Dvar Torah on Racism and the Vigil for George Floyd

I am thankful that I was invited to offer the opening prayer this past weekend at the Vigil for George Floyd. In this epidemic environment, I have avoided anything resembling a crowd, because having had open heart surgery, I am at elevated risk.

But I could not stay away. I did wear a mask and did my best to social distance, but the reality is that it’s hard to maintain social distance in crowds. Masks are important.

I was there to demonstrate my love and support along with the love and support of the Jewish community for the African American community, our friends, and family members. I stress this latter point, “our friends and family members,” because very often in conversations about the Jewish community, Jews of Color are forgotten and people of color who are part of Jewish families are ignored entirely. Long gone are the days when the Jewish community could think of issues related to racism and civil rights as issues with which we as Jews, all white Ashkenazim, didn’t have to worry ourselves, but needed to act to help others.

The Jewish community of Des Moines today is multiracial and, increasingly, Jewish communities around the world are becoming more and more so. Racism is now an issue of immediate relevance and concern to members of our community as well. It is about us too. Some members of our community now face Antisemitism AND Racism.

 

Racism and bias are issues that need to be addressed in terms of work that needs to be done within our community, raising awareness about prejudice and privilege for some of us, on the one hand, while also needing to be seen as something that many Jews have to deal with in their daily lives because of the color of their skin on the other.

So, when I go to speak about racism, I do so thinking not only about other communities, but about those in our community as well, including our good friends and family members.

And when asked to speak, well… those who know me well, know that I’m not one to keep silent. Our tradition teaches that the greatest sin of our age is silence. I’m going to speak.

Jewish tradition teaches us, as well, several things that are important for us to think about in relation to the death of George Floyd. First, in the words of Hillel:

When people around us are acting without humanity, our job is simply to act like a human being.

When those around us are showing callousness and absence of concern about the well-being of others, as those officers did, not responding to cries for help, it is upon us to show concern and care. We are supposed to be a mensch, a human being.

The Torah reminds us as well, “v’ahavtah re’ekha camokha,” “love your neighbor as yourself.” Act with concern for the well-being of others as you would act on your own behalf.

Racism and bias, even just in regard to policing alone, much less as found across our society, aren’t concerns that are going to be fixed easily or quickly. What can one person do?

Our tradition teaches us in the words of Rabbi Tarfon:

It is not our obligation to complete the work, but neither can we avoid doing our share.

Individually, we may not be able to end racism and other forms of hatred, but it is our obligation as individuals to do what we can.

We can chant. We can march. We can protest. We can listen and we can teach. We can vote. We can be present at vigils alongside our friends and family members.

Kneeling has been a part of these protests. Kneeling is not part of the Jewish tradition. We do not kneel as part of our worship and we bow only before God.

But in protest, we have knelt, not to bring ourselves low, not to humble ourselves, but to remember. We knelt at the vigil this past Sunday. In my opening prayer that day, I prayed that our kneeling would elevate our passion and our commitment to bring positive change to our community and our world.

Kneeling, we recalled the words, “I can’t breathe!” We remembered that there was no response, instead of callousness and silence. We WILL and MUST respond!

Kneeling, we remembered all of those brought low and held down by hatred, a long history of suffering, the vast majority of it unrecorded, at the hands of those with the power to prevent it from being known. May we will pledge ourselves to remember that long history, as we pledge to reach out our hands to respond to the cries of the oppressed.

Kneeling, we joined ourselves together, united in our commitment to justice.

It was moving to see police officers and protesters kneeling together and in some cases marching and dancing together. And it was good to see our Republican Governor accompanied by Des Moines’ Democrat Mayor and African American Leaders including Democrat State Representative Ako Samad, along with police officials working together and holding a press conference together, the other day. Together, we can change our world.

As we look out at what is happening in America, may we constantly be reminded that we are all created in the divine image and that each and every one of us is deserving of love and care.

May God give us strength in our efforts. Let us be strong and strengthen one another.

Kneeling, by the hundreds, by the thousands, by the millions across our nation, we are united in the urgent need for change.

We have much work to do.

As we take action, on this Shabbat, in this time of epidemics of disease and of hatred,

May we do so in health and safety.

And let us say, Amen.

Sermon on Teshuvah, Btselem Elohim for Kol Nidrei 5778 2017

225 years ago, in 1792, Moses Seixas [say-shuss], a Jewish congregational president in Newport, Rhode Island, wrote a letter to the first President of the United States checking to see if the new nation’s leadership would, using Seixas’ words, “give to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance.” President Washington responded, repeating those words, in one of the best statements of the nature of America. President Washington wrote:

It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.

Hearing those words, some of us cringe. Is our country still there? Was America ever truly there? We live in a time of great partisan divide. Today, discussions are often over the victories or losses of a party and not necessarily over the improvement of the lives of the people. Far too often in our real communities and in our digital ones, we see hatred put into words and action.

The Jewish people have seen that happen before. The flag and torch bearers, the hate filled marchers, too often have come for us. Whenever minorities have been persecuted or oppressed, if we have not been the initial target, historically, neither have we been far down the list.

We have seen some of humanity’s worst. We have seen inhuman hatred. Three thousand years ago, our people’s story already proclaimed our origin to be found in the words, “Let my people go!” Two thousand years ago, living under oppressive Roman rule, Hillel proclaimed, “In a place where there is no humanity, strive be to a human being.” We know that evil exists.

Yet, our tradition also loudly proclaims that we are all created, “B’tselem Elohim.” That is one of the most beautiful and, at times, also difficult teachings in the Jewish Tradition, the idea that we are all created in the image of God.

On the beautiful side of things, it is a teaching that reminds us of the inherent value of all people, that people should be treated equally. It is a directive to rise above concerns about difference, to overcome concerns about race, ethnicity, physical capability and beauty, or sexual orientation. B’tselem Elohim is an idea that helps us feel compassion for those who suffer, urging us to aid them. We should not be able to tolerate seeing people suffering. Everyone is like us. Each of us, in the image of God.

On the difficult side of things, that we are all created B’tselem Elohim is a teaching that reminds us that we have things in common with all people, including those with whom we’d much rather not, enemies, people whom we consider to be evil.

In the Mishnah, in Pirkei Avot, we find the statement: “Who is wise? The one who learns from every person.” Traditionally, this teaches that the wisest person can learn something from anyone and everyone, the most exalted can learn from the lowest. The teacher can learn from the student.

The Baal Shem Tov taught in regard to the statement:

When you look into a mirror you see your own blemishes. Think of other people as being your mirror. When you notice a defect or imperfection in someone else, that should tell you that you are tainted by the same shortcoming... Remember that Heaven shows you these sins in others in order that you search yourself and mend your ways.

It’s like a gut-punch. Our first response is “No way am I like….” “Not me! I could never act like that, feel like that, do something like that.” “I could never get so angry.” “I could never hate like that.”

How difficult is it to look at that image of those white supremacists and neo-Nazis standing with torches while shouting hateful slogans and say not only, “B’tselem Elohim,” this one too was created in the image of God, but perhaps, to use the words of the Baal Shem Tov, “I am tainted by the same shortcoming?” No, perhaps not exactly the same, not the same sort of hatred, not of the same things. But:

·      An ability to become enraged?

·      An ability to hate others?

·      A willingness and even desire to march along with others, to be part of a crowd, to rebel against authority, to want to fit in with a group?

·      An unwillingness to stand up to friends and family members even when we know that they are wrong, because we care about them?

·      A tendency to repeat hateful things about others whom we’ve never met?

·      A desire to see faults in others, to pass the blame to others?

·      A willfulness to see the worst in others who disagree with us.

·      A willingness or even eagerness to rise up from a place of frustration and hopelessness to take actions we might regret later.

·      An ability to look out at other people and easily say of them, “These are not B’tselem Elohim.” “I am likened to God, but them, those people, they’re nothing like God, they’re nothing like me. They’re evil.”

·      A blindness towards our commonality with those we do not like.

Remember that Heaven shows you these sins in others in order that you search yourself and mend your ways.

And how many of us would want to be defined by the worst picture taken of us, perhaps not one that was taken but one that could have been taken? Has there ever been a time when we acted in a way that would anger or embarrass us now?

We may not have ever considered the possibility of ourselves preaching hatred while holding a torch, but, and here is another difficult lesson, far too many otherwise good and even religious people participated in horrors in ages past and still in many places around the world do today. No few of those bearing and sharing their hatreds publicly will eventually repent and change their ways. There are a multitude of stories.

Father William Aitcheson, formerly the parochial vicar at St. Leo the Great parish in Fairfax City, Virginia recently wrote an editorial in The Arlington Catholic Herald acknowledging his past.

“My actions were despicable,” he wrote. “When I think back on burning crosses, a threatening letter, and so on, I feel as though I am speaking of somebody else. It’s hard to believe that was me. While 40 years have passed, I must say this: I’m sorry. To anyone who has been subjected to racism or bigotry, I am sorry. I have no excuse, but I hope you will forgive me.”

There is Frankie Meeink, who was a prominent skinhead when he was younger and living in South Philadelphia. He spoke at Beth El congregation a couple of years ago about his story. On TV fairly regularly, he is now an outspoken critic of white supremacy and an advocate for overcoming their hate with love and caring. Today, he lives in Des Moines and coaches youth hockey.

There is the story of the teenagers who defaced our building. They went through a restorative justice process, a teshuva process of learning with Rabbi Fink and working for the Temple that resulted in them not only overcoming their hatred of Jews, but in later inviting Rabbi Fink and Jack Huff to attend their wedding.

And then there is the story of Larry Trapp, once Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan in Nebraska, which you can find in Chicken Soup of the Jewish Soul. Larry Trapp repeatedly called to harass and threaten Cantor Michael Weisser and his wife Julie after they moved to Lincoln. Trapp was known to be dangerous by the FBI. He was heavily armed and made explosives. Trapp spewed hatred in numerous ways. The Weissers were warned to avoid him.

Trapp evidently was responsible for firebombing several homes of African Americans and had been making plans to bomb Temple B’nai Jeshurun in Lincoln, Cantor Weisser’s congregation. Over time, the Weissers called in to his radio show to tie up the phone lines, then eventually to ask him why he hated them, why he hated Jews. Trapp never responded but he listened.

They found out things about him. He was isolated, lived in a small apartment. He was in a wheelchair.

Cantor Weisser once left a message reminding Larry Trap that the Nazis came for those with disabilities first. They kept reaching out. They offered to help him, to talk with him, to take him to the grocery store. Eventually, Larry Trapp realized that the Cantor and his wife were the only people who seemed to care about him at all.

When Trapp finally met the Weissers, he burst into tears. Trapp took the swastika rings off of his fingers and handed them to Cantor Weisser, telling him that he couldn’t wear them anymore, to take them away.

“On November 16, 1991, Trapp resigned from the Klan.” He went on to right apologies to many of those he had threatened or harmed over the years. Trapp said, “I wasted the first forty years of my life and caused harm to other people. Now, I’ve learned we’re one race and one race only.”

Only a little over a month later, Trapp learned that he had less than a year to live because of the progression of his illness. The Weissers invited Trapp to move into their home so that Julie could take care of him. It was disruptive to their lives. They had three teenage children.

On June 5, 1992, Larry Trapp, former Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan, converted to Judaism in a ceremony at B’nai Jeshurun in Lincoln, in the very building that he had planned at one point to bomb. Only a few months later, on September 6, Larry Trapp died in a hospital bed in the Weissers’ living room, Michael and Julie, holding his hands.

One doesn’t really atone for the acts committed by Larry Trapp over the course of his lifetime. But people can change their direction in life. We can perform T’shuvah, turning from paths that led us in bad directions to the path of righteousness. Sometimes, those who hate simply need to see that we are all created B’tselem Elohim, in the image of God. Sometimes, what the haters need is for others to see them in that way as well, not as other, as entirely different, or as inherently evil.

Cantor Michael Weisser, during the time he was interacting with Larry Trapp, offered a prayer for healing during services in his congregation, one that I will repeat here with the hope that it impacts not one specific person in our country, but many, all of those so afflicted:

            May those who are sick with the illness of bigotry and hatred be healed.

And in this time of political discord, when our passions are easily kindled, when we too often forget even among our family and friends that our commonalities are greater than our differences. May we recall the words spoken by President Abraham Lincoln as he closed his First Inaugural Address:

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies.

Though passion may have strained,

It must not break our bonds of affection.

The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and

Patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land,

Will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched,

As surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

May our better angels allow us to see the divine in those with whom we disagree and in all of God’s children.

This Yom Kippur, this Day of Atonement, this Day of T’shuvah, of turning and returning, let us remember the words of the Baal Shem Tov:

When you look into a mirror you see your own blemishes. Think of other people as being your mirror. When you notice a defect or imperfection in someone else, that should tell you that you are tainted by the same shortcoming... Remember that Heaven shows you these sins in others in order that you search yourself and mend your ways.

After all, we are imperfect human beings and all created in the image of God.

Shabbat Shalom and Shanah tovah tikateivu v’teihateimu,

May you be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life for a good year.

Kein Yehi Ratson. May it be God’s will.

Enough! Balaam's Ass and Church Conventions

When we teach bible stories to the kids in the religious school, there are many that are difficult for the students to understand or which fail to hold their attention long enough to explain so that they might. This Torah portion contains one of the stories that belies those problems. This Torah portion is one during which they giggle when we discuss it. You see, it features a donkey. But of course, the text doesn’t use that term. It uses “Ass.” Giggle. Giggle. “The rabbi said ‘Ass!’” Yep, it’s even true for adults. The story of Balaam’s Ass is one of the best in the Jewish tradition and certainly one of my favorites, not because I get to say the word “Ass” from the pulpit, but because it is a meaningful story.

The story is about how Balaam riding his donkey encounters an Angel blocking the road. Of course, the donkey sees the Angel. Balaam, looking right at the Angel, doesn’t see it and gets angry with the donkey which does. Balaam then beats the donkey, which then speaks up to stop him. Of course, the fact that this is a TALKING ASS doesn’t register as strange for Balaam either.

By now, you’re all thinking “And I know a few of those…” That’s another reason that adults giggle. Regardless, this Torah portion speaks to us, for sure. But other than enabling us to giggle at its vocabulary and get a jab or two in at those we know who at times act like donkeys, how is this story relevant for us today?

To get there, I’ll ask a question. What does the donkey say to Balaam?

He says, “Look, I am the ass you have been riding all along until this day! Have I been in the habit of doing this to you?” And Balaam answered, “No.”

To what topic does this simple conversation apply? It occurred to me that it applies all too well to one that is important and problematic for Jews today.

Any guesses as to the one about which I speak?

How about if I rephrase what the donkey stated as follows, “Look, I am a Jew that you have known and interacted with years? Have I been in the habit of doing or supporting what you casually accuse other Jews whom you don’t know of doing and supporting?”

This is a good explanation of how antisemitism and anti-Jewish racism found its way to be commonplace at the national conventions of our progressive Christian friends. This story helps us understand how, knowing Jews in their personal lives who act nothing like the way that some in their movements are accusing Israeli Jews of acting, progressive Christians too often nonetheless ignore the Jews in their midst whom they know well and instead act as if even the most heinous accusations make sense of the entire population of Israel.

This week, the United Church of Christ, perhaps the Reform movement’s closest of all of our friends in the Christian community, with whom we regularly interact on almost every social issue that arises, chose to beat us without talking to us. That’s a bit blunt. What a significant majority of its national conference delegates did was to condemn Israel based on false testimony, to advocate for the spreading of falsehoods about Jews and Israel as facts, and to do so without making any effort to reach out to Jews who were loudly protesting their actions until after the fact, if at all.

My friend, Rev. Matt Mardis-Lecroy of Plymouth Congregation, the largest UCC affiliated church in Iowa, reached out to me yesterday to apologize for not conversing with me before the vote which took place earlier in the week. He also sent along comments which he will publish stating that this vote doesn't necessarily bind or represent his church. I appreciate those sentiments, especially since he is the only one of a number of UCC ministers who could have reached out. We have yet to meet to discuss the issues, but this far he, nor any other UCC minister here in Des Moines has offered any statement of significant disagreement with or outright rejection of the contemptible discussions and votes which took place at the UCC national convention.

And they were contemptible. Not only did the UCC vote to divest itself from companies that “profit from the occupation,” a significant majority of UCC voters actually supported a vote that would have deemed Israel an “Apartheid state,” AND the UCC is advocating that the basis of its education concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict be the “Kairos Palestine” document which the Central Conference of American Rabbis stated in 2009 was both full of falsehoods and outright antisemitism.

On Wednesday, the CCAR issued what is perhaps its strongest ever condemnation. I am going to read it to you:

With sadness and dismay, we condemn the action of the United Church of Christ (UCC) to target Israel with divestment and boycotts. With this vote, the UCC has now taken sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and has explicitly joined the global Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, a contemptible effort to delegitimize the State of Israel and deny the Jewish people's right to statehood. We do thank and commend the small, brave, minority of delegates to the UCC General Synod who voted against the wrongful, self-defeating resolution.

[I add my appreciation for all those in our local UCC churches who would have done so if given the opportunity.]

We note with even greater revulsion the majority vote of the General Synod to brand Israel an apartheid state. We take cold comfort in the fact that the "apartheid" resolution failed for want of the two-thirds majority required for adoption. This vote most closely resembles the odious 1975 United Nations resolution equating Zionism with racism. Though later revoked, it marked the emergence of the U.N. as a venue of implacable anti-Israel hostility.

Reform rabbis are particularly saddened by this development, because of the long-standing and meaningful relationships that many of us and our communities have cherished, and will now be forced to re-evaluate with UCC clergy and congregations. We note with disgust that our UCC colleagues chose to consult a virulently anti-Israel organization, calling itself "Jewish Voice for Peace," rather than their trusted friends and allies who lead the organized Jewish community. Like our UCC colleagues, Reform rabbis are deeply engaged with the plight of the Palestinians, and we strongly support the peace process to achieve two states for two peoples.

We affirm what the CCAR resolved in 2005: "We deeply deplore efforts that blame [only] Israel for the failure of the peace process or that seek to use economic actions against Israel, including singling out for shareholder actions or divestment, companies working in Israel. These shareholder efforts are more likely to hinder rather than advance the peace process. Israel's adversaries may interpret them as endorsing continuation of their strategies of rejectionist and terror. In addition, the one-sided nature of these actions undermines their credibility [,. . .] thereby creating the perception that the sponsoring entities [in this case, the United Church of Christ] seek to delegitimize the very existence of the State of Israel."

This decision is a shameful episode for the United Church of Christ.

Yet, how more shameful was it to invite Rev. Mitri Raheb to offer a keynote speech the day before the UCC voted to support divestment?

Rev. Raheb, beloved by those who advocate for the Palestinian side, believes that Palestinian Christians have inherited all of the blessings offered to the people of Israel in the Torah, that the Jews who exist today are all people from Eastern Europe, descended from Khazars who converted to Judaism, and that today’s Jews have no historical connection to the land of Israel at all. Raheb always refers to Jesus as a Palestinian and not as a Jew.

These things are not representative of a difference in policy regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, they are representative of racism and antisemitism as well as utter ignorance and hate.

Let me be very explicit here. It is both ignorance and racism to argue that Jews as a race descend from Khazars. End of discussion. Racism. And antisemitism as well because this utter falsehood demeans Jews as people. It is therefore clearly anti-Jewish. Finally, the argument that Jews have no connection to the land, an obvious falsehood, is designed and used to instill contempt of the Jews by arguing that the Jews as liars have stolen what never belonged to them and therefore have no rights to any state at all.

My friend, Dexter Van Zile, wrote about Raheb’s speech at the UCC Convention. He said in a recent article for CAMERA.org:

No, Raheb is not a Nazi, but no one who knows about previous efforts to separate Jesus from Judaism can applaud Raheb’s sermon in good conscience. No one who knows anything about the impact of efforts to separate Christianity from its Jewish roots can applaud Raheb’s polemic.

But that's what UCCer's did at the denomination's 30th General Synod.

What makes Raheb’s sermon so much more troublesome is that when he did mention Israel in his sermon it was in reference to “the occupation.” Clearly, Israeli policies have an impact on Palestinians, but nowhere during his talk did he mention Palestinian violence against Israel, only the “suffocating Israeli occupation.”

In sum, Raheb removed Jews from the land of Israel, deprived them of their history and then portrayed the modern Jewish state as the singular source of suffering endured by the Palestinian people.

And for this he got a standing ovation.

Raheb, the people who invited him to speak, and the people who applauded after his sermon engaged in a sinful act of false witness against the Jewish people and their homeland.

Our friends, who have known us a long time, are blinded and are wrongfully beating us. It is time for us donkeys to speak up about it.

Rev. Matt Mardis-Lecroy and I will be meeting in a couple of weeks and I will make an effort along with others among the Jewish leadership in town to reach out to others.

Our message is simple:

We may disagree on the nature of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and in the possible ways in which it might be resolved, but the promotion of anti-Jewish racism and traditional antisemitism as well as Christian supercessionism are not an acceptable part of the conversation whether they are being discussed by known White Supremacists and Neo-Nazis, for whom they are standard tropes, or by Palestinian Christian religious leaders, or even by Nobel laureates. And furthermore, study materials concerning the history of the conflict and its possible resolutions, along with any discussion of the nature of the Jewish people or of Israelis as Jews, must be devoid of that racism, antisemitism, and Christian supercessionism to be meaningful and helpful in approaching possible resolutions.

It would be unfair to suggest that only the UCC is guilty of this type of behavior, though the extent of what took place at its recent convention deserves specific condemnation. Unfortunately, the UCC simply has added its advocacy to a number of other churches who have chosen to promote hateful Antisemitic tropes in their anti-Israel pro-Palestinian advocacy efforts. 

This week, as we read the story of the Ass, let us hope Balaam will stop beating us long enough to realize he’s wrong.

Shabbat Shalom!

To Bigotry No Sanction

"To bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance," these words begin the letter of response to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island, written by President George Washington. The President borrowed ideas – and actual words – directly from Moses Seixas’s letter to him. They are words of which we all should be mindful this weekend as the decision by the Grand Jury in St. Louis is announced. George Washington wrote that:

"The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for giving to Mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection, should demean themselves as good citizens."

Pres. Washington closed with an invocation: “May the father of all mercies scatter light and not darkness in our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in his own due time and way everlastingly happy.”

Regardless of what happens with the Grand Jury decision in Ferguson this weekend, there are vitally important issues that need to be addressed going forward, not just in St. Louis but across the United States.
There is a lack of trust between police and minorities in many communities around our nation.
There is an assumption of active racism and bias. In many places, there is a history of it coupled with modern experience.
There are municipalities that fund themselves off of citing the poor for infractions often caused by poverty and need.
There is deep poverty and despair, joblessness and under-employment, a lack of quality education, hunger and homelessness.
Drug use, drug trafficking, robberies and murder connected to them are common and periods of incarceration are an assumed part of life.
Children live in environments where it is safer to be part of gangs and to arm themselves than try to remain apart from the gangs and guns.
Guns and violence are so prevalent in local communities that police officers rightly need to be on guard, something that can cause the rapid escalation of interactions into deadly encounters.
Far too many young men are dying.
Far too many parents and children are grieving.
There is plenty of blame to go around and a whole lot of work to be done.
Let us not stand idly by.

This weekend, let us pray for peace and change for the better. Let us be thankful for the many blessings in our lives as we head into Thanksgiving week, but also heighten our awareness of those who lack them in their lives. Let us "scatter light and not darkness."

Shabbat Shalom.

When We Were Slaves : A Sermon on Ferguson

When We Were Slaves : A Sermon on Ferguson and Eikev

August 15, 2014

Rabbi David Kaufman

This week’s Torah portion contains these words from Deuteronomy Chapter 8:

⁶ Observe the commands of Adonai your God, walking in obedience to him and revering him. ⁷ For Adonai your God is bringing you into a good land—a land with brooks, streams, and deep springs gushing out into the valleys and hills; ⁸ a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey; ⁹ a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.

¹⁰ When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise Adonai your God for the good land he has given you. ¹¹ Be careful that you do not forget Adonai your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day.¹² Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, ¹³ and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, ¹⁴ then your heart will become proud and you will forget Adonai your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 

What does it mean for us to remember that we were slaves in Egypt?

The obvious answer to that question is that we should be thankful to God for all that we have received. It was, of course, God who brought us forth from slavery in Egypt. The Torah portion makes that answer clear by explaining that if we do not follow God’s commandments, then bad things will happen to us.

Yet, is that all it means for us to remember that we were slaves?

Remembering that we were slaves also should urge us to confront oppression and slavery wherever we see it. Jews throughout the world see exactly that meaning in the words and advocate for freedom and liberty. When Jews see the weeping of the suffering, we weep. We also try to end their suffering.

When we forget that we were slaves- and it is important to understand that this is not a matter of if, but when, then we don’t necessarily do the right thing. Pride is not something that we are lacking. We take pride in our accomplishments and those of our friends and families. We also cherish our wealth and our power. We earned it, after all. Those without either, well…we convince ourselves all too easily, they earned that too.

We all sometimes forget that we were once slaves: poor, powerless, oppressed.

But when the images of oppression are obvious, we pay attention. We pay attention when see discrimination, when we see rights violated, and when we see violence used by the powerful against the weak. We pay attention and challenge decisions even when we’re talking about decisions made by Jews in their defense, such as something Israel might do to ensure its security. We pay attention when we see immigrants being treated poorly, for we remember that we were immigrants. We remember that we once stood before Pharaoh’s mighty army with none of our own.

I have found myself in the position this week of on the one hand addressing the conflict between Israel and Hamas and on the other responding to the events in the northern part of St. Louis, in Ferguson, Missouri, where an unarmed young man was shot and where police descended upon rioters like a military confronting an enemy.

Bear with me for a moment--I hate the phrase “As a Jew.” I think it is generally used by people who want to excuse a sentiment opposed by most Jews, and who in many such cases would like to express why their own personal interpretation of Judaism is the only reasonable one. I would suggest to you, that whenever you see that phrase being used, you are about to see or hear something that the speaker believes is opposed by Jews who are representatives of the Jewish community. Usually the representative speakers would use additional qualifiers such as, “As a Reform Jew,” or “as a Rabbi,” or “as a supporter of Israel.” Never “as a Jew,” and someone who actually represents the Jewish tradition could say, “As Jews, we…”

So where I might say something like “As a Jew, I feel for the oppressed,” with the idea that all Jews should. Instead, I would rather say, “The Jewish tradition reminds us to care about the oppressed and to remember that we slaves,” "As Jews, we feel for the oppressed." We have been at times in our history like the people the people standing before those dressed in armor and at times we have been like those dressed in armor. In fact, one could note that we were both this week, some marching in Ferguson and others defending Israeli from those who would kill them.

I believe that in both cases, Jews were thinking about what Judaism teaches even if in both cases other things may have governed decisions rather than Torah and Talmud.

In fact, in many cases wherein we find Jews being told to remember that we were strangers in Egypt or that we were once slaves, we modern Jews also remember the Shoah and the directive, “Never Again!” So when we see protesters standing before tanks in Ferguson, we remember being slaves. And when we hear those standing before tanks in Gaza and firing rockets into Israel shouting, “Prepare for the annihilation of Israel!” and “Death to the Jews!” our reaction is both to remember times when our people was oppressed and insecure and other times when those threatening to commit genocide against our people carried out the threat. We remember pogroms and exiles. We remember the Holocaust. And when we look at the persecution of minorities in other parts of the region, the consequences of failure to stand up in defense of the Jewish state become readily apparent.

We are both mindsets in the same Jews. We ache because of the suffering of the oppressed and impoverished. Yet, we also understand that were it not for the strength of the Israel Defense Forces and their ability to defend the people of Israel, we, the Jewish people, could once again become oppressed, impoverished, or worse.

The Torah’s warning is not only that in our success, we may become proud and forget that we were slaves. Or fail to acknowledge that it was God, not our own strength, who freed us. It is quite possible that we may also, in our success, forget all the suffering and even miracles that it took for us to acquire our prosperity and security. We are doubly reminded at such times about the tenuous nature of our people’s prosperity in a world of threats against us.

So on this Shabbat we stand with Israel strongly as it defends itself against attacks, but feel compassion for those who are suffering because of its response. And we look upon the strife in Ferguson, Missouri not only with a concern that justice be done in the death of young man, but with concern that the lives of the people in the community will improve.

We will remember that we were slaves in Egypt. Shabbat Shalom.

Whatever Happened to Love Thy Neighbor? Kol Nidrei Sermon 2013

I have to admit that I am a big fan of Mel Brooks’ comedies. They are anything but politically correct, making fun of stereotype after stereotype. From the Producers  to Spaceballs, from History of the World Part I to Blazing Saddles, Brooks’ movies make us laugh, but they also make us think about the world in which we live and how we treat one another. Often, they make us cringe. As a recent PBS documentary noted, “Mel Brooks never met a stereotype he couldn’t upend.”

Perhaps, his most politically incorrect work is Blazing Saddles. Released in 1974, the film starred Cleavon Little as a Black Sheriff named Bart, no doubt after the famous outlaw “Black Bart.” Bart is full of Yiddishkeit and sophistication. He works alongside sidekick Gene Wilder and the people of a small western town to oppose the machinations of Harvey Korman aided by a very racist and ignorant Slim Pickens. Along the way, racist stereotype after racist stereotype is confronted head on. Brought to light, they appear absurdly ignorant and silly, but throughout the movie the viewer is confronted with the reality that some people really act this way and believe this stuff.

There are many verbal exchanges in the film that are very funny, very pointed, and very much inappropriate for a High Holiday sermon, but there is one story that I would like to share. It begins with a knock on the side window of the Sheriff’s office.

[Bart gets up and sees the same woman who insulted him earlier]

Elderly Woman: Good evening, Sherriff. Sorry about the (Insult and racial epithet) I offered earlier.

[Many of you know the exact words of that insult. Tonight, on Kol Nidrei, let us operate under the Jewish premise, Hu mei-vin Ya-vin, the one who understands will understand… She continued].  

I hope this apple pie will in some small way say thank you for your ingenuity and courage in defeating that horrible Mongo.

Bart: Well, uh... thank you, much obliged. Good night.

[Bart closes the window and smells the pie... but returns to the window when he hears another knock]

Elderly Woman: Of course, you'll have the good taste not to mention that I spoke to you.

Bart: Of course.

Elderly Woman: Thank you.

The bigger picture, pardon the pun, within the movie is a very Jewish narrative. Bart and his fellow railroad workers, all with dark skin of course, are driven by a taskmaster who does not value their lives at all. Bart strikes the overseer and flees. The narrative diverges of course, the move is a cowboy spoof, but throughout—with its outlandish violations of political correctness—one theme develops: When people of all sorts work together, they can overcome those who discriminate and hate. That message remains as appropriate for today as it was nearly 40 years ago.

Tonight, I would like to talk a bit about discrimination in our day and age and then I will answer two questions. How do we overcome hatred based upon difference? And bringing it into the context of Yom Kippur, whatever happened to ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself’, the directive that we read in tomorrow’s Torah portion?”

Where we are today?

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. famously said, “The moral arc of the universe bends toward justice.” In response, at the 50^th anniversary of March on Washington and Dr. King’s “I have a Dream speech,” President Obama stated that, “The arc of the moral universe may bend towards justice, but it doesn’t bend on its own,” one of the better statements concerning civil rights that I have heard.

As I look back at this past year with Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman, with battles over Same Sex Marriage and Immigration Reform, with voter restriction efforts reminiscent of the early 1960s, I wonder how much of an arc there is at all. It appears as if the arc of the moral universe has been running pretty much parallel to justice for a very long time, never getting too close or at times rebounding in the other direction. In fact, sometimes, like when discussing the absence of concern about children dying in conflicts overseas, one wonders whether or not the “moral arc of the universe” curves at all.

I would more confidently say that there is a “moral arc within our lives.” We relate to those around us, to our family, our friends, but not necessarily to our universe, to all of humanity or all of creation. We are far more angered by relatively small injustices close to home than by massive injustices committed at a distance. We tend to care much more about our neighborhood and our neighbors than about others further away. We care even more by things affecting people whom we have met in person. Our personal moral arc is more likely to bend toward justice for them.

So what happens when our lives consist of waking up in the morning, driving to work alone in our cars, working in a cubicle or small office, interacting in person with few others at work to any substantial degree and then returning home? We might interact with a few people on Facebook, send a few emails, make a few phone calls, but too often for most of us, our actual person to person interactions are very limited both in number and duration. While we may indeed interact with those who are different from us, we are almost certain to avoid talking about that difference, especially if it makes us uncomfortable.

I’m not telling you to go out and act like the Elderly Woman in Blazing Saddles by confronting difference by airing discriminatory views, but I am going to tell you that avoiding addressing them or only doing so by looking at Google search results online, as those of us who are younger are wont to do, is not going to have the same impact as personal interaction. There is a big difference between speaking to a Sudanese refugee from Darfur about what it is like being an African Muslim in Des Moines and looking up “African Muslims in America” online. You may get a very different answer if you ask a Muslim woman why she is wearing a Hijab, a head scarf, than you would if you look it up with Bing. And if you look up different views about issues related to Judaism, after scrolling down through multiple links taking you to ultra-Orthodox websites which make no effort to represent Reform or Conservative perspectives, what answers you may find may not only confuse you, but could well mislead or anger you.

This brings me to the discussion to which I had the privilege to listen between Leon Wieseltier and David Wolpe about the Jewish people today when I attended a program for rabbis put on by AIPAC in Washington DC in August. Wieseltier began with an observation that defines our age. He said that:

“The Internet is the greatest attack on human attention—and Judaism is largely based upon attention and constancy of mind.” ADHD is not the disorder. Attention is now the disorder.

It is certainly humorous, but the implication isn’t. By this, Wieseltier meant that the practice of Judaism in general is under threat because Judaism requires regular participation in person and over a period of time. We, especially the younger generations, hardly do anything regularly over a period of time. Further, Judaism mandates that we be focused on what we are doing, that we pray with intentionality. In the internet age, we are easily distracted. We quickly click and look and then click and look away just as swiftly.

But the threat from the internet that Wieseltier noted is greater still:

You don’t support institutions with a click. You don’t support institutions by visiting the webpage. You support institutions by maintaining the boiler. Judaism operates in places and places need maintaining. We are a physical people.

Obviously, he was more than implying that there is an essential financial component. We need institutions and we need to be able to maintain them. We are also a people with the concept of a minyan. In the Jewish tradition, when ten Jews gather, the presence of God is with them, the dynamic changes. Connection to other Jews is vitally important and the primary place where that connection should happen is in our synagogues.

At the recent opening of this year’s Sunday school program, it was noted that an individual child being absent from class does not just affect that child’s ability to learn, it impacts others as well. In small groups, the absence of one child can make all the difference in another child feeling comfortable in attending or participating. We know this affects youth group activities as well. Kids want to know if their friends will be attending.

This doesn’t stop when we graduate from high school. Even as adults we feel much more comfortable seeing friendly faces and this is all the more true when we are feeling sad, insecure, or have something we are excited to share. Think for a moment about the times when people feel the greatest need to attend services. You got it. It is exactly at those times when we feel sad, insecure, or when we have something going on in our lives that we feel excited to share. The basic reason for a congregational community to exist is to be there at those moments. That is part of fulfilling the commandment “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” If we want that support, we should be there for others.

In that vein, there is the story of the supposedly religious Jew and avid golfer who decides to play golf all by himself on Yom Kippur instead of sitting through services and hits a hole in one. He’s so excited that he can hardly contain it. He shouts to God, “Thank you God! I’ve played for many years and finally, finally, I hit a hole in one. I thought, ‘God will strike me down for playing on Yom Kippur,’ but look! Look what happened today. The sun is shining. No one is out here to slow me down or hurry me up. And I hit a hole in one! You are so gracious, God. Thank you for not punishing me. I finally hit a hole in one!”

A voice calls down from heaven, “Who are you going to tell?”

We want to share our accomplishments and our joys. It is torturous for the golfer who hits a hole in one on Yom Kippur not to be able to share his joy. It is not all that different for those of us who have something we are eager to share to have no one with whom to share it. And let’s be honest, sharing it online isn’t the same as getting a high five from a good friend. We know well that there is an essential dynamic when we gather with other people, especially with our friends, that isn’t there when we are sitting alone in front of our computers at home or in our office. Hanging out with friends in person is far superior to a Google Hangout and that is much better that clicking the “like” button when your friend posts something on Facebook.

When it comes to liking life, clicking “like” isn’t going to get the job done.

It is not just that we need to put into action the directive to “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” We need to make sure we have neighbors in our lives. We need to interact with other people.

A significant nuance should not be overlooked. The term “v’ahavtah” does not mean “love” as in “like” or “appreciate.” It really means “be devoted to” or “act like you care about.” It is not an emotional term but a term of action. The “V’ahavtah” reading which follows the Sh’ma in every service is not about “Liking God no matter what you are doing,” though that is a nice sentiment. It is about “acting like you care about what God expects of you” no matter what you are doing or where you are or when. V’ahavtah l’rei-ekha kamokha, “Love thy neighbor as thyself” really means “Act like you care about your neighbor as much as you care about yourself.” It is a statement about how we should treat other people more than it is about how we should feel about them.

The problem, of course, is that we all too easily develop the belief that very few people whom we know well, or only a certain kind of people, qualify as our neighbors. We equip ourselves to treat others differently than we would want to be treated. The Jewish tradition is constantly working to correct that and throughout the year, we are reminded to “Remember the stranger for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.”

We were just like those different people over there. We were just like the new people who moved into our neighborhood, the new kid at school, the new employee at work. We were just like that woman dressed differently, that man from a distant land having trouble speaking our language. We have been the “them” for generation after generation. We know what it is like to be oppressed and yearn for freedom. We know what it is like to be bullied and praying for strength. We know what it is like to not be called “neighbor” and to not be treated with care. We know from over three thousand years of history how that feels. It is in that context we are to hear “Love thy neighbor as thyself.”

I am not going to tell you to stop sharing your joys and your sadness with “friends” on Facebook, some or many of whom, you may not really know. I am telling you that you need more than that in your life. I’m reminding you that life is much better lived not in isolation but among friends and neighbors. And that if you work at getting to know strangers, you might make them neighbors and friends.

And one last thing—a vitally important thing to mention on this night: tonight we come before God asking God to be gracious to us, to pardon our failings, to treat us kindly and generously, to be merciful. Our tradition challenges us: How can we ask that for ourselves if we are not willing to act that way toward others? To an extent, this day is all about those five words, “Love thy neighbor as thyself.”

Shanah Tovah and G’mar Hatimah Tovah!

May we all be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life for a good and happy year!