The Courage to Move Forward

James Tissot 
Spies Returning from 
Canaan

Our parasha for this week is crucial to understanding the Exodus story. A mere two years out of Egypt, the Israelites are about to enter the Promised Land. Moses sends 12 spies to reconnoiter the Land. Two of the spies, Joshua and Caleb, return confident that the Israelites can successfully conquer Canaan. The report of the other ten spies, however begin to sow doubt and fear into the minds of the Israelites. They weep and shout and cry that G-d has brought them into the wilderness to die by the sword. Caleb and Joshua exhort the people to be strong, trust in G-d, and enter the land. The people pelt them with stones. They refuse to listen and refuse to enter the land.

It is a turning point, a moment of crisis for the Jewish people, and they fail to answer the call. They lose their faith in G-d, in their leaders, and in themselves. It feels that we too are at a turning point in our country. We can either bravely enter the future, or we can lose our nerve, and, like the Israelites, turn back. It would not be the first time we have turned back as a nation. Today marks a holiday that many of us had never heard of. American Blacks have long acknowledged it as “Juneteenth”. On June 19^th, 1865 Union soldiers, led by Major General Gordon Granger, landed at Galveston, Texas with news that the war had ended and that the enslaved were now free.  Only two and a half years earlier, in 1863, President Abraham Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation  but it had  not freed  the slaves living   in Texas. Now, however, with the surrender of Lee’s Confederate forces and the arrival of the Union army in Texas, forces on the ground were finally strong enough to overcome resistance and enforce Emancipation.

One could say that Juneteenth has some things in common with Passover. Juneteenth is also a celebration of liberation from slavery. Just like Passover, celebrated in ancient times with a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, in the 19^th century Juneteenth was celebrated by many former slaves and their descendants with a pilgrimage to Galveston.

The ten years following the Civil War were called “Reconstruction”. It was a way forward – an attempt to introduce civil rights to the recently liberated African Americans. . However, the American people, like the Israelites in our Torah reading this week, lost our nerve, we turned back. We did not have the courage to continue down this path toward freedom for all. Southern States introduced legislation known as “Jim Crow” which legalized discrimination against blacks, enforced segregation and removed economic and political gains made by blacks during Reconstruction. Discrimination also persisted in the North, more subtly, perhaps, but just as damaging to the fabric American life. The Jim Crow era lasted until the 1960’s, when the Civil Rights movement pushed for the abolition of discriminatory legislation in the South.

Martin Luther King famously said that although he may not be privileged to enter the Promised Land, he, like, Moses, could see it. The Promised Land for King wasn’t a place, it was a vision of a time when, as he said, “All of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!” King articulated a vision of a future where we would all be liberated – from racism, from antisemitism, from homophobia and sexism, from ageism and ableism.

But we too have not yet entered that Promised Land. With regard to race, post 1960s, we have relegated millions of African Americans to second class citizenship through a criminal justice system which has incarcerated millions of Black citizens. Michelle Alexander’s book, published ten years ago, is called “The New Jim Crow”. It is must reading if you want to understand where we are in the process of liberating American Blacks from being an underclass to assuming their rightful place as equal American citizens.

We have all reawakened these past few weeks to the struggles of Black Americans. As Jews, as descendants of slaves ourselves, we have a special obligation to participate in the ongoing effort to liberate our country from the scourge of racism. We must try to imagine what America looks like to people of color by talking to them, building relationships with them, reading their words, and listening carefully as they describe their experiences.

To that let us say, Amen.

It's All in the Preparation

Depiction of the Menorah
sketched in Maimonides' own hand.

Our parasha for this week opens with the command that Aaron the High Priest is to be tasked with lighting the seven candles of the Menorah daily. This follows last week’s parasha, where the heads of each tribe bring gifts at the dedication of the Tabernacle. Neither Aaron, nor his family, nor his tribe are present in this gift giving ceremony.  Rabbi’s imagine that Aaron is disappointed in not being represented at this dedication of the sanctuary. So, G-d, by way of consoling Aaron, comes to him in this week’s parasha saying, “Do not be downcast, Aaron, for your role is greater than theirs!  It is your duty, and the duty of your descendants, to trim and light the wicks of the Menorah throughout the generations.”

Contrary to this midrash, which makes the lighting of the Menorah the purview of the High Priest and his family, the Talmud tells us that in the Temple in Jerusalem, the lighting of the Menorah could be done by a layperson. The only duty restricted to the Priest was to trim the wicks of the lamps. Once the Priest prepared the wicks for lighting, he could bring the Menorah out from the holy area where the layperson was not allowed, and the layperson could light the Menorah. Then the Priest would return the lit Menorah to its proper place in the Temple precinct.

It must have been considered a great honor for a layperson to have the privilege of lighting the menorah in the Temple in Jerusalem. To imagine what this must have meant, think of the excitement a person might feel were they asked to throw the first pitch of a Cubs baseball game. Or how it must feel to be asked to ring the bell to start the trading day on Wall Street. That is what it must have felt like to be asked to light the Menorah at the Temple in Jerusalem. And like those two secular events in our own time, the honor must have been given in recognition of an achievement or of a high position in government or industry. You cannot just walk off the street and throw the first pitch of a baseball game!

If the actual lighting of the Menorah can be done by a layperson, what does that teach us about what is left of the mitzvah for the priest – the preparing and the trimming of the wick.  We can reason from this that it is a greater mitzvah to prepare the candle for lighting than it is for the lighting itself.  This teaches us that preparing to do a mitzvah is more important than the performance of the mitzvah itself. Holiness is found in the preparation for a mitzvah even more so than carrying it out.

It is something to think about the next time we are studying a Torah portion to read it in synagogue, when we are getting dressed up to attend a service, when we are baking challah for Friday night or setting the table for our Shabbat dinner. The mitzvah is not only in chanting before the congregation in the synagogue, or in attending the service, or in eating the Challah, or in dining together. The greater mitzvah, according to the Rabbis, comes in the preparation to do all these things. These are the holiest of moments. We need to appreciate them as such.

Shabbat Shalom

The Murder of George Floyd

Dear Congregants and Friends,

Six days ago our nation and the world witnessed the killing, caught on camera, of George Floyd, a 46 year old Black American man in the custody of the Minneapolis Police Department. By now the horrific image has been seared into the consciousness of the American public - a Minneapolis police officer with his leg on the neck of a black man lying prone and handcuffed on the ground, the victim pleading with the officer that he cannot breathe, even calling out to his dead mother for help, while three other officers stand by and watch. By the time the paramedics arrived, George Floyd was unresponsive. Massive protests have erupted nationwide and in other countries against this travesty, emblematic of the racism and inequality that has long afflicted our country.

 

As we know this is not an isolated incident. We have become used to periodic reports of police violence against Black citizens, often caught on cell phones by passers-by. This is not a matter of a few over-zealous policemen. This is a problem of systemic racism. A recent Washington Post analysis showed that black Americans are shot and killed by police at a rate that is twice as high as for White Americans. Tragically this is happening with the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic which has struck far more members of the Black community than any other group in the United States.

 

We are all accountable for doing our part to end the racism that has long been part of American society. At times like this I am reminded of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel's statement published in an essay entitled, "Why I am Involved in the Peace Movement". He writes, "The more deeply immersed I became in the thinking of the Prophets, the more powerfully it became clear to me what the lives of the Prophets sought to convey: that morally speaking, there is no limit to the concern one must feel for the suffering of human beings, that indifference to evil is worse than evil itself, that in a free society, some are guilty, but all are responsible."

 

The Torah teaches us that we must "not stand by the blood of our neighbor". (Leviticus 19:15) We cannot do nothing. We must not look the other way. It is imperative we elect officials on the local, state and national levels who will make racial justice a priority in this country. We must speak out when we hear racist comments made by our family members, friends, fellow workers and business associates. We must demand that we end discrimination in all walks of life. We must work toward the day when equality truly exists for all Americans regardless of the color of their skin. Perhaps most of all we need to examine and discuss with family, friends, and neighbors our own attitudes toward African Americans, reflect on and discuss with people in our lives our own prejudices, our own biases. Let us make sure we are not part of the problem, but part of the solution.

Rabbi Marc Rudolph