Messages From the Rabbi

  

February 17th, 2012 

At first blush, Exodus 23:2-3 can appear troubling.  The JPS translation is “You shall neither side with the mighty to do wrong—you shall not give perverse testimony in a dispute so as to pervert it in favor of the mighty—nor shall you show deference to a poor man in his dispute.”  The primary reading one can glean from this is justice should be strictly maintained with no deference to the masses or the poor.

Rabbinical students are no different than medical, law or business students.  We frequently study in groups and I vividly recall being at a classmates apartment going over this very pasuk, verse, and her husband, a lawyer chimed in “that could be said for the legal system we have today.”   I was getting ready to say it and his wife so ably responded, “Where do you think the current system came from?”

It is remarkable that the Torah anticipates what remains one of the most challenging aspects of democratic rule—how to respect the will of the majority while protecting the rights of the minority, especially when that minority is vulnerable.  Unlike our translation, I see verses 2 and 3 as opposites—verse 2 warns us not to join the crowd in favoring the mighty; verse 3 balances this by warning us not to show partiality to the poor either.  Is justice in the middle?

Digging deeper, our rabbis in the Talmud, Hullin 11a read this as a moral instruction and, as a legal guide.  How?  In the first clause, we see in capital cases, a simple majority suffices to exonerate a defendant and a “majority” of two is required for conviction.  Rashi notes, the extensive rabbinic comments around this verse are confusing; their basic thrust is to follow the majority for “good” (i.e. to exonerate) but to require a supermajority for “bad (i. e. to convict).  How can a conviction be considered “bad?’

The overwhelming posture in rabbinic literature is that capital convictions represent failure—for the evil doer—and society as a whole.  In today’s world we see the same “bad” result when examining incarcerations.  Whites are incarcerated at a rate of 353 per 100,000 and blacks at a rate of 2,532 per 100,000.  In any given case, justice may have been served, and yet the result is still “bad.”

In the Jerusalem Talmud, Sanhedrin 3:8 we see a principal enunciated some 200 years before the Babylonian Talmud came into being, the gist of which being you “listen to the words of the plaintiff and only then to the words of the defendant.”  I am sure my lawyer friend would tell me “that is exactly how they do it nowadays in New Yorkcourts.”  This reminds of a precious interaction I had with one of my own teachers last year days after my ordination.  It was overwhelming and intimidating to sit in a room with many of the hanhala or faculty, all greater than me in “wisdom and years” trying to interject my opinion on a contemporary halachic issue.

My mind wandered back to those remarkable days in the study halls and classrooms of JTS where one of my beloved rabbis taught me the importance of comprehending what others may say, I must make up my own mind on halachic and political issues—but within the proper framework.  Even rabbi’s listen and learn from each other and even more so from those I have come to respect and adore.  It is perhaps for this reason that the ancient Sanhedrin began its deliberations from the side, where the junior scholars sat, so the junior scholars could speak freely without intimidation.

Taken together, these short reading of one or two verses of Mishpatim yield a sense of great moral responsibility in the construction of a just society.  Each judge must be independent, respectful of rich and poor alike, tipping the scales just slightly towards leniency so that just and righteous society can emerge.  Leadership requires wisdom and creativity and at the same time principle and courage.  What is true for judges and civil leaders is equally true for those called to religious leadership.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

February 10th, 2012 

Many commentators have studied the structure of the Ten Commandments (or Decalogue as the Etz Hayim denominates it in Greek), seeking to understand the relationship of its parts to one another and its overall structure. There are famous debates such as the one between Maimonides and Nachmanides over whether what we know as number one (I am the Lord Your God…) is a foundational principle (Nachmanides) or a discrete mitzvah (Maimonides).

My interest is in the simple question of overall structure beyond the famous division between mitzvoth bein adam lamakom (between man/woman and God) and bein adam lichaveiro (between each other).  There is a great insight in the Drash commentary of our Etz Hayim to 20:14 (p.448): “Some see a symmetrical arrangement in the entire passage. The Decalogue begins with an abstract principle concerning thought (“I am the Lord your God”), proceeds to prohibit verbal utterances (swearing falsely) and then focuses on deeds (Shabbat, honoring parents, refraining from murder, adultery, and theft) before returning to the improper use of words (bearing false witness) and concluding with abstract thought (coveting).”

Rabbis Harold Kushner and Susan Grossman, two of the editors were once asked, who “some see” was, but neither could recall who it actually was. Let us expand on the dichotomy between speech and action.  Cultivating faith can lead to sanctified speech, which can lead to holy behavior.  But the progression does not end there.  Holy behavior can lead to careful speech and that to self-control in our thoughts.  Thought leads to action, and action leads to thought; speech is the gateway between our interior and exterior selves.  Physical practice is necessary to develop psychological self-control.  But faith, the conviction that there is a source of goodness and purpose to life in God, is foundational.  There is symmetry not only in the literary structure of the dialogue, but in the moral structure that it implies.

There is a fundamental mussar (ethics) concept, the essence of which is to never say anything uncomplimentary about anyone, ever.  Why?  Someone may have screamed when Ahmad Bradshaw did not go down on the one yard line at the end of the Super Bowl and called him a fool.  (Considering I may have done this, by all accounts I was wrong and should have instead told Bradshaw that I loved him)  Right or wrong, true or false, we want to train ourselves.  The mussar posture is if we do it here, we will soon find ourselves downward on the “slippery slope.”  The challenge is not to.  It is difficult, it is hard.  If we think about it, we can see the virtue.

I would go a step further and see this symmetrical structure as essential to our theory of the self. In contrast to the dualists who would divide body from mind or soul, Judaism generally (with apologies to Maimonides) teaches an integrated model of the self.  There is no intellect or spirit with the body and no body can live without the mind.  Body and soul are like a battery and a gadget. Neither is of any use without the other.  The Decalogue teaches a continuum of sanctified life, where ideas, words and actions are all attached, and no meaningful life can be complete without the entire package.

Of course, this perspective challenges the concept of the life of a soul before and after death.  I cannot say more here other than that the institution of Shabbat seems to be pointing us to awareness that there is more than one way to inhabit physical space.  Keeping Shabbat is at least in part a preparation for the afterlife, olam haba, a type of selfhood that is active but not through physical activity. There can be no Shabbat without the six days of labor, but it is Shabbat that gives purpose and perhaps even permanence to our labor.

Shabbat is a forshpeits of the World to Come.   When we get there it will always be “sunny and 70!  We are exposed to it weekly so we will have a feel for what it is like and maybe, maybe make us do what it takes to get there.   That is why it is said Shabbat is not a burden, it is a delight.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

February 3rd, 2012 

One of the seminal moments in the history of our people occurs this week.  The miracle of the splitting of the Red Sea (some of you may refer to it as theSeaofReeds) is the crescendo of “our” departure fromEgypt.  A cursory examination of the actual verses opens up an obvious question.  There is a widely accepted maxim that when God performs a so-called miracle — he follows the laws of nature as much as possible.  God wants to cause as little havoc as possible to thereby leave those watching or experiencing the miracle to retain their freedom to “believe or not believe.”

Our question comes from 14:21 and 14:27.  If God moved the sea for us at night, why does the Torah say the Egyptians drowned in the day?  I know this adds fuel to the posture that our Torah is not “word of God” or even “divinely inspired.”  Like many of you I sometimes wonder and wander in my belief.  I make no secret of my conviction or principle, but it is a never ending quest.  This concept is one I read a few years ago and after being here seven months realized how germane it is to us at CSI.

God could have created a more natural event by creating a more modest miracle.  Had the miracle occurred in daylight our people could have “seen” where they were going thereby diminishing the miracle and vice versa for the Egyptians.  Specifically, the Egyptians “got engulfed in the sea in the daylight.”  Why did God enlarge the miracle?  The Egyptians could have drown in the night and made things seem much more — normal.

The Hebrew word for miracle is nes, which is similar and comes from the same root as the word for test, nisayon.  The power and force of a nes is directly related to the nesayon the person or people and what they had to overcome to merit the miracle.  The Ramban tells us that the Jews traveled within Egypt at night from cities and towns all over to assemble in the city of Ramses for their grandiose exit (if you cannot recall that dramatic scene from The movie, you need to see it again—and again!)    Can you imagine or envision walking into that sea—in the dark?  The reality is that the greater the challenge, the greater the reward.

Whatever your take, we learn an important lesson here.   Observing the Torah and performing the mitzvot in an emotionless manner definitely gets one some reward.  The real reward, however, comes from fulfilling the mitzvot with passion, doing more than the minimum.  Even in my short stay here at CSI, I see the work and dedication our tireless leadership puts out day after day—with much of it at “night” when it would be easy to curl up at home with a book or your loved ones.  Just as our forefathers were “bold into the night” let us revel in the work our CSI foremothers and forefathers have been doing here for 120 years.  May God continue to give us strength M’dor L’dor, from generation to generation!

 

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

January 27th, 2012 

The Jewish historian Simon Dubnow, who wrote an extraordinary ten volume World History of the Jewish People, was forced into the Riga ghetto in 1941, and then executed by the Nazis in December of that year. According to several accounts, Dubnow would go around the ghetto exhorting the people, “Yidn, shreibt un fershreibt” (“Jews, write and record”). His sense of urgency to record events was, I think, more than just a desire for substantiation of the monstrosity to be preserved. Recording events is part of the process of interpretation, and the act of writing gives purpose and dignity to life even in the most chaotic and humiliating of circumstances.

Something similar transpires in Parashat Bo, with the commandment to memorialize the Exodus even before it has reached its climax. In chapters 12-13 numerous mitzvot are commanded–from the fixing of the calendar (for you trivia buffs, what is the first mitzvah in the Torah?) to the redemption of first born to the Korban Pesach to eat matzot for seven days and on to the admonition marking of these events on the hand and head with tefillin—these mitzvot are all expressly designed to commemorate the historic passage to freedom. Curiously, there is no instruction to write things down.  In the ensuing years we received the Talmud and the Shulchan Aruch.  It seems that the preservation of memory requires physical rituals.  Judaism can be trusted always to embed such rituals in a thicket of text, and all of these rituals are now well explicated for each generation.

Yet this same imperative to create ritual, and to explain the enduring meaning of events is not how most of us respond to our own personal lives. Today when we sense that we are in a momentous occasion, our instinct is to create images so that we can literally see what happened. Yet a picture is not always worth a thousand words.  Or, as someone once said “the book is better than the movie.”  A picture does not explain the meaning of an event. That requires a response of some sort. A picture accompanied by commentary, or embedded within a larger work of art can begin to give meaning to the experience. If we were leaving Egypt today, most of us would lift up our camera-phones and catch images of the Exodus, but that would never capture the power and grandeur of the experience.

What does it take to make us feel that we are in the midst of a historic change?  What rupture can shake our sense of habit and make use feel the urgency of writing about and ritualizing our experience?  Although we do not live in the kind of moment described by our parashah, it seems that our personal sense of mission can only be enhanced by our taking the time to write and create.  I reveled in the evening reading poetry with many of you last week as well as our recent service of Kavanah with new ways we are looking to express ourselves at CSI.  The time I have spent getting to know many of you these past few months has been truly meaningful.

Obviously there were movie and still cameras inRigain 1941, but few had access to them in those depraved days.  Deubnow may well have condoned the numerous methods of recordation available to each of us in 2012.  But my real feel is that he would still espouse what many would call hard evidence.  Who has not seen photos (or movies) on phones or a computer screen?  Each of them is gone with the flick of a finger or the click of a mouse.

Between MP3 players, laptops, Ipads, Iphones, Androids, Kindles, and Nooks (someone recently said to me “before you know it the Jews will be known as the ‘people of the Nook.’”), there will be no photos on the credenza.  My father and father-in-law were dumfounded when I e-mailed them a photo of Benny on the plane when we were still in the air.  All that is well and I am not maligning it.  We still need something to touch and feel.  As Rabbi Ismar Schorsch, the Chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary when I started noted when referring to his father, a well known rabbi, “Though he died over twenty years ago, we often meet in the pages of his books that are scattered throughout my library.”  What could be more poignant?

Some things need to be caressed, touched and seen—not for a fleeting moment, but all the time.  This week, let us try to identify the historic potential of our present, and at the very least mentally transcribe that awareness so that the moment does not simply pass, but is realized and remembered.  Just as the Israelites are about to cross the Red Sea and began transcribing our religion as we know it, let us learn from the past and the present so that we can take it with us forging our future together at CSI.

 

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

January 20th, 2012 

This week presents us with a difficult question.  Moses and Aaron approach Pharaoh, asking that he allow the Israelites to leave Egypt, Pharaoh listens to their request but refuses to let the people go, and then a terrible plague is sent to punish Egypt and cajole Pharaoh into changing his mind.  The same cycle we all know is repeated ten times.  Each time the Egyptian ruler seems to indicate that he is ready to say yes to the demand for freedom put forth by Aaron and Moses.  Then, mysteriously, his “heart hardens.”

The difficult question is what the Torah means by “hardening of the heart.”  What happened to Pharaoh each time he was about to say yes and instead said no?  Was God overriding the Egyptian ruler or playing with him like a puppet on strings?  Or, was Pharaoh freely making his own decisions?

Interpreters point out that the Torah mentions the “hardening” by Pharaoh 20 times.  The first 10 have to do with the first five plagues, and in each case we are told that “Pharaoh hardened his heart.”  Clearly, it would seem that whatever is happening is being caused by Pharaoh.  Yet the next ten references to the “hardened heart” are different.  They occur with the last five plagues, and in each we are told that “God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.”  It seems that God, not Pharaoh, is in control and is bringing about the change in Pharaoh’s heart.

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch points out that the Torah uses there different Hebrew words to describe the “hardening.”  The first is kashah, meaning “to be hard altogether, to let everything pass over one without making any impression.”  The second is kaved, meaning “heavy.”  One can receive impressions, but there can be a big gap between the impression and the moment one lets oneself be guided by this impression.  Finally, the Torah uses the word chazak, meaning “firm,” consciously opposing any pliancy, any submission.  Hirsch argues that “Pharaoh’s coldness, his apathetic insensibility” was used by God so that “all subsequent ages could derive a knowledge and conviction of the Almightiness, the Presence, and the Direction of God in human history.”  Never again, Hirsch says, would there be a “necessity for miracles.”  In other words, God pulled the strings and directed the choices for the Egyptian ruler.  God made his heart kashah, kaved, and chazak in order to demonstrate where the power and control really is!  It is obvious, God has not graced us with any (overt) miracles since Moses’s time and as it is so often said “may it be speedily in our day.”

In the Talmud, Rabbi Yochanan is troubled by an explanation similar to the one offered by Hirsch.  In contrast, he reasoned that if God is pulling all the strings, and Pharaoh has no free choice, then the Egyptian ruler could not be held responsible for his choices.  That would mean that none of us is really free and that our choices between acts of love or hatred, caring or selfishness, justice or indifference are an illusion.  Resh Lakish (Third Century CE) in the Midrash Exodus Rabbah 13:3 and Maimonides centuries later both emphasize that it was not God who forced Pharaoh to do evil toIsrael, but the decision was his alone.  Maimonides adds in his commentary that Judaism believes in free will, but that one bad choice in life will lead to another just as one good choice will lead to another.

Modern psychologist Erich Fromm notes that Pharaoh’s first choices to continue persecuting and oppression the Israelites ultimately led him to a point of no return.  He must have thought that “if I give in to their demands and do not stiffen my heart and rule them harshly, then both the Jews and the Egyptians will conclude that I am weak and will rebel.”  Trapped by fear of failure and unable to develop creative solutions to his problems, Pharaoh fell victim to his own bad decisions.  Tragically, he chose the steep path and, once he came plunging down it was like the new drinking cup I handed Benny as we were walking down the hill last Shabbat.  It was “gone” the moment he dropped it!

The last few weeks I have focused on leadership, both related to the upcoming Presidential election and locally.  As many of you know, I have spent the significant time over the last 10 days engulfed in the closing of the ReubenGittlemanHebrewDay Schooland the attempt to initiate the new Rockland Jewish Academy.  We can learn a great deal from our scholars both past and present.  In order for the RocklandCountynon-Orthodox community to survive and propser, we need to not allow our hearts to be hardened.  Instead let us learn from the past and create a better CSI community, a new successful day school, and an invigorated RocklandCountykehilah.

 

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

January 13th, 2012 

On the final page of the Talmud, Masechet Chagigah, as with so many rabbinic texts, there is a “siyum meshichi” or triumphant conclusion. Discussing the incense altar, which was plated with just a thin layer of gold over the acacia wood, the rabbis say that it was miraculous that the intense heat of burning incense wouldn’t damage the wood underneath; so too the fire of Gehenna does not affect the teachers of Torah, or even anyone who practices the mitzvot. In the Midrash Tanchuma on our parshah, it says that the miracle was made possible by a heavenly form of fire that burns but does not consume. This is the same “black fire” of the Torah. Thus the incense altar was able to contain the heat of heavenly fire without destroying its container; so too the bush noticed by Moses was burning with “eish shel ma’alah” and thus not consumed.

My take, based on these rabbinic texts, is that it is a rare divine gift to be aflame with heavenly light that does not destroy.  Usually, intense religious passion has a consuming power, destroying that which seeks to contain it, and also that which surrounds it.  This is what caught the attention of Moses.  Surely he had seen fires before, and certainly he had noticed religious passion in his day.  But this was different–a divine apparition that was commanding, but not threatening, a bush that burned but was not consumed.

At CSI, we just had a lecture last week discussing Jewish/Black relations and are working hard at our interfaith relations with other faiths in the area.  For all of the varieties of faith and practice, the essential quality that I look for is this type of “eish shel ma’alah.” Is this a religious passion that nurtures without destroying? Or is this a type of passion that is out of control, contaminated by politics, jealousy, greed and hatred?  This week’s parsha, Parshat Shemot and the subsequent parashiot bring us into the heart of religious quest–the contest of belief. What will Israel believe, and do? What will the Egyptians believe and do? What type of faith will Israel develop? Will it be an eish shel ma’alah, or an eish okhelet, a consuming fire?

It seems that our parshah points to a quality test of revelation. The burning bush is not a sign of passivity–it is dynamic and commanding. It contains the power to refocus the life of Moses, and the course of human history. It does lead to violent confrontation, but seeks to contain this for the sake of justice and freedom rather than revenge (OK, I admit there is some revenge too; the fire does not remain pure in our hands). The fire that burns and perhaps purifies but does not destroy–this is the form of faith that we aspire to develop within ourselves, and for which we search among our neighbors of other religious traditions. Finding that, we can enter into relationship without fear, celebrating the ways in which our respective lights burn in all their radiance and holiness.

As we turn to Shabbat Shemot, and follow it with the remarkable days of MLK day, it is notable that some of our leaders have shown the capacity to pursue justice with passion and perseverance, but without succumbing to the angry and destructive rhetoric that often contaminates such passion. May the example of Dr. King place before all of us a vision of glory–of a purifying passion–that can inspire our leaders to achieve the great goals of justice, prosperity and peace.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

January 6th, 2012 

As he is about to die, Jacob calls his sons to his death bed.  His “comments” to them are a combination of blessing, criticism, and prediction.  The dying patriarch is bluntly honest in his evaluation.  He tells Reuben he is “unstable as water,” accuses Simeon and Levi of “lawlessness” and “fierce anger,” and assesses Issachar as a “strong-boned ass.”  He calls Dan a “serpent,” he tells Joseph that he is “a wild ass” and Benjamin that he is “a ravenous wolf.”  Why, we might ask, was Jacob so harshly critical?

Contemporary thinker and scholar, Rabbi Pinchas Peli believes that Jacob’s evaluation was meant to be helpful.  His honesty taught them important lessons about their strengths and weaknesses.  As their father, he could say things that on their face appear pernicious.  Peli argues that “our lives often become confused and entangled for lack of a precise definition of who and what we really are on.”  He claims that Jacob’s evaluation “was meant to help his children hone in their proper identity.  Criticism of them,” Peli comments, “would help them find their way towards the future, in which they were destined to assume their roles as heads of the tribes ofIsrael.”

Peli’s psychological approach has special appeal.  A parent’s role is to help children comprehend their strengths and weaknesses.  Constructive criticism may build character and it can deepen sensitivity to one’s self and to others and improve one’s social skills.  But parental criticism can also undermine confidence or mislead children about their real talents.  Perhaps, instead of being helpful, Jacob’s last words to his sons were detrimental.  How were they to feel about themselves when their father characterized them with such negative depictions?

Not all commentators agree that “improving character” was the reason for Jacob’s critical evaluation.  Don Isaac Abravanel, from 15^th centuryPortugal, offers a different slant widely accepted by many Jewish thinkers.  Abravanel’s theory is when it came time for Jacob to die, he decided to pass on the leadership (or rule) of his family to the son most qualified.  He struggled with his decision and the realization the future of the Jewish people hinged on his choice.  He assessed carefully the strengths and weaknesses of each son.  When he reached his conclusion, he then gathered his sons and “told it like it is.”  Jacob wanted each of them to understand why they had been disqualified with specificity.

Whether or not Abravanel’s view of what motivated Jacob is correct, his discussion of what qualifies or disqualifies someone for leadership is salient.  The following summary sets out what Abravanel believes Jacob was saying about his sons and the relevant qualities he took into consideration when he assessed each of them:

• Reuben was unstable as water.
• Simeon and Levi used violence and force.
• Zebululn was always looking for a profit.
• Issachar used others to fight his battles.
• Dan snipes at others behind their backs.
• Gad weakly gives in to his opponents.
• Asher and Naphtali serve others but do not command respect.
• Joseph was hated and distrusted by his brothers.
• Benjamin lacked balance of judgment and concern for others.
• Judah, who was chosen for leadership, was trusted and accepted by his brothers.  He was brave and successful in battle.  He was steady, thoughtful, and dependable.  He was clear about his goals and determined to fulfill them.

Abravanel’s emphasis is upon the important qualities that define leadership.  Jacob, he argues did not speak to his sons in order to mar their feelings or create bitterness between them (and him).  His purpose was to clarify for them whyJudah, above them all, qualified as the leader of the tribe that would produce King David and future rulers ofIsrael.

Jacob’s last words to his sons were neither a blessing nor a promise for a peaceful future.  Instead, Jacob presented them with a blunt and cogent evaluation of their behavior and personalities.  Our interpreters believe that his purpose was to provide his sons with some critical insights into themselves and their motivations.  In doing so, Jacob also created valuable standards for defining the difference between superior and unacceptable leadership qualities.

As we move into the first Shabbat of the secular New Year, a year in which we will be having a Presidential election and at a time when the leadership in Israel is in peril over the issues with the Charedim, let us be reminded by Jacob of what leadership qualities we should seek for in our leaders in the Diaspora, Israel, and worldwide.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

December 30th, 2011 

It is a time of great tension in the family of Israelboth of course in the modern state and the original family in the Torah.  Two weeks ago in our parsha, as Joseph approaches his brothers in the field, they see him “mei-rachok,” from far away. On the p’shat simple level, they could see the well known coat, given to him as a favorite son.  But the drash or interpretation is not so hard to guess–they saw him as distant, and refused to see him up close. The text emphasizes this–”before he could come close to them”–and then uses a strange verb, “vayitnaklu oto l’hamito,” or the schemed to kill him.  Ramban, Nachmanides, from 13^th century Spain, brings out that their plan was also to kill Joseph from a distance, perhaps by setting their dogs on him, so they wouldn’t have to get into a messy face to face situation.  When that plan failed, they decided to throw him into a pit and ultimately sold him into slavery.

Every child knows the rudiments of the story.  All of the troubles in this family stem from their petty jealousies. The brothers see a coat that is emblematic of Joseph’s position viz-a-viz his father.  Joseph sees the brothers as bit players in his dreams. Yet, decades later the brothers don’t recognize Joseph even after all his machinations and intrigue.

Given the facts we have, this still begs the real question.  Yes, it took Joseph a few years to become the second most powerful man in the world.  But, how did he let his elderly father bewail and bemoan him for so many years after his ascending into power?

Joseph is surprised by his brother’s renewed fear of him after Jacob dies. Alienation is the root of anger and of great evil. The healing process cannot begin until this week’s parsha Vayigash when the brothers finally come near to one another, but even that reconciliation is incomplete as the brothers still go their separate ways.

This is of course the entire challenge of our community and all that await us. How can we transcend the alienation that surrounds us?  If we cannot hear our fellow human being, if we cannot come to know him or her, to experience their sorrow with sympathy, then how can we possibly come to know the larger communities of today awaiting our help? If we cannot transcend the alienation with people we see each day, then how can we undo the deep schism of our people from the Torah, from the life of the soul, and from God? We must learn to witness the pain of another person without feeling defensive. Rather we must show sympathy and love, and stand for hope.

We just celebrated Chanukkah.  This is now a time for reversing darkness and estrangement.  May the light of Torah which we ignite this season drive out the darkness of alienation and draw us together into a community of joy and peace.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

December 23rd, 2011 

I have come to appreciate my sleep in the last 15 months more than ever before.  Benny wakes me up long before the time I have to be up.  Let me tell you that the contrast between a natural awakening and the sounds of Benny are stark (but music to my ears).

These two types of awakenings are reminiscent of the two times we read this week, “and Pharaoh awoke.”  He awoke to the puzzling images of his dreams, and immediately wondered what they meant and what response they demanded.  We awake with an equal sense of confusing reality—a mixture of hope and anxiety attends our rising, and we wonder always, “what should I do?”  What dramas can be put aside and what new challenges demand my full attention?  Increasingly, we ARE Joseph—called upon to be a voice of wisdom and holiness in a world of fear and hatred. Exercising this form of leadership is a privilege but also a burden. Our parashah is about the assumption of responsibility and living with the consequences of our decisions.

Miketz means “at the end” and in a way this parashah is about the end of the preliminaries of the Torah and the childhood of our people.  The transition from being a family in Canaan to a nascent nation inEgypt has begun.  The decisions made by the biblical characters increasingly impact not only on their own destiny but the world. From a modest beginning will come a mighty narrative that will eventually define the terms of civilized society.

It seems appropriate that Miketz is connected each year to the festival of Hannukah, which represents both a middle and a new beginning.  This is an activist festival—the one more than any other when the initiatives of the people determined their destiny.  The festival’s name refers of course to the rededication of the Templein Jerusalemto the worship of God.  But it also alludes to chinnukh, or education—this is a time to train ourselves with new skills and insights.  Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav brings out a beautiful word play—through Hannukah we reveal the hidden light of God’s face.  The second of the priestly blessings says that “the light of God’s face will shine on you andויחנך.  We translate that last word as “be gracious to you,” from the word חן, but Reb Nachman plays on the presence of the letters for חנוכה—by celebrating Hannukah we reveal the hidden light of God’s face. The human initiative is what reveals the light, though the source of the light is eternally present.

The latter point is made even more forcefully by Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz (1565-1630) known generally as the “Shelah” for the name of his book, Shnei Luchot HaBerit.  There is an old tradition of reciting the passage “hanerot hallalu” after lighting the Hanukkah candles. The earliest version of the text is found in the Talmud, Sofrim 20:6.  The paragraph emphasizes that we are forbidden to use the light of Hannukah (e.g. to read or cook by it), but only to look at it.

The Shelah brings down that this unusual arrangement of lighting a flame and then declaring its light to be off limits for human use is reminiscent of the first light of creation.  As we all remember, God creates light on day one, but the sun, moon and stars are not fashioned until the fourth day. We use the secondary light of the celestial bodies—but what happened to the first light of creation? Already in Midrash, Bereshit Rabba 3:6 we learn the idea that God hid the initial light away for the future use of the righteous.  If I understand the Shelah correctly, he is saying that Hannukah is the “coming out” celebration where the righteous are able to reveal light that had previously been hidden and share it with the world.  What is that light?  It is the light is of the Shekhinah, the divine presence; the light of Torah; and the light of mitzvot.

One of my favorite Hannukah songs, Banu Hoshech L’garesh, makes this point as well. It is our collective responsibility and joy to reveal hidden light—sources of joy on this festival.  We can rise in darkness and feel burdened and overwhelmed by the troubles of the world.  We can bemoan the weakness of our institutions and despair of our ability to redeem goodness, tranquility and holiness in this world.  Or we can assert hope, and banish darkness.  Hannukah teaches us to simply light, and look at the dancing flames.  Not to use them, but to absorb their light until we gain hope and courage and the ability to carry on our holy work.

Shabbat Shalom and Hanukkah Sameach!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

December 16th, 2011 

Some seem surprised that I grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico.  While I knew it was not the center of the Jewish world, it was the center of my own Jewish world.  Therefore, it is not hard to hearken back to the time of my Bar Mitzvah.  A small group of us had embarked on an arduous Chumash class with our rabbi and each week he would bring up some aspect of the parsha ask how it applied to life and what were we to glean from it.

As a very interested student, I vividly recall the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge, the Ark that got all of Gods creatures on it, Abraham circumcising himself at 99, the Akeidah, Eliezer happening upon Rebecca at the well and Jacob deceiving Isaac for the birthright.  I understood each actual happening and had no trouble relating the narrative with explicit detail.  At 13 or 14, I did have trouble deciphering how these supposed teachings had any application to life and my life in particular.

We were always caught up in class trying to find the “deeper meaning.”  It only took me a moment to find the place in the Hertz Chumash [1] where the rabbi took us in answering my question about how these could apply to my life:

There is nothing in Judaism against the belief that the Bible attempts to  convey deep truths of life and conduct by means of allegory.  The Rabbis often taught by parable and such method of instruction is well known…[2]

I wanted to see what happened and why in plain English and was satisfied. Then one day it clicked.  Now I would call it an epiphany.  We were reading in this week’s parsha and came to the verses (24 and 25) where the brothers threw Joseph into the pit “…and the pit was empty, there was no water in it.  And they sat down to eat bread…” (From the Hertz translation) or as the Etz  Hayim translates it, “They sat down to eat a meal.”  Whichever you choose, there is no substantial difference.

It was not hard to tell Rabbi Celnick was waiting for an explanation that was more erudite than “they must have been hungry.”  My brain was churning and somehow I put it all in context and realized the brothers has just done a dastardly deed and rather than show any remorse, shame or guilt, started eating in what must have been the next moment.

The look of elation on the rabbi’s face will never be forgotten and with that little “icebreaker” I began to see and realize how to get past the pashat, simple meaning, to the next level or meaning.  We are told that the Torah takes us through the vicissitudes of life, both the good and the bad and until I revisited this episode in Joseph’s life (and my own life) and read the Etz Hayim footnote to verse 25.  It had always solely been associated with lack of remorse, shame or guilt.  The Etz Hayim first notes the brother’s callousness and then, to my astonishment, takes a 180-degree turn suggesting the brothers sold “Joseph into slavery so the Israelites and Egyptians will have food to eat during the famine.”

This for me is “food” for thought and while I hope my skills have grown since my Bar Mitzvah days, find it very hard to put any kind of  positive slant on the brothers sitting down to eat after casting Joseph into the pit.  Perhaps that is why we have “commentaries on commentaries” and it is all good “food for thought.”  This Shabbat, I challenge us all to take time to think about those moments when perhaps we “ate” when we really should have been helping others.

 

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

csirabbi@optonline.net

[1] It was just last week that I noted the Hertz Chumash as what seems to have been the only one in Conservative shuls the late 30’s to the turn of the century.  Rabbi Celnick relied on it exhaustively and exclusively.

[2] Hertz Chumash Page 195.

 

December 9th, 2011 

With all of the recent findings, allegations, at PennStateand Syracuse, I could not help but make the connection to the rape of Dinah this week.  In his renown commentary on the Torah, the former Chief Rabbi of the British Empire, Joseph H. Hertz[i] called the story of Dinah “a tale of dishonor, wild revenge, and indiscriminate slaughter.”

Dinah, the daughter of Leah and Jacob, goes out to socialize, something not countenanced for any woman, and is raped by Shechem, the son of Hamor who is the chief of the region.  Shechem confesses to his father that he is in love with Dinah and wants to marry her.  He asks his father to arrange the marriage with Jacob.  Jacob hears that Dinah has been raped, but he remains silent until his sons return home from the fields.  When they return, they are furious.

Jacob’s sons Simeon and Levi, outraged at the humiliation caused to their sister, trick Shechem’s residents unto circumcising themselves under the preconception that would then allow them to intermarry with Jacob’s family.  Simeon and Levi then kill all the towns males, save Dinah, take all the wealth, women and children as captives.

Jacob hears what they have done, and says to Simeon and Levi, “You have made trouble for me by giving me a bad reputation among the people of the land.  I am few in number, and if attacked my house will be destroyed.”  The brothers responded, “Should our sister be treated like a whore?”

The question posed by Simeon and Levi takes us to the heart of the matter.  What should they have done?  Should they have allowed Shechem to rape Dinah their sister, without revenge?  Given the fact that they were fewer and weaker than Hamor’s powerful fighting men, were Simeon and Levi justified in tricking them?  Who was really responsible for this incident—Dinah, who went out socializing without a chaperon, or Shechem, who forced himself upon her?  One answer is obvious that we should never rush to judgment.  As a lawyer once related to me in a divorce proceeding where we were counseling, “There are three sides to these cases, his, hers, and reality.”

These are the questions.  How could have so many people who knew about the alleged abuse sat silently like Jacob did?  The fact that Jacob waited until his sons came back and it was only his sons who dealt with the situation is already troublesome.  For Jacob to be upset that his sons sought revenge is baffling.  One can understand how Jacob would be worried that someone would exact revenge upon his family, but for him to not want Dinah’s honor to be defended is upsetting.

By no means do I feel that the actions by the brothers took the right path.  However, Jacob’s silence is troublesome.  Commentators debate whether the action of Simeon and Levi were justified and whose fault this whole situation was.  Personally, I side with those who believe that Jacob should not have remained silent and that perhaps the brother’s did the only thing they could given the circumstances.  Maimonides says that the inhabitants in the city ofShechemknew that Shechem had raped Dinah but refused to even admonish him for his evil deed.  From Maimonides perspective this was the only action available to Simeon and Levi given the strength of the people of Shechem.

I am not advocating vigilantism to those being accused of sexual abuse, but we should not stand idly by like Jacob.  Instead we need to attempt to be more vigilant and address the abuse quickly.  Jacob’s condemnation of Simeon and Levi for taking the law into their own hands, even to revenge the rape of their sister, seems like a clear message.  However, I believe had Jacob acted and at least forced Shechem before a tirbunal, Simeon and Levi would not have been forced to act as they did.  It was refreshing to see the modern State of Israel act swiftly in the case of Moshe Katzav, a man of power and importance, the Shechem of his day.

The lesson to be learned from this week’s parsha, as well as what is happening in our society is that as soon as we hear about sexual abuse or rape, we need to respond immediately.  The answer to brute force or to violence, however, should not be more violence, but instead it should be the pursuit of justice within the proper framework, expeditiously.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

December 2nd, 2011 

About a year ago I was in line to rent a car.  It was late and the line for two different companies had been combined into one.  I patiently waited in line with a dozen other people for about 30 minutes.  As it was almost my turn, a man who had just gotten there went through the other “non-existent line” and cut everyone else in line without a care in the world.  When other customers including me tried to reason with this man, he simply yelled at us telling us how foolish we all were to not create the second line.  This man clearly cheated the system and us.  I took the high road and chose to not continue any argument.  In a way, I let him cheat and win.

Last week, Jacob famously “stole” the blessing from Esau.  The text favors Jacob and it appears Jacob is the one meant to continue the Jewish people.  However, Jacob, with his mother’s help, deceives his own father into giving him the blessing.  Jacob even goes so far as to put extra “hair” on his arms so that his blind father will think he is Esau.

While many rabbinic commentaries ultimately vilify Esau, they all agree that he was wronged in this case as he was completely loyal to his father.  In Genesis Rabbah 65:16 Rabbi Shimon ben Gamliel said, “All my lifetime I attended upon my father, yet I did not do for him a one-hundredth part of the service which Esau did for his father.”

If we heard about someone deceiving someone else in our society today, would it be countenanced or celebrated?  Generally the answer is no because we try to keep to a moral code of sorts.  But how do we react in our society today if we feel that the person who has cheated, deserved to get there but was being given a raw deal before they cheated?  One example of this is Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook.  For those who saw the movie “The Social Network” last year, it is obvious that Zuckerberg cheated in some way to get to the top, but he also was initially given a raw deal.

Our Torah seems to make Jacob pay for his deception by having him be deceived by his father-in-law Laban, when Jacob marries Leah instead of Rachel.  The ongoing question is, was this punishment enough?  Does Jacob deserve to be punished more, or do we give him a pass because he was simply following the dictates of his mother?

We see Jacob wrestling with God, not once, but twice!  Perhaps Jacob’s sparring with God is also a result of his cheating the system to gain the birthright.  This is a reoccurring question for all of us.  Have you ever thought when you stubbed your toe or dropped your cell phone…is this some kind of retribution from God?  For me the answer is no, but for you it might be yes, depending on your theology.

The way I “read” our story, Jacob being tricked under the chuppah is just a speeding ticket, a bump in the road.  Jacob is the father of 13 children, and it is his 12 sons who move toEgyptto truly begin the Jewish people.  The Torah is telling us that this ebb and flow of deeds is part of life.

Our tradition tells us that cheating is a form of stealing.  The concept of Ginivat Da’at is understood to be the obtainment of undeserved good will.  That sounds like a mouthful of psychobabble until we see examples.  For instance, offering to pay at a restaurant when you know the other will not accept or inviting a friend to a simcha when you know they cannot afford to travel quickly come to mind, thus giving a false sense of generosity.  Cheating as this type of stealing is worse than any other kind of stealing, including robbing a bank, according to the Tosefta Bava Kamma 7:3.

While it may be true that others in society do things that are improper or immoral, there can be no justification based on what others are doing.  Maimonides in Hilchot Deot (the laws of personality development) 6:1 says that Judaism recognizes that peer pressure is a powerful force in life, but each person is given free choice and thus retains the ultimate responsibility for his or her choices, and each of us should always be in the company of the wise and learn from them.

We will all have moments in our lives when we can fudge or cheat to get ahead, just like the man who did so with me at the car rental counter.  I implore us all to take a step back and try to not take advantage of others or of situations that are morally wrong but could benefit us.  Our biblical heroes were not perfect, and this is but one example.  Let’s learn from Jacob’s actions and remember that we can always work to be better people.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

November 23rd, 2011 (Thanksgiving)

Jacob is destined for struggle from the womb.  He is always running, wrestling, outsmarting others and getting outsmarted in return. His story is a tight literary unit, with the use of leitmotifs of deception that always rebound upon him (taking advantage of Isaac’s blindness, but being deceived in the dark tent; using the bloody skin to deceive Isaac; the bloody tunic used by his sons to deceive him etc.). While this constant struggle makes good literary sense and also fulfills the rabbis’ concept of midah kneged midah, one measure for another, it is exhausting!  It seems like Jacob got not only Esau’s but also Ishmael’s blessing (26:12)

We would hope that Jacob could at least find refuge in religion.  However, Jacob and his family have questionable religious practices—they seem to depend on magic in the procreative tale of the mandrakes, and also with the use of stripped branches to breed mottled goats; then there is next week’s parasha, Vayeitzei which mentions the theft of Laban’s household idols, and we could see problems even with the creation of a matzeivah shrine to house God (the Bet Eil of 28:22).

It takes a long time for Jacob to transition from “the heel” (Ekev) to “upright before God” (Yashar-El).  He never seems able to relax and just be at peace with himself, his family, his neighbors or his God. As the Rabbis say, the acts of the ancestors foreshadow what will come from the descendants.  So too it seems that the Jewish people’s destiny has been to struggle in many of the ways of our ancestor Jacob/Israel.  We have the good fortune to live in a period that is somewhat tranquil; there are no cataclysmic pogroms lurking.  But the struggle to figure out how to live with integrity before God, that remains a constant challenge. How do we balance ritual versus social obligations?  How do we maintain boundaries while opening our hearts to others?  How do we live with deep principle while also respecting other opinions?  What do we do with all this tension, and how do we keep it healthy rather than corrosive?

It seems to me that the best way to balance all of this and to feel whole is in the cultivation of community.  Religious communities are seldom places where everyone is in agreement and nothing divisive ever occurs.  You may have heard of the town with two Jews and three shuls?  How could that be?  And then I realized the obvious, everyone has to have a shul they would not step foot in.

Like families, communities are places where we are known and loved even when we are at odds with one another.  As with families, it takes real, sustained effort to protect this structure, to augment the forces of love and to channel tensions into constructive cooperation, i.e. make our community into a kehilah kedoshah, a holy community.

Watching Jacob this week and next, running from Esau and then from Laban only to be forced back into an embrace with each that he had desperately sought to avoid, I think about our own lives.  As we prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving, we should think about our families and our communities.  Our families and our communities are complicated places with the greatest capacity of both love and tension. I wish all of us fortitude in the creation of such an embrace, and hope that you will experience this holiday as a time of true thanksgiving.

In order to help aid us in finding a true Thanksgiving holiday, I would like to share a beautiful Thanksgiving poem written by Rabbi Naomi Levy.

For the laughter of the children,

For my own life breath,

For the abundance of food on this table,

For the ones who prepared this sumptuous feast,

For the roof over our heads,

The clothes on our backs,

For our health,

And our wealth of blessings,

For this opportunity to celebrate with family and friends,

For the freedom to pray these words

Without fear,

In any language,

In any faith,

In this great country,

Whose landscape is as vast and beautiful as her inhabitants.

Thank You, God, for giving us all these.

 

Shabbat Shalom and Happy Thanksgiving!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

November 18th, 2011

I first came to know it as a Chinese proverb, when I met Lauren, she was working on her MBA and she related it to me as a business school mantra.  When I arrived at the Jewish Theological Seminary I constantly heard it in the context of an individual’s Jewish learning.  If you aren’t going forward, you are going backwards!

Is your “love” falling or rising?  In our vernacular, falling is typically taken as dwindling and rising as surging or growing.  It is certainly countenanced in today’s world that you meet someone (your bashert) you “fall” in love and then you get married and live happily ever after. On your weddingday, is your “love” at its apogee?  I hope not!

We are told in Chayei Sarah this week in 24:67 that when Isaac married Rebecca, “she became his wife; and he loved her.”  It certinaly seems out of sequence from what we are accustomed to.  We would say he “fell” in love with her and then he married her.

Perhaps we can learn a lesson about love from Isaac’s actions.  In today’s society, we say the word “love” so casually.  We use the word indiscriminately, thereby rendering it a meaningless term.  Count the number of times you say the word “love” during the course of the day and you will be quite surprised.  Phrases like “I just love that dress” or “I love Challah Fairy (or Rockland Bakery) babkah” are heard constantly.  But can you really, truly love an inanimate object?  Even when we say that we love a person, another human being, do we really love them for the right reasons?  Or do we contrive our own definition of love by thinking that I love her because she’s beautiful or I love him for his position in the community?

Isaac is reminding us of the true meaning of love.  Many times, people will fall in love, get married, and the relationship starts to go sour from there.  Isaac is teaching us that instead of falling in love, we should be rising in love.  I am by no means advocating for arranged marriages as with Isaac and Rebecca, but we can still rise in love like one of our patriarchs and matriarchs do in our parsha.  A relationship between two partners should be a dynamic one.  We should not “fall” into our love and then watch it fall with us.  The verse is telling us that when Isaac got married, his love was just beginning.  His love for Rebecca grew every day, knowing no bounds or limitations.  His love was real; it was not static, nor did it become stale depending on what Rebecca was wearing or by the situation they were in.  It was an everlasting love, one that we should try to emulate.

My prayer for this Shabbat is that whoever we love in our lives or for whomever we may love in the future that we are able to have the same introspection as Isaac and Rebecca to love each other through the ups and downs of life.  Let this Shabbat be one in which we can express our true love and gratitude to one another, and like our challah every week, be rising.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

November 11th, 2011

When one thinks of this week’s Torah portion, Parashat Vayera, the first thought is incredible kindness of Abraham only days after his brit milah followed by Sarah bearing a child at 90 with a 100 year old husband all trumped by Abraham’s tenth and final test, the “almost” sacrifice of Isaac.  As children, we have all touched on the first thoughts, but I would like to delve into a portion that seems like a rhetorical question of an age old issue.  In the second half of chapter 18 we are run head on into, “Should good people suffer for the evil that bad people do?”

As if we are ease dropping on the “conversation” between God and Abraham, we enter with God telling Abraham that the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah will be destroyed for their wickedness and Abraham responding with a lengthy prayer and dialog on the cities behalf.  “Cutting to the chase,” Abraham boldly asks, “Will you sweep away the innocent along with the guilty?”  You know the rest, Abraham asks “what if there were 50 righteous citizens?”  He then negotiates for 45, 40, 30, and so on until agreeing on 10 righteous people being the magical number.  Unable to find even 10 righteous citizens, God proceeds to destroy both cities.

Why did God cause this to happen?  One would think the few good would be spared.[i]  Perhaps Abraham’s successful pleas were that the smaller number of the righteous would be sufficient to save them all.  Whatever the case, the Torah tells us little with the most memorable detail being Lot’s wife who “looked back” and turned into “a pillar of salt.”[ii]

The Rabbis also ask the same question of what was so evil about the people of these cities that God decided to destroy everyone.  Varying commentators and Midrashim give different reasons that all relate to one another.  The gist of these comments are as follows:

1. They refused to share their wealth and abundant riches with others.
2. They made fun of those in need and deliberately made their lives more miserable.
3. They refused to care for the sick, aid the poor, help the needy, or offer hospitality to the immigrant or stranger in their midst.
4. Their leaders were so greedy and selfish that they made cruelty a public policy.
5. They went so far as to punish their own citizens who reached out to feed the hungry or provide shelter to the homeless.
6. Their judges practiced dishonesty and robbery, and their courts offered no fair treatment for victims of oppression or injustice.

For all of these reasons mentioned, the rabbis note thatSodomandGomorrahwere destroyed.  But what about our original question?  Even if there was one innocent, good person left inSodomorGomorrah, should that person have been destroyed with all the evil ones?  Must good people suffer because of the bad things that others do?  The answer for us in our society today is that unfortunately we often suffer because of the evil that others may do.  Perhaps you can see the connection with our parsha and the incident at Penn State.

Jewish tradition teaches us that we are free to choose between good and evil, between hurting others or helping them.  The gift of freedom means that God does not interfere and cannot prevent us from doing things that not only harms us but others as well.  God wants us to do the right thing, to be just, kind, loving, and generous, but God cannot force us to make the right choice.  We must make our own choices, and we must live with the consequences—even the consequences of the choices that other people make.  Our job in the world today is to do our best to be an example and to not put ourselves in situations where others are making poor choices.  God gave us free will, and therefore we must be conscious of the broad latitude we have been granted.

God did not plan the destruction.  The people brought their end upon themselves and others.  What we should learn from this is that if we are in a place or position that does not feel right, it is our responsibility to leave and go somewhere better, somewhere new, rather than staying with those who could potentially cause us harm in our lives.  This is not easy.

It sounds so much more expressive in French and it does seem appropriate here today.  Plus ca change, plue c’est la meme chose or “the more things change, the more they stay the same.”  The last thing I want to do is falsely accuse anyone of anything, but it sure looks like the whole upper strata of the athletic department and administration at Penn State could not figure out what to do in a very delicate situation.  Apparently, one person did something (dastardly) wrong, but nobody could figure out the right thing to do.  Not exactly like our kinsmen inSodom and Gomorah, but even the most biased observer would have to admit, similar.  Let us hope that the facts will not implicate those that did little wrong and not bring down careers and lifetimes of good work, but I fear that just like in our parsha, there were not enough righteous people to stand up for those little boys.

Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed because, as we have seen, their inhabitants were guilty of abusing human freedom.  They brought on their own destruction—and the death of many innocent people—they deliberately chose cruelty over charity, selfishness over caring, and greed over sharing.  Let us learn from our parsha this week and the incident at Penn State

to do better for ourselves and for the environment we are living in.

 

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

November 4th, 2011

It is not a secret, I am an avid baseball fan, or in my wife’s parlance “a baseball nut.”  So, of course I was riveted last week to Game 6 of the World Series, as one of the greatest games of all time unfold as Texas blew an opportunity to win the World Series three different times, allowing St. Louis to come back and win the game dramatically in the 11^th inning.  This was a game that no matter who I have spoken to that you had to see as it cultivated both the sports world and even the casual fan.

The process of looking, being seen, and being transformed in the process is discussed with particular insight this week by  Shlomo Ephraim ben Aaron Luntschitz (1550 –1619) in his Kli Yakar  on Genesis 13:14-17 from this week’s Torah Portion, Parashat Lech Lecha.

Kli Yakar notes how God first instructs Abram to look up and see the land, and then instructs him to rise and walk its length and breadth. The former instruction includes an unequivocal promise that Avram will instantly inherit the land and bequeaths it to his descendants “forever.” The latter instruction promises only that he alone will receive it.  There are other variations in language—the instruction to gaze includes the urgent Hebrew word “na” but the instruction to walk does not. Kli Yakar compares this to the story of Moses at the end of his life.  God offers him the ability to see the land from Mt. Nebo, but he urgently (e’ebarah na) desires to cross theJordan and walk it himself.  From the divine perspective, looking is the more significant act. From the human vantage, it is movement that we desire.

Kli Yakar brilliantly reconciles all of this with a nuanced theory of acquisition. Normal acquisition of property requires a physical action—walking the land and demonstrating ownership, but acquisition of the land’s spiritual qualities requires more than physical motion—it requires looking at and being seen by God (or the place of God—Mt. Moriah).  And even when one stops looking (or when God’s earthlyTemplehas been destroyed), the connection with heaven (and the heavenly temple) has been made permanent.  This idea of a sight that changes everything forever—and that has greater force than a physical experience—is extremely powerful.  But Kli Yakar notes that most people don’t feel the same urgency to look as to act. God uses the word “na” regarding “looking,” but leaves it out for “walking.” Moses reverses the sense of urgency, mistakenly associating it with a physical crossing rather than a visual experience. People are naturally inclined to “active learning” but sometimes physical activity is a distraction, and focused contemplative observation leads to deeper learning.

What relevance does this insight yield about our experience?  I suspect that this relates to the enduring challenge of creating inclusive communities—places where all people have not only physical access, but the ability to see and be seen as full participants.  Over the past 50-60 years, American society has struggled with successive campaigns of inclusion. These campaigns have, with enormous effort and sacrifice, transformed society in ways that grant greater access to people who had been excluded for reasons of race, gender, sexual orientation, physical ability and so on. Every court decision and piece of legislation, every policy and invitation that has opened the door to fuller participation is a precious victory.  These physical acts of “kinyan,” of acquisition are necessary.

But physical acquisition is not sufficient by itself. It does not suffice to ensure access to an asset, whether the asset is a physical resource like a bus or house, or a spiritual asset like Torah and mitzvot. In addition to the way we walk, there is the matter of how we look. Do we look at each other as sources of wisdom, worth and holiness?  Finally, getting back to baseball, last week’s World Series game was an incredible sight, but it is what has to be thought of or gained from a pivotal moment in our lives that matters the most.  Are we capable of “shifting the gaze” so that we see one another not as objects but as subjects—individuals with unique perspectives that can change the landscape forever?  As the physical and cultural norm of our community continues to grow more diverse, what adjustments can we make in the way that we behold one another, and how will these new ways of seeing change us?

Parashat Lekh Lekha takes us from the image of a physical journey to that of a visual transformation.  Raising our gaze we see a reality that is other, but which also has the potential to become our future.  May we see one another with the capacious and generous eye of Abram—and may we not fear what permanent change can result from our gaze.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

October 28th, 2011  

Most people when reading this week’s Torah portion, Parashat Noach think immediately about the flood, Noah’sArk, and the rainbow of promise from God that the Lord will never destroy the entire world again.  I, however, and am always struck by the story at the end of this week’s parsha about the Tower of Babel.

The Torah tells us that, after the Flood, people moved eastward and settled in the land of Shinar.  They decided to build a city for themselves and a migdal, a tower, that reached up into the heavens.  “Let’s make a name for ourselves,” they said to one another, “or we will be scattered all over the earth.”  Seeing the city and tower they were building, God decided to do what the people had feared.  “If, as one people with one language for all, this is how they have begun to act,” God reasoned, “then nothing that they may propose to do will be out of their reach.”  For that reason God scattered them throughout the world and made them speak different languages.  The city where this all took place was named Babel, which means confused or mixed up.  This seems to be an appropriate description of the entire episode which raises several questions.  What was wrong with the people building a migdal, tower?  Would we not be better off if peoples everywhere spoke one language which could have improved communication, and, perhaps, the chances for human cooperation and peace?

Commentators over the years have tried to explain and answer these questions.  As 11^th century commentator Ibn Ezra noted, we can find no reason to believe that the people were dim-witted enough to think that their building a tall tower would enable them to encounter God.  Consequently Ibn Ezra’s understanding of the story is significantly different.  He explains that their intent was not to build a tower or fortress, but rather a headquarters.  Their goal was to make a glorious name for themselves by establishing a center for all of civilization.  They thought this center was to become the heart of world society.

Isaac Abarvanel from 15^th century Portugal, Spain, and Italy, says that before building the tower, the people had lived at peace with one another, but as soon as they began building, they started to argue bitterly with one another disagreeing over who would do what in the building process.  Rabbi Benno Jacob, a 19^th Biblical scholar suggests that those who built the tower failed because their goals were wrong.  He said that the people had mastered the art of brick making, of molding, and heating the clay.  But, instead of using their technology to improve living conditions in their city, to create housing for the poor, sick, and aging, they decided to use their resources and efforts to build the highest tower in the world.  The mistake of the people was using their technology for pride and vanity instead of using it to improve the quality of life in their society.  A midrash in Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer 24 speaks about the fact that the building of the tower and the goal of fame for the community became justification for brutality and the end of individual freedom.  Bricks became more important than individual liberties or lives.

As we can see, the commentators found many important explanations for God’s destruction of theTowerofBabel.  The project produced jealousy and vicious competition, a misuse of technology, and a cruel disregard for the worth of each individual life.  It fostered a false patriotism and, ultimately, threatened the loss of freedom.  Could it be that God actually saved humanity from catastrophe by confusing their language, destroying the tower, dispersing us, and our traditions to all corners of the earth?

Perhaps the real message of this story has to do with helping us understand that our differences in language, culture, and traditions all represent significant strengths and blessings for humanity.  With all of the horrible fighting and disagreements happening in our world today, especially with Israel and the Middle East, I believe we should all look to the end of this week’s parsha and the story of the Tower of Babel to be reminded just how much we should value each and every culture in our attempts to make peace in the world.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

October 19th, 2011 (Shimini Atzeret and Shabbat)   

Moving forward.  We have completed most of the holidays in Tishrei, ready to ascend in completing the Torah and then restarting it again this week with Simchat Torah and Shabbat Breishit.

Our final parasha, V’zot Haberakhah, which we will read on Thursday night and Friday morning, has always been for me, one of the most difficult parts of the Torah to comprehend.  The language is not only poetic, but uncommon. The tribes are discussed as a single person.  Emotions run rampant throughout the text.  However, I like to think I am capable of getting past these difficulties.  The biggest dilemma is we have been following the life of a great leader, and the severest injustice is committed!  The leader dies, and we are not told where he is buried!  We know the mountain he climbs, per se.  We know that Aaron died there too – but we really have no idea today where he is buried.  How can we make sense of this?

Shortly before the Torah ends, Moses dies.  When we want to remember someone wholeheartedly we pay homage to their being in a variety of ways:  we tell stories of triumph and respect; we speak of their progeny; we build characters of love and pain and valor; and reflect.  We cannot just “remember someone.”  We need to say Kaddish.  We need to light a Yahrtzeit candle.  We need to hear that dirt hit the coffin with a resounding thud.  We need concrete connections.  I need to visit Moses’ grave to be at one with our Jewish heritage.  But, we see in Deuteronomy 34:6 that no one knows the whereabouts of Moses’ burial place.  How can this be?  How can we not make a pilgrimage to the final resting place of the venerated and exemplary leader of our people?

The commentators are likewise troubled by the omission of Moses’ burial place.  The answers seem to be in some sort of agreement, i.e. we do not know where Moses is buried because if we did, we would turn it into a shrine.  By virtue of Moses’ relationship with God, we would begin to worship Moses, or worse, we would begin a following devoted to the spirit of Moses.  Keeping to a political mindset, what would happen if there were a disagreement over the burial place?  If two factions claimed that “this is the spot where Moses is buried” (not far off from the hotels claiming “George Washington slept here”, or have you ever seen the Original Drifters?), there would be inherent strife.

It is difficult to accept these answers to my quest to find Moses’ burial place.  And so I attest that we DO know where Moses is buried.  Moses is buried in the text, or, like George Washington, “first in the hearts of his countrymen.”  We read the end of the text in Parashat Ha’azinu, which we read on the Shabbat after Rosh Hashanah, Shabbat Shuvah.  God tells Moses he is going to die in Deuteronomy 32:50, it is difficult to fathom that God would allow Moses to suffer from that point onward.  As God finished speaking, I am certain that Moses died right there and was fulfilled because God assured him that the land would be given to the Israelite people.

V’zot Haberakhah, in its entirety, is the epitaph on Moses’ tombstone, poetry of his accomplishments and conquests, our goals and our downfalls.  This is not a Blessing for us.  This is a Blessing for Moses.  The epitaph pays homage to Moses.  These are stories of triumph and respect.  We are included in the progeny.  We have reconstructed a life of love and pain, and we constructively or symbolically visit the burial place so that he is truly remembered.

It is appropriate that we “visit” the final resting place of such a hero in this season.  Just as we are beginning to walk in the shoes of new life, we are humbled that even the greatest of our leaders have to succumb to death.  And so, we finish our Torah and then we begin anew, reading from Breishit and our creation because the way to visit Moses and the way for us to gain new meaning is to reread our sacred texts each and every year.

Shabbat Shalom and Chag Sameach!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

 

September 28th, 2011

Jews find it meaningful to privately reflect on the words of Psalm 27 which we read every day during the month of Elul leading up to the High Holy Days through the end of Sukkot.  I have provided a translation of the Psalm below to help guide anyone both reading my message and for personal reflection.

In his commentary Our Heaven and Strength, Martin Samuel Cohen writes a respected and well known Conservative Rabbi notes that at a time of year when people find their thoughts turning more and more frequently to their relationships with God, it is both bold and brave to read the 27th Psalm over and over again as part of public worship, almost as though its message were in need of intense inculcation.

And what is that message?  Simply that God may be known even today in the normal way human beings know each other; that God must be served to be known, and that even the most assiduous performance of rites and rituals must be deemed meaningless in the absence of faith in a God who can be encountered and not merely obeyed.

As we enter in the holidays together, my first High Holy Days with each of you, I ask that each of us take time to reflect on this past year as well as our hopes and dreams for the year that is to come.  Together, we can make 5772 a year full of faith in God, a year full of blessings, and a year in which we build on our previous relationships with one another and new relationships that will blossom.

Shanah Tovah!

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

Psalm 27:

A psalm of David.
Adonai is my light and my help.  Whom shall I fear?
Adonai is the strength of my life.  Whom shall I dread?

When evildoers draw near to slander me, when foes threaten—they stumble and fall.  Though armies be arrayed against me, I have no fear.
Though wars threaten, I remain steadfast in my faith.

One thing I ask of Adonai—for this I yearn:
To dwell in the House of Adonai all the days of my life—to behold God’s beauty, to pray in God’s sanctuary.

Hiding me in God’s shrine, safe from peril, God will shelter me beyond the reach of disaster, and raise my head high above my enemies.

I will bring God offerings with shouts of joy, singing, chanting praise to Adonai.

Adonai, hear my voice when I call; be gracious to me and answer.
It is You whom I seek, says my heart.
It is Your presence that I seek, Adonai.

Do not hide from me; do not reject Your servant.
You have always been my help; do not abandon me.
Forsake me not, my God of deliverance.

Though my father and my mother leave me, Adonai will care for me.

Teach me Your way, Adonai.
Guide me on the right path, to confound my oppressors.

Do not abandon me to the will of my foes, for false witnesses have risen against me, purveyors of malice and lies.

Yet I have faith that I shall surely see Adonai’s goodness in the land of the living.
Hope in Adonai.
Be strong, take courage, and hope in Adonai.
 

September 23rd, 2011  •  24 Elul 5771

We have all heard incredibly moving speeches from our politicians and leaders during the course of our lifetimes.  However, I believe that the greatest speeches of all come in the next few weeks of our subsequent Torah readings.  Here, Moses delivers his last thoughts to the Israelites before his death and the transition of leadership for our people.  This week we have a double Torah portion, Nitzavim-Vayeilach.  Our first portion, Nitzavim, ends with a rousing speech by Moses calling upon heaven and earth to witness the choice to be made by Israel between life and death, blessing and curse.

Modern Bible scholars who view the Torah as following the format of a “Suzerain treaty” in which Israel enters into alliance with the Lord, just like a vassal would to an authoritarian ruler see this phase as the final witnessing of the agreement. Yet this passage is clearly about more than power and loyalty.  Moses frames Israel’s choice in terms of devotion, and clinging to God, who is the source of life.  Indeed, the idea of “clinging” to God is distinctive in the Torah to Deuteronomy (in Genesis, men “cling” to women, and in Numbers “cling” to land).

What does it mean to cling (or be glued—nidbak) to God?  This question arises in Midrash Sifre Devarim 49.  Here the rabbis wish to know how a person might cling to God—is it really possible to ascend to the heavens and cling to fire?  Rather, the Midrash says that we should cling to the sages and their students, and God will, as it were, lift you up as if you had taken heaven by storm.

Clinging to God’s ways is understood by the rabbis as a reference to imitating God’s qualities. An even better known passage from the Sifre emphasizes this point—to walk in God’s ways, is to be merciful and compassionate…and righteous, and faithful.

In the Midrash there is a key word play on Joel 3:5, “whoever is called by God’s name”—how can a person be called by God’s name?  Rather, follow God’s attributes and you will, as it were, be identified with God.

The 20^th Century Chasidic writer Rabbi Shalom Yosef Faigenboim in his Netivot Shalom notes that it does not suffice to do acts of compassion and mercy, but that one must strive to become in essence compassionate and merciful—this is the path of God.  Netivot Shalom speaks further about this transformation to imitate the divine qualities as “purification of moral qualities,” or Taharat HaMiddot, and goes on to say that this work precedes the actual observance of mitzvot, and exceeds them in difficulty.

Often times, it is tempting to focus on our intellectualizing and on our external performance of mitzvot. These are indeed essential parts of our service to God.  Yet especially during this time leading into Rosh HaShannah, we also must consider our middot—our internal qualities, our ways of relating to other people in our community and those afar.

I pray that we will use these coming days of teshuvah to draw ourselves closer to the divine qualities of compassion and mercy described in this important Midrash.  As the Sifre says elsewhere, chanun, “gracious” also comes from chinam, giving others the gift of forgiveness, whether or not they deserve it.

May we all forgive one another and also become worthy of clinging to God, and emulating God’s attributes of compassion.

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

September 16th, 2011  •  17 Elul 5771

As many of you know by now, this coming week is Benny’s first birthday.  In reflecting back on the past year, I cannot help but feel blessed for everything Benny has brought to my life, including the sleepless nights.  The journey of parenthood can definitely be seen by some as a blessing, although some nights I wonder.

We witness another type of journey in this week’s Torah portion, Parashat Ki Tavo, at the end of the portion, after the frightening string of curses, Moses waxes nostalgic about the desert trek. In Devarim, Deuteronomy 29:3 he indicates that the journey was necessary not as punishment, but as a term or period of gestation leading to spiritual preparedness for independence, “The Lord did not grant you the mind to comprehend, the eyes to see nor the ears to hear until this very day, hayom.”

The word “hayom” (this day) is a motif in Ki Tavo, and is quite popular throughout Deuteronomy (where it appears 75 times).  Rhetorically, it lends a sense of urgency to the final sermons of Moses.  This urgency was not lost on the ancient rabbis, who noted in one early midrash, “these words should be new in your eyes as if you had received them today (hayom) from Mt. Sinai.”

This is an auspicious message for all of us—that Torah should always be fresh, as if it were just revealed anew.  But I discern another meaning inherent in 29:3.  There Moses says that it wasn’t until today that you had the ability to comprehend, or even see or hear these words.  Rashi shares a beautiful additional message.  He says that we see that Moses gave the Torah scroll to the Levites and the elders.  The rest of the nation of Israel protested saying that some day the Levites would say that the Torah is theirs alone and Rashi interprets that all of Israel was standing at Sinai.  Rashi concludes that Moses rejoices saying that this demonstrates that the Israelite people had matured and become worthy of being called a People.  The journey to people hood is no less miraculous than the journey to parenthood.

We are only a couple of weeks away from Rosh Hashanah, my prayer for all of us on this verse is yet a bit different—closer, perhaps to the p’shat.^[i] On this day, at this stage of our life, each of us is capable of understanding things that were previously hidden from us. Perhaps we have learned more to enrich our lives, or perhaps we have matured. Perhaps we have suffered in some way, or perhaps we have felt new love. Our experience in this world is our aperture to the divine realm.

Only today can we understand this Torah. Tomorrow we may understand other things. But let us be fully present in this moment that is full of potential—the start of a year of Torah, the start of a new year of life. May it bring us the blessings of insight and wisdom, compassion and kindness, challenge and tranquility, and lasting peace.

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

^[i] The simple, plain or obvious meaning of a Biblical text as compared with drash, which denotes a comparative, allegoric or midrashic meaning

September 9th, 2011  •  10 Elul 5771

This past week I read a moving story about the children of 9/11.  The story focused on a group of children who were still inside of their mother’s womb when their fathers tragically passed away on September 11, 2001.  I was incredibly stirred by this article.  What struck me the most was the way each of these children, now nine years old (almost 10), and their mothers had moved on living life to the fullest of their ability all in different ways.

Each and every one of us could tell some story related to 9/11.  For some of us it hit extremely close to home as we may have known a relative or friend who was killed on that dreadful day.  For others, we may have been thousands of miles away, but still felt the pain of those who were affected by this tragedy.

Each year since 9/11, I always study with curiosity which parasha falls in the week leading up to 9/11 and I try to find some nexus.  This week is Parashat Ki Tetzei in which more laws are given than any other parsha throughout the entire year.  The focus is much deeper than just a large subset of laws (74 to be exact).  The focus of most of these laws is on the family, on preserving life.

The goal of these laws in our parsha is to foster survival, even in the face of unenviable hardship or evil.  God wants us to persevere and be strong for each other and grow in our relationships.

There is a story, told by Rabbi Akiva of the Talmud, about a fox, who was once walking alongside a river, and he saw fish going in swarms from one place to another. He said to the fish: “From what are you fleeing?” The fish replied: “From the nets cast for us by humans.” The fox said to them, “Would you like to come up on dry land so that you and I can live together in the way that my ancestors lived with your ancestors?”  The fish replied, “Are you really the one they call the cleverest of animals?  You are not clever, but foolish!  If we are afraid in the element in which we live, how much more so in the element in which we would die!  So it is with us, says the Talmud. ‘To us Jews,’ concluded Rabbi Akiva, “Torah is our life, just as water is to the fish.  If we are in danger in our natural habitat, how much greater will our danger be if we abandon it?”

On this Sunday, the 10^th anniversary of 9/11, our prayer should be that each of us will muster the strength and resolve to continue living not out of fear, but out of the renewed commitment to democratic and religious freedom. We pray that despite the human acts of terror, each of us can transmit God’s love and sheltering presence in the healing we bring to one another throughout this lingering ordeal.

As we prepare to remember those who fell unjustly right in our own “backyard” 10 years ago, let us pray that their memory is forever a beacon of instruction and inspiration: let us vow to live our lives to the fullest.  Let us remember the concepts in Ki Tetzei: family, preserving life, and faith in God.

This week, we remember, but as we also prepare for the High Holidays, we learn to be comforted and to continue to do our best to help heal the world we live in.

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

September 2nd, 2011  •  3 Elul 5771

Before the storm, I had the pleasure of going with the Federation 20s and 30s group to see the film “Sarah’s Key.”  As with most films, this film had its moments of greatness in which I was swept away with the story and its moments where I wish they would have given me a little bit more of the story line.  This is a film I would highly recommend.

What made the film so powerful to me was the story it told.  The characters are fictional, but the film opens up the eyes of the world to the way the French treated the Jews during World War II and not just the Germans.  It is imperative for us to understand just how horrifying the Holocaust truly was no matter where someone lived in Europe.

At the end of the film, the narrator and main character gives us, the viewer, and the moral of the film: we must continue to tell the stories of those who were mistreated in the Holocaust.  It is only through us that justice will prevail and that the horrors of the Holocaust will not be repeated.

I found this moral apropos considering the well known lines in our Torah reading this week, Parashat Shoftim.  While our Torah is ageless and boundless, some portions are etched in my psyche more than others.  In this week’s parasha in Devarim, Deuteronomy 16:20 we hear, ‫צֶדֶק צֶדֶק תִּרְדֹּף‬

“Justice, Justice you shall pursue.”  In the film “Sarah’s Key” we are likewise admonished to pursue justice—a modern retelling of this Biblical imperative.

The question is asked by most commentators on our verse, why is the word “justice” repeated?  Rambam, Maimonides, from 14^th century Spain says that “One should pursue justice (only through) righteousness.  It is not enough to seek righteousness; it must be done through honest means; the Torah does not condone the pursuit of a holy end through improper means.”  Simcha Bunem, a Hasidic Leader in Poland (1765-1827) said:  This command also means to “pursue justice justly,” for just goals can never be achieved by unjust means; the worthiest of goals will be rendered less worthy if we have to compromise justice to achieve it.  Abraham Joshua Heschel, a mid-20^th century Conservative philosopher and teacher said that the term ‘pursue’ carries strong connotations of effort, eagerness.  This implies more than merely respecting or following justice.  We must actively pursue it.

All three of these esteemed commentators amplify the message we must learn from this week’s well known verse.  We need to do more in our lives to actively pursue justice in our world today.  We constantly speak about wanting to change the world we live in, but how often do we actually pick up the phone (or write) and attempt to communicate with a politician, go to a soup kitchen, help in letting the media know what is really happening in Israel, or help with the efforts in a tragic place like Darfur?  We must attempt to accomplish what the film “Sarah’s Key” is asking of us: to continue the story of our people, both past, present, and future, by pursuing justice in a just matter and done with righteousness.  Only when we take the time to be activists, to pursue justice, will we be able to say that we are continuing to tell the story of our people and changing what could not have been changed in the past.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

August 26th, 2011  •  27 Av 5771

 

Can we be God’s “Treasured People?”

Several times in the Tanakh (referred to by many as the Hebrew Bible) the people of Israelare referred to as God’s am segulah, “treasured people.”

In the third month after their liberation from Egypt, Moses climbs Mount Sinai.  There, according to Exodus 19:4-6, God tells Moses: “You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to Me.  Now then, if you will obey Me faithfully and keep My covenant, you shall be My am segulah, ‘treasured possession,’ among all the peoples.”

In our Torah portion this week, Parashat Re’eh, Moses declares to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 14:2 that “You are a people consecrated to Adonai your God: Adonai your God chose you from among all other peoples on earth be God’s treasured people, am segulah.”

There are a few other examples in the Tanakh in which we are referred to as am segulah.  So, clearly the idea of the people of Israel as a “chosen people” is central to Jewish faith.  Yet, what does this assertion mean? How does the Torah understand it?  How has it been interpreted throughout our history and how should we interpret it today?

The majority of Jewish commentators seem to agree that the Jewish people in its covenant with God sensed that their relationship was more than self-serving.  They bore the unusual task or burden of being God’s instrument for extending truth, justice, righteousness, compassion, and peace on earth among all peoples.  The awareness of this responsibility grew in them. The idea is that we have become conscious of our role, but not superior.  The rabbis believed that being an am segulah means that the people of Israel must measure its existence by the values and demands of Judaism.  To be chosen by God means to be responsible, not only for your own survival, but for the survival of all peoples.

I constantly struggle with this notion of what the meaning of being an am segulah, a “treasured people” of God is for us today.  It leads to the larger question of what is the purpose of our Jewish existence.  Why did God put us here?

Of course, I would love to believe that as Jews, we have been put here to be responsible for the entire world.  I believe we strive to do this with our Tikkun Olam and social justice efforts.  However, I ponder whether this is enough to warrant the distinction of being the treasured/chosen people.

Modern philosopher Martin Buber calls the Jewish people a unique people molded by our history and by a great inner transformation through which we become an anointed kingdom representing God.  I believe it is through our history and our shared experience that we as a Jewish people and our congregation can confront these ancient ideas and issues and attempt to better understand what our responsibilities are in this world.

This Shabbat, take a moment, as we continue our preparation for Rosh Hashanah, to think about how each of us can do more to help the world we live in and prove that we deserve the title of am segulah.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

csirabbi@optonline.net

 

August 19th, 2011  •  19 Av 5771

You had to see it to believe it!

Two years ago I lived in Israel and I had an opportunity to tour South Tel Aviv, the part of Tel Aviv that no tourist would ever be shown. There, on every street, in every park, in every corner, were people sleeping and living on the streets. The poverty was out of control.

So, as the protests in Tel Aviv and the rest of Israel broke out in the last couple of weeks, it came as no surprise to me that the people in Israel would finally rebel over the current economic structure. Throughout Israel there have been protests involving nearly 500,000 people.

By no means do I believe that the poverty in Israel is any worse than that of us here in the United States, but I feel as though as a Jewish State, we should be working harder to lessen the poverty in Israel. Instead, it has been reported that 30-40 percent of the country’s wealth is in the hands of a few individuals and little is being put back into the society to help eradicate the poverty issues, especially in South Tel Aviv.

This week’s parasha, Eikev is aptly named and relates directly to this issue in Tel Aviv. Eikev means “on the heels of.” This refers to the consequences of not heeding or ignoring Gods commandments. Moses delivers a discourse whose central point is that listening to God brings blessing, while ignoring God brings curse. The most famous passage begins at Devarim, Deuteronomy 11:13, and is of course the second paragraph of the Shema. The premise of this entire parashah is that compliance with the Teaching leads to directly observable benefits. A Righteous Israel means good and prosperity while a wicked Israel means bad and penury. More simply stated, the fundamental doctrine of reward and punishment based on the mitzvot.

Yet this “prosperity gospel” (to use the Christian term for this way of thinking) is not so simplistic. Moses directly addresses the tendency of wealthy people to congratulate themselves for their great merit. In 9:4-6 he tells Israel that it is not their righteousness that has entitled them to reward—for they are a stiff necked people—but rather God’s promise to the ancestors that motivates the gift of the land. In other words: it is your fault when bad things happen, but not necessarily to your credit when the good times roll.

This form of theology has resonated with hundreds of generations of Jews as well as other peoples of faith. When there is calamity, we have historically accepted this as a form of chastisement from heaven and responded to woe with renewed piety. And when there is prosperity, we have tried to sustain the good times by the means of regular expression of gratitude. Only in this way could we curtail arrogance and avoid provoking God’s anger. Indeed, one of our parashah’s most famous lines, ואכלת ושבעת וברכת “you shall eat, be satisfied and praise God” (8:10) is explained in the following verses as being, “lest…you grow arrogant and forget the Lord your God” ורם לבבך ושכחת את יקוק אלהיך. Thanksgiving is a curb on arrogance, and human arrogance can be the downfall regarding the covenant with God. Be constantly conscious of the source of your blessings.

By no means do I agree with this theology presented above in its entirety, but I do think there is a lesson to be learned from this week’s parsha with regard to what is happening in Israel. We need our politicians to stop being so arrogant and take time to support those less fortunate. As Jews, we should learn from this week’s parsha to do our best to act in a way that God would want us to. It is time that we push the leaders in Israel to do what is right for the collective good. This is what God would want and what Moses attempted to teach the Israelites this week.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

csirabbi@optonline.net

*****Please note that this week on Shabbat morning in place of a sermon, we will be discussing this further as a congregation with additional texts offered both agreeing and disagreeing with the topic of arrogance versus gratitude.

August 12th, 2011  •  12 Av 5771

The week and Shabbat after Tisha B’Av is one of my favorites.  This Shabbat is called Shabbat Nahamu, the Shabbat of Comfort, named after the beginning of our Haftarah.  I revel in the concept that we all need to feel comforted after this time of mourning.  It is similar to why we are obligated to comfort those who are mourning a loss not just during the week of shiva, but for an extended proscribed time after shiva.

However much I connect with the comforting aspect after Tisha B’Av, my favorite part of all is Tu B’Av.  As my wife Lauren can attest to, I am not a big fan of Valentines Day¹   for a variety of reasons.  Nevertheless, I do believe it is important to show our love to one another.  So, the Jewish calendar presents that day for us on the 15^th of Av (this year Tu B’Av is on Sunday night and Monday), only six days after we are at our greatest period of mourning on Tisha B’Av, and in modern day Israel this resembles what Americans know as Valentines Day.

There is a fascinating discussion in the Talmud on Taanit 26b which states:  “Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel said that there were no days as joyous for Israel as the 15^th of Av and Yom HaKippurim, when the daughters of Israel went out in [simple] white garments that they had borrowed so as not to embarrass someone without a complete wardrobe…and they danced in the vineyards saying, ‘young man, lift your eyes and see—what will you choose for yourself? Do not gaze at beauty, but look to the family…’”

It is a strange text, to be honest. I have always had trouble thinking of Yom Kippur as an official Sadie Hawkins day in ancient Israel, though there certainly is a lot of socializing on the high holidays. It is also hard to imagine these young women explaining the Song of Song’s romantic descriptions of Solomon’s wedding as metaphors for the Sinai revelation and for the Temple’s inauguration. Obviously they did not have bridal magazines back then. When they tell the boys to look not for beauty but at the family, do they mean at the girl’s parents and “yichus” (probably), or perhaps are they instructing the boys to look with imagination at the future family that they might build with such a partner? (Proverbs 31:30)

Of course, the loveliest part of this text is the sense of social solidarity, with women exchanging clothes to dissuade their suitors from focusing on wealth and external glamour. Competition is a natural tendency in such settings, and this attempt to moderate it and to remind the young people of Judaism’s deeper values is noble.

Moshe puts this beautifully in the second aliyah of our parsha this week, Parashat Va’Etchanan in which he says that the Torah is our source of wisdom and goodness: “What great nation has rules and laws as righteous as this entire Torah that I place before you today?”  For me, the significance is that the rules become righteous when they draw on the entirety of Torah—including the ethics, the narratives and the struggles. In our Torah we see our forefathers (to steal a cliché) doing “the good, the bad, and the ugly,” all the while being no different from you and me but with a paradigm of how to carry out our lives properly.

So on this Sunday night and Monday make sure to remember to tell your loved ones how much you love them.  However, more importantly, we need to remember as we move into this Shabbat of Comfort followed by this day of love in our calendar that we need to find ways to love our Judaism together as a community and learn to love each other and our texts with a mutual respect.

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

[1] Valentines day is named after one or more early Christian martyrs named Saint Valentine, and it was established by the Pope Gelasisus I in 496 CE.  For some reason it was deleted from the General Roman Calendar of Saints by Pope Paul VI in 1969.  The day first became associated with romantic love in the circle of Geoffrey Chaucer in the High Middle Ages, when the tradition of country love flourished.

August 5th, 2011  •  5 Tammuz 5771

Like many of you, I have watched the news these last few days related to our debt and wondered to myself, “how did we get to this point?”

As I was reminded by pundits on television on Monday morning, “If you liked the debt ceiling debate of recent days, you probably will love the debate that will occur in the days leading up to Thanksgiving this year.  If you hated the current debate, you probably will despise the one coming up in four months.”

Why did the networks (FOX, CNN, NBC, ABC, etc) say this, because right before Thanksgiving is when the new 12-member special Congressional committee is supposed to come up with its proposals for major entitlement and tax reform. Entitlement reform will most likely mean cuts in Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security while tax reform is probably code for tax increases.

It may be possible to get six Democrats and six Republicans to agree on these kinds of painful choices, but it certainly won’t be easy.  In short, the country may have avoided a debt ceiling disaster for now.  But this debate is only just beginning to boil.

Listening intently to this debate I was reminded of a moment at the beginning of our parsha this week, Parashat Devarim.  Moses recalls a moment of crisis when he realized that he, by himself, could not lead the Israelites.  Moses remembers saying in Deuteronomy 1:16-17 (see also Parashat Yitro 18:17), “I cannot bear your disputes and bickering by myself.”  To aid him, he appoints “wise, discerning, and experienced” tribal leaders and judges.  “I charged them to hear out the people and to decide justly between them, Israelites or strangers.  I commanded them to be impartial in judgment, hearing out low and high alike.  I told them to fear no person in rendering a judgment because judgment is God’s.”

In commenting on the difficult burden of making judgments, the early rabbis, many of whom were presiding court judges, compare their judicial responsibility to dealing with fire.  In Midrash Tanhuma it is said, “If you come too close, you will be burnt; if you stray too far, you will be cold.  The art of making judgments is finding the right distance.”

While I am not sure that our politicians and current judges meet all of the standards Moses wanted when creating the court system as our forefathers readied themselves to enter the Land. I do know that now more than ever we need our elected officials to find the art of making judgments in “finding the right distance.”  As cliché as it sounds, the more things change, the more they remain the same.

I was extremely moved as I am sure several of you were too by the return of Congresswoman Giffords, my parent’s congresswoman, to the floor to cast her vote Monday night.  There was a moment during these intense debates where it did not matter where one stood on the debt debate.  Instead, our politicians for a brief moment found that right “distance” and banded together.  Moses too would have been proud.

Many critical debates in our country are on the horizon.  Let us pray that our politicians have the wisdom Moses did in working with others to make the best decisions possible for all of us, our children, and our children’s children.

 

July 29th, 2011  •  20 Tammuz 5771

Last Thursday I was overjoyed and excited to welcome over 150 campers and staff from Camp Ramah here in Nyack to an incredible concert they hosted in our new social hall.  All I could think about was the Beatles classic “Imagine All the People.”

Since arriving at CSI only a short few weeks ago, it has been made clear to me that one of my mandates is to bring in new families, as well as plan new and innovative programs to share with our current young members and families.  While we are all aware that this is not going to happen overnight, last Thursday gave me a glimpse into what the future portends.  As I watched these children dance and sing in the social hall followed by time to sit outside, play and eat a snack on our wonderful property, I got a brief peek as to what our shul can look like in the future.

Last week’s parsha involves taking a census of the Israelite people.  After the census is taken, however, beginning this week in Parashat Mattot, and throughout the rest of the Torah, lists all the necessary preparation so that our people can properly enter the land of Israel.

Here at CSI the same kind of preparation is going on so that we can hopefully enter into our new era with our children’s programming titled “Gan Katan.”  Programs and times are listed at the end of this message.

It does not stop there, this August, we are going to be offering Watermelon Wednesday CSI Storytime every Wednesday at 10:30.  And, on Sunday, September 11^th, we will have our first annual Rockaroo Concert for parents and children as I expect the social hall to be rocking from 11 a.m. to noon!  I am not the only leader for all of this myriad of activities.  The facilitators are all professional and some of the storytelling will feature my wife Lauren who has 10+ years of experience as a Jewish educator at cutting edge day schools in New York and Los Angeles.  Needless to say, everyone will be masters of their craft.

We have exciting programs on the horizon for the religious school and families of all ages as well.  Please be on the lookout for these future programs.

All that I have mentioned is just a taste of what we are looking to offer here at CSI.  However, none of this amazing programming is going to be successful without each of YOU!

This week’s parshah begins with God giving instructions regarding the making of vows and oaths.  Any vow made in the name of the Lord must be fulfilled.  In the Torah there is a differentiation between the vows of men and women, but I believe in our egalitarian world today the vows are equal.

I am asking each of you to make a vow to help us make our new programming initiatives successful.  If you know of any friends, grandchildren, neighbors, or anyone at all that may have an interest in our programs (members or non-members), please contact me and give me their information so we can get them on board.  I need each of you to help me get the word out that these programs are legitimate and right here at CSI.  We want to have as many children enjoying each program as possible.

On top of getting the word out, in order to make these programs as successful as possible, I need more of your help.  If you have any extra time on your hands throughout the week, we could really use your help just to greet new families at the entrance to our newly remodeled synagogue, or help us serve snack at one of these classes.  Just being there to smile, greet, meet, and schmooze is enough.  Before you know it, you will be tapping your feet and singing along. We need everyone involved!

“Imagine All the People.”  Right now we are only imagining.  This project is going to take time, and success is not going to be quantitative but qualitative initially.  However, with your help, we can make this place into the vibrant, unique shul that I know we all want it to become.

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

July 22nd, 2011  •  13 Tammuz 5771

I am obsessed with numbers and statistics.

Why you might ask?  As many of you know, after my Judaism and my family, my next love in life is baseball and especially the Yankees.  Baseball, more than any other sport is about numbers.  Ask any fan (especially a Yankee one) what do 56, 60 and 61 represent?  Fans banter about numbers like ERA, RBI, slugging percentage, on base percentage, saves and first pitch strikes ad infinitum.

Thanks to the advent of the DVR, I was able to view my all time favorite Derek Jeter join the august body of players in baseball history to record 3,000 base hits.  He did it with the aplomb of a home run to reach the magic number.   Not to mention his perfect day at bat leading the Yankees to a win.

That night,  I pondered (and rewatched it multiple times) the momentous occasion, I began to reflect on the deeper meaning of numbers and keeping track of what surely are meaningless statistics to many.  As is my wont, I began to reflect on its relationship to this week’s parsha, Pinchas.  Specifically the second Aliyah.  Here we see God ordering Moses and Elazare HaKohn to take a second census of the B’nai Yisrael.  Recall the first census took place at the beginning of Bamidbar, Numbers.  This census, thirty-nine years later includes the names of each clan in the Jewish nation by family names.  In what is one of the longest Aliyot, the Torah does not organize the census around where they pitched their tents or their date of birth, but around the Mispachot, the family clans/units originally descended from Jacob’s twelve sons.

To say this chapter appears incredibly unexciting would be an understatement.  Take your own look at pages 920-924 in our Etz Hayim Chumash.  What do we learn here?  Some say it was a method to “divide” the land, another says it was in anticipation of the impending battles to conquer the Land and another says God merely wants to count his children after the plague as a shepherd counts his flock.  While it may only be a parable, “there is something to be learned from everything.”

The other question worthy of contemplating here is why does the Torah bother to give us each leader’s name, but insists on telling us their (so called) first and last names?  In Midrash Sifrei Zuta 27:1, it is suggested that the names in the Torah signify the moral quality of the people who have them.

How does this Midrash and this part of our parsha relate to Derek Jeter?  One of the reasons Jeter’s accomplishment was so anticipated and celebrated is because of the good name he has built for himself on and off the playing field.  Numbers mean something (think of Roger Clemens, Pete Rose, Barry Bonds or Mark McGuire), but the worth of “value of a good name outshines” everything.

Our names are extremely precious.  We have to live and behave “by the book” to make and keep them valuable.  As we read in the Book of Kohelt, Ecclesiastes 7:1, “A good name is better than precious oil.”

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

July 8th, 2011  •  6 Tammuz 5771

“Home is where the heart is.”

This famous, yet cliché quote sums up my feelings during this past week.  As Lauren, Benny, and I spent the week packing and then moving yesterday into our new home here in Upper Nyack, I finally understood the cliché.  Moving can be very stressful, so when all of our boxes and furniture were finally unloaded, it felt like we had really come home; this is where our hearts belong.

All week long I have been thinking about how appropriate it is that we are moving this week, the week of Parashat Balak.  I have a soft spot for this week’s parsha, that of my Bar Mitzvah.  It does not get much better as a 13 year old than having a talking donkey as part of your parsha and incorporating it into your speech.  The “magic” is stimulating.  If you want to hear even more about this, please come on Shabbat morning to hear, “Do You Believe In Magic?”

While this parsha has great meaning for me and I love the supernatural aspect involved.  It is the words of Baalam to the Israelites that always intrigue me the most.  Every year I grasp onto a different interpretation predicated on where I am at in my life.  This week, I found the nexus that related directly to my move and the transition we are in at CSI.

In Baalam’s first “poem”, he speaks of the Israelites in Bamidbar, Numbers 23:9, “As I see them from the mountain tops, gaze on them from the heights; there is a people that dwells apart, not reckoned among the nations.”  I always ask myself, what is all this?  This appears to be a very uncomfortable statement about the Israelites.  Rashi suggests that Balaam is predicting a secure future for the people of Israel.  He means to say: “I look at your origins (mountain tops) and see that you are strongly rooted in your ancestors (heights).  You are distinguished (dwell apart) by your Torah traditions, and because of them you will not suffer the fate (be reckoned) of extinction but will survive and prosper.”

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, a 19^th century scholar from Germany takes this one step further and says that when Balaam looks upon the people, he sees in their traditions and values a uniqueness worthy of blessing.  I also see our traditions and values at CSI as a blessing; along with our glorious 120 year history, especially after the warm welcome my family and I received last Shabbat.

In Balaam’s second “poem”, he brings down the well known paean we recite today every Rosh Hashanah during the Malchuyot section of the Musaf service.  Balaam says in Numbers 23:21, “No harm is in sight for Jacob, no woe in view for Israel.  Adonai their God is with them…”  I always revel in this blessing.  Nachmanides, Ramban, perceives that Balaam is not predicting the future but making a judgment about the character of the Israelites.  Even though the Israelites sin, just as we all commit sins, their morals and values were “high” enough to overcome those sins so that God remained with the people.

The most famous blessing of all, Ma Tovu, which one should utter every time we enter a sanctuary states, “Ma Tov Ohalecha Yaakov, Mishkenotecha Yisrael,” “How goodly are your tents, O Jacob, and your tabernacles, O Israel!”  Rashi and many other commentators are quick to note that this blessing is exactly what Balaam felt as he looked down at the Israelites and their modest community.

This is precisely how I am feeling as we move into Shabbat this week.  With regard to my new homes, both on Front Street and at CSI, I cannot help but feel that these “tents” of our congregation, are beautiful and are deserving of every blessing Balaam articulated.  We all have Godly attributes in us and it is time for us together to put them to use as Balaam expressed regarding our ancestors.

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

July 1, 2011  •  29th Sivan 5771

Like many of you, words could not describe my excitement last week as I heard about the New York State Senate’s vote to finally legalize Gay Marriage in New York.  Clearly overdue, this was a monumental moment, in allowing equal rights to a faction of our community that has long been discriminated against.

I was moved by reading Manhattan Senator Thomas Duane’s words following the vote.  He said, “[‎LGBT] New Yorkers will no longer be denied the right to marry the ones they love.  For the first time in New York’s rich history they will be granted equal protection under the law…the paradoxical truth is that what already exists and will not change, but for true legal recognition, is the commitment and love that is already the reality in so many of New York’s families.”

This will hopefully be a beautiful new beginning for the LGBT community in New Yorkand hopefully lead to more equality in other states around the country.

Of course, for all of us, this is a time of new beginnings as well.  As I prepare to spend my first Shabbat with you at CSI, I must admit I am excited, anxious, and nervous all in one.  Just like this new legislation has brought about so much renewed hope, it is my vision that through Torah, through Kehillah (community), and through Avodah (hard work), I can help all of us bring Tikvah (hope) and Emunah (faith) for what the future can bring together.  I believe it is appropriate that our first Shabbat together is during Parashat Chukkat as well.

Our Torah portion this week tells us of what will become the inevitable transition of leadership and the forced new beginning for the Israelites.  Miriam and Aaron both die within 20 verses of each other and Moses is told that he will not be escorting the Israelites into the Promised Land.  This entire course of events in Bamidbar (Numbers) chapter 20 is perplexing in many ways, mainly with the much debated question: how could a simple transgression be punished so severely that Moses is no longer allowed into the Promised Land (which he has been leading the people for many years).  Come to shul this Shabbat morning when I will be speaking about: Did Moses’ punishment fit the crime?

We may not know the reason Miriam and Aaron die so close to each other or why God puts an end to Moses’ life. We do, however, know God is ready for the Israelites to transition into a new era. God seems to be trying to wean the Israelites from one kind of perception to another: from dependence on the visible and tangible, to reliance on speech in connecting with God.  At Sinai, all their senses were engaged, but the revelation itself was auditory.  When Moses retells and reframes the story in Devarim (Deuteronomy) 4:12, he reminds the people, “The sound of words you did hear, but no image did you see except the sound.”  There is a grave danger in relying only on the visible.  Judaism gives us many essential concrete items to see, for example: a tallit or Shabbat candles. But is it really the visual image that connects us, or the hearing of the blessings or words we say when wearing or experiencing these “items” and more?

Just as God wanted to wean the Israelites from only the visible and tangible, we too need to take the time to not only rely on what we may see on the surface as a community, but attempt to build our connections in a deeper way.  My goal again is to get to know each of you, obviously visually, but as the Torah says, to listen to what your needs are, and, of course to dig deeper.

Please don’t hesitate to be in touch!

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham

June 17, 2011  •  15th Sivan 5771

At some moment in every “Law and Order” television program, one of the detectives says to a potential defendant, “If you could explain to us why you did it we might be able to help you.”  In television land this almost always elicits a confession or at least some piece of damaging testimony, yet in real-life we know that intentions are never as important as actions.  Regardless of why someone kills someone, they almost always still face the consequences of their actions.

“The road to #%*%$@* is paved with good intentions.”  My grandfather z”l used to say this to me often and it is another reminder that in human existence we prioritize and accept actions above intentions.  We also see this in this week’s portion. “If you unwittingly fail to observe any one of the commandments that the Lord has declared to Moses – anything that the Lord has enjoined upon you through Moses – from the day that the Lord gave the commandment and on through the ages. . . . In case it is an individual who has sinned unwittingly, he shall offer a she-goat in its first year as a purification offering.” (Numbers 15:22-23, 27)

Nachmanides says that the biblical requirement was enacted so the person could cleanse themselves of the wrongdoing even though it was unintentional.  I read that as a golden-age manner of saying even if you did not intend to do something you are responsible none the less.  Our rabbis tell us that during our recitation of the shema, kavanah or strict intention to recite and devotion during, are not necessary to fulfill the commandment of its recitation.

This is an incredible reminder for us as Jews especially as we begin to enter the summer and in many ways begin the cycle leading to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.  How many times do we find ourselves saying, “I really didn’t mean any harm” or “I meant to do it, it just got away from me?” I know that I do that often.  For me the challenge is in being self-honest enough to say, I am wrong and what can I do to repair the damage.  This kind of self awareness and honesty allows each of us in an important way to contribute to the betterment of ourselves, our communities and tikkun olam as well.

As I write this penultimate Shabbat message I want to take a moment to say that what I have done over the last seven years has always been with the very best of intentions, and yet I recognize that even still not all experiences end well and those intentions at times are of little importance.  Therefore, please accept my apology for anything that I have done where my intentions went awry and I was unable to do what you needed in that moment.  Thank you for all of your forgiveness past, present and hopefully future.

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

May 19, 2011  •  15th of Iyyar 5771

In this week’s Torah portion we read the “Tochecha”, which is the piece of biblical literature which describes what happens to us when we are good and the horrific punishments we will endure if we fail to live up to our portion of the covenant.  It would almost be welcome to many if this kind of strict justice system existed in the world today.  Yet we know the world is more complex and nuanced than that, and proof positive is the tenuous situation today in Israel.

I listened yesterday to the President’s speech about the Arab world where he spoke about Israel and the Palestinians towards the end of a 45 minute speech.  My inbox was immediately inundated with emails from the political left and right showing outrage at text of the president’s speech.  The left was angry because they felt Obama did not do nearly enough to push Netanyahu back to the negotiating table, and the right was angry because he mentioned pre-67 borders when referencing a Palestinian state.  I want to caution us all not to over-react and to carefully look at the president’s words.

Writing yesterday in his blog for The Atlantic Monthly, Jeffrey Goldberg wrote, “In 2005, Geoge W. Bush stated that it is “unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949″ (the 1967 boundaries of Israel, in other words). Today, Barack Obama said that  he believes “the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.” I take this to mean that Israel would retain its major settlement blocs; that it would retain the Jewish neighborhoods of East Jerusalem, and that it would take West Bank land needed to thicken it at its most narrow point, in exchange for land adjacent to the Gaza Strip and the southern West Bank. I also interpret the saying “mutually agreed upon” to mean, well, “mutually agreed upon.” In other words, these boundaries would not be set without Israel’s approval. I understand that Prime Minister Netanyahu is interpreting this as a major policy shift, and I understand that much of the media is going along with this interpretation. For what it’s worth, I don’t see a huge gap in the way these two Presidents framed the core issue.”

President Bush was always considered a great friend to Israel, and while I believe the jury is still out as to whether President Obama is the greatest of friends to Israel, yesterday’s speech did not represent for me any great innovation, any significant change in American policy.  During his speech the president did reaffirm his support for Israel and stated as he has before hat there are times when as a friend you need to be honest and frank in all discussions even when you disagree. In the coming days there are three more important events before I believe we can truly take the measure of this past week and be in a position to look at what is next.

Today the president and PM Netanyahu will be meeting in the White House, in what pundits from both sides call a chilly atmosphere.  Sunday the president addresses the AIPAC conference followed by Netanyahu on Moday night, and Tuesday Netanyahu will address a joint session of congress.  After all of these events we will have a better idea of where everything stands and probably of how Obama and Netanyahu will relate over the coming years.  Our president has a tall task on his plate and is trying to succeed where many others have failed.  I applaud him for that and recognizing the flaws in the Palestinian position during his speech.  (He emphasized that trying to delegitimize Israel in any fashion will end in failure)

I also condemn him for not taking Abbas to task more for creating a coalition with Hamas who continues to vow that they will cause the destruction of Israel.  The president referred to this as a question that must be answered, and I see this as impossible.  There is no question to answer.  Hamas must disavow violence and recognize Israel’s right to exits or the Palestinian authority gets nothing from the United States.  What happens next none of us know, but again I urge you to be patient in forming opinions and to try and wade through all of the hyperbolic vitriol from the poles on both sides.  When Wednesday rolls around and the dust has settled we will be looking at an important time in the history of both Israel and US-Israel relations and we should have all the facts before we decide how to react.

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

April 18, 2011  •  14th of Nisan 5771

The preparation for this holiday probably outweighs the combined prep-time for all the other holidays combined.  One could easily be so bogged down in the all of the work preceding the holiday that forgetting the important themes of the holiday would be a virtual certainty.  There are three lessons that I learn during the preparation for and the celebration of this holiday that I think are timeless and I want to take a moment to discuss them in the hope that it will help you find a little meaning as well.  The first is the importance of Jewish symbols.  Our symbols tell stories and teach messages far greater than their mere physical appearance would suggest.  The maztah, which is the central symbol of the holiday of Passover, simultaneously teaches us about freedom and about affliction.  But our symbols do more than teach us, they also bind us together with past generations.  For thousands of years we have been employing the same symbols and we do many of the same rituals today that our ancestors and people have been doing for so many years.

Passover teaches us through these symbols the importance of our people’s history.  On no other holiday do we actually attempt to transform ourselves into our ancient predecessors.  On Passover we are told to view ourselves as though we too left from the land of Egypt.  It is not enough to simply remember our people, rather we must assume their persona for at least an evening as we try to imagine what it was like to be a Jew in their day.  Our history and our stories are what make us unique as a people and are what binds us together throughout time.  On Passover that connection is stronger than at any other time largely because of these eternal symbols.

More than anything Passover teaches me about the importance of family.  It is true that many other Jewish holidays are celebrated with family and are special times when family is together.  However, no holiday in our tradition illuminates visceral family memories and moments the way Passover does.  There are times when it is a story of Seder’s past, but also times when a simple glass or a bowl is the vehicle to transport us back to the memory of previous Passover holidays.  Above all, my Passover history is littered with family moments and anecdotes that make the grueling process of getting ready for the holiday each year a welcome trip down memory lane.

As we celebrate Passover 5771 I am joined by Elissa, Sammy and Kayla in wishing each of you a happy and healthy holiday.  May the symbols of the holiday bring you meaning and take you back you to the early days of our people.  May the legacy of our ancient people be an example for us and our daily lives.  Finally, I pray that for each of us the holiday is a time to be with family and when this not possible may it be a time to remember those most dear to us with whom we celebrate eternally.

Chag Sameach

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

April 8, 2011  •  4th of Nisan 5771

So much is made of the connection between the biblical affliction of leprosy and its connection to slanderous speech that we lose sight of the real purpose for inclusion of this bizarre topic in biblical literature.  This week’s portion as well as last week’s which speak in great detail about leprosy and other skin afflictions, don’t even mention speech as a root cause.  In fact, we don’t make that connection until Miriam is afflicted after speaking negatively behind the back of her brother.

There has to be another reason for the great detail the narrative employs about the kind of skin ailments one could have and the purification needed afterward.   For me, I have to look at the ailments themselves.  The ailments described all have one factor in common which is the fact that they are on the skin and therefore most likely visible to the entire community.  Even if some were contagious we know that not all skin based afflictions are, and on some level there was a level of embarrassment in public that took place here.

I do not agree with the biblical paradigm of sending a lot of these people into some form of quarantine, but I do understand why they were “freaked out” enough to do so.  However, for me the lasting lesson of this bizarre episode is that there is always a way back to the Jewish community.  For the Children of Israel this kind of affliction was so difficult that they had to cast these people out, but yet they still found a way to allow them back into the community.  For us, this serves as a reminder that no one is ever too far removed from the community that they can not come back.

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

April 1, 2011  •  18th of Adar II 5771

Shabbat Shalom

This Shabbat we read the Torah portion of Tazria and the special passage for Shabbat Ha-chodesh.  The special passage is taken from the 12th chapter of Exodus and tells the story of the first specific command given to the Children of Israel as a religious polity.  “This month shall mark for you the beginning of the months; it shall be the first of the months of the year for you.[1]”  There are commentators that question whether or not this verse would have been a better starting place for the Torah.  This is arguably the moment where they began the process of becoming the Jewish people, and would have made a fitting first story for our Torah.

Why then does the narrative begin with creation?  One could make the case that we needed to read about the creation of the world in order to instill a belief in God.  One could also make the case that we needed to read about the first Jews to be inspired to be committed to our religion and understand that it will involve sacrifice at times.  While each of these and in fact many other reasons are ample answers to this central question, ultimately for me there is an entirely different reason that the Torah starts with creation.

I believe that at the very least God caused the creation of the world, and most of the time I even believe that God was uniquely involved in both the actual creation and in its design as well.  But beginning the Torah with this story for me is not to instill belief in God but in human beings and ultimately in the Jewish community.  After creation the world was left to humanity.  When Adam and Eve fail to listen they are punished and responsible for their own actions.

As we see the biblical communities develop we see people take the mantles of leadership, but these leaders are only effective when they can empower the community to lead with them.  For me the lasting lesson of beginning the Torah with the story of creation is the idea ultimately that it is communities who will be the strength of people and specifically our people throughout history.  There is a break after creation and God’s role immediately changes. Our people have only been and will only be strong when the community as a whole is strong and that depends predominantly on the masses and not on the leaders.

During my past seven years as your rabbi I have always been proud to serve this community together with my family and to be called your rabbi.  As we begin this transition period between rabbis with the imminent hiring of a new spiritual leader, I am comforted as I think you should be by the fact that this community is made so strong by its people and not its leaders.  I was privileged to follow Rabbi Hoffman and to continue on what he and other past colleagues built, and I know whoever the next rabbi is, that they too will be able to be successful here at CSI.  Our community is our great strength.  The people who belong to this synagogue are dedicated and committed to her health and survival and because of that this community will remain strong for a long time and will continue to be a great place to be a rabbi.

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

March 17, 2011  •  11th of Adar II 5771

Shabbat Shalom and Chag Purim Sameach.

I want to begin by thanking all of you for all of your support as Elissa and I went through the difficult process of finding a new community.  We are pleased to announce that we will be moving to Beth El in Yardley, PA.  For those of you with young children we will only be a few minutes from Sesame Place, for those of you who like Atlantic City we can be your half-marker, and for all of you we hope that you will come down to visit.  We look forward to the next three and a half months together.

This Shabbat we celebrate Shabbat Zachor and immediately following Havdalah we begin the celebration of the holiday of Purim.  On Shabbat Zachor we customarily read a biblical portion that tells the tale of our ancient arch enemy the tribe of Amalek.  Amalek was said to be a crafty and deceitful foe who resorted to any means necessary to fight and win.  Haman, the villain of the Purim story was a descendant of this tribe and fulfilled their ancient desire to destroy the Jews.  It would be easy to look at the events of the past week and find a justified modern Amalek.

This past week five members of one family were murdered in the Israeli West-Bank town of Itamar by terrorists who were hailed as heroes by some of the very same people that the world asks Israel to sit with and discuss peace.  In addition, the Israeli navy deftly intercepted a ship that was carrying tons of weapons to Egypt for undoubted use by those who seek to wipe Israel off of the map.  It would be easy to look at those who seek to destroy Israel and are willing to murder innocent civilians to do so, and call them our modern-day Amalek.  They are.

But the conversation can not end there.  The people like the ones who murdered five members of the Fogel Family this past week, can not have the last say in this discussion.  If we allow their actions to be the ones that derail any hope for peace or at least a somewhat calm co-existence, then we have let the worst kind of people dictate the conversation.  Those of us who deplore this kind of violence must not only speak out against it, but also must not permit it to be the voice of the issue.

The special passage that we read tomorrow from the second Torah gives us the command not only to wipe out Amalek from the Earth, but also never to forget them.  “You shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.  Do not forget!” (Deut 25:19)  Perhaps this dual, almost conflicting command is meant to instruct us not only to wipe out this enemy, but also to remember what they did and how they did it so that we can recognize a true enemy from someone who might be at the very least a potential friend.

When Anwar Sadat came to Israel over 30 years ago, it was his personal relationship with Menachem Begin that allowed Israel and Egypt to enter into a partnership of peace.  Sadat paid with his life, but their willingness to find common ground paved the way for peace.  We must continue, even when it seems most difficult and unlikely to seek out partners for peace who deplore the violence perpetrated on the Fogels this week as much as we do.  It is only then that we can truly wipe out Amalek from within our midst.

Shabbat Shalom and Chag Purim Sameach

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

February 18, 2011  •  14 Adar 5771

The story of the golden calf is one of the low moments of our people’s history.  We often want to look at these kinds of biblical stories and assign blame.  Who is to blame for the golden calf?  In truth, everyone is to blame.  God, Moses, Aaron and the people are all culpable in this total breakdown of the Jewish community.  But blame renders this episode meaningless in playing a significant role in our history.  If we can not learn from our communal mistakes we are doomed to repeat them and weaken our communities from within.  Making mistakes is a reality all Jewish communities confront, what ultimately defines us is the manner in which we learn and grow from said mistakes. What is there to learn from the sin of the golden calf?  The answer is that if we take a close look there are in fact three important lessons that we can learn, and in fact they are things that we do apply today in the Jewish community.

It is clear from the story and its aftermath that the people were feeling distant from God.  It seems that the first thing that happened after the episode was the building of the Tabernacle whose purpose was in part to help the people feel closer to God.  In fact, after the whole structure is completed the text tells us that God’s presence filled the Tabernacle.  But it goes further than just the ancient Tabernacle.  In our modern Jewish community we build institutions and homes so that we have an opportunity to feel closer to God.  We try to create sacred space where Jews can feel closer to God than they might elsewhere, and so that there is a place for people to go when they experience divine distance.  The ancient Israelites can not be excused just because they felt removed from God, however to ignore this issue as simply a product of their situation in their day, would be destructive for the Jewish people.

Moses and Aaron were great leaders of the Jewish people.  Moses is often thought of as the greatest leader we have known in our history.  Their leadership structure though was less than effective.  At the time of the golden calf, most scholars agree that Jethro had not yet arrived to impart his wisdom regarding leadership, so Moses and Aaron were leading all by themselves.  When Moses went up to Sinai Aaron was left to lead on his own and it seems unlikely that many of the people felt secure in this type of leadership.  The lesson for us is the necessity of a broader leadership in our communities the way Jethro ultimately suggested.  In a modern forum we must invest and empower professional and lay leadership to steer and guide our communities in the hopes that we can avoid calamities like the golden calf.  Yet, when they inevitably happen we also need a leadership that responds without seeking blame, but rather looking for the path that will help the community avoid the mistake in the future while growing from it at the same time.

The Italian Bible commentator Sforno, said that had one member of the Israelites stood up and protested the building of the golden calf it never would have happened.  While I find that hard to believe, I can see that if one had said something others would have followed and perhaps the community would have avoided this disaster.  Jewish communities must be replete with members who feel empowered to speak their mind and who feel secure enough in their Jewish identities to know when something in the community is not congruent with the Jewish ideal.  A Jewish community is only as strong as its ability to invest its membership in its core principles, and as strong as the extent to which every member feels empowered to stand up and be counted and speak their mind.  Every Jew in a community must feel strong about standing up and saying “Hineni”, I am present.

If we can learn these lessons than the story of this great breakdown is not only less potent in the damage it causes our people, but is also a positive force in our ability to create all aspects of  a Kehillah Kedosha a sacred community.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

February 11, 2011  •  7 Adar 5771

“There are known knowns; there are things we know we know.
We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns – the ones we don’t know we don’t know.”
Former United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld

It is fitting that Mr. Rumsfeld’s memoir which was published recently was given the title Known and Unknown, a name clearly based on his most famous quote.   In truth, when you break down his statement, it is a series of rational thoughts albeit delivered in a somewhat clumsy manner.  Rumsfeld was stating a simple idea in a convoluted way: The unknown is scary, especially when you have no idea what the substance of said situation will actually be.  In other words, one can prepare in life for what they know they will face and even the situations where they are not sure what they will encounter but know that there will be an encounter.  What is truly difficult about existence is dealing with and figuring out those moments that surprise and confound us with the tenor of the moment as well as its existence.

It must have been nice for the people to have the Urim and Thummim.  “Inside the breast-piece of decision you shall place the Urim and Thummim, so that they are over Aaron’s heart when he comes before the Lord.  Thus Aaron shall carry the instrument of decision for the Israelites over his heart before the Lord at all times.” (JPS Translation)  Nahum Sarna says that the instrument was only used for major decisions in which the community needed to determine divine will on specific matters that were beyond human understanding.  This was not a magic 8-ball.  Rashi in a commentary on the Talmud describes this instrument by their name.  Urim means lights, and Thummim means completeness.  When the letters on the instrument were read in the correct order they would light up and be the beacon for complete and true divine answers.  Ramban even suggests that they were used by Phineas the high priest after crossing the Jordan to determine which tribe would lead the attack.

All agree that they were lost during the destruction of the first Temple, and determining direct divine responses to our problems was erased from the Temple priestly services.  How great would it be in modern times to have and instrument of decision?  Imagine being able to determine how God would want us to act in every situation.  I think it might be nice for a short while, but how many of us would follow the answers in perpetuity?  I know eventually that I would slip.  Yet maybe the absence of the Urim and Thummim as an instrument of determining divine will is something meant to empower and inspire us rather than forcing us to lament their disappearance.

The unknown is scary.  I can tell you that I am currently in the midst of one of the greatest periods of this in my adult life and it is anxiety inducing and can be paralyzing.  Yet the mistake that I can make is to lose sight of everything prior to the moment.  In some strong way I believe that these difficult moments in our life are a product of everything that happened previously.  All of our past experience guides us as we face the challenge of a period of uncertainty and doubt.  Our country and in some way the world exists in this period right now with the global economic crisis and the ever changing face of the global landscape.  Rather than run and hide from these massive problems we need to face them with thoughtful and meaningful responses.

It would have been easy for our people to give up after losing this breast-piece.  Instead, we have spent the last 2500 years re-shaping who we are and empowering all Jews as individuals and as community to not feel as though they need Urim and Thummim to navigate even life’s most difficult situations.  Through tradition, experience and our own personal ability we are equipped to deal with these situations.  I have never liked the phrase, “God doesn’t give us more than we can handle.”  I think that is patently false.  We often face more than we can handle.  But it is in our ability to accept that and continue living that we find the true measure of our character.  Perhaps Mr. Rumsfeld should have chosen to quote a “higher” source rather than clumsily state his ideas on his own:

You’ll get mixed up of course, as you already know.
You’ll get mixed up with many strange birds as you go.
So be sure when you step, Step with care and great tact.And remember that life’s
A Great Balancing Act.
And will you succeed? Yes!
You will, indeed!(98 and ¾ percent guaranteed)
Kid, you’ll move mountains.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

February 4, 2011  •  1 Adar 5771

This past Saturday night I had the pleasure of attending my son’s Havdalah presentation at Reuben Gittelman Hebrew Day School.  It was in a word, magnificent.  I would lay a claim to the title of proudest person in the room during the performance, but my mother attended as well and I know when I am facing an unwinnable battle.  The students prepared more than five Hebrew and English songs to sing and each made a bevy of Jewish ritual items including a Havdalah candle, spice sack, Kiddush cup, Tzedakah box and a Mezuzah.  Using them this past week has been an opportunity for my son to feel pride in his Jewish expression and for me to teach both of my children about ritual items that we use regularly.

For those in attendance one of the unquestioned highlights of the evening was the passion the children showed when singing their songs and teaching about their creations.  If there was a way to bottle this kind of Jewish passion and ingest it magically, our communities would certainly be full of more Ruach and energy.  I hold no delusions of grandeur.  I know that at some point in his development that Sammy will not display the same measure of passion and his energetic singing and praying style will be replaced by the familiar refrain of, “Do I have to go to synagogue again?”  However, for now I cherish this about him and wonder how to recreate it on some level for Jews of all ages.

Perhaps there is a secret in this week’s Torah portion and in the weeks to come as our narrative becomes dominated by the description of how to build and the subsequent construction of the Tabernacle.  It would be easy to dismiss the next piece of our Torah as boring and irrelevant to modern Jewish life, but nothing could be further from the truth.  We know ultimately that after being instructed to voluntarily bring gifts for the construction that too many gifts are brought and the people are stopped from bringing more.  Their passion for this structure was so great that they brought more than enough.

Why was their passion so great?  Perhaps their newness to the religion and a life of monotheism made them like children in that regard and as such it is attributed less to their mindset and more to the timing of the situation.  Perhaps though, their passion was driven by their connection to the community, Moses and to this God who keeps saving them despite their transgressions.  I am willing to accept that the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle of these two hypothetical reasons, but nonetheless there is what that we can take as a blueprint for the modern Jewish community.

It is my responsibility and the task of Jewish leaders both lay and professional everywhere to build and sustain Jewish communities that Jews can feel passionate about.  This is obviously a task that is easier said than done, yet it is one that we never stop working at for to stop would mean the death of the idea of a living and breathing Jewish community.  When one program doesn’t work we try another.  When we identify an aspect of our Kehillah Kedosha, our holy community that people connect with, we try to explore that connection and take it as far as possible.  We may not be able to completely re-create the passion of Jewish Children and of the Israelites in building the Tabernacle, but we can use it as a call to all of us to find our passion within Judaism and as a model for creating Jewish passion for all Jews in the world today.

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

January 28, 2011  •  23 Shevat 5771

“The Power of Vav”

Even the most casual reader of the five books of Moses becomes trained quickly to know that every word in the Torah is important, and that none of their usage or omission happens by accident.  But if one desired to delve a little deeper one could ultimately ascribe the same importance to each letter.  The power of Hebrew letters is often lost amidst so many words, yet a closer examination reveals their potency.

The letters hay, vav and yood are all used in some form in the writing of God’s name and therefore have an inherent power.  For those of you lucky enough to have attended a class with our own Judith Rose, you know that each letter has a unique spirit and meaning as well as its own individual essence.  For those of you who have learning styles that skew towards numbers, gematria teaches us that each letter has a corresponding number and they are often used in the Midrashic enterprise.

For me though, there is no more powerful letter in our Torah than the vav at the beginning of this week’s Torah portion. “V’eleh ha-meeshpateem a-share ta-seem leaf-nay-hem.” “And these are the rules that you shall set before them.”  (Exodus 21:1 JPS Translation p.117)  Why is this vav so important?  All that this letter translates to is the word and; how could that possibly a fundamental moment in our text?  According to Rashi this word indicates that there is a connection between this chapter and the previous one which told the story of Sinai and the Ten Commandments, and just as one was given at Mt. Sinai, so too was the other.  In fact, Rashi goes on to say that this was the reason for the Temple and the Sanhedrin’s close proximity to one another.

The Midrash takes a bit of stronger approach saying that the word v’eleh implies connection and the word eleh rejection.  As proof they cite the latter’s utterance after the flood of Noah to describe the generations, and the former’s inclusion at the beginning of the story as if to reject the generation of the flood except Noah.  Almost all of the commentators agree that the vav at the beginning of this week’s portion comes to connect the civil law we read this week to the law received at Sinai.  The significance of this letter is borne out in what we learn from its inclusion in the text.

There are for me three fundamental ideas that we learn from the connection of the reading last week with this week.  First, we learn that how we relate to one another is just as important if not more so than how we relate to God.  The Ten Commandments are divided almost equally between laws which are bain adam l’makom (between humans and God) and bain adam l’adam. (between humans and humans)  Despite that fact they are often looked at as a piece of divine law more so than what we read this week.  However, their connection here tells us that each of these categories of Mitzvot is important.  We can not as Jews place a hierarchy on one at the expense of the other.

The second thing we learn is that our micro Jewish behavior is as important as our macro behavior.  In other words, it would be easy for us to focus on and follow the Ten Commandments they are general rules that play a huge role in who we are as people and Jews.  But this connection comes to teach us that the little things are just as important.  The way we conduct ourselves in the every day is just as meaningful and significant as the way we do so during the biggest moments.

Finally, we are told 36 times throughout Torah that it is one of our greatest responsibilities as a Jew to treat those less fortunate with the same care and dignity that we ourselves would want.  However, it is only in this week’s portion that it is connected to our first 10 major laws.  It is in reading this week’s portion juxtaposed with last week’s that we understand one of the fundamental principles of our religion and its equal importance with any other of our traditions.  The Babylonian Talmud confirms this when it relates the following story in Tractate Shabbat 31a: “On another occasion it happened that a certain heathen came before Shammai and said to him, ‘Make me a proselyte, on condition that you teach me the whole Torah while I stand on one foot.’ Thereupon he repulsed him with the builder’s cubit which was in his hand. When he went before Hillel, he said to him, ‘What is hateful to you, do not to your neighbor: that is the whole Torah, while the rest is the commentary; go and learn it.”

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

January 21, 2011  •  12 Shevat 5771

This past week I was running late for a meeting and trying to get Kayla and myself dressed and out of the house in some form of a timely manner. In the haste and confusion of leaving I didn’t realize that Kayla was asking me a question about her shoes until she started to cry. When I asked her why it was that she was crying she angrily responded that I had not answered her question. Her question was an uncomplicated attempt to figure out the correct shoe to put on each of her feet, my lack of a response prompted a reaction from her that was not congruent to me with the importance of the subject of said question. Clearly I am wrong.

As Congresswoman Giffords begins to navigate what will inevitably be her long and arduous road to recovery, her progress is often measured by her ability to respond to external stimuli. For example, when someone squeezes her hand and she responds in kind it is seen as a tremendous positive sign in her ongoing healing process. Her ability to respond helps physicians determine the extent to which her brain is functioning and to which it will heal. We often take the power of a simple response for granted until we need one or until we are unable to receive or present one in an important time.

When we describe revelation at Mount Sinai we often focus on what was said to, received and experienced by the ancient Jews. The rabbis have long held that every Jew should feel as though they were present at Sinai as well. Martin Buber believed in an ongoing revelation that began at Sinai and continues throughout time. I agree with Buber but have often found it hard to imagine myself standing at Sinai until I read the book, God in Search of Man by Abraham Joshua Heschel. Heschel writes, “The wonder of Israel’s acceptance was as decisive as the wonder of god’s expression. God was alone in the world until Israel became engaged to god. At Sinai God revealed the divine word and Israel her ability to respond. For Sinai consisted of both a divine proclamation and a human perception. It was a moment in which god was not alone.”

Our challenge to experience ongoing revelation is not based on imagining that we were present for the laser-light show at Sinai, but rather on our constant ability to respond to God’s call in the world. L’mashal (for example), being present for acts of hessed (deeds of kindness) is not a moment during which God’s presence is revealed unless it calls us in to action and pushes us to do our own acts of hessed. We always have the ability to respond to God’s call the task is to use that ability. At times the call comes in the form of a need for charity and kindness, there are moments when that call is answered by simply being part of a Minyan and there are times when answering the divine call allows us to transcend that which we and others thought of as the best version of ourselves.

As we read the story of Mount Sinai this year, I am focusing on my response to the revelation of God’s presence and on the power of responding to life and humanity in general. Even though I was not present at Sinai and personally have great difficulty imagining myself there, my identity as a Jew is defined largely by my response to this ongoing moment. How we all respond to revelation and the life that being a part of the Jewish community asks us to lead is one of the few aspects of our life that we know we can control. With this control comes great responsibility, but also the ability to achieve and contribute more than we ever thought possible.

Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi Joshua Z. Gruenberg

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