I Am What I Am - Identity and Persecution

If you have been paying any attention to politics over the past few weeks, you know that they have been heated. All sorts of nasty names have been thrown around. Political interactions have been pretty heated for some time. Political advocates often demonize their opponents, wanting nothing to do with people like them, comparing them to the evils in their lives, or even some of the worst of history’s evils.

This attitude is far from a modern development. It has been found in every generation. For much of the past two thousand years, the Jewish people were often a primary target of such demonization. Some of the worst offenders in history compared the Jews to rats or to a plague.

And that’s where we are in the Torah this week, after a pharaoh arose, “who knew not Joseph.” Pharaoh told his advisors:

Behold, the Israelites have become many and great, as opposed to us. Let us deal wisely with them so that they may not increase, otherwise in the event of war, they might join our enemies, fighting against us, rising up from the ground.

Those last few words in particular caught my attention, “rising up from the ground,” “v’alah min Haaretz,” in the Hebrew. What rises up from the ground? What would Egyptians have thought of when they heard that phrase in reference to something that they didn’t want to see rising up from the ground? The first thing that occurred to me was likely what was intended, locusts.

The term for locust in Hebrew is Ravah. It is based on the root – Reish-Vav, which has to do with many. Using that Hebrew connection, in the context of worry about something multiplying and attacking, rising up from the ground, a slightly different translation would be more appropriate:

Behold, the Israelites have become an enormous swarm, apart from us. Let us deal wisely with them so that they do not multiply. Otherwise, in the event of a war, they might be added to our enemies, fighting against us, rising up from the ground.

That is a statement that might have been said by numerous rulers throughout history about their enemies or at least about people who are different, whose numbers are growing over and against their own.

In fact, it is regularly used, even today. Talk of “swarming” is all too normative for people who oppose immigration or are concerned specifically about America’s southern border or about refugees coming to Europe. That is how they often describe refugees and migrants. Seeing that term in the words of Pharaoh about the Israelites, who themselves were migrants, escaping famine, resonated with me.

It wasn’t just a matter of Pharaoh worried about a people who might politically cause problems, it was a matter of Pharaoh seeing the Israelites as a dangerous other, a swarm rising up from the ground.

Whenever we want to rally opposition against someone, an individual or a group, it often begins with showing how they are “other,” that they don’t really belong in the primary  group, and then, if that isn’t working or isn’t working fast enough, portraying that person or people as evil or even inhuman. If you consider the worst persecutions in history, the greatest oppressions, from genocidal wars to slavery, from religious persecution to forced marches, all of them have included some form of degradation and some level of demonization, used by those in power to justify the mistreatment they desire to do.

In politics today, it is normal to paint political opponents, not just as having a difference of opinion, but as motivated by evil intent. Some years ago, it occurred to me that political opponent shaming in America almost always resembles Antisemitism, even when the target isn’t Jewish. Antisemitism seems to be the paradigm for rallying opposition against anyone. Consider this:

The worst political opponents are called Nazis, people who hate children, racists, communists or socialists who would destroy businesses or greedy capitalists who hate and oppress workers, people who are called “Un-Christian,” had their group or national loyalty questioned, depicted as war mongers, or depicted as having their purity corrupted, perfidious, and manipulative, perhaps portrayed as someone who doesn’t care about the very lives of children, someone who is immoral, and maybe even called something “other,” such as a member of the all evil opposing party or hated group. This is so normal in our political dialogue that we hardly even pay attention to it.

But you get the idea. That list is the same list that was used against Jews in the 20^th Century by both the Nazis and the Soviet Union, though not all the same terms were used by each, of course.

Have we seen those terms being applied to non-Jewish members of the US Congress? To Presidents or Presidential candidates? It wouldn’t take you more than a moment to find such criticism, from the left against the right or right against the left, from within the Democratic party in criticism of those who refuse to vote with the rest of the party or when the Republicans have control, in criticism of their own too. In primary campaigns? Just… yikes! Difference of opinion these days is tantamount to waving an enemy flag.

Something that is increasingly concerning to me is that whenever any of these charges are made against any political opponent, there is the possibility that someone will remember the Antisemitism to which they’ve been exposed and connect the current criticism to Jews, thus increasing Antisemitism. For example, is there any question that when someone hears that a politician supports Wall Street and Banks? Or supports New York Liberal ideas? That people might think of the criticism, the traditional Antisemitism, that they have heard in relation to Jews?

We are, of course, particularly sensitive to all of this at this time of year, and especially tonight, when we feel our difference from those around us. It is Chinese and a Movie Night! The night when Jews are commanded by Tradition to indulge in salty foods, reminding us of the parting of the sea, using chopsticks that remind us of Aaron and Moses’ staves, which like us they seem to have dropped all the time, all the while eating eggrolls reminiscent of Moses in the basket, but better represented still by wonton soup! The tubs of popcorn at theaters to which we journey, now roughly the size of the great Pyramids, remind us of the abundance of sand across which we journeyed in the wilderness!

As an aside, that sort of Drash on foods and actions is exactly how Jews have retold stories and put meaning behind new traditions, generation after generation. It’s very similar to how the rabbis created Jewish meaning behind the actions of a Roman Symposium Meal with its story telling, courses of foods, and four cups of wine, turning it into our Passover Seder.

Among the movies that we might see this weekend is a fantastic Spiderman Movie, No Way Home. I saw it last week. If you’re a diehard fan of the MCU, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, you probably have already seen it. If not, it’s worth seeing and some of us probably will see it again.

Spiderman is one of those characters that is based on a public and private persona, like Superman. The private or hidden side is one for which if people knew the truth, it would cause problems. People would be afraid or act differently towards them. The public persona enables them to lead a normal life, or at least a life devoid of attention paid to their difference.

For generations, that was Jewish life. Also, I should mention, that was life for homosexuals too. If people knew… Well, depending on where you were and when, there could be problems. Your whole life, your whole world could come crashing down. To bring everything together could create problems.

I won’t tell you anything about the Spiderman movie, except that this is how it begins, with that barrier between public and private shattered. On the other hand, this week in our Torah portion, that very thing happens to Moses as well.

Moses’ true identity was hidden, until he was forced to make a decision between his public life and his private persona, the moment he defended a slave and attacked the overseer. He was suddenly a public Israelite. At that point, he had no choice but to flee.

If you think about it, Moses later actually proves Pharaoh’s prophecy correct, right down to locusts rising up from the ground and covering the land. 

Notably, what the story of the Exodus reminds us, and the story of Moses and the overseer in particular, is both that we cannot easily hide who we really are and that when we act like who we really are, we can be like Moses, or Superman, or Spiderman and use our difference, our unique set of skills and understanding, to overcome oppression and evil.

Sometimes, it benefits us to keep the different aspects of our lives separate, perhaps even hidden. We may see ourselves having dual identities, perhaps ones in conflict. Healing may only come with wholeness, the point when we allow what we have hidden to become part of who we are in public.

If you’re a fan of Marvel movies, there is another character who has a profound dual identity, the Hulk, a different times an unassuming calm headed scientist or a raging difficult to control monster, who is immediately recognizable. In a later movie, this duality is resolved by having the two parts exist together, the calm scientist keeping control of the mind as the monster form remains. The character then ceases to have conflicting identities and is happy.

For many Jews, finding this happy medium is difficult in America. They’re always worried about how others will view them. No few Jews have made Aliyah to Israel to alleviate the conflict, the allow themselves to feel comfortable as a public Jew.

It occurred to me, as I considered this, that when God speaks to Moses from the Burning Bush, Moses asks God:

When I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?” What shall I say to them?” and God responds, “Ehyeh asher Ehyeh,” “I am what I am,” or perhaps, “I will be what I will be.”

That God, who was known by many names and identities in ancient times, was telling Moses, “I am who I am. I have one identity.” And Moses himself would realize, “I am who I am as well. I have one identity too. I am a Child of Israel.”

It is, I think, only at that moment that Moses ceases to be afraid to be in public, what he had long been only in private, an Israelite.

Shabbat Shalom

 

 

The Meaning of Tisha b'Av

Tisha b'Av, the ninth of the month of Av, which begins at sundown tonight, is a holiday mourning the destruction of the 1st and 2nd Temples; hoping for their restoration and the Jewish people's return to worship in that space. The Temples were built on Mt. Zion, which is what is today called the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Functionally, Tisha b'Av is a 2,600 year old Zionist holiday, a least by the most basic definition of seeking a return to Zion.

Yes, there are other events that are now included in the Jewish people's mourning on Tisha b'Av including the expulsion of the Jews from Spain and the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto, but at its heart, Tisha b'Av is about a return to a restored Mt. Zion.

Those who believe that Zionism is fully a modern invention are wrong. Those who believe that Zionism is solely a response to events in Europe in the 20th Century are wrong. What changed at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th Centuries was that Jews, facing genocidal mobs in no few nations and severe bigotry even in the most welcoming of them, asked why Jews as a people should not assert our right to nationhood, like other peoples and nations, and to seek to return as a people to our ancestral land, from which we were violently expelled, and to which we had hoped to return for the entirety of our nearly 2,000 year exile as a people, to live in security and prosperity.

The answer, as we wept by the "waters of our Babylon" in numerous countries, was "Im tirzu, ein zo agada," "If you will it, it is no dream." And the Jewish people returned in larger and larger numbers, as refugees from persecution, were not welcomed, but were attacked and even massacred by inhabitants of the land whose ancestors had conquered the territory from its previous conquerers centuries earlier. But the people whose origin is in the land of Israel, the people of the Kingdom of Judah, who had been in exile, survived and re-founded a nation.

Tisha b'Av reminds us of more than just the times when we were exiled or faced tremendous loss as a people, it reminds us as well that whatever glories we might have or whatever temporary solace we may find, that we must ever be vigilant of threats. That it perhaps reminds us as well of difficulties faced by other peoples is inherent to the nature of the day, when we remember humankind's ability to act with inhumanity against Jews through generation after generation.

It is on Tisha b'Av, perhaps most of all, that Jews traditionally expressly hope for the coming of the Messianic Age, a time when such tragedies would end and peace would prevail. Today, many of us believe that bringing about that age requires our efforts rather than a divine act. May we act to bring about an age when the mourning of all peoples turns into laughter and joy.

Then the words of the prophet Isaiah will ring true and the day will come when people can turn their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, when nation will no longer lift up sword against nation, and their children won't ever have to learn of war.

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.

Reopening, Masks, Fear, and Courage

Friends, I appreciate all of the support and appreciation for what I said at the event for faith leaders (I speak 36 minutes in) and what I said on CNN with Don Lemon the other night. It's always nice to feel appreciated. I feel I need to clarify a few things.

First, I truly appreciated the opportunity to be able to share my thoughts and those of the Jewish community with the Vice President, Governor, and our Senators. That is an opportunity that doesn't come around very often in any circumstance. I am thankful and feel honored that I was considered and invited. I thank Gov. Reynolds and the White House for giving me the opportunity. We need dialogue that includes different points of view. That needs to be encouraged, especially in this polarized political climate. That said, even more diversity of respectful viewpoints would have been better. I was the only non-Christian clergy member in the group.

Second, I wore a mask at the event because as I stated on CNN Tonight, I wear one whenever I'm going out and going to be around people I am not normally around. Having survived bypass surgery, courage is going out and doing things while wearing a mask. It doesn't require being foolhardy and taking unnecessary risks. The greatest thing we have to fear, isn’t fear itself, it’s reality. We all need to address our reality in our own way. Those who have health concerns should consider wearing masks regardless of whether or not they're significantly afraid of getting COVID, just like people with risk factors for heart disease should consider keeping their Cholesterol low whether or not they think they’re at high risk for an immanent heart attack. Adapting to risk isn’t a sign of fear, it’s wisdom.

Those who have been around people who are known to have COVID should consider wearing masks, not because they think they're ill, but because they want to protect the health of those they come into contact with in case they are ill. A cloth mask may reduce your risk of inhaling viral material, though it is not as effective as a medical grade n95 mask, but it definitely helps prevent you from breathing, coughing, shouting, singing, or sneezing large droplets across a room.

Peer pressure, including political peer pressure, can be dangerous here, if it discourages those who should be wearing a mask from doing so, because they want their friends to like them, because it isn't comfortable to wear a mask and any excuse not to is easy to take, or because "they don't want to appear afraid."

Additionally, there are people who can't or shouldn't wear a mask because of their own health concerns. Rather than suggesting that such people not go out of their homes or that they accept grave risk, those of us who can wear a mask can do so to lessen their risk of catching COVID from us.

Third, I do not understand why wearing masks around our state and national officials is not required standard security protocol right now. We can debate whether or not the President, Vice President, or Governor should wear a mask themselves during a press conference or program and under what circumstances, with all sorts of arguments that can be made that they should be able to speak without them with certain protective measures like proper social distancing having been taken, but it really makes little sense at all that others who are attending in whatever fashion, as staff, as journalists, as clergy sharing their thoughts, or in any other way should even have the option not to wear one when around those leaders. 

Our elected officials have security personnel in place to prevent harm from coming to them and many measures are taken to prevent disruptions in the chain of command. A single person with COVID, even without a fever, could start coughing and within days put a political leader in the hospital or worse. Don't get me started about the obvious fact that people can take medicine to lower their temperatures, making the on the spot tests at events and programs highly unreliable, and expel a huge sneeze in a room full of important people. Even if the leaders just have to self-isolate for a few days, it is a disruption in leadership. Why isn't wearing a mask around them then a security issue? And around the VP and President wouldn’t it be a matter of national security? In fact, one could argue that this would be the case around the vitally important leaders of the task forces that are in place to help us fight the epidemic as well.

Wearing masks around people who might be vulnerable, and you may well not know who is vulnerable, should be expected, not just encouraged, for anyone who cares about the health of other people. In other words, for a while to come, in crowds of strangers, everyone should be wearing masks when they can and maintaining physical distance, especially if they can’t wear a mask or if they choose not to wear one for whatever reason, such as will be the case for diners in reopened restaurants.

Fourth, mitigation efforts were put in place to keep our hospitals from being overwhelmed. Restrictions on freedom are not tolerable for long and the idea that states of emergency can be maintained indefinitely without any legal challenges is anathema to democracy. We consider those concerns alongside the principle of pikuach nefesh in the Jewish tradition, saving a life. Our synagogues and temples aren't going to swiftly return to normal just because we're free to do so, if we wanted. Could is not Should.

We have significant numbers of people who attend our in-person services who are particularly vulnerable because of age or medical conditions. Many are elderly. No few attend because they’re facing health challenges. Others come because they’re thankful for finally overcoming them. We like to hug, which we cannot do right now. We like to have communal meals, which we cannot do right now. Our services are based on singing and chanting, which we cannot do right now.

We urgently want to return to anything like normalcy, but right now what we’re able to do in online services, singing and seeing each other’s smiles, celebrating Kiddush at the end of services with glasses held high together, is much closer to normal than what we would be able to do in person with social distancing, masks, and concerns about choral and communal singing. We have a history of adapting to challenging environments and we are up to the task in this one as well.

We will need to have people able to get back to work. The calculus that I’ve seen of “even if it saves one life” doesn’t work. Lockdowns are costing lives as well, some from depression and anxiety, some from people not going to the doctor or not taking care of their health in other ways including not being able to easily get away from abusive situations at home, and others will be lost from the impact of economic hardship in the aftermath of this, including ones lost because state and federal income along with income of vital institutions will be severely impacted until well after the economy begins to recover, harming the ability to maintain and fund helpful programs,. So many beloved communal institutions that are desired and needed are being crushed by extreme financial shortfalls.

Yes, if we open too soon and without proper precautions, we could see a return to concerns about rising cases. We could open up and then have to close down again. We know that spread will increase as we reopen our economy and people physically interact. That is certain. But there are also grave consequences for remaining closed.

None of this is simple. We need to work together. It is important to “reopen” safely and responsibly. We need to focus attention on those who are most at risk, but understand that everyone, including children, is at some risk, potentially other than those who have immunity from having had COVID and recovered from it, if that really provides lasting immunity (and assuming we have a reliable test). We need readily available PPE and we need easily accessible rapid testing. Some things realistically can't happen until we have a vaccine. 

We cannot go through life avoiding all risk. But we don’t need to be foolhardy either. 

Wear a mask appropriately. Keep social distancing. Keep washing your hands.

Reach out to your family and friends. Support those who are in need.

Take care of your health, mental and physical.

Be gracious to people as well. We don’t all see things the same way. Some readers are without a doubt thinking of arguments against some of the points that I have made. Be willing to listen to the views and concerns of others as much as you are to share your own opinions. And give people a break! 

We’re all stressed out. Even though you may be super on edge, others may even be worse off. That stressed out grumpy person in the store may be unable to visit a family member in the ICU or maybe just lost a job and is wondering how they’re going to pay for groceries next month.

People who you know are going to get sick. You might, yourself.

People who you know may even be hospitalized. You might, yourself.

Many of us already have had people near and dear to us die of COVID.

This has been an awful experience for many people.

All lives are precious.

Be gracious. Be humble. Remember the words of Hillel, “When those around you are not acting like human beings, be a human being.” Try to be a mensch.

It isn’t going to be easy to get through this. Getting through it isn’t going to be about not being afraid, when fear is appropriate. It’s going to be about courage, facing our fears, and about wisdom, facing our fears in the wisest of ways, responsibly. It is not courageous to deny reality. Courage is accepting the challenges that reality presents and taking them on. Wisdom is understanding if, when, and how to do so.

We don’t need to take unnecessary risks, but living life is in part about taking them.

In our highly polarized environment, this is precisely a time for moderation. I am glad that I have been able to play a part in finding the right path. I hope that we as a nation will be able to work together. We will make it through this because we acted wisely and courageously, with concern about the possible rapid spread of illness and impacts upon those who are vulnerable and concern about freedom and the economy, not only focusing on some of these and not the others.

Love your neighbor and 

Love yourself.

It will be dark for a while, but a new dawn will rise before long.

Statement on the Possibility of Returning to In Person Services at the Meeting with the Vice President - May 8 2020

This is the text that I prepared for my statement. I offered a slightly different statement live in the actual meeting. You can find it at this link on the C-Span website with my part beginning at about 36:30. Here is my prepared statement:

Thank you for inviting me to participate, today. I appreciate having the opportunity to express the thoughts and concerns of the Iowa Jewish communities this morning about resuming in-person worship.

The leaders of the Jewish communities across Iowa have been holding a weekly online meeting to check in with one another about what is going on in our communities and what concerns we all have. Additionally, my congregation just had a meeting to discuss possible parameters for reopening at some point in the future. There is uniform agreement that it would be inadvisable for us to do so in the near future and especially not with rising case counts in our communities.

First, the population that regularly attends worship is significantly comprised of people who are vulnerable, either people over 70 years of age or people who have or are recovering from illness and are seeking spiritual support amid their health battles or attend to offer thanksgiving for recovering from them. None of those people should attend such gatherings right now and that would significantly impact any return to in person worship. With added concerns about younger people also having complications after contracting COVID, we cannot ignore risk to younger members of our communities as well.

Some of us in the clergy are also high risk ourselves from other medical conditions. I am recovering from Quadruple Bypass surgery that I had at the end of August.

Second, we are a people who like to hug, to eat together, and perhaps most relevant of all, to sing together. Public singing right now in any sort of confined space is very problematic. Singing increases spread of germs and may result in the rapid spread of illness through congregations, especially among members of choirs.

Third, while online worship doesn’t offer the same sense of fellowship that in person worship does and we miss that greatly, we can conduct our services with singing in a safe environment while gathering spiritually. When this crisis is over, we will continue to live-stream our services so that those who are unable to attend physically for whatever reason are still able to join us. This is also true for educational programming. We have also found ways to adapt life cycle events to online platforms, though they are perhaps a bit awkward.

The Jewish community statewide doesn’t see a pressing need to resume in person worship services. We will create new programs, services, and religious experiences to adapt to current needs. It’s what we have done through numerous times of difficulty in the past.

Finally, opening up will functionally require an end to a need for social distancing, and antibody testing to know who may be immune. Without these, it will be difficult, if not impossible, for us to return to something like the situation prior to March of this year.

There is perhaps no one who wants to return to normalcy and celebrations of communal joy and communal support for mourners than the Jewish community and we eagerly look forward to the day when we’ll be able to celebrate together in large numbers in person. Our tradition greatly values communal worship and the concept of the minyan in which the presence of God is found when ten or more are present. We urgently wish to return to worship in person.

We just do not believe that time is now or necessarily in the immediate future and are currently considering alternative plans for the celebration of the Jewish High Holidays in the fall.

Thankful for Every New Moment - My Heart Bypass Story

The last weekend in January, I took a few days of vacation to run the Arizona Rock ‘n Roll Half Marathon in Tempe, Arizona. I raised several hundred dollars for St. Jude’s Childhood Cancer research. My time was a bit slower than my normal, but I figured maybe I was just a bit off from having flown in the day before.

The second weekend in April, I drove down to Kansas City and finished the Garmin Land of Oz Half Marathon. By the end, I was dragging. I finished nearly a half an hour off of my best time. I’ve finished 15 Half Marathons, 13.1 mile races, and one Marathon, 26.2 miles, over the past 5 years. Six in the calendar year, when I finished the race in April. Though, I wasn’t exactly setting land-speed records, I thought I was in pretty good cardio-vascular shape.

When I go to camp, in July, I take some time to run. This year, I tried. I could run for a bit, but mostly had to walk. I thought I had bronchitis, which I probably did. My doctor called in a prescription for anti-biotics and soon my cough went away.

A few days after I returned to Des Moines from camp, we flew to Orlando, to Universal Studios, for a family vacation. We walked all over the parks. Probably six miles a day. I had to rest every now and then, but we rode just about every ride, including going on some of those “People with Heart Problems are discouraged from riding this ride” roller coasters multiple times in row. Yes, I am a roller coaster fan. The faster and more time spent upside down the better!

We went to Volcano Bay, Universal Studios waterpark, and of course, I had to go on the fastest, most intense water slide, right away. Over 200 steps up and a straight vertical drop for a couple of seconds. You reach the bottom pool in seven seconds. I had to stop and rest to catch my breath about ¾ of the way up the stairs, each of the five times that I climbed them. Since, I’ve been running long distances, I have gotten fairly used to never being tired unless I’ve been doing something fairly intense. I was a surprised at being tired.

We were back in Des Moines for a few days and then we flew to North Carolina for my wife’s family’s reunion. With a brother in Japan and nephews in France and Switzerland as well as in a couple of different US states, it isn’t often that they’re all together. As it is, one of the French nephews couldn’t attend.

One of the things one does in the mountains is hike. When we went hiking, I found myself winded pretty easily. I couldn’t keep up. I started to suspect that a medicine that I had been taking for a while might be preventing my heart from working as fast as it needed to work. I didn’t feel bad, just tired, and I was fine after I slowed down. I called to set an appointment to meet with my doctor about it after I got back. The appointment was a couple of weeks out.

We got back to Des Moines in time for the state fair. I went three times. Each time, I was tired pretty easily walking around. I never went up the hill this year. On the way back to the car, the second time I went, I had to stop several times to catch my breath. Again, after resting a bit, things seemed okay. That night I was winded walking up a flight of stairs at home.

Now, I was quite concerned. It’s scary to not be able to breathe.

I didn’t want to wait for my scheduled doctor’s appointment, the next day. I called and asked to see whomever was available. I got in with a different doctor that afternoon.

My EKG was normal. My heart sounded normal. My blood pressure was slightly up, but not high. My cholesterol was good. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but said, “If this is only happening when your system is under stress, we should get a stress test. It might be something electrical. The stress test would show that.” The first available stress test was nearly a week out on Wednesday.

The next day, we went to the fair again, on our 25^th wedding anniversary, we went to see our favorite comedian perform. Again, I had to stop several times on the way back to the car. It felt like I was under water too long. But again, after resting a bit, things seemed okay.

The day before the stress test, I drove three other local Jewish professionals to Cedar Rapids, over 2 hours each way, for our Iowa Jewish Professionals meeting.

The next day, Wednesday, I took my stress test.

They started off giving me an EKG, which was again clear. They did an Echocardiogram as well, which looked good. Then they had me get on the treadmill. It was fairly clear fairly quickly that something was wrong. My heart rate needed to get up to 90% of my max, but well short of that my EKG started to get wonky. They stopped the test and had me lay down to do another Echocardiogram. A few minutes later, I was downstairs in the cardiologist’s office.

They did another EKG then, which came back normal.

A few minutes after that, the doctor came in to see me:

I think it fairly certain that you have a blockage and I’m fairly certain that it’s in a pretty bad location. You need an angiogram. They’ll inject dye into your veins and that will show them where the blockage is. My guess is that you’ll need a stent and probably will have to stay overnight at the hospital. Normally, I’d ask you which doctor and which hospital you want, but you’re lucky. You get to have the first available appointment! As long as your EKG stays normal, you can go home tonight, but if you feel like you have felt when you’ve been short of breath, don’t call your wife or me, call 911.

On Thursday morning, I went downtown for the angiogram. They explained what they were going to do and all the risks. If they found something, which they anticipated, they would put in a stent if they thought that would work. Otherwise, if things were bad, they’d stop and we’d reassess for treatment another day. Then the nurse put in the IV line. They wheeled me into the OR and I was out like a light.

I woke up a while later and the doctor came in to see us. “We had to stop. You have several major blockages. You need bypass surgery.” Another doctor told me that one of the blockages is normally discovered by the forensic pathologist and that I was extremely lucky.

They weren’t going to let me go anywhere. Rather quickly, I was given a room and put on a blood thinner. They scheduled the surgery for Monday, an expected Triple Bypass, but told me that if anything happened in the interim, I’d be going to surgery right away.

My cardiologist came in and told me that I’d had this condition to a pretty severe degree for a very long time. My heart had created natural bypasses, collaterals, veins that went around the blockages. Those were what was enabling my heart to perform okay on a resting EKG. They just weren’t providing enough blood flow to allow my heart to do anything more than that at this point, because blood flow was so limited.

That Saturday, I walked a little in the hallway with my IV pole in tow. I could walk about 100 feet before I was very tired. I was afraid that I would need the surgery right away; that I wasn’t even going to make it to Monday. But I did.

People kept asking me if I was afraid about the surgery. I really wasn’t. I had been afraid all of those times when I couldn’t breathe. I was upset that I had made my family stress out. When I started running in early 2015, I did so because I wanted to prevent exactly this sort of thing. I wanted to get myself healthy and thought I had done a pretty good job of it, shedding weight and getting my heart in shape. I didn’t know that by that point, most, if not almost all, of the damage was already done.

I just kept thinking of all of the times, running dozens upon dozens of examples through my mind, when the worst could have happened. I thought about how miraculous it is, in fact, that it didn’t happen, all things considered. How many times had I gone on long runs? How many trips had I been on? Several times to Israel. Long drives in the car by myself? Those times when I was running by myself on the sports’ fields at camp while everyone else was at lunch. No one else around for an hour. And on and on.

No, I wasn’t afraid of the surgery so much as relieved for having made it to surgery and hopeful that it would be fixed. One doctor told me that with decent blood flow to my heart, I would likely find myself able to do far better at my running than I had before. I was hopeful.

I ended up having Quadruple Bypass surgery, which they tell me, went extremely well.

Recovery isn’t and hasn’t been easy. I have been able to get moving a little easier than most people would. The rest of me was in pretty good shape. But coughing and laughing hurt for a while. Sneezing, hurt a lot. And a week after surgery, when my kids decided to play some funny videos on their phones and were laughing, it hurt when I joined in. I had to ask them to stop making me laugh and I love to laugh.

It’s was especially hard for me not to be able to do all of the things I would like to do with my family and friends over the past few weeks. No, I am not going to be running the Des Moines Half Marathon again this month. I deferred my entry to next October. It’s also been difficult for me to not be able to be there for you as rabbi as much and in the ways that I would have liked since this began. Being tired while recovering is a real thing.

What has made it all better for me is the tremendous amount of support that my family and I have received. So many people have reached out in concern. Again, your support has meant a great deal. Thank you.

Today, Yom Kippur, it is said that we Jews rehearse our death. We contemplate what will happen when the end comes. What will be accrued to our benefit? What to our detriment? Have we had a positive impact on people’s lives? Can we do better? If we heard eulogies about us, what would they say?

Over the past couple of months, I have had the opportunity to hear some of these things about me. Thank you for all of your beautiful sentiments, heartfelt thanks and concerns, and wishes for a full and speedy recovery.

I have also had ample opportunity to imagine not being here today. To not have been here, to not have experienced so many wonderful things over the years, to not have been able to be there to help others either. It’s been quite a time of Cheshbon Nefesh, of an accounting of the soul.

This morning, we read, “Atem Nitzavim hayom kul’chem lifnei Adonai Eloheichem,” “You stand this day, all of you, before Adonai your God.” It is a passage that reminds us that today, we should humble ourselves, recalling the dictum of the rabbis, “Da lifnei mi atah omeid,” “Know before whom you stand.” Think about what it means to be where you are. For me, this is not just about before whom, but how and why.

Why are we here today? What has our journey been to reach this place? Thinking not only of physical movement, but of thoughts and feelings. Am I appreciative? Do I want things to change? Am I willing to do what is necessary to bring about the changes that I would like to see? In my life, what do I stand for? How did I arrive here at this moment? Would I like to be in a different place physically, spiritually, mentally?

This afternoon, during our Healing service, I will come up to stand before the open ark thanking God for allowing me to reach this day, for the many miracles, far too many to count, that have enabled it to come to pass, for the skill of my healthcare providers, for loving family and friends who lifted my spirits and may well have given me a lift in their cars to go out as well, and for all of those whose thoughts and prayers helped bring me healing of spirit as well as body. It will be all the more meaningful a service this year and every year going forward for me.

I have come to realize that every moment is one deserving a Shehecheyanu:

“Baruch atah, Adonai Eloheinu, Melech haolam, shehecheyanu, v'kiy'manu, v'higiyanu laz'man hazeh.”

“Blessed are you, Adonai, our God, Ruler of the Universe, for keeping us alive, sustaining us, and enabling us to reach this moment.”

L’shanah Tovah tikateivu v’teihateimu.

May we all be inscribed and sealed in the book of life for a good and healthy new year.

Unetaneh Tokef. Life Happens.

***Six weeks before delivering this sermon, I had quadruple bypass surgery.***

Many things have happened in this past year, some good, some not so good. On the bright side, this past year, over the past couple of months, I learned to be less concerned about having my blood drawn.

I am thankful to be able to be here today. I’m not 100% yet. It isn’t an easy or short recovery. My voice isn’t what it normally is and you’ll have to bear with me coughing now and then.

Before I continue, I wanted to thank you for the tremendous amount of support that my family and I have received. So many people have reached out in concern, sent notes of support, and made donations for my recovery. Your support has meant a great deal. Thank you. 

[Personal thank yous to my family, friends, and congregational leaders followed, which I have not included here.]

Today, in the context of what happened to me, I want to talk about a traditional prayer that is difficult for most of us to deal with conceptually. The Unetaneh Tokef prayer tells us that God determines not only who lives and who dies, inscribing some in the Book of Life and not others. We are told:

On Rosh Hashanah it is inscribed,

And on Yom Kippur it is sealed.

How many shall pass away and how many shall be born,

Who shall live and who shall die,

Who shall reach the end of his days and who shall not,

Who shall perish by water and who by fire,

Who by sword and who by wild beast,

Who by famine and who by thirst,

Who by earthquake and who by plague…

The statement concludes:

But repentance, prayer and righteousness avert the severe decree.

Most of us do not believe in this sort of theodicy, this sort of understanding of divine judgement, the causing of blessing or curse, with reward or punishment. I have long argued against this concept as traditionally understood. With my recent ailment, though I’m still not a believer in this idea, I’ve come to see this portion of our service in a slightly different way.

The purpose of this prayer is truly to try to help us to find order in what otherwise would appear to be chaos, seemingly random chance. We know that bad things happen. We know too that they don’t just happen to bad people; they happen to good people as well. And more importantly than this abstract conception:

They happen to us and they can happen suddenly.

• ·      We live in a world in which we can set the temperature of our homes and cars to whatever temperature we like.
• ·      We can wear clothing that is impervious to rain, keeping us dry in the worst of downpours.
• ·      We can have food from just about every restaurant in town delivered to our homes for a nominal delivery fee or even for free!
• ·      We know about and can monitor and treat high cholesterol and high blood pressure.
• ·      We can use a laser to fix our eyesight in addition to wearing glasses.
• ·      We have ways to treat some of the worst of diseases, ones that once would have taken lives before we were even aware of them.
• ·      We can ask a wireless device in our homes to turn on the lights, open the shades, play our favorite music, read us a book, change the channel, or order us a new pair of jeans to be delivered free of charge to our doorstep in less than two days. We can even do these things from wherever we are on our cell phones.

We appear to be in control of our lives, much of the time. But we’re not. We’re truly not. It’s an illusion.

Life happens. Some people prefer to use a different word than “life” in that statement, especially when the results are not good ones. Life happens and sometimes what life brings isn’t remotely ideal.

This High Holidays, Jews around the world remember those who were killed over the past year, simply because they were Jews. It has not been a good year for us as a people.

Lori Kaye was shot and killed in the shooting in Poway, California five months ago. It’s hard to believe it was only at the end of April. Lori evidently confronted the shooter near the door. In addition to supporting the synagogue, Lori was heavily involved in raising money to combat Childhood Cancer and for Chai Lifeline which aids families with seriously ill children. By all accounts, she was an eishet chayil, a woman of valor, a woman of courage. She fought her own battle with illness and was doing well. A few months prior, she celebrated her 60^th Birthday and posted about it on Facebook. She wrote:

"Fearless at 60! As I enter a new decade, I am full of "gratitude" & thankfulness for the many blessings in my life. As I said on my 40th & 50th birthdays:

Life is not measured by the breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away."

Unetaneh Tokef. “The moments that take our breath away.”

So many of us here have our own lived examples and those of our loved ones, times when life happened. Unetaneh Tokef is a painful prayer. It makes us remember. It makes us think about seeming randomness, chaos, and things beyond our control that happen to us, to our friends and family members, or to others. It’s both the hurricanes far away from us and the whirlwinds that strike our homes.

Some of us have had the opportunity to live in times of blessing, of prosperity and relative security. For others, the Kol Nidrei prayer, for which this evening’s service is named, was a way of coping with being forced to face and do what they neither wanted to face or do. Living under threat, they had to swear oaths that they did not believe and act as they would not or could not act.

Unetaneh Tokef. Life in the places and times they lived brought them challenges, difficulties, threats, not just opportunities and blessings.

The Unetaneh Tokef prayer is both about those who died before their time and those who lived ad meah v’esrim, to 120. It’s about those whose businesses became successful and those who tried, tried again, and failed over and over. It’s also about those who have been struck with illness. Some of us, this past year, found out that we weren’t quite as healthy as we thought and suddenly faced severe challenges.

Unetaneh Tokef. You need surgery. Or

Unetaneh Tokef. You need radiation. Or

Unetaneh Tokef. You need to radically change your diet, your lifestyle. No more fried cheesecake at the fair for you! No more rushing from task to task while barely taking the time to breathe or taking time to care for yourself.

New priorities---- breathe. Take time for yourself to make yourself what you need to be. Prioritize your health.

But Unetaneh Tokef. Sometimes, no matter what you do… Life happens.

You can get out there and run, three times a week. Three 10Ks a week. You can run Half Marathons. You can be on the right medicines and seeing a doctor regularly.

Unetaneh Tokef. Do you have a family history? Yes.

“You won the lottery,” the doctor said, “Genetics.” Control is a delusion. No matter how much control we think we have, we really don’t have the ability to bring it all under our control. We may not have much of an ability to control at all.

Unetaneh Tokef. Life happens.

What we can do is do our best to adapt to it in the best ways. How we respond when life happens is really what defines who we are.

• ·      It’s not difficult to smile when everything goes our way. It may be difficult to remain humble when everything and everyone around us seem to elevate us.
• ·      It’s not difficult to feel depressed or sad when everything is going wrong, when bad things have happened. It may be difficult to react with hopefulness and seek happiness, when they do.
• ·      It’s not difficult to avoid action when action is painful. “Doctor, it hurts when I do this.” “Don’t do that.” So easy. But it may be difficult to get moving and endure it as we move on and get better. Rehab can be painful and tiring. But after rehab, hopefully, less pain and more energy.

Unetaneh Tokef. Life happens. The challenge before us when it does happen is to do what is difficult.

L’shanah Tovah Tikateivu v’teiteimu.

May we all be inscribed and sealed for a good and sweet and healthy and blessed New Year.

But if the coming year doesn’t bring some or even any of these things,

May we do our best to do the difficult and

Help and support each other as we do so, 

Just as you have done for me and for my family.

We’ll make the next year and the years to come, the best that we can make them.

Good yom tov.