IF THE SIREN IS SOUNDED

Sermon for first morning of Rosh Hashanah 5775

September 25, 2014

 אִם-יִתָּקַע שׁוֹפָר בְּעִיר, וְעָם לֹא יֶחֱרָדוּ

6 If a shofar is sounded in a city, do the people not tremble?

That quotation from Amos chapter 3 verse 6 has been much on my mind, especially since my return from Israel.

If Amos had been living in Israel this summer, I think that instead of asking

IM YITAKA SHOFAR B’IR/ IF A SHOFAR IS SOUNDED IN THE CITY DO THE PEOPLE NOT TREMBLE?…

He would have asked:

IM YITAKA TZOFAR B’IR/ IF A SIREN IS SOUNDED IN THE CITY DO THE PEOPLE NOT TREMBLE?

As many of you know, I was in Israel this summer, from July 11-21 to be exact, to participate in a study mission for Reconstructionist rabbis.  The sirens were indeed like shofarot to us and all Israel.  They would sound and we would tremble.

Although sirens were heard all over the country at various times, I personally only heard them when I was in Tel Aviv. 

My first siren was when I was settled into my hotel room on my first evening in Israel on Friday, July 11th.  I didn’t really know what to do. They hadn’t gone over the procedure with me when I checked in.  So, I went out into the hallway and shouted “is anyone around?” “where am I supposed to go?” --- No response, so I went into the internal stairwell, followed the sounds of voices I heard a floor or two above me, and found a bunch of Russian speaking hotel guests in a laundry room. They were looking at their cel phones trying to get the latest news.  They told me that you’re supposed to wait 10 minutes after the siren stops before you leave the secured area, but that most people don’t bother waiting that long.  There were some nervous expressions on some people’s faces, but they were mostly taking it in stride.  It was clearly not their “first time.”

The next evening, Saturday evening July 12th, I was eating dinner at a restaurant on the “Namal”, the refurbished Tel Aviv Port.  I didn’t actually hear the siren, it must have been too far away.  But apparently there had been one, because suddenly all the restaurant guests and staff were rushing past me into the storage area in the rear of the restaurant next to the kitchen.  It was sort of a bonding experience: Now, as they checked their smartphones, folks were talking with each other even though they had been in separate dinner parties in the restaurant. 

What really got me nervous was that only about 15 minutes after we went back to our tables there was another siren and we all had to rush to the back of the restaurant a second time.  This time, I heard a boom.  At first I thought a missile had crashed nearby.  But folks explained to me that that was the sound of Israel’s Iron Dome defense system intercepting and destroying the Hamas missile in the sky overhead.  Okay --- this time when I got back to my table I quickly chugged down the remainder of my pint of Goldstar beer and decided I’d hurry back to my hotel.  Thankfully, it was quiet the rest of the night.

The next day, Sunday, July 13th, I got together for lunch in southern Tel Aviv with my rabbinic colleague Nina Mandel from northeastern Pennsylvania.  Our Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association study mission was set to start on Monday afternoon in Jerusalem but Nina, like me, had decided to arrive a few days early to spend the weekend in Tel Aviv.  Nina and I were wandering around an older neighborhood called Neve Tzedek.  This was the first Jewish neighborhood to be established outside of the Jaffa city walls, about 20 years prior to the founding of Tel Aviv itself.  A very peaceful and relaxing afternoon. 

But then, while we were browsing in a souvenir shop, the siren sounded.  The store manager led us out of the store as she locked the door behind us (We had been the only three people in the store at the time).  The three of us rushed across the street to an apartment building and descended to the basement.  A young couple joined us there.   It suddenly occurred to me that this was the sort of private apartment building where normally one would expect the front door to be locked and where you’d expect to have to be buzzed in over the intercom by whomever you were visiting.  But, in the face of missile attacks, such private property restrictions had been preempted by concern for civil defense. 

After we heard the ominous boom over head – which sounded pretty darn close by --- and after the siren stopped, Nina and I went back to the souvenir shop.  The manager offered us glasses of water, and thanked us for being in Tel Aviv this summer when so many tourists had stayed away.  And both of us made sure to buy some souvenirs as we felt a sense of connection with the woman and her store. (I purchased some drink coasters with scenes of Tel Aviv.)  

By this point, I was feeling really uneasy, worse than after the two previous sirens I had experienced. I guess I had lulled myself into thinking that the sirens only come in the evening.  But now I realized that Hamas missiles could be heading our way any time of the day.  After that, Nina and I went to a book store and browsed around.  Then we headed west a few blocks to the Mediterranean, where we sat in the shade at an outdoor restaurant called “Banana Beach.”  It was relaxing to hang out there with my friend and colleague, to wiggle my toes in the sand, drink my beer, listen to the American 70’s and 80’s pop music on the loudspeakers and watch the nearby beach volleyball games. After I said goodbye to Nina, I watched a beautiful sunset as I walked north along the Mediterranean back to my hotel.  It was such an odd experience – Tel Aviv during the Gaza War was stressful and relaxing at the same time. 

The next siren I heard was five days later on Friday, July 18th, and this time I experienced it together with all of my RRA colleagues. We had been based in Jerusalem, for the first three nights of our study mission and then were based in Tel Aviv for the last four nights, though we made day trips throughout the region. 

On Friday the 18th, the siren sounded when we were getting ready to leave the hotel for a Shabbat evening service.  I was actually just finishing up writing my August bulletin article on the computer in the hotel lobby.  I was able to save it on google docs, but had not yet emailed it to Duluth when I had to rush to the basement with everyone else.  I guess I was an old pro by this time.  After the all clear I went back to the lobby to email my bulletin article before heading out. The Shabbat evening service we went to was put on by a wonderful community called Bet Tefila Israeli.  The service leader and his fellow musicians of this community, which is about 10 years old, were featured at the recent URJ biennial in San Diego.  The congregation is part of a renaissance of so-called “secular” Israelis who are re-engaging with Jewish spirituality.  Their motto (found on the inside cover of their prayer book) is taken from a 1930 essay by the poet Chayim Nachman Bialik:

“Celebrate your ancestors’ holidays, and add to them a bit of your own – according to your ability, your taste, and your reason.  What is paramount is that you do everything out of faith, and with a live feeling, and a soulful need – and don’t be too clever."

(Bialik is also the poet who composed “Shabbat Hamalkah”, the 20th century meditation on the medieval poem Shalom Aleichem with which we sometimes open our Shabbat evening services here.)

Bet Tefila Israeli is especially known for its outdoor Friday night services at the Tel Aviv Port, but this summer those services had been moved indoors – and, indeed, most large outdoor gatherings had been cancelled because of the danger of missile attacks.   Still, even though we didn’t get to watch the sun set over the Mediterranean while we were davenning, it was great to experience the warmth and spirituality of that Shabbat evening service in Tel Aviv.

As for Shabbat morning services the next day, a few of us went to the main Reform congregation in Tel Aviv, Bet Daniel.  A young man was celebrating his Bar Mitzvah there that morning. His Torah portion, Matot, describes Moses speaking to the heads of the various tribes (Matot) of Israel.  In his speech, in Hebrew of course, the young man reflected upon how the various modern “matot” of the State of Israel ---Religious/Secular/Ashkenazi/Sephardi/Ethiopian/Rich/Poor  ---were now working together in the Israel Defense Forces to protect the nation from terrorist attacks.

Finally, on Monday morning July 21st, while we were on a “Graffiti Tour” in the Florentine neighborhood of Southern Tel Aviv, the siren sounded once more.  This time we found ourselves taking cover inside a construction site for a new high rise that was in the process of being built in that rapidly gentrifying neighborhood.

I flew out of Israel on Monday evening July 21st, and have to admit that I breathed a little sigh of relief when we finally left Israeli airspace after some flight maneuvers that lengthened our time in Israeli airspace so that we wouldn’t fly near Gaza.  Had I waited a day I would’ve been stuck in Israel for a few more days because of the cancellation of many flights after a Hamas missile landed near Ben Gurion Airport.

So, that’s my tale of Tel Aviv in Six Sirens.

Of course, while the folks in Tel Aviv experienced ongoing stress over the summer, the situation was far worse the closer you got to the Gaza border.  In Tel Aviv you had 90 seconds to find shelter when the siren went off.  In Sderot, on the Gaza border, you had 15 seconds. And the folks in Sderot and nearby areas have been dealing with Hamas missile attacks for the better part of a decade already, ever since Hamas forcibly expelled Palestinian Authority officials from there in 2007. 

As for this summer’s fighting, though most Hamas missiles were destroyed or fell on unpopulated areas, there were still a few Israeli civilian casualties from the Hamas missiles, including the killing of four-year-old Daniel Tragerman in the community of Sha’ar Hanegev.

As we all know, the civilians in Gaza had it far worse.  Cruelly used by Hamas terrorists as human shields, they suffered the brunt of Israeli attacks.  But what was Israel to do when Hamas deployed its rocket launchers in residential neighborhoods; and when Hamas built its terror tunnels amidst civilian populations using concrete that was supposed to have been used for reconstruction of homes following the previous outbreak of fighting in 2012?

The Israeli author Amos Oz expressed this conundrum vividly in an interview with Germany’s international broadcaster Deutsche Welle published on July 30th. Here’s how that interview began: 

“Amoz Oz: I would like to begin the interview in a very unusual way: by presenting one or two questions to your readers and listeners. May I do that?

“Deutsche Welle: Go ahead!

“Question 1: What would you do if your neighbor across the street sits down on the balcony, puts his little boy on his lap and starts shooting machine gun fire into your nursery?

“Question 2: What would you do if your neighbor across the street digs a tunnel from his nursery to your nursery in order to blow up your home or in order to kidnap your family?

“With these two questions I pass the interview to you.”

One of my colleagues in the Minnesota Rabbinical Association, Rabbi Hayim Herring, put it this way at an MRA meeting that I attended earlier this month in St. Paul:

“My right to life is greater than your right to kill me.”

As for Amos Oz, the great Israeli author, I very much agree with what he says later in his interview with Deutsche Welle:

“The present hostilities will only stop, unfortunately, when one of the parties or both of them are exhausted. This morning I read very carefully the charter of Hamas. It says that the Prophet commands every Muslim to kill every Jew everywhere in the world. It quotes the Protocols of the Elders of Zion [anti-Semitic diatribe – the ed.] and says that the Jews controlled the world through the League of Nations and through the United Nations, that the Jews caused the two world wars and that the entire world is controlled by Jewish money. So I hardly see a prospect for a compromise between Israel and Hamas. I have been a man of compromise all my life. But even a man of compromise cannot approach Hamas and say: ‘Maybe we meet halfway and Israel only exists on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.’” 

Later in the interview Oz goes on to say: 

“The only alternative to continuing the Israeli military operation is simply to follow Jesus Christ and turn the other cheek. I never agreed with Jesus Christ about the need to turn the other cheek to an enemy. Unlike European pacifists I never believed the ultimate evil in the world is war. In my view the ultimate evil in the world is aggression, and the only way to repel aggression is unfortunately by force. That is where the difference lies between a European pacifist and an Israeli peacenik like myself. And if I may add a little anecdote: A relative of mine who survived the Nazi Holocaust in Theresienstadt always reminded her children and her grandchildren that her life was saved in 1945 not by peace demonstrators with placards and flowers but by Soviet soldiers and submachine guns.”

Amos Oz’s views notwithstanding -- The fighting did cease on August 26th in accordance with a temporary ceasefire arranged under Egyptian auspices.  So far, the ceasefire has stayed in place for the most part.

As you surely know, there have been fierce protests against Israel’s conduct of the Gaza campaign, especially in Europe, where some of the protests have crossed the line and degenerated into crude anti-Semitic agitation.  There was even a front page article in the New York Times just yesterday warning of a general rise in anti-Semitism in Europe. 

However, lest we become despairing or fearful, we should not ignore the profound difference between the Europe of the 1930’s and the Europe of today.  In this regard, we should take heart from events like the huge demonstration against anti-Semitism that took place on Sunday, September 14th at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate. 

Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, was there and here is some of what she said:

“That people in Germany are threatened and abused because of their Jewish appearance or their support for Israel is an outrageous scandal that we won’t accept.”

“It’s our national and civic duty to fight anti-Semitism.”

“Anyone who hits someone wearing a skullcap is hitting us all. Anyone who damages a Jewish gravestone is disgracing our culture. Anyone who attacks a synagogue is attacking the foundations of our free society.”

“That far more than 100,000 Jews are now living in Germany is something of a miracle. It’s a gift and it fills me with a deepest gratitude.”

“Jewish life is part of our identity and culture.” 

Remember:  Those are the words of the Chancellor of Germany speaking.  We should not minimize their importance.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

In the wake of this summer’s fighting, I find myself harboring a complex mix of feelings.

On the one hand, while the fighting was going on, I found myself (like the majority of the Israeli electorate) very much in support of Netanyahu’s leadership with respect to the IDF’s efforts to fight back against the Hamas missile attacks, to destroy Hamas infrastructure, and to dismantle their terror tunnels.

And, to the extent that IDF soldiers failed to adhere to their own rules of engagement, I trust Israel to investigate these incidents and mete out punishment as appropriate, as it is in the process of doing right now.

As Rabbi Herring says:  My right to live is greater than your right to kill me.

HOWEVER, ON THE OTHER HAND:

It seems to me that Israel would not even have been in this situation if it had been more forthcoming in its negotiations with the Palestinian Authority under Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.  The Israeli government has consistently undercut Abbas.  They have paid lip service to supporting the idea of a two-state solution, yet undercut that possibility by expanding settlements and seizing more and more land in the West Bank.

I was on a conference call earlier this month sponsored by the American pro-Israel pro-peace lobby “J-Street” with Knesset Member Nitan Horowitz from the left-wing party Meretz.

Horowitz put things quite bluntly[1]:

Concerning, Mahmoud Abbas (otherwise known as Abu Mazen), he said: 

 “Abbas was very helpful in curbing violence in the West Bank.  This is to his merit and proof of his true desire for peace.  But it will not last forever if there is no hope for peace process.  He is not a young man.  He is a Palestinian leader.  He is not Jewish.  He is not Zionist.  But we have to help him because it is in our own interests.  Otherwise, of course we will have a third intifada and revival of Gaza violence if there are no peace talks.  The lesson is:  When there is no hope, that’s when you get violence.  RESUME THE PEACE TALKS. THIS WILL PREVENT THE THIRD INTIFADA.”

[Concerning the recent appropriation of land in the Gush Etzion area of the west bank, Horowitz said:]

… “[W]e have an opportunity to resume peace talks and the Israeli govt. instead chooses to poke the eye of the Palestinians.  They are repeating the same mistakes of building more settlements and seizing more land.  This is telling us that Netanyahu does not want peace.  It’s a lack of will not a lack of power on his part.  We will pay a heavy price for such moves."

[Later Knesset Member Horowitz elaborated:]

“[R]ealistically, foreign or outside pressure won’t affect Netanyahu’s settlement policy.  The only way to change the policy is to change the government and it’s up to the Israeli political system to do it.  As long as this government is in place there is no real chance of changing this policy.  If you look at this Knesset, you see there is a solid majority for peace.  Netanyahu has the political support to make a deal with Abu Mazen but the problem is that he doesn’t want it.”

So, where does this leave us? 

I for one keep thinking that we’ve known for decades what the solution is:  Two states – Israel and Palestine – living peacefully side by side based on the 1967 borders as modified by mutually agreed upon land swaps – along with a small symbolic number of pre-1948 Palestinian refugees being permitted to return to Israel proper under the guise of family reunification. 

And, if all this can’t be done right away in Gaza because of Hamas intransigence – then  at least Israel should do it now with the West Bank-- permitting the West Bank to become a model of Palestinian freedom and prosperity that will inspire Gazans to want to reject Hamas and follow suit.

Meanwhile, we wait for moderates on both sides to hold sway.

Back to Amos – His question:  

ו  אִם-יִתָּקַע שׁוֹפָר בְּעִיר, וְעָם לֹא יֶחֱרָדוּ

6 If the shofar is sounded in a city, do the people not tremble?

is actually just one in a series of rhetorical questions in Chapter 3 of the Book of Amos.

Another one of those rhetorical questions, at Amos ch. 3 verse 3, seems a fitting place to close. 

ג  הֲיֵלְכוּ שְׁנַיִם, יַחְדָּו, בִּלְתִּי, אִם-נוֹעָדוּ.

3 Can two walk together, without having met?

May that meeting – a meeting of minds, hearts and spirits --- come speedily in our days, so that Israelis and Palestinians can walk together---  with no one trembling in fear.  

Shanah tovah.

© Rabbi David Steinberg

September 2014/ Rosh Hashanah 5775

[1] The quotations from Nitan Horowitz are based on my own simultaneous notes.  They are verbatim to the extent I was able to type them out accurately while I was on the call.

CASTING OFF TOGETHER

Sermon for First Evening of Rosh Hashanah 5775

Wed. 9/24/14

As you probably know, it’s a long standing tradition to visit the graves of loved ones during the month of Elul, the month immediately preceding the High Holidays. 

This year when we gathered at Temple Emanuel Cemetery for our congregational visit on Sunday, September 13th we didn’t have a minyan present, so we didn’t recite mourners kaddish.  Subsequently, I was asked by someone who had been present there why we couldn’t simply count some dead Jews in the minyan since we were standing in a Jewish cemetery.  I told him, sorry, it doesn’t work that way:

ONLY THE LIVING CAN PERFORM MITZVOT.  NOT THE DEAD.

For in the Talmud in Masechet Berachot/ The Tractate on Blessings, a story is told about two sages who were visiting a cemetery. 

רבי חייא ורבי יונתן הוו שקלי ואזלי בבית הקברות הוה קשדיא תכלתא דרבי יונתן

“Rabbi Chiya and Rabbi Yonatan were walking in a cemetery, and Rabbi Yonatan’s tzitzit (the fringe of his garment) was dragging [over the graves].  Rabbi Chiyah said to him ---  “Dalyey”/”Lift it up!”  ---  ‘Lift up your garment lest the dead say – “Tomorrow they will be joining us yet now they mock us.”’[1]

Hearing this story, we might wonder --- Why did Rabbi Chiyah think that dragging his fringed garment on the graves constitutes mocking the dead? 

According to various commentators on that Talmudic story, we learn this from a verse in the Book of Proverbs, Proverbs 17:5 to be exact:   

ה  לֹעֵג לָרָשׁ, חֵרֵף עֹשֵׂהוּ

5 Whoever mocks the poor blasphemes his Maker […]

The commentators say that the dead are considered “poor” in that they can’t perform mitzvot (such as, for example, the mitzvah of wearing a fringed garment). So, that explains Rabbi Chiyah’s challenge to Rabbi Yonatan: 

‘Lift up your garment [don’t drag your tzitzit on the graves] lest the dead say – “Tomorrow they will be joining us yet now they mock us.”’

*******

I’ve often thought about this general idea that it‘s only the living who can perform mitzvot.

Certainly, we are spiritually blessed by the life lessons that our loved ones of previous generations have left us – lessons of proper living based on the examples of their lives.  That’s why funeral eulogies traditionally end with the phrase --- zichrono livracha/ may his memory be for a blessing or zichrona livracha/ may her memory be for a blessing.  And that’s why we mark our loved ones’ yahrtzeits each year on the anniversary of their deaths.  And that’s why we have a yizkor service on Yom Kippur.  Zichronam livracha/ for their memories are a blessing and an inspiration to us.

And blessing can also come from the material generosity provided by previous generations.  A prime example of this is the legacy of Jeanne and Ben Overman through the Ben and Jeanne Overman Charitable Trust which to this day helps assure the financial stability of Temple Israel.  Indeed, those of you in the rear rows this evening are physically sitting in the “Overman Room,” our social hall, which we rededicated in summer 2013. 

But, in the final analysis, Judaism teaches that the most important time for realizing our values is here and now/ ba’olam hazeh/ in this world-- a world in which we are only temporary sojourners.    

As it says in Psalm 90:

12. Teach us to number our days, so that we shall acquire a heart of wisdom.

יב. לִמְנוֹת יָמֵינוּ כֵּן הוֹדַע וְנָבִא לְבַב חָכְמָה:

We do so by being here for one another – celebrating each other’s joys and supporting each other in times of sorrow.  And helping one another to engage with the traditions of our people. 

That, in short, is what being members of a congregation is all about.

Someone asked me recently what was so important about being a Temple member, especially if one participated in Temple functions and even donated monetarily to the Temple – but without officially being a member.

In looking for a way to respond I found an article on the web that summed up the value of synagogue membership much more eloquently than I could do in my own words.  I liked the article so much that I shared it with the Board – and members of the Board liked it so much that they asked if I could share it with you. 

So, here permit me to share with you some excerpts from an essay, composed in 2009 by Rabbi Gil Steinlauf of Adas Israel Congregation in Washington, DC, and entitled “The Power of Membership:”

Rabbi Steinlauf writes:

Why be a member at a synagogue? The answer to this question is not at all as simple as it was a generation ago. Once upon a time, belonging to a synagogue was a given in American Jewish life. There were a host of unspoken bonds that linked us Jews to one another—ethnic bonds, Yiddish language and culture, first and second-generation immigrant values and aspirations—and synagogues were our gathering place. We may not have necessarily believed in God. We may have been secular in every other aspect of our lives. We may have attended synagogue only on High Holy Days. But synagogue membership was sacrosanct. By and large, we didn’t belong to country clubs, to the uppermost echelons of professional societies, and we didn’t attend the old-boy elite universities.

[And, an aside here, as Jack Seiler remarked to me, in Duluth some of those country clubs and private societies, such as the Northland Country Club, explicitly barred Jews from membership not so long ago.]

Rabbi Steinlauf’s essay continues:

Shul was where we gathered and affirmed that we belonged to something important, timeless and meaningful. Shul was where we accessed our time-honored traditions, where we felt special, where we could marshal our resources to look out for each other, and for Jews around the world.

Times have changed. We Jews have made it in America. There is hardly an elite institution or cultural achievement in this society where there is not a Jewish presence and influence. Yiddish language, culture, and ethnic identity—however beloved and cherished—has fallen into the background of our lived experience.

[…]

Of course, there are still many Jewish people who still proudly support synagogues because of strong family traditions, strong ethnic sensibilities, and identification with Jewish particularism in the world. But for all the Jews who belong for the time-honored reasons, there are many more Jews today who do not feel that they need a synagogue to play its traditional role for them anymore. Jews today can belong to so many movements, so many institutions, so many means of finding and expressing meaning beyond the Jewish world. Ever-increasing numbers of 21st-century Jews no longer seek meaning through ethnic identification. We’re global citizens now. Many Jews today see just as much in common with other races and religious groups as we do with our ancestral religious and ethnic group. Our prevailing societal outlook is postmodern: we can and do invent ourselves. […]

To become a member of a synagogue in today’s world is an extraordinary act. It’s something we can easily choose not to do. To do so, then, is not just about giving money to receive services. It is, first and foremost, an act of faith that this institution called a synagogue stands for something important in our lives, and in the world. Synagogue membership runs against the grain of postmodern expectation. In most settings nowadays, you give your money, you click that button, and you receive instant and personalized gratification. Not so in synagogues. Synagogue membership is about something deeper. You give your money so that you and your family benefit, yes, but also because other individuals and families will benefit from the very same services that you value. Those other individuals and families may be your friends, but they also may be people whom you don’t know at all. At times, they may even be people you don’t like! To be a synagogue member is to rise above all of that, and to acknowledge: “I may not know you at all, but I am responsible to you for no other reason than the fact that you and I share a common heritage that matters in the world. I am responsible to you because--just maybe--you and I share a common destiny to improve this world as Jews.” In other words, synagogue membership is an act of faith in the power of community to transform the world.

[…] To be a member of a synagogue means that you are expressing faith that the community will not only mirror your personal expectations and preferences, but it will also challenge you to question those very preferences and expectations by force of Torah and wisdom when circumstances demand that we be challenged. To be a member at a synagogue nowadays is an expression of faith that the synagogue just may inspire us to live in new and more meaningful ways. It’s an affirmation that we just may discover insight from an ancient heritage with thousands of years of collective wisdom. […]

On the deepest level, synagogue membership is not just an act of faith. It’s an act of Chesed, of lovingkindness. […] It symbolizes that we care about what it does, that its mission succeeds. It’s an act of Chesed [kindness] because it it’s not about instant gratification! […] We give for our membership because we know that our funds will keep the lights and heat on, even if we’re not there. It will pay the salaries of the teachers of Torah who can enrich the soul of someone else’s child, if not my own child.

Our ancient sages teach that Chesed shel Emet, True Lovingkindness, is giving with no expectation of reward. This is the essence of synagogue membership in the 21st century. We belong not because we’re in it just to get something out of it. We belong because the very act of belonging is an act of kindness and giving, of being there for others beyond our personal self-interest. […] To belong to a synagogue confirms that we really can transform our lives—together. And together, from generation to generation, is the only way we can transform the world.

Those excerpts from Rabbi Steinlauf’s essay, “The Power of Membership,” remind me of a couple of verses from Psalms that appear in the liturgy for Selichot (which we observed last Saturday night) and Yom Kippur (which we’ll observe next week):

From Psalm 51: 

יג  אַל-תַּשְׁלִיכֵנִי מִלְּפָנֶיךָ;    וְרוּחַ קָדְשְׁךָ, אַל-תִּקַּח מִמֶּנִּי.

“Do not cast me away from Your Presence; Do not take Your holy spirit from me.

And from Psalm 71: 

ט  אַל-תַּשְׁלִיכֵנִי, לְעֵת זִקְנָה;    כִּכְלוֹת כֹּחִי, אַל-תַּעַזְבֵנִי.

“Do not cast me off in old age; when my strength fails, do not forsake me.

The psalmist writes in the first person singular, but when these verses are incorporated into the High Holiday liturgy, Jewish tradition does what it often does – It transforms them from the realm of the individual to the realm of the community. 

“al tashlicheNUmilfanekha [SAYS THE MACHZOR]-- Do not cast US away from your presence; do not take your holy spirit from US

“al tashlicheNU l’eyt ziknah -- Do not cast US off in old age; when OUR strength fails; do not forsake US!

The fact that our prayers are so often in the first person plural – even when incorporating biblical verses that were originally in the first person singular – reminds us of the importance of community in Judaism. 

As Temple members, we join together in fellowship so that, hopefully, we can ensure that none of us ever feel cast away or forsaken.  In fact, in Hebrew, the same word – chaver – means both friend and member.

This is a work in progress.

But it is indeed our work.

As chaverim/ as members here at Temple Israel we also come together to share the simchaot/the joys and happy occasions/ in our lives as well.  (The next such simcha, by the way, will be the brit milah of Maxwell W_______ --- 5pm this Monday here at Temple Israel – YOU’RE ALL INVITED!). 

To put it in the words of Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan (words which mean so much to me that I’ve included them in the signature line on all my outgoing Temple e-mails:)

“We short-circuit religion when we treat it as an affair between the individual and God. To function normally, the religious current connecting the individual with God must pass through the life of the people.”

Tomorrow afternoon at Chester Bowl, our Tashlikh --- our “Casting Off” --  will be a symbolic casting off of our sins even as we continue to engage in prayerful reflection and repentance over this entire period of the Aseret Ymey Teshuvah.

During these Ten Days of Repentance – as we try to cast away our sins --- it also behooves us to give some focus to our responsibility not to cast away one another. 

Like all mitzvot, we see this responsibility not as a burden but rather as a gift and a blessing – as an opportunity to make real the poetic sentiments of the siddur:  

Ashreinu, mah tov chelkeynu, umah na’im goraleinu, umah yafah yerushateinu…

“Happy are we, how good is our portion, how pleasant our lot, and how beautiful our heritage….”

Let us be thankful for the blessing of being able to observe these Yamim Nora’im/Days of Awe together with one another once again.

May each of us, and the whole House of Israel, be inscribed and sealed in the book of life for this new year Five Thousand Seven Hundred and Seventy Five.

And may it be a year of shalom u’veracha/ peace and blessing for all the world.

L’Shanah Tovah.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg

September 2014/ Rosh Hashanah 5775

OFFERINGS

This week we begin Sefer Vayikra ("The Book of Leviticus") in our lectionary cycle.  I wrote the following dvar torah back in 2004 when I was rabbi of Temple Beth Israel in Plattsburgh, New York.

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The cycle of weekly Torah portions begins and ends on Simchat Torah in the fall, but it doesn’t necessarily match up with the cycle of Jewish holidays on the calendar. So, for instance, tonight – with Passover less than two weeks away, and many of us already busy cleaning our houses of chametz [NOTE: THIS YEAR (2014) PASSOVER DOES NOT START UNTIL THE EVENING OF APRIL 14], we’ve already finished the Torah’s account of the Exodus some weeks ago.  Now we are ready to start a new book of the Torah  --- Sefer Vayikra/ The Book of Leviticus – which has an entirely different focus. 

Still, as a way of getting ourselves into the text of this sometimes difficult biblical book, I’d like first to go back to the Passover story in the Sefer Shemot/ the Book of Exodus for a moment.   We all remember God’s famous demand relayed by Moses to Pharoah, “Let my people go”.  But that’s actually only the first half of the sentence.  Does anyone remember the rest of it?

There are a few variations in different parts of Sefer Shemot, but basically the full idea is, as expressed in Ex. 8:16 ---  is “Shalach [et] ami v’ya’avduni” /“Let my people go that they may serve me”  (See also, e.g., Ex. 4:23, 7:16).

And so, one way of thinking about Sefer Vayikra/ the Book of Leviticus is that it attempts to answer the second part of the challenge “Let my people go that they may serve me”.  Leviticus, beginning with this week’s parasha, talks about how to serve God.

The first thing to note is that “avodat hashem”/ “service to God” comprises both ritual and ethical observances.  The first seven chapters of Leviticus focus on ritual service – which in biblical times centered on grain offerings and animal sacrifices, and which in subsequent eras and to this day centers on prayer.  Indeed, the same Hebrew word, “avodah” refers both to the sacrificial rites of the ancient Temples,  and the prayer services of the post-biblical synagogue.

Later chapters of Leviticus have a mixture of ethical precepts like loving your neighbor as yourself, and honesty in commerce ---  and ritual precepts like the dietary laws of kashrut and the traditional practices of family purity.

But Judaism teaches that both the ritual and the ethical precepts have the same purpose – the purpose  of acknowledging God as the source of all life and the master of all the world.

The Jewish people include thelogically orthodox folks who believe that the Torah is an accurate account of God’s will for humanity --- and theologically liberal folks who believe that the Torah is the record of the Jewish people’s necessarily imperfect human efforts to find ultimate meaning.   And of course, we can and do fall everywhere in between on that spectrum as well.

And the particular synagogue we belong do doesn’t necessarily determine where in the theological spectrum each of us falls.

No matter where on the theological spectrum we find ourselves, it’s a challenge to relate to the detailed descriptions of the rituals of grain offerings and animal sacrifices in these first weekly portions of the Book of Leviticus. For example, the Orthodox Rabbi Yisroel Ciner writes that “For most people with a western upbringing, the karbonos [sacrifices] are an issue that is difficult to relate to. For many they bring back bad memories of late night horror movies.”  (www.torah.org/learning/parsha-insights/5757/vayikra.html)

Similarly, Reform Rabbi Norman Lipson writes in this week’s “Torat Chayim/Living Torah” article from the U.R.J. website, “For anyone who has ever read or studied Torah, approaching Leviticus […] often fills one with a desire to skip whole sections it in search of ostensibly more religious or meaningful verses that hopefully manage to shine through the often tediously redundant narration, with its graphic detail of numerous sacrifices and how and why they would be performed.”  (accessible at www.urj.org/learning).

One important way of understanding the sacrifices is to place them in a historical context.  No less a giant of traditional Judaism than Maimonides took that approach in his “Guide of the Perplexed”, written some eight centuries ago.  Here’s a taste of his approach:

“[A] sudden transition from one opposite to another is impossible … [A]t that time the way of life generally accepted and customary in the whole world and the universal service upon which we were brought up consisted in offering various species of living beings in the temples in which images were set up, in worshipping the latter, and in burning incense before them …  [God’s] wisdom, may [God] be exalted, and [God’s] gracious ruse … did not require that [God] give us a Law prescribing the rejection, abandonment, and abolition of all these kinds of worship.  For one could not then conceive the acceptance of [such a Law], considering [human] nature, which always likes that to which it is accustomed.  At that time this would have been similar to the appearance of a prophet in these times who, calling upon the people to worship God, would say: ‘God has given you a Law forbidding you to pray to Him, [or] to fast, [or] to call upon Him for help in misfortune.  Your worship should consist solely in meditation without any works at all.”  (Guide III:32, translation by Shlomo Pines, Univ. of Chicago Press, 1963, pp. 525-526).

Maimonides then goes on to explain how the point of the sacrifices was not really that God needs to be fed or that God enjoys the smell – obviously Judaism does not contemplate the concept of a God who is so limited by human weaknesses and drives.  Rather, as the Talmud states in a quote that Maimonides cites in the Guide of the Perplexed – “The Torah is written in the language of human beings.” (Baba Metzia 31b) (Guide I: 26).  Rather, Maimonides argues, since these were the natural modes of behavior at the time of the Torah, the best way to establish monotheism in the world would be to modify and redirect these existing practices towards the one Eternal God.

We no longer worship God through grain offerings and animal sacrifices as described in the Torah.  But we still seek to find ways to express gratitude to God for our blessings.  We still seek to find ways to reconnect with God when we feel that God is hidden from us.  And we still seek to find ways to relate to our fellow human beings that acknowledge the divine spark within each of us.

The closing chapters of Exodus talk about the building of the Tabernacle or Tent of Meeting.  Leviticus opens with the statement:  “Adonai called to Moses and spoke to him from the Tent of Meeting”.

In a classic midrash from Vayikra Rabbah, the sages imagine God saying to God’s self – “All of this glory Moses did for me and I am inside and he is outside?! [So God] called him that he might enter within.”

And so does God call each of us.  Boi v’shalom.  Enter in peace.

Shabbat shalom.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg 5774/2014 

A JEW WITH HORNS

Dvar Torah for Shabbat Ki Tisa (Exodus 30:11 - 34:35) given at Temple Israel on 2/14/14

At the end of this week’s Torah portion, Parshat Ki Tisa, in Exodus 34: 29-35 to be exact, Moses comes down from Mt. Sinai with the second set of tablets following the sin of the golden calf and the smashing of the first set of tablets.  Here’s the passage to which I’m referring:

²⁹ Moses came down from Mount Sinai. And as Moses came down from the mountain bearing the two tablets of the Pact, Moses was not aware that the skin of his face was radiant, since he had spoken with God. ³⁰ Aaron and all the Israelites saw that the skin of Moses' face was radiant; and they shrank from coming near him. ³¹ But Moses called to them, and Aaron and all the chieftains in the assembly returned to him, and Moses spoke to them. ³² Afterward all the Israelites came near, and he instructed them concerning all that the Eternal had imparted to him on Mount Sinai. ³³ And when Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil over his face.

³⁴ Whenever Moses went in before the Eternal to converse, he would leave the veil off until he came out; and when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, ³⁵ the Israelites would see how radiant the skin of Moses' face was. Moses would then put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with God.

Later Jewish tradition teaches that the date on which Moses returned with the second set of tablets was the 10^th of Tishri, which is Yom Kippur/ The Day of Atonement.

The Torah reports that when Moses returned, קָרַן עוֹר פָּנָיו /   “karan or panav” / “the skin of his face was beaming” from having been in such close communion with God.  The Hebrew word “karan/ קרן”  (which the Jewish Publication Society translates as “radiant” and that I just translated as “beaming,” is a verb derived from the noun “keren” (same Hebrew letters but pronounced with different vowels) meaning “horn”.   Rashi comments that the word “keren” is used here:  שהאור מבהיק ובולט כמין קרן / “sheha’or mavhik uvolet kemin keren” (“because the light shines out and projects like a sort of horn”).  

Of course, this is the root of some old anti-Semitic misunderstandings that claimed that Jews had horns.  But In a more sympathetic, contemporary context we might describe Moses here as having a sort of “aura.”

However we understand the phrase “karan or panav,” a question remains for us:  Moses had spoken with God many times before without getting these beams, or horns or rays of light.  So what’s different about this latest encounter with God compared to his previous encounters with God? 

What’s different is that it’s on this occasion that Moses learns of the possibility of teshuvah/repentance/turning.  The very fact that Moses could come back with a replacement set of tablets was a sign that God had decided to give the people a second chance.

And so we find, earlier in our parasha, that when Moses asks God to show him God’s ways, God’s response is all about teshuva ( Indeed, although the most common translation of “teshuvah” is “repentance,” the word can also, literally, be translated as “response”). 

We are well familiar with that response, the Shelosh Esrey Midot/ “The Thirteen Divine Attributes.”  These words from our Torah portion, in somewhat abbreviated fashion, are part of our Yom Kippur liturgy:

יְהוָה יְהוָה, אֵל רַחוּם וְחַנּוּן--אֶרֶךְ אַפַּיִם, וְרַב-חֶסֶד וֶאֱמֶת.	Adonai, Adonai, God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth
נֹצֵר חֶסֶד לָאֲלָפִים, נֹשֵׂא עָו‍ֹן וָפֶשַׁע וְחַטָּאָה; וְנַקֵּה	keeping mercy unto the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin; and acquitting the penitent.

It’s in this new, deeper experience of God, this new perception of God’s aspect of granting pardon and forgiveness, that Moses acquires that aura. 

The gift of the second set of tablets teaches Moses, and teaches us, that it’s never too late to start over, to refocus, to return to our better selves. 

And just as God gives us the possibility of being forgiven, so also ought we to be forgiving to others who may have messed up in one way or another in their relationships with us.

For, ultimately, healthy relationship is not about being perfect and never making a mistake.  Rather it’s about having faith and trust in the long run.  Indeed, in the Hebrew language, the verb “l’ha’amin” (להאמין)  from the root letters aleph-mem-nun/א.מ.נ. ) (and the related noun “emunah”  אמוניה include the English concepts of faith, belief and trust – all in the same word. 

So, to use another word derived from the same root letters (aleph-mem-nun):  Whenever we say Ameyn (or “Amen” in English) --- we’re not just saying that we believe the message of a particular prayer to be factually true.  More importantly --  we’re saying that we have faith and trust in the ongoing relationship between ourselves and God.

And yet, the Torah also reports that the people at first recoil in fear at Moshe’s beaming countenance.  So Moses puts on a veil to help the people to be more comfortable in his presence.

How often do we act in similar fashion?  When we have had life-changing experiences --- be they joyful or sorrowful -- sometimes we know that those close to us are not always capable of really hearing what we have to say. 

What we want to say to them is too sublime, too powerful to put out to them totally unfiltered, at least not right away.  And so, most times, most days, most places, we veil our innermost truths, and comport ourselves with the polite social conventions of small talk and pleasantries.

This is not a bad thing per se.  We would simply burn out if every interpersonal interaction was as intense as the Revelation at Sinai.

But we must not veil ourselves all the time.  As the Torah teaches, Moses takes off the veil when he speaks with God and when he teaches God’s mitzvot to his people.

To me, the analogous message for us is this:  Despite whatever polite, social conventions we may feel we need to adopt in whatever social settings, we still need to be able to be out, to be open, and to be fully who we are when it matters most --- when we seek intimate connection with others, and when we seek to live out our deepest values.

Shabbat shalom.

© Rabbi David Steinberg (5774/2014)           

CHOOSING LIFE

Dvar Torah for Parashat Mishpatim (Exodus 21:1 - 24:18) given at Temple Israel, Duluth on Friday evening 1/24/14

Earlier this week our country marked the forty-first anniversary of the historic United States Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade.  As I’m sure you are all well aware, this decision struck down then existing laws that had sought to deny women the right to abort a pregnancy.  Since then, the holding in Roe v. Wade has been progressively whittled away by statutes and court decisions narrowing its scope.  Opponents of abortion rights, mostly though not entirely on the political right, have remained determined all these years to whittle away abortion rights further.  Indeed, the possibility exists that a current or future U.S. Supreme Court might seek to overturn Roe v. Wade in its entirety.

What does this have to do with this week’s Torah portion?  From a certain perspective, nothing at all.  Our nation, thankfully, is a nation without an established religion.  The particular tenets of any particular organized religion, including our own, do not determine the holdings of our secular courts.  Rather, the courts are supposed to base their interpretations of law on the provisions of the United States Constitution and judicial precedent.  Our religious beliefs and practices teach us how to live a good and moral life, but, as citizens of a secular republic, we try to live in harmony with fellow citizens who may have a variety of views on a variety of moral matters.

All that being said, Judaism does have something to say on the question of abortion.  In this week’s Torah portion, Parshat Mishpatim, we are presented with a hypothetical case of two men who are fighting with one another, who accidentally injure a pregnant woman bystander.  The Torah states that if the woman as a result has a miscarriage, then the person who caused the miscarriage is liable to a monetary fine (Ex. 21:22).  However, if the mother herself dies, then the person who caused the damage is liable to the death penalty.

Jewish tradition derived from this the general principal that a fetus is not considered a person in the same way as one who has been born.  For if the fetus were a person, then the person who caused the miscarriage would have been liable to the death penalty. 

Of course this case doesn’t deal directly with intentional abortion.  For that scenario, we look to the Mishnah, the codification of Jewish law that was put in its final form in approximately 200 C.E.   In Tractate Ohalot of the Mishnah, Jewish law provides that “If a woman suffers hard labor in travail, the child must be cut up in her womb and brought out piecemeal, for her life takes precedence over its life; [but] if the greater part has already come forth, it must not be touched, for the claim of one life can not supercede that of another life.” (Ohalot 7:6)

Later rabbinic jurisprudence provides that abortion is permissible not only when a mother’s life is endangered, but also when the mother’s health would be seriously endangered by bringing the fetus to term.   Some halachic authorities include severe mental anguish in this category.  All the rabbinic authorities, it seems, agree with the Talmudic teaching, found in Tractate Yevamot 69b, that says that during the first forty days after conception the fetus is to be considered as מיא בעלמא / “mey be’alma” (“mere fluid”) as if a woman were not really pregnant.

In addition, the traditional Jewish authorities tend to be in agreement that the fetus is not considered to be a “nefesh” or “soul” until it is born, and that, prior to delivery, it is considered part of the mother’s body.

The Central Conference of American Rabbis had this to say in a responsum issued in 1985: “The Reform Movement has had a long history of liberalism on many social and family matters. We feel that the pattern of tradition, until the most recent generation, has demonstrated a liberal approach to abortion and has definitely permitted it in case of any danger to the life of the mother. That danger may be physical or psychological. When this occurs at any time during the pregnancy, we would not hesitate to permit an abortion. This would also include cases of incest and rape if the mother wishes to have an abortion.”

However, the responsum was careful to conclude with the observation:  “We do not encourage abortion, nor favor it for trivial reasons, or sanction it ‘on demand.’”  This view is quoted with favor in a more recent CCAR responsum dated 1995.

Clearly, the extreme positions advocated by some “pro-life” groups are inconsistent with Jewish tradition.  Jewish law, both Reform and Orthodox sources would agree, permits abortion sometimes, and even requires abortion sometimes.  The bottom line is always the life and health of the pregnant woman.  For her life already exists, while the fetus is only a potential life until it is born.

A clergy colleague of mine years ago addressed the subject in a way that resonated for me when that colleague wrote in an op-ed piece that abortion “while sometimes acceptable, is always tragic.” And many of you may remember Bill Clinton’s formulation when he was president that he hoped for abortion to be “safe, legal and rare” – again nodding to the moral complexities of the topic.

When the so-called “pro-choice” side of the issue is taken to its logical conclusion, we sometimes hear the argument being made that it’s a woman’s own body and so she should have the absolute right to treat it as she sees fit, including aborting a pregnancy for any reason.  When the so-called “pro-life” side of the issue is taken to its logical conclusion, we sometimes hear it claimed that life begins at conception, so that any interference with a pregnancy is tantamount to murder and should be outlawed.

Traditional Jewish halacha clearly accepts that before a baby is delivered, the fetus is indeed considered part of the woman’s own body.  (Indeed, if it’s not too irreverent to mention, you may have heard the old joke that in Judaism the fetus is not considered viable until after it graduates from medical school…) 

But all kidding aside, what happens when advances in medical science point to greater sensitivity and cognition on the part of a fetus than earlier generations may have assumed?  What value should an expectant mother give to the pain felt by the fetus when she faces the momentous choice of whether she wishes to terminate her pregnancy? What happens when medical advances permit a child to live outside the womb under medical care at earlier and earlier stages of gestation?  And what value ought we give to the potential life, even if we don’t consider life to fully begin until it exists outside the womb?

These are all deep spiritual questions to be considered.

And yet, whatever any of us might think or believe in the abstract, the ultimate decision rests with the pregnant woman herself.  From my own perspective as a rabbi, as a Jew, and as a human being, I believe that sometimes a woman’s choice to have an abortion is morally correct and sometimes it is morally incorrect.  From that perspective, I would distance myself from extremists on either side of the abortion rights debate.

But, the bottom line is, regardless of what I (or anyone else who would not actually be carrying the fetus inside their own body) might think, it is only the woman herself who can be the ultimate judge of her own particular situation.   Therefore, in the face of continual attempts by anti-abortion rights activists to overturn Roe v. Wade, we must remain diligent to be sure that it remains the law of the land.  And we must oppose attempts by legislators or lobbyists to limit the availability of legal and safe abortion services.  For the alternative would be a return for many women to a world of unsafe back-alley abortions. 

And so, even to those in our society who would consider a fetus a life, I would say better the loss of one life (that of the fetus) than the potential loss of two lives (that of the fetus and that of the mother) were safe, legal abortions services not available.

The availability of safe, legal abortion services is from my perspective, a matter of pikuach nefesh/ saving a life, and that should trump all other considerations.

Just last week Rabbi David Saperstein, Director and Counsel of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, and Rabbi Marla Feldman, Executive Director of the Women of Reform Judaism, submitted a joint statement to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice in opposition to H.R. 7 – “The No Tax Payer Funding for Abortion Act.”   (See http://rac.org/Articles/index.cfm?id=23375&pge_prg_id=16317 )

Here’s an excerpt from their statement to the House Subcommittee. Rabbis Saperstein and Feldman wrote: 

"The Reform Movement views abortion as a deeply personal issue and, like most Americans, holds the core belief that women are moral decision-makers in their own right entitled to make fundamental medical and reproductive choices. A woman should make a decision about whether to have an abortion according to her own beliefs and in consultation with her clergy, her family, and her doctor; politicians and ideologues should not make the decision for her. We believe that religious matters are best left to religious communities and individual conscience, and decisions about health, including what constitutes a life-saving procedure, are best left to patients in consultation with physicians.

"We come to these beliefs inspired by the sanctity of life. Our faith tradition teaches that women are commanded to care for the health and well-being of their bodies above all else. Banning potentially life-saving medical procedures and interfering with a doctor's medical decision-making are contrary to the Jewish commandment to protect life. Although an unborn fetus is precious and is to be protected as a potential human being, Judaism views the life and health of the mother as paramount, placing a higher value on existing life than on potential life."

By the way, Rabbi David Saperstein will be the keynote speaker on Thursday, March 13^th at the Joint Religious Legislative Coalition “Day on the Hill” at the State Capitol in St. Paul.  Admittedly, abortion rights will not be among the topics covered that day given the difference of views among the various Christian, Muslim and Jewish organizations affiliated with the JRLC.

This year the JRLC Day on the Hill activities will focus on efforts to regulate Payday Lending and to raise Minnesota’s minimum wage, among other legislative goals currently being finalized.  CHUM is sponsoring a bus and I hope you will join me and your neighbors for that day of legislative lobbying.

In the final analysis, our religious values do have a bearing on our goals for the sort of general society we want to live in.  But the balance between our own sense of morality and justice on the one hand versus our commitment to pluralism on the other hand gets recalculated issue by issue.  We just hope and pray that the ideological battles that divide our society today remain makhlekot lesheym shamayim / “arguments for the sake of Heaven.”

Shabbat shalom.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg (5774/2014) 

Brothers and Sister

Dvar Torah for Parashat Beshallach (Ex. 13:17 – 17:16)

I’m one of three children in my family.  I’m the oldest, my brother Brian is 3 years younger than me, and my sister Robin is one year younger than Brian.  We’re close and have a warm relationship with one another but, with me in Minnesota and Brian in New York and Robin in Florida – we’re rarely all three in the same place at the same time.  I know that’s true of lots of siblings – and there’s a part of me that’s jealous of those of you who do live close to your brothers and sisters.

And for the young kids in our congregation, I wonder how much they appreciate what a gift it is to have their siblings living in the same house with them.  

We have a joke in my extended family that, whenever my brother and sister and I get together and someone wants to take a photo, the three of us “assume the position.”  The position is the pose that the three of us have had for group pictures from the time we were little kids:  We revert to age order:  I’m on the left, Brian is in the middle and Robin is on the right, and we all three stand or all three sit with our bodies facing left and our heads tilted to the right facing the camera.

I was looking at a whole bunch of photos of us situated in this pose on Facebook the other day and was reminded of how much I love my brother and my sister and how grateful I am that we are close. 

I always end up thinking of my relationships with my own brother and sister whenever we get to this week’s Torah portion, Beshallach, because Parashat Beshallach also features three siblings – two brothers and a sister.  The prophet Micah (in the haftarah for Parshat Balak which we read later in the yearly lectionary cycle) says:     כִּי הֶעֱלִתִיךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם, וּמִבֵּית עֲבָדִים פְּדִיתִיךָ; וָאֶשְׁלַח לְפָנֶיךָ, אֶת-מֹשֶׁה אַהֲרֹן וּמִרְיָם.    / “Ki he’elitikha meyeretz mitzrayim, umibeyt avadim peditikha; va’eshlach lefanekha et Moshe, Aharon u’Miriyam”/ “For I brought you up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, and I sent before you Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.”  (Micah 6:4)

However, from the details of the Torah itself and from rabbinic tradition, we understand the actual birth order to be Miriam, Aaron and Moses. 

In this week’s Torah portion Miriam is referred to in Exodus 15:20 as מִרְיָם הַנְּבִיאָה אֲחוֹת אַהֲרֹן / “Miriyam haneviyah, achot Aharon”/ “Miriam the Prophet, sister of Aaron” for the Talmud teaches that she was already a prophet before Moses was born, when Aaron was her only sibling (Rashi on Ex. 15:20 citing Sotah 11b).   But even that explanation seems incomplete because we still wonder why she is identified as a sister rather than as a daughter.  For as we know in Jewish tradition we are usually identified as “bat” (daughter of”) or “ben” (son of).  Maybe she’s “Miriam achot Aharon” rather than “Miriam bat Amram v’Yocheved” because she was particularly close with her brother Aaron.  Indeed Rashi in his commentary to Exodus 15:20 offers his own alternative explanation for all of this by suggesting that she is called “Achot Aharon” because “He [Aaron] put his life in jeopardy for her when she was struck by leprosy.”

My teacher Rabbi Linda Holtzman gave a dvar torah at my installation as Rabbi of Temple Beth Israel in Plattsburgh, fourteen years ago.  I remember that she spoke that evening about how each of those siblings – Miriam, Aaron and Moses – embodied and symbolized different kinds of leadership qualities:  Miriam could lead the community in song and dance, and could raise hope in those who listened to her voice.  Rabbinic tradition teaches that even as a child, Miriam acted as a prophet when she was able to convince the adults of her generation that they should keep having children even after the issuance of Pharaoh’s harsh decrees, and that they should not give up hope for the future.  (See Nachmanides on Exodus 2:1)

Aaron is the great peacemaker.  Indeed the very first teaching in Pirke Avot ascribed to the great sage Hillel is this:   הוי כתלמידיו של אהרון--אוהב שלום ורודף שלום, אוהב את הברייות ומקרבן לתורה / “Hevey ketalmidav shel Aharon – ohev shalom verodef shalom, ohev et habriyot umekarban latorah”/ “Be like the disciples of Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace, loving your fellow creatures and bringing them close to the Torah.” (Pirke Avot 1:12)

And a classic midrash teaches:

"If two people had quarreled, Aaron went and sat with one of them. He said, 'My son, see what your neighbor is doing: He is tearing out his heart and rending his garments, and saying, "Woe is me, how shall I lift up my eyes and look at my neighbor? I am ashamed in front of him, because it is I who acted offensively towards him."' [Aaron] sat with him until he had removed hatred from his heart. Then he went and sat with the other, and said the same things to him. So that when these two met, they embraced and kissed one another.   (Avot DeRabbi Natan, Version A, Chapter 12).

As for Moses --- that guy was not necessarily the life of the party…

But, more importantly, he is the one portrayed in our tradition as the ultimate eved adonai (“servant of the Eternal”) [Deut. 34:5] in the struggle for liberation from oppression; and the ultimate prophet in seeing God, so to speak,  “panim el panim” (“face to face”) [Deut. 34:10].    In later Jewish tradition we know him as Moshe Rabeinu (“Moses our Teacher”) who receives the Torah and shares it with Israel – who in turn share it with the world.

Rabbi Holtzman, at the time of my installation in Plattsburgh, was gracious enough to say to my congregants there that I, as their new rabbi, had something of each of those qualities – Miriam’s ability to inspire joyful worship, Aaron’s ability to promote peace and friendship, and Moses’s ability to teach and lead. 

Of course, I do not claim such qualities – rather I merely aspire to them. 

So I share this recollection not to highlight my own talents or my own shortcomings -- But rather to encourage us all to aspire towards these qualities in ourselves individually, and in ourselves as a community.

How can each of us strive to be more like Moses?  How can we try harder in our lives to discern the right path – the path of justice in our world and integrity in our lives; the path of spiritual communion with God in whatever way we understand God?

How can each of us strive to be more like Aaron?  How can we try harder in our lives to let go of grudges, to give people the benefit of the doubt, to bring about peace and reconciliation where there is strife?

And how can each of us strive to be more like Miriam?  How can we try harder to cultivate joy, optimism and faith in ourselves; to let our voices sing; to let our bodies dance; and to share this outlook with those we encounter each day?

Immediately before the start of Shirat Hayam, the Song of the Sea, the Torah says, at Exodus 15:1 -- אָז יָשִׁיר-מֹשֶׁה וּבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל אֶת-הַשִּׁירָה הַזֹּאת, לַיהוָה. / “Az yashir Moshe uveney yisra’el et hashirah hazot ladonai.[…]”  The Plaut Torah Commentary translates this as:  “Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the Eternal.”  However the verb “yashir” is in the future tense so that it would seem that the verse should be translated as “will sing” not “sang”.    Various medieval commentators offer various grammatical and philosophical explanations for how to deal with this linguistic anomaly.

But I think for us it works best to take it on both levels – As we gather together on Shabbat we give thanks in song and prayer for all the blessings we have experienced in the past and that we experience in the present.  And we affirm our faith that we will have reason and capacity to sing of deliverance in the future as well.

Keyn yehi Ratzon/ May this be God’s will.

Shabbat Shalom.

© Rabbi David Steinberg (2014/5774)

Soft and Clear

(Devar Torah for Shabbat Shemot, given at Temple Israel, Duluth, MN on Friday 12/20/13)

I don’t own a television, but, like more and more people these days, I do watch my share of television programs on internet streaming services like Netflix. Probably my favorite t.v. show of recent years has a title that might make you think it’s about Shabbat evening services at Temple Israel.

Indeed, it would probably make a good NY Times crossword puzzle cue:  46 down:  “Welcoming Shabbat at Temple?” (17 letters).

Yup you guessed it:  “Friday Night Lights”

Actually the title refers to the stadium lights in a small city modeled after Odessa, Texas where High School Football is one of the ties that binds the whole community together.  And even though I’m not personally a big football fan, I loved “Friday Night Lights” because football on the show was merely a vehicle for treating themes of family, ethics and community. 

In Temple, when we have our call to prayer, the service leader says:  Barchu et Adonai Hamevorakh (meaning “Bless the Eternal, the One who is Blessed”), to which the congregation responds Baruch Adonai Hamevorakh Le’olam Va’ed (meaning “Blessed is Adonai, the One who is blessed forever and ever).  On “Friday Night Lights,” they have their call to play  -- when, just before they hit the field, Coach Taylor (played by Kyle Chandler) says:  “Clear Eyes, Full Hearts” and the team responds:

“Can’t Lose!”

Let’s do that cheer together:  “CLEAR EYES, FULL HEARTS – CAN’T LOSE!”

I was thinking about that phrase a lot last week when I was attending the Union for Reform Judaism Biennial in San Diego.  Especially the “clear eyes” part.

Several of the workshops and services I attended included a time when the leader led us in meditative exercises.  At several of these events the leader would ask us to “close our eyes” or “soften our gaze.”

I think I get it:  Closing our eyes or softening our gaze helps us to relax; helps us calm down; helps us be present; helps us be open.

I went to a wonderful forum at the Biennial that featured Rabbi Sharon Brous, the founder and spiritual leader of a dynamic community in Los Angeles called Ikar.  She said that there are two kinds of Jews in her community:  The first kind are the Jews for whom seeking personal meaning and spiritual comfort is the prime objective.  I tend to think of this as the “soften your gaze” approach. 

And Rabbi Brous said that the other kind of Jews in her community are the folks for whom “The World Is On Fire”, so that for them the prime objective is tikkun olam through social action.  I tend to think of this as the “clear eyes” approach.

Of course, we need both --  and Shabbat itself invites rest, relaxation, a softening of the gaze.  One traditional Shabbat zemer (table song) declares – “Menucha v’Simcha Or Layehudim/ Yom Shabbaton Yom Machamadim” (Rest and Joy, light for the Jews, the day of Shabbat is a day of delights.”).

But we also use this day of rest to focus on Torah. And Psalm 19, part of the traditional Shabbat morning pesukei dizimra liturgy declares: 

ח  תּוֹרַת יְהוָה תְּמִימָה, מְשִׁיבַת נָפֶשׁ;    עֵדוּת יְהוָה נֶאֱמָנָה, מַחְכִּימַת פֶּתִי.	8 The Torah of the Eternal is perfect, restoring the soul; the testimony of the Eternal is enduring, making wise the simple.
ט  פִּקּוּדֵי יְהוָה יְשָׁרִים, מְשַׂמְּחֵי-לֵב;    מִצְוַת יְהוָה בָּרָה, מְאִירַת עֵינָיִם.	9 The precepts of the Eternal are upright, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of Adonai is clear, enlightening the eyes.
י  יִרְאַת יְהוָה, טְהוֹרָה--עוֹמֶדֶת לָעַד:    מִשְׁפְּטֵי-יְהוָה אֱמֶת; צָדְקוּ יַחְדָּו.	10 The fear of the Eternal is pure, abiding for ever; the judgments of the Eternal are true, altogether just.
יא  הַנֶּחֱמָדִים--מִזָּהָב, וּמִפַּז רָב;    וּמְתוּקִים מִדְּבַשׁ, וְנֹפֶת צוּפִים.	11 More desirable than even the finest gold; sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.
יב  גַּם-עַבְדְּךָ, נִזְהָר בָּהֶם;    בְּשָׁמְרָם, עֵקֶב רָב.	12 Your servant heeds them; in keeping of them there is great reward.

In other words, with the guidance provided by Torah, and, more generally, with the guidance of our Jewishly informed consciences, we learn: 

CLEAR EYES, FULL HEARTS ---  CAN’T LOSE!

This week’s Torah portion transitions us from the family dramas of the Book of Genesis that we finished last Shabbat to the national dramas of the Book of Exodus.  Our clear eyes and full hearts are now on the prize – the prize of freedom and liberation from slavery and oppression.  The two Hebrew midwives, Shifra and Puah, are the first people in the Torah who are described as “God fearing” – as it says in Exodus 1:17 –

יז  וַתִּירֶאןָ הַמְיַלְּדֹת, אֶת-הָאֱלֹהִים, וְלֹא עָשׂוּ, כַּאֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר אֲלֵיהֶן מֶלֶךְ מִצְרָיִם; וַתְּחַיֶּיןָ, אֶת-הַיְלָדִים.	17 The midwives feared God, and did not do as the king of Egypt had commanded them, but instead saved the newborn male children [whom Pharaoh had commanded them to kill.]

Thus, Torah teaches us that , yirat Hashem – “fear of God” (or if you prefer the alternative translation) “awe of God”  -- is bound up with the idea of civil disobedience, of resistance to oppression.

Or as Rabbi Brous teaches --- Our faith teaches us not to permit our eyes to glaze over when “The World is On Fire” and there is work to do to repair it and to fight injustice.

The URJ Biennial in San Diego filled me with appreciation of both of these aspects of Judaism in general and Reform Judaism in particular:

We gather together on Shabbat to leave the imperfections of the world behind – to internalize and truly feel how miraculous life is – experiencing Shabbat as a foretaste of paradise. 

Let your gaze grow soft.

Let your anxieties and defenses relax.

Let your soul be nourished by this day of joy and peace.    

And we gather together on Shabbat to remind us that the work of battling injustice is part of who we are – that our sacred traditions motivate us to defeat the Pharaohs of the world with clear eyes and full hearts.

Shabbat shalom.

© Rabbi David Steinberg (5774/2013)

SERMON FOR FIRST EVENING OF ROSH HASHANAH 5774/2013

TAKE HIM DOWN

            I’m sure you’ve heard this one:  It’s the High Holidays in an old shtiebel in Eastern Europe and the chazzan is pouring his heart out before the open ark, beating his breast and chanting,”Oy, avinu bashmayim, Gott in Himmel, I am nothing, I am nothing, I am nothing….”

            The rabbi standing next to him on the bima is so moved that he joins in the act, himself chanting “O God, hakadosh barukh hu, I am nothing, I am nothing, I am nothing….

            Then the shul president is so taken that he too starts chanting “I am nothing, I am nothing…” 

            They’re all going at it when another plaintive wail is heard from the rear of the hall where the shammus (the building custodian) is so moved that he starts chanting and beating his breast davenning passionately, “O Lord, I am nothing, I am nothing…

            And the guys on the bima give each other a side glance, roll their eyes and mutter – “Hmmmh!  Look who thinks he’s nothing!”

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I think for Bernie Bernstein and Stan Segal that joke would have been “number 58”

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            Oh --- there are so many ways in which that joke is so politically incorrect --- but it’s still a surefire way to get a laugh because it plays up some of the mixed up messages of the High Holidays.

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            And by mixed up messages – I mean that in a good way….

            What are these mixed messages?  On the one hand – These are the Yamim Nora’im/ The Days of Awe – And yes, the noun yirah [יראה] and the related adjective nora[נורא]  – mean both “awe” AND “fear”  --- 2 English concepts --  but one Hebrew concept that embraces both. 

            There’s a real seriousness to our gathering together.  We stand in judgment before God and before our own consciences --- knowing full well that we have not lived up to the potential of what we COULD have accomplished since Rosh Hashanah 5773 to bring love, healing and justice to our fellow creatures and to our world.  Tradition refers to Rosh Hashanah as “Yom Ha-Din” – the “Day of Judgement” – and midrash imagines a celestial book in which we --- through our own deeds ---  inscribe our own fates.  As the piyyut Unetaneh Tokef declares ---- Vitiftach et sefer hazichronot umeyalav yikarei vechotam yad kawl adam bo.”  “God opens the Book of Memories, and it speaks for itself, for each person, by his or her deeds, has inscribed it with their own hand.” 

            But -- on the other hand – these Days of Fear and Trembling are also Days of Hope and Promise:  Rosh Hashanah is the birthday of the world and the re-coronation ceremony for its Divine Sovereign.   A time for us to be thankful to be together with one another; a time to have hope for the future; a time for returning to our better selves.

            As we are taught by the Prophet Jeremiah in the haftarah for the second day of Rosh Hashanah ---

טו כֹּ֣ה ׀ אָמַ֣ר יְהוָ֗ה מִנְעִ֤י קוֹלֵךְ֙ מִבֶּ֔כִי וְעֵינַ֖יִךְ מִדִּמְעָ֑ה כִּי֩ יֵ֨שׁ שָׂכָ֤ר לִפְעֻלָּתֵךְ֙ נְאֻם־יְהוָ֔ה וְשָׁ֖בוּ מֵאֶ֥רֶץ אוֹיֵֽב׃

Thus says the Eternal:  Take away the weeping from your voice, the tears from your eyes; for there is a reward for your labor, declares the Eternal, [Rachel’s children] will return from the land of the enemy.  (Jer. 31:16).

            To anticipate rebirth and renewal   ----- Even when the trees are poised soon to shed their leaves and the birds will soon migrate to warmer climes  --- and the days will soon grow short ---  and the winds will soon blow cold  -- that’s what hope is about.

            But back to the fear and trembling:  The words of the Hineni prayer, which I sang before the open ark a little while ago, set that mood:  Hineni he’awni mima’as, nirash venifchad, mipachad-yoshev-tehilot-yisra’el (“Here I am, poor in deeds, trembling and apprehensive in fear of the One who dwells amid the praises of Israel.”)  Bati la’amod ulehitchanen lafanekha al amkha yisra’el asher shelachuni, af al pi she eyni kheday vehagun lechakh.  (“I have come to stand before you to plead for your people Israel who have delegated me, though I am neither fit nor worthy…..”)

In other words – I am nothing, I am nothing, I am nothing ----

            We’ll all have our chance come Yom Kippur to beat our breasts over and over again – Ashamnu, Bagadnu, Gazalnu, Dibarnu Dofi ---- We have sinned, we have betrayed, we have robbed, we have deceived….. And we will ask:

            What harm have we done by our actions?

            What healing have we failed to do by our failure to act?

            As Jews, we can certainly be hypercritical of ourselves and hyper-vigilant about the injustices in the world.  But we also cultivate hope and confidence that we can bring about better days. 

            The words of the Aleinu --- which originated as a Rosh Hashanah prayer but since the time of the Crusades has been part of every Jewish prayer service – envisions a world in which idolatry has been swept away “letaken olam bemalchut shaddai”/ “in order to bring tikkun olam – repair of the world – under the sovereignty of the Almighty.” 

            This hope --- this faith in the possibility of a world of justice and compassion in which all are individual yet all are one ---- sustains us even in the face of loss. 

            And indeed, this is a time of year when our losses, both recent and long ago, stir our hearts.  Rosh Hashanah itself is also known as “Yom Hazikaron”/ “The Day of Remembrance” and “zikaron”/ “remembrance” --- with the root letters zayin-kaf-resh [זכר] – is related to the word  “Yizkor” which means “May [God] Remember”).  So our dead are in our thoughts and our hearts not just when we recite Yizkor on Yom Kippur afternoon, but on Rosh Hashanah and the days in between as well. 

            And yes, I know that for those who have experienced profound loss, those losses may be in our thoughts and hearts every day of the year.

            But still, this time of year is when we try to put it all into context --- the cycle of life goes on its inevitable course.  And so Psalm 27, traditionally recited throughout Elul and up through Yom Kippur  – declares ---

י כִּי-אָבִי וְאִמִּי עֲזָבוּנִי; וַיהוָה יַאַסְפֵנִי.	10 though my father and my mother have abandoned me, Adonai will take me in. […]
יג לוּלֵא--הֶאֱמַנְתִּי, לִרְאוֹת בְּטוּב-יְהוָה: בְּאֶרֶץ חַיִּים.	13 If I had not believed that I would see the goodness of the Eternal in the land of the living!--
יד קַוֵּה, אֶל-יְהוָה: חֲזַק, וְיַאֲמֵץ לִבֶּךָ; וְקַוֵּה, אֶל-יְהוָה.	14 So, hope in the Eternal; be strong, and let your heart take courage; and hope in the Eternal.

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            Hineni.

            Here Am I!

            Each and every one us searches for a way to make that declaration within our own heart.  It’s the essential response to the first question posed by God in the Torah.  God’s existential question to Adam in the Garden of Eden in Genesis 3:9 

            “Ayeka?” / “Where are you?”  

            Adam hesitates and obfuscates but ultimately learns (as must each of us) that we must strive for self-knowledge.  We must be able to answer --- Hineni! / Here I am! –

            On a personal level, my own “Hineni” (“Here I am”) – my own personal answer to the question “Ayeka?” (“Where are you?) ---   is that I feel a growing sense of rootedness in this community. 

            I’m grateful for the confidence that Temple Israel has shown in me in entering into a five-year contract renewal agreement with me.  

            I feel an ever-deepening sense of gratitude in my life for the opportunity for us to grow together in spirit and to accompany one another on our Jewish journeys. 

            And I feel blessed by your support during the personal life transitions that I was experiencing in the past year. 

            That’s where I am tonight as I speak to you from this bima.

            Hineni.

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            And what does “Hineni”/ Here I am” mean in your life right now?  Right now --- how do you --- in the depths of your soul  --- answer the fundamental question:  “Ayeka?”  “Where are you?”  

            Wherever you are – emotionally, medically, financially, psychologically, spiritually – know that just as we learn that the angel told Hagar –  אַל־תִּ֣ירְאִ֔י כִּֽי־שָׁמַ֧ע אֱלֹהִ֛ים אֶל־ק֥וֹל הַנַּ֖עַר בַּֽאֲשֶׁ֥ר הוּא־שָֽׁם  /Al tiri – Ki Shama Elohim et kol hana’ar ba’asher hu sham/ “Do not fear!  -- For God has hear the voice of the lad where he is.”… 

            So too do we have faith that God hears each of our voices – where we are.

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            Mixed messages:  Even in these Days of Awe and Fear and Trembling and Judgment --- We also know NOT to fear… and NOT to doubt in the power of repentance and return – the power of teshuva – to recalibrate our path for the new year.

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That solemn declaration ---  הנני/“Hineni”/ “Here I am” --- appears several times in the Torah. 

Moses responds “Hineni” when God calls to him from the Burning Bush (Ex. 3:4).  Joseph answers “Hineni” when his father Jacob calls upon him to go on a fateful journey to check up on his jealous brothers.  (Ex. 37:13)

            But on Rosh Hashanah, it’s most likely that the first Biblical “Hineni” that comes to our minds is Abrahams’ “Hineni” in the story of Akedat Yitzchak – “The Binding of Isaac” --  which we read on the Second Morning of Rosh Hashanah.  This is a disturbing tale that opens in a chillingly understated way: 

וַיְהִי, אַחַר הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה, וְהָאֱלֹהִים, נִסָּה אֶת-אַבְרָהָם; וַיֹּאמֶר אֵלָיו, אַבְרָהָם וַיֹּאמֶר הִנֵּנִי.

“Some time afterward, God put Abraham to the test, saying “Abraham!” – and he said:  ‘Hineni’ – ‘Here I am.’” (Gen. 22:1).   

            I’ve always had problems relating to that story.  Who wouldn’t?  Remember our hometown troubador Bob Dylan’s take on it?

Oh God said to Abraham, "Kill me a son"
Abe says, "Man, you must be puttin' me on"
God say, "No." Abe say, "What ?"
God say, "You can do what you want Abe, but
The next time you see me comin' you better run"
Well Abe says, "Where do you want this killin' done ?"
God says. "Out on Highway 61".

            Or, even more starkly, we have the words of Wilfred Owen, the young English poet who fought and died in World War I.   In his poem “The Parable of the Old Man and the Young”, famously set to music by Benjamin Britten in his “War Requiem,” Owens writes:

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,

And took the fire with him, and a knife.

And as they sojourned both of them together,

Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,

Behold the preparations, fire and iron,

But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?

Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,

and builded parapets and trenches there,

And stretchèd forth the knife to slay his son.

When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,

Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,

Neither do anything to him. Behold,

A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;

Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.

But the old man would not so, but slew his son,

And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

            Wilfred Owen’s question:  When does zeal for a cause turn into murderous obsession? --- is one that haunts us to this day. 

            My own take on the Akedah is that Abraham failed God’s test.  I think the point of the story is that God wanted to test Abraham to see if Abraham could think for himself.  To see if this ardent believer had truly absorbed the ultimate lesson of all true spirituality which is this ---- CHOOSE LIFE.

            But Abraham gets it wrong  -- He is poised to choose death. Blind obedience has become more important to him than clear-eyed compassion.  He has crossed the line. 

            So God understands that this trial has to be cancelled -- and sends an angel who calls out again to Abraham – this time not just once but twice “Avraham, Avraham”  --- to call off this macabre spectacle. 

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            And  Abraham snaps out of it --- he comes back to his senses – and , with the knife still poised to kill his son --- Abraham says the magic word once more – the word that shows that he has returned from the place of violence, torture and abuse to the place of love, compassion and relationship:

            “Hineni”/ “Here I am.” (see Gen. 22: 9-14).

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            To my mind, the rest is irony and sarcasm:  God bestowing divine blessing on Abraham and his seed is not a reward for Abraham’s willingness to murder his son --- but rather a concession to his imperfection in spite of having failed the test.   

            At any rate, that’s my modern midrash on it all…..

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            But I also like how the sages of old confronted this difficult text:  In particular, that awful directive: 

וְלֶ֨ךְ־לְךָ֔ אֶל־אֶ֖רֶץ הַמֹּֽרִיָּ֑ה וְהַֽעֲלֵ֤הוּ שָׁם֙ לְעֹלָ֔ה עַ֚ל אַחַ֣ד הֶֽהָרִ֔ים אֲשֶׁ֖ר אֹמַ֥ר אֵלֶֽיךָ׃

“Get yourself into the land of Moriah, and offer him up as a burnt offering there on one of the mountains which I will designate to you.”   

            But notice that our machzor (High Holiday prayer book) “On Wings of Awe” also offers and alternative translation:  “bring him up there for a going-up” (instead of “offer him up as a burnt offering there”).

            That alternative translation hearkens to a commentary by Rashi, which Rashi takes from the classic midrash collection Bereshit Rabba:  In this midrash Abraham is confused about what is required of him and God explains to Abraham:  לא אמרתי לך שחטהו אלא העלהו, אסקתיה אחתיה (“I did not say to you, ‘Slaughter him,’  but rather, ’Bring him up.’ You have brought him up; [now] take him down.” (Rashi on Gen. 22:12 quoting from Gen. Rabbah 56:8)

            (In case you didn’t follow that, the linguistic ambiguity which the midrash is riffing on is that the word “olah” [עולה] – normally translated as burnt offering, and the verb “leha’a lot” [להעלות]  – normally translated as “to offer up” or “to sacrifice” are both derived from the root letters ayin-lamed-hey  [עלה]– like in the word “aliyah” [עליה] which we know means ascent or going up, like an aliyah to the Torah or making aliyah to Israel.)

            The editor of our machzor, Rabbi Richard Levy, puts it this way in the second of the discussion questions that he suggest for this Torah reading:  “Why do you think Abraham translated it in the most extreme way (“offer him up as burnt offering”) rather than the more benign one (“take him up for a hike up the mountain.”)? Do you think Abraham misunderstood what God wanted?”  (On Wings of Awe, revised edition, Ktav Publishing House, 2011, p. 169)

            That idea really resonates for me:  That the Binding of Isaac can be seen, at its core, as a huge case of misunderstanding on the part of Abraham and Isaac and God.       

            And so, when we come to the story of the Binding of Isaac on Rosh Hashanah, what we really should learn is: 

            Let’s not kill our children. – Let’s just go for a hike up the mountain.

            TAKE HIM DOWN! --- Is not a murder directive on a crime show – No, “take him down” --- is a call to protect one another from harm.     

            No true God would command us to kill our children.

            The true God is the loving spirit --- kevodo malei olam --- whose glory fills the world. 

            And so what we have in the story of Akedat Yitzchak/ The Binding of Isaac is a huge misunderstanding….

            A huge misunderstanding…

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            I think that’s also a helpful way of coming to grips with the case of George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin.

            George killed Trayvon because he had a huge misunderstanding of what was going on during that fateful night. 

            It was all so tragic, all so stupid, all so unnecessary.

            Where was the voice of the angel to come down from Heaven to cry out to George Zimmerman --- אַל־תִּשְׁלַ֤ח יָֽדְךָ֙ אֶל־הַנַּ֔עַר וְאַל־תַּ֥עַשׂ ל֖וֹ מְא֑וּמָה  / “al tishlakh et yadkha el ha na’ar, v’al ta’as lo me’umah!”/ “do not stretch out your hand against the lad; don’t do anything to him!” (Gen. 22:12)
            Oh yeah --- there was such a voice – that of the Emergency Dispatcher who asked George: 

                “Are you following him?”

                To which George answered “Yeah”. 

                To which the dispatcher replied “Okay, we don’t need you to do that.”

                To which George replied. “Okay.”

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                What happened after that is the subject of conflicting testimony. 

                The prosecution claimed that George went in pursuit of Trayvon who had been running away. 

                The defense denied this, and claimed that shortly after the phone call with the dispatcher,   Trayvon accosted George, knocked him down, and was slamming George’s head against the concrete sidewalk when George fired his gun in self-defense and killed Trayvon.

                The jury believed George.   

                Lurking in the background of this tragedy was the presence of Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law --- which stated that if George Zimmerman thought he was in danger he had the right to stand his ground and shoot to kill the person who came to attack him – even if he were not in his own home, and even if he could easily retreat to safety.   And, indeed, it seems that the existence of the Stand Your Ground law may have been one of the factors in the unseemly delay on Florida’s part in charging George Zimmerman with any crime.

                However, as the case developed, George in fact did NOT seek a “stand your ground” preliminary hearing.  And he did not invoke the “Stand Your Ground” law in his legal defense at his criminal trial.  Rather, he claimed, and the jury believed him, that he shot Trayvon in self-defense in a situation in which there was no opportunity to retreat to safety.  Not while he was on the ground with his head being smashed into a sidewalk.

                And so, in the ruling that came down from the trial, it didn’t matter whether or not the “Stand Your Ground” law would have said he didn’t have to retreat  -- since the jury found that George did not in fact have any possibility of retreating.

                “Stand Your Ground” is still a sick law.   It’s still a law that increases the likelihood of violence all for the sake of a peculiarly American ideal of machismo. 

                But it turns out that the case of the death of Trayvon Martin at the hands of George Zimmerman did not actually involve the “Stand Your Ground” law.

                But it’s a tragedy all the same. 

                 If Trayvon Martin did indeed attack George Zimmerman, as the court found, and if George Zimmerman had died – Trayvon would have had a powerful self-defense argument as well:  He might have argued that he feared for his life – because he was being followed on a dark rainy night by a stranger with a gun who mistook him for a potential burglar. 

                And as for George Zimmerman --- What would “Hineni” --- “Here I am” mean to him?  Last week it was reported that he is petitioning the Florida courts for reimbursement of his court costs.  Under the law of Florida he is entitled to do that as a person who has been acquitted of a criminal offense.  But I’m reminded of the words of singer-songwriter Ben Folds, in the chorus of his song “Evaporate”  -- the last cut on one of my favorite CD’s: “Whatever and Ever Amen” by the Ben Folds Five:    

Here I stand,
Sad and free.
I can't cry,
And I can't see
What I've done.
Oh God what have I done?

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I’ve backed myself into a homiletical  corner here --- leaving you with such a downbeat Rosh

Hashanah sermon that started so promisingly with a joke…

            But that’s okay –

            Now is the time for Tikkun Atzmi/ Repair of Ourselves and of our still broken social fabric.

            And now is the time to remain hopeful and engaged towards Tikkun Olam/ the Repair of [our] World.

            And now is the time to heed the Psalmist’s call: 

חֲזַק, וְיַאֲמֵץ לִבֶּךָ; וְקַוֵּה, אֶל-יְהוָה / be strong, and let your heart take courage; and hope in the Eternal. (Ps. 27:14)

            The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr famously said in 1963 – 50 years ago:  “I have a dream” --- and he drew upon the exodus narratives of Torah and the justice calls of the Prophets to infuse hope into his dream.   

***************************************

            So today as well, may we be among the rodfei shalom va-tzedek/ the pursuers of peace and justice.  May we all be safe from harm in a world where misunderstandings don’t turn lethal because in that world we will have become united in friendship and trust.   

            May we not lose hope.

            Keyn Yehi Ratzon/  May this be God’s will.

            And, in the meantime, L’shanah tovah tikateyvu – May you be inscribed for a good year --- l’shanah tovah u’metukah – a year of goodness and of sweetness.

            Amen.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg 5774/2013

SERMON FOR FIRST MORNING OF ROSH HASHANAH 5774/2013

Sounds of the Shofar

            Our tradition has several names for the holiday that brings us here today on this first day of the Jewish month of Tishri.   Rosh Hashanah is, of course, the most common one.  As you probably already know, it means the Head (“Rosh”) of the Year (“Shanah”), in other words, the start of the year.  It’s interesting to note that the word “shanah” (year) comes from a Hebrew root that means change and difference.  We are thus reminded that every moment is different from the one that has past, every year is different from the one which is past.  And we ponder --- Amidst all this change – What are the constants that root us and that give our lives stability, security and definition in the midst of this relentless change?

            Another name for the holiday is Yom Ha-Din – the Day of Judgment.  Tradition teaches that this is the day when our fates for the coming year are, so to speak, “inscribed.”  Thus begins a period of reflection and making amends and restoring frayed relationships that culminates in Yom Kippur, on the 10^th day of Tishri.  On Yom Kippur/ The Day of Atonement, tradition teaches that those fates that were inscribed on Rosh Hashanah are, so to speak, “sealed.”  But of course, that’s metaphorical language.  The process of moral inventory is a year round process.  The gates of repentance are ever open.  Indeed, the weekday amidah, throughout the year, includes prayers seeking repentance and pardon.   It’s just that these themes take “center stage” this time of year. 

            Which brings us to yet another name for this holiday:   Yom Harat Olam --- The Birthday of the World.  The Talmud teaches that the world was created on the 25^th of Elul and that Rosh Hashanah, the 1^st of Tishri, is actually the anniversary of the 6^th day of Creation --- the day of the creation of the first human being as described in Genesis chapter 1.   Birthdays are times of celebration and joy and wonder.  However, they can also be times for taking stock of our lives.  How much more so when we identify today as the birthday for our entire species!  And so Rosh Hashanah is also Yom Din – a day of judgement, a day when, in the words of the prayer Unetaneh Tokef:

“Kevakarat ro’eh edro ma’avir tzono tachat shivto….”/ “As the shepherd gathers the sheep, moving them on beneath the staff, so do You, God, move and enumerate, call to account and visit every living soul, appointing the measure of every creature’s life, inscribing the decree of their judgment. 

            Yet another name for the holiday is Yom Hazikaron – the Day of Remembrance.  In our Torah readings and Haftarot on Rosh Hashanah we revisit the stories of God remembering Sarah and God remembering Hannah in their despair at not being able to conceive.  And in the prayers of the Machzor we ask God to remember the Divine covenant between God and all humanity in the time of Noah, and the covenant between God and the Jewish people established with our Ancestors and played out at Sinai and ever since.

            So many names.  So many themes and meanings.

            But probably the most evocative name for this holiday is “Yom Teruah.” 

            “Teruah”   is one of the kinds of sounds produced on the Shofar, so Yom Teruah, is often translated as something like “The Day of the Shofar Blast” or “The Day of the Sounding of the Shofar.”   In Numbers chapter 10, the Torah describes two types of sounds that the sages of the Talmud later applied to the shofar blasts on Rosh Hashanah.  “Teruah” refers to repeated short, staccato blasts.  By contrast, “Tekiah” is a single long blast. The Tekiah is the signal for the people to gather together and the Teruah is the signal for the people to start moving ahead to the next stage of the 40 year long journey to the Promised Land. (See Num. 10: 1-10).  This description in the Torah of Tekiah and Teruah becomes in the Talmud the proof text for requiring that every Teruah played on the Shofar be preceded by a Tekiah.

            But before we explore that distinction between Tekiah and Teruah any further, let’s go back to the symbol of the shofar in general.  It’s a ritual object whose appearance and whose sound evokes so many memories and feelings and impressions.

            As I was working on this sermon, I asked Maureen O’Brien if she could share with me her own feelings about her role as ba’alat tekiah (the person who sounds the shofar).

Here’s some of what Maureen wrote to me in response:

[She writes:]

“I am keenly aware that the commandment is that we hear the sound of the shofar.  It is not about the blowing of the shofar but rather that it be heard.  It is not about  me as the shofar blower -- I am just an instrument for others.  I am honored and humbled by the experience.  It is also a very nerve-wracking experience.  One of the most powerful moments for me is when you have the whole congregation do the calls -- all are participants saying we want and accept the sound of the shofar.  I have always found it interesting that the Rabbis didn't known what the exact sound was to be. […]  In their inclusive ways all [the different possibilities] were incorporated into the service.  To me that says something about Judaism itself as well as about the mixed moods associated with the High Holidays.  T'ki'ah is associated with coronations and has a celebratory mood to it.  Sh'varim, to me, invokes a yearning.  With any new beginning we want to hold onto the past and we fear, in a way, the uncertainty of the future.  Will I truly be able to change? Will I be alone in that process?  The staccato notes of t'ru'ah were supposedly associated with the call to battle.  It says to me awake, take notice, move forward.”

            My friend Susan Harris lives in Brooklyn, New York and sounds the shofar each year on Rosh Hashanah at Congregation Beth Simchat Torah in Manhattan.  I’ve known Sue since 1993 when she was a participant at the Elat Chayim Jewish Renewal Retreat Center and I was a summer intern there.  She told me on the phone a few days ago that for her the shofar reminds her of the human body.  Just like our own physical bodies, the shofar is basically a lifeless, empty shell until the shofar player infuses it with breath, spirit, soul, neshamah.  And Sue also thinks about how in order to produce a clear sound you have to clean out the shmutz – the accumulated dirt and gunk -- from the inside of the shofar.  Similarly for us, we have to clean out from ourselves the accumulation of unproductive thoughts, attitudes and habits so that we can fully access our own souls and so that we can more clearly express our own prayers, longings and aspirations.

            What thoughts, memories or associations come to you when you see the shofar or hear its sounds?

            Well, here’s a “TOP TEN LIST”  -- though I don’t think this top 10 list has ever been on the David Letterman Show.  This is 10^th century Jewish philosopher Saadia Ga’on’s top 10 list of symbolic meanings of the shofar – in an adapted version of that list that I found on the website of Kolel: The Adult Centre for Liberal Jewish Learning of Toronto. See if any of these have particular resonance for you: 

            (I’m tempted to go from number 10 up to number 1 like David Letterman does, but for clarity’s sake I’ll stick to the order set out by Saadia Ga’on.)

1. The Shofar is like the trumpet which announces a royal coronation.  On Rosh Hashanah, the birthday of the universe, we accept God's Rulership- our prayers and shofar blasts are like the coronation ceremony in which Israel crowns God as Sovereign.
2. Rosh Hashana is the first of the Aseret Yemei Teshuvah (Ten Days of Repentence), and the Shofar calls us to examine our deeds and return to God, who will always accept us if we are sincere.
3. The Shofar reminds us of the Shofar which blew when the Torah was given at Sinai; thus we are reminded to study and cherish the Torah.
4. The Shofar reminds us of the voice of the prophets, whose voices rang out like a Shofar blast in calling the people to do justice and mercy and follow Holy ways.
5. The Shofar sounds like crying, which reminds us of the destruction of the ancient Temple, and thus calls upon us to work for and pray for redemption.
6. The Shofar, since it is a ram's horn, reminds us of the Akedah, the story of the binding of Isaac, when God provided a ram to be sacrificed instead. Thus we are called upon to be as faithful to God as Abraham, and be inspired by his example of sacrifice and love of God.
7. The Shofar calls us to be humble- its mighty blast reminds us of the mightiness of God and the fact that God is everywhere at all times.
8. On the Day of Judgment, a Shofar will be blown to announce God's Rulership- our Shofar blasts remind us to prepare for God's examination of our deeds.
9. The Shofar foreshadows the jubilant Jewish return to freedom and peace when we all end up in Jerusalem in the time of Messiah- it reminds us to have hope and faith in God's saving power.
10. The Shofar will be blown in Messianic times to announce the redemption of the whole world, when all nations will recognize that God is One.

            Our own particular religious and theological beliefs over 1000 years after Saadia Gaon may not be identical, but I think a lot of what he wrote still speaks to us.

            I particularly want to highlight number five on Saadia’s list:  The Shofar sounds like crying, which reminds us of the destruction of the ancient Temple, and thus calls upon us to work for and pray for redemption. This identification of the shofar sounds with human tears is a well-known theme.   But maybe we’re not as focused on the destruction of the ancient Temple as are ancestors were or as some of our contemporaries are.  So I think it’s really striking that the Talmud actually cites a different example of human tears when it talks about the shofar.     Specifically, in Tractate Rosh Hashanah of the Talmud we learn that the crying sounds of the shofar are to remind us of the tears of Sisera’s mother as she awaited her son’s return from battle.  Sisera was a bitter Canaanite enemy of the Israelites who was killed in battle by Ya’el, and the image of Sisera’s weeping mother comes from the Song of Deborah in the Book of Judges.  It’s all portrayed very much as a just war.  And yet, in the most charged ritual of Rosh Hashanah we are supposed to remember the tears of the mothers of our enemies.

            In these days when we are witnessing a new rush to war,  we remember those tears.

**************************

            In preparing these remarks, I took the opportunity to ask myself the same question I asked all of you:  What does the shofar sound evoke for me when I hear it?  And the first things that came to mind for me were those “tests of the Emergency Broadcast System” that we hear from time to time on radio and television.   The format for those tests seems to have been streamlined in the last few years.  However,  when I think of them I mostly remember how they were before that --- There would be a long, annoying alarm that would last longer than any Tekiah Gedolah I’ve heard in synagogue.  But before that, the announcer would assure us “THIS IS ONLY A TEST” and afterwards they’d reassure us again “THIS HAS BEEN A TEST of the Emergency Broadcast System”. 

            So I guess for me then the challenge is to get past the inclination to think:  “THIS IS ONLY A TEST” – and instead really to take to heart the shofar’s call to repentance, self-reflection and reconciliation that this season brings.

            Because, really – this in NOT a test.  As the popular adage goes – “Life is not a rehearsal.”  This is the real thing.  We shouldn’t take the days and hours and minutes and seconds for granted for time moves only in one direction (notwithstanding Doctor Who or all the other science fiction programs I love watching….)  

            **************************

            The first mention of the Shofar in the traditional Rosh Hashanah liturgy comes just before the Rosh Hashanah evening amidah.  That’s where we find the famous passage from Psalm 81 that proclaims: 

ד תִּקְעוּ בַחֹדֶשׁ שׁוֹפָר; בַּכֵּסֶה, לְיוֹם חַגֵּנוּ.	4 Sound tekiyah on the shofar on the New Moon [of Tishri] at the dark of the moon, the time of our holy day.
ה כִּי חֹק לְיִשְׂרָאֵל הוּא; מִשְׁפָּט, לֵאלֹהֵי יַעֲקֹב.	5 For it is a law for Israel, a judgment by the God of Jacob.

A commentary I read this week from Rabbi Eli Mansour points out that in this passage the sounding of the shofar is described both as “chok”  (translated here as “law”) and as “mishpat” (translated here as “judgment”).

            The Hebrew words “chok” [חוק]and “mishpat” [משפט] are actually translated in a variety of ways in different machzorim and Bible commentaries.  However, the key difference, as far as rabbinic tradition is concerned, is that “chok” refers to a mitzvah that is supposed to be followed simply as an expression of devotion to God, and which supposedly does not lend itself to rational interpretation.  By contrast, “mishpat” is a mitzvah about which our sages teach that had God not commanded it, human beings would still have come up with it on our own because it makes rational sense as a way for living in society.

            But Psalm 81 uses both designations – the sounding of the shofar is both “chok” and “mishpat.” 

            What this says to me is that there is an aspect of the experience of hearing the shofar that reaches us emotionally and another aspect of the experience that reaches us intellectually.  The “mishpat” --- the “rational” or “intellectual” aspect is the idea that the shofar expresses – or at least implies – a clear articulate message.  What is that message?  Here is Maimonides’ famous answer from his 12^th century work “Mishneh Torah”, from the section in it called Hilchot Teshuvah/ Laws of Repentance. This is the message at which he says the shofar call hints:

“Awake, you sleepers from your sleep. Arouse you slumberers from your slumber and ponder your deeds; remember your Creator and return to God in repentance. Do not be like those who miss the truth in pursuit of shadows and waste their years seeking vanity. Look well to your souls and consider your deeds; turn away from your wrong ways and improper thoughts.” (Hilchot Teshuvah 3:4)

In other words, this is the shofar as spiritual alarm clock – our wake-up call to return to our better selves and to live more closely in tune with our ethical and moral standards.

            Indeed, the organization formerly known as Rabbis For Human Rights – North America recently changed its name to Teruah:  The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights.

            But then there’s the “chok” side – the irrational, inarticulate, inchoate side.  The emotional aspect that can’t be put into cogent directives.  From this “chok” perspective, the shofar’s sounds are the sounds of our yearnings and our hunches and our sensations that we can’t put into words.  It’s the “I-Thou” experience, it’s the magic of connection and relationship of one person with another and of each person with God.

            But I want to go back to what I mentioned earlier about the distinction between the different types of shofar sounds.  Nowadays we think of three different shofar sounds:  The single long tekiah, the three-fold broken wail of the shevarim, and the nine-fold broken sobs of the teruah.  However, the Torah only refers to tekiah and teruah.

            In the Talmud there is a debate about the meaning of teruah. Basically, some sages thought that the nine-fold teruah we know today was the real teruah, and other sages thought that the three-fold pattern that we now call “shevarim” was the real teruah.  And some thought that “teruah” really meant the combination of the three-fold call and the nine-fold call.

            So, the solution was that each set of shofar calls would include every possible version of what teruah could mean.

            In general, however you slice it whether it’s “pah-pah-pah,”  or whether it’s “pa-pa-pa/pa-pa-pa/pa-pa-pa”, or whether it’s “pah-pah-pah -- pa-pa-pa/pa-pa-pa/pa-pa-pa”  --- this is indeed supposed to be the sound of crying out. The sound of our soul’s yearning. The sound of our anxiety as we face judgment.

            But what I really find meaningful is the teaching that each one of those repeated cries has to be preceded and followed by the long, steady, confident sound of the single note TEKIAH.  The sages derive this requirement from the fact that both TEKIAH and TERUAH are invoked in that excerpt from Numbers chapter 10 that I mentioned earlier.

            Rabbi Shlomo Riskin has a nice teaching about this.  Basically, he teaches that the short sobbing sounds (in all their permutations of teruah, shevarim and shevarim-teruah) express our sorrows at living in an imperfect world full of injustice, and our anxiety as to whether our own actions have lived up to our moral standards.  But the long, confident, exultant sound of the Tekiah expresses our faith in God’s compassion and our commitment to repairing the world.  

            For ultimately this is a world of hope and blessing and potential.

            I think the true heroes of our day are the ones who can tap into both of those aspects:  the teruah of anguish and anger --- and the tekiah of faith, hope and commitment.

            In the American Civil Rights movement this was known as keeping one’s “Eyes on the Prize.”  (the tekiah) even in the midst of the struggle against injustice (the teruah).   It’s sort of like the tradition of the Passover seder, where the bitter maror of slavery is always tempered by the sweetness of the charoset. 

            My own nominee for such a hero of our day is Malala Yousafsai, the Pakistani teenager shot by the Taliban after speaking out for girls' rights to education in Pakistan.  She has since become a beacon of hope in this world where injustice, prejudice and violence often seem to have the upper hand.

            Here’s some of what she said just two days ago in her new hometown of Birmingham, England, as she officiated a new public library there.  This new facility is in fact now the largest public library in Europe.

            This is what Malala says:

"Pens and books are the weapons that defeat terrorism.

"I truly believe the only way we can create global peace is through not only educating our minds, but our hearts and our souls.

"This is the way forward to our destiny of peace and prosperity.

"Books are very precious - some books can [take] you back centuries and some take you into the future.

"In some books you will visit the core of your heart and in others you will go out into the universe.

"Books keep ones feeling alive.

"Aristotle's words are still breathing, Rumi's poetry will always inspire and Shakespeare's soul will never die.

"There is no better way to explain the importance of books than say that even God chose the medium of a book to send his message to his people."

"We must not forget that 57 million children are out of school.

"We must speak up for peace and development in Nigeria, Syria and Somalia.

"We must speak up for the children of Pakistan, India and Afghanistan, who are suffering from terrorism, poverty, child labour and child trafficking.

"Let us help them through our voice, action and charity.

"Let us help them to read books and go to school.

"And let us not forget that even one book, one pen, one child and one teacher can change the world."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/10283443/Malala-Yousafzai-opens-new-library-in-Birmingham-and-declares-books-will-defeat-terrorism.html

Malala’s words ring out like the sound of the shofar.

            In this new year 5774 may the short broken cries of the shofar help us to give voice to our innermost yearnings.  And may the long steady calls of the shofar shore up in us the faith and courage that sustains us.  And, may we be graced with the ability to hear and respond to the cries of our neighbor – friend and foe alike – as clearly as we hear the sound of the shofar on this Yom Teruah.  

            L’shanah tovah tikateivu/ May you be inscribed for a good year    ----- shanah tovah u’metukah, a good and sweet year of health, blessing, prosperity, meaning and connection.

            Amen

 (c) Rabbi David Steinberg 5774/2013

SERMON FOR YOM KIPPUR EVENING 5774/2013

 TOO MUCH INFORMATION – PART I

          There’s a trick question that rabbis and religious school teachers sometimes like to ask in order to stump their congregants and their students.  But I bet there are plenty of you who will get the right answer even though it is sort of tricky.  Ready?

            What is the most important Jewish holiday?  (Everyone who thinks they know should just call out the response simultaneously)

            Yes, some of you got it – the answer is Shabbat. 

            So, yes, I want to congratulate you all for coming to Temple for the most important Jewish holiday --- Shabbat…

            Of course, Yom Kippur is very important too.  And, our little quiz notwithstanding, we all know very well that Yom Kippur --– and especially the Kol Nidre service that inaugurates it --- is when many synagogues will have their biggest attendance. 

            What is it that draws us here on this night of all nights?

The one night of the year when here at Temple we have no refreshments!  What ever happened to the supposedly hard and fast rule of “feed them and they will come?”

            My sense is that what draws us to shul for Yom Kippur is that this is the day each year when, as a Jewish community, we most powerfully confront our sense of mortality.          

Indeed, the language of the ritual confession or “vidui” that is recited at the bedside of a person who is near death is similar to the language of the vidui prayer of the minchah (afternoon service) for Erev Yom Kippur, which I personally recited just a few hours ago. 

            And the white kittel that I’m wearing to lead services is intended to remind us of a burial shroud.

            Kol Nidre night may pull us into shul because it reminds us that we have a limited time on this earth.  We can never know with absolute certainty what tomorrow will bring. 

So it is today/hayom that we must rededicate ourselves to being better partners with God in the healing and repair of our world; and in the healing and repair of ourselves.

            In Hebrew the same word “avodah” means both “worship” and “service.”  The two are inextricably linked.  Our worship – in prayer and song and public reading of scripture – should lead us to service.  That is the message of this awesome day. 

            I’m hoping we will pay particular attention this year to a verse from the Yom Kippur afternoon Torah portion, Leviticus 19:16 to be precise:  There we learn -- “lo ta’amod al dam reyekha”/ “do not stand idly by your neighbor’s blood.” (Lev. 19:16).

            The Talmud explains that the commandment “do not stand idly by your neighbor’s blood” means that we must not stand and watch a person die when we can do something to save them.

            This is a lesson that too few people understood as the Shoah unfolded in the 1930’s and 40’s.  This is a lesson that too few people understood as genocide took place in Rwanda in the 1990’s.  And nine years ago on Kol Nidre night I was speaking to the congregation in my former congregation in Plattsburgh, NY about not standing idly by while the people of Darfur in western Sudan were being massacred by the central government of their own country. 

            Growing up, and inculcated with the values I absorbed in my own Jewish upbringing, I accepted the notion that the Shoah was totally unique in world history.  I no longer agree with that idea.  Genocide is genocide, and it makes no difference that in the particular case of the Jewish people during the Nazi era it was the work of white Europeans….

            I feel I need to mention this because a congregant who I respect very much challenged me a couple of weeks ago when I first mentioned from the bima that I was opposed to President Obama’s plan to bomb Syria.  One of the offhand comments I had made at the time was that this was a Syrian civil war, and that Assad was not attacking or threatening to attack the United States (or Israel for that matter). 

            But then he said to me:  Well, if the Syrians who were being gassed were Jews would that be different?  My instinctive, even reflexive, response to him at that moment was that, yes, that would be different because we, as Jews, have a special responsibility to other Jews.  So, in that sense, it would be as if we ourselves were, in fact, being attacked so that this would no longer be just a Syrian internal civil conflict.  He then responded that our responsibility really should be to all of humanity.

            Okay, so let me clarify the reflexive answer I gave to him two weeks ago.  And that congregant – He told me I could identify him – was none other than our Temple president Tom Griggs --- who I do indeed respect very much.

            So I want to state, “for the record” that yes, I do believe that “lo ta’amod al dam reyekha”  / “do not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor” DOES apply to all of our neighbors on this planet of ours, and that includes the innocent dead of Syria. 

            Here’s what Elie Wiesel said in 2004 when the topic was the genocidal violence during the civil war in the Darfur region of Sudan.  His  words from back then still resonate now as we think about the situation in Syria:

“[…] Congressional delegations, special envoys and humanitarian agencies send back or bring back horror-filled reports from the scene. A million human beings, young and old, have been uprooted, deported. Scores of women are being raped every day, children are dying of disease hunger and violence.

“How can a citizen of a free country not pay attention? How can anyone, anywhere not feel outraged? How can a person, whether religious or secular, not be moved by compassion? And above all, how can anyone who remembers remain silent?

“As a Jew who does not compare any event to the Holocaust, I feel concerned and challenged by the Sudanese tragedy. We must be involved. How can we reproach the indifference of non-Jews to Jewish suffering if we remain indifferent to another people's plight?

“It happened in Cambodia, then in former Yugoslavia, and in Rwanda, now in Sudan. Asia, Europe, Africa: Three continents have become prisons, killing fields and cemeteries for countless innocent, defenseless populations. Will the plague be allowed to spread?

"Lo taamod al dam réakha" is a Biblical commandment. "Thou shall not stand idly by the shedding of the blood of thy fellow man." The word is not "akhikha," thy Jewish brother, but "réakha," thy fellow human being, be he or she Jewish or not. All are entitled to live with dignity and hope. All are entitled to live without fear and pain.

“Not to assist Sudan's victims today would for me be unworthy of what I have learned from my teachers, my ancestors and my friends, namely that God alone is alone: His creatures must not be.

“What pains and hurts me most now is the simultaneity of events. While we sit here and discuss how to behave morally, both individually and collectively, over there, in Darfur and elsewhere in Sudan, human beings kill and die.

“Should the Sudanese victims feel abandoned and neglected, it would be our fault - and perhaps our guilt.

“That's why we must intervene.

“If we do, they and their children will be grateful for us. As will be, through them, our own.”

And yet:  That was 2004 and now this is 2013.  Between then and now we have the long drawn out legacy of the Iraq War, and the complicated new dynamics of the Arab Spring.  And here is the most recent statement I found on the internet this week from Elie Wiesel regarding the current situation in Syria:  In an interview with a reporter from the Los Angeles Times[i] in April of this year he was asked:

“How do you read the Arab Spring?”

And Wiesel responded:

“I think it began well, a kind of spiritual and political rebellion. It was hijacked and turned into something else. Take Syria. The problem with Syria is painful because the Syrian border with Israel is the only one that has never been violated. The Syrians are respecting the border with Israel. And yet their fanatics are fanatics. What to do? If I knew the answer to that!”

            The question that remains then is not --- do we have a moral obligation to respond to the atrocities taking place in Syria.  (The answer to that question is YES) but rather the question is --- “What sorts of responses would be productive?”

            The bloodshed has been going on in Syria for two years already --- or decades – if you want to think of the larger picture of the violent repressive nature of the State led now by Bashar Assad and formerly by his father Hafez Assad. 

            But even if we limit ourselves to the current civil conflict there, we are faced with the fact that atrocities are being committed on both sides, and great moral ambiguity exists regarding the pros and cons of any particular solutions to the conflict.  What we do know is that over 100,000 Syrians have died in the last two years of fighting, and that MILLIONS of Syrians have fled the country as refugees. 

            And the question remains:  What is to be done?

*****************

            There is a classic Jewish teaching that the designation -- Yom Ha-Kippurim [יום הכפורים] – which is how the Day of Atonement is referred to in the Torah – should be interpreted as if the letter kaf[כ]  were not part of the verbal root kaf-pey-resh [כפר] meaning “atone” but rather as if that letter kaf represented the prefix “ke” (meaning “like” or “as) so that we’d get “Yom ke-Purim,”  meaning “A Day Like Purim.”   I found a nice explanation of this in an article by Rabbi Shraga Simmons on the aish.com website.  Rabbi Simmons explains that the description of the Day of Atonement as a “day like Purim” refers to the idea that what we accomplish on Yom Kippur with spiritual pursuits, we accomplish on Purim with physical pursuits. These holidays are two sides of the same coin, two opposite halves of the same day.”

            But on this Yom Kippur 5774, I’m sensing other ways in which today feels like Yom Ke-Purim/ A Day Like Purim.  In Megillat Esther there are dizzying twists and turns of plot---- so too this High Holiday season.  We’ve gone from the brink of attacking Syria to a new attempt at diplomacy in ways we would not have anticipated less than a week ago.  And, depending on your interpretation of recent events, President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry have been as inept as King Achashverosh or as astute as Mordechai in their handling of the situation.

            Assad we know is as despicable and murderous as Haman.  And as for Russian President Vladimir Putin, I prefer to think of him as a sort of Queen Esther ---   Esther breaks character to rescue her people, while Putin breaks character to rescue his client Bashar Assad.   Well, the parallels I guess aren’t exact, but, in light of Putin’s persecution of gay people in Russia, it does give me pleasure to imagine him as a drag queen…  

            But that’s the subject of another sermon….  

            In any event, all the Purimesque plot twists of the past couple of weeks have been particularly challenging for rabbis like me who have been trying to write our High Holiday sermons. 

            My first reaction when President Obama started pushing the idea of attacking Syria was impatience with him for getting tripped up in a “red line” of his own making.  But then again, I too find myself tripped up by my own self-imposed “red line” of wanting to do a current-events oriented talk from the bima tonight. 

            In truth, I often feel that way when trying to make connections between Jewish teachings, liturgy and scripture and political issues of the day.  From my perspective, Judaism is multi-voiced and the Jewish people are politically diverse.  And my general sense is that any of you can read the New York Times or listen to NPR just as well as I can.  And this week in particular, I’ve been dealing with data overload  –   TMI – too much information --- as I’ve been seizing onto every new blog post, news report and op-ed essay to try to help me understand what’s going on in Syria and what should be done about it. It has gotten to the point where I have so many news articles and listserve posts from colleagues weighing in on Syria that all these resources have just blurred together and have pretty much become useless to me.  So, I’ll just have to try to give you an impressionistic account of my thinking on the subject and see if I can try to couch it in some Jewish teaching appropriate for the holiday. 

            Viscerally, I’m reminded of the events of 9-11 and their aftermath.  We marked the anniversary of that awful day just yesterday.  Back then I found myself glued to media reports of the ongoing rush of new developments in the same way that I’ve been doing so in the last couple of weeks about the possibility of the US attacking Syria. 

            The attacks on New York City and Washington, DC and the plane crash in Shanksville, Pennsylvania that was headed to Washington --- took place 12 years ago, but we still, as a nation, carry within ourselves the trauma of that day.   If we are reluctant to confront Assad militarily over his use of chemical weapons, the reluctance comes in part from our knowing that Assad’s opponents include significant numbers of extremists allied to the terrorist group that targeted us on 9-11. 

            And our reluctance comes from remembering the costly and destabilizing legacy of the Iraq War that President George W. Bush instigated in large part by using the events of 9-11 as a phony pretext. 

            And our reluctance comes from remembering how that war was sold to us as a limited action and so we don’t trust the current administration when it says it too wants authorization only for a limited action.

            And we’re confused about what this supposedly limited action is supposed to entail --- more than a pinprick but less than a regime change --- with no real sense of what that actually would entail.

            And how can it not turn out to be a slippery slope to being fully mired in a civil war that is not our own?

            And our reluctance comes from knowing that there are so many “nation building” needs right here at home that compete for our attention and our dollars.

******************

            What is there to say?  My first instinct has been the same as that of many others, both Republicans and Democrats:  that President Obama’s plan to attack Syria has been more about proving our toughness than about achieving cogent goals.   Assad is a brutal dictator, but a US attack on his forces would be an act of aggression against a nation that has neither attacked us nor threatened to attack us. 

            All for what?  To defend a “rule of warfare” not to use chemical weapons.  Yes, the President made a poignant case on national television and radio Wednesday night about the horrors of poison gas.  But to my mind he didn’t manage to make a sensible case for how this is qualitatively worse than the horrors of conventional warfare that has killed over 100 times as many Syrians.   And to my mind he didn’t make a convincing case as to how adding American attacks to the mix would increase the likelihood of peace or even how it would decrease the likelihood of Assad using chemical weapons if in fact we’re NOT looking to oust Assad altogether and we’re not attempting to destroy the chemical weapons themselves –  for we know that any such attempt would simply release them into the air and cause the very harms we’re trying to prevent.

            I’m very thankful that there is now a reasonable possibility that the current impasse over chemical weapons and red lines will be resolved without sending American bombs into the midst of the Syrian Civil War.    The Russians have given us a diplomatic way out.  I’m sure that President Putin’s motives include a general desire to increase Russian influence in the World in general and the Middle East in particular.  But, however Machiavellian his motives may be, my gut sense is that --- yes – he, with his Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov are very much serving the cause of peace.

            And I give a lot of credit to both President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry for switching course to give the diplomatic effort the best possible shot at success. 

            Of course, a number of pundits have suggested that this course change suits President Obama just fine.  The resolution of support he was seeking in Congress was poised to fail, and there is that suspicion all around that he was backed into a corner by his own red lines. 

            As Maureen Dowd trenchantly opined in the NY Times on Wednesday:  “ Where the mindlessly certain W. adopted a fig leaf of diplomacy to use force in Iraq, the mindfully uncertain Obama is adopting a fig leaf of force to use diplomacy in Syria….” 

            Whatever the motivations, and whether all this was planned or serendipitous -- Let us hope and pray for the success of these diplomatic efforts.

            And further, let us hope and pray for the welfare of all of the innocent civilians caught in the crossfire.

            Meanwhile, there are various organizations working to assist Syrian refugees.  Many of us just a few months ago attended a fundraising dinner organized by the Islamic Center of the Twin Ports and the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Duluth for Syrian refugee relief.

            Better than bombs, we can still contribute to such organizations as:  CARE, Unicef, Doctors Without Borders or other groups that are trying to address what the World Health Organization has called the worst humanitarian crisis in the world today.  I hope you will consider doing so as I have personally done earlier this week.

            Just remember that even if Syria signs on to the international convention of chemical weapons, and even if those weapons are put under international control and destroyed --- that doesn’t mean that the Syrian crisis will have been resolved.  Far from it.

            Psalm 34, one of the biblical passages that we often include in our Shabbat morning service charges us:בַּקֵּשׁ שָׁלוֹם וְרָדְפֵהוּ.  – Seek peace and chase after it.  May those who are pursuing peace be crowned with success in their efforts.

            And, in the meantime, amidst all the work that needs to be done in our own city, our own state, and our own country, may we nevertheless not stand idly by as the crisis that engulfs Syria continues to unfold.

            Gmar chatimah tovah v’tzom kal/  I wish you all a good sealing in the Book of Life, and an easy fast.

            Shabbat shalom.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg 5774/2013

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[i] http://articles.latimes.com/2013/apr/23/opinion/la-oe-morrison-wiesel-20130418