Category: ethics

CCAR Mission to Israel

We are on the final day of our CCAR Israel mission of solidarity and learning. I have not written about most of my experiences and I have refrained from posting anything except for some re-posting of pictures to Facebook that my colleagues have taken, commemorating our time in various places. Although I want to share the extraordinary and incredible experiences, I also want to give them some time to sit inside me as I ruminate and try make sense of them. In some I will be successful and in some I will not.

These days have been filled with visits and talks and discussions and analyses. We packed as much as we could into our days and often into the nights as well. There is much pain here as we struggle to remember who we are while fighting to make a future possible. The actions we take now are the foundation upon which we build that future. Often building is difficult and now in this time of war it is acutely so. The price is paid in blood and also in our souls. If we are the caretakers of the world for our next generation, what is it that we will leave to them? The answer to that question is being forged now.

The singular most important thing I could do was be here to express my solidarity with the people and the State of Israel. So I came. The gratitude was palpable. And for that I am grateful as well. But now it is time to bring it back home and share what I have experienced. I hope to do justice to that sacred task.

There is a time for every thing under heaven. Now is the time to express support, reflect on what is happening and then engage in what is to be done, once the immediacy of this war is concluded. There is much to do tomorrow. But for today, I support my people and pray that all may live in peace.

Thoughts as I Prepare to leave for Israel

I am a day away from heading off to Israel. I prepare to leave feeling a combination of excitement and trepidation, but I leave with three goals in mind: First and foremost, I want to support and show solidarity with Israel, then I want to learn first hand what is happening and finally, I want to return prepared to share with my community the result of these experiences.

So far I have refrained from writing publicly about the war. Enough people are weighing in. Emotions are running high, facts are difficult to ascertain and thoughts continue to be tested. And I struggle with it all.

I believe that there is a time and place for things. Now, it is the time to show support and solidarity. But I will share that I believe war is a hellish nightmare that consumes and irrevocably changes all it touches. It is my hope however that from the ashes of destruction something meaningful and hopeful can rise. And it is my hope that I will be able to contribute something positive to the process.

Shabbat Shalom!

Anguish and Hope

Like so many others, I find myself in a place of anguish.  The violence perpetrated upon both Israelis and Palestinians is overwhelmingly sad and tragic.  I struggle with the hatred and resultant terror, death and destruction.  Whether the cause is righteous or even justifiable, the price that the innocents pay is too great.  And in the end, we all have blood on our hands, forever changed by war.

 Today, many of us observe a fast.  The 17th of Tammuz is traditionally a fast day for the Jewish people, marking catastrophes and heartbreaks in our history.  It coincides with the fast of Ramadan.  We join together praying that our sadness might transform into hope, that the killing might end, that the hatred might cease, that the opportunity for peace might appear as rays of light shining through the cracks in the broken vessel in which we find ourselves.

 To learn more about this event, look to the website:

https://www.facebook.com/JewsAndArabsChooselife?hc_location=timeline

 I share the following poem written by two religious leaders from Jerusalem,  Sheikh Ibtisam Mahamid and Rabbi Tamar Elad-Appelbaum, shared with me by my colleague, Rabbi David Ackerman.

 God of Life

Who heals the broken-hearted and binds up their wounds

 May it be your will to hear the prayer of mothers

For you did not create us to kill each other

Nor to live in fear, anger or hatred in your world

But rather you have created us so we can grant permission to one another to sanctify Your name of Life, your name of Peace in this world.

For these things I weep, my eye, my eye runs down with water

For our children crying at nights,

For parents holding their children with despair and darkness in their hearts

For a gate that is closing and who will open it while day has not yet dawned.

And with my tears and prayers which I pray

And with the tears of all women who deeply feel the pain of these difficult days

I raise my hands to you please God have mercy on us

Hear our voice that we shall not despair

That we shall see life in each other,

That we shall have mercy for each other,

That we shall have pity on each other,

That we shall hope for each other

And we shall write our lives in the book of Life

For your sake God of Life

Let us choose Life.

For you are Peace, your world is Peace and all that is yours is Peace,

And so shall be your will and let us say

 Amen

Where do we go from here?

In the aftermath of four dead children, we need to carefully assess who we are, not who we believe ourselves to be.  It is hard to be self-critical, but it is critically important.  The tragedies of the four slain boys is deeply shocking and painful.   What it can tell us about ourselves is a step toward understanding those we currently consider adversaries on so many levels and how we might find a way to live together.  The horrible reality is that we have been sacrificing our children for way too long.  Our tradition compels us to continue to seek another way.  It will be hard and fraught with obstacles and disappointments.

Israel is a nation of laws.  Once, the aspiration was that Israel would be a nation like all other nations.  But in fact, we hold Israel to a higher standard of ethics and morality.  Although inevitably she will fall short of our ideal, it is the aspiration that makes her the land of hope for all Jews.  We support and love her and commit ourselves to striving to reach the ideal where all children might live in peace and security.  We have much work to do.  Let everyone use the tragedy that has befallen all of us to dedicate ourselves to the possibility of achieving peace someday

May we find peace this Shabbat

May we find peace and solace this Shabbat.

We include the name of Mohammed Abu Khdeir to the names of Naftali Frankel, Gilad Shaar and Eyal Yifrach this evening as we recite Kaddish Yatom.  We ask of the Divine One:

May the One who makes peace in the high heavens
make peace for us, for all Israel and all who inhabit the earth.

Amen.

עֹשֶׂה שָׁלוֹם בִּמְרוֹמָיו הוּא יַעֲשֶׂה
שָׁלוֹם עָלֵינוּ וְעַל כָּל יִשְׂרָאֵל, וְעַל
כָּל יושבֵי תבל, וְאִמְרוּ אָמֵן

Oseh shalom bimromav,  hu yaaseh shalom aleinu, 

v’al kol Yisrael, v’al kol yoshvei teiveil,v’imru.

Amen.

A Quest for Meaning

 In Naso, we are introduced to the Nazir. A Nazir is one who purposefully separates himself or herself of the community by abstaining from certain luxuries or conventions, taking a vow as part of a spiritual search. This is the issue of the individual’s quest for meaning.

 We see the idea of a vow as a chance to be in closer communion with God. It is an extraordinary commitment as the individual, man or woman, commits to refraining from some basic of things. This particular vow seems to contradict the idea that we are in community; the Nazir does things that by their nature separates him/her from societal norms: The Nazir does not drink, does not cut his/her hair, not to be near the dead, even including those for whom even a Kohen would. At the end of the vow’s timeframe, the Nazir brings a sacrifice as a Sin offering and a second as an offering of well-being signaling the vow is now concluded and fulfilled.

 Once the Nazir has made the appropriate sacrifices, Aaron blesses the people with the Priestly blessing. This is as though through the process the Nazir endures in the sacred separating and the sacred re-joining, the whole people become worthy of God’s blessings.

 Like the Nazir we too try to find meaning in our lives. We reflect and act to give life purpose. The path we walk in that process can be difficult and often lonesome. We might find a need to separate ourselves from those we love or things that are familiar in order learn and grapple with the hard questions we confront in our lives. We do things that set us apart, not unlike the Nazir. However, our tradition teaches are not hermits or ascetics.   Parashah Naso teaches that our path needs to lead us back to the community. When we return, we are changed and, we pray, better off for the journey. When we return and again become a participant in our community, we enrich our community as well.

 We see this understanding of the Nazir play itself out all the time in our modern lives as well. Our young people for example, venture out from the family in their quest to find their paths, to challenge the paradigms they have learned in their youth and as they seek wisdom and growth. We call this going off to college. Our children leave us as adolescents and hopefully return as thoughtful young adults. In other even more noble pursuits, many of our best and brightest make a vow in the form of enlisting in the military to serve their country. The ideals they embrace they are willing to defend with their lives.

 We give our young the best we can. And then they leave. We pray that they will be safe on the journey and return to us whole. Then we know that indeed The Eternal has blessed us and protected us and caused The Divine Countenance to shine upon us.

My father was God

A beautiful poem I shared for Yizkor Shavuot by Yehuda Amichai-

My father was God and did not know it.

He gave me
The Ten Commandments
neither in thunder nor in fury; neither in fire nor in cloud
But rather in gentleness and love. And he added caresses and kind words
and he added “I beg You,” and “please.”And he sang “keep” and “remember” the Shabbat         In a single melody and he pleaded and

cried quietly between one utterance and the next ,“Do not take the name of God in vain,”       do not take it, not in vain,I beg you, “do not bear false witness against your neighbor.”           And he hugged me tightly and whispered in my ear“
Do not steal. Do not commit adultery. Do not murder.”

And he put the palms of his open hands
On my head with the Yom Kippur blessing.“Honor, love, that your days might be long On the earth.”  And my father’s voice was white like the hair on his head.
Later on he turned his face to me one last time
Like on the day when he died in my arms and said
I want to add Two to the Ten Commandments:
The eleventh commandment – “Thou shall not change.”
And the twelfth commandment – “Thou must surely change.”
So said my father and then he turned from me and walked off
Disappearing into his strange distances.

אבי היה אלוהים / יהודה עמיחי

אבי היה אלוהים ולא ידע.הוא נתן לי את עשרת הדיברות לא ברעם ולא בזעם, לא באש ולא בענן אלא ברכות ובאהבה. והוסיף לטופים והוסיף מילים טובות, והוסיף “אנא” והוסיף “בבקשה”. וזמר זכור ושמור בניגון אחד והתחנן ובכה בשקט בין דבר לדבר, לא תשא שם אלוהיך לשוא, לא תשא, לא לשוא, אנא, אל תענה ברעך עד שקר.וחבק אותי חזק ולחש באוזני, לא תגנב, לא תנאף, לא תרצח. ושם את כפות ידיו הפתוחות על ראשי בברכת יום כפור. כבד, אהב, למען יאריכון ימיך על פני האדמה. וקול אבי לבן כמו שער ראשו. אחר כך הפנה את פניו אלי בפעם האחרונה כמו ביום שבו מת בזרועותיי, ואמר:”אני רוצה להוסיף שנים לעשרת הדברות:הדבר האחד-עשר, “לא תשתנה”והדבר השנים-עשר,”השתנה, תשתנה”כך אמר אבי ופנה ממני והלך ונעלם במרחקיו המוזרים.

—Yehuda Amichai

Help the Veterans Now

The problems plaguing the VA are a national disgrace.  Our treatment of returning wounded veterans is nothing less than shameful.

 It is incumbent upon the President of the United States to implement a disaster response to alleviate the backlogs and treat our veterans in need immediately.  We are able to provide emergency aid to victims of natural disasters so must we be able to provide for our veterans. Mr. President, it is past time to make a public statement and direct bold swift action.

There is an urgent need to understand what happened and how the system designed to provide support for our wounded went so horribly off the rails.  So investigate and correct the system.  But the pressing need is to get help our vets who are struggling now.  This is not the efficient way to manage the problem, but there are lives at stake.  Investigating and managing the problem are secondary to the task of saving veteran’s lives.

This catastrophe is compounded both by the lies and the cover-ups, and also by the anguish and pain endured by our veterans.  Certainly the system is horribly broken and we must demand accountability on all levels that permits such corruption to exist.  Force resignations, fire others, prosecute criminal activity, conduct investigations and fix this horrible mess.  But first,  help those desperately in need.

 Right now we must focus on getting help to our vets.  Get caregivers into the field.  If our military with all of it’s extraordinary capabilities or our other disaster response groups such as FEMA cannot do it, then get the Red Cross or Doctors without Borders in to do the job we are unwilling to do.  This is a national disgrace and must be addressed now.

Remembering- Seders past and Yizkor

Yizkor Pesach 2014

The Seder Table at my grandparent’s houses was one of those interesting affairs.  The table started in the dining room, made its way past the wall into the living room and hung a right turn into the foyer.  This was unlike my great-aunt on my father’s side, where the table started in the living room, ran through the dining room and into the kitchen, where the kids sat.  Now I realize why the two families never got along; I always thought it was because one was Galitziana and the other Litvak…

At Nanny and Grandpop’s house, my mom’s parents, the table seemed to groan under the weight of the Seder Plates and bowls of salt water and bottles of wine and the platters upon platters of food. The table was laden with a stuffed breast of veal and brisket, homemade gefilte fish and chicken soup with dill and soft matzoh balls that my father mocked because they were not hard enough.  My mom made them like rocks, which according to my father who actually loved them, could be used by the Israeli army as provisions to be eaten or if necessary as a weapon to be thrown.  I recall my hand being slapped by my grandfather as I tried to take the Afikomen a bit too early in the affair.  I eventually would get it, but only after an appropriate amount of time and tries had elapsed according to his calculations.  I recall the mixing of English and Hebrew, the raucous noise of talking, singing, laughing and of course arguing, and sharing the story from the Hagaddah. The three major denominations of Judaism were all represented and all joined together to celebrate this mix of religion and family at the festive table.

I can trace my life through my movement along that table.  I moved from the kids table, where I once chanted the “four questions,” to the main table where I chant the Kiddush, and ultimately now to sit at the head of the table to help lead the Seder.  And there I sat this year, with my wife’s family.

They have their own interesting rituals and traditions, as does each family.  But one is particularly worth noting.  At the conclusion of the Seder, my mother-in-law plugs in the cassette player with a very special recording.  They recorded her mother on one of her last Seders at the table, telling stories sharing recollections of times past and a poem.  My mother-in-law sits transfixed, the voice carries her someplace else as she listens to her mother re-tell the telling of the Exodus.  She drinks in her mother’s words and for those brief moments, Rose Mandel comes alive for her.  That is truly the high point of the Seder.  And why we need to commemorate those we loved this Yizkor.

For Yizkor is our time to remember.  It is our time to reflect back on those we loved.  This is our time to recognize how much they continue to mean to us.  Often they fade into the background.  We are so caught up in the day-to-day things that fill our time.  Kids, food, shopping, the house, the spouse and our own selves, just to name the short list.  But now is our time to remember them.  Those we loved, those who we have lost, often too soon.  Oh to have a few more moments of them.  For when we remember them, we remember the blessings they brought to our lives.  The richness that is ours because of them, the history that is uniquely our individual own because of the way they shaped and influenced our lives.  We remember to offer gratitude for their being in our lives.  We remember their best as a means to help propel us to be our best.  And therefore we remember them as we strive to create the memories for those who come after us as the legacy we leave to them in an unbroken chain of loving and caring.

It’s Time to Free Jonathan Pollard

For a long time, I resisted calls to free Jonathan Pollard.  He was convicted of treason, spying against the United States of America.  Although his punishment was more severe and although he spied on behalf of the State of Israel, an ally of the United States, his sentence seemed acceptable to me. He was a convicted spy serving a life sentence for betraying his country-that was okay in my book.

However, it is clear from the latest round of Middle East negotiations that Jonathan Pollard became little more than a political pawn, to be played in order to achieve a settlement.  If our own government admits that Pollard’s punishment can be overlooked to achieve a political end, then the reason for his original punishment seems to have run its course, and he has paid the price.  I do not believe a pardon is in order but it seems reasonable that we permit the time served be sufficient punishment for his treasonous acts.

 Notwithstanding the collapse of the complicated formula that included his release to bring an agreement to the Middle East peace talks, Pollard appears to be merely taking up space in a prison as far as the US Government is concerned.  So therefore, it seems appropriate to release and deport him to Israel.  Pollard does not matter to the United States anymore as evidenced by our willingness to release him. Dangling Pollard in front of those who might believe he matters, only serves to distract the two directly affected parties from the important and hard decisions they need to make.   So let us now take the only reasonable course of action, release Jonathan Pollard now.