Category: ethics

Shabbat Shalom

The tension between generations continues.  It was embodied in this Cat Stevens /Yusef Islam music, Father & Son, that resonated so deeply for me them and now.

“There is a better place, a promised land…There is no way we get from here to there  except by joining hands, marching together.” (Mishkan Tefillah, p.39)

Shabbat Shalom

I’m Looking at the Man in the Mirror

Like so many, I am frustrated.  In large measure, I am frustrated with myself. It is me who needs the work.  Privilege, whiteness, racist and similar words or phrases can be jingoistic, masquerading in a cloak of empathy.   They really have no weight until I confront who I am with honesty and vulnerability.  I have struggled with what I can only describe as our own hypocrisy; far too often we preach and we teach, but we do not fully live the Jewish values we espouse.  How could this not be at the forefront of everything I do for as long as I have been doing it?  What took me so long, why now?  I think back at those interesting words at the beginning of Exodus: And God heard their cry and remembered the Covenant God made. What took God so long?  There were 400 years of suffering and oppression.  What took God so long?

It does not assuage my guilt to take solace in the human time it took God.  Despite knowing I cannot change the past, I struggle with how I affect the future. This only adds to the frustration of knowing I have not done enough to bring us farther along.  And do I really believe in what I proclaim?

Do I have the fortitude and courage to look deep within and grapple with who I am and what I must do to change?  Only then will I be whole enough to join in the battle that our society and humanity as a whole must wage to create the world I profess to believe in.  Will I cross over or find contentment on this side in my narrow but for the most part comfortable space.

We have had opportunities before.  We have moved forward, slowly, haltingly, stumbling often one step forward and two steps back.  In actuality, we have lived with the opportunities to make change continuously.  What makes this moment different?  Will I be like Nachshon, wading deliberately into the unknown Sea of Reeds or be one of those longing for the land of Goshen, that narrow harsh place, whose evils are known but tempered by our thoughts of powerlessness?

Prescriptions are being bandied about. Some might be curative and others little more than a bandage.  Everywhere there are now lists of things proposing changes ostensibly serving to right society’s wrongs.  How could these lists be created so quickly?  Seeing these in the immediate aftermath of George Floyd’s murder makes me wonder if the answers been known all along. This would imply either the problem is not that complicated or we did not have the strength to enact these prescriptions. We need to ask ourselves which it is.   Or is the problem so deep and thorny as to render it all but impossible to unravel? And we have left the status quo because we are overwhelmed at the enormity of the issue.   At this moment in time are we willing to find out?  Will this time different from all of the other times?    Am I up to the challenge?

 

 

 

When you emerge, who will you be?

Behar-Bechukotai

by Yoram Raanan

Have you ever taken a vacation?

Usually, it is for one of two reasons:

To see or experience something new, or to Rest and relax (and of course some of us combine these). Both are ways to recharge to have a reset, time away from the normal and challenging tasks of work to engage in shavat v’yinafash, resting and refreshing both the body and the soul.

This week׳s Torah Portion Parsha Behar-Bechukotai talks about a reset- The Shmita -a reset of the land.  Every seven years we are supposed to stop tilling the soil to let the fields recharge and all people regardless of stature; resident, worker, and slave alike, even the animals, get to partake equally in what is there.

We let things lie dormant so they can be rejuvenated.

The land is recharged and also not uncoincidentally those who do the hard physical labor of farming are given a respite as well.  We do this for seven cycles of seven years and then in the 50th year is the Jubilee.  “And you shall sanctify the fiftieth year, and proclaim freedom for slaves throughout the land for all who live on it. It shall be a Jubilee for you, and you shall return each man to his property, and you shall return each man to his family.”(Lev 25:10)

What might we learn from such a giant reset?

Our tradition recognizes that there are imbalances in the system- imbalances inherent in all systems.  Some people are more successful in acquiring things, in working skillfully or even artfully, some possess better business acumen, some are particularly adept in choosing the right parents perhaps.  And then, there are those not so skilled.  The Talmud extensively discusses the issue that  “Batar Anya Azla Aniyuta,” or  “poverty follows the poor” or that Poverty actually increases from being impoverished.

All societies naturally tend towards these proclivities,  and it is up to us, those who can make a difference, to make a change.  To reset society to align with our values and principles.  Another example of such a reset is commemorated at this time in our calendar.

As we mark the 34th day of our trek to Sinai the story of Shimon Bar Yochai is also worth noting.  A disciple of Rabbi Akiva, he and his son, Eleazar, fled to escape the Romans, living in a cave for 12 years.  He emerged but instead of re-joining his community, he was disgusted by a perceived lack of piety by the people.  Shimon’s eyes burned everything they saw to a cinder, field and man, alike.  God’s messenger, The Bat Kol, sent him back to the cave for another year and he emerged an enlightened man dedicated to righteous living and scholarship, redeeming Tiberias and possibly laying the groundwork for writing the seminal book of Jewish Mysticism, the Zohar.

This is the charge of this week’s Parsha- for each of us individually to rededicate ourselves to serving the needs of our people compassionately and deliberately, fully committed to the sacred cause of living Jewishly if we are willing to take up the challenge.

When this health emergency is past, will you emerge hardened from the cave? Or will you emerge from this quarantine open and deeper in touch with the values that are there to guide you?  Or, will you figuratively burn what you see to the ground by turning a blind eye towards the deep injustices and needs that exist, or instead, will you choose to engage in pursuing righteousness and Jewish values, treating the people with Tzedek and compassion?

Which path will you choose?

May you choose to walk the Jewish path

Cain Yehi Ratzon,

 

 

 

 

Shabbat Shalom

We still believe that there is a better place, a promised land, and the way there is through the wilderness.  There is no way for us to get from here to there, except by joining hands, marching together. (Mishkan Tefillah, adapted)

If you can, be at the rally in New York this Sunday to express solidarity as a first step toward achieving the values that are at the center of Judaism and America.  Together as the Jewish community of the United States with all others of goodwill, we will overcome forces of hatred and bigotry.  There is much work to be done and miles to go before we sleep.  Together we can get there.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

By Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Shabbat Shalom

 

Vayera – What did Abraham hear when God spoke?

I, like so many others, have struggled with Abraham’s responses to God in the stories of Vayera.  Why was our Patriarch eager to confront God and bargain to save Sodom and Gomorrah and then be so passively accepting of God’s command to kill Isaac?  Abraham responds to what he heard, a message filtered by his own biases and his perception of God, the other in this relationship.

In the Akedah, God instructs Abraham in painful detail, “Take your son, your only son, the one that you love, Isaac, go to Moriah and offer him as a burnt offering.”  God is carefully staking out Abraham’s test of faithfulness.  There is no room for a conversation. The Akedah is so intense; it is almost impossible for Abraham to catch his breath, let alone say something in response.   Although there is no conversation, the ensuing language makes it clear that the next three days, Abraham is thoroughly deliberate traveling to Mt. Moriah.  Abraham cannot deliberate with God, but it is clear he is consumed in his mind by what is to come.

Sodom and Gomorrah were decidedly different.  God deliberates about telling Abraham His plan, which included assessing the situation on the ground, framing an invitation to a conversation. Abraham joins in, and God encourages it by continuing to engage  Despite the trepidation of arguing with the God of Justice about acting justly, Abraham bargains to lower the number of righteous needed to spare the city until he reaches what he perceives as the best he can do, 10-  a minyan.  The negotiating ends with the best deal Abraham believes he can achieve.

How we hear and understand something sets the table for how we respond to it.  Why Abraham feels he has license to argue in one case and not in the other remains one of the mysteries of our text.  But it is all too familiar territory for all of us.  Each of us responds to what we think we have heard, rendering very different responses, even to the same person, based on the facts and our emotional and situation, among other factors.

What do we hear when another speaks?  Have they spoken undeniable truth, or is it an invitation to engage to achieve a better understanding of each other? Knowing when to speak and when to be silent is among the more difficult decisions we make.  Grappling with this issue is as hard for us as it was for Abraham.  Our tradition encourages us to confront it.

The practice of Mussar works hard at getting us to understand the virtues, or middot, that drive both the person with whom we are in relationship and us.  We learn that the successful relationship requires that we appreciate the middot are working on both of us so that it can be complicated.  We often do not get it right, but we stand a better chance of engaging in meaningful dialogue when we try. Abraham’s inconsistent reactions to God is a lesson with a timeless message, certainly one that is pertinent to today.  Torah is a profound understanding of the human condition.  The issues Abraham and all the characters of our tradition confront are genuinely human issues, as relevant today as they were when first written down.  Let’s try harder to listen better to understand each other.

Shabbat Shalom

 

Remembering Pittsburgh- Stronger than Hate

The tragic murder of 11 people one year ago in Pittsburgh is a harsh reminder that hatred is real and we are not always in control of events.  Things often happen to us.   As painful, hurtful, or even devastating as something can be, how we react is in our control.  What is the life-lesson that we learn and how do we actively embrace that life lesson going forward?

Do we react cynically or with an open, albeit wounded, heart?  Can we forgive? Will this event haunt us holding us back, or compel us to move onward? What is the vision of the future we see that is shaped by what happened, what is the world we want to see, and how will we get there?

I struggle with an anger and pain that could be overwhelming, especially as one of the Rabbis initially deploying to Pittsburgh with the Red Cross in the immediate aftermath of the shooting.  Our Jewish tradition helps me re-center myself.  Here I can embrace the timeless values that understand the human condition and provide a framework for a just society where we all might live in peace, based on the idea that we should treat our neighbors as ourselves.   But it is a hard climb up to that mountaintop.

This is the challenge of Pittsburgh.  Our hearts ache for those lost as a result of violent Anti-Semitism.  We take solace in the love of our neighbors and find strength standing shoulder to shoulder with other people of goodwill to continue to strive for the kind of just society we want America to be.

Our tradition is one of deeds.  Our response to this tragedy needs to be more than a feeling.  There are many ways to respond through civic involvement and community activism.  Judaism requires that we belong to a community committed to promoting our values be it a synagogue, philanthropy, or civil rights group.  The important thing is that you are compelled to respond with actions to live the values of our tradition and to build a better world.   What will you do?

Zichronam Livracha and Shabbat Shalom.