Shelach Lecha Sermon

Given this week’s news, and last week’s, and perhaps even the week before, I have been thinking about how incredibly disappointing people can be.  People really have the remarkable ability to disappoint.  This of course was the theme of my weekly email message.  I am not going to retell that Talmudic story and its sordid details at services, but here is the question for this evening: what is the meaning of being human?  As human beings we are capable of untold depths, but also of course great heights.  People can indeed disappoint, but also surprise.

We find this theme in the week’s parsha, Shelach Lecha.  It tells the story of the spies who are sent to scout the land of Israel.  Twelve spies are sent; two different reports return with them.  Ten report the following: “The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers.  All the people that we saw in it are men of great size…and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves and so we must have looked to them.”  (Numbers 13:32-33)  Joshua and Caleb however say, “The land that we traversed and scouted is an exceedingly good land…  Have no fear then of the people of the country, for they are our prey: their protection has departed from them, but the Lord is with us.  Have no fear of them!”  (Numbers 14:7-9) 

It is a remarkable contrast: the same experience yet entirely different responses.  Some spies see only the challenges and difficulties.  Joshua and Caleb see instead possibilities.  Joshua and Caleb see only milk and honey.  The other spies see giants; they imagine mythic figures who will overpower them.  For this good report Joshua and Caleb, and they alone, are rewarded with being able to enter the land of Israel.  They are the only two of the generation who leave Egypt allowed to enter the land.  It was of course the same experience for all twelve spies, yet they offered different responses and therefore discovered different outcomes.

There was an interesting article in The New York Times about this week’s events.  It made the claim that male politicians are far more likely to be felled by sex scandals.  Women politicians by contrast are not so frequently embroiled in such things.  The reporter suggested that this was because women better understand how precarious their achievements are and therefore don’t want to jeopardize these hard earned positions.  Sheryl Gay Stolberg also made the claim that men go into politics to be somebody and women by contrast go into politics to change things. 

I thought this last point was an interesting claim.  I am not going to weigh in on this male-female dichotomy, but I am sure it will make for interesting debates at home between husbands and wives.  Instead I wish to focus on the claim that the goal is not to make something of ourselves but instead to make something of the world.  I believe, I have always believed, that this is our God-given task.  And so I guess in the Time’s reporter’s estimation, my belief shows your rabbi’s feminine side.  We are called upon to improve our world, to make things better, even if only a little bit.

Now I am not usually a fan of CNN or the TV news in general, especially this week.  It is not just because of CNN’s biased reporting about Israel.  It is instead that TV is actually no longer news.  It all seems to be approaching reality TV, and even Jersey Shore.  It is because TV reporting spends far too much time talking about people’s mistakes and foibles.

But CNN also has this wonderful program called, "Everyday Heroes".  It showcases ordinary people doing extraordinary things.  Here is one such story. Yuval Roth, is an Israeli whose brother was kidnapped and murdered by Hamas terrorists in 1993.  Since then he has become active in a group that brings together Palestinians and Israelis who have both suffered loss, whether by terrorists or the IDF’s weapons.  (The result of course is the same even though the moral legitimacy is clearly different.)  In this group Yuval discovered a need.

Many Palestinians require medical attention in Israel but can’t afford to get to Israeli hospitals. So Yuval created an organization that now comprises some 200 volunteers.  These volunteers help transport Palestinians to and from the West Bank.  One young three year old Palestinian girl requires frequent dialysis and has been driven some 500 times by the group.  In 2010 the group drove 90,000 kilometers helping Palestinians traverse Israeli checkpoints and reach medical care in Israel.  Yuval said the following: “I lost my brother, but I didn't lose my head.  This activity gives me an essence for life. I have learned the price of the conflict is a lot more than the price of making peace. We are all human beings.”

Many people might understandably look at this situation and make a different choice.  Many people might again understandably allow grief to turn into anger.  But Yuval demanded of himself something different.  He chose instead to make something of this world.  He did not set out to make a name for himself.  He chose instead to transform his small piece of the world.  Whether or not he helps to make peace in the Middle East is not the point.  He is helping to bring healing to others.  To a greater or lesser extent each of us is faced with a similar choice.

We have to decide.  We can look in the mirror (forgive me, I cannot resist) and say like our former congressman, “Wow don’t I look fine?”  Actually in case this is unclear, you are not supposed to say that.  You are also not supposed to say with the ten spies, “I am but a puny little grasshopper.”  Or we can say what we are supposed to say, “What good can I bring to this world?”  What can I make of this world?  What can I change?  What healing can I bring to others?

In the end Anthony Wiener’s sin was not that he tweeted a picture of himself, however lewd and salacious it might have been.  His failure was one of leadership.  The moral issues are only between him and his wife.  His sin was instead that he actually thought it was all about himself.  Leadership, and politics, are supposed to transcend the self.  His failure to see this was his great undoing, and our shame.  It is never supposed to be about ourselves.  Ok, maybe that is an impossible ideal.  It is not supposed to be only about ourselves.

Try thinking about others first.  Try thinking about what the world need you to do first.  Because the more of us who live by Joshua’s and Caleb’s example the better.  That is, the better the world will be for it.  Thinking about others and our world is really supposed to be our most important job.  It is all of our jobs.  But it is especially the job of our leaders.

Below is the CNN video clip of Yuval Roth.

Shelach Lecha

I have been thinking about a famous Talmudic story.  I have added a few embellishments and modern idioms, but the salacious details are the Talmud’s.  Such stories are not new to the Twittersphere.   They are part and parcel of our Talmud, and even our Bible as well.

Once a man, who was very scrupulous about the mitzvah of tzitzit, heard of a certain prostitute in one of the towns by the sea who accepted four hundred dollars for her services.  He wired her the four hundred dollars and scheduled an appointment.  When the day arrived he came and waited at her door, and her attendant came and told her, “That man who sent you the four hundred dollars is here and waiting at the door;” to which she replied, “Let him come in.”

When he came in she prepared for him seven beds, six of silver and one of gold; and between one bed and the other there were steps of silver, but the last were of gold.  She then went up to the top bed and lay down upon it naked, seductively motioning to the man to climb to the top, golden bed.  He quickly climbed the silver beds in his desire to sit naked with her, when all of sudden the four tzitzit of his tallit struck him across the face as he climbed on top of the golden bed; whereupon he jumped off the bed and sat on the ground. 

She followed him off the bed and sat on the ground next to him and said, “By the Roman Capital, I will not leave you alone until you tell me what blemish you saw in me.”  He replied, “By the holy Temple, never have I seen a woman as beautiful as you; but there is one commandment which the Lord our God has commanded us, it is called tzitzit, and with regard to it the expression ‘I am the Lord your God’ is written twice, signifying I am the God who will exact punishment in the future and I am the God who will give reward in the future.  Now when the tzitzit hit me in the face they appeared to me as four witnesses testifying against me.”

She said, “I will not leave you until you tell me your name, the name of your town, the name of your teacher, the name of your school in which you study the Torah.”  So he wrote all this down on piece of paper and handed it to her, returning to his town.  She then arose and divided her estate into three parts; one third for the government, one third to be distributed among the poor, and one third she took with her in her hand; her sexy lingerie, however, she retained.

She then came to the school of Rabbi Hiyya, and said to him, “Master, give instructions to me that you might make me a convert.”  He replied, “My daughter, perhaps you have set your eyes upon one of my disciples?” She thereupon took out the handwritten note and handed it to the Rabbi.  Rabbi Hiyya said, “The two of you should go and get married.”

And that very lingerie which she had spread out for him for an illicit purpose she now spread out for him lawfully.  And so this is the reward of the mitzvah in this world; and as for its reward in the future world we do not know how great it will prove to be.  (Babylonian Talmud, Menahot 44a)

The Torah portion states: “That shall be your tzitzit; look at them and recall all the commandments of the Lord and observe them, so that you do not follow your heart and eyes in your lustful urge.” (Numbers 15:39)

Whether it is Twitter, Facebook, sexting, or a gold bed, our eyes do stray.  It is not a sickness to be treated or a disease to be cured.  It is instead human.  Rabbi ben Zoma states: “Who is a hero?  The person who conquers his, or her, evil inclination.” (Pirke Avot 4:1)  I am forgiving of human weaknesses.  I am unforgiving when people’s mistakes, and sins, are excused as addictions.  When we err, we have no choice but to admit our errors and change our ways.  When we face addictions, as difficult and painful as it may be, we have no choice but to conquer them. 

Everyone does err, and even stray.  Our tradition teaches that rituals help to focus our attention towards our divine purpose.  It is always helpful to have reminders.   It can be the mezuzah on our doorposts, or the tallit on our shoulders.  The intention is that they help to bring out the best in us. 

And when we think of veering, rituals can help to redirect our thoughts—and we hope and pray as well, even guide our actions.

Behaalotecha Sermon

Some brief words of Torah before we conclude this special Shabbat service and celebrate this year's confirmation students.

Have you ever walked around the cocktail hour at a bar/bat mitzvah party and said, “What no lamb chops?”

Our Torah portion states: “Then the Israelites wept and said, ‘If only we had meat to eat!  We remember the fish that we used to eat free in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.  Now our gullets are shriveled.  There is nothing at all!  Nothing but this manna to look to!’”  (Numbers 11:4-6)

It is remarkable that people are so often ungrateful for the many blessings they have.  The Israelites had just earned freedom, and yet all they wanted to do was go back to Egypt.  They complained and complained and said at least there they could cucumbers and melons.  

Freedom is of course an enormous blessing.  It is part of what we celebrate as we mark confirmation this evening.  But freedom comes with enormous responsibility.  At times this responsibility overwhelms the blessings.  We rebel under the weight of the responsibility.   We complain, “I have so much to do…”

Abraham Joshua Heschel called this the “insecurity of freedom” in his book about our responsibility to speak out against injustices.  Freedom is not about doing whatever you want.  It is about doing what you need to do.  Moreover it is about doing what the world needs you to do.

My hope and prayer on this Shabbat is that we look more at what we have than what we don’t have.  I pray that we affirm all our blessings each and every day.  And not curse the few things we have not yet achieved.  My hope and prayer is that we live up to the responsibilities of freedom.

Then we will never say, “What where are the lamb chops, or the cucumbers or the melons?”  You can look at the world like the Israelites did in our parsha.  Or you can look at the world and the many things you do have and count your blessings.  I believe they are always plentiful.  Our blessings are especially plentiful when you look at all the things that you must do and see them as blessings.  You can look at the world and say, “Wow look at the many blessings I can achieve by virtue of the responsibilities I have.”

Then nothing is a burden and everything a blessing.

The 19^th century poet and minister, Phillips Brooks, wrote (I thank Rabbi Marc Gellman for bringing this poem to my attention):

Do not pray for easy lives;

pray to be stronger men [people].

Do not pray for tasks equal

to your powers; pray for

powers equal to your tasks.

Then the doing of your work

shall be no miracle, but

you shall be a miracle.

Every day you shall wonder

at yourself, at the richness

of the life which has come to

you by the grace of God.

Amen v‘amen!

Partition - for Zionism's Sake

Partition - for Zionism's Sake - Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News
Ruth Gavison writes:

In the history of the Zionist movement, there were those who saw its goal as re-uniting the Jewish people with its historic homeland, and those who emphasized the idea that the objective of Zionism is the political rebirth of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel. Yet on every occasion when the leadership of the country's Jewish community, the Yishuv, faced a choice between having a Jewish state in part of the land or clinging to the dream of a Greater Eretz Israel, it selected, by a large majority, the option of having political independence in part of the land, where there would be a stable Jewish majority, and allowing the Arab minority to enjoy rights and equality. 

The same holds true today. A strong majority of the Jewish population in Israel wants to end the occupation and create a reality in which a stable Jewish majority is preserved in a State of Israel that does not rule over another people, whose members lack civil and political rights. The debate is not about liberating ourselves from Zionism, but rather, about creating the basic conditions crucial for Zionism's realization.

The validity of this goal and its advancement are not predicated upon the Palestinians' intentions or ambitions. Ostensibly, even the prime minister understands this and declares it to be his objective as well. Yet, neither he nor his government have shown consistent support of it, nor are they doing enough to promote it. They put the keys for advancing toward its realization in the hands of the Palestinians. 

As much as we may wish to retain the West Bank and as much as we rightfully can do so, withdrawing from the territories might be required in order to ensure the survival of the Zionist dream.

Naso Sermon

My sermon from Friday, June 3, follows.

This week’s Torah portion is Naso.  It is the longest of all the weekly portions.  It details a number of items.  There is the census of the Levites, the tribe assigned to priestly duties.  There is the Nazarite vow, pledging those adherents to God and setting them apart from the people by insisting that they abstain from drinking alcohol (rather un-Jewish if you asked me) and by refraining from cutting their hair (oops).  Hence the most well known Nazarite is Samson who when he is seduced into cutting his hair loses all his strength.

At the conclusion of this chapter about the Nazarite’s vow occurs one of the most familiar blessings in the entire Torah, the priestly blessing: “May the Lord bless you and keep you; may the light of the Lord’s face shine upon you and be gracious to you; may you always find God’s presence in your life and be blessed with shalom, with peace.”  The final chapter then offers the last bit of preparations for the tabernacle’s use.

I would like to focus on the opening chapter.  To my mind the theme of this chapter is keeping the community whole.  It discusses several different circumstances when one’s place in the community is called into question.  It opens with what situations make someone ritually impure.  Then it discusses the strange sotah ritual which was the subject of this week’s email.  This is the ritual for determining the guilt of an adulterer.  The suspected wife was made to drink a mixture of bitter water and earth.  If her belly grew and her thigh sagged then she had sinned.  (I know a bizarre ritual.)  I don’t believe this ritual ever worked to prove or disprove adultery.

But I do believe it worked to keep the relationship intact.  It managed to assuage a husband’s jealousy and anger.  It allowed a husband and wife to return home together.  It kept the relationship whole.  This appears to be the overriding concern of this chapter: how to keep the community whole; how to keep relationships intact.

Unlike the contemporary ethos of truth will set you free, or the truth at all costs, truth was not the Torah’s primary concern.  Take another example from this same chapter.  “When a man or woman commits any wrong toward a fellow man, thus breaking faith with the Lord, and that person realizes his guilt, he shall confess the wrong that he has done.  He shall make restitution in the principal amount and add one-fifth to it, giving it to him whom he has wronged.”

Think about this law.  All of us would agree that some wrongs require more payment than others.  Which requires more payment: an insult or theft of property, an injury or damaged reputation?  Whether or not someone is wronged is a subjective evaluation.  Our chapter does not detail what the wrong is.  It says instead, “When someone commits any wrong…”  To make it right you have to do two things: confess and make restitution plus 20%.

If this was about truth and about rebalancing the scales then you would pay back an equal amount.  But the Torah wants to make the community whole.  The Torah recognizes that in order to create shalom, peace in relationships you have to go farther, you have to add 20%.  You have to make an effort to correct hurt feelings.

It is not just about fairness.  It is not about you lost $1,000 so you must get back $1,000. The Torah appears to recognize that it has to go beyond full payment.  It is not even about the truth of who was right and who was wrong.  It leaves that question aside.  This truth can be sacrificed for the sake of peace, for the sake of shalom.

Take these two examples together. The sotah and the confession of wrong and you have a whole community.  In the sotah ritual, the tradition is bent so that the relationship can be made whole.  A ritual is invented so that a relationship can be repaired.  In the confession of wrong, the individual bends to repair the mistake and the relationship.  The overriding concern is that we must go to great lengths to keep our community whole.  Much can be sacrificed to keep us together.  That has always been the most pressing Jewish concern.

Who is right and who is wrong is not what is most important.  It is instead that we sit together.  Rabbi Hillel said, “Al tifrosh min ha-tzibbur—don’t separate yourself from the community.”  We must never separate ourselves from the community.  We must never separate ourselves from each other.

The community, relationships, always takes precedence.  Peace is always worth an additional 20%. 

Behaalotecha

Since the exodus of Jews from the former Soviet Union there has been a proliferation of pork stores in Israel.  Now in the holy city of Jerusalem one can easily buy ham.  Russian Jews, who now comprise twenty percent of the Israeli population, apparently love pork.  And so they have brought the food they grew to love in Russia to the State of Israel.

“The riffraff in their midst felt a gluttonous craving; and then the Israelites wept and said, ‘If only we had meat to eat!  We remember the fish that we used to eat free in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.  Now our gullets are shriveled.  There is nothing at all!  Nothing but this manna to look to!’”  (Numbers 11:4-6)

Too often people are unable to recognize the blessings that they have.  The Israelites were recently freed from slavery in Egypt.  Within months they began complaining.  True they were stuck wandering the Sinai wilderness.  But they were free.  They were their own people.  No longer were they forced to build palaces for Pharaoh.  Water was plentiful.  Manna was abundant.  Still they longed for the familiarity of Egypt.  They longed for the foods of their slave owners.   

It was as if they said, “At least when we were in jail we ate three meals a day.”  Even when immigrants are grateful to leave their countries of origin and even when they have gained freedom in a new found home, they continue to long for the food their parents served them, or for that matter the food their taskmasters provided them.   It was as if Russian Jews looked at all of Israel’s successes and said, “There is nothing but this falafel and hummus!”

Many times people are unable to see the blessings that stand before them.  They always want more.  People are too often unhappy with the gifts they have.   We fail see our freedoms.  We are unable, for example, to see the many blessings of our American democracy.  Instead we focus on our country’s problems.  Instead we focus on our gluttonous craving.  We only see what we left behind.  Rabbi ben Zoma teaches: “Who is rich?  Those who are content with their portion.”

But how can we be content when we face so many struggles and challenges?  The Israelites were unable to do so.  They were wandering through the desert.  It was beginning to look like their trip was going to take much longer than planned.  Perhaps it is understandable that they wanted to go back to Egypt.  Perhaps it is understandable that they wanted to taste the familiar. 

Immigrants make better lives for themselves here in this country, as well as in Israel, and enrich our country in the process.  Even though they desperately wanted to leave their home countries, they still long for the familiar sights, sounds and especially tastes of their youth.  Recently when driving through Queens I saw Indian and Pakistani immigrants playing cricket.  I thought to myself, “Why would they invest so much time and energy in the sport of their former British overlords?”  And then I realized that they were not playing a British game but the game of their youth.  People always long for the familiar.  They will always love their home country’s cooking.  Comfort food is whatever one grows up eating.  Why?

It is provided for you.  Life is much harder when you have to provide for yourself, when you have to cook for yourself.  There are moments when we long for the past, even with its limits, even when it represents a time when decisions were made for us.  We ask, how can we move forward through challenges and struggles while still seeing the blessings that lie before us?  How can we move forward while still holding fast to our youthful past without allowing it to rule our lives?

Perhaps it is helpful to savor the food with which we grew up.  Even when it is the food of the country we were thankful to leave, its taste gives us strength to fight the challenges of today.

Shavuot

Shavuot is among the most important of Jewish holidays, yet the least observed.  It marks the revelation at Mount Sinai seven weeks after the liberation from Egypt.  Thus the holidays of Passover and Shavuot are connected by the counting of the Omer.  Judaism believes that our freedom must be wedded to Torah in order for our lives to have meaning. 

Many people think that a life devoted to Torah is a life scrupulously bound to Jewish rituals.  An observant Jew is one who lights candles 18 minutes before sunset, keeps a kosher kitchen, fasts on Yom Kippur, sleeps in a sukkah, prays three times a day and much more.  These rituals are important to be sure.  Rituals can bring great meaning to our lives, adding a measure of holiness and helping to focus our thoughts on what is important and lasting.

But it is demeaning of Judaism and the gift of Torah to define a religious life in terms of rituals alone.  Torah is even more importantly about ethics and how we behave towards each other.  One cannot be religious and cheat in business.  One cannot be observant and scream words of anger to those we are supposed to love. 

If our freedom from Egypt is going to have lasting meaning then it must be tied to how we treat each other.  Torah must bring healing to our world.  On this Shavuot I would like us to rededicate ourselves to the ethical meaning of Torah.  I would like us to allow Torah to influence our actions.  I would like to dream that the gift of Torah can transform our world into a better place.

That is a dream I cannot fulfill alone.  Join me in devoting ourselves anew to the gift of Torah.

Naso

This week’s Torah portion, Naso, contains the curious, and bizarre, sotah ritual (Numbers 5).  Although its practice was long ago abolished by the rabbis, its meaning and purpose are worth pondering.  Here is the ritual.  If a husband suspects his wife of committing adultery he brings her to the priest.  (This ritual and its accompanying laws were decidedly one-sided.)  The husband brings a meal offering.  Then the priest has the woman come forward and stand before the altar.  He makes her drink bitter waters.  The priest then offers an incantation saying, “If you have committed adultery then may these waters make your belly distend and your thigh sag.”  She responds, “Amen, amen!”  If these words come true then she has broken faith with her husband.

What a strange ritual indeed!  We belong to a tradition that rejects such magic.  The purposes of rituals are to add holiness to our lives and focus our thoughts on proper behavior.  They are not to work magic.  Ask me to pray for the sick.  And you might be granted extra strength.  Ask me to hold your hand.  And you might gain added comfort.  Beg me to lay my hands on your head and scream, “You are healed!”  This is beyond human abilities and foreign to our tradition.  Miracles can instead be found in the ordinary. They stand before us each and every day.  Magic by contrast is the stuff of charlatans, and not believers.

Why then would the Torah offer this uncharacteristic ritual?  The medieval commentator, Ramban, remarks that only in the case of this sotah ritual is a judicial decision dependent on such magic.  The suggestion is clear.  This ritual was intended not to render justice but to avoid judgment.  According to the Torah adultery is a capital crime.  The renowned biblical scholar Jacob Milgrom notes that the Bible stands apart from other ancient Near Eastern legal traditions in not allowing the husband to commute the death sentence against an adulterous spouse.  He can’t simply say, “I forgive you.”  Here is the underlying theory.  If it is a crime against God then only God can unravel the judgment.  This is the purpose of the sotah ritual.

It is a ritual devised to circumvent the law.  Judgment is not always the best medicine.  Perhaps magic and potions can bring healing to broken relationships.

Today people get divorced for many different reasons.  Judaism recognizes its necessity.  Sometimes the best medicine for the couple, and the family for that matter, is divorce.  Still Judaism wants people to fulfill the Torah’s wish, “It is not good to be alone.”  In this week’s portion it appears as well to be making the remarkable claim that at times adultery can be overlooked, that the relationship might be more worthy of preserving than even this truth of “breaking faith.”

When the sotah ritual is examined one realizes that the intended result is that the couple is made whole again.  The ritual stands in direct contrast to today’s news reporters and gossip columnists who pursue such truths and thereby destroy countless relationships.  The priest does not run around the community searching for witnesses in order to prove or disprove the husband’s claim of infidelity.  Instead he makes the wife drink a potion.  Did these waters of bitterness ever make any woman’s belly distend or thighs sag?  I suspect not.  

And so then the priest could say, “Let your jealousy be quelled.  Return home together.”  In our age we might say, “How arcane.   What superstitious nonsense.” Then again we might do well to ponder the extraordinary lengths our tradition travels to preserve relationships.  Time and again Judaism sacrifices truth for the sake of peace.  Shalom bayit, peace in the home, takes precedence over most else.

Here it invents a ritual so that a husband and wife can again look each other in the eyes and say, “I love you.”  That is the message of the sotah ritual.  Helping couples say these words is its intent.  Helping couples say “I love you” is worth renewed effort.

It is even worth resorting to magic potions. 

Newsletter Article

What follows is my newsletter article from the May-June 2011 Newsletter.

A few more questions from our Religious School students.

How was the first person made?

According to the Torah there are two stories about the creation of human beings.  In the first God creates a human being (adam) just by saying, “Let there be a person.”  Then God divides this person in half and makes the first man and woman.  In the second God creates adam out of adamah (earth).  In this story God is more like an artist who is fashioning a clay pot.  Then God realizes that something is wrong.  Adam is really lonely.  So God creates the first woman, Eve, out of his rib so that they can keep each other company.  So in the first version God creates the first people and in the second God creates the first couple.

Why do we only believe in one God?

Is this a trick question!  The answer is because there is only one God.  I know it is really hard to think about something or understand something that you can’t touch or see, but that is what we believe.  I believe we can see God when we see beautiful things or when we see people do really wonderful things.

Do you keep kosher?  What are things that kosher people do?

Yes.  I really like keeping kosher.  It makes me think about being Jewish even when I am eating.  Keeping kosher is about only eating meat that has been killed in the least painful way.  It is about not mixing milk and meat and it is also about only eating those animals that God says in the Torah are permitted.  But keeping kosher is not only about food.  It is also about doing the right thing.  The word kosher means fitting or proper.  So the most important thing is always to do the right thing.  That is what a kosher person is supposed to do!

Will another Holocaust start?  Please say “No.”

I wish I could say no, but unfortunately too many have already happened since the Holocaust we learned about in Religious School.  This is why we have to focus really hard on making the world a better place and doing kosher things.  If everyone tries to do the right thing then another Holocaust can’t happen. 

Recently Annie Bleiberg, a Holocaust survivor, came to our sixth grade class.  The following quotes are what some of our students wrote after listening to her story.  Their words give us hope that no more Holocausts might happen!

“When she said how all the people were dying for no reason at all and it just occurred to me how all the people just probably fell asleep and never woke up.  Also when she said how they were freed from the camps and ghettos and they were crying tears of joy.”

“What I remembered most was when she was telling us about how she got the number on her arm.  This stood out to me most because of the way it happened and what happened when it occurred. “

“This is a picture of when she jumped off the train and fell on the snow.”

“It amazed me how Annie never gave up on life no matter how tired or how hungry she was.  She kept fighting for freedom and life.”

“Annie said to us, ‘Don’t give up.  Life is worth fighting for.’”

Amen.  Annie always says it best!

Have a great summer!  Thanks as always for your questions.

New Yorker Editorial

O’Bama and Netanyahoo’s Duelling Speeches : The New Yorker
My worry begins with this week's editorial by Henrik Hertzberg. He concludes with these words:

Nearly as appalling as Netanyahu’s intransigence was the mindlessness of the senators and representatives, Republican and Democratic, who rewarded him with ovation after standing ovation. This had less to do with studied convictions about the issues than with the political salience, actual and perceived, of certain Jewish and evangelical constituencies. (For many in the House chamber, the two-state solution is their own plus Florida.) But Middle East diplomacy is always distorted by short-term domestic politics. At the moment, Israel-accepting Fatah has its untested détente with Israel-denying Hamas; Netanyahu has a cabinet stocked with ministers openly determined to keep every inch of the West Bank; Obama has 2012. The President has put down some markers but has no discernible plan to make them stick. Time is short. In much of the Arab world, public opinion is supplanting the whims of malleable tyrants. Palestinians are beginning to discover the possibilities of nonviolence, which Israel, with its ethical and political traditions, would find far harder to resist than rocks and rockets. The longer the occupation lasts, and the larger the Arab and Palestinian populations grow in territory under Israeli control, the more untenable Israel’s future as both Jewish and democratic becomes. And a tsunami approaches. “There is an impatience with the peace process, or the absence of one, not just in the Arab world—in Latin America, in Asia, and in Europe,” Obama told the AIPAC delegates. In September, the United Nations may consider a Palestinian request for admission as a sovereign state. Such a resolution would not make Palestine sovereign, of course. But it would damage Israel’s legitimacy in unprecedented ways, and probably threaten its economy. In Europe last week, Obama sought support to head off such a U.N. resolution, or, at least, to avoid having to veto it in isolation. If he is to succeed in even that limited task, he’ll need a lot more than the luck of the Irish.

The Zionist vision was the creation of an independent Jewish state.  I worry that Israel has become far too dependent on American aid and support.  Israel should be able to go it alone.  It should be able to decide what is the best course of action and how to guarantee a peaceful future.  On the other hand the state should have a deep and abiding relationship with world Jewry.  It should be sensitive to the concerns of those Jews living outside of the land.

This of course is fanciful thinking.  As I read The New Yorker's editorial I grew increasingly worried that Israel is isolating itself from the Western world and from many diaspora Jews.  Most Jews living in this country in particular are more sensitive to the pulls of democracy than those of Jewish history and tradition.  They feel more American than Jewish.  As Israel's democratic character falters they will lose sympathy with the Jewish state.  Much of the Western world, in particular Europe, has already lost faith with the Jewish state.  With each instance when Israel's democracy is challenged and when Israelis fail to live up to democratic values, American Jews lose faith with the State of Israel. 

I feel the pull of Jewish tradition and the tug of Jerusalem.  I fear however that many do not.feel similarly.  While I agreed with much of what Netanyahu said I wonder with how many others did it resonate.  How many instead feel more kinship with the sentiments expressed above?  If the majority feel like minded then Netanyahu was indeed speaking to the wrong audience.  He should not be speaking as much to those who are cheering, but to doubters and critics.  He already has me in his corner.  I will always be on Israel's side.  How will he gain more supporters to the cause?

MEMRI TV Clip #2952

Below is a clip from a May 20th rally in Gaza. In the rally marchers chant slogans praising Osama bin Laden and denouncing the US.  It is difficult to discern how many are present at this rally.  Nonetheless it provides more troubling evidence of the hatred filling the streets of Gaza.



I continue to hope and pray that the Palestinians of Gaza, and in particular their Hamas leadership, will focus more on building something rather than destroying others. But with each of these clips I become more and more pessimistic about the hopes for peace.

Bamidbar Sermon

The greatest king of Israel was David, yet he sinned a number of times.  Interestingly one of his sins was exactly what Moses does in this week’s Torah portion.  According to the Bible David was punished for ordering a census.  The Book of Samuel reports: “David reproached himself for having numbered the people.  And David said to the Lord, ‘I have sinned grievously in what I have done.  Please, O Lord, remit the guilt of Your servant, for I have acted foolishly.’” (2 Samuel 24)

Apparently the counting of the tribes, the numbering of the people, reported in Parshat Bamidbar, was an exception, not the norm.  Moses takes a census of the people in order to muster the troops and determine how many battalions he has before his successor, Joshua, makes war on the inhabitants of the Promised Land.  This contrast between Moses and David brings to light Judaism’s discomfort with counting.  Throughout our history the numbering of people was greeted with great hesitation.

We do not live in such times.  We count how many friends we have—on Facebook.  We list how many followers we have—on Twitter.  We have the Forbes 500.  We make endless lists of people.  We count our possessions.  We count other people’s money, as well as our own. 

We count how many members belong to our clubs, and our synagogues.  The modern American Jewish scene appears obsessed with counting.  How many Jews are there?  Is it only 12 million, or perhaps 14 million?  This is of course understandable.  It was not so long ago that we lost six million.  How many more would we be if not for the Holocaust?  How different the Jewish landscape might be if not for our calamitous loss 65 years ago. 

But in the near obsession with tallying our numbers we may lose our essence.  This is why the tradition does not allow us to actually count towards a minyan.  Instead we use a biblical verse with ten words.  Psalm 28 is among the favorite choices: “Save Your people and bless Your treasured; care for them and sustain them forever.”  If we cannot complete the verse then we do not have the required number and the community is not “sustained”.  This is preferred over counting one, two, three…

By contrast today every birthday is considered momentous occasions.  My grandparents however were never 100% sure of their birthdays.  When it became more commonplace to celebrate birthdays it was miraculously determined that they were both born on the same day in the same year.

For their generation counting was seen as bad luck.  But we live in an age when we are over confident with our blessings.  Counting everything suggests such unwarranted confidence.  Perhaps it would be wise to take the tradition’s caution to heart.  We might be better served not to count so much.  In fact counting does not add meaning to our lives. 

It is not the number of friends one is surrounded with, but the depth of friendships.  It is not the size of the congregation, but the spirit of the community.  It is not the number of awards, or grades, or wealth, but whether or not we succeed in bringing blessings to the world around us.  These are my beliefs.

This week we also find ourselves nearing the ending of the counting of the Omer.  We count from Passover to Shavuot (the holiday celebrated in two weeks on June 7^th).  The tradition is that we count the days, as we would count towards a birthday, until we receive the Torah on Mount Sinai.  Shavuot of course celebrates the giving of the Torah.  Passover celebrates our freedom from Egypt.  The two must be married to each other.  And thus we count from freedom to its meaning.

Our freedom from Egypt finds meaning in the Torah.  We only count to the gift of Torah.  Only the meaning and depth of Torah is worthy of our counting.  Everything else we would do well to observe the superstitions of old.  Count far less.  Focus instead on the people standing before us.

All we should count toward is meaning and depth.  And all that can be found in Torah.

By the Numbers

By the Numbers - by Liel Leibovitz > Tablet Magazine
A worthy read regarding Netanyahu's recent speech to Congress.

Ours, alas, is the era of unreal numbers, from the falsified spreadsheets of Bernie Madoff to the felonious schemes of the equally criminal yet tragically unpunished swindlers behind the subprime mortgage bubble. Bluffing discreetly on balance sheets is bad enough; do it in the open, on the largest imaginable stage, and we’re headed down a dangerous road.

Unfortunately, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to a joint session of the Congress earlier this week was a master class of numeric (and other) inaccuracies. Because these things matter—they matter very much—let us, in the spirit of this week’s parasha, do the Jewish thing and set the record straight.

Netanyahu said: The vast majority of the 650,000 Israelis who live beyond the 1967 lines reside in neighborhoods and suburbs of Jerusalem and Greater Tel Aviv.
Actually, there are 304,569 Israelis living in the West Bank, according to the Israel Defense Forces. Add to that East Jerusalem—which, according to most credible sources, is home to about 200,000 Israelis—and you hit the 500,000 mark. Even if one chooses to be generous and give the prime minister these East Jerusalemites in his count, one has to wonder, as Jonathan Lis recently did in Haaretz, why Netanyahu, who later on in his speech roared that “Jerusalem must never again be divided,” would possibly choose to include the residents of the undividable capital in the overall tally of the contested populace.

In Judea and Samaria, the Jewish people are not foreign occupiers. We are not the British in India. We are not the Belgians in the Congo. This is the land of our forefathers, the Land of Israel, to which Abraham brought the idea of one God, where David set out to confront Goliath.
David, actually, swung his fateful sling in the valley of Elah, near modern-day Beit Shemesh, which is squarely within the boundaries of Israel proper. And if Netanyahu truly believes Israel is nothing like the Brits or the Belgians, he is welcome, of course, to do with the West Bank as had once been done with Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, and annex them. Until then, however, the prime minister has to choose: If he wishes to follow the Bible as his unsurpassable guide to realpolitik, let him declare so openly and allow his constituents to support or reject his theological aspirations. But if he wishes to guide the ship of state according to the acceptable, rational norms of Western democracies, all that blessed biblical stuff is, alas, rather irrelevant. Seen from that perspective, asserting martial law on a territory and its citizens, setting up an intricate bureaucracy of governance, oppressing any aspirations for self-governance, and insisting time and again that the natives are too corrupt and incompetent to govern themselves sounds like it’s one punch bowl away from feeling right at home at the Bengal Club.

But instead of hurling oneself against the firm wall of slurs and untruths Netanyahu erected in his Washington speech, let us read the parasha instead, and recall the spirit, sacred and fierce and urgent, that urges us to keep our accounting strict and strictly honest.

Netanyahu's and Obama's speeches are only the beginning of the debate.  Given that we are unable to agree about the "facts" makes this discussion even more vexing.

MEMRI TV Clip #2949

Below is a depressing clip. In it Hamas Foreign Liaisons Chief Osama Hamdan states that armed confrontation will continue and that Israelis must return to their countries of origin.



How can peace be made with those who seek Israel's destruction? This is yet more evidence that the Hamas-Fatah accord is the single worst development in recent months.  It is hard to watch this Western dressed spokesman offer his medieval views.  What could possibly be wrong with two nations living side by side in peace?

Behar Sermon

What follows is the sermon delivered on Friday, May 13.

The Torah portion makes clear that the land of Israel is particularly dear.  It is of course the holy land.  This is why it alone is granted a sabbatical year.

One might therefore think, especially with the success of modern Zionism, that only the land of Israel is holy.  But in fact all lands are holy.  The earth, the very ground beneath our feet, is holy. 

Our blessings do not say, for example, “Thank You God for the fruit of Israel,” but instead “for the fruit of the earth—borei pri ha-adamah.”  The Psalms declare, in a decidedly universal tone, “The earth is Adonai’s and all that it holds; the world and all its inhabitants.  For God founded it upon the ocean, set on the farthest streams.” (Psalm 24)

The Hebrew word for earth here in this text is ha-aretz, the land.  Yet the intention is clear.  It is the earth, the world, all lands that is intended.    Psalm 104 declares: “How many are the things You have made, O Lord; You have made them all with wisdom; the earth is full of Your creations.”  This psalm goes on to provide a litany of God’s earthly creations.

Recently I have been thinking about this psalm and of course about the power of nature.  Ironically it is often nature’s fury that reminds me of nature’s majesty.  There were the tsunamis and tornadoes.  And now there is the flooding of the Mississippi.  We see on the news renewed evidence of the psalmist’s words: “You make springs gush forth in torrents; they make their way between the hills.”

The psalmist continually reminds us.  “God looks at the earth and it trembles; God touches the mountains and they smoke.”  And so I have no choice but to: “I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; all my life I will chant hymns to my God.  May my prayer be pleasing to Him; I will rejoice in the Lord.” 

As we again stand before the awesome power of nature, we have no choice but to sing God’s praises.  At times that is all that can rescue us from the earth’s recent fury.  We require such reverence not only before God but before nature.

For too long we have believed that we are masters of nature, that we can control nature, that we can tame the mighty Mississippi.  But its name alone should suggest otherwise.  We can build better locks and dams and even higher levees, but nature cannot be tamed.  In fact some have suggested that our lock and dam system has made catastrophic floods more likely.  Furthermore we know now that these dams prevent vital nutrients from reaching the river’s delta.

I am not of course suggesting that we give up this effort entirely.  Reverence combined with knowledge would be a much better approach.  We would do well to remind ourselves of God’s admonition to Job: “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundations?  Speak if you have understanding.”

And so we must relearn this truth.  All lands are indeed holy.  It is not just one land.  It is not just our backyard but all the earth.  Zionism implies that only one land is holy.  In fact Israel’s Declaration of Independence has contributed to this misunderstanding when it states: “Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel, was the birthplace of the Jewish people.  Here their spiritual, religious and political identity was shaped.”

But this is inaccurate and a misreading of history.  The Torah was given in Sinai, in the wilderness.  It was given there to make clear that it was given to all.  It was given there moreover so that no land could claim the Torah as its alone.

Eretz Yisrael, the land of Israel, is of course my favorite land.  It is my favorite because so much of Jewish history occurred there.  I love nothing more than to hike its wadis and play in its waterfalls.  But it is not the only land.

The reverence for the land that the sabbatical year suggests is something that we must apply to all lands. We must restore a reverence for the earth and the land. We can no longer afford to do whatever we want with any l and. And so let us restore a reverence for the earth in our hearts and souls.

PM Netanyahu's Speech Take 2

On Tuesday, Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the US Congress.  The entire speech can be found here.  It was an excellent speech in which he made a number of important points.  Here are a few of his words.  My commentary again follows.  In bold are what I believe to be his most significant statements.

Israel has no better friend than America. And America has no better friend than Israel. We stand together to defend democracy. We stand together to advance peace. We stand together to fight terrorism. Congratulations America, Congratulations, Mr. President. You got bin Laden. Good riddance!

In an unstable Middle East, Israel is the one anchor of stability. In a region of shifting alliances, Israel is America’s unwavering ally. Israel has always been pro-American. Israel will always be pro-American.

…Of those 300 million Arabs, less than one-half of one-percent are truly free, and they're all citizens of Israel!

This startling fact reveals a basic truth: Israel is not what is wrong about the Middle East. Israel is what is right about the Middle East.

Israel fully supports the desire of Arab peoples in our region to live freely. We long for the day when Israel will be one of many real democracies in the Middle East.

Militant Islam threatens the world. It threatens Islam. I have no doubt that it will ultimately be defeated. It will eventually succumb to the forces of freedom and progress. But like other fanaticisms that were doomed to fail, militant Islam could exact a horrific price from all of us before its inevitable demise.

Leaders who spew such venom, should be banned from every respectable forum on the planet. But there is something that makes the outrage even greater: The lack of outrage. In much of the international community, the calls for our destruction are met with utter silence. It is even worse because there are many who rush to condemn Israel for defending itself against Iran’s terror proxies.

As for Israel, if history has taught the Jewish people anything, it is that we must take calls for our destruction seriously. We are a nation that rose from the ashes of the Holocaust. When we say never again, we mean never again. Israel always reserves the right to defend itself.

The peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan are vital. But they're not enough. We must also find a way to forge a lasting peace with the Palestinians. Two years ago, I publicly committed to a solution of two states for two peoples: A Palestinian state alongside the Jewish state.

I am willing to make painful compromises to achieve this historic peace. As the leader of Israel, it is my responsibility to lead my people to peace.

This is not easy for me. I recognize that in a genuine peace, we will be required to give up parts of the Jewish homeland. In Judea and Samaria, the Jewish people are not foreign occupiers. We are not the British in India. We are not the Belgians in the Congo.

This is the land of our forefathers, the Land of Israel, to which Abraham brought the idea of one God, where David set out to confront Goliath, and where Isaiah saw a vision of eternal peace. No distortion of history can deny the four thousand year old bond, between the Jewish people and the Jewish land. 

But there is another truth: The Palestinians share this small land with us. We seek a peace in which they will be neither Israel’s subjects nor its citizens. They should enjoy a national life of dignity as a free, viable and independent people in their own state. They should enjoy a prosperous economy, where their creativity and initiative can flourish.

So now here is the question. You have to ask it. If the benefits of peace with the Palestinians are so clear, why has peace eluded us? Because all six Israeli Prime Ministers since the signing of Oslo accords agreed to establish a Palestinian state. Myself included. So why has peace not been achieved? Because so far, the Palestinians have been unwilling to accept a Palestinian state, if it meant accepting a Jewish state alongside it.

You see, our conflict has never been about the establishment of a Palestinian state. It has always been about the existence of the Jewish state. This is what this conflict is about. In 1947, the United Nations voted to partition the land into a Jewish state and an Arab state. The Jews said yes. The Palestinians said no. In recent years, the Palestinians twice refused generous offers by Israeli Prime Ministers, to establish a Palestinian state on virtually all the territory won by Israel in the Six Day War.

They were simply unwilling to end the conflict. And I regret to say this: They continue to educate their children to hate. They continue to name public squares after terrorists. And worst of all, they continue to perpetuate the fantasy that Israel will one day be flooded by the descendants of Palestinian refugees.

My friends, this must come to an end. President Abbas must do what I have done. I stood before my people, and I told you it wasn’t easy for me, and I said… "I will accept a Palestinian state." It is time for President Abbas to stand before his people and say… "I will accept a Jewish state."

So I say to President Abbas: Tear up your pact with Hamas! Sit down and negotiate! Make peace with the Jewish state! And if you do, I promise you this. Israel will not be the last country to welcome a Palestinian state as a new member of the United Nations. It will be the first to do so.

In essence Netanyahu clarified a number of points.  Israel is willing to withdraw from a good portion of the West Bank, as long as security guarantees are made, including maintaining an Israeli military presence on Jordan’s border.  Israel would retain the large settlement blocs of Ariel, Gush Etzion and Maale Adumim.  Israel would forever retain control of the entirety of Jerusalem.  This would write the majority of Israelis living outside the Green Line within the State of Israel’s borders.  Furthermore the Palestinian refugee problem would be solved within the newly created Palestinian state.  All of these points appear self-evident.  In reality Netanyahu’s positions offered clarification of what Obama suggested in his speech of last week.  All of this has been the formula for at least the last ten years.  Two times Israelis and Palestinians were near reaching an agreement.  Creative solutions, different from Netanyahu’s positions, were then offered regarding the refugees and Jerusalem.  One such proposal suggested that a peace agreement would philosophically affirm the Palestinian positions on these issues but hue to the Israel position in terms of practice. 

I fear that Netanyahu’s speech is closer to the truth.  Although much of the world views Israel as the stumbling block to peace, the Palestinians and their Arab leaders have created this “catastrophe.”  If Abbas were to come to the Knesset, as Sadat did, and loudly and unequivocally affirm the Jewish State, he would win over the majority of Israelis.  The question is what Netanyahu can do in order to nurture such a move.  What can Netanyahu do to support the likes of Salam Fayyad?  Time is not on our side. 

To be very honest part of the problem is that the world has not by and large bought into the Jewish vision of the State of Israel.  It has affirmed the democratic foundations of the state.  If these democratic foundations continue to be eroded we will most certainly lose even more of the world’s support.  Would we want to go it alone?  Moreover, are we willing to sacrifice these democratic principles?    

Bamidbar

This week we begin reading the fourth book of the Torah, Bamidbar, called in English, Numbers.  It is a book filled with a variety of stories.  The people will spend this book journeying through the wilderness (midbar), preparing to cross the Jordan River into the Promised Land.  This 40 year journey, its challenges and triumphs, are preparation for what lies ahead, in particular the battles with the Canannites and those who occupy the land of Israel.  There is the story of the spies scouting the land.  There are moments when the people lose faith and question the purpose of their mission.  There are as well other moments when the people rebel against Moses.  And there is this week’s opening chapter, a census of the Israelites.

The plain meaning of the census is clear.  It is a mustering of the troops.  Each tribe is counted, with the exception of the Levites.  Their sole purpose was to tend to the tabernacle and its ritual objects and therefore need not be counted as part of the army.  “Those are the enrollments recorded by Moses and Aaron and by the chieftains of Israel, who were twelve in number, one man to each ancestral house.  All the Israelites, aged twenty years and over, enrolled by ancestral houses, all those in Israel who were able to bear arms—all who were enrolled came to 603,550.”  (Numbers 1:44-46)  What an apparently large army that was!

Yet regardless of the army’s size, the Bible suggests that there is only one reason why Israel succeeds on the battlefield.  “On that occasion, when the Lord routed the Amorites before the Israelites, Joshua addressed the Lord; he said in the presence of the Israelites: ‘Stand still, O sun, at Gibeon, O moon, in the Valley of Aiyalon!’  And the sun stood still and the moon halted, while a nation wreaked judgment on its foes…”  (Joshua 10:12-13)  Ultimately it is God who leads the fight for Israel’s army of 600,000.

When the modern State of Israel was founded its Jewish population was slightly more than this ancient number.  In today’s Israel it is therefore difficult to ignore ancient tropes in its modern achievements.  That is the country’s power. That is the nation’s pull.  It is also of course its danger.

How do we read the Bible and find meaning in its words while not becoming intoxicated by its rhythms?  How can the modern State of Israel remain Jewish while not as well become a land ruled by Joshuas?  Let me be honest and forthright.  Joshua was an extraordinary leader for ancient times.  He took the reins from Moses and successfully led the Israelites into battle for the Promised Land.  Under his leadership the Torah’s promise of living in the land of Israel was achieved. 

Yet Joshua must not serve as a template for a modern leader.  Why?  The answer is simple.  He was no democratic ruler.  The State of Israel must be both Jewish and democratic in order for it to survive in the modern age.  It must be Jewish and democratic in order for it to fulfill the vision of its Zionist founders. 

As I read this week’s portion I find myself torn.  The Bible will always have great pull on my soul.  But I must not allow it to rule over my life.  It can be a great source of unending inspiration, but never the final answer to all modern questions.

And so given this week’s news, I turn as well to its words to draw strength for the future.  Joshua charges the people: “Be strong and resolute; do not be terrified or dismayed, for the Lord your God is with wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:9)  Joshua’s actions might give me pause.  His words continue to offer inspiration.

Yom Haatzmaut Meditation

On Friday, May 6 we observed Yom Yaatzmaut.  I wrote a meditation exploring our 3,000 year connection to the city of Jerusalem.  In this meditation I explored this history through the Bible, Siddur, medieval poetry and modern songs.  Natalie Tenenbaum composed a beautiful musical piece for piano and clarinet, expertly played by Vasko Dukovski, to give expression to my words and the varied texts I selected.  The voice of the clarinet especially gave expression to those joyful times, like the present, when we can touch the land.  The chords of the piano helped to give voice to the words of the prayerbook and poets.  What follows is a brief excerpt from the meditation’s conclusion. 

Then in our own day the dream is realized.  There are no more dangers of sea travel.  We can board a plane and in less than one day touch the soil of eretz yisrael, the land and cities our ancestors only dreamed of.  The place is different than the dreams of our prayerbooks and poets.   The earthly is not all dreams, but the baruch of successive generations keeps it alive in our hearts.  L’hiyot am chofshi b’artzeinu.  To be a free people in our own land.

The poet of the modern age is Yehudah Amichai.  He too writes about women and love.  He also writes poem after poem about the city in which he lives, Jerusalem.

Jerusalem is a merry-go-round-and-round

From the Old City through all the neighborhoods and back to the Old.

And you can’t get off.  Whoever jumps off puts his life on the line

And whoever gets off at the final round has to pay again

To get back on for the rounds that have no end.

And instead of elephants and painted horses to ride,

There are religions that go up and down and turn on their axis

To the music of oily tunes from the houses of prayer.

Jerusalem is a seesaw; sometimes I dip down

Into past generations, sometimes I rise up to the skies and then

I shriek like a child, feet swinging on high:

I want down, Daddy, I want down,

Abba, get me down.

And that’s how the saints all ascend to heaven,

Like a child screaming, Daddy, I want to stay up here.

Abba, don’t get me down, Avinu Malkeinu,

Leave us up here, Avinu Malkeinu.

And there are days here when everything is sails and more sails,

Even though there’s no sea in Jerusalem, not even a river.

Everything is sails: the flags, the tallisim, the black coats,

The monks’ robes, the kaftans and kaffiyehs,

Young women’s dresses and headdresses,

Torah mantles and prayer rugs, feelings that swell in the wind

And hopes that set them sailing in other directions.

Even my father’s hands, spread out in blessing

[Baruch shem kavod malchuto l’olam va-ed.]

My mother’s broad face and Ruth’s faraway death

Are sails, all of them sails in the splendid regatta

On the two seas of Jerusalem:

The sea of memory and the sea of forgetting.

Amicha writes poem after poem.  How to reconcile the dreams with the reality?  How does the heavenly Jerusalem mingle with the earthly?

In the Spring of 1967 Jerusalem’s mayor, Teddy Kollek, organized a song competition.  The theme was Jerusalem.  Naomi Shemer submitted a song, “Jerusalem of Gold.”  The song won the competition at the Musical Festival celebrating Israel’s nineteen years of statehood.  Three weeks later, in the early days of June, Israel won the Six Day War and captured Jerusalem’s Old City from the Jordanians.  The song immediately became the anthem for the war.  The image of crying soldiers standing at the Western Wall became part of the Jewish people’s collective memory.  

Shemer added a new concluding verse:

We have returned to the cisterns,

to the market and to the square. 

A shofar calls out on the Temple Mount in the Old City.

And in the caves in the rock, thousands of suns shine.  

We will once again descend to the Dead Sea by way of Jericho.

Yerushalayim shel zahav,

Jerusalem of gold, of bronze, and of light,

am I not a harp and lyre for all your songs.

We have stood on Jerusalem’s walls.  We have said with prior generations:

Baruch shem kavo malchuto l’olam va-ed.

Our generation is the same, yet different.  Our Jerusalem is happiness built on ruins. Many still cry and lament for what was lost.  They mourn for dreams unrealized, prayers unfulfilled, for a Temple and its sacrifices still not restored.  I instead will only say a blessing for what has been gained.  I will no longer mourn. I will revel in the songs of thousands and thousands of Jews.  I will rejoice that we have returned to this city, the city of Jerusalem, a city of heaven and earth.  I will recall that today, in this unique and blessed age, Jerusalem is no longer in ruins. There may very well be untold ruins beneath the feet. But there is no ruin in the air. Jerusalem is happiness built on ruins.

From Solomon until now one unbroken chain.  Sometimes a cry.  Sometimes a song. 

Always the word Baruch.  Always the people said as one: Baruch shem kavod malchuto l’olam va-ed.  We say with our people: Baruch shem kavod malchuto l’olam va-ed.

We say today a blessing.  We are again a free people in our own land, standing again in our city of Jerusalem.

PM Netanyahu's Speech

What follows is Prime Minister Netanyahu's remarks at the AIPAC Policy Conference.  You can watch the video here.  This speech was delivered last night. Again I have highlighted what I believe to be his most important statements.  My commentary follows.  I await his address to the US Congress scheduled for today.

My friends,

To all our supporters in this great hall and to the millions of supporters across this great land, the people of Israel thank you. Thank you for your staunch commitment to Israel's security. Thank you for defending Israel's right to defend itself. Thank you for standing by Israel as it seeks a secure peace.

Now, I heard tonight from all the speakers something that you know - that Israel is America's indispensable ally. You understand that Israel and America stand shoulder to shoulder fighting common enemies, protecting common interests. You know that Israeli innovators help power computers, fight disease, conserve water, clean the planet. Your support for Israel flows from the heart.

You see, it's not just what Israel does. It's what Israel is. Now, let me explain that. Yesterday I had a great day. They let me out. Sara and I could actually go for a walk. And I have to congratulate the American security services. They're a little more generous than ours. So we walked along the Potomac and we got to visit Washington's majestic memorials. I read Jefferson's timeless words, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal." I read Lincoln's immortal address, "government of the people, for the people, by the people."

Now, let me tell you why these words resonate so powerfully with me and with all Israelis - because they're rooted in ideas first championed by our people, the Jewish people, the idea that all men are created in God's image, that no ruler is above the law, that everyone is entitled to justice. These are revolutionary Jewish ideas, and they were spoken thousands of years ago - when vast empires ruled the earth, vast slave empires ruled the world. And the Jews spoke these truths. 

Israel is the cradle of our common civilization. It's the crucible of our common values. And the modern state of Israel was founded precisely on these eternal values. And this is why Israel's more than 1 million Muslims enjoy full democratic rights. This is why the only place in the Middle East where Christians are completely free to practice their faith is the democratic State of Israel. And this is why Israel, and only Israel, can be trusted to ensure the freedom for all faiths in our eternal capital, the united city of Jerusalem.

My friends, Israel and America have drawn from these deep well springs of our common values. We forged an enduring friendship not merely between our governments, but between our peoples. Support for Israel doesn't divide America. It unites America. It unites the old and the young, liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans. And, yes, Joe Lieberman, it even unites independents. I want to take this opportunity to salute one of the great senators in my lifetime, a man who's given unbelievable service to his country, America, and has been unbelievably dedicated to Israel and the Jewish people. Thank you, Joe Lieberman.

You see, this broad support for Israel in the United States is a tremendous help and gives tremendous strength to my country. And since Harry Truman, Israel has looked to American presidents to stand by it as we meet the unfolding challenges of a changing world.

Yesterday President Obama spoke about his ironclad commitment to Israel's security. He rightly said that our security cooperation is unprecedented. He spoke of that commitment not just in front of AIPAC. He spoke about it in two speeches heard throughout the Arab world. And he has backed those words with deeds.

I know these are tough economic times. So I want to thank the president and Congress for providing Israel with vital assistance so that Israel can defend itself by itself. I want to thank you all for supporting the Iron Dome missile defense system. A few weeks ago, Hamas terrorists in Gaza fired eight rockets at our cities, at Ashkelon and Beer Sheva. Now, these rockets never reached their targets. Iron Dome intercepted them in midair. For the first time, a missile defense system worked in combat. That's a precedent in military history. And I want to say thank you, America.

America and Israel are cooperating in many other ways as well. We're cooperating in science, in technology, in trade, in investment. It's not only American companies that are investing in Israel. It's Israeli companies investing in America. In the last decade, Israeli companies have invested more than $50 billion in the United States. One of those companies is investing just down the road in Richmond. It's a company that is building a food factory. Now, here's what it means - more business, more jobs, and, yes, more hummus.

Well, it's not just food we're bringing to America. Take medicine. Israel is advancing cure for multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer's, cancer. We've developed mechanical means to make paraplegics walk again. We've placed a tiny diagnostic camera inside a pill. I have not swallowed it, but I understand it's quite effective. And you've just heard of this miraculous bandage developed by an Israeli company that has helped save Congresswoman Gabby Giffords' life. And I wish Gabby, a great friend of Israel, “Refuah Shlema”, a happy, quick, speedy recovery.

Israel and America are also cooperating to end the world's worst addiction, the addiction to oil. This dependence fuels terrorism. It poisons the planet. So we've launched a 10-year program in Israel to kick the habit, to find a substitute for gasoline. And if we succeed, we can change the world. We can change history.

My friends, the American people's support for Israel is reflected in my invitation to address a joint meeting of Congress tomorrow. I will talk about the great convulsion taking place in the Middle East, the risks and the opportunities. And I will talk about the dangers of a nuclear-armed Iran. And I will also outline a vision for a secure Israeli-Palestinian peace. I intend to speak the unvarnished truth because now, more than ever, what we need is clarity. 

Events in the region are opening people's eyes to a simple truth: The problems of the region are not rooted in Israel. The remarkable scenes we're witnessing in town squares across the Middle East and North Africa are occurring for a simple reason: People want freedom. They want progress. They want a better life.

For many of the peoples of the region, the 20th century skipped them by. And now 21st century technology is telling them what they missed out on. You remember that desperate food vendor in Tunis? Why did he set himself on fire? Not because of Israel. He set himself on fire because of decades of indignity, decades of intolerable corruption.

And the millions who poured into the streets of Tehran, Tunis, Cairo, Sanaa, Benghazi, Damascus, they're not thinking about Israel. They're thinking of freedom. They're yearning for opportunity. They're yearning for hope for themselves and for their children. So it's time to stop blaming Israel for all the region's problems.

Let me stress one thing. Peace between Israelis and Palestinians is a vital interest for us. It would be the realization of a powerful and eternal dream. But it is not a panacea for the endemic problems of the Middle East. It will not give women in some Arab countries the right to drive a car. It will not prevent churches from being bombed. It will not keep journalists out of jail.

What will change this? One word: Democracy - real, genuine democracy. And by democracy, I don't just mean elections. I mean freedom of speech, freedom of press, freedom of assembly, the rights for women, for gays, for minorities, for everyone. What the people of Israel want is for the people of the Middle East to have what you have in America, what we have in Israel - democracy. So it's time to recognize this basic truth. Israel is not what's wrong with the Middle East. Israel is what's right about the Middle East.

My friends, we want peace because we know the pain of terror and we know the agony of war. We want peace because we know the blessings peace could bring - what it could bring to us and to our Palestinian neighbors. But if we hope to advance peace with the Palestinians, then it's time that we admitted another truth. This conflict has raged for nearly a century because the Palestinians refuse to end it. They refuse to accept the Jewish state.

Now, this is what this conflict has always been about. There are many issues linked to this conflict that must be resolved between Israelis and Palestinians. We can, we must, resolve them. But I repeat: We can only make peace with the Palestinians if they're prepared to make peace with the Jewish state.

Tomorrow in Congress, I'll describe what a peace between a Palestinian state and the Jewish state could look like. But I want to assure you of one thing. It must leave Israel with security. And therefore, Israel cannot return to the indefensible 1967 lines.

I'll talk about these and other aspects of peace tomorrow in Congress. But tonight I want to express Israel's gratitude for all you are doing to help strengthen Israel and the great alliance that Israel has with America. You helped maintain our qualitative military edge. You backed sanctions against Iran. You supported genuine peace. You opposed Hamas. And you've joined President Obama and me in denouncing Hamas and demanding that it release our captive soldier, Gilad Shalit. That's another outrageous crime of Hamas. Just imagine keeping a young soldier locked in a dark dungeon for five years without even a single visit - not a single visit of the Red Cross. I think that the entire civilized community should join Israel and the United States and all of us in a simple demand from Hamas: Release Gilad Shalit.

My friends, I spent my high-school years in Philadelphia. I understand it's developed quite a bit since then. But during those years, when it was a sleepier town, I used to go visit the Liberty Bell. Now, as Prime Minister of Israel, I can walk down the street and see an exact replica of that bell in Jerusalem's Liberty Park. On both bells is the same inscription. It comes from the Bible, from the book of Leviticus , “U’kratem Dror BaAretz L’chol Yoshveha”, “Proclaim liberty throughout the land.” My dear friends, this is the essence of the great alliance between our two nations - two peoples bonded in liberty and seeking freedom and peace for all. That's what this alliance is all about. And you are part of it. You maintain it.

I thank you on behalf of the people of Israel and the government of Israel. Thank you for the American-Israel alliance. Thank you, AIPAC.

Netanyahu reiterated the foundations of the US-Israel alliance.  He emphasized that more than anything else it is based on shared values.  Not only are Israel and the US united in fighting terrorism but this alliance benefits the United States in terms of  military and technological know how.  Most importantly Netanyahu emphasized that Israel is not the cause of the recent unrest in the Arab world.  It is instead based on the denial of democratic rights.  On this point especially Netanyahu is correct.  There is a tendency to pressure Israel to make changes because Israel listens and is sensitive to rebuke.  The central issue remains that far too many in the Arab Middle East live in oppressive regimes.  Israel and the US should be joined in helping to nurture democracy!

Bechukotai Sermon

Before we conclude this evening’s service let me share a few words of Torah.   In Leviticus 26, our Torah portion proclaims: “I will grant peace in the land, and you shall lie down untroubled by anyone; I will give the land respite from vicious beasts, and no sword shall cross your land.  You shall give chase to your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword…”

This promise is predicated on our observance of the commandments.  It precedes a detailed list of punishments.  I am not going to enumerate the details of these punishments but suffice it to say that if you do not obey the commandments a lot of bad things will happen.  The punishments are quite lengthy and detailed.

I wish instead to speak for a moment about the promise of peace.  “Vnatati shalom ba-aretz…  I will grant peace in the land.”  The Torah suggests that peace, and in particular peace for the land of Israel, is in our hands.

This of course is the question of the day, and especially of this week.  President Obama just made a major speech about the Middle East and the peace process.  He suggested that the contours of a future Palestinians State would follow the 1967 borders.  Where it didn’t there would be land swaps in exchange.  He left unanswered the questions of Palestinian refugees and the status of Jerusalem.

There is no doubt that in the pursuit of peace Israelis will have to make major, painful concessions.  There should also be little doubt that Israel (and the Palestinians) can’t make peace unilaterally.  Peace, however, much we might wish it to be so, is not entirely dependent on us.

Our observance can only grant us respite of the soul.  Peace of the land is not only in our own hands.  We can withdraw from much of the West Bank and even uproot settlements.  But this alone will not bring peace.  The Palestinians must affirm the legitimacy of a Jewish state in the Arab Middle East.  They must affirm that this state is rooted in ancient history.  Without that all of the painful sacrifices and security guarantees will not, cannot bring peace.

And so we might feel understandably nervous and anxious.  I find myself quite pessimistic about the possibilities of peace.  For such an upbeat person this is as well an unnerving situation.

And so at such times we must continue praying for peace.  Our tradition commands us that we must never lose hope.  As the Psalmist says, “Shaalu shalom yerushalayim.”   (Psalm 122)   May it indeed be so!  We cannot afford to lose hope!  Never!

V’natati shalom ba-aretz.  May the land be granted peace!