Parasha Toldot -- Raising Children

I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving with family and friends. Middy and I spent the holiday in Connecticut with our son Mario and his wife and two children. Our son Ariel joined us there. On Sunday all of us guys went on a hike in a game reservation. We hiked about a mile to the summit of a lookout, then walked down just before sunset. As we were walking down, my two grandchildren, boys ages 9 and 6, were having a grand time together. Ariel looked at me and his big brother, Mario and asked,  “Do you think that they will always get along like that?” Before anyone could say anything he asked, “Did you get along with your brother like that, Dad?” I told him that my brother and I were close in childhood, but our interests diverged as we approached adolescence and we went on to lead very different lives. I thought to myself that it is wonderful when siblings can be friends, as our two sons are, but it doesn’t always work out that way.

Is it all about parenting? Rabbi Sydney Greenberg, z”l tells the story of one student of child behavior who frequently delivered a lecture entitled, “Ten Commandments For Parents.”  He married and became a father.  He changed the title of his lecture to “Ten Hints For Parents.”  A second child was born and the lecture title became “Some Suggestions For Parents.”  When a third child arrived the lecturer simply stopped lecturing.

Despite having the same parents, growing up in the same household, and being exposed to the same influences, siblings often grow up to develop different talents, pursue different interests, and often see the world in different ways.  The late Gershom Scholem, of whom I spoke earlier, was one of four brothers.  One of them was attracted to no ideals or movements.  One became a right wing German nationalist.  A third, turned communist, was a member of the Reichstag and was killed by the Nazis in Buchenwald.  Of course, Gershom himself emigrated to pre-state Israel and devoted his life to studying and teaching our heritage.  But these differences pale in comparison with the siblings we meet in this week’s Torah portion.

Jacob and Esau are twin brothers born to Isaac and Rebecca after twenty years of infertility. You can imagine how happy this couple must have been to give birth to two sons after such a long period of childlessness. Right from birth they were totally different. Esau was a robust child who was born first. His head was covered with so much hair it gave him the appearance of an older child, not a newborn. Jacob was born second, grasping onto the heel of his older brother. Rashi cites a midrash that says that Jacob was conceived first, and should have legitimately been born first. His grasping of the heel was to try to prevent Esau from being first born.

Thus, the competition between these two brothers was present right from the get- go According to the rabbis, they were relatively similar to one another as children. But, as they reached adolescence their differences began to emerge.  Esau was an active man, an athlete and a hunter. Jacob was a quiet, studious sort, preferring the comforts of home to the challenges of the outdoor life. The Torah does not make a moral judgement on their character or their behaviors. Later rabbinic thought, however, idealizes Jacob and demonizes Esav.

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, living in Germany in the 19^th century, accepts the Rabbi’s assertion that Jacob was virtuous and Esau was wicked.  He attributes the differences between Jacob and Esau to the mistakes that their parents made in raising them.  Esau could have turned out more like Jacob, according to Hirsch, had their parents recognized each one’s natural proclivities and tailored their education to take advantage of each one’s unique talents. Instead, Hirsch maintains, they educated the boys in the same way and treated them similarly. This worked out great for Jacob, who “drew with ever growing zeal from the well of wisdom and truth”. But Esau could not wait until his schooling was over, when he could throw away his books and set out on life. According to Hirsch, had Isaac and Rebecca been more sensitive to what Esau needed, he could have grown up to become a more virtuous, well rounded individual.

I’m not so sure about that!  Children are subject to many influences which help mold their lives and that are beyond the control of parents. As parents, we all make mistakes. No one is perfect, or omniscient, and can know exactly what each particular child needs. To hold ourselves solely responsible when our children do not turn out the way we hoped is a tendency we ought to resist.  It is not that we should totally absolve ourselves of all responsibility when it comes to who our children turn out to be – but we ought to maintain a reasonable perspective.  Nor should we succumb to the illusion that when things turn out well it is all to our credit. Parenting is a humbling undertaking. Parents can only do their best – and hope that when our children themselves become parents that they will do even better.

Shabbat Shalom

Lech Lecha and the Elections -- Going Forward From Here

Does it not seem like a long time since the Chicago Cubs won the World Series?  Last Friday night we were all gathered right here in our sanctuary celebrating the historic victory. What has happened to that spirit of joy and solidarity that we all experienced?  What happened?   The   election of Donald Trump to the Presidency of the United States is what happened! In place of feelings of unity, joy and community that we experienced last week, there are feelings of fear, of division and of anxiety. The popular vote was pretty much split down the middle.  Half of the people in our country believe that the country has made a terrible mistake.  That half is worried about the future of our great nation. The other half of the country believes that in electing Donald Trump we have narrowly avoided a disaster. That half is relieved that our great nation is finally on the right path forward. One half of the nation is rejoicing in the election of our new President to be. The other half is dejected and demoralized by that very choice.  As we all know this has been one of the most divisive elections in our history. It has been an election like none in our lifetime, and perhaps like none in American history. We have lived through something unique and historic.

In our parasha for this week, Abraham is told by G-d to leave his home and go to a land that G-d will show him. So, Abraham sets out into the unknown. It is an unknown destination, and an unknown future.  In many ways, regardless of who you voted for, we all feel a little of what Abraham must have felt when he headed into an unknown future. The President of the United States holds the most powerful position in the world. Yet, no newly elected President has any experience whatsoever being the President of the United States. There is no internship for it, no formal training, and no apprenticeship. Only three Presidents of the United States were elected without previous political experience – Zachary Taylor, US Grant and Dwight D. Eisenhower. However, they were all leaders of men -- Generals in the United States military.

Protests have already broken out in 25 cities across the United States in reaction to the election. Protesters chanted “Not My President” in demonstrations across the country. A few thousand people demonstrated in Chicago. In Los Angeles, 1500 High School students left class in a non-violent protest against the election.

Of course, they are fundamentally protesting because they are frightened. They are scared of the unknown, scared for themselves and scared for America.

They have reason to be scared. During the campaign, Donald Trump promised to do a lot of things that many considered unwise and some considered dangerous.  He also expressed frightening opinions about different groups of people who are part of the fabric of our nation. We learned alarming things about his behavior, both past and present. Both his rhetoric and his ideas on how to address crucial issues in our country and around the world were deeply disturbing to millions of our fellow Americans as well as many others around the world.

A couple of days after he won the election, I came across a sermon by Rabbi Mitch Wohlberg of Beth Tifiloh Congregation, an Orthodox synagogue in Baltimore. Rabbi Wohberg’s words made me feel a bit more optimistic about the future.  I want to share some of what Rabbi Wohlberg said with you this evening in the hope that, if you are worried about what a Trump Presidency will look like, you may find some comfort as well.

Rabbi Wohlberg quotes Mark Cuban, a Jewish billionaire, owner of the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, and a severe Trump critic. Mark Cuban tweeted, “We all need to give President-Elect Trump a chance. Support the good. Lobby against what we disagree on. No one is bigger than us all.” I am glad he reminded us of this, as it is the Jewish way. Our tradition tells us to judge people, “lechaf zechut” – giving them the benefit of the doubt. But as Jews and as Americans, we have the responsibility to speak up when we disagree.

Why should we have any hope that President elect Donald Trump will speak and act any differently in the future? Rabbi Wohlberg referred to a Midrash related to this week’s Torah reading that highlights possibility of change. In the beginning of our Parasha G-d tells Avram and Sarai that they will become a great nation and that their name will become great. But years pass, and they have no children. They have no one to carry on after them, and they are in despair. G-d takes Avram and tells him to look into the heavens. G-d tells him that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the sky. On the face of it, G-d is simply reassuring Avram that he and his wife will eventually have children, despite their advanced age. But the rabbis see something deeper. The rabbis say that when Avram is gazing at the stars, he is really reading his horoscope. He sees in his horoscope that he is not destined to have a child with Sarai. G-d tells him that he is correct!  As Avram and Sarai, they are not destined to have a child. However, because of their great faith, G-d is going to change their names. As Avraham and Sarah, they will have a child. Now, says G-d, look at your horoscope again, using the moment of your name change as the moment of your birth.  When Avraham recalculates their horoscopes keeping in mind this new moment of birth he sees that he and Sarah are destined to give birth to a son.

Donald Trump is, in a way, also getting a new name. His name is being changed from Donald Trump to Mr. President. With that new name come new and daunting responsibilities, and a new destiny.  In order to be a successful President, Donald Trump will have to work long and hard to unite the country. In order to be a successful President he has to bring us together. He cannot govern a country successfully where one half of the country is constantly at war with the other half. As President Donald Trump, he needs to slowly build consensus.  Regardless of our positions we all need to help him do just that.

Remember that when Ariel Sharon was Prime Minister of Israel, he oversaw the dismantling of Israeli settlements in the Gaza strip that displaced 8000 people. This was the same Ariel Sharon who was one of the primary architects of the settler movement. When right wing critics and former allies wondered how he could make such an about face, he famously replied, “The view from here is different from the view from there.” Becoming the head of the government, responsible for the welfare of your nation, is different from being the leader of a party or a political candidate. Let’s hope President elect Trump understands that.

These are the words that give me hope that the President-elect will become President for all the people, and not just the people who voted for him. These are the words that give me some hope to believe that a President Trump will temper the words and policies of Candidate Trump. These are the words that lead me to say, “Let’s give him a chance -- let’s withhold our judgement about how he may be as President.” And if that hope does not materialize, we must remember that we are a free people. The fate of our country is in our own hands. Though our country is not without its problems, none of us need surrender to hopelessness, despair or paralysis. We are all co-writers of the story of the United States of America and we should resolutely bear responsibility for that story. This responsibility gives us the opportunity to renew and to build and to strengthen the future of this nation in which we are all the primary authors. Please join me now as we recite the prayer for our country on page 418.

“Sovereign of the universe, mercifully receive our prayer for our land and its government. Let your blessing pour out on this land and on all officials of this country who are occupied, in good faith, with the public needs. Instruct them from your Torah’s laws, enable them to understand your principles of justice, so that peace and tranquility, happiness and freedom, might never turn away from our land. Please, Wise One, God of the lifebreath of all flesh, waken your spirit within all inhabitants of our land, and plant among the peoples of different nationalities and faiths who dwell here, love and brotherhood, peace and friendship. Uproot from their hearts all hatred and enmity, all jealousy and vying for supremacy. Fulfill the yearning of all the people of our country to speak proudly in its honor. Fulfill their desire to see it become a light to all nations.”

Amen, Shabbat Shalom

What Do Noah and Cubs Fans Have in Common?

Hank Greenberg was arguably the greatest Jewish baseball player of all time. Born, Hyman Greenberg, in 1911, he played first base for the Detroit Tigers in the 1930’s and 1940’s. Known also as “Hammerin’ Hank Greenberg and “Hankus Pankus”, Greenberg is a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. In 1934, Greenberg, his team in the middle of the American League pennant race, famously refused to play on Yom Kippur. Greenberg wrote in his biography, “The team was fighting for first place, and I was probably the only batter in the lineup who was not in a slump. But in the Jewish religion, it is traditional that one observe the holiday solemnly, with prayer.” His refusal to play on Yom Kippur was immortalized in a poem by Edward Guest which goes as follows:

"Came Yom Kippur — [holy-fast -day] world-wide-over to the Jew,

And Hank Greenberg to his teaching and the old tradition true

Spent the day among his people and he didn't come to play.

Said Murphy to Mulrooney, 'We shall lose the game today!

We shall miss him on the infield and shall miss him at the bat

But he's true to his religion — and I honor him for that!'"

There has always been a special relationship between Jews and baseball. Jewish lore has it that in 1903 when the young Talmudic scholar Louis Ginzberg joined the faculty of the Jewish Theological Seminary, he was advised by the legendary Chancellor Solomon Schecter to master baseball. “You can’t be a rabbi in America without understanding baseball,” said Schecter to his protégée.  Ginzberg went on to master both the Talmud and baseball! Over a century ago the Yiddish language newspaper The Jewish Daily Forward told its readers, in an advice column entitled Bintel Brief : “Let children play the "wild American game [of baseball]...Don't let your child grow up a stranger in his own country." – A wise exhortation to the millions of European Jewish immigrants arriving to the shores of the United States eager to learn how to become Americans.

The writer Jeffery Tobin identified a more profound reason for the affinity of Jews to the game of baseball. : "Baseball is a game that can break your heart, and to a people whose history has had more than its share of sadness, it was a perfect fit." Do we need to look any further to explain the love Jewish Chicagoans have had for the once hapless Chicago Cubs?

There are other similarities between the sport of Baseball and the Jewish people. At the conclusion of the Passover seder, we say “Next Year in Jerusalem.” And at the conclusion of the Baseball season – or more realistically for Cubs fans at the All Star Break – aren’t we accustomed to saying “There’s always next year!” Then there’s a Chasidic teaching that says that if all Jews in the world kept the Sabbath for only one Shabbat, the Messiah would come. In Chicago it has been widely accepted that if the Cubs ever won the World Series, it would be a sign that the Mashiach would be hard on the heels of the victory!

It seems to me perfectly fitting that the Cubs won the World Series the week that we are reading Parasha Noah. As you know, the Torah tells us that violence has spread across the world and G-d regrets that He created it.  G-d decides to destroy the world, but Noah finds favor in G-d’s eyes. G-d commands Noah to build and ark to save himself, his family, and other flora and fauna in order to begin again following the destruction of the flood. Noah does so. Then the Torah says, “Noah and his wife, and his sons and his daughters-in-law entered the ark because of the rain.” Rashi seizes upon this final clause “because of the rain”. Rashi asks, “Didn’t Noah enter the Ark because G-d commanded him to do so?  What is this “because of the rain?” Rashi concludes that this teaches us that Noah didn’t really believe that G-d would bring a flood to destroy the earth. Despite all the preparations in building the ark and collecting the plants and animals, Noah wasn’t really sure that that G-d would do what G-d said He would do. Sometimes Noah thought it would happen, sometimes he doubted it would happen, but it wasn’t until it started to pour that Noah decided he better get everyone into the ark. He didn’t get into that ark until circumstances forced him to. He was a man, says Rashi, of “mekatnei emunah” – he had little faith. Some say that Noah did not really believe there would be a flood that would destroy the world until he was up to his knees in water. Some say he did not believe it until he was up to his waist in water!  Then it was like, “This looks like it is really going to happen. We better get into that Ark!”

Isn’t that just like us Cubs fans? This past Sunday morning I met with our 8^th through 10^th graders during Sunday school. One student sheepishly asked me a question. Rabbi, do the Cubs still have a chance to win the World Series? This is the morning after the Cubs lost game four and are down 3-1. It was time for THE RABBI to offer some spiritual guidance! Of course they can still win, I said. First, they have to win Sunday night. If they do that, and they win on Tuesday night, there will be a seventh game, and who knows what could happen. To be a Jew is to never give up hope!

Of course, for Cubs fans, with our long, tormented history, we, like Noah, have little faith!  It was hard to believe. Even though they had the best regular season record in baseball, it was hard to believe. Even when they forced a seventh game, it was hard to believe. Even when they were up 5-1 late in the game, it was hard to believe. It was especially hard to believe when the Indians tied it at six in the bottom of the eighth!  It was just as hard to believe when the Cubs went up by two in the top of the tenth. How many Chicagoans were convinced with a certainly surpassing all certainties that the Indians would score three in their half of the inning and win the World Series?  Like Noah needing to be up to his knees in water before he believed it was happening, we didn’t believe the Cubs would or could win until the third out was firmly in the glove of first baseman Rizzo.

The Rabbis teach that there is no happier day on the calendar than Yom Kippur. This is because on Yom Kippur we are finally judged, and, “Ein Simcha Ka-Hatarot Sefeikot – “there is no greater happiness than release from doubt”. Noah was released from doubt when the flood finally came. We, Chicago Cubs fans, are released from doubt now that the drought is finally over. May we find many more reasons for happiness in the years to come. 

Shabbat Shalom

Braisheet -- When You Thought I Wasn't Looking

This week’s Torah reading is from the beginning of the Torah -- The Book of Genesis. On Simchat Torah, just celebrated on Monday evening, we concluded the final paragraphs of the Book of Deuteronomy which noted the death of Moses on the border of the Land of Israel. Our Torah reading concludes at that point.  Curiously, we never get to read about the conquest of the Land in the Torah.  We read about this in the Book of Joshua, which is part of the section of scriptures known as The Prophets. Instead of moving forward we wind backward, both figuratively and literally. We roll the Torah scroll back to the Story of Creation, and begin our yearly Torah cycle again.

“In the beginning, G-d created the heavens and the earth”. In some ways it is fascinating that we begin the Torah in the beginning! Let me explain. If the Torah is meant to teach us how we ought to live our lives, why does it begin with the creation of the universe? If the Torah is primarily designed to teach us the proper way to live, why does the Torah not begin with LAWS? The Torah could simply begin with the commandment to be fruitful and multiply, then follow up with the commandment to circumcise our sons. It could move on to the commandment to observe the Sabbath. Then it could tell us to observe our Festivals. It could lay out the laws of keeping kosher. It could tell us to love our neighbor as ourselves. It could command us to give charity the poor, and to protect the stranger, the widow and the orphan. Of course, the Torah does tell us all of these but as we know, in addition the Torah tells us much more.

In other words, I dare say, perhaps G-d could have used a good editor when G-d wrote the Torah. Perhaps G-d should not have been so convinced of His own perfection, and let an angel read what He wrote before publication. I am not the only one to think this. The very first comment in the Torah by the great commentator Rashi poses this very question. Of what use is the entire book of Genesis, which is basically a book of stories about our ancestors, in helping us to lead our lives? Why didn’t G-d just start with the commandments?

One answer is that we can learn a great deal from examining the lives of the patriarchs and matriarchs about how we should conduct our own lives. From reading about the life of Abraham we learn about what a life of righteousness and justice looks like. We can see how a man with unshakable faith in the One G-d lives out his life in that faith. From looking at the life of Rivka we can learn about how a strong woman can shape the destiny of her family and the Jewish people. From the life of Jacob we can see someone who struggles with his own inner demons and overcomes them. From the story of Joseph we learn about how repentance and forgiveness play themselves out in the life of an individual and a family.  We learn best not by following a set of rules laid down to us by an authority. We learn best by modeling ourselves after the behavior of those who live out those rules in their own lives. By studying their lives, we come to love these holy ancestors and want to follow their example.

A few weeks ago, footage was released containing lewd remarks about women made by one of our Presidential candidates back in 2005. Much of the condemnation by public figures that followed these remarks noted the status of the speaker as a father of daughters. For example, Mitch McConnell identified himself as “the father of three daughters” in condemning the remarks. John McCain mentioned his daughters. Mitt Romney was outraged on behalf of his mother, wife and daughter. Texas senator John Cornyn, North Carolina senator Thom Tillis, New Jersey House representative Scott Garrett, and Florida representative Carlos Curbelo all condemned the lewd comments by invoking their status as a “father of daughters”.

I wondered about the fathers of sons! One columnist who addressed this issue wrote that men would not have to worry so much about defending the honor of their daughters if more men taught their sons to respect women! He advised men to sit down and talk to their sons about proper behavior toward women in light of the candidate’s comments. I think men have to do that, and much more! More than talking to our sons, we need to model for our sons the proper way to treat women and talk about women. Our children, who area astute observers, notice what we do. Our children are carefully watching how we behave. Just as the Torah gives us role models to emulate, to show us how to live our lives, we need to live out our values in our lives in order to teach our children the proper way to live. We cannot simply lay down the laws and expect them to be followed – especially when our children can see that our behavior is at odds with our words.

We have just concluded the Festival of Sukkot. The Torah commands us in Leviticus 23: “You shall sit in sukkos … so that your children will know”.  The Chofetz Chaim derives a lesson from this verse about Jewish education that is applicable to all our efforts to educate our children. He notes that the Torah first tells a parent to sit in a sukkah. Only then does it say, “so that your children will know”. The lesson – Only by sitting in the sukkah ourselves will we be able to teach our children. If we fail to sit in the sukkah first, then all attempts to teach our children will be wasted.

Our children learn primarily by example. Our children are watching us, for better or worse. We may think they are not looking, but they are soaking up everything we do. I leave you with this poem by an unknown author:

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw you hang my first painting on the refrigerator, and I wanted to paint another one.

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw you feed a stray cat, and I thought it was good to be kind to animals.

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw you make my favorite cake just for me, and I knew that little things are special things.

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I heard you say a prayer, and I believed there is a God I could always talk to.

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I felt you kiss me good night, and I felt loved.

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw tears come from your eyes, and I learned that sometimes things hurt, but it’s all right to cry.

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw that you cared, and I wanted to be everything that I could be.

When you thought I wasn’t looking, I looked…and wanted to say thanks for all the things I saw when you thought I wasn’t looking.

Shabbat Shalom

               

Haazinu: Three Unlikely Headlines

Two unlikely headlines in the paper in our national press seem worthy of the satirical newspaper, “The Onion”. The first headline is “Donald Trump wins Republican Nomination for President”. The second headline is “Bob Dylan wins the Nobel Prize for Literature”. I, along with many of us sitting here, am hoping for a third unlikely headline to appear, “Cubs Win World Series!”

Of these headlines, the announcement that Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize for Literature is the most surprising. We all knew that Donald Trump was a long shot for winning the nomination, but he had been toying with the idea of running for President for a long time. Over the course of year, we had grown accustomed to the possibility, at least, that this unlikely candidate would triumph. Chicagoans have been talking about the Cubs winning another World Series for over a hundred years, and it is bound to happen by the end of the 21rst Century. But Bob Dylan winning the Nobel Prize in Literature –whoever, thought of or discussed that? Philip Roth –yes! But Bob Dylan?

The parasha for this week is Ha-azinu. The parasha consists of a poem by Moses warning the Jewish people to remember G-d’s goodness when they settle in the Land of Canaan. The prophetic reading for this week is from Samuel. It is a long poem of gratitude written by King David. It seems, therefore, particularly appropriate that the announcement of the award to Bob Dylan should be made this week. Dylan was awarded the prize “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition", according to the Nobel Committee.  He is only the latest in a long line of poet/musicians in the Jewish tradition. There is the Song of Deborah in the Book of Judges, an entire book of the Bible called “Song of Songs”, another book of poems called The Psalms. One could trace the succession of great Jewish poets from the Bible through the middle ages – Yehudah Halevi, Moses Ibn Ezra, Shemuel Hanagid -- all the way to the Modern Hebrew poets, Chaim Nachman Bialik, Yehuda Amichai, Zelda and Leah Goldberg, to name a few. Last January during the Rabbinic Mission we visited with celebrated Israeli poet Rivka Miriam in her Jerusalem home.

Another headline appeared in my in-box today that was unfortunately all too predictable – “Judaism’s Holiest Site is reclassified as Exclusively Muslim by UNESCO”. The Executive Board of UNESCO, by a vote of 24-6 with 26 countries abstaining, passed a resolution introduced by the Palestinians that called the Temple Mount and the Western Wall Plaza by their Arabic names, appearing to deny any Jewish connection to the sites. Of course this is nothing new. A year ago The Grand Mufti, the chief Muslim cleric of Jerusalem, declared on Israeli television that nothing was ever on the Temple Mount but the al Asqa Mosque. Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian President, has himself called Israeli history in Jerusalem “illusions and legends” and “delusional myths,” and refers to the “alleged Temple” when he refers to the Temple at all.

Political differences are one thing, they can be resolved. But when your enemy denies your very history and tries to convince others of the lie, it inflicts a deeper wound. Repeat a lie often enough, and people begin to believe it. In response to the UNESCO vote, Prime Minister Netanyahu put out a statement stating, “To say that Israel has no connection to the Temple Mount is like saying that China has no connection to the Great Wall of China or that Egypt has no connection to the Pyramids.”

Returning to Bob Dylan: In 1983 Bob Dylan celebrated his son Jesse’s bar mitzvah at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Bob Dylan was raised Jewish and spent his summers at Herzl Camp, a Zionist camp in Wisconsin. But in the 1970s he became a Born Again Christian. He released three Christian themed albums in from 1979 to 1981 before returning to Judaism. The year Dylan celebrated his son’s Bar Mitzvah at the Western Wall, he released the album entitle “Infidel” with perhaps the most pro-Jewish rock song ever recorded, “Neighborhood Bully”. In it, he describes Israel as a man “always on trial” with “a gun at his back” unfairly labeled “the neighborhood bully”.

Well, the neighborhood bully, he's just one man
His enemies say he's on their land
They got him outnumbered about a million to one
He got no place to escape to, no place to run
He's the neighborhood bully.

The neighborhood bully he just lives to survive
He's criticized and condemned for being alive
He's not supposed to fight back, he's supposed to have thick skin
He's supposed to lay down and die when his door is kicked in
He's the neighborhood bully.

The neighborhood bully been driven out of every land
He's wandered the earth an exiled man
Seen his family scattered, his people hounded and torn
He's always on trial for just being born
He's the neighborhood bully.

Well, he knocked out a lynch mob, he was criticized
Old women condemned him, said he should apologize
Then he destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad
The bombs were meant for him. He was supposed to feel bad
He's the neighborhood bully.

Well, the chances are against it, and the odds are slim
That he'll live by the rules that the world makes for him
'Cause there's a noose at his neck and a gun at his back
And a license to kill him is given out to every maniac
He's the neighborhood bully.

Well, he got no allies to really speak of
What he gets he must pay for, he don't get it out of love
He buys obsolete weapons and he won't be denied
But no one sends flesh and blood to fight by his side
He's the neighborhood bully.

Well, he's surrounded by pacifists who all want peace
They pray for it nightly that the bloodshed must cease
Now, they wouldn't hurt a fly. To hurt one they would weep
They lay and they wait for this bully to fall asleep
He's the neighborhood bully.

Every empire that's enslaved him is gone
Egypt and Rome, even the great Babylon
He's made a garden of paradise in the desert sand
In bed with nobody, under no one's command
He's the neighborhood bully.

Now his holiest books have been trampled upon
No contract that he signed was worth that what it was written on
He took the crumbs of the world and he turned it into wealth
Took sickness and disease and he turned it into health
He's the neighborhood bully.

What's anybody indebted to him for?
Nothing, they say. He just likes to cause war
Pride and prejudice and superstition indeed
They wait for this bully like a dog waits for feed
He's the neighborhood bully.

What has he done to wear so many scars?
Does he change the course of rivers? Does he pollute the moon and stars?
Neighborhood bully, standing on the hill
Running out the clock, time standing still
Neighborhood bully.

Rosh Hashanah Day 5777 : A Fresh Start

One of the themes of Rosh Hashanah is birth and renewal.  We proclaim on this day, Hayom Harat Olam, “Today is the Birthday of the World”. Our tradition holds that the world was created 5777 years ago. Of course, nothing in Judaism is without controversy. In fact there is a debate in the Talmud between two sages as to precisely when the world was created. According to Rabbi Eliezer, the world was created in the fall, in the month of Tishre. According to Rabbi Yehoshua, the world was created in the spring, in the month of Nisan!  Each sage cites the exact same biblical verse to support his claim, yet they each interpret it differently. Their reasoning is..... Talmudic, which means mysterious, long, and complex -- I will therefor spare you the details.

Since the matter was not settled in the Talmud, later Rabbis took up the argument. The medieval Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra, of Navarro, Spain, supports the position of Rabbi Eliezer, that the world was created on Rosh Hashanah, in Tishre, in the fall. As proof, Ibn Ezra notes that the Torah commands us to sound the Shofar on Yom Kippur to mark the beginning of the Jubilee year, the year in which all slaves are freed, all debts forgiven, and all land returned to its original owners. It makes sense, he reasons, that the beginning of Jubilee Year would start very close to the beginning of the true New Year, Rosh Hashanah.  Not so fast, say other Rabbis, who bring evidence that the world was in fact created in the spring, according to the position of Rabbi Yohoshua.  Every 28 years, they point out, we recite the birchat hachama.  This is a blessing recited when the sun returns to the same position in the heavens that it was in when it was created on the fourth day. Some of us may recall gathering together in the synagogue courtyard on April 8, 2009 to recite this blessing. It was on a Wednesday morning, the fourth day of the week. This blessing is always recited in the spring, in Nisan. It stands to reason, therefore, that the world itself was created in the spring.

Two well thought out positions, two valid arguments – but we are no further in determining the truth of when the world was created than were the Rabbis in the Talmud. Rabbeinu Tam, a grandson of the illustrious Rashi who lived in twelfth century France, broke the deadlock this way – you guessed it – they’re BOTH RIGHT.  According to Rabeinu Tam, G-d thought of creating the world in the fall, on the day we celebrate Rosh Hashanah, but G-d did not physically create the world until the spring, in the month of Nissan. Since G-d’s thought is identical to G-d’s action – both positions are right! As the Torah explains in the Book of Numbers:

“God is not man to be capricious/or mortal to change His mind/ would he speak and not act/promise and not fulfill?”

If G-d is not man, then man is not G-d, and following through on our best intentions is precisely the challenge we face on Rosh Hashanah.  Every now and then we have an idea or an inspiration, and we expect it to change us, but we don’t do anything about it! We may intend to carry through on it, but we never get around to taking concrete action. We make promises to ourselves, but never fulfill them. We are inspired to change, but can’t motivate ourselves to take the first step. Thus, many worthy thoughts that should be acted upon remain stuck in our heads, and never realized.

In the Book of Deuteronomy, the Israelites are poised to enter the land of Canaan. Moses instructs them on how to establish a just and fair society when they settle the land. Moses tells the People of Israel to “appoint judges and officers at your gates”. On the face of it this means simply that they must set up a judicial branch of government. The sages see something deeper. They note that the Hebrew word for “gates”– shaar – is the same word as for “considerations”, “reckonings”, “thoughts”, “calculations” and “deliberations” in Hebrew. Accordingly, this verse can also be read, “Appoint judges and officers for your personal deliberations, your internal considerations, your calculations for the future.” We should appoint internal “judges” to carefully weigh the consequences of putting our thoughts into action, the effect they will have on us, the impact they will have on our loved ones, the ramifications they will have for our community. After we have given careful thought to our plans and and deemed them to be good for us, we should implement them! This is the point at which many of us falter. Many of us have difficulty bringing our plans to fruition.

Therefore, as the Torah says, we should also appoint internal “officers”, who will insure that our worthy plans are carried out. How many potentially life changing resolutions go unfulfilled because of an absence of will, a failure to follow through?  Our metaphorical officers are tasked with the enforcement of our good intentions so that we will actually CHANGE.

Rabbi Kalman Packouz poses five questions to think about while we are here in synagogue or to discuss at our Rosh Hashanah meals:

1.       When do I most feel that my life is meaningful?

2.       If I could change only one thing about myself, what would that be?

3.       If I could change one thing about my spiritual life, what would it be?

4.       Are there any ideals I would be willing to die for?

5.       If I could live my life over, would I change anything?

Rosh Hashanah is a time of reflection, of hope and of renewal. Rosh Hashanah should wake us up, spark us to look at our lives, inspire in us the belief that it is never too late to grow and to change.  In the autumn nature is preparing for her long winter sleep. Along comes the Shofar to warn us not to do the same. The Shofar cries out to us, “Awake ye sleepers from your slumber; rouse yourselves from your lethargy.”

We cannot allow blind habit and deadening routine to rule our lives. This is why our sages, while ordaining a fixed order and a fixed time for prayer, insist that we must add something new in our prayers. They feared that our prayers would become empty recitations of memorized words. Such prayers have neither the power to reach upward to move Heaven nor inward to touch our deepest selves. A central prayer in our siddur reminds us that G-d renews creation each day. G-d did not wind up the clock of creation in the Beginning and then let it run. G-d is continually involved in the process of creation of the world. In the same way, we too need to be continually involved in the creation of our lives, lest our lives, too, become dull and empty.

Mindless routine is the enemy of spiritual growth and renewal. Much of our day is spent going perfunctorily through set patterns of behaviors – the time we awaken in the morning, what we have for breakfast, the route we take to work, the regularity of our work-a-day lives, our bed-time rituals, the chores we perform week in and week out. Without some modicum of routine we would find it difficult to get much accomplished at all. But to sleepwalk through our spiritual life is to court our spiritual decline, to lose touch with the Divine Source that animates our lives.

The Chasidic Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berdichev notes that the Hebrew word for soul --“neshamah”-- is related to the Hebrew word for breath -- “neshimah”.  He teaches that, with each breath out, it is as if our soul departs from our body. Were it not for the power of G-d to restore our breath each time we exhale, our soul would leave us permanently, and we would die. Just as creation is renewed each day, so, G-d restores our soul at every moment.  We are continuously being renewed and reborn.

The story is told of an angry reader once stormed into a newspaper office waving the day’s paper, asking to see the editor of the obituary column. He showed him his name in the obituary listing. “You see,” he said, “I am very much alive. I demand a retraction!”  The editor replied, “I never retract a story. But I’ll tell you what I’ll do; I’ll put you in the birth column and give you a fresh start!”

With each breath we take in we are new and are given a fresh start.

At the beginning of this sermon I told you about the debate between Rabbi Eliezer, who thought the world was created in the fall, and Rabbi Yehoshua, who thought that the world was created in the spring. We, of course, follow Rabbi Eliezer, and celebrate the “Creation of the World” in the fall. But is the fall really the season of birth and renewal?  The fall brings to mind the term “The Autumn of our Lives”, a saying that denotes that we are past our peak -- that we are winding down that we have more days behind us than we have ahead of us. However many days we may have ahead, it is incumbent upon us to determine, at this time of year, whether we have lived the life that is true to ourselves. If we have not – if we have long considered the need for a change in direction, a course correction, then let us make this year the year that we put our thoughts into action and renew our lives for the better. With that thought in mind, I leave you with a poem written in 1934 by American writer and musician Dale Wimbrow, which I have adapted:

When you get what you want in your struggle for self
And the world gives you accolades,
Just go to a mirror and look at yourself,
And see what that person says.

For it isn't your father or mother or spouse,
Whose judgement upon you must pass;
The person whose verdict counts most in your life
Is the one staring back from the glass.

That’s who you must please, never mind all the rest.
That’s who you live with to the end,
And you've passed the most dangerous, difficult test
If the one in the glass is your friend.

You may fool the whole world down the pathway of years.
And get pats on the back as you pass,
But your final reward will be the heartaches and tears
If you've cheated the one in the glass.

Rosh Hashanah 5777 Eve : Letting Go of our Baggage

I’d like to begin my sermon this evening by telling you a story. The story takes place in the 1980’s, before the widespread use of personal computers, before smart phones, before ipads and fitbits and all of the technology that we now carry around in our pockets or wear on our wrists. The story begins when Shimon gets off the train in Union Station struggling with two heavy suitcases. As he wrestles his suitcases to the platform, a man he doesn’t know, let’s call him Reuven, comes up to him and asks for the time. Shimon pulls a watch out of his pocket, but instead of looking at the time, he speaks to the watch! “Could you tell me what time it is?” Shimon asks. The watch replies, “It’s four o’clock, pm, Central Time”. “Wow, that’s some watch you have there,” says Rueven. “Oh, that’s nothing,” Shimon says. Speaking to the watch again, the he asks, “What time is it in New York?” “Two O’clock pm,” the voice in the watch responds.  “And in Barcelona?” “It is eleven O’clock pm in Barcelona,” answers the watch. Munich, Shanghai, Buenos Aires, the watch instantaneously provides the exact time in any city in the world.

“I am so impressed,” says Reuven. “I have never seen a watch that can do that!” “Oh, that’s nothing,” says Shimon. Speaking to the watch again, Shimon says, “Get me the Book of Genesis,” and immediately the story of Adam and Eve scrolls down the face of the watch.  “That’s fantastic,” says Rueven.  Seeing how engrossed Rueven is in this technological marvel, Shimon continues. “I’m able to carry around every volume of the Talmud in this little watch,” he says. “What would take up shelves upon shelves of space in my Rabbi’s office, I can carry around in the vest pocket of my suit jacket!”

“This is wonderful,” says Rueven, now beside himself with enthusiasm if not a little envy. “Look,” says Shimon, “My daughter recently had her bat mitzvah. Here’s a video of her chanting her Haftorah on Shabbes morning. We were so proud of her.  And that appointment book that I’m pretty sure you carry in your briefcase. I have it right here on my watch, at the touch of a button.”

“Where did you get such a watch, I have to have one,” says Rueven. Shimon tells him that it’s not available in any stores. “I’ll give you ten thousand dollars for that watch,” Reuven says to Shimon. “Oh, I can’t sell it to you for ten thousand dollars,” says Shimon. “I’ll give you forty thousand dollars for that watch,” says Rueven. “I’m sorry, it’s not for sale,” says Shimon. But Rueven detects a hint of indecision in Shimon’s voice. “I will give you sixty thousand dollars for that watch,” Rueven proclaims, and he pulls out his check book and starts writing a check. Shimon thinks, well, sixty thousand dollars is a lot of money, and I can always make another watch for myself, so Shimon agrees to sell Rueven the watch for sixty thousand dollars. He hands Rueven the watch and Reuven walks away. Shimon yells after him, “Hey, wait a minute. “  Reuven turns around warily. Shimon points to the two suitcases he had been struggling to carry through the station, and says, “Don’t forget the batteries!”

How many times have we wanted something desperately only to find out once we actually got it that it did not bring us the satisfaction we had hoped?  I think back to an early lesson I learned as a child about this. I don’t think boys still play with toy soldiers, as I did when I was a boy. Nowadays a child can just turn on a screen and land in the middle of a hyper-realistic, apocalyptic war zone, but when I was a lad one had to rely more on one’s imagination. I remember desperately wanting a set of two hundred revolutionary war toy soldiers advertised on the back of the comic books I was reading. The illustration accompanying the ad, depicting Redcoats and Patriots engaged in fierce battle, made the toy soldiers look so exciting! I imagined setting a hundred Brits up against a hundred Yankees and re-creating the Battles of Lexington and Concord right there on my bedroom floor. I saved up my money, collected my box tops and sent for the soldiers. Each day I eagerly awaited the mailman. Yet, when those toy soldiers actually arrived they were nothing like they looked in the advertisement!  They were ¾ of an inch tall and a millimeter wide and no sooner did I stand them up for battle than then they all fell over. What a disappointment. Often, that’s the way it is in life. Those things that are told will bring us joy or change our lives for the good often don’t deliver on their promise. Later on it was the automobile that we just had to have that would make us so popular with the girls, the college that we had to get into that would lead to success, the marriage that would complete us, the dream house that would finally bring us happiness. Then we discover that yes, sometimes these things bring us a measure of satisfaction and sometimes they even make us feel whole. Sometimes, however, they become baggage that weighs us down or traps us because they are not what we hoped for or expected after all.

Like the man in the story who could not enjoy what he had purchased because of the baggage that came with it, we too are unable to fully enjoy the blessings of our lives because of what we bring along with us from the past.

Tomorrow morning we will read the story from the Torah about G-d’s call to Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac. It is, of course, not the first time that G-d has called Abraham. Abraham’s story begins with G-d’s words as recorded in the Torah -- "Leave your land, your birthplace, the home of your parents, to the land that I will show you."  Did you ever notice that there was something unusual in that call to Abraham?

Usually, the emphasis, when giving directions, is on the DESTINATION!  After all, a person already knows where they are --they need to know where they are going! In G-d’s charge to Abraham, however, it is the opposite! G-d never identifies the destination to Abraham. The emphasis in G-d’s charge to Abraham is not where he is going. The emphasis in G-d’s charge to Abraham is on where he leaving -- his land, his birthplace, the home of his parents. THAT is what is unusual.

According to Chassidic thought, the Torah is telling us that as we journey through life, we must leave some things behind in order to reach our potential.  Abraham had to leave his country, his city, and his home in order to fulfill his destiny. In a similar way, in order to become who we were meant to be, to achieve our personal destinies, to live healthy and productive and loving lives, we may need to abandon some of the values and beliefs that we learned in our homes, our communities, and our country.  We may need to examine and reassess those social conventions that we have taken for granted.  Many of us grew up believing, for example, that men don’t cry, or that women are the “weaker sex”. Many of us grew up being taught that homosexuality was a sickness, or that certain ethnic or racial groups were prone to violence, or laziness, or dishonesty. We were taught what constitutes beauty in a woman, and what is the measure of success in a man, and as adults we strive to live up to what we learned, often causing a lot of pain, alienation and conflict along the way.  Some of us were taught to always put the needs of others first, to the extent that one’s own legitimate needs are ignored or denied. We run ourselves ragged taking care of others, while neglecting our own emotional, spiritual and physical health. Sometimes we must identify and let go of what we were taught as to how to think about ourselves and others. Trying to conform to society’s ideas about who we ought to be can prevent us from becoming who we were meant to be. We need to be able to identify patterns that we repeat -- those which bring us back time and time again to familiar but hurtful ways of acting.  And we must figure out how we can break those patterns, shed the baggage, that is pulling us back, dragging us down, and making our efforts to recognize and embrace our blessings self-defeating. That’s why the emphasis is on the place where Abraham was leaving.  The Torah is teaching us that we need to pay attention to where we come from and what we take with us, if we are to be successful on our journey to who we want to be, and how we would like to be thought of by others.

There are two kinds of burdens we carry with us through life. There is the baggage we know we are carrying around, but choose to ignore. Perhaps that baggage consists of resentment over a slight we experienced in the past. Perhaps we were treated unfairly in a relationship, and this left scars on us that we carry to this day. Perhaps an employer did not give us the promotion that we felt we deserved, or our partner cheated us in business. Perhaps when you were growing up your rabbi made an unkind or hurtful comment, and made it difficult for you to want to embrace Judaism or feel a part of the Jewish community. Then there is the “hidden baggage” we carry, the baggage we are not as aware of -- a devastating loss that we thought we overcame, a life altering illness that we thought left no scars, a difficult childhood that we thought we outgrew.  As parents we want to do right by our children, but we too carry baggage into our marriages and into the families that we create. At times we unknowingly transfer our baggage onto the shoulders of our children who don’t ever realize that they have taken on the baggage of their parents and are carrying it into a new generation.

We carry these loads around for so long that they become a part of us. We don’t even know they are there until we examine our lives, we identify our grievances, we label our resentments, and we name our pain. That is part of the task of Rosh Hashanah, what we call “Chesbon Ha-Nefesh” taking an account of ourselves. Only when we do this are we able to unload the weight we strain under and begin to walk a little lighter.

The man who unloaded his baggage at the train station to a wide-eyed passerby found an easy way to get rid of an unwanted weight that was a burden to him. For us, it is never that easy. Let’s begin by using this holiday season to acknowledge that we all carry baggage around with us. Let us resolve this Rosh Hashanah to at least make a start at shedding our unnecessary burdens from the past.  Let’s examine our priorities and stop striving for goals that bring neither fulfillment nor true happiness to us or our loved ones. Let us cast away our stubbornness, our bad habits, and our unwillingness to recognize when we need to change. Let’s dispose of our selfishness and our self- centeredness, and free ourselves to share more of ourselves with others.  

May we carry a lighter load with us into the New Year. May we begin our New Year full of hope and confidence, of optimism and of humility, of self-scrutiny and of spiritual renewal.

Parasha Ki Ta-vo-uh: "When you Enter the Land"

These final weeks leading up to the High Holidays we are reading The Book of Deuteronomy. The Book of Deuteronomy is part farewell address by Moses, part exhortation to the Children of Israel, part legislative program intended to be put into effect when the Israelites settle the Land of Canaan. Part of this legislation lays out the requirements for a King, should the people decide they need one. The King needs to be a Jewish king. No foreign King can rule the Jewish nation. The King must not have many wives. Acquiring a harem could distract him from the responsibilities of leadership. The King could not amass silver or gold to excess. Apparently the King might be tempted to misuse his wealth, or, massive wealth might lead him to lose touch with the common people. The King must keep a copy of the Torah by his side at all times, and study it constantly. The King, in other words, is not to be an absolute dictator but a Constitutional Monarch, with the Torah serving as a constitution. The King was to be subject to the same laws of the Torah as everyone else. 

When the modern State of Israel was born in 1948, many of the founding fathers and mothers wanted to enact a modern constitution to guide the political life of the nascent state. However, Israel was unable to adopt a constitution because of a conflict between religious and secular leaders over the role that Torah law would play in Israel. Many religious Jews believed that the Torah ought to serve as the Constitution of Israel, and that the only legitimate law for the nation was the Halacha – the rabbinic law -- that flowed from it. They argued that there was no need for a modern, secular Constitution, which might ultimately undermine Torah law.  After all, adherence to Divine Law had guided Jewish communities in their passage through the Diaspora for two thousand years.

Both religious and secular leaders were able to agree, however, that there ought to be a Declaration of Independence for the Jewish State. The task of drafting this document fell to Mordechai Beham, an undistinguished Ukrainian-born attorney. Mordechai Beham had no previous experience writing a Declaration of Independence, and didn’t know where to begin. Writers know that staring at a blank piece of paper before starting to write is often the most terrifying and difficult step in the creative process. After spending hours doing research in a private library of an American rabbi who was a neighbor, Mr. Beham began with the words, “When in the course of human events……”  Now, if you are charged with writing a Declaration of Independence, you could find worse places to start than stealing the words of Thomas Jefferson!  Mr. Beham also plagiarized from the Book of Deuteronomy as well as from the English Bill of Rights for his first draft of the Israeli Declaration of Independence. The Declaration went through a dozen drafts and many hands were involved until a final document was signed and proclaimed before thousands in Tel Aviv by David Ben Gurion on May 14, 1948, three weeks later. But scholars who have studied these earlier drafts concede that the American model significantly influenced the writing of the Israeli Declaration of Independence.

This is only one example of the influence of the United States on the founding of the State of Israel. We will learn about another important contribution of the United States in Israel’s very survival tomorrow night, when we screen the movie, “Above and Beyond” prior to our Selichot service.

This documentary was released in 2015 and is produced by Nancy Spielberg, Steven Spielberg’s sister. As you are not doubt well aware, when, on November 29, 1947, the United Nations voted in to create a Jewish State and an Arab State in what was then the British Mandate in Palestine, the Jewish leadership of Palestine agreed to the division. The Arab leadership did not, and five Arab countries prepared to invade the newly declared State of Israel when the British withdrew. Israel, unlike Egypt, had no Air Force. The United States government had imposed an arms embargo on all weapons to the Middle East. This movie tells how a group of Jewish combat veterans from WW ll risked imprisonment and loss of American citizenship to smuggle airplanes out of the United States and create the Israeli Air Force. The film skillfully weaves historical footage with computer generated re-enactments of air battles to dramatize the story of the crucial contribution of that Air Force to Israel’s success in the war. But the driving force behind the movie is interviews with the pilots themselves, now in their late eighties and nineties, as they look back on their experiences as young men and the impact that their decision to join the fighting had on their Jewish identities.

As we look back on the birth of the State of Israel, I hope we will be inspired by the sacrifices that were made to secure her existence by those who did not have to fight, but who chose to fight on behalf of their people.  May their example encourage us to reflect on the importance of Israel, of Judaism, and of the Jewish People in our own lives as this New Year dawns upon us.

Shabbat Shalom

[The documentary "Above and Beyond" will be shown at Congregation Beth Shalom in Naperville Saturday night (motzei Shabbat) September 24, 2016 at 8:00 pm following a brief Havdalah service. Refreshments will follow, then Selichot services. All are welcome]

Parasha Shoftim: The Qualities of a Leader

At the Academy for Jewish Religion, all rabbinic students were required to take a course in Homiletics. For those of us who are not clergy and may not be familiar with this word, “Homiletics” is a fancy way of saying “sermonizing”. Our teacher for the course, Rabbi Richardson, had a long and successful career as a pulpit rabbi and had given thousands of sermons in his time.  His job was to help us to develop into rabbis who would give stimulating and inspirational sermons to our future congregations.  At the beginning of the course he gave us a piece of general advice. Looking quite seriously at all of the men and women in the room, he said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, if you want to succeed as a rabbi on the pulpit, there are two things that you should never talk about in your sermons. The first is politics. The second is religion!”

Well, according to Ecclesiastes, there is a time and a season for everything -- so, why NOT a sermon about politics! We are of course in the very heart of the political season. When I last checked this afternoon we were 59 days, 8 hours, 44 minutes and 10 seconds from Election Day. But who’s counting? When it comes time for us to vote, what should we look for in a leader? The Torah reading for today offers some advice, although it will take a creative reading of the text to understand it.  The Torah states:

You shall appoint leaders for your tribes….. and they shall govern the people with due justice. You shall not plant a sacred tree or any kind of pole or wood beside the altar of the Lord Your G-d.

A rabbinic commentator asks, “Why are these two verses next to one another? Is there any connection between a leader, mentioned in the first verse, and an altar, mentioned in the second? He answers – A leader needs to be like an altar. Just as an altar is made of earth on the inside, and brass on the outside, so a good leader needs to be humble and soft on the inside, like the dust of the earth, and hard and dignified on the outside, like the brass of the altar’s exterior. A leader needs to be strong enough to stand against the powerful, the arrogant and the privileged members of society who seeks to exploit the poor and weak in order to keep them subjugated. In order to succeed that same leader needs to be humble and compassionate on the inside, so that he or she could identify with those who need protection and speak on their behalf.

Lyndon Baines Johnson, our 36^th President, was such a man. I am thinking of him because this week I watched the film “All the Way” on HBO.  It is a great movie and I urge you to see it. It stars Bryan Cranston as Lyndon Baines Johnson in a role that has been recreated from a play that had a run on Broadway in 2014. It is the story about the passing of the Civil Rights Bill of 1964. Upon assuming office following the assassination of John F. Kennedy in November, 1963, Johnson’s first order of business is to see to it that the Civil Rights Bill that President Kennedy had sent to Congress would be passed into law. In order to get this bill passed, Johnson has to overcome the resistance of Southern Democrats in the House and Senate who were usually his allies but who opposed this bill.  The Civil Rights Movement is also building in 1964. The film depicts the pressure on Johnson from the Black Community, in the person of Dr. Martin Luther King, to pass this bill. In addition, Johnson’s upcoming race against Barry Goldwater in November was much on his mind. Johnson’s is concerned that if he does not retaliate to an attack by the North Vietnamese against the United States Navy that might -- or might not – have occurred in the Gulf of Tonkin, he could be perceived as weak by the American people in the upcoming election.

Johnson had to be tough as nails to stand up to these competing pressures and divergent interests. He was battle hardened by the 24 years he spent in the House and Senate. He was prepared to fight for what he believed in. Yet as hard as he was, Johnson had a soft spot for the poor and for African Americans who were struggling to gain civil rights and their share of the American Dream. His commitment to social justice and to racial equality were authentic and lifelong.

Johnson had tough decisions to make, and not everyone was pleased with them, to say the least.

It is not easy to be unbending and flexible, stubborn and compromising, unyielding and accommodating. The movie shows how President Johnson was a master at this in his political life. He was a proud and principled man who was nevertheless prepared to compromise if it meant further advancing his agenda for the poor and the disenfranchised. We can all learn a lesson from this. There are times we need to take a stand against injustice and resist the temptation to make concessions to it. And there are times, especially when we are wronged, that we want to strike back and hurt the other as we have been hurt. This is the time when we must be soft; we must resist the temptation to exact revenge, and be forgiving of the other.

Do you know what a “Sabra” is? You may know it as a brand of Hummus, but it is also a kind of fruit – a prickly pear. Native born Jewish Israelis are called “Sabras” because they are prickly on the outside but sweet on the inside. Israel herself needs to be hard on the outside. She has developed a formidable military presence in the Middle East. When your nation is but 65 years old and you have already fought five major wars; when you have had to be constantly alert to terrorist infiltration; when a major power in the region that is on the verge of nuclear capabilities repeats that they want to “wipe you off the face of the earth’ and when a major political faction within the ranks of those with whom you are called upon to make peace calls for your elimination, it is no wonder that you develop a prickly outer skin as a nation. You have to be hard like brass in order to survive. You have to be unyielding. Yet that hardness is tempered by the compassion and mercy built into the Jewish soul through study of Torah and years of suffering.  Shalom, peace, is the highest value taught by Judaism. I believe that Israel is willing to compromise for true peace – a peace that includes recognition by her neighbors of the right to have a Jewish State in the Middle East.  I think Israel would be able show real flexibility if only the attitudes of her neighbors toward her would change.

I hope I have given you something to think about in choosing leaders this election. I hope I have also taught you some words of Torah. I hope that each one of us finds the right balance in our lives between firmness and flexibility, between dignity and humility. I pray that each of you sitting here this evening, especially those of you eligible to vote for the first time, casts a vote this year.

There, I’ve done a sermon on politics and hardly anyone has walked out. Who knows, next week I may even talk about religion!

Shabbat Shalom

Parasha Ekev: Coping with Despair

In July of 1854 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, author of the American classics  which  I am sure some of you know ---  “The Song of Hiawatha”, “Paul Revere’s Ride” and “Evangeline” -- visited the Jewish cemetery of Newport, Rhode Island.  At the time of the visit, cemetery tourism was a popular past time for Americans, and cemeteries were seen as a place for meditation and spirituality.  In 1658, two hundred years before Longfellow’s visit to the Jewish cemetery, fifteen Jewish families of Spanish and Portuguese descent arrived in Newport, Rhode Island. They were drawn to Newport because it was an important colonial trade center. It also was known for its tradition of religious tolerance. Nineteen years after their arrival, in 1677, the Jews of Newport bought land for a cemetery. They continued to worship in private homes until 1763, when they dedicated a synagogue.

But following the Revolutionary War, as the centers of commerce shifted to New York and Boston, the fortunes of Newport declined, and with it the Jewish population. By the time of Longfellow’s visit in 1854 there were few Jewish families left in Newport.

Longfellow wrote a poem on the disorienting experience of visiting a Jewish cemetery in Newport. He begins his poem by noting how strange it is to come across the cemetery in a community that has virtually no Jews. He likens the old tombstones on the graves to the tablets broken by Moses on his descent from Mt. Sinai. He notes how the names on the gravestones are, to him, an odd combination of classic Hebrew names – Abraham and Jacob – with Spanish surnames, Rivera and Alvarez. He writes that in the now closed synagogue adjacent to the cemetery, “No Psalms of David now the silence break, No Rabbi reads the ancient Decalogue.” Longfellow wonders why this ancient people came to these shores, and in the following verse meditates upon the years of persecution that the Jewish people have endured. He writes:

Pride and humiliation hand in hand
Walked with them through the world where'er they went;
Trampled and beaten were they as the sand,
And yet unshaken as the continent. 

In his poem, Longfellow expresses admiration for the Jewish people, who, he writes, stoically endured, though persecuted and oppressed throughout the ages.  But he ends his poem with a lament:

But ah! what once has been shall be no more!
The groaning earth in travail and in pain
Brings forth its races, but does not restore,
And the dead nations never rise again. 

Despite his admiration for the Jews, Longfellow pronounces Israel dead and buried, never to live again.  That could have, in fact, come to pass had the Jewish people given up hope during our long years of exile and wandering. Yet, that hope was kept alive in many ways, not the least of which was through our liturgy and the rhythm of our calendar.

 A few weeks ago we observed Tisha B’av. When the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 CE, Jerusalem was turned by Rome into a pagan city and Jews were not permitted to enter. The Rabbis who lived through these tragic times looked back in history for a way to both mourn the catastrophe that had befallen the Jewish people and find comfort and hope for the future.  These Rabbinic sages turned to Jeremiah’s Lamentations over the destruction of The First Temple and Jerusalem, written 500 years earlier, as a way of giving voice to the sadness and despair they felt at the destruction in their own time. Paradoxically, the reading of Lamentations also gave them hope that just as the Jewish people had returned from exile and rebuilt the Temple in Jerusalem in Jeremiah’s time, so they too, with G-d’s help, would overcome the calamity in their time as well.

The Rabbis also incorporated special Prophetic readings into the Sabbath morning services on the seven Sabbaths that fall after Tisha B’Av leading to Rosh Hashannah.  Usually the prophetic readings, or Haftorahs, are connected thematically to the Torah readings for the week. For example, the week we read about G-d calling Abraham in the Torah, we read a selection from the prophet Isaiah that refers to Abraham and his journey. Or, when we read about the plagues in Egypt in the Torah, we read a selection from the Prophet Ezekiel that mentions how G-d once humbled Egypt.  In these seven weeks between Tisha B’Av and Rosh Hashannah, the prophetic portions are not connected thematically to the Torah readings. They are, instead connected to one another through the themes of comfort and the restoration of hope.

Others may have assigned the Jews to the dustbins of history, but we have always maintained hope in the future. As Jerusalem lay neglected, impoverished, and exploited by her many conquerors throughout history, the Jewish people listened to the promise of Isaiah, that Zion’s “desert will become like the Garden of Eden, and gladness and joy shall one day abide there.”    Longfellow writes, sympathetically, “What once has been can be no more”.  Isaiah responds,

Raise a shout together/O ruins of Jerusalem/ For G-d will comfort his people/ Will restore Jerusalem.

There is a saying in Yiddish “Gelt farloren, gor nicht farloren; mut farloren, alts farloren. “You lose your money, nothing really is lost; you lose your hope and courage, everything is lost”.  Or, as the poet Naftali Herz Imber of Ukraine writes in the ninth stanza of his poem, Hatikvah (yes, there are nine stanzas!)

Hear, my people, in the lands of exile/The voice of one of our seers/Only with the very last Jew/ is there the end of our hope!

Shabbat Shalom

Parasha Devarim

Friday Night, August 12, 2016/ 9 Av, 5776

On behalf of Congregation Beth Shalom, I would like to welcome Rosanne Kearny and Don McCallum and Kelly Callahan into our community and into the Jewish people.  You might not be fully aware of this, but this morning you joined a very complicated people . Even our earliest Rabbis were perplexed by the character of the Jewish people. Rabbi Abba bar Acha says in the Talmud, “One cannot determine the nature of this people! When asked to contribute to the making of the Golden Calf, they give. When asked to contribute to the building of the Tabernacle, they give!”

In our Torah this week, Moses compares the Jewish people to the stars of the heavens. In which ways are we like stars of the heavens?  The 11^th century Biblical commentator Rashi , writing in the medieval city of Troyes, France, says that just as the stars are a permanent fixture in the universe, so the Jewish people are a permanent fixture on history’s stage. Whereas other people enter and exit from history, the Jewish people remain. Eight hundred years after the death of Rashi, writing from a continent that Rashi did not know existed and from a country that he could never imagine, Mark Twain said much the same about the Jewish people.  He wrote in 1899:

“The Egyptian, the Babylonian and the Persian rose, filled the planet with sound and splendor, then faded to dream-stuff and passed away; the Greek and the Roman followed, and made a vast noise, and they are gone; other people have sprung up and held their torch high for a time, but it burned out and they sit in twilight now, or have vanished. The Jew saw them all, beat them all, and is now what he always was, exhibiting no decadence, no infirmities of age, no weakening of his parts, no slowing of his energies, no dulling of his alert and aggressive mind. All things are mortal but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?”

The Jewish people are also like stars because often we stand out in the darkness.  Jews have been at the forefront in the battle against the Kingdom of Night in the world, first in the struggle against oppression, first to confront the haters in our world.  Yes, we have often paid the price when we have stood up to tyrants, when we have fought for the cause of freedom and for human rights.  We aspire, at least, to fulfill Isaiah’s vision of the Jewish People as a “Light unto the Nations” – a moral beacon toward which people of the world could look for inspiration and as an example of ethical living.

The Torah also compares the Jewish people to the sands of the sea. Each individual grain of sand is insignificant in and of itself, but those grains gathered together on a beach are a force to be reckoned with, a force that can withstand the power of the seas that continuously assault them.  Perhaps as individuals we may at times feel insignificant and weak.  However, when we stand together, we can withstand forces far greater than any one of us can withstand alone. Just as the sands of the sea are battered by the waves but endure, so the Jewish people, though persecuted and pursued throughout our history, have endured.

G-d promises Abraham that his and Sarah’s descendants would be “as numerous as the stars in the heavens and the sands of the sea.”  If Abraham and Sarah could see us now, they would be amazed how, from such a small family, there are now more than 16 million of us on earth. Yet, we are, comparatively, a small number of people, only 16 million in a world population of 7.4 billion. We make up .2% of the world’s population. Still, we are not as numerous as either the stars in the heavens or the sands of the sea, in terms of numbers of people. Yet, the sages never understood the blessing to Abraham and Sarah in term of numbers, in terms of a head count. Rather, the sages understood that the blessings of the Jewish people would be as numerous as the stars of the heavens and the sands of the sea.

Now we have three more blessings  -- Kelly, Don, and Rosanne -- Welcome to our congregation. 

Shabbat Shalom

Parasha -- Matot Massei -- Speaking Up

Shabbat Shalom.    It is wonderful to return home to Congregation Beth Shalom after my vacation. Middy and I had a great time, both resting at home and traveling to the Northwest. Over a period of ten days in July we visited Seattle, Washington, Mt. Ranier, Portland, Oregon and the Oregon coast. I know I speak for Middy as well when I say that it is very special to see all of you, and, most importantly, to gather with you in worship once again.  

Since I last spoke with you from this pulpit about a month ago, much has happened in the world. On July 2 we lost Elie Wiesel. Elie Wiesel came on to the world stage with the publication of Night in 1958. It was a searing account of Wiesel’s experience in the Holocaust as a teen. The publication of Night brought the experience of the Holocaust out from the shadows and into the daylight. It allowed people for the first time to talk about the extermination of European Jewry. Night gave us a vocabulary and a language in which we could communicate as the world began to come to terms with the trauma of the heretofore unspeakable horrors of what we now call “The Shoah”. Elie Wiesel went on to become one of the great moral voices of our time. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986. In an announcement awarding the Nobel Peace Prize, the Nobel committee said that:

“Wiesel is a messenger to mankind; his message is one of peace, atonement and human dignity. His belief that the forces fighting evil in the world can be victorious is a hard-won belief. His message is based on his own personal experience of total humiliation and of the utter contempt for humanity shown in Hitler's death camps. The message is in the form of a testimony, repeated and deepened through the works of a great author.

“Wiesel's commitment, which originated in the sufferings of the Jewish people, has been widened to embrace all repressed peoples and races. “

And yet the world keeps spinning. It does not take a day off to honor the death of a great man. I hesitate to remind us of the other events in July. There was the Orlando Massacre that claimed 49 lives in Florida. There was the unthinkable Bastille Day terror in France that killed 80 people, many of them children. Ever more shootings occurred in our American cities and towns, shootings of citizens by police, as in Baton Rouge and in Minnesota, as well as of police officers doing their jobs --like the five officers ambushed in Dallas, Texas. There was an attempted coup in Turkey and the exit of England from the European Union, the aptly named BREXIT. A  Catholic priest was murdered officiating Mass in France by men acting in the name of ISIS.  All of these events taking place in the context of our American political climate and the Republican and Democratic National Conventions and their aftermath. To many it may feels a bit like 1968, another election year where events threatened to spin out of control.   It is a period when many of us are pondering serious questions about how we treat each other, about what constitutes respect, about how we honor one another’s humanity, about peace in our communities; the very questions that Elie Wiesel addressed throughout his life.  

With so much going on, we have a tendency to withdraw, to throw up our hands, to conclude that there is nothing that we can do, to wonder why bother? Our Torah portion for this addresses those feelings. The Torah portion in question deals with the ability of a woman to take and to keep a vow. A vow is a self imposed obligation. It is a binding promise to oneself or to another party to act in a certain way.  The Torah states that if a married woman makes a vow, her husband can annul the vow if he does so on the day he finds out about it. Similarly, if a single woman makes a vow her father may annul the vow if he does so on the day he finds out about it. However, if the husband or father find out about the vow and do nothing on the day they find out about it, the vow will stand.

Of course I am keenly aware and I understand that most of us cringe at the Biblical notion of the husband or father having the authority to keep an adult woman from fulfilling a vow she has voluntarily taken.   Clearly this doesn’t conform to our present day values and sensibilities. But this aside, the Talmud derives an important moral principle from this law. The Talmud states that “silence constitutes assent”. If the husband or father finds out about a vow, but does nothing about it, it is considered as if he is acquiescing to the promise and to the commitment that his wife or daughter has made. From then on, he has lost his right to invalidate the vow. If he says nothing when he hears of it, it is as if he is agreeing with it, and it must stand, even if he changes his mind later on.

The important insight of the Talmud is that “silence constitutes assent”. This is of course true outside of the domestic realm as well. For example, historical research has shown that only a hard-core minority of the people who voted for Hitler in 1933 were anti-Semitic. Most of the people who voted for Hitler did so despite his anti-Semitic ideology, not because of it. They simply decided to sacrifice the protection of a vulnerable minority for what they perceived as their own self interest. They were not actively hostile to Jews; the welfare of Jews simply did not matter to them. Their silence, their indifference to the fate of their fellow citizens, constituted assent for what Hitler planned to do to their neighbors.

Elie Wiesel put it this way:

“The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.”

So, let us choose love of our fellow human being over indifference to their fate; let us choose beauty over indifference to our environment; let us choose faith over our indifference to universal human values.  We cannot evade responsibility by sitting on the sidelines, refusing to get involved. We must not take refuge in silence. As Elie Wiesel said in his Nobel acceptance speech, “We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”

Let us say, Amen.

Shabbat Shalom