into the public arena alienate not only Israel’s own citizens, but also us – those of us who choose to live outside of Israel but who support Israel in a myriad of ways. Israel needs our support. Israel needs support from Jews and non-Jews throughout the international community, and it simply can’t afford to place the needs of a radical Orthodox minority over the needs of the nation.

Israel has a choice. It can either continue in its path of being dictated solely by the religious right, or it can strive to become a fully democratic state that recognizes and allows for the public expression of the full breadth of Jewish life. Despite the sense among the Orthodox that Progressive Judaism threatens Jewish vitality, history teaches otherwise. Religious pluralism has marked Jewish life since its inception. It has enriched Jewish life leading to the growth of a wealth of literature, including our Rabbinic literature, differing points of view, and cultural expressions. It can continue to do so if Israel’s legislature would give it the opportunity.

One point Rabbi Rosenstein makes with which I fully and passionately agree: “feeling challenged to educate and litigate and demonstrate toward a more perfect Jewish democratic state is not the same as nor does it justify statements that imply washing our hands of Israel, or feeling that we have no stake in it.” We do have a stake – yes, in part because we are Jews, and we have an historical connection to the land. Yes, in part because we know from experience that there is a need for a place that will open its borders to any Jew in need. But also, because as Theodore Herzl reminded us, the world benefits from Israel’s presence and all it has to offer the international community. Do we really want to imagine the Middle East without Israel? We may not be Israeli citizens. We may get frustrated by the news we read. But we must care – and we must dare to voice our concern so that Israel can grow to become that more perfect Jewish democratic state we so hope it to be.

Delivered Erev Shabbat Shemot, 1/8/2010 by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman

2010-01-11T08:33:00.001-08:00

ויקם מלך חדש על מצרים אשר לא ידע את יוסף
I have always viewed this verse as one of the most striking in this week’s parshah, parashot Shemot – and indeed in perhaps the entire story of the Israelites’ sojourn in Egypt; it marks a significant turning point in the narrative. How could this be that a new king wouldn’t have heard of Joseph? Recall just a few parshiot ago, Pharoah declared that none other than Joseph shall be greater in Egypt save for the throne itself. Responsible for Egypt’s extraordinary economic survival during great famine, Joseph was highly esteemed within the political structure of the Egyptian court. He was to quote Tim Rice’s wonderful libretto of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, “Pharoah’s number 2.”

So what happened between the end of Genesis when Joseph was still highly respected and certainly as well known in Egypt, one would imagine, as Rahm Emanuel is today, and the start of Exodus where apparently he is unknown?The midrash has a few thoughts on the matter that are informative.

One, that there was actually a new king. Accept the pshat, the stated text at face value. Accordingly, so much time has passed, that indeed, the previous leader’s chief side kick and all of his efforts have been long forgotten. A bit simplistic, but perhaps possible. Another, more realistic thought is that Joseph was not actually forgotten. Instead, this midrash argues, it was the same king but who succumbing to political pressure from his constituents issued new decrees as if he was not aware that Joseph ever existed. This view forwards the idea that it wasn’t just Pharoah who was capable of evil, but that the Egyptian people were so filled with fear and hatred of their neighbors that it didn’t matter that Joseph had saved lives. Moreover, this commentary suggests that despite their growing numbers, the Israelites had little or no say in the matter – no voice.

The midrash struggles with the text largely because it seems unlikely that Joseph would be so quickly forgotten following his death at the close of Genesis. It seems unlikely that all memory of that period of his influence would be gone from Egyptian consciousness. So unlikely that it demands an explanation.

The historians among us want to know exactly how much time has transpired: is the first opinion possible? Could it truly have been such a long time that Joseph and his policies were barely if at all memorable? Of course, this is a difficult if not impossible thing to assess. That being said, the question does keep academics busy, though hopefully not awake at night, and attempts have been made to historically place the Biblical narrative of Israelite descent into Egypt into the historical time line. A favored theory has the period of Israelite bondage coinciding with the overthrow of the Hyksos empire (one that was apparently favorable to the Israelites) and the rise of Ahmose I (who apparently was not). A compelling theory as archeological evidence indicates that Ahmose’s reign was marked by lots of ambitious building that demanded cheap – i.e., slave - labor. This timing would place the Israelites in Egypt around the 15-13 centuries BCE, a plausible time frame but one that frankly doesn’t fully line up with the biblical record. But, if this hypothesis is correct – which be clear is far from certain – than Ahmose I would represent that melech hadash who if he did ‘know’ of Joseph’s influence on the previous ruler, would have worked diligently to undermine it with new legislation in order to forward and strengthen his own regime.

Of course, the bible is not intended to be historically accurate. It presents at best a telescoped and elaborated version of history whose purpose is to offer a theological message. This is a natural phenomenon; aren’t we already condensing recent events into “the first decade of the 21st century” as if time is a concrete construct that can transform history into something larger? The uncertainty of the history of the bible actually helps the theology rise to the surface – the details are far less important than the story of the development of this chosen nation and where it is going.

This history, however unclear, though, is instructive particularly when coupled with a third view presented in the Midrash, namely that this phrase ‘who knew not Joseph’ should be understood as evidence that the Israelites had so fully assimilated into Egyptian society that they had willingly and completely given up their own identity and their commitment to the values of their ancestors. In essence, they allowed their unique and empowering voice to be lost and forgotten.

This pivotal verse that tells us a ‘new king who knew not Joseph’ follows immediately after the verse informing us that the Israelites had grown so in number that they filled the land. Numbers weren’t the issue. This verse in our Torah portion, vayakom melech chadash al mitzraim asher lo yada et yosef, should serve to remind us of the importance of making sure that we make a visible and audible presence whether we are present in large or small numbers. In large part, the Jewish community has succeeded in this effort throughout the modern period. Today the Jewish community is a remarkable minority representing only 2% of the American population and less than .02% of the world’s population. Yet, not only, as did Joseph, does the Jewish community maintain a vital presence on the governmental level representing this year 11% of congress as well as being represented by various lobbying arms such our own movement’s Religious Action Center, AIPAC, and the more recently formed J-Street, but Jews have made their voice known and have made a positive impact in virtually all areas of society. As a recent email that is circulating through our inboxes notes, Jews account for almost 129 of awarded Nobel Prizes since its establishment in 1895 in fields such as economics, physics, and literature as well as the highly esteemed Nobel Peace Prize. Such success requires a proactive effort and a desire to learn and promote one’s values in the community.
Perhaps the greatest failure of the Israelites in Egypt was their passivity. As their mass was growing, they somehow failed to become a functioning and integral part of Egyptian society. They remained separate enough to be identifiable, yet at the same time they failed to make a positive contribution to society which left them ultimately unknown, or at least not valued enough in order to retain protection by those in high office. The lesson of this verse and its accompanying midrashim is that it is our responsibility, not any one person’s – it wasn’t solely Joseph’s responsibility - it is everyone’s responsibility to make sure that our presence and voice is always heard so that when a new power does arise, it knows who we are and even more importantly sees us as a positive force in society. This requires us to be confident in our identity as Jews, to know the values for which we stand, and to be willing to work towards enacting them in this world. Whether it is our commitment to working towards social and economic justice, ensuring freedom from religious persecution, or working towards the eradication of poverty and abuse in this world, this is our mandate: to continue to recommit ourselves to the pursuit of Jewish values in this world – only then, can we ensure that a new king won’t rise up who doesn’t know us!

Delivered Erev Shabbat Vayigash, 12/25/2009 by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman

2009-12-28T07:59:00.000-08:00

It is easy as a Jew, especially at this time of year when the Christian calendar so thoroughly consumes American culture (so much so that a Christian holiday is marked by an American national holiday), to wax poetic about living in Israel. As we’ve been reminded in past weeks, there are those who believe that Israel is the only homeland for the Jewish people. If you have had the opportunity to spend some time in Israel, you know the incredible feeling of living in a country that marks Jewish time. When main street is as quiet as today’s American streets, if not more so, but on Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, the major Chaggim, and even Shabbat. There is no question that there is an incredible sense of validation and comfort that comes from living in an environment that fully responds to Jewish time, when society and the culture generally moves according to our rhythm.

Yet, despite my love of Israel and my firm commitment to supporting Israel and demanding that her voice be present and heard in International dialogue and debate, and despite the challenges I sometimes face as a Jew living in a predominately Christian country, I would take up permanent residence nowhere else other than here, in America. That is not to say that I don’t hope to have many chances to visit Israel and to again perhaps have the opportunity to have an extended stay in the Jewish State, but I choose to remain solely an American citizen. I do not believe that Israel is the only home for Jews. As long as America remains fully committed to pursuing values of democracy, equal rights, and the separation of church and state, than as a Jew, this is my country; and I feel proud and fortunate to have the opportunity to hold citizenship here.

It is not easy to publically criticize Israel these days. Israel needs our support during this critical period of uncertainty. With Hamas becoming slowly but surely legitimized while Israel is increasingly vilified in the public eye, we must stand by her side even if at those times when we disagree with her. This is imperative. However that being said, while standing by her side, we can ask that Israel continue to work towards being the best expression of democratic and Jewish values in our world.

Last Friday, a group of close to 200 women gathered for prayer at the Kotel, The Western Wall, as part of their observance of Rosh Chodesh, the 1st of the Jewish month. This gathering has become somewhat of a ritual - the group having become known by the acronym ”W.O.W” - “The Women of the Wall.” This month’s gathering, however, was larger than usual due to events that transpired last month.
At their last gathering, a 25 year old medical student, and regular participant in these gatherings for 4 years, was arrested for wearing a tallis (a Jewish prayer shawl), an act that at The Western Wall is illegal for a woman. Nofrat Frenkel was among 16 women donning tallitot that early morning as is fairly typical at these regular gatherings. This month, however, she was the one carrying the Torah. At this particular gathering last month, upon concluding their public recitation of Hallel without, unusually enough, any disturbance, the group made the bold mistake of taking their Torah out of its carry-all-bag before heading out from The Wall to their sanctioned area at the nearby Robinson’s Arch. As the women were moving to The Robinson’s Arch, a nearby archeological site deemed ‘non-sacred’ and thus a place where they have been granted permission by the Israeli Supreme Court to read from Torah, the police chose to make an example of Ms. Frenkel. If found guilty, not only will Ms. Frenkel face up to 6 months in prison or a 10,000 shekel fine, but more significantly and far more lasting, she will be barred from the medical profession due to having been convicted of a felony. Ironic, isn’t it? Nofrat Frenkel may be restricted from being a doctor in Israel, the Jewish State, due to her commitment to Jewish life and its public expression.

Fast forward to this past Friday. In addition to having to endure the standard attacks, including verbal epitaphs, spitting, and often physical assault that often occurs at these gatherings, it happened to be raining, hard. When it was time to read Torah, the group began to make their way away from The Wall to the area where permission has been granted for them to read. Their procession drew in a couple dozen men who joined in solidarity. Upon arrival at The Robinson’s Arch, the men who wanted to read Torah were granted access and protection from the rain. The women carrying their Torah were left standing in the rain. Later that morning, Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitch, the Rabbi of the Western Wall Heritage Foundation, the governmental agency which has been given full and sole authority over the Kotel, stated, “It’s not for nothing that the rain raged at that time, because the heavens are crying over women who try to harm the Western Wall and the feelings of those who pray there.”

In Israel, where separate of church and state is far from reality, Rabbi Rabinovitch’s words are upheld by the government. He is a government appointed official. While he has been quoted saying, “[the Western Wall] is run with gentle arrangement and great sensitivity to any world view” and that attendance at the wall reveals that “everyone feels connected to it,” be clear that Rabbi Rabinovitch is an Orthodox Rabbi who does not recognize any other branch of Judaism. He would not recognize any of the Reform, Conservative, or Reconstructionist Rabbis within or without his own country – certainly not us female ones! And, he is wrong in his view that every Jew feels comfortable at The Wall. Under current circumstances, I sure don’t!

Relative to all of the countries which surround this small nation in the mid-East, Israel is progressive in its expression of democracy and in its treatment of women, and for that we should be proud as we continue to demand change. However, and some may view this as a cop out, I will continue to hope and demand for change from here, as I prefer to live in a country which allows me, as a Jew and as a woman, the right to the full and public expression of my religion.

Living in America during the Christmas season can be unsettling for Jews. Either we can jump right into the festivities of the season feeling not only inauthentic as non-Christians piggy backing onto someone else’s holiday or worse yet perhaps insulting those Christians for whom this holiday still retains even a modicum of religious significance; or, we can choose to stand on the sidelines – as a guest at the party, enjoying the mandated day off without the enormous pressure that a grand holiday usually creates (I choose the latter myself). Yet until Israel validates all expressions of Judaism – until it becomes a nation that welcomes me – a proudly observant Progressive Jew – as eagerly and as openly as my Orthodox colleagues and neighbors, until then, I’ll stay put.

By the way, while staying put, I look forward to planning and leading the next Temple Emanuel trip & mission to Israel in the summer of 2012. I hope you will consider joining in on the excursion!

Shabbat Chanukah II, delivered by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman, Erev Shabbat Miketz 5770, 12/18/2009

2009-12-21T08:54:00.000-08:00

Joseph has become an astute self-marketer, hasn’t he.

Last week’s portion paints him as a bit naive. It is one things to have dreams of grandeur where one’s elders are symbolically represented as bowing at your presence, it is quite another to share them with those very elders - Joseph’s brother’s and father - without any thought to the consequences. What was he thinking?

The story requires him to be thoughtless at that juncture. Being the subject of his brothers’ violent anger as well as a prisoner in a foreign land has apparently allowed him to mature. The interpreter of dreams who emerges in parshat Miketz is not the same idealistic dreamer of last Shabbat.

Last Shabbat, in parashat Yayeshev, Joseph announces his dreams boldly without thinking them through:
‘Joseph said to his brothers, שמעו נ֕א החלו֥ם הז֖ה אש֣ר חל֑מתי... – “Listen up! This is the dream that I have dreamed.” The Masoretic pointing - the use of the independent and forceful zakef gadol - underscores Joseph’s confidence, שמעו נ֕א! His brothers proceed to question him, ‘are you so sure of yourself? Do you really expect to rule over us?’ You’d think Joseph would have recognized the need for a more nuanced, less confrontation approach. But no, after his second dream, he again emphatically - hiney - pronounces it in the face of his family, “ה֙נה חל֤מתי חלום֙ עו֔ד והנ֧ה הש֣מש והיר֗ח ואח֤ד עשר֙ כוכב֔ים משתחו֖ים ליֽ:",” ‘hiney, I have dreamed another dream, and hiney the sun, the moon, and 11 stars are bowing to me!’

Hiney is one of those fabulous Hebrew words that put a wrench into translation. Frankly, there is no adequate translation. My most recent Biblical grammar teacher, Dr. Susanna Garfein, argues that hiney is often best left untranslated but rather is a dramatic marker than can be best reflected in the voice. Many translations use the unsatisfactory, ‘behold’ to emphasize its dramatic function: behold, I dreamed a dream... (sounds a bit too Man of the Mancha-esque, for me). The point is, Joseph’s use of hiney is significant. The sentence would make perfect sense without it. By using it, twice no less -- hiney, I dreamed, and hiney, here it is -- Joseph is clearly pushing the envelope, drawing added attention to himself and to what must have appeared to his brothers as a thoroughly self centered and delusional dream.

By this week’s portion, Joseph has developed a different approach, and one that serves him far better. He has learned to recognize and place God, a force beyond himself, at the center of the action. It isn’t all about him. Perhaps Joseph is finally getting an inkling of the reality that he is just one piece of the bigger narrative - the development of the Israelite nation.

In this week’s parashat Mikketz, Joseph recognizes immediately when called by Pharoah that בִלְעָדָי not me, but אלהים will answer regarding Pharoah’s well-being (Gen 41:16). Now Pharoah is no push-over. Our midrashic tradition, Genesis Rabbah to be precise, understands Pharoah’s statement, “I dreamt a dream and there is no one to interpret it” (Gen 41:15) as meaning not that there hasn’t been any attempts at interpretation but that there has been no interpretation yet to his liking!

So let’s see what was so compelling about Joe’s analysis (p. 237-8). Joseph frames his entire explanation as God, specifically Elohim, telling Pharoah what is going to happen. Moreover, before finishing, he adds: :כי־נכ֤ון הדבר֙ מֵ֣עִם האלה֔ים וממה֥ר האלה֖ים לעשתֽו, ‘this matter has been decided (in other words, its a done deal) by Elohim and Elohim is quickly making it happen. (Gen 41:32)’ Taking the traditional approach to text study that no word is superfluous, it is striking that Elohim is repeated here. If we look at the verses that lead up to it, the proper pronoun for God is not repeated but rather understood. Verse 28, for example, “this is the thing that I told Pharoah, that which God is doing,הֶראָה את פרעה ‘he’ has shown to Pharoah.” Verse 25 too, “היגיד לפרעה” ‘he’ has made known; but in verse 32, Joseph uses what 20th century biblical commentator Nahama Leibowitz calls the rhetorical device of repetition: כי נכון הדבר מעם האלהים וממהר האלהים לעשתו. Like the previous sentences, this sentence is fully understandable without the 2nd Elohim: it could just as easily read: כי נכון הדבר מעם האלהים וממהר לעשתו - This matter has been decided by God and he is quickly making it happen.

This ‘rhetorical repetition’ works! Joseph succeeds at convincing Pharoah that his interpretation is correct, and that God is in charge. Pharoah’s first words after Joseph’s recommendations to ‘find a man with the spirit of Elohim in him,’ is indeed, ‘since Elohim has made all of this known to you, (Gen 41:39)’ I pick you.

Joseph has brilliantly marketed himself on the shoulders of God.

Perhaps Joseph instinctively understood Dr. Rashkover’s remarks last week regarding how religious communities must be able to come to interfaith dialogue with far more than secular interests at hand. We must be willing to confront God and theology in our discussions. Notice that Joseph is able to foster relations between him, an Israelite, and Pharoah, an Egyptian, by plainly and boldly recognizing God. At this time of year, when we feel the greatest challenges of assimilation, when it is easy to feel pulled by outside cultural influences - namely the Christmas season, the retention of Elohim here in the text instead of that יהוה we identify as Adonai is worthy of exploration. Was reference to the uniquely Israelite יהוה too particularistic for this story to work?

A Biblical-Critical approach to the text, the study of how the text arises out of various textual traditions, reveals both, what we call, the J (yawist) and E (Elohist) strands throughout the Joseph story. One of the biggest (though not indisputable) cues of these strands is the use of יהוה (Adonai) vs. Elohim in referring to God. However, the text went through various redactions before final canonization. Many opportunities arose for editing, yet throughout Joseph’s interpretation and advice to Pharoah, Elohim is retained - the Adonai of the Jawist strand is never allowed into Joseph’s dialogue with Pharoah.

Joseph’s use of Elohim can be viewed as highly calculating. Perhaps he is striking a balance between what he must reveal about himself and what will be acceptable by the outsider. As Jews living in an America that is frankly saturated with Christmas, we too have to figure out how to respond.

Our individual responses will differ - perhaps even greatly - depending on the make up of our families, how we were raised, and on what values we choose to hold onto and pass forward into the future. The challenge, and not necessarily an easy one, is to be conscious about how we are responding. Turning Chanukah into a ‘Jewish Christmas’ as retail marketing forces would like us to do is an inadequate response. Displaying our chanukiyot in the windows of our home during these 8 days as a proud expression of our Jewish identity is however our mandate.

We are no longer in Egypt. Thankfully, we don’t live in the time of Pharoah. It behooves us to maintain our particularity and to resist any fear of expressing it, in how Dr. Rashkover framed it, the public square. This square is equally ours even if we are present in fewer numbers and even if it is covered with tinsel and jingle bells through all of December.

The greatest challenge of being a Jew in the modern world is finding that balance between particularism - asserting our unique identity, and assimilation - striving to fit in. In facing this challenge, we will be confronted with many attempts at blurring the boundaries, Christmas-kah cards and Chanukah bushes, for instance. Where and when do make sure that Adonai - our specifically Jewish culture and values - is not absorbed by Elohim requires tough and confident choices. Choices, though, that are worthy of the effort.

In Memory of Jennifer Lynn Harris: b. 4/23/66 d. 5/23/1981

2009-11-28T11:25:00.000-08:00

Among my most vivid childhood memories are the day Jenni Harris died and the following Monday when while sitting in the chair just behind her empty chair (Harrison always followed Harris in the seating chart), her death was announced over the PA system to the entire school. Losing a dear friend at such a young age leaves its mark. It was certainly my first close hand experience with death. I would venture to guess that Jenni’s death likewise left a mark on many of us, her Lower Moreland classmates.

Luckily I have many memories of Jenni’s life to offset the ones of her death. Her beaming smile and her incredible sense of humor are foremost. Cystic Fibrosis may have ravaged her body, but Jenni rarely if ever let it consume her incredible spirit. Even when the illness would flare up and hospitalization was required – as it too often was – she made the best of it with wheel chair and IV pole races up and down the halls of the peds unit at Holy Redeemer between therapies. That’s how Jenni approached life. With zest, eagerness, and a desire, like most kids, to have fun! Of course, as any kid would, Jenni hated the CF – she couldn’t stand being sick; she couldn’t stand being so skinny when all of her friends around her were growing up (and she certainly couldn’t understand when one of her friends was doing anything to fight the normal processes of puberty); and yet, despite the CF, Jenni was able to laugh through her struggles and engage fully with her life, family, and friends, for as short as it was, remaining active in all of the activities – which were many - that gave her joy really until the very end of her life.

Memory is an interesting phenomenon – two people can experience the same exact events and yet their memories of these shared events can be diametrically opposed. I could continue to share all of my personal memories of Jenni: such as playing the flute in band together or being picked on by her older brother, but each of us has memories of our classmate, Jennifer Lynn Harris, differing and varied memories for sure. Some crystal clear and others faded with the passage of time - yet, all of us who had the opportunity to know Jenni can share an important lesson from her life.

Jenni had 15 years in this world. That’s it. She lived them fully and made the very best of those few years she had facing each day with courage and all the joy she could muster. My fellow Lower Moreland classmates: we have all lived well more than twice the number of years that Jenni had -- we are nearing three times her lifetime. Let’s not take that for granted! Let’s be grateful for each and every day we have to share with our family and our friends and to be grateful for all that is good. In that way, perhaps, we can allow Jenni’s legacy to persist in this world.

In Judaism we offer the words: זכרונה לברכה (may she be remembered for a blessing) after the name of one who has deceased. Jennifer Lynn Harris, זכרונה לברכה –may Jenni’s memory survive in each of us and may she be remembered always as a blessing.

Toldot: The Chain of History, delivered Erev Shabbat Toldot

2009-11-23T09:12:00.000-08:00

As some of you know, this past Shabbat I had the joy of celebrating with my family as the son of one of my many cousins was called to the Torah as a Bar Mitzvah. I descend from a fairly sizable family. Growing up, it was a tight nit family: cousins from both sides would gather with grandparents regularly. Seders and Chanukah parties would draw 50 some odd relatives. My family got to host one night of seder each year and the large summer swim parties (‘cause we had the big, old sunken pool in the back yard). There are stark differences between the sides of my family - my mother’s side having roots in this country that extend back at least to the Civil War and possibly to the American Revolution, while my father’s parents each immigrated here separately and by themselves from Russia and Poland between the World Wars. My mother’s parents’ home depicted the traditional set up – my grandfather a business owner, my grandmother a school teacher who ‘retired’ in order to raise kids and volunteer in her synagogue and numerous other organizations such as NOW and Hadassah. My dad’s mom, on the other hand was a career woman, a partner in hers and my grandfather’s men’s suit business. And when left suddenly a widow in mid-life, she applied that tough immigrant work ethic and ran the family business single handedly. She was the rare business woman of her generation working hard to provide for her children and put them through college (Ivy League no less – which gave her immense pride). She was a tough woman. Those pool parties were the rare occasion I saw my Grandmom Irene in something other than a business suit. My mom’s mom was a fabulous cook who nurtured us with food and my grandfather a prolific gardener. My Dad’s mom, well her cookies were as hard as golf balls, and Shake n’Bake was gourmet at her place (though it was she who taught me how to make Kasha). Yet despite all the differences, everyone in the family came together often and en mass. Now, spread out occasions such as Bar Mitzvahs, 50th wedding anniversaries, significant birthdays, and the rare Rabbinical ordination, serve as our family gatherings. Each time we gather, I am struck by the aging of my parents generation…is that my aunt who is so bent over, when did my Dad start walking so slowly…as well as the aging of my generation’s kids: how is that little Julie is already in college! The one who celebrated his Bar Mitzvah this past Shabbat - I’m sure we just celebrate his 1st birthday.

While Torah portions take their name simply from their opening words, this week’s portion’s appellation, Toldot, generations, is fitting in that it underscores the power of family and specifically the patriarchal lineage that is presented in these early stories of Bereshit.

Parashat Toldot can serve to remind us each of our place in the historical chain of Jewish history. We’ve read a lot about Abraham in the past couple of weeks. From his willingness to follow the call of lech l’cha of going forth to settle a new land and seed a new nation, to his challenging God in the story of Soddom and Gomorrah, to his purchase of that first plot of land on the soil which God has promised to his progeny, the appointment of Abraham as a patriarch of the Israelite nation is obvious. We celebrate him as the father of the Jewish people - it all starts with him.

This week’s Torah portions jumps quite quickly to Abe’s grandchildren. And, the narrative throughout the next few portions inclusive of that famous wrestling match from which Jacob will emerge a physically and emotionally changed man will make Jacob’s place among the patriarchs clear. He emerges as none other than Israel.

But what about Isaac? We read of his birth, of his travels with his father to Mount Moriah where he finds himself bound for slaughter. We read of his servant’s travels to find him a wife, but what does he do? What actions does he take? The pshat doesn’t offer much; there simply isn’t much in the narrative to go on. Isaac doesn’t appear to do anything particularly astounding. In fact on the contrary, most view Isaac as a helpless character – unable to find his own wife, unable to even give the right blessing to the right son. Maybe his political negotiations with Avimelech, the king of the Philistines, are the source of his claim to patriarchal fame? Doubtful. Rather, I’d argue that it is his sheer presence and willingness to stay connected to the family that makes him an important link in our Jewish history.

We are wonderful at celebrating the success of the individual. We tend to celebrate achievements and accomplishments as if these are the key to our legacy in the world. Isaac’s presence in the chain of our patriarchs reminds us otherwise. He didn’t have to wrestle with God to get there. BUT, he does have to bear the responsibility of passing on the values that were central to his parents to his own children.

The Midrash, drawing on a text in Leviticus where our Patriarchs are listed in reverse order: Jacob, Isaac, then Abraham, teaches that all three were on par with each other. Their individual accomplishments are worthy and important, but they do not serve to elevate one individual over another in terms of their individual status within their family and by extension among the Israelites. Their yichus, as my immigrant grandmother would have called it, comes from being committed to the chain. If Isaac opted out there would have been no Jacob to wrestle with God and become Israel.

Each and every one of us is a vital link in the chain of history. Regardless of our accomplishments or lack thereof, our presence and involvement is essential – each of us matters. And the significant role each of us has to play is to make sure this chain of Jewish history doesn’t end with us. We should all strive to be like Isaac –a critical link through which Judaism lives and is passed to the next generation.

My cousin and her husband have done and continue to do their job. Witnessing the next generation of Harrisons/Cohens/Wolfes (and soon Silvermans!) step up to the responsibility of Torah, I am confident that like Isaac my cousins and I are doing our best to be a vital link in Toldot - in Jewish history – the link between our parents and our children. How about you?

"Where is God?" delivered Shabbat Vayera 11/7/09 by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman

2009-11-08T07:23:00.000-08:00

I admit it. Those of you who know me well may not be too surprised, but those of you who don’t, well - hold on to your seats for a confession: I am not too sure I believe in God. Whew! There. I said it. I struggle with the concept of, the belief in God, particularly a personal God. And some days, I’m far less sure than others. I doubt I am alone in this. I know that I am not alone in this, but somehow to admit this as a Rabbi, a Cantor - a Jewish leader, feels heretical. “What do you mean YOU don’t believe in God?” You might be thinking. “If you, someone who has devoted her life to Jewish study, synagogue life, and the perpetuation of Judaism, who stands on this bema and offers prayers on behalf of the kahal; if you don’t have faith, then why should I?” A valid point.

However, it should be fully noted that while I struggle with the existence of a personal God, I firmly believe in Godliness! This week’s Torah portion Vayera certainly challenges us to delve into the question of God. And a close look at the text propels me to imagine that our Biblical ancestors also struggled with the nature of God. Immediately in our portion, the line between God and humanity is blurred:וירא אליו יהוה באלני ממרא God appeared to Abraham as he was resting outside his tent under the shady oaks of Mamre in the heat of the day, then immediately וישא עיניו וירא, Abe looked up and saw שלש אנשים נצבים עליו, 3 men standing there upon him. We are informed that God makes Godself known to Abraham, but when Abraham looks up, he sees men, human beings. Three humans that tradition views, not as ordinary mortals, but as מלאכים, divine messengers. It is unclear when Abraham comes to recognize their Godliness: is part of his eagerness to serve them a recognition of their divine status? One thing is clear, the Biblical author uses these אנשים almost interchangeably with God.

The division between man and God is no less clear in the fiery story of Sodom and Gommorah. The men ַאנשים)) went up from there and gazed down upon Sodom, Abraham going along with them to send them off. The Eternal [“Adonai”] then thought “Should I hide from Abraham what I am doing?...vs. 20) The Eternal One [“Adonai”] said, ‘The outcry in Sodom and Gomorrah - how great it is, and their crime - how grave it is! Let me go down and determine whether they are wreaking havoc in equal measure to the shrieking that is coming to Me. If not, I will know. vs22) The men now turned away and went toward Sodom...

It’s as if these human men are far more than messengers, but rather agents - the eyes and ears of God - as if they and God were instant messaging information back and forth [maybe the traditionalists are right that everything of import is indeed found in Torah - look a biblical precedent for IMing]! This encounter between Abraham, these אנשים and יהוה raises a key question: is there a line between divinity and humanity? And, if so, where is it?   Clearly the Biblical text regards humankind as a vehicle of divinity. Regardless of our personal faith, or lack of faith in God, this is a lesson, a model from which all of us can and should learn. Furthermore, this text challenges us to ask who is truly offering the best representation of Godliness. Are these anashim, whom we readily recognize and understand as representations of God the best exemplars of Godliness. They appear to be the vehicle by which this Adonai sees and hears what’s happening; yet, it seems to me that Abraham’s behavior is far more worthy of emulation.

Our opening verses (which our Bat Mitzvah will discuss) of course remind us of Abe’s hospitality, literally we are told that he וירץ לקראתם, eagerly runs out to greet and attend to the needs of the stranger.  But even more compelling is his behavior with regard to God’s announcement regarding the destruction Sodom and Gomorrah. While the men that tradition recognizes as agents of God stand and witness the wickedness of Sodom apparently accepting their boss’ (i.e., God’s) harsh judgement as deserved without question, it is the fully mortal Abraham who is willing to speak out, to argue on behalf of the innocent, working against what is understood as the most all-powerful force - namely GOD - in order to save life.   He doesn’t succeed, and we are lead to believe that there was no innocent life worth saving; regardless of his failure, his efforts are valiant and by definition, godly.

The other difficult story in Parashat Vayera - the Akeidah, the binding of Isaac - a tale that is held up in much of Rabbinic folklore as a testament to the extent and extraordinary nature of Abraham’s faith in God.    A midrash preserved in Sefer Aggadah, a wonderful collection of Rabbinic legends, however, could help us understand it differently. According to this legend, Abraham had repeated opportunities presented by the advisary to change paths, yet he determinedly (stubbornly?) continues on this terrible journey to sacrifice his son. In the moment that he raises the knife, however, Abraham demands of the messengers who call to him a conversation directly with God, calling out, “I...swear that I will not go down from this altar until I say all that I need to say!” The midrash imagines Abraham continuing with a confession; and it is this confession that is open to comment: “When You - God - commanded me to sacrifice my son Isaac... I restrained my impulse and did not reply as I should have.” Historically, this confession is understood as Abraham admitting to a moment of crisis in faith (a failure of faith), before saying yes to God’s awful demand; yet, his confession could just as easily be understood as a recognition, an admittance, that he was wrong to blindly trust this absurd request.

Perhaps we are to understand that God’s reward of a blessed and numerous progeny stems from Abraham admitting that he should have said no from the start. Let us not be so quick to demand of ourselves so consistent and unwavering faith in God that we then find fault in our doubt or worse in ourselves. If Abraham, a regular joe, just like any of us, has the capacity to question what he perceives as God, and in doing so is able to act Godly in this world, than certainly can we.

Lech L’cha: Go Forth, delivered Shabbat morning 10/31/2009, Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman

2009-11-02T08:24:00.000-08:00

לך לך֛ These opening words of our parsha flow off the tongue beautifully in Hebrew. Any attempt at a literal translation, though, stumbles clumsily past our lips. Lech, that’s easy - “Go!”, but the l’cha raises a bit of difficulty. A word which, as is common in Hebrew, incorporates both preposition and pronoun together, it could be “to you” or “for you.” No combination of these words translated separately quite captures the essence of Lech l’cha. Rather, לך לך֛ is most accurately understand as a phrase evoking motion; the best definition, “Go forth!” implies an imperative 2nd person singular, with the ‘you’ understood rather than stated. Ah - the challenge and fun of translation, and from a Jewish approach to text, a source for rich comment.

Much of the commentary on this parasha focuses on the subject of Lech l’cha, the ‘you’ – which is, of course, Avram, who we will soon know as Abraham. The midrashim, the legends, explaining why Avram is the focus of this imperative lech l’cha are endless. The most famous, the one we learn so well as children in religious school that as adults many of us are surprised to find that it is nowhere in the Biblical text itself, may be the story about a young Abraham smashing his father’s idols and thus bravely and boldly displaying faith in a singular and invisible God. Another lovely midrash which seeks to explain why Abram is chosen to be the subject of the biblical ‘Go Forth’ imperative imagines God finding Avram from among the rest of humanity in the same way that a king finds his precious pearl buried in the dust of the earth. Still another has the Mesopotamian ruler Nimrod seeing Abraham’s rise as the father of numerous and blessed progeny predicted in the stars of the sky.

The focus of these legends are firmly on the ‘l’cha’ – an attempt to understand the choice of who. Why Abe? And, more honestly, as Jews who trace our lineage back to Abraham, what we are ultimately striving to understand is, “why us?” The tendency towards creating this apologetic explanation of why Abraham was chosen, and by extension the Israelites, for covenant in our biblical text - why us and not someone else or some other people - is rife with theological difficulty; and, Reform Judaism has openly struggled with this difficult concept of chosen-ness since its inception. I’d argue we are still struggling with finding that balance between particular- and universal - isms. By focusing on the l’cha of our command lech l’cha, however, we remain focused on this challenging question of chosenness which is frankly, in my opinion, ultimately unanswerable without a critical understanding of the historical context.

Instead, let us focus on the Lech, the verb instead of the subject. This instruction can give us clear direction, and here that English understanding “Go forth!” is extremely useful.

The opening lines of our text are filled with the promise of blessing. At first glance, it appears that we will be the passive recipients of blessing. ונברכו בך כל משפחות האדמה, “then they, all the communities of the earth, will be blessed through you” as if Avram’s actions will lead to all of us receiving blessing. This promise of future blessing appears in two other places in Genesis but with a slight emendation. In each place it reads, והתברכו בזרעך כל גוי הארץ, “then all the nations of the earth will make themselves blessed through your seed.”

The primary difference has to do with the verbal form of the word for “bless.” A brief grammar lesson. Hebrew verbs have roots that change meaning depending on their form, what we call in hebrew their binyan. In this week’s verse, the binyan is nifal, נברכו, which is generally translated as passive; hence, the translation ‘that the families/communities of the earth will be blessed through you.’ The later verses contain the hitpael verb form, התברכו, which is an active, reflexive form, ‘they shall bless themselves.’ So which is it? Do we receive blessing because Abraham was chosen; OR, do we create our own blessing because of actions we take?

Biblical scholar, E.A. Speiser argues drawing on those parallel verses that come later that even in our opening passage of Lech L’cha, the phrase should be translated in the active, reflexive form teaching us that in order to gain blessing, we each have to Lech l’cha, we have to ‘go forth.’ Ultimately this is a choice, but it isn’t God’s choice, or our ancestor’s choice. This is a choice that each and every one of us has to make.

A word to our Bat Mitzvah –
Sfat Emet, a late 19th century chasidic commentator viewed the command lech l’cha to be less about geographic movement than about being willing to carve out a new path separate from the past, being able to continually move forward, in his mind, to ‘keep walking.’ In modern psychological speak, we might call this ‘individuation’ - where an individual is able to take what she needs from what has been given her and is able to formulate her own path, make her own healthy decisions, and formulate her own opinions and unique ideas. May you, lech l’cha, go forth!, from today using all of the ideas and tools for life that you have been given so far, to hitbarech, to create your own blessing while remaining an active and full participant in our congregation and the extended Jewish community.

D’var Shabbat Noach, 10/24/09 Global Climate Healing Shabbat: Why bother?

2009-10-25T06:46:00.000-07:00

Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream….merrily, merrily…life is but a dream. This ditty comes to mind whenever I see pictorial representations of the story of Noah. It’s a cute children’s song. The story of Noah is all too often presented as a cute tale for children. It adorns books, nurseries, blankets, our Temple Emanuel Learning Center walls and as well as walls in many other Jewish institutions that cater to children: schools, pediatric hospital wings, daycare centers; even the Union of Reform Judaism’s child naming certificates are beautifully adorned with Noah’s ark. Noah depicted as the nurturing caretaker, the zoo-keeper, providing for all the animals during the flood as if his ark flows ‘gently down the stream’ through the storm. I would dare to say that this is the most frequently drawn upon Torah story for children’s stuff. We don’t depict the Temple or the sacrificial cult detailed in Leviticus for our kids, though according to Rabbinic tradition Leviticus is the first book of Torah we are to teach our children; nor do we depict the Exodus from Egypt, the crossing of the Reed Sea – a defining moment in Jewish peoplehood, on the walls of our nursery schools. No, we pick this sweet story of Noah caring for the animals during the flood.
But is it really? Is it such a sweet story? God is fed up with all that that has been created – particularly humankind and decides to “לשחת כל בשר אשר בו רוח חיים” destroy every thing that breathes. All living creatures save for a number of selected representatives only 2 of whom are human are doomed to destruction. Anyone who has witnessed the devastation brought on by massive flooding knows this is at heart a violent story. Our country and particularly the regions most affected are still recovering from the catastrophic floods of 2005’s Hurricane Katrina. And our biblical narrative describes flood waters far more expansive, so high that the tallest mountains on earth were completely submerged bringing destruction and death to any and all life on earth. Carefully, painfully, the text explains: וימ֜ח את כל היק֣וּם אש֣ר על פנ֣י האדמ֗ה מאד֤ם עד בהמה֙ עד ר֙מש֙ ועד או֣ף השמ֔ים וימָ֖חוּ מן הא֑רץ ויִשָ֧אֶר אך נ֛ח ואש֥ר אִת֖ו בתבֽה, "God wiped out all that was on the face of the earth, from man to beast, from all that crawls to the birds in the sky, they were all wiped out from the earth. Only Noah and that which was with him in the ark remained." Bringing some goats and doves up as sacrificial offerings to God seems to me like light reading in comparison.

Perhaps we lighten it into a children’s story because we fear facing the horror of it. Denial is a very real psychological phenomenon! And it works.
Today has been labeled International Day of Climate Action. Jews have joined the hundreds of thousands of people in 158 countries who will be participating in this call to action by identifying this Shabbat, Shabbat Noah, as Global Climate Healing Shabbat. Today is expected to be the most widespread day of environmental action in our planet’s history. Extraordinary, really.

But why bother? There are many who argue that we are dealing with improbable, unpredictable, even uncontrollable phenomena; and, some of their arguments seem awfully compelling. Denial is easier, isn’t it. Sun columnist Mike Tidwell reminded us this past week that we “…comfortable Americans tend to view really big catastrophes such as tsunamis and famines as far away matters involving people usually too poor or undereducated to plan better.” But this does impact us, and this isn’t some children’s story, or even a tale we can dismiss as Mesopotamian myth like we can with our biblical text. This is our 21st century reality, and we’ve had our heads buried in the sand (whatever’s left of it) for far too long.
Twenty-one years ago, I was finishing up college, considering grad schools, diligently working at various jobs between classes while trying to maintain some assemblance of a social life. Twenty-one years ago, I blissfully knew nothing of the first congressional testimony regarding Global warming. I admit, I was a late bloomer when it came to interest in current events, but environmental and climate issues were far from most of society’s mainstream consciousness; this was a time when even recycling was limited to special event organizational drives. As early as 1988, though, Dr. James Hansen, of NASA, a scientist who perhaps has been studying climate trends for longer than anyone else, testified before our United States Congress that Global warming is real and has serious consequences if left unchecked.
Two decades later, we are finally beginning to pay serious attention. 350.org, the sponsor of today’s International Climate Day and the motivator behind our Global Climate Healing Shabbat, views an international treaty as paramount to combating global warming and its consequences. Few remain confident that one will pass this December in Copenhagen as was hoped when leaders from the international community first began meeting, but at least the issue is being recognized and efforts are being made to further the environmentalist agenda. The momentum must continue, and we can do our part by encouraging our political leaders to stay the course and remain proactive on environmental issues.

350.org did not consult the Jewish calendar when selecting this date. Its confluence with parashat Noach – and this story of rising flood waters, is pure accident, yet it is fitting. It reminds us of our dependence on the earth’s resources for our survival and the extraordinary power of nature.

Our Torah portion tells the story of what happens when society is left unchecked. There are a variety of ways to understand the text. A fundamentalist reading strives to blame such natural climate phenomena on behavior that doesn’t fit into the overly rigid moral agenda of the religious right. The historical Rabbinic reading, our midrashic sages blamed such phenomena on the yetzer ha-ra, the human inclination towards lawlessness that was said to run rampant in Noah’s day. Today we recognize the science behind the pattern of global warming, a trend that if left unchecked could lead to continual glacial melting and subsequent flooding. Our behavior is critical – but the behavior that we now know is critical has all to do with our environmental choices. These must begin take on a moral imperative.

350.org takes its name from the upper limit (350 ppm) of carbon dioxide that is viewed by scientists across the board as the safe limit for the continued healthy functioning of our planet. America, while certainly not the largest producer of CO2 in gross output (I believe China and India can battle for that honor), yet we produce more CO2 per person than virtually every other country in the world.

It may not seem it, but there is much we can do to make a difference, and even small choices make an impact. The Baltimore Jewish Environmental Network (BJEN) has many suggestions which are listed on our website and on a poster in our lobby that range from planting trees, reducing our dependence on the automobile, changing what kind of light bulb we choose to use in our homes and offices, to simply unplugging unused electrical appliances and chargers. But we do have to make the choice to respond and act.

Our Torah portion makes it clear that humans continued to make poor choices even after the apparent lesson of the flood – we are far from perfect, we are inherently flawed. Yet we also have the capacity for incredible goodness. The text also makes clear that God recognizes this inherent goodness, for God decides never again to destroy humanity despite the fact that we will make mistakes. The symbol of this promise is of course the rainbow. The Hebrew is clear that this bow is far more than picturesque symbol; it is a tangible sign of, brit, of covenant. Covenant demands a partnership, an agreement between two parties by which both parties have responsibility. The text never outlines the human part of the deal that is left for our imagination. So, let us imagine that our responsibility is to wake up to the reality of what we can do to take care of this planet and do it, one small step at a time.

Noah according to the Biblical accounting lived interestingly enough 350 years after the flood. Let that span of his life, after the covenant of God’s rainbow, be a reminder of our part in reaching the communal goal of keeping our carbon dioxide emissions below that 350 ppm upper limit. If we don’t do our part to heal our planet earth, if warming trends and the melting of our earth’s glaciers continues, only we will be to be blame. And I guarantee we and our progeny won’t be rowing so merrily down the stream.

Bereshit: A Model of Tolerance, delivered 10/16/2009 Rabbi Rhoda JH Silverman

2009-10-17T06:41:00.000-07:00

We live, it seems, in a world of increasing divisiveness and intolerance of the other – perhaps this is a function of the economic stresses of the world that will fade once stability is restored. I am too young to know from actual experience if our nation faced such divisiveness in the last period of great economic depression to which this one is so often compared, and I am far from an expert on this relatively recent historical period; yet my sense from my limited reading is that our social and cultural response today is different. Perhaps time has softened the historical memory, but it appears to me that whereas in the past great stress brought our country together creating bonds among citizens, today it seems to be feeding a growing disparity between the right and the left and an increasing lack of tolerance for each other’s point of view.

Parashat Bereshit offers us a model of tolerance for differing views. Two creation stories are contained this week’s portion – two very different creation stories that despite the traditionalist and theological attempts to reconcile them into one story reflect drastically opposing world views.

The first, a story that like much of the biblical text – particularly the material attributed to the Priestly hand (as is this) - is difficult to date. There are a couple of differing and compelling scholarly theories, yet clearly it reveals an awareness of Mesopotamian mythology and thus may have roots in that culture. This presentation of creation is an orderly and systematic accounting of the world’s creation out, תהו ובהו, of utter chaos. It is memorable – “בראשית ברא אלהים” – at the start, or as popularly translated, ‘in the beginning,’ God created…” as God proceeds carefully through each day commanding ‘ויאמר אלהים’, through speech, the creation of light, land & water, vegetation, the lights in the sky including the sun, moon, and starts, the animals that fill our earth, and of course humankind.

It’s a lovely story in its order and simplicity: God is all-powerful and systematic; and humans are simply one element among a grand litany of God’s creations. Certainly we humans are differentiated from the rest of God’s creation, not only by the use of the Hebrew word ויברא in place of the word ויעש– the verb used for the rest of creation, but also by the statement that we are בצלם אלהים, made in God’s image. Like God, we are given power over other creations, yet despite humans being given special consideration (and the midrashist’s interpretation that the world was created entirely for our sake), the creation of man is not the central facet of this story of creation. Creating divine order out of disorder is.

Story two, most probably an older textual tradition (attributed to the J strand), offers a different opinion. Here, despite the passage creating an expectation that we will now hear אלה תולדות השמים והארץ בהבראם, a chronicled history of the making of heaven and earth, man takes center stage in no less than 3 verses and remains central throughout the rest of the story, the raison d’etre for the creation of all other animals. Unlike the first story presented, this rendition is far from orderly – on the contrary, the author is far less concerned with outlining an ordered and detailed litany of creation than with explaining the human condition. If anything, creation goes from order, gan eden, to chaos in this version. Moreover, there is no b’tzelem Elohim. On the contrary, there is the implication that God doesn’t want humans to be God-like, at least if we are to believe the serpant: “כי וֹדֵעַ אלהים כי ביום אכָלכם ממנו ונפקחו עיניכם והייתם כּאלהים...,” “God knows that on the day that you eat from that tree, the tree of knowledge, your eyes will be opened and v’hyitem k’Elohim, you will be like God.” God is not all-powerful in this story, rather the free will of human beings interferes with God’s control of order shatters the orderliness, the paradise, of Eden.

So which is it? The former offers a version where order is paramount and a Divinely dictated hierarchy is implicit. All creation comes from the word of God. The latter offers a version where earth is not only primary but serves as literally the source material for mankind who then becomes the center of all attention and all further creative activity, some good and some not so good. Theologians throughout history have worked to reconcile these two stories into a seamless whole, and some have striven to use their theology in order to scientifically explain creation; yet, be clear that regardless of any creationist attempt at creating science out of theology, the biblical text was never intended to serve as scientific truth. Rather the intent of the biblical author (whether God or human hand – that of course is another question entirely, and most everyone here should know where I stand on that issue), was to introduce ideology, a moral code – a way of understanding the universe, not necessarily knowing the universe. Science, as a discipline, comes much later.

The goal of Torah is to explain the selection of the Israelites, to couple them with this God known as י-ה-ו-ה and to the Land of Canaan, and to follow their journey to this place. Parashat Bereshit really does nothing to further this specific agenda; but, it does provide important background, a preface, if you will, to the story of our national development. It provides a universal setting and primeval history to the birth of a specific people. At the same time, these stories present different philosophies on the nature of human kind – they prioritize different ideas; and, and here’s the point: from the Torah’s perspective, it doesn’t matter! What is important to the wholeness of Torah is that these stories share the then innovative idea of an ever-present and singular God.

Perhaps the inclusion of these two diametrically opposed stories by the final biblical redactor was purposeful as a reminder to all future generations – including us - that Judaism has never been monolithic; there is, and always has been, room for difference of opinion and for debate. It is that very fluidity and open mindedness that keeps Jewish life growing and thoroughly enriching.

Liberals and Conservatives have similar ultimate goals – we all want peace, here and abroad; we all want affordable health care, and we expect those most in need to be cared for properly; we all want jobs – and the opportunity to feel productive while experiencing the joy of our world; we all want a stable economy and affordable housing. We all care about life, protecting it and ensuring the mental and physical health of all humankind. There are different opinions as to how to accomplish all of these goals; and mostly like there is more than one right way of how to get there, but we won’t get there if we remain divided, unwilling to fully listen and hear, to work with and ultimately compromise with each other.

The Biblical text is clear, whether made b’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God, or from the very dust of the earth – or somehow both – we humans all share our humanity in common however that humanity has come to be. Let the difference of opinion, the diversity inherent and retained in our biblical text help us counter fundamentalist and rigid ideology. Let it serve as a model of tolerance for us in this challenging economic and political climate. Let it remind us that it is through the diversity of opinion and open minded compromise that the solutions to our most difficult challenges will be found.
Ken y’hi ratzon!

Be Happy! Delivered Shabbat/Sukkot morning, October 3, 2009/15 Tishre 5770

2009-10-03T12:50:00.001-07:00

Shabbat/Sukkot 1, 15 Tishrei 5770
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This special portion for the holiday of Sukkot, a passage from parashat Emor, details what we are supposed to do. The requirements are outlined clearly:

• On the first day and the last day, don’t go to work; it is a sacred day that demands complete rest. That’s clear, no? Whether we choose to honor that commandment, well that’s another story, but the expectation is clearly stated for us to understand: these days are to be set aside as distinct and deserving of שבתון.

• For 7 days, bring offerings: meal offerings, burnt offerings, sacrifices, etc. to God. Okay - an instruction that at first glance seems no longer relevant -- we worship, thankfully, in an entirely different manner today; but, in the context of the biblical period, it is clear what was expected: a public expression of worship and appreciation for this specific holiday, separate from anything else.

• We are commanded to gather together the 4 species: פרי עץ הדר, כפת תמרים, ענף עץ עבת, & ערבי נחל, together known as the lulav and etrog. No explanation is given here in this particular passage, but it is a tangible and clear instruction nonetheless.

• We are commanded to live in booths, in sukkot during the holiday - not only a tangible task, but one with a reason offered namely to remind us that the Israelites lived in temporary dwellings after they were redeemed from Egypt.

There is one last commandment offered in this festival passage that our Bar Mitzvah will recite in just a few moments:
ושמחתם לפני יהוה ואלהיכם שבעת ימים.- “You shall rejoice before Adonai your God seven days.”

Many of us, particularly the adults in the kahal (Oliver & his friends perhaps may be to young) may be familiar with the Bobby McFerrin song, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” This now old song pops into my head every time I read this passage. ושמחתם - it’s not a suggestion rather our text is clear: וחגתם אתו חג ליהוה שבעת ימים בשנה חקת עולם לדרתיכם....(ויקרא כג) - “you shall make it a festival to Adonai - to God for 7 days a year; it is a chok, a law for all time throughout your generations”, in other words, forever. Again, this isn’t a recommendation or a suggestion, this is a command: “You, be happy! And be so for 7 days”. Moreover - and here’s the catch- rejoice while outside in the sukkah, that fragile incomplete shelter that is susceptible to wind and rain and that has little room for any material belongings.

On Thursday of this week, China celebrated the milestone of their nation’s 60th anniversary, a celebration that stands in stark contrast to the expectation of this command. Based on reports in the paper, this anniversary was marked with the kind of pomp, materialistic display, military bravado, and rejoicing that one might expect at such a celebration - especially for this country which is proud of and eager to revel in its growing position as a world power. It is easy to rejoice and celebrate in our material achievements. The timing of this nationalistic display, though, can serve to remind us of the very different intent of our biblical command, ושמחתם, to rejoice.

Sukkot requires that we rejoice despite our being out in the most simple and fragile of settings separated from those very material things that we think give us security or power. We are expected - we again are commanded - to rejoice in the simplest of pleasures: inviting guests and sharing a meal not in our elaborate redesigned 21st century kitchens with its granite counter tops and stainless appliances, but in our fragile and often less than comfortable sukkahs accessorized with perhaps a picnic table and folding chairs, but hopefully filled with people.

It is nice to have things. It is nice to surround ourselves with all of the comforts of modernity and the excesses of American consumerism; yet it is all too easy to allow ourselves to mistakenly equate these material and tangible things and structures in our lives with security and protection from our own human frailties and the reality of our mortality.

Sukkot with its seemingly paradoxical focus on the temporary and shaky sukkah and the simultaneous commandment of s’machtem, of rejoicing, reminds us that not only can we not escape insecurity of the human condition, but that we must find a way to celebrate and rejoice in our lives, in our humanity, despite it.

“To Give or Not to Give: The Legacy of Elijah,” delivered by Rabbi/Cantor Rhoda JH Silverman, Erev Yom Kippur 5770

2009-09-30T11:38:00.000-07:00

I love stories. And while I spoke about the mandate of giving, of Tzedakah last year, the continued economic crisis compels me to return to the theme of giving again on this eve of Yom Kippur.

So, to the story: this story is about a young couple: Chayim Yonah and Rivkah Baylah who lived in a far away town many, many years ago.
Chayim worked in timber. He bought a stand of forest for a good price, but then the area was closed to further cutting, and he lost everything but the shirt on his back in the deal. He was one of the lucky ones - he found work in the office of another man in the same business. But this was a time of economic recession – not too unlike ours - and he lost that job too. For months now, he and Rivka had no income at all. They managed to survive the winter - but what a struggle it was to do so.
Now Rivka and Chayim’s story picks up in spring, during the season of Passover preparations.

Everything Chayim and Rivkah had, had already been pawned - from the hanging candle sticks to the very last pillow. They had nothing left and no money to spend on the necessary items for the Passover holiday.
Rivka begged her husband, “Go to the Community Fund for the Poor (their local Jewish Community Services), maybe they’ll give you enough money so that we could at least buy flour for baking our matzahs.” But Chayim Yonah refused – you see, Chayim had faith, “If God wishes for us to have a seder, Rivka, God will provide for it. There is no reason for us to lose face,” he insisted.
So, Rivkah searched the house one last time for something to pawn. In a dark corner, she found a worn, silver spoon – it was truly a miracle, really, she thought – it had been ages since that spoon had been mislaid. At last, she’d be able to bake her matzah.

Rivka took that spoon, gave it to her husband, and asked him to sell it in the market place. He does so, but he then takes the few coins he gets from the spoon and donates them to the Community Fund for the Poor saying the poor has more need for the money than he does.

Meanwhile Passover is coming quickly, there is little time left to prepare. Chayim Yonah remains confident, “God will not desert us.” Rivkah Bayla, however, remains silent – despite her anger and sadness. She tries to remain strong in front of her neighbors, but their pitying looks stab like needles. Her friends ask, “Rivkah, when are you baking your Matzahs? How are you coming with your preparations?” She makes excuses, but those who know her better urge, “Tell us what’s the matter, Rivkah. If there is anything you need – just ask, we will be happy to help you in any way that we can!”

But Chayim Yonah would not accept charity from any mortal being and Rivkah Baylah would not publically counter husband’s wishes. Remember this was a time long before that modern wave of feminism that I discussed on Rosh Hashanah morning.
The neighbors, though, saw that something was not as it should be, and they go to the Rabbi of the town, as was customary in those days, to ask for advice. The rabbi listens to their story, and shaking his head sadly, responds, “Chayim Yonah is a pious and learned man, stubborn too. If he has faith, then that is how we must leave it.”

Finally, it is Passover. Rivkah does not even have candles over which to make a bracha. Chayim goes to the synagogue for prayers. Walking home he sees the festive joy shining from his neighbors’ houses. Only the windows of his own house are dark, like the eyes of the mourner at a wedding feast. Arriving home, he opens the door and calls out, chag sameach, Rivkah – happy holiday. In the darkness, Rivkah Baylah answers sadly, “chag sameach.”

“Rivkah, what is wrong?” Chayim asks. “This is Passover - a time of rejoicing! Look, if God didn’t wish for us to have a seder here at our home, we’ll gladly be welcome at someone else’s. Even now, they are all opening their doors inviting all who are hungry to come in and eat. If God didn’t wish us to have our own seder, we’ll join someone else’s – let’s go, get your coat.”

But before she could put on her coat, there is a knock on the door. The door opens and a voice calls out, “chag sameach!” In the darkness, they cannot see who it is, but they answer nonetheless, “chag sameach.” The visitor says, “I’d like to be a guest at your seder.”

“We’d love to have you,” Chayim Yonah explains, “but, you see, we don’t even have a seder for ourselves.”

“No worries,” the visitor responds, “I’ve brought everything we need. And then with a wave of a hand through the air – magically, silver candlesticks appear in the air holding burning tallow candles; in their light, Chayim Yonah and Rivkah Baylah can see that their visitor is none other than a poor and haggard magician who was known to entertain in the center of the town.

They gasp and clutch one another in fear as much as in surprise.

With another wave of his hand, the man calls, “table, come here and cover up “ and the table did just that - sliding from its place in the corner, a white cloth dropping from the ceiling to cover it. Then the table slides across the floor underneath the candle sticks which center themselves onto the table gracefully and perfectly. With another wave of his hand, he calls, “benches over here” – and the benches slide from their places along the wall to each side of the table. He frowns at them for a moment and then calls – ‘get wider and softer’ and those benches, if you can imagine, transform into regal arm chairs. White pillows fall from the sky and settle themselves perfectly into the arm chairs. With a wave of his hand again, he brings a round seder plate with all of the necessary items, he brings decanters full of the best red wine, he brings wine glasses, and even haggadot with gilt edged pages.

It is only when he turns to them and says, “Do you need water for washing? I can bring that too,” that they rouse from their astonishment. Rivkah leans over and whispers in her husband’s ear, “Is this okay? Is this permitted?”

“I don’t know” says Chayim.

So, Rivkah advises her husband, saying, “Go to the Rabbi’s house, ask him what we should do.”

But Chayim Yonah says, “I don’t really want to leave you here alone with this strange man.”

And so they go together, hand in hand, they run quickly to the Rabbi’s house and tell him all that has happened.

The Rabbi listens, ponders, and then explains, “There are 2 kinds of magic in the world, good magic and evil magic. Evil magic has no substance,” he tells them, “you cannot touch the things it creates.” So the rabbi advises them, “Go home. If you can touch the pillows, if you can pour the wine, if you can break the matzahs, it should be considered a gift from God and something to be enjoyed.”

Hearts pounding, Chayim and Rivkah walk home hand in hand.

When they arrive at their house, the poor magician is gone, but the seder is still there.

Slowly, they walk into the house. They reach out. Timidly, they touch the pillows. They pour the wine. They break the matzahs. And only then did they realize, that their guest must have been the prophet Elijah himself.
_________
Elijah the Prophet. A legendary figure who goes around rewarding the charitable and deserving, of whom many fantastical stories, such as this, are handed down in our tradition, l’dor va-dor, from one generation to the next. These stories are heart warming, charming even. Intended to help us remain confident during times of challenge, they encourages us to have perfect faith in that perfect world where God reigns supreme and the good are duly and justly rewarded. Problem is, our world isn’t quite so perfect.

Like Rivka Baylah and Chayim Yonah, the couple in our story, many of us are facing incredibly difficult economic challenges. Some are struggling to maintain previous lifestyles that were easily attained a couple of years ago, while others including many sitting here amongst us are struggling just to meet basic day to day needs. Certainly faith and optimism, such as Chaim Yonah’s are important, perhaps even vital, states of mind as we face such challenges, but please don’t model Chayim Yonah. Don’t let faith in God interfere with the ability of reaching out and asking for help when in need. God just may not answer. The prophetic Elijah may not show his mystical face.

Oaths of poverty and ascetism are not mainstream values in Jewish life. We don’t score cash back points by suffering. Despite the historical mandate of our legendary Elijah and the imagery of a Divinely kept ledger of deeds in our tradition, there are no seraphim on high keeping track of our self-less acts. Central, however, to our mandate as Jews, as I spoke of on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, is the minyan – the creation of community – a caring and supportive community - through which we bring Torah to life. And, one of the most significant ways we can bring Torah to life is through Tzedekah - the acts of kindness, the acts of righteousness, we do for others and we allow others to do for us. [let me repeat that – ‘and we allow others to do for us!’]

We have all just been asked to give to our beloved congregation in order to help it sustain itself as a vibrant and nurturing center of Jewish life. Our lay leaders ask every year at this time because frankly there is a need. You have also been asked to give this year in particular in order to help ensure that others who can’t sustain their financial obligations can remain connected and a part of our Temple family. If you are in a position to give, like Elijah, – please do; our Temple leadership will be ever grateful for whatever support you can offer – whether expressed through volunteerism, financial contribution, or both. At the same time, if you are in need, don’t wait for magical intervention; instead, be proactive, ask for help, and allow others the opportunity to fulfill the mitzvah of giving. Too often we refrain from reaching out and letting others know our needs due to our own sense of shame, our own fears of weakness; but as President Obama reminded our nation 2 ½ weeks ago in his address to a group of High School students in Virginia, asking for help is far from an act weakness but rather comes out of a sense of self-awareness and of strength.

Moses Maimonides, better known in Rabbinic circles as The Rambam, advised in his Mishneh Torah that man should always exert himself, even work on the Sabbath if necessary, and should sooner endure hardship than make himself dependent on the community. Yet, in almost the next breath as if fully understanding that there are times when disciplined effort no matter how well enacted is simply not enough and intervention is required, he writes, “One however, who does stand in need…who cannot live without help but who, in his pride [shall we call it piety?], declines to accept help is a shedder of blood, guilty of attempts on his own life.” (MT Book 7, chapter 10:19)

Our economy has been in crisis. Some say it is slowly healing; only time will let us know if that is the case. Yet, in the meantime, one of the best ways that we can ride out the harsh challenges of fiscal uncertainty in this economic climate is to connect to the community and support one another. We must do this without judgment. Waiting passively for intervention while we continue to starve will only keep us hungry and in grave need. So, I repeat, those who can give, please do so. Those only able to receive, please allow yourself to do so; and let us know what you need and how we can help. Only in this way will the redemptive hope of Elijah ever have a chance of coming to fruition. Only in this way can we ensure that Temple Emanuel will succeed at being a shelter from life’s storms.

Human Rights & the Progeny of Sarah, delivered Rosh Hashanah morning 5770

2009-09-20T13:56:00.000-07:00

If you are a parent of a teen or, if like me, the parent of, as the newest demographic moniker identifies them, a “tween,” then you have probably heard of the popular R&B singer Rihanna. This past winter, Rihanna, an incredibly talented, seemingly independent and vibrant young woman with a successful career underway, was the victim of what is categorized in our country as “domestic violence.” I prefer to name it for what it is: unjustified violence. The descriptive adjective ‘domestic’ somehow pardons the offense when it should instead draw attention to the devastating consequences that arise when violence is from the hands of those trusted most. More disturbing than the violence itself, if we can even imagine, was the reaction of many of Rihanna’s fans, America’s youth. As New York Times’ reporter Jan Hoffman shared in March of this year, many teenage girls instead of condemning Rihanna’s attacker, Chris Brown, a well-know pop star himself, instead questioned the veracity of her story and even went as far as to blame her for the attack. Even after seeing photos of her bruised and bloodied face, many still were quick to lay blame on her for inciting the violence while excusing her attacker from any serious consequences. According to a survey of 200 teens, 46% - almost half - said Rihanna herself was responsible; another 52% said both bore responsibility for these injuries - injuries that landed Rihanna in a hospital bed.

I don’t know about you – but as a parent, as a teacher of young people, as a human being, such responses scare the hell out of me. It is incomprehensible how any violence can be dismissed as being somehow deserved, and yet the violence perpetrated against women is a constant reality in our world, and it apparently serves as a stronger teacher to our youth than we’d like to admit.

For all the work of the feminist movement – a movement that has roots in the early decades of the 20th century but which came to full blossom in the years of my own childhood, it wasn’t until 1993 (not 1963, not 1973 – 1993) that this so-called “domestic” form of violence was officially acknowledged to be a human rights concern. To put this into context, this is the year that I finished graduate school (the first time round, of course) and went on to serve my first pulpit as a congregational cantor - close to 2 decades after women were granted cantorial and rabbinic degrees and ordination in America. By this time women had been breaking all sorts of academic, social, and professional barriers for decades and at the same time were so often not considered worthy of the basic human right of feeling safe in their own homes and in their most intimate relationships. It took another year until legislation in America, in the form of the Violence Against Women Act, an act whose funding by the way will be up for re-authorization again in 2011, was passed to formally uphold the right of women to be protected from unwarranted violence. An international version of this bill was introduced last year by then Senator Biden. It failed to pass.

Now I admit despite my having been raised in that social and cultural mileau of the mid- to late 20th century, that I am a bit of a late-comer to the public expression of feminism. I, like so many in my generation who understand how much we have gained by the work of the feminist movement, have avoided speaking out on women’s issues understanding that there will be an automatic tendency to dismiss the remarks as feminist ranting. We hesitate to make waves, davka, because we know the advantages we have, because others before us – perhaps some or many of you - have already made those waves, and we also understand the flack you received for doing so. I even hesitated before deciding to speak on this tender subject on this sacred occasion – there are so many pressing topics on our minds (health care, the economy, the ongoing war in Afghanistan, the precarious situation in Israel...); yet, the very fact that I continue to feel this nagging sense that I must offer some form of apologetic for speaking on this humanitarian issue in and of itself speaks volumes about the work still required of all of us – each and every one of us.

It isn’t surprising that women have been viewed as peripheral to main events; such marginalization has been part and parcel of our historical legacy and our most sacred traditions – a history that often ignores the herstory in the narrative.

Our Torah for example. We just read the well-known and awfully troubling passage referred to as ‘The Akeidah’. Certainly one of the more disturbing narratives of biblical text. And, if I ask you what is most disturbing, I’d bet most of us would answer: either’s God’s request or Abraham’s willingness. That Abraham seems, without any apparent doubt, quick to listen to this Elohim he hears as God even when the instruction involves such a violent and unspeakable act towards his own son unsettles us (as it should). This is considered the central story, and it serves as the basis for the bulk of Rabbinic and theological debate that arises out of the text. But, where is Sarah in all of this? If Abraham consults his wife, her input was not deemed important enough to make it into the sacred canon. Sarah – Abe’s partner in parenting, the woman who bore and at the very least co-raised this child – is completely missing from the traditional telling of the Akeidah.

What disturbs me at least as much as the theological questions raised by God’s and Abraham’s actions, is that we take Sarah’s silence for granted; we expect it. We are comfortable challenging Abraham – what was he thinking? We wonder. How could he even consider such a task? We are comfortable challenging God – we liberal Jews eagerly grapple with the theological questions raised in this text: how God could ask such a thing and how we can have confidence in or even believe in such a God. We struggle with these questions readily; but, never do we challenge our ready acceptance of Sarah’s absence. Rarely do we challenge the circumstances that allowed for her voice to be completely excised from the story. And when we do question her absence, we take pity on her as a victim in a male dominated culture rather than choosing to empower her – re-writing the story imagining her in an active role. Moreover, on those rare occasions when we do empower Sarah, such exploration, such midrash is all too often relegated to the field of ‘women’s studies.” Our ‘women’s commentaries’ are vital to modern Jewish life; they have brought new ideas to the forefront begging us to delve into the question of Sarah. But, the stark reality remains that despite the passionate and successful efforts made on behalf of women by the modern wave of feminism that blew through our country in the 1960’s and 70’s, we still expect a significant degree of silence from Sarah’s progeny. We expect a feminist voice to discuss Sarah, but she has yet to fully enter the mainstream conversation. There she still remains all too often a silent, victimized character.

Even in the modern era, women have historically been celebrated in their silence. Case in point Anna O.

Perhaps the name is familiar. Anyone who has taken an introductory psychology class - Psych 101 - has read of Anna O., one of, if not the most famous, case studies in Joseph Breuer and Sigmund Freud’s seminal book Studies on Hysteria. We know Anna O. – her story is well documented and easily accessed. A young woman who at 21 developed signs of mental illness, what were then labeled as ‘hysterical’ symptoms that left her often bedridden, paralyzed, silent, and suffering from hallucinations. Together with her therapist, Joseph Breuer (an early mentor of Freud’s), they discovered ‘the talking cure’ a cure that became the foundation of psychoanalytic theory. In 1909, Freud himself acknowledged “Breuer and Anna O’s joint creation of the ‘talking cure’ as the germ and source of psychoanalysis” (though he later would recant after a bitter split with his mentor).

What is far less documented is the story of what happened to Anna O once cured. To learn this story, one has to make a concerted effort; it isn't taught in that Psych 101 class.

In the late 19th century, a young Viennese Jewish women named Bertha Pappenheim, after having recovered from her “hysterical illness” moved from Vienna to Frankfurt and established herself as an outspoken advocate for women’s rights, human rights. Traveling alone throughout Eastern Europe (in and of itself a bit radical for a single woman in her day), she raised funds, conducted detailed research, challenged philanthropic organizations and the male leadership thereof; and most importantly, she rescued many young women – immigrants, abandoned wives, unwed mothers - many of whom were forced and sold into prostitution, what was known as ‘white slavery.’ An unsung hero, she fought vehemently for the political, educational, and economic equality of Jewish women in an era of heightened misogynistic as well as anti-semititic sentiment. At the turn of the 20th century, after unsuccessfully increasing the presence of women in leadership roles within the Jewish philanthropic establishment, she envisioned and co-founded the first national organization of Jewish women, the Jüdischer Frauenbund (The JFB). Through this organization, Pappenheim succeeded in establishing a national network of social workers whose primary concern was the caring for, protecting of, and the emancipation of women.

Ironic, isn’t it? Yet not surprising that our historical record has virtually silenced the outspoken Bertha Pappenheim – an activist, an author too, who worked tirelessly on behalf of women -- while it firmly and prolifically documents her alter-ego: the scared silent, needy and hysterical Anna O of her youth.

Hilary Rodham Clinton may just be a modern day Bertha Pappenheim renewing and continuing her work on the international scene in today’s globally connected world. One of Clinton’s stated goals as Secretary of State is to erase the silence that plagues us when it comes to women in our society. Reminding us again that women’s issues are part and parcel of the broader issue of human rights, our Secretary of State is working to bring women’s issues to the center of attention in our U. S. foreign policy. Not only is she fighting to empower women to stand up for the most simple and basic right to be taken seriously, but she is hoping to raise awareness and tackle the harsh realities, such as maternal mortality, sex trafficking, abuse, malnourishment, limited access to education, lack of basic medical care – issues women continue to face in our modern world that are ultimately an outgrowth of the fact that women’s issues are still considered tangential and less important than other human rights. According to the Family Violence and Prevention Fund (telling that we even need such an fund, isn’t it?), one out of every 3 women worldwide will be physically, sexually, or otherwise abused in her lifetime with rates reaching as high as 70 % in some countries. The type of violence routinely acted out against women is horrific ranging from rape and beatings (often at the hands of known assailants), bodily mutilation, acid burnings, dowry deaths, so-called honor killings, the list goes on... We may think we are immune in our modern, westernized America, but we are not. There is a good chance that victims of abuse are sitting in this sanctuary today. And the attitudes of teens in response to Rihanna’s attack should remind us that there is an unconscious message even here in America that women don’t matter. There is sadly still in our 21st century a strong tendency to devalue and trivialize all that is female in our world both within our country as well as abroad – a tendency that we have to work to recognize and counter.

This past summer, while working towards her goal of bringing women’s issues into mainstream foreign policy, Secretary of State Clinton traveled to the eastern Congo, one of those places in our world where tragically unimaginable brutality against women is commonplace. While there she committed $17 million U.S. dollars to help fight the violence perpetrated daily against women and children and encouraged college aged youth to demand justice for women who are violently attacked in that country. Our nation’s Secretary of State spent 11 days touring and lecturing on this critical issue; and yet, did we know about it? Far more attention was paid in our American media to her understandably curt remark to the Congolese student who asked about her husband’s views than to the substance of her own work. Back home, while her husband, former President Bill, was broadly praised for his successful trip to North Korea, Secretary of State Hilary was mocked in the press for her impatience at a lack of attention to work she views, and rightly so, as vital to the well-being of our world.

Yes, even here in America, where we pride ourselves on the advances that women have made in our society: where we’ve passed legislation such as the 19th Amendment to our Constitution which ensures a woman’s right to vote in this country, Title VII – the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which was consciously amended to include women, the Women’s Education Act of 1975 which ensures access to educational opportunities, Title IX which extended that equal opportunity in the arena of sports; here in America where we take enormous pride in the advances women have made in the corporate world – yet, here in America, we still routinely dismiss what we consider ‘women’s issues’ rather than human issues. Even subtle cues in our world, such as the mass-marketing of cosmetic surgery, undermine women. Why slicing a woman for no other reason than to have her fit or molded into a certain perceived image is an acceptable form of violence escapes me! (but that’s the subject of another sermon)

Perhaps, journalists Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn’s prediction that women’s rights will come to be known as the paramount moral challenge of the 21st century will come to fruition. I hope it does; it’s time it does. But it cannot do so if we continue to blind ourselves from theses harsh realities that still exist – that we allow to exist even here in our own country.

Our Reform mandate places the ethical pursuit of justice as a top priority in Jewish life. As Reform Jews it is incumbent upon us to open our eyes, pay attention, and act. We cannot assume that others will do it for us. Our unetane tokef prayer, recited this morning and again on Yom Kippur, reminds us that b’Rosh Hashanah yikatevun, on Rosh Hashanah, it is written who will suffer violence. Our theological struggle with this prayer stems in part from our assumption that the author of this poem meant God will write – God will determine who perishes and who not based on some Divinely kept ledger of deeds, as if we have little say in the matter. Considering the historical context of the prayer, God was likely intended, an attempt to enforce diligence through fear; but we can take advantage of the writer’s poetic style, his ambiguity, and re-interpret it from our Reform perspective. We know that we do have the power to make an impact – we can work to stop suffering in this world so that it doesn’t’ have to be written that such violence continues to be perpetrated.

It is far too easy to view the public and tangible advances women have made in our country and in other parts of the world as evidence that the work of the feminist movement is done. Far from it. Let us not get so complacent in our achievements that we stop ourselves from forging ahead. The 1968 marketers of Virginia Slims may have been correct, “We have come a long away, baby”; but boy, do we have a long way to go. Our Reform siddur encourages us to fervently pray for that time when violence, corruption, and evil give way to the forces of integrity and goodness, ”May the time not be distant, O God.” Be clear, though, we have to do a hell of lot more than pray for such change. We must act in order to make change, and the first step in acting is recognizing that all of our rights, even Sarah’s and her progeny’s, are fully and deservingly human.

Al Shelosha Devarim: Humanity in the Digital Age, delivered Erev Rosh Hashanah 5770

2009-09-20T13:38:00.000-07:00

Silent movies - a thing of the past, or an entertainment trend of the future. This summer, while watching the movie “Frost/Nixon,” (part of my and Chuck’s attempt to catch up on grown up movies while the girls were at overnight camp) this perplexing image of the future of silent movies ran through my mind. It came during the scene where that life altering telephone call made by an apparently inebriated Richard Nixon to media personality David Frost on the eve of his final day of interviewing was played out for the movie goer. I couldn’t help but question and imagine how that critical scene would play out today.

This pivotal telephone scene had little if any action - it relied almost exclusively on spoken dialogue for its drama. The verbal interaction coupled with expressive body language and facial expressions made this scene effective. Like this scene, “Talkies”, as modern sound movies were originally called, are, in general, dependent on just that - talk! In the absence of talk, of dialogue, we are left with action, but no speech. Action accompanied by music and text messaging, well they weren’t called that in their day but in essence that is what those snipets of framed text were: abbreviated dialogue - just enough to get the basic plot across to the viewer. The Silent Movie.

Parents, particularly of teens, among us know that our youth are talking far less than in previous generations; instead, they’re busy exercising their thumbs in that newest form of non-verbal communication called ‘texting’. And let us be honest with ourselves, it is not just our youth who are joining the thumb aerobics craze. We can try to dismiss the replacement of voice communication with text as part of the recurrent generation gap between parents and their children, yet I sense a far larger revolution taking place in how we speak to and how we interact with one another. One with profound implications yet to be fully understood: sound is no longer the primary vehicle for human speech and dialogue.

Humans have always had the capacity to communicate without sound; and thankfully when our ears our incapacitated, our brains can adapt fairly easily enabling us to rely solely on visual as opposed to auditory cues for communication. But, given a choice, scientists remind us that the human brain reflexively counts on hearing, on sound, for the development and expression of language. Language experts go as far as to tribute the origin of language to physiological developments in the early human ear. Our distinctly human capacity to organize noise into meaningful acoustical patterns apparently gives us an edge over the rest of the animal kingdom in the capacity to develop language.

Yet, imagine our lives without sound - some of us have to live without sound, few of us would choose to do so entirely. Silent movies became obsolete because of the very richness and depth of human characterization that ‘talkies’ - that spoken language - gave to creative hands of the movie industry.

Today we are more often than not choosing to give up sound/spoken language as our primary means of talking: instead of voice to voice phone calls, let alone face to face conversation, text-ing, Facebook statuses, and Tweets have become normative vehicles for communication. And, again - not only among our youth. Many of us, of all ages, perhaps due in large part to the influence of the young people in our lives, are relying increasingly on these non-verbal methods of speaking, even when within ear shot of each other, even in the privacy of our own homes [perhaps I should be texting this sermon – I think I spotted a few Blackberries and Iphones on the way in].

We can only imagine the ultimate impact of these new faceless, voiceless, and public forms of communication on our society. While I imagine silent movies, columnist and Public Radio personality Garrison Keillor is convinced there wouldn’t even have been a Watergate to dramatize in film in this new media age where virtually all communication is written, digitized, and made publicly accessible.

Like these Yamim No’raim, technology is awesome: both in terms of what it can do for us as well as the responsibility it demands of us. Indeed, our increasing dependance on written dialogue as a replacement for human interaction can be greatly attributed to the prevalence of the Internet and the advances of the digital age. The Internet has the potential to transform our lives exponentially, and for many it has already done so. It has redefined the ‘convenience store.’ Not only in terms of shopping - for sure, at the stroke of a cursor (perhaps too easy a stroke), we have a virtual shopping mall of options far more expansive than a trip to our local mall centers, -- but more importantly, in terms of information: the Internet has the capacity to put incredible amounts of information into our hands at incredible speed. Imagine back to the days when bound, now seemingly cumbersome encyclopedia volumes were our primary resources for information. Perhaps as cumbersome to us now as scrolls became to those in the Middle Ages. When Encyclopedia Brittanica lined our bookshelves and even the coveted Jr. version was a valued possession. When research on any topic beyond that encyclopedic entry actually required a trip to the library and a conversation with a librarian. Today a Google, or if Microsoft has their way a Bing, search puts a vast, often overwhelming, amount of information in our hands in a virtual instant, and it is our responsibility to discern what is useful and useless without the help of a trained expert at our side. Google books, a highly accessible and vast digital library puts resources from collections around the world onto each of our individual desk and laptops within seconds, and despite what Google says - with no human intermediary. Email, though increasingly archaic now that texting is so prevelant, enables us to communicate with colleagues, friends, and family located throughout the world easily and inexpensively. The Internet enables us to reach and communicate with those who in previous generations may have been unreachable, left out on the margins of society. The Internet has given voice to those unable to speak or at the very least those in the past who were unable to be heard. Remarkably, earlier this year, for instance, we watched, we read - as the Internet give voice to those underlying democratic tendencies in Iran following their controversial election, tendencies that in the past would have been left buried and largely unnoticed.

At the same time as the Internet and the capacity for non-verbal written communication has opened up the world and provided an enormous freedom of expression, it has as equal if not greater capacity to shut us in. We could in the foreseeable future have no pressing reason to leave the comfort of our homes. We can work, shop, interact socially, find entertainment, keep up with the news, all from in front of a small screen. [Anyone see the movie “Wall-e”?]

As early as 1998, sociological studies reported on the detrimental effect of Internet usage on society. Despite the incredible advances and the enrichment the Internet can bring into our lives, the reality remains that the more time one spends in front of this interactive screen the less time one is engaged with real live human beings: our friends, our neighbors, even our family members. Norman Nie, a Stanford researcher, argued close to a decade ago (long before any of us were ‘Linked In’), that “the Internet could be the ultimate isolating technology” further distancing us from participation in our communities. The Internet, Professor Nie presciently claimed would make a far greater impact on society than the television or the automobile ever did. I wonder - it may compete or even surpass the revolutionary impact of the printing press.

The Internet gives us a certain degree of independence in its ability to put everything in our hands without intermediaries. And we like that as Americans, don’t we - we value independence and the ability to accomplish tasks without help. Yet, independence at the expense of social interconnectedness not only impedes our ability to succeed but dehumanizes us and is ultimately detrimental to our over all well-being. We humans are social creatures; we thrive on relationships, yes on being dependent on one another. Ben Sherwood, the author of The Survivor’s Club, a book on the personality characteristics of those able to survive challenge and trauma, notes that social connections between humans are vital to our survival. Sherwood argues that isolation not only leads to the emotional strains of loneliness, but can more often than not lead to physiological distress. Quoting various scientific studies, he draws attention to data that indicate that social isolation - such an extreme independence where one has no support - is as great a risk factor, if not greater, for physical illness and death than smoking or high cholesterol.

Our American media does well at highlighting - glorifying - the success of the individual, but more often than not those individuals in our society who are most successful are those who allow themselves to be connected with and dependent on others for support. David Frost may have succeeded in capturing that critical and memorable moment of regret and defeat in the life of Richard Nixon, yet Frost’s ability to succeed at his task was fully dependent on the lesser known work of his researchers, financial backers, and producer not to mention, as the movie tells it, Nixon’s own foibles.

Don’t get me wrong, I am, frankly, in awe of the advances of the Internet and the new forms of digitized communication it provides. Perhaps in my role as a student I feel its impact the greatest. That I can easily access academic articles published in Israel or communicate with students and scholars around the world instantly from the comfort of my home office in Pikesville astounds me and makes my task easier. I certainly couldn’t do that the first time I was a graduate student. As a parent, that I can order my kids’ piano books, school supplies, and even their school uniforms (let alone my own clothes, and shoes!) all quickly and easily from home is an enormous time, gas, and hassle saver. As responsible adults, that Chuck and I can track and pay all of our bills (okay, its primarily Chuck, he is the accountant) without ever having to stamp an envelope or wait in line at the bank. And like so many, I admit to enjoying and perhaps sharing too much information keeping in touch with new friends while getting reacquainted with old through e-based social networks. Yet as much as I gladly depend on the Internet, its convenience, and its vast offerings, I remain acutely aware of what is missing.

Face to face human interaction.
And despite my frequent visits and activity, or its deceiving name, I don’t mean the Facebook variety.

So how do we overcome this incredible challenge? We need technology. We want our technology. Facebook, Twitter, instant text messaging - for all the challenges they raise, they have transformed our lives in positive ways; and few if any of us really want to turn the clock back. Let not our hindsight be clouded by those all too easy to wear rose colored glasses. Sure, we may grow misty eyed at the end of face-face personal service, yet be clear that what makes us misty eyed has nothing to do with the practical commercial aspects of this change (the Internet can often do that better in many cases), rather it is the human aspects that we mourn. The recollection, for instance in my case, of walking into Padelson’s that glorious, full service music store in Manhattan (one that my own internet shopping habits helped to close) and being waited on by a human being as equally interested in music as I; being greeted with a friendly and sincere shanah tovah while picking up a deli order at Edmart in Pikesville -- that is at the heart of what we glamorize about the past. Face to face human interaction and dialogue! We miss the people, not the product.

We must work to nurture our capacity for dialogue and human relationship in this Internet age in order to balance the potentially isolating effects of living in a society where everything and everyone is conveniently reachable through a square box that sits either on a desk or more likely these days in the palm of one’s hand. This requires a concerted effort. An effort that previous generations could not even have imagined, and one that perhaps we have yet to fully imagine ourselves. We just may have to figure it out as we go along.

One thing is for sure, the synagogue can and must be a haven for human dialogue and social support. I admit, a shameless plug - one, though, you must have seen coming. Even in our attempts to keep Temple Emanuel current by having an interactive website, e-newsletters, and a tech committee that explores other ways in which we can use technology to make our congregation not only greener, but more vibrant, educationally relevant, and user-friendly, we must at the same time remain committed to being a Beit Keneset - a place, a home where people gather face to face, not just on line, not just through Facebook, but in person.

Perhaps the dilemma is not new. In the later half of the 18th century, Enlightened German philosopher, Moses Mendelssohn cautioned against giving too much weight to the written word. Recalling the ancient prohibition of fixing the oral law into writing, Mendelssohn argured that Jewish life - as he conceived of it through law and action - thrived in human debate. In his treastise, Jerusalem (published in 1783), Mendelssohn wrote, commenting specifically on the impact of printing,
“The diffusion of writings and books...has entirely transformed man. [causing a] great upheaval in the whole system of human knowledge and convictions ...” (p. 103, Jerusalem).” “Everything is dead letter; the spirit of living conversation has vanished.”

Though admitting that the “bygone days of ancient times” were not necessarily better than his own era, recall Mendelssohn was a passionate advocate of modernity, he did argue that in the era where oral transmission was primary, “Man was more necessary to man; teaching was more closely connected with life, contemplation more intimately bound up with action.”

Judaism has historically looked almost exclusively to the past in its effort to carry its values and wisdom forward as it faced the future, notes Rabbi Harold Schulweiss, the editor of the book, Jews and Judaism in the 21st Century. A model that Mendelssohn too seemed to understand may be untenable in our modern world. His 18th century remarks compel us not to look solely to the past - to what is fixed in writing - for truth, put instead to reaffirm the centrality of human responsibility and human debate in the continual flourishing of Jewish life. He saw books as inadequate replacements for Jewish life and learning, so too the computer, the internet, are inadequate replacements today. Necessary and vital tools - yes, no question. Replacements - absolutely not.

Our movement’s magazine, Reform Judaism’s summer issue, entitled, “CyberSanctuary” explored and documented the myriad of ways in which congregations throughout the country are taking advantage of technology in order to enrich worship and enhance education. It had great and exciting ideas from which we can learn: Internet based Hebrew and B’nai Mitzvah tutoring, on-line streaming of worship services, sermon podcasts instead of written posts, projected visual worship.... At the same time, while not considered the lead story, this issue also had a substantial section on “Hardship and Hope” where human relationships were featured as the antidote to despair. A paradox? Certainly not.

Maybe not conscious on the agenda of the editors, but a clear message that the heart of a synagogue remains always the people - it is the human relationships that are central: not the space, not the classroom, not the technology, no matter how necessary that technology is to the functioning of a 21st century synagogue, but the ‘minyan.’

The synagogue must continue to remain viable places for face-to-face dialogue through the pursuit of Torah, study in the form of chevruta, partnered, respectful dialogue and debate; the pursuit of Avodah, worship that requires a communal gathering to engage in responsive prayer; and the pursuit of g’milut chasadim, just acts that we do along with and for others. All of this must continue to happen here, and all of this requires a human presence.

Perhaps our earliest sages understood that it is the human need for community and interconnectedness that makes these tasks, Torah, Avodah, and G’milut Chasadim, “Al Shelosha d’varim ha-olam omeid” the 3 pillars upon which our world stands. More than anything else, it is the minyan that defines the synagogue - that gathering of people who come together to bring Torah to life: to worship, to study, to support one another through the mess of life.

Our involvement in Jewish life, in the life of our Temple Emanuel community, this offers the vital foundation of social support in our modern, text based world. Let us all work together to make it so - to continue to make Temple Emanuel such a gathering place, a Beit Knesset in this upcoming year of 5770. Ken y’hi ratzon.

Last year's Erev Rosh Hashanah sermon:" I am a Reform Jew"

2009-09-17T06:44:00.001-07:00

I am a Reform Jew – Erev Rosh Hashanah, 5769
I am a Reform Jew. No surprise there – having arrived in Baltimore over a decade and a ½ ago after graduating HUC-JIR, the Reform Rabbinical and Cantorial seminary in New York, to serve our Reform community here in Baltimore, I have publically as well as personally been associated with the Reform movement throughout my adulthood. The majority of my Jewish connections growing up were also with the Reform movement. From the 3rd grade on, I was educated in a Reform congregation. I participated in NFTY events, put in a few years at a Union summer camp even attended the Reform movement’s leadership academy, Camp Kutz, for one summer. No question, I was inspired by many of these experiences, yet are these public alliances, my connections to certain organizations, what makes me a Reform Jew? A question that I don’t think we ask ourselves often enough: why are we Reform Jews? We may be quick to identify ourselves as Reform by virtue of our membership here at Temple Emanuel, a congregation affiliated with the URJ – the Union of Reform Judaism, the umbrella organization for all North American Reform synagogues, or by the various Reform organizations in which we may have participated in at various times in our life –but is that it – is that what makes each of us Reform Jews? I certainly hope not.
According to the Central Conference of American Rabbi’s 1976 Centenary Perspective, a document inspired by the centennial celebrations of both the aforementioned organizations, the URJ, then known as the UAHC, the Union of American Hebrew Congregations and the Hebrew Union College, Reform Judaism is characterized by seven specific points:
• It should interact with modern culture
• Its forms and expressions should reflect a contemporary aesthetic
• Its scholarship should be conducted by modern and critical methodology
• It recognizes change as a fundamental reality – not just for the future, but of both past and present as well.
• It recognizes the ethics of universalism as an explicit part of our Jewish duty
• It demands gender equality with regard to the study and practice of Judaism
And perhaps most significantly,
• Reform Judaism demands that Jewish obligation begin with the informed will of the individual.

The informed will of the individual. This seventh point is the most challenging element of Reform Judaism. The first 6 certainly require effort, but can easily be delegated to others – to the leaders in the movement, Rabbis, Cantors, scholars, musicians, administrators. But point 7 is aimed directly at the individual. I would argue that it is this point with which we as Reform Jews most struggle and which leads to the gross misunderstanding of Reform Judaism in the larger community. It is also a point on which we have the utmost control to fulfill and in turn has the power to enrich us as individuals and as Jews.

“The informed will of the individual.” This critical point is at the root of Reform Judaism’s principle of autonomy. We are not a movement that looks to the Halacha, the traditional Jewish law, for final arbitration on our daily choices. Rather we are movement that certainly includes Halacha, but among other resources, both historical and modern, to inform our decision making; decision making that is ultimately left to the individual. This process demands a high degree of responsibility and effort; a degree to which, frankly, most of us fall short.
We take for granted even become lazy in our autonomy – as Americans raised on the values of democracy coupled with the freedom of religion, we simply can’t imagine our daily religious choices being anything but based on our own autonomous decision making. And the truth is, as much as others might argue otherwise, in a country such as ours which values (and hopefully will continue to maintain), the separation of Church and State, all religious choices are ultimately grounded in personal autonomy. No one ‘has’ to keep any form of religious observance. All Jews – Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, Reconstructionist -- all of us have the power to choose for ourselves how to express our Judaism. Some may choose to follow a path in line with communal Halachik standards – such as Orthodoxy, but that is at its core a personal choice.

We Reform Jews celebrate autonomy by generally rejecting such rigid communal standards, but by doing so, we have a tendency to become complacent in this autonomy forgetting the Jewish value of placing community on equal footing, if not over and above the individual. A well-known mishnah recorded in tractate Avot reminds us of this tension between community and self:
הוא היה אומר: אם אין אני לי מי לי וכשאני לעצמי מה אני (ואם לא אכשיו אימתי:)
He was known to say: if I am not for myself, who will be for me? But, if I am only for myself, what am I?( And if not now, when?)
Written in the first centuries of the first millennium, this text not only highlights that this tension between individualism and communalism is ancient and is not solely a result of American ideology, but it also underscores that autonomy – the self-- is at the root of any commitment we make to the larger community.
19th century commentator Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch notes in his discussion of this very mishnah that while one can only attain “spiritual fitness” and moral worth by virtue of his own efforts, it is only by actively working to create, to establish and to increase the happiness and prosperity of his fellow man that one can begin to become truly human, b’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God. It is through community by which we find divinity.

Are we Reform Jews fully grounded in our identity, or has lack of observance replaced active and creative idealistic efforts, such as Hirsch describes, as the bond among Reform Jews? How I cringe when I hear a fellow Jew use the word “Reform” as a reason not to do. “I don’t go to services very often; I’m Reform.” “I eat bread on Pesach, it’s okay, I’m Reform.” “I eat shrimp because I’m Reform.” The Reform label seems to have become an excuse for lack of intention, connection, and involvement in the larger community. Not that I am advocating for a particular level of ritual observance, far from it! BUT, I fear we forget about the “informed” part of being a Reform Jew. We use that value of autonomy to support all of our decisions with regard to personal practice and often communal obligation as well, without taking the time and effort to “become informed” as Reform Judaism mandates.

Recall point 7:
• Reform Judaism demands that Jewish obligation start with the informed will of the individual. Sorry folks, Reform Judaism was never intended to be the easy way out. On the contrary, it requires us to explore, to think for ourselves, and make decisions accordingly. A mistake we often make is to view those who choose a more stringent level of observance as somehow more valid, even more pious, than ourselves. Reform viewed as the least committed on the continuum and the orthodox the most. Sadly, this continuum is often reinforced by our own reticence to speak out and our own lack of involvement in the larger Jewish community.

A bit of history is noteworthy. The Reform movement grew out of the late 18th century European enlightenment. Ironically, so did Orthodoxy. In a very real sense, they are parallel movements. The word “orthodox” a term used by the Lutheran Church to refer to dogmatic Biblicism, wasn’t used by a Jew in 1755. It was in that year, that the great Enlightenment figure, Moses Mendelsohn used this term in a letter to another such thinker asking if a contemporary of theirs, a modern scientist, was really “orthodox“ or just pretending to be so. Orthodox at this time was a referent only to the unwillingness of allowing modern ideology into religious thought. It wasn’t until the mid-19th century when a group of Jews successfully advocated for change in ritual expression that allowed for enlightenment values to impact Jewish practice that orthodoxy as a self-defined movement developed. Indeed, it grew out of opposition to become the self-avowed standard bearer of Judaism. 19th century Europe was not the first playground for change, Judaism has constantly evolved over time – but it was a period that marked the coming together of the social, cultural, and philosophical forces of modernity in a manner which forever changed the face of Jewry.

While the image of Orthodoxy as a standard bearer of Judaism in our community persists, Reform Judaism has been far more influential in its impact on modern Jewry. The issues which others debate today are generally issues which the Reform movement placed in the forefront and with which Reform Judaism has already come to terms. Social justice and the ethical impulse as a paramount virtue has its roots in Classical Reform ideology; Gender equality was a stated value in the earliest platforms of Reform Judaism, and HUC was the first American Jewish seminary to admit and later ordain women; the Reform movement has actively welcomed interfaith families into our congregations; HUC has welcomed gay and lesbian candidates for ordination without reservation, and Reform congregations across North America openly welcome gays, lesbians, and their families as fully participating members in our midst.

Even our style of worship and our music has made its impact. Praying in the vernacular is a Reform innovation as is the inclusion of our matriarchs and gender sensitive language into the liturgy. So many of the tunes that are simply labeled as “traditional” are products of Germany’s 19th century early Reform synagogues – gems like Shema, Hodo Al Eretz, Adon Olam. These early Reform synagogues hired musical directors and cantors that, simply put, revolutionized synagogue song and made an impact far beyond the bemas of their then nascent Reform synagogues.

So if the Reform movement has been such an avant garde movement, setting the standards for others to follow, why is it that it is viewed in the community as the “least” on that continuum of commitment and activity?
Informed will of the individual. How we define ourselves as Reform Jews is at the crux of the matter. We must reframe our definitions of ourselves. Instead of defining ourselves by what we choose not to do, we must begin to define ourselves by what we do. We are a movement of action, and thus need to market ourselves as such – as individuals and as a movement.
As we begin this new year, 5769, I challenge all of us to grapple with our Reform identities – let us challenge ourselves to be actively Reform rather than by default. Certainly, no easy task. Striving to define Reform Judaism based on tangible practice has been divisive to say the least among Reform leaders since the days of the Pittsburgh Platform. The cherished value of autonomy holds up any standardized vision of Reform practice. Indeed, individual autonomy makes that challenge of informing oneself on the one hand, more compelling, but also all the more difficult. It requires self-imposed motivation and discipline. Doing simply because communal guidelines exist telling you so isn’t an option here.
So what is it that makes us Reform Jews?

My parents made a conscious decision when I was young to affiliate with a Reform congregation after belonging to a liberal, albeit modern Orthodox synagogue. I can’t speak to their motivations as I was just a kid (you can ask them for yourselves), but their decision, whether they were or are aware or not, left a decisive mark on me. After getting over the disappointment that I would not be attending that extra day of Hebrew school that I had been eagerly awaiting (clearly synagogue life was meant to be my destiny), I discovered that the beauty of Reform Judaism isn’t about the amount of practice but rather the journey one takes towards or away from that practice. Being a Reform Jew is about the values and the manner in which the choice to or not to practice is made. I could define myself by the many things I don’t do: I haven’t walked to synagogue save for the periods of time I’ve spent in Israel since childhood. I don’t keep a kosher home per standardized heksher standards. I have no interest frankly in laying Tefillin. I could go on in this list, but rather and more importantly I chose to define myself as a Jew by what I do, by the actions I take, such as: studying Torah regularly – struggling with, striving (even if not with success) to find meaning even in its most challenging sections; observing Shabbat in a meaningful way that connects me and my family to family, synagogue life and klal Yisrael; consciously and carefully giving tzedakah; taking pride in the our movement’s Religious Action Center and striving personally to champion the ethical values of social justice voiced by our prophetic tradition; remaining connected even if at times remotely to Israel and the values for which she stands; raising, together with Chuck, our children in a home filled with Jewish values and learning and within a caring synagogue community; striving towards the engagement of g’milut chasadim, acts of love and kindness.
Indeed: I am a Reform Jew.
What about you?