Taste of Torah

Hope where you'd least expect it / B'Shallach

2012-01-25T10:00:00.000-08:00

I grew up reading Snoopy cartoons, the creation of Charles M. Schulz (1922-2000), each day. From the page of the newspaper, Snoopy said, “Yesterday I was a dog. Today I’m a dog. Tomorrow I’ll probably still be a dog. Sigh! There’s so little hope for advancement.” Curiously, Snoopy didn’t shut out the possibility of hope: “so little hope” suggests there is some. Apparently “hope springs eternal” even in dogs.

The Israelites are struggling with hope. Despite being witness to God’s power and miracles in Egypt, they arrive at the Reed Sea no wiser.

As Pharaoh drew near, the Israelites caught sight of the Egyptians advancing upon them. Greatly frightened, the Israelites cried out to the Lord. And they said to Moses, “Was it for want of graves in Egypt that you brought us to die in the wilderness! What have you done to us, taking us out of Egypt? Is this not the very thing we told you in Egypt, saying, ‘Let us be, and we will serve the Egyptians, for it is better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness’?” (Exodus 14:10-12)

At one and the same time, the Israelites are gripped by fear (“greatly frightened”), sure they are doomed (“it is better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness”), and looking for someone to blame for their predicament (“What have you done to us, taking us out of Egypt?”). But they also evince a glimmer of hope (“the Israelites cried out to the Lord”).

Hope is what makes it possible for all of us to face -- well, everything. Even Snoopy had some hope. We hope for improved health, greater success, better relationships. We hope that what plagues us will give way to our own personal redemption. We hold out hope for ourselves and for our loved ones. The nasty irony of hope is that the worse things are and the more you need it, the harder it is to hold on to.

It sounds like pious platitude to say, “So long as we are alive, there is reason to hope.”
But the Rabbis go further. They tell that hope extends beyond life. Midrash Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer tells us that Pharaoh’s story does not end with his death in the Reed Sea.

R. Nechunia b. Hakkanah said: Know the power of repentance. Come and see from Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who rebelled most grievously against the Rock, the Most High, as it is said, Who is the Lord that I should hearken to his voice? (Exodus 5:2). In the same way that [Pharaoh] sinned through speech, he repented through speech, as it is said, Who is like You, O Lord, among the mighty? (Exodus 15:11). The Holy One Blessed be God delivered [Pharaoh] from among the dead. Whence do we know [Pharaoh] died? Because it is said, I could have put forth my hand and stricken you… (Exodus 9:15). [Pharaoh] went and ruled Nineveh. The men of Nineveh were writing fraudulent deeds, everyone robbed his neighbor, they committed sodomy, and similar wicked deeds. When the Holy One Blessed be God sent for Jonah to prophesy the destruction of [Nineveh], Pharaoh heard and arose from his throne, rent his garments, clothed himself in sackcloth and ashes, and had a proclamation made to all his people that they should fast for two days… (Pirkei de-Rabbi Ishmael, Friedlander pp. 341-2)

The midrash tells us that all the Egyptians who pursue Israel drown in the Sea, save one. Pharaoh alone survives. Just prior to his death, he does teshuvah: he repents and acknowledges God. After his death, God resurrects him and seats him on the throne of Nineveh, king of the very city to which the prophet Jonah is sent. Pharaoh has changed; he understands what is at stake. He leads his people in fasting and repentance. They now have hope. Pharaoh, whose unyielding stubbornness doomed the Egyptians, saves the Ninevites.

What a stunning rabbinic imaginary excursion! Hope sustains every human being who is caught in Mitzrayim. Mitzrayim, the Hebrew word for “Egypt” means the “narrow straits.” It can readily be understood as a metaphor for all that traps, frightens, and threatens us. Hope need never die. Even death itself does not eclipse hope. This isn’t to say that any of us are counting on resurrection and a seat on the throne of Nineveh, but it is a reminder that good often emerges out of the darkest events. Does this redeem the events that devastate our lives? That’s for each individual to judge for him or herself. But hope abides where we give it a home, and its timeline stretches beyond ours.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Measure twice, cut once / Parshat Bo

2012-01-22T09:38:00.000-08:00

I was a fan of “This Old House,” a PBS program in which old houses were rehabbed in wonderfully creative ways. Norm Abrams -- carpenter par excellence -- came to be a regular feature on the show and eventually spun off his own show about carpentry. He then published a book entitled Measure Twice, Cut Once: Lessons from a Master Carpenter. When my husband finished our basement many years ago, this was his mantra: “Measure twice, cut once.” (He also had a slogan: “Abba Construction Company: if it’s straight, it’s a miracle.”)
More than a principle for carpentry, “Measure twice, cut once” is a principle for life. Anyone who has hit the reply button too quickly and sent out a nastygram knows. Anyone who has spewed personal venom at another person in a fit of pique knows. Anyone who has dashed off an analysis of something only to realize two days later that it was lopsided and missed the mark, knows.

This is what came to mind when I read a verse in parshat Bo that seems very much out of place. We find it not once, but twice. First, following the commandment to eat unleavened bread each year and tell our children the story of our redemption from servitude in Egypt, Torah tells us:

And this shall serve you as a sign on your hand (l’ot al yad-kha) and as a reminder on your forehead (u’l’zikaron bein einekha) -- in order that the Teaching of the Lord may be in your mouth -- that with a mighty hand the Lord freed you from Egypt. You shall keep this institution at its set time from year to year. (Exodus 13:9-10)

And again after instructing the Israelites to dedicate to God the firstborn of their cattle and offspring. Torah says that when a child inquires about the meaning of the sacrifice of the firstborn of the cattle, and the redemption of firstborn sons, one must explain:

…Therefore I sacrifice to the Lord every first male issue of the womb, but redeem every firstborn among my sons. And so it shall be as a sign upon your hand (l’ot al yad-kha) and as a symbol before your eyes (u’l’totafot bein einekha) that with a mighty hand the Lord freed us from Egypt. (Exodus 13:15-16)

The phrase “a sign on your hand and a symbol/reminder before your eyes” is well known to us from the Shema that is recited twice daily, but that comes from Deuteronomy 6:8 which reads slightly differently: Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them serve as a symbol before your eyes… We now have three occurrences of “a sign on your hand and a symbol before your eyes.”

In the first instance, the eating of matza serves as the sign and symbol. In the second, the redemption of the firstborn is the sign and symbol. In Shema, all of Torah is the sign and symbol. From this we can learn that anything can be a reminder of what is truly important if we invest it with symbolic meaning. A paperweight on your desk can serve to remind you that your opinions should carry weight, and therefore you should let them be heard. A child’s drawing -- framed and visible -- can remind you to value the efforts of everyone.

Another observation. In the first instance of “a sign upon your hand and remembrance before your eyes,” both “sign” and “remembrance” are singular, but in the other two occurrences, “sign upon your hand” is singular, while “symbol before your eyes” is plural. One for the hand; two for the eyes.

The Sages long ago decided to interpret this verse literally, and accordingly created tefillin. But for us moderns, the hand represents what do in the world -- our physical, psychological, emotional impact on the world. Eyes represent our perceptions and ideas; eyes are gateway to the brain. The eyes require twice as much attention, symbolism, reminder as the hand. This is a great lesson for many of us: think twice before acting. Measure twice, cut once.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Group work? Oh no! / Parshat Va'era

2012-01-09T14:58:00.000-08:00

When my kids were young, they hated and dreaded “group work.” This meant that four kids would be assigned a project, and all share the grade it earned. Most often, the children in my kids’ group would leave it to my kid to do all or most of the work and earn them all an “A.” It was not a happy experience because the teachers did not organize group projects to foster responsibility and genuine collaboration between the students.

Most of us grew up in schools that required us to work by ourselves, and considered collaborative work “cheating.” We studied alone, wrote papers alone, and did projects alone. How many times did we hear the teacher’s mantra, “I want to see your work alone; no one else’s”?

Yet real life -- outside the classroom -- is group work. Collaboration generates more ideas, enhances creativity, and invites the best in everyone to come to the fore. Every engineer, physicist, physician, nurse, musician, politician, and educator will tell you that collaboration is an essential part of his or her work. And consider this too: what is family life, if not a collaborative effort?

The story of the Exodus -- as it is commonly recalled -- spotlights Moses as a unique and singular leader, possessing abilities beyond those of most mortals. Moses is leader, prophet, and co-redeemer of Israel. He is even Moshe Rabbeinu, the quintessential rabbi, in the minds of the Talmudic Sages. Who else fits that description?

What is more, we think of the Exodus as a tale of independence. In fact, it’s a tale of interdependence: between people, and between God and Israel. It’s a tale of collaboration and cooperation. Sometimes there is trust; sometimes not. Sometimes the relationships are marked by love and sometimes by anger.

Maybe Cecil B. DeMille didn’t get it quite right. This week’s parashah, Va’era, chronicles Moses’ first audience with Pharaoh as well as the first seven plagues. I can still see Charlton Heston in my mind’s eye (and on the screen if I pull the DVD off the shelf), rod in hand, robust and self-assured, standing before Yul Brenner and demanding the freedom of the Hebrew slaves. Charlton Heston didn’t have a speech impediment. But Moses did (Exodus 4:10-16). That is why John Carradine, as Aaron, stood at his side to serve as his spokesman. But in The Ten Commandments, Aaron did little more.

I want to suggest that Aaron did a good deal more. The drama begins when Aaron cast down his rod in the presence of Pharaoh and his courtiers, and it turned into a serpent (Exodus 7:10). Neat trick, but easily replicated by Pharaoh’s sorcerers and magicians. Aaron’s rod/serpent then swallows their rods. Also very cool. Note that Moses stands by watching the action.

From here we move to the plagues. Picture Charlton Heston extending his rod and threatening the pharaoh of Egypt. Then consider these passages. Who initiates the plagues, Moses or Aaron?

And the Lord said to Moses, “Say to Aaron: Take your rod and hold out your arm over the waters of Egypt -- its rivers, its canals, its ponds, all its bodies of water -- that they may turn to blood; there shall be blood throughout the land of Egypt, even in vessels of wood and stone.” Moses and Aaron did just as the Lord commanded: he lifted up the rod and stuck the water in the Nile in the sight of Pharaoh and his courtiers, and all the water in the Nile was turned into blood… (Exodus 7:19-20).

Apparently, Aaron was instrumental in turning the Nile to blood. Now consider the second plague:

Aaron held out his arm over the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came up and covered the land of Egypt. (Exodus 8:2)

And the third plague:

Aaron held out his arm with the rod and struck the dust of the earth, and vermin came upon man and beast; all the dust of the earth turned to lice throughout the land of Egypt. (Exodus 8:13)

God alone initiates the plagues of wild animals and pestilence. Both Moses and Aaron together initiate the plague of boils -- this is the first time Moses steps into this role. Finally, Moses initiates the plagues of hail and locusts, the only two he initiates alone.

It appears that Aaron’s role is far greater, and more significant, than he is usually credited with having. Moses and Aaron’s collaboration is an excellent example of group work as it should be. Together, they helped God bring the entire Israelite nation out of Egypt. It wasn’t Moses alone. It was a “group work.” This is what schools and universities are beginning to teach our children. This is what some of us need to learn to do, or to do better.

You’ve heard the expression “lone wolf?” Well, it’s an oxymoron. Consider this (from a website about wolves): “Wolves are an extremely social animal. They exist as a social unit called a pack. Wolves travel and hunt in a group and perform almost all other activities in the company of fellow wolves.”

There’s a lot we can learn from wolves: we are stronger, more creative, and more productive together. Many corporations have learned this and foster collaborative work environments. Many families have learned this and foster stronger, closer relationships. It’s not always easy. Working with people, like living with people, is fraught with all sorts of challenges. We have to learn to listen more than we talk, affirm others before expecting them to affirm us, consider ideas that initially sound off-the-wall, and above all be patient. But when we bring our best ideas and personality traits to the table, we bring out the best in others. Win-win.
I've heard that many universities are doing an excellent job at organizing and supporting "group work" experiences. Hopefully, schools and universities will continue to improve their efforts to foster constructive group work and prepare their students for a lifetime of productive collaboration.

My youngest son just this minute called from college. His first week of classes has gone well, but they’re going to assign group work in his engineering class. He’s apprehensive. I'm hoping he's pleasantly surprised.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

The blessing of life / Shemot

2012-01-03T07:44:00.000-08:00

Torah draws a straight line between the notion of blessing and fertility. God’s first blessing is fertility. On the fifth day, God creates the winged and sea-dwelling creatures and Torah tells us: God blessed them, saying, “Be fertile and increase, fill the waters in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth” (Genesis 1:22). Then again on the sixth day, after bringing forth humanity: God blessed [humanity] and God said to them, “Be fertile and increase, fill the earth…” (Genesis 1:28).

As the Book of Genesis begins with blessing, it also closes with blessing. In parshat Vayechi, Jacob blesses his grandsons Ephraim and Manasseh, and then all his sons, including this dramatic blessing for Joseph, which also speaks of fertility:

The God of your father who helps you,
And Shaddai who blesses you
With blessings of heaven above,
Blessings of the deep that couches below,
Blessing of the breast and womb. (Genesis 49:25)

It’s not surprising then that the Book of Exodus opens with the very same notion. No sooner are we told the names of the sons of Jacob who descended into Egypt than:

But the Israelites were fertile and prolific; they multiplied and increased very greatly, so that the land was filled with them. (Exodus 1:7)

Torah, which usually uses words sparingly, elaborates on the generativity of the Hebrews, generously supplies four separate words to describe the fertility of the Israelites paru va’yish’r’tzu vayirbu va’ya’atzmu (“fertile and prolific, multiplied and increased”), then adds b’me’od me’od (“very greatly”) and even continues va’timalei ha’aretz otam (“the land was filled with them”). And of course the account that follows tell us that Pharaoh is spooked by the proliferation of Hebrews in his midst and not only enslaves them but launches a genocidal plan, enlisting the midwives Shifrah and Puah to help.

Certainly children are a blessing. And there are certainly other blessings besides. But the emphasis Torah places on procreation -- both human and animal -- led our Sages to what I believe was a bad call in interpreting Genesis 1:28 as prescriptive, rather than description. That is to say: they declared procreation to be a commandment. When God says, “Be fertile and increase,” (Genesis 1:28) this is a description of the very nature of the human species. Like the animals created the fifth day (Genesis 1:22), humanity is self-sustaining. God created once and now people and animals will procreate in order to sustain creation. Just as the animals cannot be commanded to reproduce, it is absurd to think that God commanded each and every human to reproduce. Yet this is precisely how the Rabbis choose to read Genesis 1:28.

Thus we find in the Mishnah:

No man may abstain from keeping the law Be fertile and increase (Genesis 1:28), unless he already has children: according to the School of Shammai, two sons; according to the School of Hillel, a son and a daughter, for it is written, Male and female He created them (Genesis 5:2). (m. Yebamot 6:6)

When the Rabbis say “no man may abstain…” they mean “no Jewish man may abstain.” This points to yet another inconsistency and absurdity, since Genesis 1:28 concerns all humanity, not just Jews. Mishnah assumes the obligation and quickly turns to how many of each sex one is obligated to produce. What does this say to, and about, people who choose not to become parents? What does this say to, and about, people who are infertile? Are they in violation of God’s law? Yet how can they “obey”? But wait, it gets worse. Again from Mishnah Yebamot 6:6 --

If [a man] married a woman and lived with her ten years and she bore no child, it is not permitted him to abstain [from fulfilling this mitzvah]. If he divorced her she may be married to another and the second husband may live with her for ten years. If she had a miscarriage the space [of ten years] is measured from the time of the miscarriage.

This is downright draconian -- harsh and pitiless. Marriage has been reduced to an arrangement to facilitate the man’s presumed obligation to procreate, as derived by the Rabbis from Genesis 1:28. Not surprisingly, there is plenty of pushback as well in the Rabbinic tradition. My favorite example is a midrash in Pesikta de-Rav Kahanah (22:2) that tells the story of a loving couple who come to R. Shimon b. Yochai because although married for a decade, they have no children. The husband invites his wife to take with her whatever she considers most precious from his house when she leaves. From this, we (and R. Shimon) understand the quality of their love. R. Shimon then instructs the couple to spend their last night together just as they spent their first night together, beginning with good food and drink. So they do. Food, drink… What else did they do on their first night together? When the husband finally falls asleep, the wife has her servants transport him to her father’s house. The husband wakes up confused by his surroundings, prompting his wife to explain that she did precisely what he bade her: she took what was most precious to her: him. The midrash makes it clear that this couple did not divorce. Love trumps fertility in importance.
This brings us back to the question: Is blessing primarily about procreation? Is that what Pharaoh sees in the Hebrews that frightens him? But the Israelites were fertile and prolific; they multiplied and increased very greatly, so that the land was filled with them (Exodus 1:7). Pharaoh notes their numbers: And he said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are much too numerous for us…” (Exodus 1:9). Pharaoh sees a good deal more than the birthrate of the Hebrews. He sees that this is a people that loves life, that considers life itself the greatest blessing -- in its fullness, robustness, richness. Such people threaten his power, which depends on the diminution and devaluation of human life. In its essence, blessing is not about procreation; it’s about life itself, the greatest and ultimate blessing of God. The trick is not necessarily to engender more lives, but to engender more life.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Brothers / Parshat Vayechi

2012-01-02T09:06:00.000-08:00

The Rabbis tell the story of two brothers who were utterly selfless; each placed the welfare of the other before himself. They shared a wheat field they had inherited from their father. The married brother reasoned that his single brother needed more wheat because he had no children to care for him in his old age. The single brother reasoned that the married brother needed more wheat because he had more mouths at home to feed. It’s a beautiful ideal.

When I was growing up, it was accepted wisdom that siblings compete, fight, resent one another, and therefore have great difficulty getting along. Psychology had taught that this is “normal,” and at least where I grew up, parents set their expectations and responded to their children’s behavior accordingly.

Psychologists could have used Genesis as their proof text: Cain and Abel, Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau, Joseph and his brothers. What happens in the next generation?

Joseph has two sons born in Egypt: Manasseh and Ephraim. Thus far Torah has recorded their names (Genesis 41:50-53), but not a word or act of either. Manasseh and Ephraim figure prominently in the events recorded in parshat Vayechi although the words and actions are not theirs. Why is it, then, that we bless our sons, “May God make you like Ephraim and Manasseh?” Why not “Abraham and Isaac” or “Jacob and Joseph” or “David and Solomon”? What’s so exemplary about these brothers -- whose words and actions are not even recorded in Torah -- that they are the model for our sons, shabbat after shabbat and generation after generation?

Parshat Vayechi recounts Jacob’s blessing of Joseph’s sons, and it entails several peculiarities. First, Jacob wishes to (at least symbolically) adopt the sons of Joseph born in Egypt -- outside Eretz Yisrael, away from the family hearth -- Ephraim and Manasseh.

[On his deathbed] Jacob said to Joseph, “El Shaddai appeared to me in Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me, saying to me: ‘Behold, I will make you fruitful and multiply you; I will make you a multitude of peoples and I will give this land to your seed after you as an everlasting possession.’ Now, then, your two sons born to you in the land of Egypt before my arrival in Egypt -- they are mine; Ephraim and Manasseh will be to me like Reuben and Simeon. But your progeny whom you engender after them are yours; they will be called by their brothers’ names in their family allotment.” (Genesis 48:3-6)

Perhaps this is a later retrojection, explaining why there is no tribe of Joseph, yet there are tribes named Ephraim and Manasseh among the twelve tribes of Israel. We cannot ignore, however, that there is something special about Ephraim and Manasseh. What could it be?

Jacob is moved to specially bless Manasseh and Ephraim. Jacob kisses and hugs them. Then their father Joseph positions them to receive their grandfather’s blessing, so that the elder brother, Manasseh, is at Jacob’s right hand, and the younger brother, Ephraim, is at Jacob’s left hand, as custom requires.

But Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on Ephraim’s head, though he was the younger, and his left hand on Manasseh’s head -- thus crossing his hands -- although Manasseh was the first-born. (Genesis 48:14)

The preference for, or superiority of, the younger over the older is a motif in virtually every generation we have encountered: Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau, Joseph and his brothers. We will see it again in the generation of King David. Why these boys? There is no reason to think Ephraim has any special attributes or abilities. Jacob’s switch seems arbitrary and unjust.

Perhaps the reason we bless our sons by Ephraim and Manasseh is because these brothers do not reject or hate one another. They do not compete and contend with one another, nor attempt to overpower one another and gain control of the family -- even when their grandfather imposes himself as Jacob did.
The brothers’ silence speaks volumes -- they live together in peace. They teach us one of the secrets to achieving peace in a sibling relationship, or in any other relationship: there are times when we need to hold our peace to have peace, and privilege the relationship above our ego needs of the moment. That takes foresight on the one hand, and humility on the other: foresight to set goals according to the bigger picture and broader implications of our behavior, and humility to do the tzimtzum (contraction) necessary to reach our goals.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Joseph and his brothers: take two / Vayigash

2011-12-18T12:09:00.000-08:00

Nelson R. Mandela and Frederik Willem de Klerk received the Nobel Prize for Peace for their roles in the Peace and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa. How many of us believed that peace and reconciliation were possible in South Africa when they began their work? Truth and Reconciliation Commissions have operated in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, El Salvador, Kenya, Liberia, Morocco, Sierra Leone, and 14 other counties -- including the United States. Truth and Reconciliation Commissions are put into play in cases of egregious state terrorism and human rights abuses.

Most of us, in our lives, come to a point where we long for reconciliation. We don’t need a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, but sometimes it feels like our situation is as insurmountable as those that do.

For many weeks we have been reading the complex, convoluted, and compelling “Joseph Cycle” in the Torah. We’ve watch Joseph grow from a spoiled and bratty little brother into the prime minister of Egypt, wielding nearly limitless power. It’s packed with all the elements of a hit movie directed by Quentin Tarantino and starring Daniel Craig: love, jealousy, intrigue, power, sex, bitter competition, betrayal, and revenge.

Yet all the while, and despite everything he has, Joseph discovers that he does not have what he most needs to be whole: to be reconciled with his brothers and reunited with his father. The arrival of Joseph’s brothers to buy grain in Egypt rips open the wound of long ago, a wound that never really healed.

This week, in parshat Vayigash, Joseph finally reveals himself to his brothers and at last, reconciliation begins. But there’s something intriguing about how Torah recounts the story. Judah, the oldest of the 12 brothers, approaches Joseph and launches into a long discourse. Usually, people speak succinctly in the Torah. Not here! Judah goes on and on about his father’s pain and his fear that if Joseph keeps Benjamin, Jacob’s heart will break, and how he couldn’t bear for that to happen. Judah then offers himself as ransom for Benjamin. Here’s a little of it:

Please, my lord, let your servant appeal to my lord, and do not be impatient with your servant, you who are the equal of Pharaoh… If I come to your servant my father and the boy is not with us -- since his own life is so bound up with his -- when he sees that the boy is not with us, he will die, and your servants will send the white head of your servant our father down to Sheol in grief. Now your servant has pledged himself for the boy to my father saying, “If I do not bring him back to you, I shall stand guilty before my father forever.’ Therefore, please let your servant remain as a slave to my lord instead of the boy, and let the boy go back with his brothers. For how can I go back to my father unless the boy is with me? Let me not be witness to the woe that would overtake my father!” (Genesis 44: 18, 30-34)

The scene that leads to reconciliation is striking: First, Judah speaks to Joseph at length and without rancor. He doesn’t express hate, resentment, anger, or bitterness. As a result, Joseph can hear commonalities with Judah. The father Judah wants to save from anguish is his own father, Jacob.

Second, Judah speaks not about his resentments and gripes, but about what he loves and is committed to. He speaks in terms Joseph can affirm. Again, Joseph can absorb what Judah says, feel empathy and concern for him (and remember, this is the brother who threw him into a pit and sold him into slavery) and respond positively.

Third, Joseph listens without interrupting, commenting or contradicting. He just listens. Most of us need to learn to do that. We think we do, but… do we really?

Fourth, each side acknowledges the experience and reality of the other.

This is not to say that the reality of what happened is tossed aside. There are issues of justice, equity, and recompense that must be addressed. Corazon Aquino, who led the 1986 People Power Revolution that toppled Ferdinand Marcos, and who became the 11th president of the Philippines said, “Reconciliation should be accompanied by justice, otherwise it will not last. While we all hope for peace it shouldn't be peace at any cost but peace based on principle, on justice.”

Joseph knows this. Sensing his brothers’ guilt and fear, he tells them:

Now do not be distressed or reproach yourselves because you sold me hither; it was to save life that God sent me ahead of you… God has sent me ahead of you to ensure your survival on earth, and to save your lives in an extraordinary deliverance. So, it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of all his household, and ruler over the whole land of Egypt. (Genesis 45:5, 7-8)

Whether or not we subscribe to Joseph’s theological belief, we can appreciate that he recognizes the need to address the wrongs that caused the rift.

What a great model for people everywhere! Wise, practical, and effective: Speak factually and without rancor, but say it all; say what you believe in and what you need; listen -- truly listen -- to what the other side says; acknowledge the experience and reality of the other; know that justice must be served. That’s the formula. It works for the sons of Jacob. It worked in South Africa. With a lot of courage and conviction, it can work for us.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Come on baby, light my fire / Miketz

2011-12-13T08:22:00.000-08:00

Taking great liberties with the Doors’ 1967 hit,

The time to hesitate is through
No time to wallow in the mire
Try now we can only lose
But vision lifts our spirits higher.

In a sense this is Joseph’s story, and it is the story of Chanukah, as well.

Miketz, and next week’s parashah, Vayigash, contain perhaps the most emotional narratives in Torah. Joseph does not cry when his brothers throw him into the pit, or when they sell him to a traveling caravan of Midianites, or when Potiphar throws him into the dungeon. Yet Joseph, overcome with emotion, weeps four times. (The first two instances are in this week’s parashah and the second two are recounted in parshat Vayigash.)

Joseph cries first when he hears his brothers speak among themselves about the plan to leave Shimon as a hostage in Egypt until they bring Benjamin from the land of Canaan. In their conversation, the brothers acknowledge and take full responsibility for the egregious way they treated their brother Joseph.

The brothers said to one another, “Oh we are being punished on account of our brother! We saw his soul’s distress when he pleaded with us -- on that account his distress has come upon us.” Reuben now responded to them, saying, “Didn’t I say to you, ‘Do not sin against the lad’! But you wouldn’t listen, and so his blood-payment, see -- it has come due.” (Genesis 42:21-22)

The brothers so not realize that Joseph understands their language. But Joseph understands more than their language; he must leave the room as his eyes brim with tears.

The second instance is when Benjamin, Joseph’s only full brother, is brought to Joseph:

With that, Joseph hurried, out, for he was overcome with feeling toward his brother and was on the verge of tears; he went into a room and wept there. (Genesis 43:30)

Later, having planted a valuable goblet in Benjamin’s pack as a pretext to accuse Benjamin of theft and toss him in jail, Judah, the eldest brother, makes a long and impassioned speech about his father Jacob (who is Joseph’s father, too, of course) in which Judah says that if Benjamin does not return with his brothers, their father will die of grief. Judah offers himself as ransom for Benjamin and for a third time, Joseph is overcome with emotion. He sends his servants from of the room and reveals himself to his brothers. This time he not only weeps, but wails:

His sobs were so loud that the Egyptians could hear, and so the news reached Pharaoh’s palace. (Genesis 45:2)

And finally, when Jacob comes down to Egypt and Joseph sets eyes on him for the first time in so long, we are hardly surprised that Joseph weeps a fourth time:

Joseph harnessed his chariot and went up to meet his father Israel in Goshen; he presented himself to him and threw himself on his neck, weeping all the time. (Genesis 46:29)

If Joseph does not cry at the most frightening and potentially deadly moments in his life, why does he weep these four times? All four instances involve steps in the process of reunion and reconciliation with the people closest to him -- his brothers and father. These tears are mixed with pain, no doubt, but each time Joseph cries, it is because he has come closer to the vision of wholeness, reconciliation that has supported him through his years of ordeal.

What makes Joseph cry are glimpses of his vision fulfilled, milestones along the way to achieving it. Joseph is moved by his brothers' repentance. When they express remorse for how they treated Joseph, and take responsibility for it, Joseph is overcome. He is overcome again when Judah puts bones on that remorse and acceptance of responsibility by offering himself as ransom for Benjamin. Joseph sees that the brothers have truly changed; they are not the same jealous, vindictive, self-righteous siblings who cavalierly threw him into a pit without water and then proceeded to picnic (Genesis 37:24-25). Reconciliation is possible; healing is possible. Wholeness is within reach.

Joseph also cries when he first sees Benjamin and Jacob -- his two closest connections to his mother, Rachel, who died when he was but a lad.

When we examine what is most important and meaningful in our lives, it is probably what we cry about. I think of the people on Wall Street who threw themselves out of windows when the stock market crashed; it is clear how they defined their very being. For Joseph, his primary relationships with family define who he is and he desperately needs to rectify these relationships. Joseph remains broken until the breach is repaired.

Miketz is always read on the Shabbat during Chanukah, which is also known as Chag ha-Urim, the festival of lights. Chanukah is about light (or vision) fueled by dedication that led to a miracle.

Let’s take those three -- vision, dedication, and miracle -- in reverse order. The Chanukah miracle was not really the big, splashy kind, like the Parting of the Reed Sea, but rather a small miracle. The cruse of oil -- one tiny clay jar, a one-day supply -- was barely visible in the piles of rubble on the Temple Mount. Yet the Rabbis tell us it was sufficient to kindle the Temple lamp and keep it burning for eight days (b.Shabbat 21b). A legend, to be sure, but as with all rabbinic legends, this one is replete with a deeper meaning. Miracles are how we see things. They arise from within us and are set in motion through our dedication, our willingness to take risks and keep plugging for what we believe is right. That light, or vision, that helps us see what the end might look like, even when we’re tired, or scared, or unsure of ourselves, fueling and refueling our dedication. The Maccabees had a clear vision: sovereignty in their land, restoration of the Temple worship, freedom to live as Jews. That vision fueled, and many times refueled the dedication they needed to persevere through three long years of hiding in caves and conducting a guerilla war against their Hellenistic overlords. With a clear vision and dedication to that vision, they achieved victory in a war any historian would have said was impossible to win. The miracle of the lamp is the miracle they wrought.
Joseph, too, worked a miracle. Who would have believed that reunion and reconciliation with his family was possible when the brothers sold him into slavery, or when Potiphar cast him into the dungeon, or when Pharaoh made him grand vizier and married him off to the daughter of an Egyptian priest? Yet Joseph kept before him a vision of return and restoration to his family. He dedicated himself to that vision. He wasn’t unrealistic; he wanted assurances that his brothers had changed, had repented, felt remorse. These assurances brought him to tears because he recognized in them yet another miracle in a series of miracles that brought him closer and closer to his vision, closer and closer to the light.

Again, taking great liberties with the Doors’ 1967 hit song (start at 0:35) --

The time to hesitate is through
No time to wallow in the mire
Try now we can only lose
But visions lifts our spirits higher.

So here’s something to ponder: What makes you cry? What is your vision? What is most important to you? What keeps the cruse of oil inside you burning? With whom are you going to share your light and your miracle?

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Divine Providence is not in Rhode Island / Vayeshev

2011-12-07T16:22:00.000-08:00

I have a number of pet peeves, and high on my list are people who, having survived a calamity that took numerous lives, spout out, “God saved me for a reason.” If God saves one, then God causes the death of others. This hubristic and self-absorbed statement implies -- and not too subtly -- that God caused the deaths of those who perished also for a reason.

A discussion of hashgachah (divine providence) emerges in the traditional commentaries on parshat Vayeshev. Hasgachah is the belief that God supervises and determines what happens in our world. Taken to another level, hashgachah pratit (personal divine providence) presumes that God is deeply involved in the day-to-day events and intricacies of our lives. Is that your sense of things?

Rabbi Akiba is said to have taught: Everything is foreseen, but freedom of choice is given… (Pirke Avot 3:19) What on earth does that mean? If all is foreseen, then events are pre-determined -- either by biology or God -- in which case we have no genuine free will.

In parshat Vayeshev, Joseph goes in search of his brothers in Shechem:

One time, when his brothers had gone to pasture their father’s flock in Shechem, Israel said to Joseph, “Your brothers are pasturing at Shechem. Come, I will send you to them.” [Joseph] answered hineinu/ Here I am. And [his father] said to him, “Go and see how your brothers are and how the flocks are faring, and bring me back word.” (Genesis 37:12-13)

Jacob (called Israel in this passage) sends Joseph to check on his brothers and the flocks. We are not told that Joseph brings food, money, or a message to his brothers. We might wonder then at the real purpose of the trip.

Joseph responds to Jacob, Hineinu/ Here I am. Abraham responds Hineinu when God tells he to offer Isaac as a sacrifice (Genesis 22:1). Jacob responds Hineini when God tells him to return to the Land of Israel (Genesis 31:11). Moses answers Hineini when God calls to him from the burning bush (Exodus 3:4). Isaiah responds Hineini to God who is searching for a prophet (Isaiah 6:8). Here, too, Hineini signals that Joseph’s journey has covenantal significant (Genesis 37:12-17)

When [Joseph] reached Shechem, a man (ish) came upon him wandering in the fields. The man (ish) asked him, “What are you looking for?” He answered, “I am looking for my brothers. Could you tell me where they are pasturing?” The man (ish) said, “They have gone from here, for I heard them say: let us go to Dothan.” So Joseph followed his brothers and found them at Dothan. (Genesis 37:14-17)

Who is this ish, this man wandering aimlessly around Shechem? Joseph does not describe his brothers to the man, yet the man knows who they are and where they have gone. We are reminded of the ish Joseph’s father Jacob encountered the night before his reunion with Esau. Torah tells us, Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the break of dawn (Genesis 32:25) -- this is the man who wrenches his hip, gives him the new name Israel, and blesses him. Is the ish Joseph meets also an angel or manifestation of God?

Ibn Ezra and Rashbam don’t make that claim. They lean on pshat to tell us that the ish is a wayfarer and the encounter proves Joseph’s fine character in diligently carrying out his father’s request.

Ramban and Rambam, however, ascribe supernatural significance to the encounter. Rambam identifies the ish as an angel. Ramban and others claim the encounter is evidence of God’s hashgachah, the divine plan for the people Israel to go down into Egypt. He writes: “God prepared for [Joseph] a guide who, without him being aware of it, brought him into [his brothers’] hands. And this is what Chazel (our Sages may their memory be for good) meant when they said that these people were angels, for the story… teaches us that God’s will is fulfilled.” Abravanel claims that because God is directing the shots, no one in the story bears responsibility for their behavior because all is God’s will. He adds that at the same time, they all have free will and the events could unfold in another sequence -- but he doesn’t explain how that is possible.

Joseph himself confirms his belief in divine providence when he tells his brothers -- quaking in their sandals, terrified that Joseph will exact revenge on them:

God has sent me ahead of you to ensure your survival on earth, and to save your lives in an extraordinary deliverance. So, it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of all his household, and ruler over the whole land of Egypt. (Genesis 45:7-8)

In Joseph’s mind, his brothers sold him into slavery so that he could rise to the level of grand vizier and save his family from famine when the drought came. By this thinking, the ish Joseph encounters in Shechem is God’s directional guide.

The Rabbis are deeply invested in divine providence. Midrash tells us: "No blade of grass grows without an angel telling it to 'Grow!'" (Bereishit Rabbah 10:6)

We may reject hashgachah (divine providence) on the macro level -- certainly science and a conviction concerning human free will run strongly counter to hashgachah -- but what about the level of our personal lives? The Rabbis also spoke of hashgachah pratit (personal providence) and many people, including those who would consider themselves modern, scientific folk express the belief that events “happen for a purpose” and that God is directing their lives. How is this consistent with free will, moral responsibility, and science?

Perhaps the claim, “God saved me for a reason” is an emotional reaction to events of great danger and significance, events that take on special meaning to people, such as surviving a hurricane or car crash, being cured of a serious illness, succeeding when failure seemed assured. I would hope that people who utter such words would respond “no” to the question, “And did God specifically designate for death those who perished?”

Our Rabbis said: Even things which you may regard as completely superfluous to the creation of the world, such as fleas, gnats and flies, even they are included in the creation of the world and the Holy One carries out the Divine purpose through everything – even a snake, a scorpion, a gnat or a frog. (Bereishit Rabbah 10:7)

Read another way, we can understand the text to say that everything in the universe can be seen to have purpose in our eyes. That doesn’t mean God is a cosmic puppeteer pulling our strings. Rather, it can be our way of making sense of emotionally overwhelming events. Seeing our lives as purposeful is an excellent way to respond emotionally to trauma, because when we see our lives as purposeful, we can do things that really matter.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

The value of pain / Vayishlach

2011-11-28T12:02:00.000-08:00

Looking up, Jacob saw Esau coming, accompanied by four hundred men. (Genesis 33:1)

A happy family reunion of brothers after two decades’ separation? Hard to tell. Jacob certainly isn’t taking any chances:

…He divided the children among Leah, Rachel, and the two maids, putting the maids and their children first, Leah and her children next, and Rachel and Joseph last. He himself went on ahead and bowed low to the ground seven times until he was near his brother. (Genesis 33:1-3)

Jacob is an endlessly fascinating character. As a youth, he lacks empathy, and because he lacks empathy (he cannot understanding the feelings of others) he also lacks compassion (the capacity to act on that knowledge). He has no difficulty tricking and cheating his brother, and deceiving his father. He is focused on his gain; he does not feel their pain.

Where does empathy come from? The Dalai Lama, in conversation with Daniel Goleman said, “One way you can develop empathy is to start with small sentient beings like ants and insects. Really attend to them and recognize that they wish to find happiness, experience pleasure, and be free of pain… Other human beings and yourself will all follow.” The Dalai Lama goes on to explain that those who dismiss the pain of an animal go on to dismiss the pain of human beings. “With the attitude, ‘I don’t feel it,’ you dismiss that pain. You would never feel the empathy until it actually hits your own skin.”

Those who don't have the benefit of childhood experiences that nurture empathy have to learn it the hard way. If they arrive at adulthood, as Jacob did, not comprehending or caring what other people feel, the only way understand the pain they have caused is when they themselves experience it. Jacob is this sort of person. When Laban deceives Jacob, substituting Leah for Rachel on his wedding night, Jacob finally comprehends. And it is only when he understands the pain he has caused -- because he’s feeling it himself -- that he can return to Eretz Yisrael for a healing reunion with Esau.

Jacob has truly changed. His wrestling match with the angel is evidence of his new and emerging conscience. From name change to name change: First, Jacob name is change to Israel, signifying his transformation from a selfish, scheming, unfeeling person into one capable of empathy and responsibility -- a transformation that takes two decades to accomplish. Jacob uses his pain and newfound empathy to brave a meeting with Esau. later, when his sons Shimon and Levi take revenge on the men of Shechem for violating their sister, Dinah, Jacob's first reaction is pragmatic: You have brought trouble on me, making me odious among the inhabitants of the land... I and my house will be destroyed (Genesis 24:30). But immediately after, God instructs him to return to Bethel and Jacob recognizes the moral dimension of what has transpired. In Bethel he builds an altar; God is now a part of his life and conscience. Soon after, his beloved wife Rachel dies in childbirth on the road to Bethlehem. With her last dying breath, Rachel names her son Ben-oni (son of my suffering) but Jacob changes his name to Benjamin (son of the right hand). It appears that Jacob, now capable of empathy, even amidst what must have been devastating pain at losing Rachel, is considering Benjamin's feelings. Jacob does not want Benjamin to carry through life a name that makes him emblematic of his mother's death.

Life dishes out a lot of pain: unfulfilled dreams, humiliation, loss of loved ones and friends, excruciatingly painful and life-threatening medical concerns, lost relationships, abuse, and much more. No one gets through unscathed and unscarred. There’s no hermetically sealed emotional bubble we can hang out in to avoid it.

Among the Rabbis’ appellations for God is HaRachaman -- the Compassionate One -- because God experiences everything we experience. Our pain is God’s pain. God’s empathy is complete and total but that doesn’t mean we should strive to be 100% empathetic. No person could, or should; the consequences would be devastating. In Sue Monk Kidd’s marvelous book, The Secret Life of Bees, May Boatwright is totally empathetic; she absorbs everyone’s pain as her own. When she cannot hold it all, she commits suicide. Moving from fiction to the real world, were a surgeon, rabbi, psychologist, teacher, or social worker to experience everyone’s pain, they would not be able to do their jobs. We are not God, nor should we follow the example of May Boatwright. We need to find the right balance.

I want to add that Jewish tradition is filled with practices that guide us in this direction of cultivating appropriate empathy and compassion. If we see our rituals and traditions as God’s gift to us to learn and grow, rather than merely a means to exhibit piety and “serve God,” they will be conduits of holiness. The story is told of a learned rabbi who came to visit a small community. His host, a man of modest means, was thrilled and honored that the great rabbi would stay in his home. He instructed his wife to clean the house, prepare an elaborate Shabbat dinner, and set the table with the finest tablecloth and dishes they had. [Okay, so this is an old story.] When the rabbi and the man returned home after Kabbalat Shabbat, the house was spotless, the scent of food cooking was intoxicating, and the table gleamed. They man noticed, however, that his wife had neglected to cover the challah. Embarrassed, he berated his wife. The rabbi stopped him and said, “My friend, do you know why we cover the challah when making Kiddush over the wine? The challah receives only a short blessing, but the wine gets much more. We use the wine to sanctify Shabbat itself and recite a much longer blessing. We cover the challah so it won’t hear the greater blessing we recite over the wine, lest its feelings be hurt, and only uncover it after we complete Kiddush. If we are so careful about the feelings of inanimate objects -- two loaves of bread -- how much the more so should we be scrupulously careful about the feelings of a human being?” Our rituals can become our guides and teachers to greater empathy and compassion. When we succeed, we will truly serve God and become, ourselves, conduits of holiness.

That brings me back to considering the pain we all carry around inside. Would that we could drop it off somewhere -- in a dumpster would be good -- and never retrieve it! For the most part, after processing pain, it’s good to set it aside. Don't stew in it, and don't be a prisoner to it. But on occasion we can redeem our pain by calling it up and putting it to good use -- to help others. Try putting your pain to good use - it may well be healing for you.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match / Vayeitzei

2011-11-21T08:51:00.000-08:00

Mae West famously said, “Marriage is a great institution, but I’m not ready for an institution yet.”

I met a young woman -- a physician -- on a flight to Huntsville earlier this year. She comes from India. Her parents arranged her marriage, as they did the marriages of her two brothers, also physicians living in America. I asked her about arranged marriages. She shrugged and said they are as good as any other kind. She correctly pointed out that all marriages are hard work, and many love matches don’t survive the vicissitudes of life. The relationship need only be good enough to weather the storms. I suppose she would applaud Charlotte’s words to Elizabeth in Pride and Prejudice, “Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. If the dispositions of the parties are ever so well known to each other, or ever so similar before-hand, it does not advance their felicity in the least. They always contrive to grow sufficiently unlike afterwards to have their share of vexation; and it is better to know as little as possible of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life.''

I can barely imagine being in an arranged marriage. Torah records many arranged marriages; marriages were arranged for social, economic, religious, and cultural reasons. Yet Torah speaks of Isaac’s love for Rebekah, and Jacob’s passion for Rachel. Song of Songs certainly knows of romantic love. Conversely, marriages today have business elements to them; think of prenuptial agreements. And there are still many arranged marriages today: in India, Pakistan, some Middle Eastern countries, rural Japan, and even in some parts of America. Yet I think: how could someone else choose a partner for me that involves a lifetime emotional, social, and financial partnership; intimacy; and raising children together; not to mention coping with and supporting one another through illness, trauma, tragedy, and anything else thrown in to spice things up? Whether I choose my spouse, or someone else does, marriage is still hard work and love conquers all only in Hollywood -- that is, on the screen, not in the street. (Rita Rudner said, “In Hollywood, a marriage is a success if it outlasts milk.”)
Arranged or not, finding a partner is a challenge. Midrash (Bereishit Rabbah 68) tells the humorous and sage story of a Roman matron who challenges Rabbi Yose b. Chalafta by asking what his God has been doing since creating the world. R. Yose responds, “Making matches.” “Why anyone can do that!” the Roman matron replies haughtily.” Rabbi Yose replies, “It may seem easy to you, but for God, making a good match is as difficult as parting the Reed Sea.” That night, to prove her point, the Roman matron lines up her household servants - 1000 men and 1000 women - pairs them up, and marries them off. You won’t be surprised to learn that they return to her the following morning, one with a black eye, one with a bruised face, one limping, and each saying, “This one you designated for me I do not want.” Her arbitrary choices, which did not take into account the people involved, are a disaster. Talmud concurs, attributing to Rabbah b. Bar Chanah said in the name of R. Yochanan these words: “It is as difficult for God to make a match as it was to part the Reed Sea (Sotah 2a).”

Many people in love matches say that their beloved is their “beshert,” a charming Yiddish word that means “destiny,” suggesting ironically, as the story from Bereishit Rabbah claims, God chooses our “soul mate” for us. And indeed, in the Talmud, Rav Yehudah explains how it works: at the time a child is conceived, a bat kol (heavenly voice) announces who is going to marry whom. God, the cosmic shadchan (matchmaker), is at work making matches ‘round the clock.

It’s charming. It’s romantic. It’s idyllic. And it’s nonsense. My husband and I met when we were 19 years old. We married at 22. It seemed so easy - we were young and in love, with shared plans and dreams. Who’s to say that 20, 30, 40 years down the line, when we are very different people than we were at 19, that we are still compatible and satisfying to one another? It doesn’t always happen that way, and that’s why divorce is a necessary escape valve. There is nothing dishonorable about divorce, and in many cases it is the most honorable thing to do.

But maybe that’s not what the Rabbis meant when they told the story of Rabbi Yose’s encounter with the Roman matron, and quoted Rabbah b. Bar Chanah as saying, “It is as difficult for God to make a match as it was to part the Reed Sea.” Perhaps they mean to tell us that a good marriage is a miracle, however long it lasts. What are the chances that two people can navigate the rocks and shoals for decades without running aground?

As surely as there are moment of celebration, joy, and ecstasy, there are challenges and stumbling blocks in every relationship. Marriage is hard work, very hard work. There’s no one formula for success, and success is never guaranteed, but the prophet Hosea, speaking of the covenantal relationship between God and Israel, provides guidance:

And I will espouse you forever.
I will espouse you in righteousness and justice,
and with kindness and compassion.
And I will espouse you with faithfulness. (Hosea 2:21-22)

Hosea speaks of four components of long-lasting love: Equitable justice, Loving kindness, Compassion, and Faithfulness.

Equitable justice (tzedek u’mishpat) suggests to me that a committed couple puts the needs of the other on equal par with his or her own, and often makes the needs of the other the priority. Rather than making sure “I get what I need from the relationship,” each one makes sure he or she gives what is needed. Equitable righteousness requires us to proactively dispense love and attention, rather than sit around waiting to receive it.

Loving kindness (chesed) is most often the little things: small considerations, kind words, small favors, patience. It’s so easy for us to take for granted the one with whom we’ve been living for a long time. The glow of early romance fades; the chores and pressures of life weigh us down. Yet it’s remarkable how much power a small kindness has, and every day abounds with opportunities for chesed.

Compassion (rachamim) requires us to see the world through the eyes of the other. Genuine compassion requires not mere sympathy, but active empathy. When we understand another’s pain, fears, joys, ambition, and desires, we enter into their hearts, and they into ours.

Faithfulness (emunah) means committing to the relationship by placing it above all others, so that it gets the lion’s share of our energy and effort. In other words, marriage is a 24/7 project, especially in the bad times, and despite the ups and downs that are normal for all relationships.

Hosea’s advice - even when taken and applied - does not guarantee that a marriage will last forever. (Nothing guarantees that except force and coercion, and sometimes even that doesn’t work.) Love is something we work hard to create and maintain, through equitable justice, kindness, compassion, and faithfulness. Love is the most precious and meaningful thing in the world.

Jacob has a love match and an arranged match. I wonder if he thinks Rachel is his beshert. It sure seems that in the mind of Laban, Leah is Jacob’s beshert! I suspect that the reality is that neither is his beshert, but both became his beshert because he works hard to make them so. And maybe the message is that a marriage that works - for however long it works - is a miracle.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Does the end justify the means? / Toldot

2011-11-15T14:32:00.000-08:00

In the days before the telephone, the only way to communicate long distance was by telegram. Telegrams were very expensive, so people conveyed their messages in the fewest words possible. Once a stockbroker in New York got a good tip on a company. He sent a cable to his favorite client, away doing business in London. The client in London knew the company was a dog, so he sent a cable to New York saying, “Don’t. Sell.” The stockbroker received the cable and read it aloud: “Hmmm… don’t sell. Okay, I’ll buy him 10,000 shares.”

God speaks directly to Rebekah. I can’t think of another woman in the Torah to whom God speaks directly. Rebekah is in agony because the twins in her womb are already in active competition with one another -- and in very tight quarters.

And Adonai said to her:
Two nations are in your womb,
Two separate peoples shall issue from your body;
One people shall be mightier than the other,
And the older shall serve the younger. (Genesis 25:23)

There is an ambiguity in the last phrase that I will try to render in English the best I can. There are two ways to read the phrase v’rav ya’a’vod tza’ir: “The elder shall serve the younger” or “the elder, the younger shall serve.” It is not crystal clear whom God intends to inherit the Covenant.

Rebekah, who is headstrong and decisive, confidently decides that Jacob is the right brother for the patriarchal position that will open up when Isaac dies. Accordingly she favors Jacob, supports him, and ultimately schemes with him to insure he gets what she believes God wants for him.
Rebekah is willing to flout social convention and act immorally to see her vision through. She purposefully deceives her nearly blind and possibly enfeebled husband, Isaac. She instructs Jacob to lie to his father in order to secure for Jacob, Esau’s rightful blessing and inheritance.

This inspires the question: Does the end justify the means?

The phrase “the end justifies the means” originated with Machiavelli. Niccolo Machiavelli promulgated this principle as a pragmatic philosophy, the purpose being to stabilize and improve governments. He did not mean to suggest that the principle applies to the interactions and relationships of people who are motivated by personal gain, greed, or even self-improvement. Immanuel Kant held nearly the opposite opinion as Machiavelli: moral absolutism. The ends never justify the means. An act is evil or good on its own merits, regardless of outcome.

What does Jewish tradition say about this perpetual conundrum?

In the case of pikuach nefesh (the obligation to save a life) the door is open to cheating, stealing, and lying if that is what is required to save a person’s life. If your life is threatened, all the doors and windows are flung open. You are obligated to kill the one who threatens you in order to save your own life: ya-avor v'al yei-ha-reg (“transgress and do not be killed”). The end justifies the means.

But the house is hermetically sealed shut if the means to the end is murder, idolatry, or sexual immorality. The principle in such cases is yei-ha-reg v’al ya’avor (“be killed and do not transgress”). Or maybe not? In the days of Deborah the Judge, Yael seduces the enemy general Sisera and kills him. In the Bavli (Babylonian Talmud) masechet Horayot 10b, we find an interesting comment amidst a discussion of the role of intentionality in performing mitzvot (commandments) and in Torah study. R. Nachman b. Yitzhak expounds: gadol avirah lishma mi'mitzvah shelo lishma -- “Greater is a transgression committed for a good intention than a commandment performed without intent.” Certainly a hyperbolic statement, but he backs up his claim by citing Judges 5:24 -- Most blessed of women be Yael, wife of Hever the Kenite, most blessed of women of tents. The expression “women of tents” is peculiar and the Rabbis explain it to mean the matriarchs Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, and Leah. This means they are praising Yael’s actions -- seducing Sisera and then decapitating him as he slept it off -- above any of the matriarchs. That’s a resounding affirmation. Yael killed Sisera to stop a war and save many lives. Machiavelli would have approved. Kant would not.

On an even larger scale is the ethical debate concerning the atomic bombs dropped on Japan in August 1945 in order to bring World War II to a rapid conclusion. The calculation that led President Truman to give the signal to drop “Little Boy” over Hiroshima, and then “Fat Man” over Nagasaki, was that if the war in the Pacific Theater were to drag on, and Operation Downfall to invade Japan launched, between 250,000 and one million American soldiers would die. The Joint Chiefs of Staff the previous April had set the estimates at 380,000 dead and 1.6 million injured. The Japanese deaths that would result are in addition to these numbers. And added to these, it was estimated that each month that the war stretched on, 250,000 Asians (largely Chinese, and most of them non-combatants) would die. Winston Churchill said, “I am surprised that very worthy people—but people who in most cases had no intention of proceeding to the Japanese front themselves—should adopt a position that rather than throw this bomb we should have sacrificed a million American and a quarter of a million British lives…” Do these estimated casualties justify dropping “Little Boy” and “Fat Man” over Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

Rebekah’s decision is nowhere on the scale of the Atomic Bomb, but it does involve a future nation, perhaps meeting Machiavelli’s criterion. Yet terrible things continue to result from her decision: Jacob flees to Haran and Rebekah never saw him again. It appears Ishmael leaves, as well. The family is rent asunder: a very high price to pay.

Torah does not weigh in on the morality of Rebekah’s actions. None of the matriarchs or patriarchs is completely righteous and beyond reproach. They, like all of us, face some painfully difficult choices. But choose we must, because ethically, doing nothing is a choice.

How do you make such decisions in your own life? When do you believe the end justify the means? Something to ponder this shabbat.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Separation and Return / Chayei Sarah

2011-11-08T09:57:00.000-08:00

Heidi and Rick Solomon’s son, Daniel, spent his first 7-1/2 years of life warehoused in a Romanian orphanage. It was a horror. Daniel spent his days in a crib, except when he ate or used the bathroom. He didn’t know any of the caregivers well enough to learn their names. Six months after bringing Daniel home, Daniel became a horror: throwing hurricane tantrums for hours, punching holes in the walls, physically attacking his mother. Heidi and Rick called the police frequently. Their marriage was at risk. Daniel was homicidal. Two psychiatrists told them the situation was hopeless: Daniel had severe attachment disorder.

Psychologists tell us that attachment and separation are hugely important issues in the life of every child, with ramifications well into adulthood. Social and emotional attachment to a parent or primary caregiver from the earliest age is critically necessary to healthy development. Being separated from the caregiver is a trauma and can be terribly damaging, adversely affecting the social, emotional and cognitive development of a child.

The experts further tell us that when families experience trauma, and separation ensues, they must grieve. Studies abound on children who have experienced violence (either at home, or as refugees), children who were adopted when they were old enough to feel the separation, and children who have lost their parents or were taken from their homes. But it is not only children who suffer from separation when trauma strikes; adult do, as well.

This week’s parashah describes such a family: Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac.

In the opening two verses, Torah recounts Sarah’s death:

Sarah’s lifetime -- the span of Sarah’s life -- came to one hundred and twenty-seven years. Sarah died in Kiryat Arba -- now Hebron -- in the land of Canaan; and Abraham proceeded to mourn for Sarah and to bewail her. (Genesis 23:1-2)

Since these verses (Genesis 23:1-2) follow directly on the tail of the Akedah (the Binding of Isaac), our Sages reasoned that Sarah died of grief when she learned what had happened at Mount Moriah (Tanhuma, Vayera #23 and Ecclesiastes Rabbah 9:7 #1). Imagine her shock and horror; imagine the trauma.

Abraham approaches the Hittites and after a protracted negotiation, purchases Ma’arat ha-Machpelah (the Cave of Machpelah) near Mamre.

And then Abraham buried his wife Sarah in the cave of the field of Machpelah, facing Mamre -- how Hebron -- in the land of Canaan. (Genesis 23:19)
(The structure over the Cave of Machpelah today)

Between the mourning, the negotiation, and the burial, some time must have elapsed. Where was Isaac all this time? Didn’t he mourn his mother? Didn’t he attend the burial? No mention is made of him.

And here’s another question: Where was Abraham when Sarah died? She was in Kiryat Arba, but he was in Beer Sheba, where he had gone upon return from Mount Moriah (Genesis 22:19). Commentators attempt to explain their separation in various ways. Midrash Bereishit Rabbah (58:5) concocts this explanation:

And Abraham came to mourn for Sarah (Genesis 23:2). Whence did he come? R. Levi said: He came from the funeral of Terah [his father] to that of Sarah. R. Yose said to him: But Terah’s funeral preceded Sarah’s by two years. In fact, he came from Mount Moriah [implying that Sarah died of grief when she heard what had transpired there].

Still on the subject of Abraham’s mysterious whereabouts at the time of Sarah’s death, Rashi tells us that his stay in Beersheba was only temporary; but Genesis 22:19 is clear: Abraham settled in Beersheba. Rabbi Judah haChassid (1150-1217, author of Sefer haChasidim, the Book of the Pious) tells us that Abraham did not return to Kiryat Arba because he thought Sarah would consider him insane for what he had done, and not believe that God could possibly have commanded it. Other commentaries tell us that Abraham did live in Kiryat Arba, and yet others that Sarah came to Beersheba.

Everyone is dancing around what the text makes clear: After the Akedah, Abraham and Sarah live apart. The trauma of the Akedah -- for all three -- leads them to separate, and they suffer for it, because the separation adds trauma to the trauma. Abraham no longer lives with Sarah, Isaac does not attend his mother’s burial. And they all grieve. Attachment, Separation, Grief.

Families are torn apart for many reasons and often the damage is irreparable. Pain, fear, resentment, and bitterness can run very deep in the souls of those severely traumatized. The parashah affirms at its end, however, that healing is possible, even in very difficult situations.

Parshat Chayei Sarah famously begins by recounting the death of Sarah and ends with the death of Abraham. How different they are! Here is the account of Abraham’s death:

This was the total span of Abraham’s life: one hundred and seventy-five years. And Abraham breathed his last, dying at a good ripe age, old and contented; and he was gathered to his kin. His sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron son of Zohar the Hittite, facing Mamre. (Genesis 25:7-9)

The contrast is striking: Isaac was absent from his beloved mother’s funeral. Not only was he present to bury his father Abraham, but he did so together with Ishmael. It’s remarkable that the two half-brothers could come together over anything, and were not permanently alienated after Ishmael and Hagar were banished to insure that Isaac alone would inherit the patrimony (Genesis 21:9-21). The brothers have come together, if only for the brief time necessary to bury their patriarch.

There’s no sugarcoated, sappy happily-ever-after here. No promises. But Torah does hold out hope. So far as we know, Isaac and Ishmael go their separate ways and do not speak to one another again, but they came together at that crucial moment.

We might well wonder: what happened during that short interlude they were together. What did they say to one another? Did they reconcile, at least enough to shed bitterness and resentment? Did they find closure so that they could eventually find peace? I would like to think so, because the message I hear is that healing and reconciliation are sometimes possible when we think them utterly impossible.

Perhaps you’re wondering what happened to Daniel Solomon. His mother Heidi took out eight weeks to provide Daniel a taste of the infanthood he never had. She maintained constant contact with him -- both physical and eye contact -- as if he were a baby. She made Daniel entirely dependent on her, and taught him that his needs would be met without him asking. At the age of 13, for a year his parents cradled Daniel for 20 minutes each night like a baby, talked with him, and fed him ice cream. Eventually Daniel opened up and began to talk about his experiences at the orphanage. All in all, it was a long, arduous, indescribably painful road, but Daniel eventually learned love and empathy. Daniel, who had been escorted out of his family’s synagogue by police officers any number of times, was confirmed there as a teenager, and what is more, he was awarded the prestigious Brickner Award.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

You can hear Heidi, Rick, and Daniel Solomon’s story, as well as Daniel’s speech at Confirmation, on This American Life.

Opening our hearts / Vayera

2011-10-31T17:16:00.000-07:00

Shakespeare wrote, “Unbidden guests are often welcomest when they are gone.” Benjamin Franklin famously said, “Visitors and fish stink after three days.” Torah, however, lauds hospitality.

In this week’s parashah, Vayera, we read:

The Lord appeared to [Abraham] by the terebinths of Mamre; he was sitting at the entrance of the tent as the day grew hot. Looking up [Abraham] saw three men standing near him. As soon as he saw them, he ran from the entrance of the tent to greet them and, bowing to the ground, he said, “My lords, if it please you, do not go on past your servant. Let a little water be brought; bathe your feet and recline under the tree.” (Genesis 18:1-4)

Our Sages learn from this passage two mitzvot: bikkur cholim (visiting the sick) and hachnasat orchim (hospitality). The angels, manifestations of God, visit Abraham as he heals from his circumcision (chapter 17); hence God models bikkur cholim (visiting the sick). Abraham, the Rabbis tell us, had a tent with four flaps open in each direction so he could always welcome visitors, as we see him doing in this passage; Abraham exhibits hachnasat orchim (hospitality).

Nedivut ha-lev means generosity of the heart. It encompasses visiting the sick, welcoming guests, charity, and many other mitzvot that require us to open our hearts, hands, and homes to others. Abraham has come to be a seminal exemplar.

Nedivut ha-lev (generosity of the heart) requires that we share with others what we have (money, time, energy, possessions, and even our homes). It is an inborn trait in some, but most of us need to develop and nurture it in ourselves. Nedivut ha-lev takes concerted practice. For some this is a huge challenge.

A story is told about a time the community of Mezritch was in dire straits: a young Jew was arrested and held hostage by the Russian police on the eve of his wedding. The police chief demanded 10,000 rubles as bail to release the young man -- essentially ransom. The young man was an orphan, as was his fiancée, so the community set about raising as much money as possible. People sold their cows and chickens, furniture and samovars, but they only raised 1,000 rubles.

It was clear that they needed the help of Zev the Miser. Zev was rich, but he had never given so much as a kopeck to anyone.

Four great rabbis, the Alter Rebbe (then still a young man), the Maggid of Mezritch, Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berdichev, and Rabbi Mendel of Vitebsk, went to visit Zev.

Zev welcomed them into his home and listened to the heart-breaking story they told. “This is indeed am emergency,” he said. “I will give you one kopeck.” Now, a kopeck is 1/100 of a ruble -- essentially a penny. The Maggid of Mezritch, Rabbi Levi Yitzhak and Rabbi Mendel wanted to throttle the miser, but the Alter Rebbe stopped them. He shook Zev’s hand and said, “Thank you so much. What you’ve done is wonderful and we are deeply grateful.”

Then the four rabbis left. They had not gone half a block when Zev called them back. “Here’s another kopeck,” he said. The Alter Rebbe again expressed his gratitude and praised Zev for his generosity. Again the rabbis left. Within a minute, Zev called them back again. This time he gave them a ruble. Again the Alter Rebbe treated it as a truly significant gift. This pattern continued, with Zev giving 5 rubles, then 10 rubles, then 100 rubles. In several hours, Zev the Miser had contributed the entire sum needed to ransom the young man in time for his wedding.

After the wedding, the Maggid of Mezritch, Rabbi Levi Yitzhak and Rabbi Mendel asked the Alter Rebbe, “How did you know what to do? What changed Zev the Miser into a generous man?”

He responded, “Last night Zev learned that he had far more spiritual strength than he ever knew. At first he had only the strength to give a kopek, but then he gave another and another. Each time he gave, he realized the good he was doing and grew in generosity and spiritual strength. It goes step by step for all of us.”

The story teaches us that generosity is learned and practiced. It is not an innate trait in everyone, but it can be developed and nurtured.

Why is it so difficult? What causes timtum ha-lev (stopping up of the heart)? I’d like to suggest three possibilities: First, those who have experienced abuse, neglect, or deprivation in their lives may close themselves off to others as a way of self-protection. Second, ego can block up our hearts. We live in a society that places a premium on wealth and possessions; giving something up is then seen as a loss. Third, timtum ha-lev may arise due to a fear of elevated expectations: if I give this much now, or host these people now, how much more will be expected of me next time? Our life experiences shape us; our attitudes guide our decisions; our fears paralyze us. It takes concerted effort to overcome any of these three causes of timtum ha-lev.

Torah describes in some detail Abraham’s hospitality. Note how he involves others:

Abraham hastened into the tent of Sarah, and said, “Quick! Three seahs of choice flour! Knead and make cakes!” Then Abraham ran to the herd, took a calf, tender and choice, and gave it to a servant-boy, who hastened to prepare it. He took curds and milk and the calf that had been prepared and set these before them; and he waited on them under the tree as they ate. (Genesis 18:6-8)

Abraham makes his tent a training ground for nedivut ha-lev (generosity of the heart). He involves his whole household in the mitzvah. He doesn’t just preach it, nor does he merely teach by example. He gets everyone involved.

May our homes be schools and laboratories for learning and practicing nedivut ha-lev (generosity of the heart) in all its expressions and manifestations, so that we and our children start it flowing out our front doors, into the streets, and out into the world beyond.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1745-1812), the first rebbe of Chabad.
Maggid of Mezrich: Rabbi Dov Ber of Mezritch (c. 1705-1772), a disciple of the Baal Shem Tov, the founder of Hasidism.
Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berdichev (1740-1809), a disciple of the Maggid of Mezritch.
Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Vitebsk (1730-1788), a disciple of the Maggid of Mezritch.

Get up and go forth! / Lech Lecha

2011-10-31T07:38:00.000-07:00

Meet Abraham. He’s 75 years old and embarking on a new career long after many of us would think to retire. His new career promises travel and adventure, challenge and reward. Of course, Abraham hasn’t a clue where he’s going or what he will face. He’s a trusting soul -- that’s why God chose him.

The Lord said to Abram: “Go forth (lech lecha) from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation and I will bless you. I will make your name great, and you shall be a blessing.” (Genesis 12:1-2)

Please also meet a team of eight young graduate students from The Johns Hopkins University who are just starting their careers. They have developed an Antenatal Screening Kit to test thousands of pregnant women and newborns in developing countries for eclampsia, malnutrition, gestational diabetes, and urinary tract infections -- for just pennies per test. They have left their comfortable American homes, university classrooms and laboratories, and traveled to India, Tanzania, and Nepal to observe firsthand the challenge of delivering scarce health care resources in rural, impoverished locations.

When we leave our familiar surroundings and comfort zone, we gain an entirely new perspective on the world and on ourselves. This was true for Abraham and I’m sure it has been true for the eight young biomedical engineers from Johns Hopkins.

God tells Abraham: Lech lecha. Lech lecha is a peculiar construction. This is not the common doubling of a verb form for emphasis. Lech lecha could mean “Go for yourself” or “Go to yourself.” Did God want Abraham to leave Haran for his own good, to gain a new perspective, and escape the stifling influence of his native culture? Or did God have in mind for Abraham to engage in a journey of self-exploration, to discover his true beliefs, and forge a relationship with God? I think both. God has designated Abraham to be the progenitor of a nation that will pass a covenantal tradition through the generations, shaping the lives of many who, as Torah says, are meant to be a blessing to the world. Abraham’s journey is for his own good, allowing him to realize his full potential because it is a journey of self-exploration. The two are inextricably bound.

The journey of the biomedical engineering graduate students has been both “for them” and “to them.” They have gained a new perspective and insight concerning the health challenges faced halfway around the world, and they have learned just how much they can contribute.

A bit more about their remarkable work: Urine tests are used to diagnose a variety of conditions that threaten the life of a pregnant woman and the fetus she carries. In impoverished nations, cost severely prohibits access to care. The standard way of conducting these tests involves a strip of paper impregnated with a variety of chemicals that is dipped it into the woman’s urine. These strips do not seem costly by our standards, but they are prohibitively costly in developing nations. The students developed chemical-filled pens that can be used on paper to produce test-strips on the spot -- for mere pennies. One marker for each chemical test. If a mark turns the color on the cap of the pen, the test result is positive. Their accomplishment won grand prize recently in an international competition sponsored by ABC News and the Duke Global Health Institute. Kol hakavod!

The Lord said to Abram: “Go forth (lech lecha) from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation and I will bless you. I will make your name great, and you shall be a blessing.” (Genesis 12:1-2)

Abram journeyed out to gave rise to a nation; lives came into being because of him. These students journeyed out to save lives; their Antenatal Screening Kit will save countless lives.

God blessed Abram. His life was full and rich, and he left a legacy. His named is great -- he is remembered in love to this day, and his name is evoked in prayer by his descendants several times each day. Abram has certainly been a blessing.

The students have been blessed in many ways, not the least being the love, support, and encouragement they receive from family and friends, and the superb opportunities and education they receive at Hopkins. They are making names for themselves in the world thought work that will save lives. And in that way, they are certainly a blessing to us all.

And for both Abraham and the eight students, the opportunity to be a blessing is probably the biggest blessing of all. Lech lecha -- They went forth, leaving their familiar environment, and ventured into the world both for themselves and to themselves. They became blessings, and thereby blessed us, as well.

Have you gone forth? Is it time for you to go forth “for yourself” and “to yourself”? Traveling hundreds or thousands of miles is not the only way to “go forth.” The world is a big place to explore, but you are a world to be explored, as well. Where is your journey taking you? Whose life will you bless?

The students from The Johns Hopkins University who invented the Antenatal Screening Kit are:
Front row: Matthew Means, Sherri Hall, Mary O’Grady and Shishira Nagesh. Back row: Peter Truskey, Maxim Budyansky, Sean Monagle and James Waring.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

A Seussian Edifice Complex / Noach

2011-10-22T13:45:00.000-07:00

The Tower of Babel narrative -- a mere 22 verses! -- is a thinly veiled, stinging commentary on the culture of ancient Babylonia. Babylonia (Bavel in Hebrew) is renowned for its technical advancements, not the least of which include wheeled vehicles, metalworking, surveying, and mathematics. The Babylonians built impressive ziggurats and hanging gardens, but they also invented siege engines, war chariots, and a rigid division of social classes.

Torah tells us that the people of Bavel (Babylonia) embark on an exceptionally ambitious building project:

Everyone on earth had the same language and the same words… They said to one another, “Come let us make bricks and burn them hard.” Brick served them as stone, and bitumen served them as mortar. And they said, “Come, let us build us a city, and a tower with its top in the sky, to make a name for ourselves; else we be scattered all over the world.” (Genesis 11: 1, 3-4)

Torah emphasizes that the people all speak the same language, and then adds that they have the same words, a seeming redundancy. We are accustomed to thinking that good communication begets efficiency and productivity. And that is certainly the case here. So why is God displeased?

There are hints in the words: First, Torah emphasizes that the people of Bavel made bricks, baked them and combined them with mortar. We find the very same language used in the account of slavery in Egypt -- l’veinim (bricks) and chomer (mortar) -- no doubt an allusion to servitude in Egypt (Exodus 1:13-14). Imagine how human labor must have been exploited to build that tower.

That could well point to one reason that God views the mammoth Lego tower askance. What seems, on the surface, a lovely building project, the product of excellent communication, is actually an exercise in exploitation to satisfy the vanity of (most likely) the king.

Even more: They spoke the same language, but Torah then says [they had] the same words (that redundancy in Genesis 11:1). If we already know they speak the same language, would we not presume they have the same words? Having the same words, saying the same thing, suggests that the people were either all of one mind, or coerced into expressing the same ideas. Totalitarianism and fascism leap to mind, and certainly accord with Torah’s hint that the Tower is built by exploited, or possibly slave, labor. No wonder God’s solution is to befuddle their speech so that they all sound like they’re speaking jibberish to one another. In fact, that is what Bavel means, and English derives the word “babble” from it.

My first lesson in totalitarianism and exploitation was courtesy of that great social critic and moral "philosophiser," Dr. Seuss. Yertle the Turtle is more-or-less a version of the Tower tale. The location’s name -- Sala-ma-Sond itself sounds like babbling. In Dr. Seuss’ fine style:

On the far-away island of Sala-ma-Sond,
Yertle the Turtle was king of the pond.
A nice little pond. It was clean. It was neat.
The water was warm. There was plenty to eat.
The turtles had everything turtles might need.
And they were all happy. Quite happy indeed.

They were... until Yertle, the king of them all,
Decided the kingdom he ruled was too small.
"I'm ruler," said Yertle, "of all that I see.
But I don't see enough. That's the trouble with me.
With this stone for a throne, I look down on my pond
But I cannot look down on the places beyond.
This throne that I sit on is too, too low down.
It ought to be higher!" he said with a frown.
"If I could sit high, how much greater I'd be!
What a king! I'd be ruler of all that I see!"

Those of you who are cultured intellectuals and aficionados of fine literature know the outcome: King Yertle presses all the turtles into service to build his high throne using their bodies as bricks. When the turtles complained of their pain and hunger…

"You hush up your mouth!" howled the mighty King Yertle.
"You've no right to talk to the world's highest turtle.
I rule from the clouds! Over land! Over sea!
There's nothing, no, NOTHING, that's higher than me!"

Yertle the Turtle King’s throne comes crashing down when one little turtle named Mack -- stuck at the bottom of the stack -- burped.

Could Yertle have built his self-aggrandizing throne without oppressing his subjects? Could the Tower of Babel have been built without exploiting human beings?

This alone would be sufficient reason for God to scuttle the Tower project. In addition to conscripted labor, imagine how much time, energy, and materials are wasted. Yet perhaps there is another reason, also hinted at in the language of the passage.

The people of Babel build the Tower to make a name for themselves. The building of the Tower, which likely features exploitation and oppression, also serves to separate the people of Babel, to distinguish them, from all other peoples. Let’s explore that avenue for a moment.

Biblical narratives are often stylistically chiastic: this means that we find the climax or most important part in the middle. Here is the very center of the 22-verse Tower narrative.

The Lord came down to look at the city and tower that humans had built, and the Lord said, “If as one people with one language for all, this is how they have begun to act, then nothing that they may propose to do will be out of their reach.” (Genesis 11:5)

The verb “to look at” or “to see” seems extraneous, just as [they had] the same words. God needs to come down to see? God doesn’t already know? Why is God’s seeing so important? The verb lir’ot (“to see”) is pivotal.

The people see the Tower as a reflection of their greatness. Others will see the Tower and acknowledge the people of Babel as superior. Everyone sees, but doesn’t really see. The sight of the Tower blinds them to what is true and important. The Tower -- and the fine communication that facilitates its construction -- have separated people from one another, from God, from the very world. And so God sees that the Tower is a big problem.

The Hasidim tell a parable about a king and his palace, and what people see. The story -- which is found in many versions -- is attributed to the Baal Shem Tov (Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, 1698-1760, the founder of Hasidism).

A king had a glorious palace with many chambers, one inside another, in concentric circles. The king hid himself in the center, behind wall after wall. Guards were stationed at the doors to each chamber to prevent anyone from entering. Wild beasts ran free throughout the outer chambers of the palace. The king issued a proclamation that anyone who came to see him would be richly rewarded. The guards turned back most who approached the palace. A few scaled the walls but were driven back by the terrifying wild beasts. Those who made it past the wild beasts were given gold coins and precious jewels by the guards. They were so pleased with these that they forgot their goal had been to visit the king. No one reached the king’s chamber except the king’s son. He ignored the guards, scaled the walls, evaded the wild animals, and threw the money and jewels down. He recognized that all these were distractions, barriers, obstacles. He longed to see his father. He sat down and cried. “Father, father, don’t keep me away from you. Let me into your presence!” At once the guards, the beasts, the walls -- indeed every outer part of the palace -- disappeared. The son found himself in the presence of his father, who was seated on a majestic throne. It was then that the son realized that the king had never been concealed or hidden from view. The guards, the walls, the wild beasts, the money, and the jewels were all illusions. He had been in the king’s presence all along, but had been unable to see him until he set everything else aside.

The story reminds us that we are always in God’s presence, but often cannot experience (“see”) God’s presence because of so many illusory walls and obstacles in our lives, including ideas, emotions, but perhaps most of all material reality. All those ideas, emotions, and objects are real, to be sure, and they are also important and valuable in our lives, but they are not ultimate. We need to see beyond them.

We see our individual selves as distinct and separate, unique and unparalleled. And indeed, that too is true and necessary. But on a higher spiritual level, we come to see that all distinctions fade away; they are illusory. The unity of the universe includes us; we are not separate from it. We are all part of God and God is within us all. Our very bodies are constructed of atoms that have been part of who knows how many people, plants, objects, and stars before. They came into being in the early moments of the universe after the Big Bang. And they will be recycled after we die. Our lives are not separate from the flow of the universe; we are part of the great rushing river of the evolving universe. When we can “see” our connection, the guards, beasts, walls, and material distractions fall away, we can see what is real and be in God’s presence. We can visit God.

When we have that vision of God and the universe, we see that totalitarianism and exploitation run counter to God’s will. God loves diversity -- the many languages people speak at the end of the story dramatize this -- but it is diversity within a great unity.

In a world corrupted by human trafficking, child labor, children used as soldiers, exploitation of cheap labor, sexual abuse, and even the struggle for a living wage, we see that we build our own Towers. It’s time to vacate these towers and enter God’s palace.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Shemini Atzeret and the Grand Canyon

2011-10-19T12:10:00.000-07:00

What is Shemini Atzeret? Everyone asks that question, even rabbis. Sukkot lasts seven days. What’s the “Eighth Day Gathering” tacked onto the end? One lovely midrashic response is that God wants all the pilgrims who gathered in Jerusalem for Sukkot to remain one more day. Don’t you always want to extend your vacation with loved ones one more day?

Liturgically and with great ceremony, we add the prayer for rain back into the second blessing of the Amidah: Mashiv ha-ruach u’morid ha’gashem / You cause the wind to blow and the rain to fall. Several observations: (1) In Eretz Yisrael, the winter rains begin at this time of year. Certainly no one wanted them to begin while they were still traveling to and from Jerusalem, so the prayer was added after Sukkot. (2) We have just finished the autumn harvest festival. Although most of us are not farmers, those of us who need to eat can still appreciate the importance of the growing cycle. Having given thanks for what we harvested this year, we immediately turn our attention to the most essential element in next year’s harvest: the winter rains. (3) Mashiv ha-ruach is added to the Gevurot, the blessing about resurrection, because rain renews the life of the world.

We have gone through the High Holy Days: introspection, repentance, atonement, and intention to change and improve. Hopefully we have experience renewal and set a new course for our lives -- not wholesale change, but improvement. No one walks out of synagogue after Ne’ilah and the final shofar utterly transformed. We’ve done the head and heart work, but how do we translate that into behavior?

Change doesn’t come easily or immediately. I think the image of water -- so central to Shemini Atzeret -- can help us. I’d like to share with you a wonderful story about Rabbi Akiba found in chapter 6 of the midrashic compilation Avot de-Rabbi Natan (which itself is a commentary on Pirke Avot). I’ll interpolate some comments.

What was the beginning of Rabbi Akiba? At age 40 he had not learned anything. One time he was standing at the mouth of a well, and asked, "Who hollowed out this rock?" They answered him, "Was it not the water that constantly falls on it?" They further said, "Akiba, are you not familiar with the verse, Water wears away stone... (Job 14:19). Rabbi Akiba immediately made the following logical inference to himself: "Just as the soft [water] shaped the hard [stone], words of Torah -- which are as hard as iron -- all the more so they will shape my heart which is but flesh and blood."

Rabbi Akiba recognizes that the process of erosion is slow and painstaking, but exceptionally powerful and successful. The Colorado River cut the Grand Canyon. The most successful changes come gradually. (One example is weight loss: if you do it gradually, it’s because you’re changing your lifestyle, and that is change that is far more likely to stick.) He learns from this -- as can we -- that change can come slowly, in small increments, little by little. During the High Holy Days, we planted the seeds of change. We don’t expect Jack’s beanstalk the next day. The seeds will germinate and grow in time, slowly and gently.

[Akiba] immediately went to learn Torah. He went with his son, and they both sat in front of a teacher of young students. Rabbi Akiba said, "My master, teacher me Torah." Rabbi Akiba held one end of a tablet, and his son held the other end. The teacher wrote the letters aleph, bet, and Rabbi Akiba learned them. Aleph, taf and Rabbi Akiba learned them. The Book of Leviticus, and he learned it. He went on studying until he had learned the entire Torah. Then he went and sat before Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua. He said to them, "My Masters open for me [reveal to me] the taste of the Mishnah. Once they told him one halakhah (law), he went and sat by himself, pondering: "Why was this [letter] aleph written; why was this [letter] bet written; why was this thing said?" He went back and asked them, and reduced them to silence.

Rabbi Akiba is 40 years old and does not know even the alphabet. He needs to start at the very beginning, learning two letters at a time. He does not expect himself to learn everything overnight. Each tidbit he learns facilitates the next; each incremental change facilitates and reinforces the next. He is gradually transforming himself from an ignorant farmhand to a learned sage.

The midrash is about learning Torah, and perhaps that’s one of your goals for the coming year. But it applies equally well to other changes you want to make: Jewish practice, personality traits, work habits, exercise, a healthier diet, more time with your loved ones… The seeds planted so recently will grow with time. Keep at it, but give it time.

Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar said, “I will give a parable. To what is this matter similar? It is like a stonecutter who was chiseling away in the mountains. One time he took his pickaxe, sat upon a mountain, and began cutting away small pieces of stone. People came up to him and asked, "What are you doing?" He replied, "I am uprooting the mountain so I can throw it into the Jordan River." They said, "You will never be able to uproot the entire mountain." The stonecutter continued until he came upon a large rock. He got underneath it, uprooted it and placed it in the Jordan. He said to the rock, "Your place is not here [on the mountain], but here [in the river]." This is what Rabbi Akiba did to Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua. Rabbi Tarfon said to him: "Akiba, about you the verse says, He dams up he sources of the stream so that hidden things may be brought to light (Job 28:11) -- Rabbi Akiba brought to light things that are hidden from [other] people."

Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar’s parable is beautiful. If you keep chipping away, eventually you can move a mountain. That’s our task in the coming year: to let the water in, drop by drop, to shape us into the people we wish to be. We need to be patient with ourselves, but keep moving forward and noting our successes. Renewal doesn’t always happen in a flash; sometimes it comes drop by drop.

Here’s a picture of the Grand Canyon. Perhaps you might print it out and keep it as a reminder.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Another mechitza we don't need / Parshat Bereishit

2011-10-15T15:25:00.000-07:00

One day in the Garden of Eden, Eve said to God, “This is a great place. The plants are beautiful, the animals are wonderful, and food is no more than an arm’s length away, but…”

“What’s the problem, Eve?” God asked.

“Well, to tell the truth, I’m lonely. There’s no one like me here.”

“I’ll create a man for you, Eve. Then you won’t be lonesome any longer,” God replied.

“What’s a man?” Eve asked.

“A man is a creature who will grow up but remain forever childish. He’ll be bigger, stronger, and faster than you, and he’ll hunt food and bring it home. When he’s not being deceitful and arrogant, he’ll be clueless and witless. And he will never ask for directions. He will, however, satisfy your physical needs magnificently.”

Eve raised an eyebrow. “What’s the catch?”

“Well, given his vanity and pride, you’ll have to let him believe I made him first. And just remember, it’s our little secret, woman to woman.”

We all fill out a lot of forms: applications, registrations, licensing. In some we are asked our sex, and in others our gender. Sex and gender are not the same. Sex is a matter of biology. Gender is a social construct: the attributes assigned to a particular sex. In the joke, Eve’s sex is female (and apparently God’s, as well) and Adam’s sex is male, but “deceitful, arrogant, witless, clueless,” and so on, are matters of gender. We can easily dismiss this as an old, obnoxious, and bigoted joke because the presumption of gender behind it no longer rings true.

We begin the cycle of Torah reading anew this shabbat with Parshat Bereishit. Here we find not one, but two creation stories. While they differ in many significant details, I want to focus on one aspect in which both concur: sex. Torah presumes two sexes: male and female. In chapter one, multiple people are created on the sixth day -- some males and some females.

And God created humanity in his image, in the image of God he created humanity; male and female he created them. (Genesis 1:27)

In chapter two, a single man is created, and only after God realizes he is lonely, a woman is created.

So the Lord God cast a deep sleep upon the man; and while he slept, he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that spot. And the Lord God fashioned the rib that he had taken from the man into a women; and he brought her to the man. (Genesis 2:21-22)

I recently found myself in a conference hotel that had two identically equipped single restrooms on the fifth floor. Yet one was marked “women” and one was marked “men.” What’s the point? You won’t be surprised to hear that there was a line outside the first, and no one using the second. The view of the human race as divided among males and females, who even use separate although identical single rest rooms, runs deep in our society. It is accompanied by varying notions of gender: what is expected from, and what is appropriate for, boys and girls, men and women.

Torah is our Master Narrative. It informs all our thinking about, and discussion of, sex, gender, and sexuality. Torah presumes a binary oppositional world: males and females; holy and mundane; shabbat and the other days; Israel and the other nations; obedience and disobedience to the covenant; reward and punishment.

Perhaps we have misread Torah for a long time. Perhaps the point is that there is variety that makes reproduction possible, not that there are only two options. There are people for whom the rest room designations “men” and “women” are not sufficient. People have long recognized hermaphrodites as well as pseudohermaphrodites; Talmud discusses this (Yebamot 81, 83; Shabbat 134b; mishnah Bikkurim, ch. 4). Today there are people who openly identify as transgender, bigender, transsexual, or intersex. They often call themselves “genderqueer.” Dr. Anne Fausto-Sterling, professor in the Department of Molecular and Cell Biology and Biochemistry at Brown University, has suggested that there are at least five sexes. While not widely accepted, her ideas are certainly eye opening. Even the most basic “truths” sometimes turn out not be true at all.

Where once we pretended homosexuality did not exist, today we are challenged to fully recognize and accept genderqueer people as children of God, created in the divine image like all other people. After all, God is only male as a matter of semantics, and female as a matter of humor. God is beyond sex and gender, or perhaps better put, God incorporates all.

The Rabbis tell us that the first primordial human was androgynous -- neither male nor female as Torah seems to suggest, and certainly as it has been interpreted for a very long time. Rather, one side of the primordial human was male and the other side was female. Another opinion holds that the primordial human was altogether sexless.

Rabbi Yermia the son of Elazar said: When the Holy One Blessed be God created the first human, He created him androgynous, for it says, Male and female created He them (Genesis 1:27). Rabbi Shmuel b. Nachman said: When the Holy One Blessed be God created the first human, He made it two-faced, then he sawed it and made a back for this one and a back for that one. They objected to him: but it says, He took one of his ribs [tsela’] (Genesis 2:21). He answered: [tsela’ means] "one of his sides," similarly to that which is written, And the side [tsela'] of the tabernacle (Exodus 26:20). Rabbi Tanchuma in the name of Rabbi Banayah and Rabbi Berekiah in the name of Rabbi Elazar: He created him as a golem, and he was stretched from one end of the world to the other, as it says, My golem which Your eyes have seen. (Psalm 139:16) (Bereishit Rabbah 1:54-55)

In the Rabbis’ imagination, the primordial human -- the ideal human -- is unsexed and undifferentiated: beyond gender assignment. The primordial human is neither “male” nor “female,” but rather a person. This person contains everything within or is a golem, without identifiable sex or gender. When one considers this primordial human, all discussion of sex and gender fall away as irrelevant. What one sees -- and all one can see -- is a human being, created by God, in the Divine Image. There’s a lesson here for us about viewing people not from a narrow, limited slant, but rather through God’s broad and loving lens.

Can you do that? What will it take for you to do that? If you already do that, can you help others to do so also?

And for goodness sake, let’s make rest rooms user-friendly.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Gevalt! A new generation / Sukkot and V'zot ha-berakhah

2011-10-10T09:57:00.000-07:00

Sukkot arrives in a few hours, with shabbat on its tail. Rain is threatening. Irony: We don’t add the prayer for rain until Shemini Atzeret because rain doesn’t fall in Israel until then. Here we might be inclined to pray for a cessation of rain for a week so we can enjoy our sukkot. Another irony: Living in a sukkah for a week reminds us of the fragility of our lives, but when it rains tonight (according the weather report) we’ll be inside effectively denying that. One is not required to sit and suffer in a sukkah, the Jewish light bulb joke aside. In the 21st century it helps us appreciate the warm, snug homes we live in the other 51 weeks of the year. We have just finished the High Holy Days, which impressed upon us our mortality -- life is the ultimate deadline -- and now we make our homes in temporary huts, which remind us that even while we are alive, we are so very vulnerable. All this helps us readjust our entitlement meters. Life is a gift, a blessing, and we have a limited amount of time to use it well.

If the High Holy Days and Sukkot are not sufficient reminders of our mortality and fragility, on shabbat we read Zot ha-berakhah - “and this is the blessing” - the last parashah of Torah. The first cousins to mortality and fragility are change and transition. This parashah is largely about transition. Moses reaches his “deadline.” He dies on Mt. Nebo, is buried by God, and Joshua ben Nun takes the reins as leader of a new generation. The generation that came out of Egypt is leaving this world. A new generation, born in the Wilderness, with an entirely different perspective on themselves and the world, has come of age.

Every generation expresses trepidation about turning the reins of leadership, and indeed the world, over to the next generation. Each generation seems to find the next generation lacking. Quite frankly, it’s tiresome, especially this round of kvetching about Generation-X and the Millennial Generation. What is true for Star Trek is true today: the next generation is terrific.

Heraclitus of Ephesus (c. 535 BCE - 475 BCE) recognized long ago that change is the only constant in the universe: everything flows; nothing stands still.

In the very last chapter of the Torah, Moses climbs to the top of Mt. Nebo, the last hike he will ever take.

Moses went up from the steppes of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the summit of Pisgah, opposite Jericho, and the Lord showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan; all Naphtali; the land of Ephraim and Manasseh; the whole land of Judah as far as the Western Sea; the Negev; and the Plain -- the Valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees -- as far as Zoar. (Deuteronomy 34:1-4)

Moses will never reach the Promised Land. What was he thinking as he scanned the horizon and gazed at the Land he would never enter? Did he consider Joshua ben Nun competent to take over the mantle of leadership? Did he believe the generation born in the Wilderness would succeed in the Land? With his last words, Moses blesses the people, each and every tribe, his people, his children, his successors:

This is the blessing with which Moses, the man of God, bade the Israelites farewell before he died... Torah tziva lanu Moshe, morashah k’hilat Yaakov. When Moses charged us with the Teaching as the heritage of the congregation of Jacob, then [God] became king in Jeshurun, when the heads of the people assembled, the tribes of Israel together. (Deuteronomy 33:1, 4-5)

We know that Moses was distraught that he would never enter the Promised Land, but nowhere does Torah tell us that Moses doubts the competence or integrity of the next generation. He delivers stern warnings and exhortations precisely because he knows they will carry on. He has confidence in them to carry the Covenant forward. He believes in the next generation.

We should do no less. I have heard many of my contemporaries bemoan the “next generation” and describe them as narcissistic, selfish, materialistic, and uncaring. Utter nonsense. Nothing could be further from the truth. We have every reason to bless the next generation and have confidence in them.

No doubt there are Gen-Xers and Millennials who will not succeed in making a life for themselves. Some will be toxic for society. This happens in every generation. But those who will lead and innovate are far more knowledgeable and informed, and know how to navigate the world far better than my generation. They are socially aware, their moral commitments run deep, and they get involved. They keep themselves informed about the events and issues of the day. They do a lot of volunteer work, here and around the world. I have met many whose career plans are to go into medicine not to enable a certain lifestyle, but to work with underprivileged populations, or pursue research on a particular medical condition and thereby alleviate, or at least mitigate, suffering. I have met many who want to go to law school not to strike it rich, but to insure that justice is dispensed to the have-nots. Many are concerned about the environment and plan scientific and entrepreneurial careers with this in mind. They have a global perspective and strong sense of social responsibility.

I’m sick and tired of the characterization of this generation as plugged into their devices and tuned out to everything else. More nonsense. This generation has taken to modern technology as fish to water and birds to air. When you grow up with a mouse in your hand that comes as no surprise. They use technology well. They stay in touch with one another and support one another because they know what’s happening in one another’s lives in real time. They value their relationships. They use their 24/7 internet connection to keep informed and to research issues they care about. (For what it’s worth, I plug in and listen to podcasts and music at the gym, in the supermarket, and while folding laundry. I think if it weren’t for podcasts, I might never fold the laundry because it’s so mind-numbingly boring. Why shouldn’t they during the downtimes in their day?)

I spent the High Holy Days in Ann Arbor where I had the joy and privilege of helping to lead the High Holy Day services at the University of Michigan Hillel. I split my time between Conservative and Reform services, affording me the opportunity to meet and work with a great many students. I’m not easy to impress (ask my kids). I was blown away by these students: they are intelligent and interesting to be sure, but even more, they are kind to one another, respectful of adults, and brimming with ambition wedded to idealism. Most importantly, they are menschen with loving, caring hearts. Yet another confirmation of what I have been seeing in this generation of years. Yet the moment I stepped on the plane to head home, I overheard the pilot and a passenger discussing how going to work is great because you get away from your kids (based on their ages, they both had grown kids) because this generation... bla, bla, bla.

Pirke Avot begins:

Moses received the Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua; Joshua to the elders; the elders to the prophets; and the prophets handed it down to the men of the Great Assembly. They said three things: Be deliberate in judgment, raise up many disciples, and make a fence around the Torah. (1:1)

We are accustomed to seeing in this mishnah the Rabbis’ claim that Oral Torah (the Talmud) has the same authoritative status as Written Torah (the Five Books of Moses). But let’s look again. For the Rabbis, Moses is Moshe Rabbeinu (“Moses our rabbi”). In this mishnah Joshua is Moses’ successor in Torah. Masechet Sanhedrin envisions Joshua studying in the bet midrash as the Rabbis did. The Rabbis were not projecting themselves back to the generation that stood at Sinai; they were advancing Moses and Joshua forward to the rabbinic period. Perhaps being closer to Sinai was deemed more spiritually powerful, but novelty and innovative thinking were what the Rabbis truly prized.

The first mishnah in Pirke Avot exhorts each generation to “be deliberate in judgment, raise up many disciples, and make a fence around the Torah.” No doubt this advice was meant for the rabbis -- much of Pirke Avot is rabbis talking to rabbis -- but we can also understand this teaching in a broader sense as being directed at us. We have been deliberative in how we raised this generation -- and we are often criticized for our “excessive” involvement in their lives (sometimes rightly so). The result is that this generation is also deliberative in their judgment and, I hasten to say, far less judgmental than their parents. We have raised up many disciples.

Intermarriage and assimilation are neither new nor the only news. If you’re concerned that Judaism will dissolve with this generation, set your worries aside. (Simon Rawidowicz pointed out in "Israel: The Ever-Dying People," an essay written in 1957, that every generation thinks it is the last.) Gen-X has been at the forefront of an explosion of Jewish learning and Jewish spirituality, not to mention progressive and innovative practice. There has been an explosion of independent minyanim among this generation in the past decade. Check out what they’re doing on the internet. They share it with everyone. Take a look at the blogs they keep on Torah, Zionism, social justice, and more. (A few links below.) Their fresh and insightful interpretations of Torah are bubbling, sparking, flowing. They are taking on Torah seriously, doing just what God intended R. Akiba to do when putting the decorations on the letters of the Written Torah: generate new torah. (Menachot 29b)

It’s not that “change is coming.” The universe evolves continually. Change is the way of the world.

The generation entering the Promised Land was born into freedom and enjoyed a broader perspective than their parents who knew only servitude in the tar pits of Egypt. Gen-X and the Millennials were born into a high-tech global world; they too enjoy a broader perspective than their parents. Different generations. Different experiences. Different perspective on the world and their place in it. For what generation is that not true?

Each generation will surely inherit the world. Should it be entrusted to them? The fact that we are here more than 3500 years after Moses turned his staff over to Joshua speaks to the qualifications of the Wilderness generation. In time, Gen-X and the Millennials will have the opportunity to prove themselves. I have every confidence in them. They have my blessing.

May our time in our sukkot help us appreciate the many blessings in our lives, including the next generation.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

http://mahrabu.blogspot.com/
http://stuffjewishyoungadultslike.wordpress.com/
http://jewschool.com/
http://blogs.forward.com/the-jew-and-the-carrot/
http://www.jewishideasdaily.com/
http://www.frumsatire.net/
http://joshyuter.com/
http://sinaiandsynapses.com/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/judaism/
http://www.jewlicious.com/

Focus on good rather than sin for a moment / Yom Kippur

2011-09-23T08:50:00.000-07:00

Some of us are getting teshuvah-weary -- weeks of soul-searching and facing our moral failings. Teshuvah (repentance) is hard work, and certainly a good, long look into the moral mirror helps. By the time the sun sets on Yom Kippur we will have thoroughly explored the crevices of our souls and embark on multiple confessions of sins we didn’t commit, along with those we did. Our prayers on the High Holy Days help us identity only our deficits. But our holiday liturgy is one-sided.

Certainly focusing on our sins and failings is one path to improvement. But it’s not the only way to become the best version of ourselves we can become. There is much good in each of us. There is much we have done in the past year that speaks well for us in heaven and on earth. Building on our strengths and moral accomplishments is a fine way to improve in the coming year, and a good balance to the confessionals on Yom Kippur.

Think back over the past year. What did you do that makes you especially proud? (It’s perfectly fine to be proud of being a mensch.) Did you go out of your way to help someone in a way that made difference in their life? Were you able to be patient and kind to someone who normally pushes your every button? Were you especially generous with your time or resources on behalf of a great cause? Did you do something as a child, parent, grandparent, or friend that you feel is remarkable for you? Did you fulfill a commitment you thought you might not be able to fulfill?

What you did once last year, you can do twice or thrice this coming year.

The goal is improvement. Perfection has never been a Jewish goal. We’re human -- sometimes delightfully so, and sometimes tragically so. But we are human nonetheless. We do good and we miss the boat. That is in the nature of our biology, and some of the traits we might not like in ourselves evolved over time to assure our survival. But Torah tells us two things to help us channel our natures and our energies positively: First, we have free will. We can decide whether to follow our biological inclinations or moderate them. Second, we are created b’tzelem Elohim (on the model of God).

There are many interpretations of what it means to be the tzelem Elohim (image of God). We generally agree that it means we should be “godly.” But what does “godly” mean? Our Sages struggled to understand it and offer us two perspectives.

The Bavli (Babylonian Talmud, Sotah 14a) wants to help us in our attempt at self-improvement and tells us that imitating God means doing what God does: clothe the naked (God clothes Adam and Eve), visit the sick (God visits Abraham after his circumcision), comfort the bereaved (God blesses Isaac after Abraham died), and bury the dead (God buries Moses). These are concrete behaviors, acts of chesed (loving kindness) on behalf of others. What concrete godlike acts have you performed this past year? I’ll bet there are plenty you don’t even remember.

The midrash Sifrei Devarim (Parshat Ekev, #13) tells us that being godly means developing the character of God as expressed in the Thirteen Attributes of Exodus 34:6-7 -- and especially the traits of compassion and kindness. What godlike traits have you exemplified in the past year?

Your goodness can be your model for the coming year. What you did last year, you can build on this coming year. Little by little, we move toward our potential and become the best versions of ourselves we can be.

If you’re still in doubt that perfection is not a Jewish value, here’s something more to consider. For the Rabbis, as for Torah, God does not claim perfection. Rather, God models the struggle for self-improvement, the key to which is self-control. Yes, even God is struggling with self-control. The Talmud (Berakhot 7a) shares a teaching of R. Yochanan in the name of R. Yose: Every day God prays, “May it be My will that My compassion will conquer My anger, and that My compassion will overcome My [sterner] attributes, and that I behave towards My children with the attribute of mercy, and that for their sake I go beyond the boundary of [strict] judgment [and forgive].”

Imagine yourself reciting this prayer each day. Indeed, try it! Here it is, reworked for our use: “Today may I exert my free will so that my compassion conquers my anger, and my compassion overcomes my other attributes, and I treat every person I meet with compassion, and for their sake I avoid being judgmental.”

In the coming year, lead with your goodness. May we all enjoy a year of abundant blessing, and may we all be a blessing to all those around us. Shanah tovah u’metukah.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Don't ask why. Ask what now? / Rosh Hashanah

2011-09-23T08:44:00.000-07:00

The premier Torah reading for Rosh Hashanah is the Birth of Isaac (Genesis, chapter 21). The story of the birth of Isaac evokes new beginnings, promises fulfilled, continuity of the Jewish people, God’s covenant -- all appropriate themes for Rosh Hashanah. It is thought that the Akedah (The Binding of Isaac, chapter 22) is read on the second day of Rosh Hashanah because that’s where the Torah is rolled to when we arrive in shul that morning. Yet the Akedah has come to be associated so tightly with Rosh Hashanah that in the Reform movement’s machzor, Gates of Repentance, it is the first morning reading, and Genesis, chapter 1 (Creation, since Rosh Hashanah is the anniversary of the birth of the world) is offered for the second morning.

Why does the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac, loom so large in the Jewish psyche on Rosh Hashanah? At a time when we are engaged in the (often painful) self-evaluative process of teshuvah (repentance), striving to improve ourselves, and praying for life and blessing in the coming year, the Akedah is a stark reminder that everything in life is up in the air, even God’s “plan.” Now, I don’t personally subscribe to a theology that affirms a God who micromanages or even intervenes in the physics of the universe, but I am as keenly aware as you are that life has no guarantees and tragedy can befall us in an instant. In our lives, day can become night, light can give way to darkness, truth can become falsehood, love can become hatred or indifference, and blessings can give way to curses. However well we understand and appreciate the laws of physics that govern the universe, and chaos theory aside, from a human standpoint, the nature of nature is capricious. Perhaps that is the gripping power of the Akedah: the sheer terror it evokes, and the theological challenge it presents. When tragedy strikes, even those of us whose theology does not lend itself to the question “Why?” cannot help but ask it.

Our Sages asked that question as well. Why would a good and loving God require his loyal follower to offer up his beloved son as a sacrifice? Torah tells us it was a test: V'ha'Elohim nisa et Avraham / God put Abraham to the test (Genesis 22:1). To what purpose? Abraham has already proven his loyalty. He left Haran -- everyone and everything he had known -- to obey God’s call. He circumcised himself and all the males in his household as a sign of his covenant with God. What more does God need to know? The test is cruel and damaging. How can Isaac ever trust his father again? According to the Sages, Sarah dies when she hears what happened.

The Rabbis struggle with the “Why?” In this drash I want to share with you two of their speculative responses, midrashim that attempt to explain how it came to be that God instructed Abraham to offer up his beloved son as a sacrifice on Mt. Moriah.

The first midrash hypothesizes that the idea for the Akedah comes about because of a conversation between God and Satan, the adversary in heaven. Satan’s job is to serve as prosecuting attorney in the heavenly court, bringing evidence of people’s guilt before the throne of heaven. Apparently, he often brings his work home, as this conversation, from the imagination of the Rabbis, suggests:

And it came to pass after these things that God tried Abraham (Genesis 22:1). After what things? According to R. Yochanan, citing R. Yosi ben Zimra, after the things Satan had to say. [Following the feast given] upon the child’s having grown and being weaned (Genesis 21:8), Satan spoke up to the Holy One, “Master of the universe, out of the entire feast that this old man, upon whom You bestowed fruit of the womb at the age of one hundred, out of the entire feast he prepared, could he not have spared, say, one turtledove, one fledgling, as an offering to You?” The Holy One replied, “Is it not true that Abraham prepared the feast in honor of his son? Still, if I say to him, ‘Sacrifice your son to Me,’ he will sacrifice him at once.” Satan said, “Try him.” At once “God tried Abraham.” (b Sanhedrin 89b)

If you’re thinking of the Book of Job, you’re on the right track. Job is composed of two parts. The main body is a long, complex theological poem. A two-part narrative (the first and last chapters) frames the poem and casts its drama in a certain theological light. Chapter 1 tells us that Job’s trials and tribulations come about because Satan makes a bet with God that were Job not prosperous and blessed in every way a man would wish, he would not be loyal to God. The purpose of the bet is to test Satan’s theory. Here we see the same motif, now a familiar trop.

This is why God commands Abraham? The Akedah comes about because of an offhand bet in heaven? God doesn’t doubt Abraham will comply. Abraham certainly doesn’t need the trauma of the test. But God wants to prove something to a mere angel, Satan? God’s caprice -- as the Rabbis imagine it -- is disturbing. If this doesn’t summon theological nausea, I cannot imagine what would.

Here’s another rabbinic attempt to explain why:

…take your son, your favored son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moria and offer him up (והעלהו ve’ha’aleihu) there. They recited a mashal (parable): It is like a king who said to his admirer, “Offer up (חעלה ha’alei) your son on my table.” The admirer, a knife in his hand, brought his son. The king said, “Did I tell you to offer him so as to eat him? I said, ‘Raise him up [exalt him] in love!’” Nimshal (application of the parable): this is what is written: …it never occurred (lo alah alay) to Me (Jeremiah 19:5) – this verse refers to Isaac. (Genesis Rabbah 56:8)

This midrash turns on two possible interpretations of והעלהו ve’ha’leihu. Every translation you will find of Genesis 22:1 will say something like this: “offer him up,” “offer him as a sacrifice,” “bring him as an offering,” etc. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind that God wants Abraham to sacrifice his own son, a ritual that requires that Abraham slaughter Isaac and burn him on a pyre. The Rabbis, however, point out that this is not the only way to parse the term. It could also mean “raise him up,” meaning exalt him or lift him up in love. In case you haven’t yet understood this midrash, it’s probably because the Rabbi’s suggestion is so outside the box, your mind cannot make sense of it. They are suggesting that God never asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac at all! Quite to the contrary: God told Abraham to exalt Isaac in love, and Abraham completely misinterpreted God’s instruction. This explanation, while exonerating God from the charge of extremely cruelty, doesn’t exactly let God off the hook. Doesn’t God see how Abraham interprets the instruction? It took three days to get to Moriah. Abraham is not equipped with utensils for making s’mores; he carries wood and a slaughtering knife. And how is it that a God who creates the very universe with words cannot communicate clearly with his loyal follower? (While this is going off in another direction entirely, if God told Abraham to exalt his son in love, and Abraham understood this as a requirement to slaughter him as a sacrifice, we have to wonder what kind of lunatic fanatic Abraham is.)

In the first midrash, the Rabbis posit that God commands Abraham to offer Isaac as a sacrifice due to bar bet with Satan. In the second midrash, the Rabbis suggest that it is a big misunderstanding, a case of poor communication. These two attempts to explain why God tests Abraham in this way are deeply unsatisfying if we presume God is a Being with will, agency, and emotions (foremost mercy and compassion, both of which are severely violated by the Akedah) and the capacity to intervene in the physical processes of the universe.

But if you don’t hold that God is a Being, if instead you subscribe to a theology that says that the universe is in God, and God is in everything in the universe -- which is to say that God is the entire universe and also beyond the universe -- then the very capriciousness and inexplicability of the Akedah makes perfect sense: this is how we experience life in this universe. Terrible and frightening and unexpected things happen. They come out of nowhere. Our attempts to explain “why” only beget more troubling questions and rarely provide comfort. It is Rosh Hashanah and a new year is beginning. We would hope and pray for the blessings of health, peace, love, contentment, and prosperity in the coming year -- may you know all these blessings and more! -- yet we know deep down that the coming year might deal us a curve ball, or worse.

“Why?” is then not the question to ask. Strictly speaking, physics and biology explain why. What we really want and need to know is what an event -- and particularly a painful or tragic event -- means. And here asking the right question is crucial. We should not ask why, but rather “Now what?” In the face of pain and tragedy, either in my life or in the life of another, how will I respond? What will I do? How can I conjure within myself hope and strength? How can I bring comfort to others? If we can respond with compassion, love, patience, and commitment in the face of another’s pain, if we can accept the same from others when we are in pain, we will have responded to, “What now?” and we will have the answer we need.

May the new year bring you and yours, and indeed our entire world, peace and prosperity, health and humanity. Shanah tovah u’metukah!

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Blessing and Curses: if only it were that easy! / Nitzavim

2011-09-22T15:21:00.001-07:00

My dear friend David lives in Vermont. His partner Yuval raises bees there. Yuval’s bees produce honey unlike any I’ve eaten -- the flavor is most definitely a taste of heaven. Last spring, David gave me a jar of Yuval’s honey. I saved it until our son Danny married Leora. There is a tradition that newlyweds put honey, rather than salt, on their challah each shabbat during their first year of marriage. I wanted Leora and Danny to taste Yuval’s honey on shabbat as they entered married life together -- may it always be sweet. Alas, the jar was empty before many shabbatot had passed, so if Yuval is reading this drash, maybe he’ll send another jar to Maryland? We wouldn’t say no.

Bees are fascinating creatures. Yuval took me on a tour of the hives in his backyard when I was visiting a year ago. One bee lodged itself in my hair. Alarm bells went off in my head. I wanted it out immediately. This tiny, impressively industrious, and amazingly prolific creature was a dangerous threat. (No, I’m not allergic to bees, but who wants to be stung?) What had seemed a blessing a moment ago now seemed like a curse.

Yuval, like all beekeepers, has learned how to work around bees. He is skilled in extracting the sweet honey without being stung in the bargain. It’s a real trick to separate the sweet from the sting, the blessing from the curse.

See, I set before you this day life and prosperity, death and adversity. For I command you this day, to love the Lord your God, to walk in God’s ways, and the keep God’s commandments, laws, and rules, that you may thrive and increase, and that the Lord your God may bless you in the land that you are about the enter and possess… I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day: I have put before you life and earth, blessing and curse. Choose life -- if you and your offspring would live -- by loving the Lord your God, heeding God’s commands, and holding fast to God. For thereby you shall have life and shall long endure upon the soil that the Lord swore to your ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give to them. (Deuteronomy 30:15-16, 19-20)

First, Torah is saying we have free will and we have choices. So far I’m on board. Second, Torah is saying that not all choices are equal because some lead to blessing and some lead to curse. Okay, I’m still onboard, though with the caveat that fortune and misfortune can happen despite our choices because it’s a big, complicated universe. Third, Torah is saying that adherence to God’s “commandments, laws, and rules” will assure a good life. Is there a clear cut set of rules to follow to assure an avalanche of blessing and protection from all curses? We need not look far to discern the answer to this question: obviously not.

Let’s return a moment to the bees. They live in what for animals is a sophisticated society and they exhibit complex interactive behavior that amazes even biologists. Yet their decisions to extract pollen from flowers, transfer it to other flowers, impregnate the queen bee, and produce honey are not conscious free will choices. It’s instinct. They sting in response to perceived threat. In none of these do the bees make what we would consider a free will moral choice. They cannot choose between blessing and curse.

But sometimes, neither can we. We don’t always know which path to take in life. Should I accept a certain job offer? Should I stay in a certain relationship? Should I move to a new community? Should I respond to something someone said that rubs me wrong? How should I allocate my time, energy, and skills? How should I invest my resources? Should I have a certain surgery or medical treatment? Sure, I want to choose blessing and avoid curse, but it’s rarely as simple as Torah seems to suggest.

The bees know what to do. They act on instinct. They live in hives where the name of the game is the survival of the queen, not the individual bee. We, however, are calculating a dozen factors in the big decisions we make and sometimes losing sleep over what the outcome will be. How do we know if we’re choosing blessing or curse? Is there anyone who hasn’t been there?

Wouldn’t it be great if we could wind the tape forward and peek into the future to see the outcome of our decisions? But we cannot know the future -- even God cannot know the future -- because it does not yet exist. If God knew what we would choose, we would not have free choice. So God offers us the best choice, we choose, and then we wait to learn the outcome.

The best we can do is to make a decision with eyes open, good intentions, and full integrity. If we have done that, and it doesn’t turn out well, it is not God cursing us. It is the reality of living in an unpredictable world of probabilities, not assurances. If things don’t work out well, we still have choices to make, and with each choice God stands ready to show us the best option. All we can do is our best. In the end, that’s good enough because doing our best -- and knowing we did -- is a genuine blessing.

So Yuval, how about blessing us with another jar of your honey?

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Winning the Lottery / Ki Tavo

2011-09-12T18:10:00.000-07:00

Leroy Fick was on food stamps. Still is. And that is despite the fact that last spring he won $2 million ($850,000 after taxes) in Michigan’s “Make Me Rich” lottery. Fick continued to use food stamps after he won the lottery. (In Michigan this is completely legal because eligibility is based on income but not assets. Rest assured that Michigan lawmakers are scrambling to close this loophole.) Fick believes he is entitled to continue to receive food stamps.

In parshat Ki Tavo, we find an unusual passage -- unusual for two reasons. The first reason is because it comes with instructions to recite it aloud (and indeed, we still do every year). The second reason is because of what the passage does, and does not, include in a 100-word summary of 440 years of Israelite history.

You shall then recite as follows before the Lord Your God: “My father [probably Jacob] was a wandering Aramean. He went down to Egypt with meager numbers [Jacob’s clan] and sojourned there [400 years]; but there he became a great and populous nation. The Egyptians dealt harshly with us and oppressed us; they imposed heavy labor upon us. We cried to the Lord, the God of our ancestors, and the Lord heard our plea and saw our plight, our misery, and our oppression. The Lord freed us from Egypt by a mighty hand, by an outstretched arm and awesome power, and by signs and portents. He brought us to this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. Wherefore I now bring the first fruits of the soil which You, O Lord, have given me.” You shall leave it before the Lord Your God [this is the first tithe, which went to the priests] and bow low before the Lord Your God. And you shall enjoy, together with the Levite and the stranger in your midst, all the bounty [this refers to the second tithe] that the Lord your God has bestowed upon you and your household. (Exodus 26:5-10)

This passage, known is Arami oveid avi (the first three words in Hebrew), is familiar to us because it is found in the Pesach haggadah and plays a central liturgical role in the seder. When the Sages (Mishnah Sotah 7:2, 3; also Bikkurim 3:7) discuss it alongside the very small number of Torah passages that are to be recited on one occasion or another, they tell us that Arami oveid avi must be recited -- verbatim and in Hebrew -- by each person bringing first fruits to the Temple. It’s a fairly long passage to memorize (except for you thespians who are so adept at memorization), so the Sages tell us that a prompter was available to help those who could not recite it by heart. Not surprisingly, needing a prompter was embarrassing, so the modus operandi was changed: everyone was prompted so as not to make distinction between those who could and those who could not.

Now please consider the content. Here’s what the passage includes:

Jacob’s clan went down into Egypt.
The Israelites were in Egypt 400 years.
Jacob’s clan grew into a populous nation.
Slavery and oppression.
The people called out to God and God responded.
God brought Israel out of Egypt, displaying enormous might.
God brought Israel to the Promised Land.
You must bring the first fruits of your harvest to God via the priests in a designated place.
Bow before God.
Party hardy in Jerusalem and enjoy the bounty of the Land. Include in your celebration all those who do not have a harvest of their own.

Most surprisingly, here’s what it doesn’t include:

The redemption at the Reed Sea.
The giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai.
The many, many experiences of the Israelites in the Wilderness during their 40 years there.

Why does Torah provide this compact summary of more than four centuries, yet leave out essential parts of the story? And why does Torah prescribe this seemingly incomplete summary to be recited aloud? I think that perhaps a hint of the answer to the second question is found in the first.

The Israelites are standing on the border of Eretz Yisrael, prepared to enter and take possession of the Land. Once settled, the very first thing they are to do is bring the very first fruits of their labor to God. A précis of the recitation might sound like this:

You went down into Egypt merely a clan, and were oppressed slaves for a long time. Through a stupendous show of might, God brought you up out of slavery in Egypt -- where you had nothing -- to this Land, which you will now possess. Be sure to do 2 things when the Land first yields its harvest to you: (1) thank God; (2) celebrate and enjoy, but be sure to include those who do not have what you have.

It seems to me that the recitation accomplishes two things. First, it establishes concretely the Israelites’ independence and self-sufficiency. Before, all depended on God. In the Wilderness, God fed them. Now they will work the Land to feed themselves. Now much depends on them. God has given them the tools to create a just and compassionate society, and is turning the reigns over to them. It’s important to get it right, and when they fail, to make a course correction.

The second purpose of the First Fruits Ceremony is to ward off a sense of entitlement. People who have never possessed much more than the clothes on their backs, and whose parents were slaves in Egypt, will soon possess land. They are about to win the lottery. How easily they could fall into thinking that God who sustained them in the Wilderness with manna, quail, and Miriam’s well, will continue to provide for them in a similar way because that’s how it works for Israel. The Israelites are not divinely or otherwise entitled to a bounteous harvest. It comes through their hard work.

At the same time, it is God who makes possible life and growth. When we give thanks to God, expressing appreciation for what we have, we come to realize that our lives are filled with blessings. And more: we are happier and more generous people. Sometimes the very best antidote to unhappiness and dissatisfaction is to quite literally count our blessings (try actually writing them down and see what happens!). Another wonderful antidote is to go out and do something for someone in need. Both antidotes work wonders. And that is precisely what the passage instructs. Take another look at verse 11:

And you shall enjoy, together with the Levite and the stranger in your midst, all the bounty [this refers to the second tithe] that the Lord your God has bestowed upon you and your household.

When the Israelites recite the First Fruits passage, they become mindful of their many blessings and experience gratitude. This leads them to rejoice and enjoy what they have produced thanks to God and with their own hands. But more, they share their blessings with those who are more in need than they, the strangers in their midst.

The First Fruits Recitation is an exercise in mandatory gratitude leading to joy and generosity. Pretty cool, no?

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Project Torah Runway / Ki Teitzei

2011-09-06T18:56:00.000-07:00

When I was young, my favorite piece of play equipment was the monkey bars (remember them?). I spent many happy hours flipping and spinning on the monkey bars in the backyard. School, however, was another story: girls could not play on monkey bars because we were required to wear skirts or dresses. I told my third grade teacher I would wear shorts instead of a skirt to school. She told me that was forbidden. Eventually, I started wearing shorts under my skirt. My teacher disapproved but there wasn’t a thing she could do about it.
Legend and history are filled with stories of cross-dressing. Achilles’ mother dressed him in women’s garb to clandestinely enter the court of Lycomedes without being noticed by Odysseus. “The Odyssey” describes Athena dressing as a man to help people. In ancient Norse mythology, the hero Frotho dresses for battle as a warrior maiden, while the god Odin dresses as a female healer to seduce Rindr.

Hua Mulan (5th century; not clear if she’s fictional or historical) donned a soldier’s uniform so her sick father would not have to serve in the Chinese army. Joan of Arc (15th century) led the French into battle with the British dressed in mail. Catalina de Erauso (17th century). Jazz pianist and saxophonist Billy Tipton (20th century) was actually Dorothy Lucille Tipton but few knew this until after his death.

Ki Teitzei tells us:

A woman must not put on man’s apparel (k’li gever), nor shall a man wear woman’s clothing (simlat isha); for whoever does these things is abhorrent (to’evah) to the Lord your God. (Deuteronomy 22:5)

Most societies have prohibitions and taboos related to cross-dressing. According to Torah, God doesn’t like cross-dressing (except on Purim) either. In fact, cross-dressing is termed a to’evah (“abomination”). That is very strong language. Torah views the universe through the lens of dualism, everything and its opposite (light/dark, good/evil, Israelite/gentile, male/female). Torah strongly favors keeping things in their “proper” category and not blurring the presumed clear-cut boundaries of God’s creation. Can you imagine my teacher’s reaction when I came to school wearing culottes? Yentl would have kicked out of my third grade class.

Torah seems determined to keep the distinction between men and women clear and visible. If we sift through later commentaries on this verse, as summarized by Rashi (10th century) and codified in the Shulchan Arukh (16th century), we see that the underlying concern of many interpreters is that cross-dressing can lead to sexual immorality: women might don the clothing of men and go out to socialize among men, and vice versa. Sefer ha-Chinukh (13th century, Spain, anonymous) summarizes the concern succinctly: "The root of this mitzvah (commandment) is to keep us from sexual sin... there is no doubt that if men and women's clothing were the same, they would mix and the earth would be filled with impropriety” (mitzvah #564). I wonder if they considered that perhaps cross-dressing was about something other than sex? Think Yentl again. Or think comfort.

Of course what constitutes “male” and “female” attire differs widely from locale to locale, and generation to generation. This makes Torah’s concern very elusive. Are jeans in the province of men? I don’t think my husband would want to wear mine, and I’m quite sure I wouldn’t want to see him in them. Is the category of the garment (e.g., jeans), the style, the color, or something else that makes it “male” or “female”?

Torah’s concerning with restricting everything to its “proper” category, and the Rabbis’ concern about preventing possible sexual immorality aside, we know that the world is not black or white -- it is mostly gray. Sexuality and orientation do not lie in distinct “his and hers” baskets, but rather along spectra. Today, we understand far more than previous generations. We acknowledge and (ought to) treat with respect people who are bisexual, transgendered, and queer. They are how they are, just as heteronormative people are how they are. What matters is who they are.

We can easily dismiss Torah as reflecting a pre-scientific unenlightened time. But before we do that, we can note three things:

Torah is unclear. What is the precise meaning of k’li gever (men’s gear)? Some have said it means men’s military appurtenances meaning that women cannot become warriors. What is simlat isha (women’s wear)? Is it clothing or hairstyle? Again, there are differing opinions. There is not even agreement on what to’evah (abomination) means.
The commentators use the caveat of local custom. Some have said that the Torah’s concern is that men should not shave their hair (under their arms and in the pubic area) as women in some localities do, unless that is local custom. There is no pinning this one down. Interpreters recognize that this is about fashion customs, and customs differ from place to place.
3. In Judaism, the principle of k’vod ha-briot (human dignity) trumps just about everything, and certainly the vague concern expressed in Deuteronomy 22:5, and the rather unlikely scenario Shulchan Arukh and Sefer ha-Chinukh are worried about.

Rather than worrying about fashion and style -- and how they are labeled -- we should focus on scrupulously protecting human dignity, celebrating human individuality, and cultivating respect for the natural diversity of God’s creation.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Bring on the bribes / Parshat Shoftim

2011-09-01T08:24:00.000-07:00

From the grab bag of news stories during the past week:

A former federal agent at Midway International Airport was sentenced to nearly four years in prison for taking thousands of dollars in bribes to allow foreign workers to stay in the United States illegally.

An attorney arrested earlier this month after accepting $50,000 in cash as part of a payment made in exchange for the lawyer's promise to tamper with a federal grand jury investigation was indicted this afternoon by another federal grand jury.

A judge sentenced the former mayor of the small Arizona border town of Nogales on Monday to 3.5 years in prison for bribery and seven years of probation for fraud… The former mayor was arrested last September at his office in the town of 25,000, about 60 miles south of Tucson, after a five-month FBI investigation. He was accused of accepting bribes to award city contracts without the normal bidding process and to protect contracts already in place.

Accepting a bribe is not only illegal, it undermines the very legal system by doing an end run around it: those who are entrusted with carrying out the law impartially are, themselves, in collusion with those trying to abrogate it. Bribery compromises justice for everyone.

Parshat Shofetim (which means “judges”) opens with a direct attack on judges who accept bribes:

You shall appoint magistrates and officials for your tribes, in all your settlements that the Lord your God is giving you, and they shall govern the people with due justice. You shall not judge unfairly: you shall show no partiality; you shall not take bribes, for bribes blind the eyes of the discerning and upset the plea of the just. (Deuteronomy 16:18, 19)

Torah then summarizes concern with arguably the most famous verse in all Torah: Tzedek tzedek tirdof / Justice, justice, shall you pursue (Deuteronomy 16:20). Why is the word tzedek / justice repeated? Perhaps to remind us that it’s bad enough if individual members of society commit bribery, but if judges accept payola, the entire system of justice is corrupted from the foundation up.

Our Sages discuss this matter of accepting bribes in the Talmud (b. Ketubot 105b).
The discussion opens with a marvelous verse from Proverbs 29:4 -- A king sustains the land through justice, but a fraudulent man [or: one who loves gifts] tears it down. The Sages then their take concern about judicial corruption further, ramping up what a judge is required to do twice.

The first ramping up concerns the emotional state of the judge. R. Dimi cites the verse above in the name of R. Nachman b. Kohen. We might have expected the verse from Proverbs to say, "A judge sustains the land through justice." Why is a king mentioned? R. Dimi brings the teaching of R. Nachman b. Kohen: a judge should be like a king who is not in need of anything (and hence bribes are meaningless to him and do not tempt him) rather than like a priest, who depends upon the people’s tithes to sustain himself and his family, and is therefore far more susceptible to bribes.

The judge’s emotions are obviously a major factor, so the Rabbis continue in that vein:

Raba said: What is the reason for the prohibition against accepting a gift? Because as soon as a man receives a gift from another, he becomes so well disposed toward him that he becomes like the man himself, and no one sees himself in the wrong… R. Papa said: A man should not act as judge either for one whom he loves or for one whom he hates; for no man can see the guilt of one whom he loves or the merit of one whom he hates.

R. Papa alerts us to the fact that our partiality is compromised by our own emotions: when we love or hate someone, when we consider someone a friend or an enemy, we cannot render impartial judgments. No surprise there. The judge must supervise and control his emotions -- about himself -- in order to immunize himself against taking bribes. This is hard enough, but the Rabbis are not finished.

An anonymous statement attributed to the Sages introduces the second ramping up:

Our Rabbis taught: You shall take no bribes -- there was no need to speak of a gift of money [i.e. that is obvious, therefore Torah must be teaching something different] but rather: Even a bribe of words is forbidden.

Judges must guard against verbal bribes because this could undermine his ability to be impartial. What is a verbal bribe? The Gemara provides several examples. The first is recounted by Ameimar and might strike us as trivial.

Once while Ameimar was engaged in judging a case, a feather flew down and settled on his head. A man approached and removed it. “What is your business here,” [Ameimar] asked him. “I have a lawsuit,” he replied. [Ameimar] replied, “I am disqualified from acting as your judge.”

Mar Ukba recounts an even more seemingly trivial case: someone spat on the ground in front of Mar Ukba and a man approached to cover the spittle. Mar Ukba recused himself. More examples are brought, each one involving not the suggestion of a bribe, but rather the appearance of the suggestion of a bribe. For example: R. Yishmael b. R Yose’s tenant farmer brought him a basket of fruit each Friday, but once dropped it off on Thursday. When R. Yishmael inquired about the change, the man said he had a case before R. Yishmael and thought: by the way, I’ll bring fruit to my master. The fruit was not a gift; it was something the tenant farmer brought each week. But in bringing it early, he got R. Yishmael’s attention and suggested that perhaps the judge might consider the early delivery while judging his case. Needless to say, R. Yishmael b. R. Yose recused himself.

The Rabbis tell us to work on our emotions about ourselves, but also guard against our feelings toward other people.

The Rabbis bring these seemingly trivial examples to emphasize the importance of Torah’s requirement to have impartial courts and judges in order to deliver genuine tzedek. They are building geder la-Torah, a fence around the Torah, to protect it from infringement.

The concept of building a fence around the Torah is well known. Here is one mention of the principle in the Talmud:

It has been taught: R. Eliezer b. Yaakov said: I have heard that the bet din (court) may [when it deems it necessary] impose flagellation and pronounce [capital] sentences even where not [required] by the Torah; yet not with the intention of disregarding the Torah, but rather in order to put a fence around it. (Sanhedrin 46a)

Here’s an example of a “fence law.” Torah forbids work on shabbat, but the Sages forbid handling an work implement on shabbat, since doing so could lead one to unthinkingly the tool it in the usual manner.

In the case of bribery, the Rabbis exhort judges to go beyond refusing bribes. They should condition themselves emotionally to feel they neither need nor want the bribe, and they should recuse themselves from a case if there is a verbal suggestion of a bribe, however small and insignificant it may seem.

In the public realm, the message is obvious: public officials of all sorts should avoid even the appearance of wrong doing in order to stay away from genuine bribes and destructive corruption. You hardly need me to cite examples for you of those who did not (although I did at the beginning of this drash). Sadly, there are all too many.

What’s the message for us? The exhortation and examples provided by the Rabbis remind us that we must do work up front -- to cultivate a mindset of concerning our own needs and desires, to control our feelings toward others, and avoid even seemingly trivial events that give the appearance of accepting a bribe -- in order to be able to turn down real and enticing bribes and stay far from corruption. As we wind our way through Elul and approach Rosh Hashanah, we try to be more reflective and introspective in an effort to improve ourselves. That is the hard work and wonderful opportunity the High Holy Days offer us. Each of us has something to work on. In what areas would you benefit by proactively train yourself to think and behave differently? Elul is a wonderful time to begin.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

"Food glorious food!" / Parshat Re'eh

2011-08-23T18:20:00.000-07:00

“Food glorious food!
“They tried to kill us. We survived. Let’s eat.”
“Eat to live; don’t live to eat.”

My daughter arrived home from Israel late last night, after a summer than included leading a Birthright trip (“it was awesome”), five weeks of study as a Tikva Israel Fellow (“it was beyond awesome”), and three weeks “couch cruising,” my husband’s term for traveling from friend to relative to friend all over the country and crashing on their couches (“it was phenomenally awesome”). We picked her up at BWI last night. So much to talk about. So much to catch up on. No sooner had she hugged and kissed us all and gotten in the car, than she said, “Ema, when are you going to make me pizza?” Her father and brother (for whom I had made pizza the previous night) echoed, “Yes, when?” I have not the slightest pretensions of being a talented cook, but I do make, well… awesome pizza from scratch. Food -- and eating together -- has a special place in our lives. This is true for everyone, isn’t it?

Parshat Re’eh begins with a reminder to the Israelites that the power of blessing and curse lie in their hands:

See, this day I set before you blessing and curse: blessing, if you obey the commandment of the Lord your God that I enjoin upon you this day; curse, if you do not obey the commandments of the Lord your God, but turn way from the path that I enjoin upon you this day and follow others gods whom you have not experienced. (Deuteronomy 11:26-28)

The Israelites have choice; they have control. They can choose lives of blessing.

And while there are many topics covered in the parashah, two themes predominate and are interwoven throughout Parshat Re’eh: idolatry and food. The concerns expressed about idolatry include tearing down idolatrous worship sites (Dt. 12:2-3), engaging in idolatrous worship (Dt. 12:4-7), being lured into idolatry by the Canaanites (Dt. 12:29-31), false prophets and soothsayers that encourage idolatrous worship (Dt. 13:2-6), neighbors who lure you into idolatry (13:7-12), and entire communities that give themselves over the idolatry (Dt. 13:13-19). The passages about food and eating discuss sacrificial offerings (Dt. 12:12-16 and 15:19-20), agricultural tithes (Dt. 12:17-18 and 14:23), permissible food (Dt. 12:20ff), and a reiteration of the standards of kashrut (chapter 14).

Why do these two themes -- food and idolatry -- predominate, and why are they interwoven throughout the parashah? Perhaps one message here is to beware the idolatry of food.

By now, we all know the sobering and alarming facts: the CDC reports that 34% of American adults are obese (not just overweight, but obese) and 17% of American children (ages 2-19) are obese as well. The increase in these numbers from 1985-2010 (just 15 years) is staggering -- around 25%. There is a corresponding increase in eating disorders: anorexia, bulimia, binging. It is estimated that 8 million Americans have an eating disorder. (Those suffering from an eating disorder need quality medical care. If this is you, please seek help or allow someone who loves you to help you find it.)

We eat for nutrition. We eat for celebration. But not only nutrition and celebration.

Lucretius, the 1st century Roman poet and philosopher, said, “What is food to one, is to others bitter poison.” We overeat when we feel stress, upset, overwhelmed, depressed, sadness, bored, low on energy. We overeat due to a sense of deprivation, or self-hatred, or to please others, or addiction.

Our reasons for eating -- and overeating -- are many, varied, subtle, and sometimes unconscious. As Molly Wizenberg wisely observed, “When I walk into my kitchen today, I am not alone. Whether we know it or not, none of us is. We bring father and mothers and kitchen tables, and every meal we have ever eaten. Food is never just food. It’s also a way of getting at something else: who we are, who we have been, and who we want to be.” (A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table, emphasis mine.)

But how is overeating idolatry? Torah speaks of idolatry as the practice of worshiping sticks and statues. (That’s not what ancient peoples were doing, but that’s another topic altogether.) Idolatry takes many forms, but it boils down to regarding any object, activity, or pursuit with such adoration and devotion that it has power over us and surpasses our obligations to God. For some of us, food has become an idolatry.

I have known food-as-poison, and food-as-idolatry, especially processed sugar, and most especially chocolate. I admit to looking at a few slices of pizza remaining after dinner and saying to my family, “I don’t want any leftovers.” (What on earth was I thinking?)

Jewish tradition places a premium on health. Midrash tells us that Hillel would often take leave of his students, saying, “I’m going to perform a meritorious act.” It turns out Hillel was headed for the bathhouse. When his students expressed astonishment, he said, “If the statues erected to kings in theaters and circuses are washed and scrubbed, how more should we, who are created in the divine image and likeness, take care of our bodies, for as Torah says, For in the image of God He made man (Genesis 9:6). (Leviticus Rabbah 34:3) Our bodies are a gift from God: it is life itself.

The health problems associated with excess weight and obesity are legion and could even include a diminished lifespan. Yet we need to eat, and food is ubiquitous. There is no easy fix.

Experts tell us that the key is often a wholesale change in attitude and priorities. Isn’t that what a life of Torah is all about: retooling our attitudes and priorities. This takes time and effort. In my case, I had to rethink what food was going to be in my life, and reset my priorities. I don’t pretend it’s easy. It’s a struggle. But for many of us, it is a choice within our control. I was determined to choose blessing, and not curse, and to treat myself with the divine middot (attributes) of compassion and patience.

Our parashah ends with a holiday calendar of the three pilgrimage festivals, beginning presciently with Pesach, the festival of liberation and redemption. How do we re-enact the redemption? No surprise here: we eat. But it’s no sumptuous, calorie-laden buffet. We eat unleavened bread, bitter herbs, and the paschal sacrifice.

Observe the month of Aviv… You shall slaughter the Passover sacrifice… You shall not eat anything leavened with it… You shall cook and eat it at the place that the Lord your God will choose… After eating unleavened bread six days… (Deuteronomy 16:1-8)

And finally, the parashah ends on a note of blessing:

Three times a year -- on the Feast of unleavened Bread, on the Feast of Weeks, and on the Feast of Booths -- all your males shall appear before the Lord your God in the place that He will choose. They shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed, but each with his own gift, according to the blessing that the Lord your God has bestowed upon you. (Deuteronomy 16:16-17)

It is a blessing to have good, nutritious, affordable, plentiful food. It is also a blessing to be able to say no to food in order to say yes to health and well-being.

Naomi got pizza tonight, to the delight of her father, brothers, and sister-in-law. There are leftovers in the refrigerator.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

God's SAT? / Parshat Ekev

2011-08-15T12:42:00.000-07:00

Ekev begins, as do many sections of Torah, with the familiar reward and punishment trop: if you obey My covenant, you will be blessed with fertility in field and womb, health, and military success. Tacked on is an oft-heard warning not to engage in the idol worship of the people of Canaan. Then we find this curious claim:

Remember the long way that Adonai your God has made you travel in the wilderness these past forty years, in order to test you (l’na’so’t’kha – the root is nun-samech-hey) by hardships to learn what was in your hearts: whether you would keep the divine commandments or not. (Deuteronomy 8:2)

It’s a test? The Israelites’ 40 years of hunger, thirst, privation, and fear is a test?

In Numbers chapter 14 we are told that the 40 years in the wilderness is a punishment for the Israelites’ failure to believe Joshua and Caleb, over and above the other ten spies, that they could take possession of Eretz Yisrael.

None of the people who have seen My Glory and the signs that I have performed in Egypt and in the wilderness, and who have tested (va’y’na’su – again the root is nun-samech-hey) Me these many times and have disobeyed Me, shall see the land that I promised on oath to their fathers; none of those who spurn Me shall see it… You shall bear your punishment for 40 years… (Numbers 14:22-23, 34a)

Here, it is the Israelites who have tried and tested God, and they are being punished for it.
We do find support for the notion that God administers the SAT (Supernal Aptitude Test) to Israel on numerous occasions. Three days after crossing the Reed Sea:

The people grumbled against Moses, saying, “What shall we drink?” So he cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a piece of wood; he threw it into the water and the water became sweet. There [God] made for them a fixed rule, and there [God] tested them (ni’sa’hu – you’ve already guessed that the root is nun-samech-hey). He said, “If you will heed the Lord your God diligently, doing what is upright in [God’s] sight, giving ear to [God’s] commandments and keeping all [God’s] laws, then I will not bring upon you any of the diseases that I brought upon the Egyptians for I the Lord am your healer. (Exodus 15:24-26)

Similarly, we are told in Exodus 16:4 that the manna raining down from heaven is also a test (a’na’se’nu – yes, again) to determine if the Israelites will obey God’s instructions. Yet again in next week’s parashah, Deuteronomy 13:4, God is testing Israel. If God knows Israel so well, what need is there to test them? Clearly, God is not omniscient and cannot know how the Israelites will respond under stress.

God also tests individuals. An entire book is devoted to God testing Job.

Unquestionably the most disturbing and bewildering instance in Torah is the Akedah. God commands Abraham to offer up his beloved son Isaac (Genesis, chapter 22, ni-sah). The Rabbis are deeply troubled. Why would a good God subject an amazingly loyal devotee to such a horror? Regardless of how this test turns out, Abraham will suffer grievously. (Isaac is a whole other subject.) Yet if God knows Abraham will offer his son, what point is there to testing him? In midrash Bereishit Rabbah, we find:

It is written: The Lord seeks out the righteous man, but loathes the wicked one who loves injustice (Psalm 11:5). Rabbi Yonatan said: A potter does not test the quality of fragile vessels, which he has but to strike once and they break. Which does he test? The sturdy vessels, because even if he strikes them several times they do not break. Thus the Holy One, blessed be God, does not test the wicked, but rather the righteous, as it is said: The Lord seeks out [the Hebrew can be understood to mean “examines”] the righteous man.

It is also written: God put Abraham to the test. (Genesis 22:1). Rabbi Yosi b. Chanina said: When a flax worker knows that his flax is good, the more he pounds it, the better it becomes, and when he beats it, it becomes finer; but when he knows his flax is not good, he has but to pound it once and the fiber breaks. Thus the Holy One, blessed be God, does not test the wicked, but rather the righteous, as it is said: The Lord seeks out the righteous man.

Rabbi Eleazar said: This may be compared to a landlord who has two cows, one robust and one weak. On which would he put the yoke, not on the robust one? Thus the Holy One, blessed be God, tests the righteous, as it is written, The Lord seeks out the righteous man. (Bereishit Rabbah 32:3)

I have separated the three opinions expressed so we can examine them separately. At first glance they seem to say the same thing, but upon closer examination, we find an escalating pattern: R. Yonatan claims that God tests only the righteous because God knows the wicked will fail. R. Yosi b. Chanina goes a step further, claiming that testing the righteous makes them better and stronger. R. Eleazar goes even further, telling us that God requires the testing of the righteous (presumably to serve as a model for others).

Gevalt! What kind of theology is this?

Four possibilities come to mind. One explanation is that the Rabbis truly believe that God inflicts hardship and suffering on good people in order test their mettle and be assured God has chosen the right person.

A second interpretation is that God tests the righteous so they can serve as an example of continuing loyalty to God despite their suffering. Job is Exhibit A. (However, this sounds less like a test and more like isurim shel ahavah / chastisements of love, discussed at length in b. Berakhot 6).

A third possibility – at least in some cases – is that the notion of a test explains why good people suffer. It’s a test. We just don’t know the ultimate purpose of the test.

Are you surprised to know that I find all three explanations objectionable?

Allow me to offer a fourth interpretation. There is no morally reasonable explanation for why good people suffer; yet we know it happens all the time. Cancer, earthquakes, and drunk drivers do not carefully consider which victims they will strike. Our job is to see the tzelem Elohim – the image of God, the divine spark – in the other and do our utmost to heal them.

But how does the victim make sense of his/her suffering? What do we tell ourselves about undeserved terror, pain, loss? Some years ago I had severe chronic back pain for nearly five years. There are many who have had far worse pain, I’m sure, and I am fortunate that I finally healed. However, during those years I had to decide how I would think about the pain that was my constant unbidden companion. A dear friend and colleague recommending that I consider the pain atonement for whatever I had done wrong and failed to do right. That didn’t work. Instead, I chose to regard the pain as a test. Not as a test from God because I surely do not believe God visits affliction on people for any reason, but as my test of myself: Could I be patient? Could I refrain from complaining? Could I continue to do what I do without allowing the pain to control my life? Could I retain a sense of humor? Could I live positively and constructively with this forever if I didn’t heal? I was the tester; God was a source of strength. I didn’t choose the pain, but as long as I had it, I could choose the role it would play in my life.

Perhaps it is the Israelites’ perception that God is testing them. As a test, they learn much about themselves, including just how much they can endure. The verse with which I began this drash is followed by this:

[God] subjected you to the hardship of hunger and then gave you manna to eat, which neither you nor your ancestors had ever known, in order to teach you that a human being does not live on bread alone, but that one may live on anything that Adonai decrees. (Deuteronomy 8:3)

The Israelites learn two things during their 40 years in the Wilderness, just as I did during those five years: First, they learn to live on less. The quality of life is not a simple equation, but rather a complex of factors. It is often the case that we can live with less without diminishing the overall quality, and certainly not the meaning, of our lives. (An excellent message in a world of rapidly depleted resources.) So maybe it’s not God’s SAT but the Israelites’ (and mine): a Supernal Aptitude Test to determine if they (and I) can overcome hardship by looking above and beyond.

The second thing learned relates to the first: the importance of gratitude. When we can feel grateful for what we do have, what we don’t have begins to take a back seat, and privation and even pain are not experienced quite as acutely. If we can count our blessings rather than tally our pain, life is easier and better.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

The Shema: take two / Parshat V'etchanan

2011-08-11T10:57:00.000-07:00

I attended a junior high school run by a harsh autocrat who loved rules, discipline, and punishment. When friends of my parents arrived in the auditorium for back-to-school night a few minutes late, the principal publicly berated them and warned them that their child had better never be late to his school. The principal was a tyrant. The rules struck me as arbitrary and often formulated simply to impose control. I resisted being controlled and consequently often found myself on the receiving end of school “discipline.” On one particularly memorable occasion, I was sent to the vice-principal for some infraction or another (probably passing notes in class). The vice-principal delivered a 30-minute canned speech in which I was likened to a budding juvenile delinquent, and then threatened to send me to reform school in upstate Connecticut.

I emerged from junior high school with a strong disdain for mindless rules, and a distinct rebellious streak. Within a month of entering high school, I was summoned to the vice principal’s office because I didn’t show up for a study hall in the typing room (no desk space to get any work done; instead I went to the English Department resource and library room). I told the vice principal that after my experience in junior high school I was no longer willing to obey pointless and absurd rules for which I could see no good purpose, and the one I had violated was Exhibit A in that regard. He was quiet and thoughtful for a moment and then asked what my criteria were for following rules. That was an easy question to answer because I’d given it much thought: I was willing to follow rules that promoted order and learning in the school, and respected the person and property of everyone there. There was a long silence. He smiled and said, “Good enough. I’ll support you.” And he was true to his word for all four years of high school.

The Torah presents (in part) a world of strict rules accompanied by harsh punishment. From parshat Etchanan alone:

And now, O Israel, give heed to the laws and rules that I am instructing you to observe, so that you may live to enter and occupy the land that the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you. You shall not add anything to what I command you or take anything away from it, but keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I enjoin upon you. (Deuteronomy 4:1-3)

This is the teaching that Moses set before the Israelites: these are the decrees, laws, and rules that Moses addressed to the people of Israel, after they had left Egypt… (Deuteronomy 4:44-45)

Moses summoned all the Israelites and said to them: Here, O Israel, the laws and rules that I proclaim to you this day! Study them and observe them faithfully! (Deuteronomy 5:1. The second version of the Decalogue – the Ten Commandments – follows.)

And this is the Instruction – the laws and the rules – that the Lord your God has commanded [me] to impart to you, to be observed in the land that you are about to cross into and occupy, so that you, your children, and your children’s children may revere the Lord your God and follow, as long as you live, all His laws and commandments that I enjoin upon you, the end that you may long endure. (Deuteronomy 6:1-2)

Torah tells us again and again that the purpose of God’s commandments is to ensure that the core of the society forming in the Wildness (to be transplanted to Eretz Yisrael) is justice tempered by compassion. Much in the Torah elevates our souls: laws that require and inspire compassion and decency, generosity and honesty. At the same time, examining the laws of the Torah at a remove of more than three millennia, we can easily find problematic laws. Stoning a shabbat violator, permitting slavery, executing the women and children of those defeated in battle, shaatnez, animal sacrifice, the second-class status of women, prohibition against homosexual behavior… Many laws strike us as cruel, primitive, misogynistic, arbitrary.

Committed Jews struggle with the desire to live fully in covenant with God and the community, without ignoring or dismissing moral and social values we have come to embrace such as freedom, human rights, egalitarianism and much more. Living in the tension between our sacred text and moral values assures that will always ponder deeply, re-interpret, and struggle with God and tradition. After all, we are Yisrael, who strive with God. But the struggle sure is like running a race without a finish line.

Sometimes, however, it’s helpful to read our sacred texts – especially the ones we’re sure we know well – through a different lens. Parshat V’etchanan includes the first paragraph of Shema, which many of us have recited by heart in Hebrew since we were youngsters.

Hear, O Israel! The Lord is your God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. Take to heart these instructions with which I charge you this day. Impress them upon your children. Recite them when you stay at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you get up. Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them serve as a symbol on your forehead; inscribe them on the doorposts of your house and on yours gates. (Deuteronomy 6:4-9)

Later generations sought to understand this paragraph concretely:

Heart: the heart is the seat of our intellect and passions, which we should harness to serve God alone.
Soul: Rashi tells us this means our very life, “even if He should take your life.”
Might: our physical and financial means.
Children: pass tradition on to the next generation.
Lie down and rise up: recite Shema evening and morning.
Bind [these words] to your hand and forehead: tefillin.
Inscribe [these words] on your doorposts: mezuzah.

If we strip away the concrete interpretations that have been imposed on this paragraph, we can see another dimension:

Love God with your heart, soul, and might – every aspect of your being.
Internalize and assimilate this love.
Make it so much a part of your being that your children inherit it.
Make it part of you at all times and everywhere you go – fundamental to who you are continually becoming.
Make it the way you act in the world (your hand) and the way you think, perceive, and respond emotionally (your forehead).

Torah depicts a powerful God who commands, rewards, punishes, and manipulates. The God of Torah is coercive and demanding. But the God of my experience, whom I worship, is nothing like this. God has no supernatural powers, does not threaten, coerce or reward. God is the ground of Being and makes possible the dynamic becoming of everything in the universe through the creativity, novelty, and freedom implicit in evolution. God experiences everything we experience. God does not foresee the future because it does not yet exist. God’s omniscience lies in the possibilities, and lures us to make the right choices. Sometimes we do, and sometimes we don’t – and in each case, God shares our experience and awaits our next choice with a lure for us to decide rightly and morally. The fabulous drama of evolution – in which emergent phenomena enter the universe and freedom foments spiritual growth – are the gifts God gives us so that we can be God’s eyes, ears, and hands in the world, reaching out to touch, love, and heal one another.

Read this way, the first paragraph of Shema is not only about adherence to a strict code of laws and regulations. Rather, it might read this way: God alone is the ground of Existence and Becoming in the universe. Therefore, everything is part of a larger tapestry whose threads are interwoven inextricably together. Raise your children to understand this so that their lives, too, are a blessing. Everything you do – your thoughts and feelings, your very life, your strengths and abilities to affect change – all will have a ripple effect in this universe. Know this at all times and in all places, lest you separate yourself from the universe. Remind yourself night and day – as you lie down at night and consider what you have become that day, and as you rise up in the morning and ponder what you will do and become that day. Let God’s love and your continual becoming ground you always – let it be your home base.

As a community, we adopt standards of behavior and observance that reflect our moral values, our sense of purpose, and our need to be a community connected to one another. Torah’s authority comes not only from God who met Moses on Sinai, but from hundreds of generations of Jews who affirmed, cherished, lived loyally by, and interpreted its sacred words. Every generation reaffirms Torah and sets standards through a process of halakhic inquiry informed by the best of science, psychology, sociology, and ethics so that the mitzvot as we understand and interpret them continue to impart meaning, purpose, and communal coherence – and help us become the very best we can become. The Shema has been, and remains, the core we come home to.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

What are we doing today? / Tisha B'Av

2011-08-09T10:35:00.000-07:00

Today is the ninth of Av on the Hebrew calendar, a day of mourning marked by fasting for many Jews, but not for all Jews. In our time, darkened by the shadow of the Holocaust yet illuminated by light of the State of Israel, some find renewed meaning in Tisha B’Av and others believe it to be no longer relevant. How people decide is a matter of what Tisha B’Av means to them.

Our Rabbis tell us that five calamities befell the Jewish people in the ninth day of Av: The decree was issued that the generation that left Israel would wander in the wilderness and die there. In 586 B.C.E., the Babylonians destroyed the Temple of Solomon on the 9th of Av. The Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans on the 9th of Av in 70 C.E. The last battle of the Bar Kochba Rebellion was put down by Rome at Beitar in 135 C.E. On the 9th of Av the following year, Jerusalem was ploughed over.

That’s a lot of tragedies. Some argue that keeping the fast of Tisha B’Av assures that we will view Jewish history through a lachrymose lens, focusing excessively on tragedies. Some say it’s a sacred obligation to “remember” and we must never “forget.”

In reality, however, the idea that we either “remember” or “forget” is simplistic. It doesn’t work that way.

There is no forgetting. Everything we experience becomes part of who we are and how we think and feel, and influences the decisions we make, even if we don’t consciously remember a specific event. Every experience makes an indelible mark – however small. Every experience shapes us and is therefore incorporated into who we are continuously becoming.

At the same time there is no remembering in the sense of running a videotape in our heads. Neuroscientists tell us that our brains are not wired for that. Rather, we construct “memories” from the bits and pieces of experiences we log in, sort, retrieve, and patch together to build “memories.” How often have you been sure of a memory only to learn that it was actually a different person, or a different time, or a different place? How often have you combined elements of different events, forging a new “fact” of your past? We all do this – this is how our minds function.

There is no complete forgetting and no pure remembering. Rather, there is the quintessential human activity of making meaning. We humans are meaning making machines. We take in every experience, interpret it to derive meaning, and store it accordingly. We catalogue these bits and pieces and call on them when we need to explain a new experience. We construct narratives that often barely resembled actual events but elaborately bespeak our place and purpose in the world.

Our Rabbis constructed such a “memory” about the destruction of the Second Temple and recorded it in the Babylonian Talmud (Gittin 56). The narrative tells us that the destruction of the Temple came about because of a series of small, seemingly inconsequential events that snowballed into a massive catastrophe. Many people were involved; each could have headed off the disaster by taking action and doing the right thing at a critical moment. Tragically none did. Most guilty of all, accordingly the Rabbis, was not the Romans (surprise!) but R. Zechariah b. Abkulas, whose unconscionable and cowardly passivity earned him his colleagues’ contempt. Ironically, Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai who could be accused of acting cowardly himself (in the last days of Jerusalem, he had himself spirited out of Jerusalem hidden in a coffin) is the hero who saves a remnant and starts a disciple circle in Yavneh that saves Judaism. Could it be historically accurate that one rabbi is responsible for the cataclysm of 70 C.E. and another is responsible for the salvation of Judaism?

The story does not tell us what actually happened in 70 C.E. It tells us what the events of 70 C.E. meant to the Rabbis of Babylonia looking back from the perspective of several centuries and many experiences later. Certainly the Rabbis saw themselves as capable of having great influence on events. But there is more:

In Torah we find the power to interpret our world and find direction for our lives. In Torah, we find inspiration and courage to do the right thing at the critical moment.
Our every word and action can have far-reaching effects; we must measure our words and consider how our actions – or failures to act – will play out, and make every effort to do the right thing. Much is at stake.
Relationships quickly unravel when small tears in the fabric are not mended and allowed to propagate. (It’s no coincidence that this story is included in the tractate about divorce.)
Sometimes we are our own worst enemy.
It’s always better to accomplish something small rather than nothing at all. Often we cannot reach the goals we set for ourselves because they are idealistic (that’s good – they inspire us), but accomplishing a portion is worthwhile.

Tisha B’Av is not about history. While there are those who yearn for a return to the sacrificial cult, most of us believe that the Rabbinic tradition that emerged in the aftermath of the Destruction – and could only have arisen because of the Destruction – is a far better expression of Torah. Yet the constructed memory – the meaning – of Tisha B’Av continues to resonate with many. Whether or not they fast and recite kinot, the “memory” of Tisha B’Av – that is, the meaning we have ascribed to it – continues as part of us.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Scared half to death / Devarim

2011-07-29T09:53:00.000-07:00

What happens if you’re scared half to death ---- twice?

Sam was certain there were dybbuks under his bed. He went to his rabbi, who told him to see a doctor. So Sam went to see his internist, who sent him to a psychiatrist, but nothing helped. Sam was absolutely certain there were dybbuks hiding under his bed. His fear began to overwhelm him entirely. Then one shabbat he came to shul totally calm. “You look great, Sam,” his rabbi said. “I feel great, Rabbi, and the dybbuks are gone from my life. One session with a therapist and they’re no longer under my bed.” “One session? How?” his rabbi asked. “The therapist told me to cut the legs off my bed.”

Fear is often disabling. Perhaps this explains much of our ancestors’ behavior in the Wilderness. The book of Deuteronomy is Moses’ more-or-less chronological summation of 40 years in the wilderness.

Moses might have organized it from the inside out: that is, from the perspective of the Israelites’ experience. In which case, it might have begun like this: “We have spent 40 years see-sawing between love and fear. God has demonstrated unreserved love for us – bringing us out of bondage, parting the Reed Sea for us, giving us Torah, dispensing manna and quail in the Wilderness, furnishing a traveling well to accompany us, providing instructions to build a Tabernacle so that God could abide right here with us, guiding us through the Wilderness with a beacon of cloud and fire. You were horribly afraid when I left you to ascend Mt. Sinai; you demanded that Aaron make you an idol, a violation that will hang over us like a black cloud for generations to come. You ignored Joshua and Caleb and allowed fear to overtake you, consigning an entire generation to die out in the Wilderness. And how many times were you scared and wanted to turn tail and run back to Egypt.”

Aren’t God’s acts of love sufficient to inspire confidence in God and allay the fears of the Israelites? Yet so much of what the Israelites do, and fail to do, is due to fear. Love inspires us to engage in life. Fear can cause us to retreat: reasonable risks we don’t take, opportunities we forego, challenges we convince ourselves we can never meet – all impeded by fear. And in those moments of intense fear (or even terror) – becoming unemployed, awaiting the results of a crucially important medical test, receiving terrible news concerning a loved one, watching a child being wheeled into the operating room – we often retreat even further.

In this week’s parashah we read Moses’ first address to the Israelites, encamped on the border of Moab. They are told not once, but twice not to fear. First, concerning the Amorites: Have no dread or fear of them (Dt. 1:29). Then a second time concerning King Og of Bashan: Do not fear him… (Dt. 3:2). Twice, a terrified population is told, “Don’t be afraid.” …And don’t think of pink elephants either.

How is this supposed to help? It defies logic. As if that isn’t bizarre enough, God assures the Israelites: I have delivered [Og] and all his men and his country into your hands. How is that possible before the war is fought? And if winning is a given, why are the Israelites afraid in the first place? Beraishit Rabbah attempts to justify God’s assurance to the Israelites by telling us that Abraham modeled the kind of trust God wants the Israelites to place in God: When confronted by Og (the ancestor of the Canaanites), Abraham continued preparing matzah for Pesach; and when Og threatened to kill Isaac, Abraham proceeded with Isaac’s brit milah. The message here is: push on and trust that God protects those who do mitzvot.

I’m sure that works for some people, but by no means everyone. So let’s return to the Torah for insight.

Have no dread or fear of them. None other than the Lord your God, who goes before you, will fight for you, just as He did for you in Egypt before your very eyes, and in the wilderness, where you saw how the Lord your God carried you (n’sa’a’kha)…

N-sa-a’-kha – “I carried you.” It has happened before. Eleanor Roosevelt said:

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, “I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.” You must do the thing you think you cannot do.

Each of us has experiences to draw on for strength, proof that having survived once with God’s help, we can do it again. We all have successes and untapped reserves of strength. But for some people, mining history to feel God’s strength in the midst of crisis is too abstract, too much to ask.

Perhaps n-sa-a’-kha can be understood in other ways. Torah has no vowels and the consonants of n'sa-a'-kha can be pointed various ways.

Here’s one: no-sei-kha – “I am (already) carrying you.” Loving and caring people help one to feel God’s presence and love in a moment of intense fear is enormously powerful. You can both be that reassuring presence and accept the ministrations of other – the eyes, ears, and hands of God – when you are gripped by fear.

Here’s one more: Ni-sa’-kha – “We will carry you.” The “we” is the community of love and support we have the power to create. It is love overpowering fear. Love integrates: it connects us with others and gives us meaning and purpose. Fear separates: it makes us feel isolated and alone. We’ve all seen it. Many of us have lived it.

And more: Ni-sa’-kha – “We will carry you” – couched in the future tense –points to hope. A vision of a better future (and in some cases, any future at all) alleviates fear. Aristotle said, “Hope is a waking dream.” But I think hope is much more. Samuel Smiles, a 19th century Scottish writer and reformer put it best, “Hope is the companion of power, and mother of success; for who so hopes strongly has within him the gift of miracles.”

Ni-sa’-kha – “We will carry you” is God saying, no-sei-kha – “I am carrying you.” That is why God – who is molding Israel into a community through Torah, can tell Israel, n-sa-a’-kha – “I carried you.”

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

If it's Tuesday, this must be Dopkhah / Masei

2011-07-25T10:22:00.000-07:00

If it’s Tuesday, this must be Belgium. The 9-country, 18-day whirlwind bus tour depicted in this 1969 film pales in comparison to Israel’s multi-stop, 40-year excursion through Sinai, led by their intrepid tour guide, Moses, following a route charted by God.

Here’s how Masei begins. Does anything here surprise you?

They set out from Rameses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month. It was on the morrow of the Passover offering that the Israelites started out defiantly, in plain view of all the Egyptians. The Egyptians meanwhile were burying those among them whom the Lord had struck down, every first-born – whereby the Lord executed judgment on their gods. (Numbers 33:3-4)

The dizzying travelogue continues:

The Israelites set out from Rameses and encamped at Succoth. They set out from Succoth and encamped at Etam, which is on the edge of the wilderness. They set out from Etham and turned about toward Pi-harhiroh, which faced Baal-zephon, and they encamped before Migdol. (Numbers 33:5-7)

And just to make your head spin, here’s the itinerary from there: Etam, Marah, Elim, wilderness of Sin, Dophkah, Alush, Rephidim, Kibrot-hattaavah, Hazerot, Ritmah, Rimon-perez, Libnah, Rissah, Kehelat, Mount Shepher, Haradah, Makhelot, Tahat, Terah; Mitkah, Hashmonah, Moserot, Bene-jaakan, Hor-haggidgad, Jotbat, Abronah, Ezion-geber, Kadesh, Mount Hor.

Are you still with me?

Rare comments are offered about a particular place, but they are short (e.g., there were twelve springs and seventy palm trees in Elim; at Rephidim they had no water to drink). This makes the comments concerning Rameses especially striking. The Egyptians meanwhile were burying those among them whom the Lord had struck down, every first-born – whereby the Lord had executed judgment on their gods.

Why does Torah pause to tell us what the Egyptians – Israel’s enemies on the other side of the Reed Sea – are doing? I would suggest to you that Torah’s overall primary goal is to instill in us the twin values of justice and compassion. The world depends not only on the exercise of justice and compassion, but on establishing and maintaining the right balance between them. If we approach others with strict justice alone, we will be judgmental and punishing. If we approach people only through the attribute of compassion, we will tolerate abusive, cruel, and violent. It’s a delicate balance. Strict justice is dangerous, but so is unmitigated compassion.

Our Sages tell us that even God finds it difficult to maintain the right balance. In the Bavli (Babylonian Talmud), the Rabbis envision God praying every day. They ask the very questions you would ask: To whom? God prays to God, of course. Next question?

What does God pray? R. Zutra b. Tobi said in the name of Rav: “May it be My will that My mercy may suppress My anger, and that My mercy may prevail over My [other] attributes, so that I may deal with My children through the attribute of mercy and, on their behalf, stop short of the limit of strict justice.” (Berakhot 7a)

In Masei, we find an example of the balance between compassion and justice:

The Egyptians meanwhile were burying those among them whom the Lord had struck down, every first-born – whereby the Lord executed judgment on their gods. (Numbers 33:4)

Torah wants us, even in our pain, to consider the suffering of our enemies. Torah is telling us: While you experience freedom, know that it came at great cost. The Egyptians are burying their dead. Imagine their pain and grief. Imagine all the families who have lost a loved one. Know that justice was served by God, but do not be callous and unfeeling.

The Bavli (Megillah 10b) tells us that when the waters of the Reed Sea closed in on the Egyptians, the Israelites sang a song of redemption that is preserved in our Torah (Shirat ha-Yam, the Song at the Sea, Exodus15). The angels in heaven wished to join in Israel’s song of victory by singing “Halleluyah” but God rebuked them, saying: “How can you sing Halleluyah when My creatures are drowning?” Israel was allowed to celebrate in that moment, but the angels were not. In recording this midrash, the Sages teach us that we should do as the angels and consider with compassion the suffering of even our enemies.

It is not easy to feel compassion for one’s enemy on a battlefield but neither is it impossible. During the Vietnam War, the U. S. military used a powerful defoliant called “Agent Orange,” which contains large quantities of Dioxin. Dioxin is both a carcinogen (it causes cancer in those exposed) and teratogen (it causes birth defects in the offspring of those exposed). Somewhere between 2.5 and 4.8 million people were exposed to Agent Orange (mostly Vietnamese, but American soldiers as well) and the effects have been devastating. The damage to the ecosystem is likewise immense and continues to adversely affect the lives of those who live in the affected areas. The suffering caused by Agent Orange is inestimable. The U.S. government knew that Agent Orange contained high levels of Dioxin, and that Dioxin is a powerful carcinogen and teratogen. Yet from 1961 to 1971, the U.S. military sprayed more than 10% of Vietnam with this poison. Leaving aside for a moment the question of the legitimacy of the war in Southeast Asia, had the U.S. military exhibited compassion for the enemy – even as they pursued the war – they would not have used Agent Orange.

On a far smaller scale, how do we treat people we have decided are our “enemies.” Do we approach them with compassion, or see them only as obstacles in our lives, impediments to reaching our goals, irritants we would prefer to clear away? It is not easy to consider the perspective, feelings, and needs of someone we have deemed to be our enemy, yet Torah wants us to stretch ourselves in that direction. Our sense of justice – what we think they deserve – must be tempered by compassion, so that we see the full picture, and our justice is genuine justice, not merely revenge.

Who do you see as your enemy? How can you temper your sense of justice with compassion? The magic of this Torah teaching is that in our personal lives, it is sometimes the case that when we do this successfully, the “enemy” stops being the enemy. Still a problem perhaps, but problems can often be resolved.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

"Not intended to be a factual statement" / Parshat Mattot

2011-07-21T11:46:00.000-07:00

This past April, Senator Jon Kyl declared on the floor of the U.S. Senate: “If you want an abortion, you go to Planned Parenthood, and that’s well over 90% of what Planned Parenthood does.” In actuality, the correct figure is 3%. The following day, Sen. Kyl’s press secretary, Ryan Patmintra, issued the now-famous disclaimer that Sen. Kyl’s words were “not intended to be a factual statement.” Apparently, neither were Patmintra’s. (I’m not a mathematician but this sounds suspiciously like recursion. But let’s not go there; better to go here and enjoy Stephen Colbert’s take on it.)

When must our words be accurate, true, and sincere? Preferably always, but hey, we’re human and some occasions are more important that others. Parshat Mattot speaks about one of those occasions: vows.

If a man makes a vow to the Lord or takes an oath imposing an obligation on himself, he shall not break his pledge; he must carry out all that has come out of his mouth. (Numbers 30:3)

In a society in which business and contracts are made verbally, and very little is written down, words take on greater value. It is crucially important to be able to rely on what a person says because often that is all you have to go on.

The Torah also discusses women’s vows. (Warning: you’re not going to like this.) If a woman is a minor living in her father’s house, her vow is valid only if her father permits it. If she marries during the period covered by the vow, her husband can annul it if he disapproves. Similarly, any vow she makes while married. Widows and divorcees are the only women whose vows cannot be annulled by a man. (Numbers 30:4-17)

There is a discussion in the Talmud concerning when and how a person may be released from a vow made to God (not a promise made to another person). It helps us consider the value and meaning of our words. Mishnah Nedarim 9:1 reads as follows (NB: the numbers below are not in the text; I added them to facilitate following the commentary below):

R. Eliezer says: They release [a vow] a person [from his vow] for the sake of the honor of his father and mother.
But the Sages prohibit [releasing him from his vow for that reason].
R. Tzaddok: Before they release him [from his vow] for the sake of his father and mother, let them release for him from it for the sake of the honor of the Omnipresent! If so, there are no vows.
The Sages agree with R. Eliezer concerning a matter [about which the vow was made] between his father and his mother that they untie it for him for the sake of the honor of his father and mother.

1. What are appropriate grounds for releasing a person from his vow? R. Eliezer recognizes that there are occasions when a person makes a vow without thinking through the consequence, or in a fit of pique, or the situation changes such that the vow comes into conflict with kibud av v’em – honoring one’s father and mother. If one can honestly say, “My vow dishonors my parents and I didn’t realize this at the time I made the vow,” he can go before a bet din (court of three rabbis) and be released from his vow.

2. Sounds reasonable, doesn’t it? Surprisingly, the Sages disagree. A vow is a vow, just as a promise is a promise.

3. R. Tzaddok then points out a flaw in R. Eliezer’s reasoning. Certainly if we are concerned about the honor of one’s parents, we must all the more so be concerned about the honor of God. It’s not difficult to argue that most any vow could be construed to dishonor God. A vow made in haste, or out of anger, or without due thought all dishonor God. If we open the door to the honor of parents, we certainly must open it to the honor of God, in which case it’s wide open and never shuts. What meaning or force will any vow have?

4. The Sages must now decide. They are in a quandary. On the one hand they want to uphold the integrity of vows and the power of words that stands behind them. Yet they recognize the legitimacy of R. Eliezer’s concern in the real world of our lives. In addition, R. Tzaddok makes an excellent point that must be considered. Therefore they amend their previous opinion: Vows will stand except in one narrow situation. If one makes a vow that concerns his parents directly and in so doing dishonors them, he may be released from that vow because the vow is specific and kibud av v’em (honoring one’s parents) takes clear precedence. However, all other vows stand.

The Sages recognize human foibles and errors, but they strongly believe that our words should have integrity because words are powerful. Our words must have integrity for us to have integrity.

Sen. Kyl used words foolishly and irresponsibly. His integrity rightly suffered as a result. This might give us all pause to consider how we use words, and whether we keep the promises we make and obligations we undertake, toward the end that we pause… before speaking.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

"Im gonna live forever" / Parshat Pinchas

2011-07-14T09:52:00.000-07:00

My father z”l always told me he planned to live forever. Alas, he didn’t, but according to our Rabbis, a woman mentioned in this week’s parashah did.

Her name is Serach – a name few of us know – and she is mentioned in a census recorded in Numbers chapter 25. Most of us think a census makes boring reading – good only for sociologists and insomniacs. A census may be tedious, but it is not always boring, and often contains a fascinating detail – the lily among the thorns.

By way of background, and to set the scene, this week’s parashah provides a rationale for, and final tally of, a census taken while the Israelites are encamped in Shittim. We are told that as a result of the “incident at Baal Peor” with which last week’s parashah closes (Numbers 25:1-9) in which the Israelites engage in idolatrous behavior with the Moabites that God orders a census be taken for war. The culminating scene of that episode comes when an Israelite named Zimri copulates with a Midianite woman named Cozbi in the Mishkan (sanctuary). With a flash of zeal, Pinchas handily runs them both through with one thrust of his sword. Shockingly, Torah conveys God’s approval for Pinchas’ act of fanatical zealotry, which serves as expiation for the nation, thereby heading off another plague. But the Midianites must be avenged for Cozbi’s seduction of Zimri and indiscretion in the Mishkan. If you’re not a fan of violent group punishment, this is yet another disturbing episode in the Torah.

So what’s interesting about this census? There are three mentions of women. Why mention women in a census whose purpose is to count men of sufficient age to fight a war? Here are the three:
1. The daughters of Zelophehad (Numbers 26:33)
2. Serach bat Asher (Numbers 26:46)
3. Yocheved, the wife of Amram, and her daughter Miriam (Numbers 26: 59)

We can explain the mention of the daughters of Zelophehad as foreshadowing what will come next: chapter 26 is devoted to the objection to the law of inheritance that Zelophehad’s daughters bring to Moses concerning which God recognizes the justice of their claim. We can explain the mention of Yocheved and Miriam because they are connected with the priestly line (emanating from Aaron) that is uniquely important and related to the upcoming holy day and festival calendar in chapter 28 that enumerates the offerings brought on each day by the sons of Aaron – son of Amram and Yocheved – and their descendants. (In fact, Numbers 28:9-10 is included in the Musaf Amidah on shabbat, and v. 16ff find their way into the Musaf Amidah on festivals.)

Who is this Serach? We first meet her in Genesis in the midst of a long genealogical list (Genesis 46:17); we are told the names of the four sons of Asher, son of Jacob, and his one daughter, Serach. From this we know that she was among the 70 souls who ventured down into Egypt with Grandfather Jacob to join Joseph, who had risen to viceroy of the land. As if a bookend, the census of parshat Pinchas, as well as the account of this same census in I Chronicles 7:30, tell us that Serach was among those who left Egypt with Moses and Aaron. How is this possible? The Israelites were in Egypt for more than four centuries!

The Bible has nothing more to say about Serach, but the Rabbis found her a most intriguing figure and filled out her story.

Serach alone spans the generations from Joseph to Moses, as Pesikta de-Rav Kahanah (B’Shellach) points out: from one trustworthy leader to another trustworthy leader. At the time of the Exodus, she is more than 400 years old. In the Babylonian Talmud, Serach is said to be the one who showed Moses where Joseph was buried so that the Israelites could carry his bones out of Egypt during the Exodus (b. Sotah 13a).

One midrash has her still alive in the generation of King David – by now at least 600 years old – by identifying her as the woman in II Samuel 20:16-22 who negotiates with David’s general Yoav on behalf of her city (Beraishit Rabbah 94:9).

Perhaps best of all is a midrash in Pesikta de-Rav Kahanah 11:3 in which the R. Yochanan interprets Exodus 14:22, which describes the walls of water formed by the parted Reed Sea. A question is raised: how could the water become a wall? R. Yochanan explains that it was a sort of net that held everything back from the dry seabed. But Serach – now at least 1400 years old! – appears in the bet midrash (study house) and declares, “I was there and the water was not a net, but transparent like windows.” Serach’s testimony is immediately accepted because she was an eyewitness.

It is not surprising then that a tradition emerged that Serach never died, but rather entered Gan Eden alive, as had Enoch, Elijah and a select group of others. Serach achieved immortality thanks to a special blessing Jacob bestowed on her after she shared with him the news that Joseph was still alive by singing the words to him accompanied by her harp. Here is the blessing: “My daughter, because you revived my soul, death shall never rule you” (Yalkut Shemoni II:367, Sefer ha-Yashar, Vayigash, 14, Derekh Eretz 1:18, Midrash ha-Gadol to Genesis 45:26).

The implication is that Jacob was alive biologically after the news of Joseph’s death, but for him life was over, devoid of sweetness, value, purpose, and meaning. Without Joseph, Jacob was finished with living. When Serach broke the news to him – gently, sensitively, and lovingly, lest he die physically of shock – Jacob’s whole being was renewed and his desire for life was restored because he had found purpose in the possibility of seeing Joseph once again. It was as if Jacob, who had alive-but-dead returned to the world of the living.

And who among us has not witnessed someone brought back to life after a medical calamity, or a devastating tragedy, or serious mental illness?

The second blessing of the Amidah praises God who resurrects the dead: m’chayeh ha-meitim, literally “who enlivens the dead.” The Rabbis ascribed the blessing to Isaac who, according to some midrashim (Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer 31; Tanchuma, Toledot 22), actually died when his father Abraham acceded to God’s command that he sacrifice Isaac on Mt. Moriah. Taken together with this midrash from Shibbole ha-Leket (9a,b),

When Father Isaac was bound on the altar and reduced to ashes and his sacrificial dust was cast on to Mount Moriah, the Holy One, blessed be God, immediately brought upon him dew and revived him. That is why David, may he rest in peace, said: Like the dew of Hermon that comes down from the mountains of Zion... [Psalm 133:3] – for he is referring to that dew with which [God] revived Father Isaac. Forthwith the ministering angels began to recite, “Blessed are You, O Lord, who resurrects the dead.”

a picture emerges: Abraham completed the sacrifice, God resurrected Isaac, occasioning Isaac to be the first to say, “Blessed are You, O Lord, who resurrects the dead.”

There has long been controversy in the Jewish community concerning the phrasing of this blessing, the religious doctrine of resurrection that the Rabbis taught lies behind it, and whether or not it can and should be understood metaphorically.

There is a segment of the Jewish community that holds that the prayerbook should include only that which the community can all affirm, and in our time, few if any believe in a literal resurrection. I suspect that if we held ourselves to that standard, the siddur would resemble one of those blank books you buy at Barnes & Noble. Accordingly, some have changed m’chayeh meitim (“Who resurrects the dead”) to m’chayeh ha-kol (“Who gives life to all”) – an entirely different idea.

There are those who hold that we should recite the blessing as it has been handed down to us because it is tradition. (Are you humming those notes from Fiddler in your head at this moment?) If we cannot believe what it says, we can at least align ourselves with the generations before us that recited these same words.

There are those who hold that liturgy is poetry, and like our sacred texts, it is ours to interpret and reinterpret. Just as each generation is responsible for grasping and reinterpreting Torah to make it their own, so too must each generation make prayer its own.

I respect and find value in all three viewpoints, but I find the third more compelling. I don’t take Torah literally (indeed, I would deny that there is a “literal” meaning to any text; all understanding is mediated by interpretation). I struggle to interpret and re-interpret Torah year after year because I love it. As a Jew, it is my lifeblood. As Ben Bag Bag says of Torah (Pirke Avot 5:26), “Turn it and turn it again [study and scrutinize it], for everything is in it. Pore over it, and wax gray and old over it. Do not stir from it for you can have no better portion of life than this.” Should I not afford the siddur similar respect, love, and consideration, and seek to make its words speak to me in a real, rather than superficial, way?

Steven Schwartzchild has pointed out that the resurrection doctrine is necessary to affirm the value of our embodied existence, as well as God’s power. Neil Gillman (Death of Death) considers resurrection mythological because it points to the “beyond.” It is not that he believes he will truly be resurrected in the days of the Messiah, but the message behind the doctrine of resurrection that moves him. He explains it more or less like this: “My body” is indispensable to my sense of self. “I am my body.” Without a body, we would have no existence in time and space. Since there is no “me” without my body, whatever God has planned must include my body. He writes:

This is the ultimate meaning of the Talmudic doctrine that at the end of days, God will bring my body and my soul together again and that I will be reconstituted as I was during my life on earth. The mythic thrust of this doctrine is that it is this totality in its concrete individuality, as manifest during my lifetime, that God treasures and that God will therefore preserve for all time. (pp. 271-272)

Serach brings Jacob back to this world, back to a life of meaning and purpose. Jacob, recognizing this, blesses her with immortality. Perhaps she is mentioned in the census in parshat Pinchas to remind us that each of us can reclaim life at any time. Moreover, after we die, something of each of us remains forever because each of us has left his or her imprint on the world – the world is different for our having lived. And even more, we are linked not only to the generations before (as the midrashim about Serach point out so beautifully) but to those yet to come (as her immortality reminds us). We pave the way for them and bequeath this world to them. They live because of us and in so doing, keep us alive – even after we are dead. "Fame" has it right: "I'm gonna live forever."

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Blessing & cursing, Being a blessing & being a curse/ Parshat Balak

2011-07-07T14:09:00.000-07:00

My son was married last week. I am blessed with a wonderful daughter-in-law. Since the wedding, friends from around the world have been writing to convey their warm wishes and to bestow their blessings on the newlyweds. One friend wrote, “May the lives of the happy couple overflow with health and fulfillment!” Another wrote, “May they know happiness and joy - osher v'osher.” And this one for our family: “May you and yours be present at many happy events for years to come.” To each and every blessing I say, “Amen!”

We all want our lives to be filled with blessings. Keep the curses far away from us! Remember the rabbi’s blessing for the Tsar? “May God bless and keep the tsar… far away from us!” But are we ourselves a blessing or a curse to others?

The story of Balaam and Balak told in this week’s parashah is about many things, among them blessing and curse. On the surface, the story of Balaam, prophet of Moab who is hired by King Balak to curse Israel, seems a curious tale of jealousy, paranoia, and power, topped off by the whimsical element of a talking donkey whose command of Hebrew grammar is impressive. Lying just beneath the surface is a truth far more insidious: King Balak, out of fear, seeks to curse Israel – essentially a death sentence for thousands.

Balak son of Tzippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. Moab was alarmed because that people was so numerous. Moab dreaded the Israelites, and Moab said to the elders of Midian, “Now this horde will lick clean all that is about us as an ox licks up the grass of the field.” (Numbers 22:2-3)

The Israelites have defeated the Amorites in battle. Now, however, they are encamped peacefully on the border of Moab, presenting no threat to their hosts. Balak cannot see that; rather, in his eyes the Israelites are a marauding herd of animals. Balak hires the prophet Balaam to rid him of the plague of Israelites in his backyard:

Come then, put a curse upon this people for me, since they are too numerous for me; perhaps I can thus defeat them and drive them out of the land. For I know that he whom you bless is blessed indeed, and he whom you curse is cursed.” (Numbers 22:6)

Two resonances in this one verse are remarkable. First, Balak is concerned with the burgeoning population of Israel, echoing the concern of an earlier king – Pharaoh – who also felt threatened by Israel’s robustness and sought her destruction.

A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph. And he said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are too numerous for us. Let us deal shrewdly with them, so that they may not increase; otherwise in event of war they may join our enemies in fighting against us and rise from the ground.”… But the more they were oppressed, the more they increased and spread out, so that the [Egyptians] came to dread the Israelites. (Exodus 1:8-10, 12)

Concerning this first resonance: just as Israel continued to proliferate in Egypt, so too do the Israelites, threatened by yet another king who views them as a danger and seeks to curse them. Pharaoh’s curse – in the form of edicts to kill the baby boys and make the people’s servitude harsher – derives from fear and insecurity.

Second, King Balak’s words echo those of God to Avram when God sent him from his homeland, out into the wider world:

I will make of you a great nation,
And I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
And you shall be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you
And curse him that curses you;
And all the families of the earth
Shall bless themselves by you.” (Genesis 12:2-3)

Concerning this second resonance: the influence of Avram over other nations is passive; what they send out to Israel will return in kind, be it blessing or curse. It is not Avram who blesses or curses; it is others who choose blessing or curse by the nature of their interaction with Avram and his clan. (Pharaoh’s curse came rocketing back at him in the form of the Ten Plagues.) King Balak, in seeking to curse Israel, ultimately curses the Moabites.

Balak ascribes to the Moabite prophet Balaam, however, the power to bless and curse on God’s behalf. How strange that Balaam – a pagan prophet – is acknowledged to possess the power to curse Israel thereby sentencing many in her midst to death. The prophet’s curse is cosmic conviction. Execution will be carried out on the battlefields of Moab.

Balaam’s power, we know, comes only with God’s acquiescence. And God does not permit Balaam to curse Israel, despite the hefty fee Balak is prepared to pay.

God came to Balaam and said, “What do these people want of you?” Balaam said to God, “Balak son of Tzippor, king of Moab, sent me this message: Here is a people that came out of Egypt and hides the earth from view. Come now and curse them for me; perhaps I can engage them in battle and drive them off.” But God said to Balaam, “Do not go with them. You must not curse that people, for they are blessed.” (Numbers 22:9-11)

Balak presses. He offers more money. God permits Balaam to accompany Balak and his entourage view Israel from a vantage point ideal for casting a curse upon them. When it appears that Balaam may well accede to Balak’s request, God stations an angel in Balaam’s path. Balaam cannot see the angel, but his donkey can. God opens the mouth of a donkey – a lowly animal (recall how Balak described Israel as a herd of lowly animals) – and speaks words of wisdom and insight. She can see what the prophet himself cannot see: an angelic manifestation of God.

Consider the remarkable reversals here: In the sight of Balak, Israel are animals, yet God blesses them. Balaam, hired to curse them, is prevented by his animal who speaks like a human and sees the angelic manifestation of God Balaam cannot see. Those who bring blessing see, hear, and are blessed. Those who bring curse are blinded, unable to hear, and curse themselves in the end.

We bring blessing and curse to other people’s lives on a daily basis through our words, our deeds, and our failures to speak and act. When we operate out of fear and insecurity – as did Pharaoh and Balak – we are most likely to be a curse rather than a blessing. But when we act out of our love for God and God’s Creation, we bring blessing. As shabbat approaches, consider whether you have been a blessing or a curse to those in your life during the past week. Where did you act out of fear and insecurity? Where did you act with love and concern?

This pertains not only to personal relations, but to leadership style, as well. There are people in positions of power and authority who command and demand, even disparaging and humiliating those under them. They are the Pharaohs and Balaks. They operate out of fear and insecurity masked by excessive arrogance and a show of power. And there are those who see their leadership not as a position of power, but rather one of empowerment. They seek the growth and fulfillment of those who work for them. They know that with the blessings of growth and fulfillment come greater productivity and loyalty.

This principle also pertains to parenting. Parents who dominate their children’s lives, making their decisions and shielding them from all pain, do not realize that they bring the curse of insecurity and dependence upon their children. Parents who empower their children to make good decisions, face challenges, and cope with what life dishes out, and who do not ridicule them for mistakes (who among us has not made mistakes, after all?) bless their children with confidence and honestly earned self-esteem.

Bottom line: Those who primarily exert power over others often curse them. Those who empower others bless them.

May Leora and Danny enjoy all the blessings bestowed on them. May you be blessed with all that you wish for yourself. And may you in your life be a blessing to those around you.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

If we do not succeed, we run the risk of faiure / Chukkat

2011-06-27T13:34:00.000-07:00

Dan Quayle is said to have uttered these immortal words: “If we do not succeed, we run the risk of failure.” Maybe that’s not such a bad thing.

If you died today, would you consider your life a success or a failure? How do you measure success and failure?

In Parshat Chukkat, Moses learns that he will never enter the Land of Israel. The Israelites encamp in Kadesh in the Wilderness of Tzin and there Miriam dies. The well that for her sake has followed the Israelites through the wilderness for nearly four decades disappears. The Israelites revert to their default behavior: they complain to Moses and imagine Egypt the fertile garden spot of the world that they were forced to leave. God tells him to bring forth water from the rock at Meribah – the very same rock he spoke to much earlier in the Israelites’ journey (Exodus 17:1-7) with success. This time, as before, God tells him:

“You and your brother Aaron take the rod and assemble the community, and before their very eyes order the rock to yield its water. Thus you shall produce water for them from the rock and provide drink for the congregation and their beasts.” (Numbers 20:8)

Moses, however, is angry with the people. He takes his staff and strikes the rock. Okay, so Moses doesn’t achieve the goal of providing water in precisely the way God prescribed. Who wouldn’t be mad?

And Moses raised his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod. Out came copious water, and the community and their beasts drank. But the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust Me enough to affirm My sanctity in the sight of the Israelite people, therefore you shall not lead this congregation into the land that I have given them.” (Numbers 20:11, 12)

Moses has endured 40 years of sacrifice, suffering, dangers, and hardships for Israel’s sake. They have spent much of the last forty years kvetching and rebelling. Wouldn’t you lose your temper on occasion?

What must Moses feel upon hearing this harsh verdict? Moses – the quintessential leader, prophet, and for our Sages, rabbi, is in this moment a failure. Success has eluded him.

Or has it?

What makes a life successful? Many of us struggle with discerning whether we are successes or failures. Perhaps that is why so much that is said about success and failure is rather cynical. Here’s a sampler:

The secret of success is sincerity. Once you can fake that you’ve got it made. (Jean Giraudoux)

Nothing succeeds like the appearance of success. (Christopher Lasch)

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure. (Mark Twain)

Nothing fails like success. (Gerald Nachman)

Why be a man when you can be a success? (Bertolt Brecht)

We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don’t like? (Jean Cocteau)

What does it mean to live a successful life? What does it mean for you to have lived a successful life? We live in a society that plies and pumps us with images of success that are conceived on Madison Avenue and manufactured in Hollywood. They are far from realistic.

No one’s life is unalloyed joy and success, of course, and most people do not receive the recognition, or feel the appreciation, they deserve. Sadly, what has gone wrong, or failed to go as planned, often looms large in our eyes – crowding out memories of our many achievements. But perhaps in addition to recognizing that everyone’s life entails failure, and that failures do not define our overall worth, we might do well to consider the “fringe benefits of failure.”

In June of 2008, J. K. Rowling delivered the Commencement Address at Harvard University. (You can read the transcript and view the video on line.) After noting her own colossal failures – “I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale. An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless” – Rowling provides sage advice on the blessing of failure.

You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.
Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way. I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected; I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above the price of rubies.

The great philosopher Mickey Rooney said: “You always pass failure on the way to success.” Perhaps Theodore Roosevelt put it more eloquently: “Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.”

In his last hours, as he trod up Mt. Nebo, Moses may well have pondered his many failures. I’d like to think that he recognized that failure comes with the territory of living. I hope his failures did not overshadow his remarkable successes.

It is not the “great” and “glorious” things that make our lives a success. It is the accumulation of “little” things – the people we have loved, the good we have done, the difference we have made. How many of these came because of what we learned from failures?

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Entirely true but utterly irrelevant / Parshat Korach

2011-06-24T13:24:00.001-07:00

Korach, as far as I can tell, is jealous and power hungry. Born into the tribe of Levi, Korach is not a member of the clan of Aaron and hence has no claim to the priesthood. He is second echelon authority seeking power. Korach gathers 250 minions around him – mostly from the tribe of Reuven, who, as descendants of Jacob’s firstborn son also feel disenfranchised – and stages a rebellion against Moses and Aaron. His fight song goes like this: “You have gone too far! For all the community are holy, all of them, and Lord is in their midst. Why then do you raise yourselves above the Lord’s congregation?” (Numbers 16:3)

Korach’s claim – “For all the community are holy, all of them, and the Lord is in their midst” – is entirely true but utterly irrelevant. It’s no secret that the Torah considers Israel a holy people, even a nation of priests. Rashi points out that Korach is claiming that everyone who stood at Sinai enjoys the same status – an indisputable fact. That “fact,” however, says nothing about who is authorized to lead them. Korach’s claim that everyone is holy – to which even Moses and Aaron can say “amen” – is a red flag. It’s a distraction. It is a shrewd, deceptive, subversive tactic. While proclaiming a fact, it is at its core dishonest because it has nothing to do with the truth that God appointed Moses to lead Israel and he has served with distinction.

Last July, conservative political firebrand Andrew Brietbart released a selectively edited video clip from a speech delivered by USDA official Shirley Sherrod at a NAACAP Freedom Fund Banquet on March 27, 2010. In the speech, Sherrod told a story about having once – prior to her employment at the U.S. Department of Agriculture – seen things through the lens of race. It is entirely true that Sherrod once privileged African American farmers over others. Sherrod herself said so. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, viewing the damning clip on an iPod, sought to end Sherrod’s employment at the USDA. His condemnation was quick.

Briebart’s carefully (and deceptively) edited clip – which quickly went viral, was a shrewd and malicious deception because it lacked context. Sherrod’s point in telling the story was that she had discovered – on her own – that racism in all its manifestations is morally wrong. The video clip, posted by Breitbart to the Internet without context or explication, caused the very media frenzy he was counting on. In this end, the truth came to light, but not before much damage was done by his “facts.”

Recently I read a blog entry by Jack Brennan posted earlier this month. I don’t know Jack Brennan. On his blog, Jack says he is the parent of grown men whom he adopted from the foster care system. He himself knows what it’s like to lose a parent and get another. How he lost his mother is the subject of the May 3, 2011 blog post that caught my eye. When Jack was 15, his parents went out to a party. His father was drunk when they left, and as Jack wryly notes, it’s unlikely he sobered up at the party. On the way home, his father crashed the car into a concrete abutment on the Long Island Expressway. His father was severely injured and his mother died. Some months later, Jack overheard his father explaining to a cousin that the party had been held at the new police precinct where he worked. He noted that his friend Norman had transferred him to this precinct. Had Norman not transferred him, he would not have been invited to the party. Therefore, he reasoned, the accident that killed Jack’s mother was Norman’s fault.

It is a fact that Norman transferred Jack’s father. It is a fact that had Norman not transferred Jack’s father, he and Jack’s mother would not have attended the party that evening. But these facts are utterly irrelevant to the truth that Jack’s father was driving drunk, and that is why his mother was killed in a one-car accident.

On the corporate level, Enron is the poster child for facts that obscure truth. Enron provided an ocean of facts – all accurate and all publicly disclosed – but so complex that it obscured the underlying fraud they were purposefully perpetrating.

Enron drenched us with facts to cover up its corruption. Jack’s father told facts to avoid the truth and to evade any responsibility for his actions. Just like Korach.

The Rabbis suggest that perhaps the source of Korach’s hubris and sense of entitlement comes from knowing that the prophet Samuel will be among his descendants (B’midbar Rabbah 18:15). Moses, after all, will have no known descendants. Perhaps Korach considers himself far worthier to lead Israel because of the line that will emerge from him. Without asking how Korach could possibly have known whom his descendants would be – the Rabbis play fast and loose with the timeline – we can certainly note that Korach uses these “facts” to undermine Moses and Aaron on utterly irrelevant grounds. Armed with facts, Korach purposefully diverts attention from the truth.

In our 24/7 media cycle, we are continually plied with facts. It’s often difficult to separate facts from truth. Bombarded with facts, we lose sight of the truth. It’s a major sorting activity.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

We learn what we live / Parshat Shelach Lekha

2011-06-12T14:33:00.000-07:00

“Children Learn What They Live” hangs in kindergartens and pediatricians’ offices. Have you seen it (you can read it below)? In the 39 years since Dorothy Law Nolte penned this poem, it has come to be a classic parents’ primer.

The theme of parshat Shelach-Lekha is a riff on this poem: if people live with freedom, they learn to feel empowered. After all, we learn what we live. The Israelites, born and raised in slavery, socialized and acculturated in the tar pits of Egypt, find themselves suddenly and miraculously free. But not having lived freedom, they do not yet feel empowered. Inside they are still slaves at heart.

The ill-fated reconnaissance mission into Eretz Yisrael predictably falls flat on its face. Although the 12 spies bring back a promising report…

“We came to the land you sent us to; it does indeed flow with milk and honey, and this is its fruit [referring to a cluster of grapes so enormous it took two men to carry it].” (Numbers 13:27)

they also report:

“However, the people who inhabit the country are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large; moreover, we saw the Anakites there. Amalekites dwell in the Negev region; Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites inhait the hill country; and Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the Jordan.” (Numbers 13:28-29)

This latter intelligence spooks the people. Despite Caleb’s and Joshua’s assurances that Israel is fully capable of taking possession of the Land, the people panic. They break into terrified wailing and crying, imagining their quick demise at the hands of the gigantic and powerful inhabitants of the Land.

Torah tells us that God responds by angrily telling Moses,

“How long will this people spurn Me, and how long will they have no faith in Me despite all the signs that I have performed in their midst? I will strike them with pestilence and disown them, and I will make of you a nation far more numerous than they!” (Numbers 14:11-12)

Where have we heard this before? When Israel built the Golden Calf, God became enraged and threatened to wipe out the nation and start anew with Moses (Exodus 32:9). Here, as there, Moses implores God to forgive the people, and God accedes, with a huge caveat:

And the Lord said, “I pardon, as you have asked. Nevertheless, as I live and as the Lord’s Presence fills the whole world, non of the men who have seen My Presence and the signs that I have performed in Egypt and in the wilderness, and who have tried Me these many times and have disobeyed Me, shall see the land that I promised on oath to their fathers; non of those who spurn Me shall see it…” (Numbers 14:20-23)

The generation born in Egypt is doomed to die in the wilderness. The next generation, born in freedom, will inherit the land of their ancestors. This generation will taste, breath, and live in freedom; they will be empowered. They will be what they live.

Why doesn’t God get this? Why does God insist it’s “all about him”: they’re spurning God, they’re disobeying God, they lack faith in God…? How about: they lack faith in themselves? I can already hear you saying: “You’re judging a book that is more than 2500 years old by 21st century sensibilities and values. Not fair.” And you are correct. But at the same time, I worry about the troubling and off-putting portrait of God Torah paints making it so difficult for so many Jews to take Torah seriously.

To the extent that God is viewed as a cosmic parent, God is taken as a model parent (Avinu Malkeinu). We must dissect our sacred text and separate our ancestors’ expression of their experience from what we know of human psychology, self-esteem, and morality. Moreover, it’s not just about children. As adults, we absorb and deliver to ourselves messages about our value, worth, and abilities all the time. Do we choose as friends and companions people who exhibit the traits we aspire to, allowing them to model for us what we seek in ourselves? Do we empower ourselves?

Let’s take a look at what the passage above says about our relationship with God and our role as parents and mentors:

Israel has tried God: Of course they did. How else can they learn to feel empowered if they don’t challenge authority, flap their wings, and push the edges of the envelope? We should encourage our children to engage in safe experimentation. Our children’s ventures into novelty are not a rejection of us; they are affirmation that encourage and empower them to be thinkers and explorers. You owe it to yourself to do the same: try something new, see if it works, learn more about yourself. Within our tradition there is a nearly inexhaustible supply of opportunities and varieties for study, religious practice, and community. Break out and try something new.
Israel has disobeyed God: Ditto on this one. The Torah’s emphasis on obedience is troubling because it paves the way for a practice of Judaism that is all about permitted/forbidden and devoid of spiritual exploration. What is more, it emphasizes the negative. All good parents know that it’s far smarter to praise what is good with a reason. In other words, rather than being alert to opportunities to punish, be vigilant for opportunities to mark what is right: “Thank you for helping your sister. Did you notice how happy you made her? You’re a big help to me.” Mitzvah goreret mitzvah. The goal of religion – and Judaism in particular – is to empower, enable, and encourage people to choose good, not slam them with guilt and ridicule for doing what we have decided is failure. Of course there are things that are unquestionably wrong (hurting others verbally or physically, stealing, cheating, deceiving and so on) but in the main, there are far more opportunities to affirm good choices. In Torah and among traditional commentators, the “sin” of the Israelites has far-reaching ramifications. Rav Kook even wrote in 1908 that the Jewish people suffered repeated exile and humiliation because of the horrendous sin of their ancestors.
Israel has spurned God: Is there a parent who hasn’t heard the words, “I hate you!” Is there an adult who didn’t utter or mutter them long ago? The notion that God demands absolute affirmation is insulting to God. I often tell people who rail against God in the face of the loss of a loved one, “Go ahead, it’s perfectly alright to yell at God. God can take it and will still be here for you, a source of love, strength, and comfort. Your pain is God’s pain – go ahead and share it.” Our Rabbis understood this. In the Babylonian Talmud (Yoma 69) they envision God saying: “Hate Me and revile Me, but do not ignore Me.” All relationships have their ups and downs. The important thing is to stay in relationship.
Israel lacks faith in God: lo ya’aminu vi (Numbers 14:11) is customarily translated “they have no faith in Me.” I confess that I don’t understand the concept of faith if it means to believe in something I neither comprehend nor experience but, as the saying goes, “take on faith.” I do understand the concept of trust and confidence based on past experience and reason. Some people use the terms interchangeably, but I find there is value in making the distinction. Faith is absolute: either you have it or you lack it. Trust, however, must be earned. It is true that the Israelites have experienced God’s redemption (the plagues in Egypt, the parting of the Reed Sea, the giving of Torah at Mt. Sinai), but this is all in the past three months. Perhaps they are wondering: where was God when we were enslaved for 400 years? Perhaps the real problem was that Israel lacked faith/confidence/trust in themselves.

Torah reflects our ancestors’ experience of God, their world, and themselves. It is not necessarily our experience. Sometimes there is wisdom to be gleaned from recognizing the values and insights of our time that distinguish us from them. But as always, Torah stimulates sacred conversation.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Children Learn What They Live
Dorothy Law Nolte, 1972

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.
If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.
If children live with fear, they learn to be apprehensive.
If children live with pity, they learn to feel sorry for themselves.
If children live with ridicule, they learn to feel shy.
If children live with jealousy, they learn to feel envy.
If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty.
If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.
If children live with tolerance, they learn patience.
If children live with praise, they learn appreciation.
If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.
If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.
If children live with recognition, they learn it is good to have a goal.
If children live with sharing, they learn generosity.
If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.
If children live with fairness, they learn justice.
If children live with kindness and consideration, they learn respect.
If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and in those about them.
If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

Location, location, location / Parshat B'haalotcha

2011-06-09T17:47:00.000-07:00

My son Danny recently ran his first half-marathon. The family piled into the car at 5 am and drove out to cheer him on. The organizers promised a bus to bring spectators to the 9-mile mark to cheer on the runners, and then to the end point to watch them cross the finish line. Everyone piled onto the buses except us – there was no room left. So we hopped into our car knowing only where the finish line was, but not the route of the race. We realized that if we crossed the path of the race, the road would be blocked off and we wouldn’t be able to get through. So we plugged in our new GPS and within a minute or two it told us exactly where we were, where the finish line was, and allowed us to survey the area to find a best route. Too late! Just as we were approaching a turn-off we were sure would take us out of the path of the race, a police officer stopped us. Everyone in front of us got through. Ours was the first car stopped. I’ll finish this story in a few minutes. For now, however, the experience of having the GPS find us and “look around” to chart a route has me thinking about location.
B’haalotcha is a rich Torah portion with so much worth discussing. This week, however, I want to look “behind” this chronicle of Israel’s early journey through the Wilderness and, with a literary GPS, ask: Where is the Tent of Meeting located? Where is God?
Here are some verses from this week’s parashah. Moses, overburdened by leading the every-complaining Israelites, has reached the point of despair. God instructs him to gather 70 elders and bring them to the Tent of Meeting where God will share some of Moses’ spirit with them so they can share the burden with Moses. As you read these verses, ask yourself: Where is the Tent located? Where is God?

Then Adonai said to Moses, “Gather for Me seventy of Israel’s elders of whom you have experience as elders and officers of the people, and bring them to the Tent of Meeting and let them take their place there with you. I will come down and speak with you there… (Numbers 11:16-17a)

Moses went out and reported the words of Adonai to the people. He gathered seventy of the people’s elders and stationed them around the Tent. Then, after coming down in a cloud and speaking to him, Adonai drew upon the spirit that was in him… (Numbers 11:24-25a)

Two of the representatives, one named Eldad and the other Medad, had remained in camp; yet the spirit rested upon them – they were among those recorded, but they had not gone out to the Tent – and they prophesied in the camp. An assistant ran out and told Moses, saying, “Eldad and Medad are acting the prophet in the camp!” (Numbers 11:26-27)

Moses then reentered the camp together with the elders of Israel. (Numbers 11:30)

A careful reading with literary GPS turn on reveals two things:
1. The Tent is located outside the Israelite encampment, at its periphery.
2. God abides in heaven above and descends only to speak with Moses on occasion.

If you’re still not sure, here’s a passage from the Book of Exodus:

Now Moses would take the Tent and pitch it outside the camp, at some distance from the camp. It was called the Tent of Meeting, and whoever sought Adonai would go out to the Tent of Meeting that was outside the camp. Whenever Moses went out to the Tent, all the people would rise and stand, at the entrance of each tent, and gaze after Moses until he had entered the Tent. And when Moses entered the Tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the Tent, while [God] spoke with Moses. (Exodus 33:7-9)

Pretty clear, isn’t it? The Tent is outside the camp, and God comes down only to speak with Moses when the occasion requires.

Now please consider these passages. Again, using your literary GPS, ask yourself: Where is the Tent located? Where is God?

Adonai spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying: The Israelites shall camp, each man with his standard under the banners of their ancestral house; they shall camp around the Tent of Meeting at a distance. (Numbers 2:1-2)

The Torah next describes precisely which four tribes were to camp in each cardinal direction with respect to the Tent of Meeting. The Tent is located in the center of the Israelite encampment.

And this:

When Moses had finished the work [of erecting the Tent], the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the Presence of Adonai filled the Tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting, because the cloud had settled upon it and the Presence of Adonai filled the Tabernacle. When the cloud lifted from the Tabernacle, the Israelites would set out, on their various journeys; but if the cloud did not lift, they would not set out until such time as it did lift. For over the Tabernacle a cloud of Adonai rested by day, and fire would appear in it by night, in the view of all the house of Israel throughout their journeys. (Exodus 40:33b-38)

Here, once the Tabernacle is completed, God moves in permanently. The hovering cloud reflects God’s continuing, abiding Presence.

What we find in Torah are two very different views. In one, the sacred space is located outside, at the periphery of the community. God comes and goes from the Tent. It is the community that is central.

In the second view, the sacred space is located in the center of the community, and God is permanently ensconced in that space. The sacred space for God is central.

The second view – the Tabernacle located in the center and God permanently ensconced – bespeaks stability and continuity. In short, security and permanence. It prefers the status quo, fixed roles, and hierarchies: we know who may enter each precinct of the Tabernacle or Temple, when, and why, and expect it will always be thus. Why? Because it is the Tabernacle/Temple – the institution and its rituals – that is central.

The first view – the Tabernacle located outside the camp and God visiting as needed – bespeaks flexibility, portability, and freedom. It is a view that invites exploration and change, pushing the boundaries of what is toward what might be. Why? Because it is the community – its pressing needs and concerns – that is central.

Perhaps surprisingly, the first view is of a largely transcendent God (God is mostly “out there” or “above”) and the second view is of an immanent God, residing within the community.

If I were to guess, I would say that the second view came first: When the Temple stood in Jerusalem, there was a centralized cult, with an established priesthood, rituals, and hierarchy of authority. People understood God to be immanent – a permanent dweller in the Holy of Holies. Perhaps they looked back on the Wilderness years through this lens. They accordingly believed that God would always protect Jerusalem. But that did not happen. The First Temple was destroyed in 586 B.C.E. and much of the population was either killed or dragged in chains into Exile in Babylonia – wrenched from their land, bereft of their Temple, in a state of shock. Perhaps they looked back on the Wilderness experience and envisioned a different organization: the community was central, and the Tabernacle at the periphery. God was not permanently in the Holy of Holies (now destroyed) but rather still in heaven, portable, and able to be with the People Israel wherever their journey took them. That view must have been comforting.

We are the inheritors of both views: the view of status quo- stability-continuity, and the view of community-flexibility-portability. Both perspectives are deeply imbedded in our tradition and consequently in our psyches. Both perspectives are continuously in tension. We desire permanence, stability, continuity and security. Yet we are a countercultural religion, always questioning, pursuing freedom, and pushing the boundaries for humankind. As we “move” in our thinking, God accompanies us – our moral and spiritual GPS.

We see these views come into conflict when we face questions like: Can we hold a service outside the synagogue? Is it okay to join a chavurah, or should everyone belong to a synagogue? Are alternative ways of davening and celebrating holy days acceptable, or are they “inauthentic?”

If we are careful not to take either worldview literally, but understand the values, ideals, and hopes behind them, we can find the balance we need – as individuals, in our families, and in our communities – between continuity and change. Both are part of our tradition – each in generous measure. “We should continue to do it this way because we’ve always don it this way” is weak justification, just as is “We should never do it the way others before us did it.” Our religious GPS locates sacred space within and without.

The postscript to my son’s half-marathon: When the police officer stopped us, it was clear we could not arrive at the end point in time to see Danny cross the finish line. Jonah (my younger son) quickly calculated how far we were from the finish line and, based on the time elapsed, predicted that his brother would show up where we were stalled in a few minutes. So I hopped out of the car in time to see my son coming around a curve. I cheered him on and even snapped a half-decent photograph of him. The GPS served us well in the end.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

"To infinity and beyond!" / Shavuot

2011-06-06T17:53:00.000-07:00

When Buzz Lightyear trumpeted those memorable words, “To infinity and beyond!” in Toy Story, the absurdity delighted us and the phrase instantly became iconic in our household. When it appeared in the title of an article published by a prestigious university, however, we were not laughing. One of my kids remarked sardonically, “Someone’s not quite clear on the concept.”

Infinity means without limit. What does “beyond infinity” mean? In the realm of engineering and science it means, “Someone’s not quite clear on the concept.”

Perhaps in the realm of religious experience and belief, which of necessity we speak about metaphorically, the phrase has meaning. “Infinity” can pertain to space or time.

Imagine with me a God that is the Ground of Being. Imagine a God that makes existence possible – not just your life and mine, but the existence of anything at all, as well as everything that is. And because this God makes existence possible, God also makes possible emergent life and phenomena that never before existed: genuine novelty. (Is that what a miracle is?) And because this God makes existence and emergence possible, this God makes morality, creativity, beauty, and love possible. We experience what God makes possible all the time: us, our ability to experience the world, our ability to make moral decisions, our ability to love, our continuous change and evolution as individual people, our fundamental and inseparable connection not only to this gloriously beautiful blue marble, but to the entire universe. All that is and all that is possible reside in God. All that is and all that is possible are God. God is the infinite possibilities of our world, and also beyond: the very Ground of Being that makes those possibilities possible.

This is not how God is described in Hebrew Scripture. There we meet a God who is a Being with a will, who exerts power, who interacts with this world, and who prescribes that we be just (yet fails to rain down justice from heaven).

This is not the neo-Platonic God of medieval thinkers like Saadia Gaon and Solomon ibn Gabirol: perfect, distant, wholly immaterial and transcendent, at a great remove from our world, emanating the universe through a series of lesser beings. God is omniscient (all-knowing) and omnipotent (all-powerful).

This is not the neo-Aristotelian God of Maimonides – the Unmoved Mover, the First Cause, the Active Intellect – that is wholly removed from our world and utterly disinterested in us.

But perhaps this is the God of Rabbi Akiba (~50 to ~135 C.E.). Perhaps.

The Babylonian Talmud (Menachot 29b) describes the very moment Moses stands at the peak of Sinai and God is poised to give him Torah. Moses is suddenly and mysteriously whisked to heaven (“to infinity and beyond”) where he sees God “tying crowns” on the letters of the Torah (these are the only decorations permitted in a scroll of Torah – please see the graphics attached to this blogpost for examples). Moses asks why God is delaying matan torah (the Giving of Torah). God explains that in the future, a man named Akiba ben Yosef will interpret not only the words, but also the letters and even the crowns. He will enlarge on the meaning and possibilities of Torah. The letters may be said to have meaning, but the decorations? Infinite possibilities. Moses is astounded. He wants to see such a man. God says, “Turn around,” and when Moses does he finds himself sitting in the eighth row of R. Akiba’s academy. R. Akiba is teaching his disciples Torah – with interpretive possibilities unimaginable to Moses. Poor Moses cannot understand a single word or concept he hears. Moses’ spacial journey to “infinity and beyond” is now also a temporal journey “to infinity and beyond.” He has transcended linear time; he sees that all that is, and all that is possible, is contained in God’s Torah because it emanates from the God of possibility.

Moses is the “lawgiver” because he transmitted God’s Torah to Israel. For Moses, Torah is a sacred book of God’s will for Israel. R. Akiba was, to our Sages, the “new Moses” because he could delve into the text in order to go beyond the text through interpretation and creative application. For Moses, Torah is the moment and place where infinity irrupts into our lives and takes us to possibilities beyond.

Who hasn’t sat daydreaming and wondered what else they might do and be. Our imaginations are limited to our experiences and our minds. But there exist possibilities we have not imagined and that do not yet exist, yet they abide in God, the author of Torah.

For some, Torah is a book, a text given long ago on one particular occasion in one particular place that forms the basis of Jewish law and practice. It is static. It simply is and it is our job to find out what it already means. But for R. Akiba Torah is a relationship between Israel and her God, a process of becoming Israel, for we are always remaking ourselves as humans and as Jews. Plato reports (Cratylus 402A) that Heraclitus said, “You cannot step into the same river twice.” So too you are not the same person you were a moment ago. Our experiences and our decisions change us continuously. The same is true of Torah. Torah is dynamic because it is relational – the ever-evolving relationship between Israel and her God. God understands this – God ties crowns on the letters of the Torah to insure that Torah will not become calcified – fixed in time or space – thereby reduced to a mere text.

For so many, Torah is merely “the instruction book of life” or “God’s revelation of how we are to live our lives” (actual quotes from actually rabbis). That’s the Moses approach. A friend told me recently of her brother, who rejected religion in college, and is now part of a rigid Orthodox community. Despite an Ivy League education that would have taught him to be intellectually curious and analytical, everything now is a matter of permitted and forbidden. There is neither inquiry, nor inquisitiveness, nor creativity in his Torah. His parents, who have always kept a kosher home, have adopted greater and great stringencies to accommodate him, yet he keeps finding more. They can no longer meet his needs. He no longer eats in his parents’ home. Where is kibbud av v’em (honor your father and your mother) in this? How is this a living Torah? Recently at a family gathering on shabbat, another rabbi began to make Havdalah, and the brother objected because it was one minute away from the time he calculated to be “correct.” Does he think that our Sages could measure time to the minute? Does he think they thought that important? Does he think that they would have condoned his disrespect for another rabbi for the sake of one minute? His Torah is a “God’s little instruction manual” and no more.
Torah is so much more. Yes, we study Torah to help us make decisions about how to live our lives because we are always becoming who we will be. Torah is the People Israel’s living, breathing covenantal relationship with God. It is our way of being Jews in the world and becoming better Jews. This is the R. Akiba approach.

For R. Akiba, the Revelation at Mount Sinai that we celebrate on Shavuot is a moment outside time. Torah is a relationship outside space. Because God is both within time and space, and also beyond time and space, when we experience God, we too experience “infinity and beyond.”

Because Torah is relational, it was not given once at Mount Sinai. It is given again and again – in every moment – a flow of divine energy, love, creativity, and moral possibility. The river flows on, always changing, never the same. We have but to dip our buckets in and savor the sweet water of Torah – mayim chaim (“life-giving water”).

Chag sameach!

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Things are not always what they seem: the ordeal of the Sotah / Parshat Naso

2011-06-01T18:47:00.000-07:00

In medieval Europe and elsewhere, trial by ordeal was often imposed to adjudicate a person’s innocence or guilt when evidence was lacking. It was viewed as judicium Dei – a procedure in which God would judge, and either condemn to death, or exonerate the innocent by protecting the accused from the ordeal or performing a miracle on behalf of the accused. Often, the victims were women accused of witchcraft or adultery, and their ordeal involved either fire or water: walking nine feet over red-hot metal, removing a stone from a pot of boiling water (or oil or lead), submersion in water with a millstone fastened around the neck (a favorite sport of witch hunters in the 16th and 17th centuries). Trial by ordeal is attested as far back as the Code of Ur-Nammu (ca. 2100 B.C.E.) and the Code of Hammurabi (ca. 1760 B.C.E.).

Many have said that this week’s parashah, Naso, features trial by ordeal in parshat ha-sotah (the portion about the suspected adulteress). I disagree.

Torah tells us that if a man is overcome by jealousy, believing his wife has had an extramarital affair, but there is no evidence and there are no witnesses, yet he is still consumed by a “fit of jealousy” (Numbers 5:14), he can subject her to the trial of the sotah.

If this were a trial by ordeal, we would expect it would determine her innocence or guilt. But if we read Torah’s description carefully, it becomes clear that the trial is designed to acquit.

How does it work? The husband drags his wife to the priest in the Tabernacle or Temple and accuses her of adultery. He brings a grain offering without oil or frankincense – this is not a joyful occasion. The priest bares the woman’s head. He then brings an earthenware vessel, puts some dust from the floor of the Tabernacle in it, and adds water. Next, the priest writes out the curse of the sotah (straight from this week’s parashah – Numbers 5:19-22) and rubs the very ink – the curse itself – into the vessel containing water and dust. The sotah is compelled to drink this concoction.

Once he has made her drink the water – if she has defiled herself by breaking faith with her husband, the spell-inducing water shall enter into her to bring on bitterness, so that her belly shall distend and her thigh shall sag; and the wife shall become a curse among her people. But if the wife had not defiled herself and is pure, she shall be unharmed and able to retain seed. (Numbers 5: 27-28)

Let’s pause for a moment, step back, and take a broad view of this bizarre ritual. The husband has initiated a dramatic and public ceremony. His wife undergoes public humiliation (baring her head publicly adds to her humiliation). But what is the likely outcome? I recall as a child being told on many occasions the 18th century English proverb, “We must eat a peck of dirt before we die.” Okay, so a peck is a rather large amount – 2 gallons! – but this adage has been generally understood to acknowledge that a little dirt won’t hurt you. Water with a little dust and dried ink (probably made from some mineral and vegetable products) is unlikely to cause harm beyond a stomachache. We ate far worse at summer camp when I was a kid.

The outcome of the ritual of the sotah, then, is that the woman fared well, exonerating her of her husband’s jealous accusation. Along the way, he had subjected her to public ridicule and humiliation only to be proven a fool and someone the community ought to keep an eye on.

But what if the husband’s accusation were true? What if she were involved with someone else and – in a world without reliable birth control, this is a real possibility – was pregnant by a man other than her husband? The verses quoted above make it clear that, if guilty, the wife would be rendered sterile by the ritual. Yet the reality is that it would be highly unlikely that the concoction she ingested would make her sick, let alone cause the horrors described in the Torah leading to her sterilization or death. What happens then?

Here’s the amazing part: the ritual would still exonerate the wife – God would be considered the final arbiter – and in so doing she would be recompensed with a child (see Numbers 5:28 above). The expectation was that if she were proved innocent, she would immediately become pregnant, and the husband would certainly be the father. It now appears that the ritual of the sotah provides cover for an adulteress relationship. Why would that be the case?

A child born of an adulteress relationship would be stigmatized as a mamzer (bastard, one born of an impermissible relationship), unable to marry in the community except to another mamzer. It is a terrible stigma to bear. The ritual of the sotah assured that the child would be fully protected.

In addition, although ostensibly it was intended as a warning to women not to engage in adultery, in reality it served as a release valve for men given to “fits of jealousy” who might consider violent retribution against their wives. Instead, they could initiate the ordeal of the sotah. Given the likely outcome, in effect, it served as a warning to men to curb their irrational jealousy because a man whose wife is exonerated by the ritual looks like a fool before the community. In a world without prisons, police, and court orders, perhaps this was the best possible way to protect women – and their children – from men inflamed with potentially violent jealousy. The husband, having dragged his wife through this horrible, dramatic, and public ritual, was now embarrassed and under the watchful eye of the priests and the community.

And the child born subsequently – regardless of who was the biological father – was protected by the imprimatur of God.

In the Babylonian Talmud, Rabban Yochanan b. Zakkai tells us that the ritual was discontinued due to the hypocrisy of subjecting women alone to the ordeal, given how adultery had proliferated among men. Mishnah Sotah 9:9 informs us:

When adulterers became numerous, the bitter waters ceased, and Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai abolished them, as it is written, I will not punish your daughters when they commit harlotry, nor your brides when they commit adultery; for they themselves go aside with harlots, and they sacrifice with cult prostitutes; therefore the people who do not understand shall fall (Hosea 4:14).

(Mishnah Sotah tells us that Rabban Yochanan b. Zakkai legislated the ritual out of existence, but according to Tosefta Sotah 14:1, he only records its annulment, suggesting that it had been discontinued before his time.)

The ritual of the sotah, which strikes many of us as primitive, even barbaric, was a clever and sophisticated mechanism for heading off potential violence provoked by the highly dangerous emotion of jealousy in an age where little else was available. It protected not only falsely accused women, but also the children of women who had conceived by another man. What is more, it fell into desuetude because practice and halakhah change with time to meet the needs and sensibilities of a community living in covenant with God. That is as it should be: Jewish tradition is about enabling us to respond to life by bringing holiness and healing into our lives and into this world – there is no one fixed immutable formula for all time to do that.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Chaos Theory and Wilderness Reality / Parshat B'midbar

2011-05-24T11:43:00.000-07:00

Chaos Theory is a branch of Applied Mathematics. The core insight of Chaos Theory is that small changes (or turbulence) in the initial conditions of a system can result in enormous and diverging differences in outcome that, although determined by the initial turbulence, are not predictable. In 1972, mathematician and meteorologist Edward Lorenz published a seminal paper in the field, whose title encapsulates the fundamental realization of Chaos Theory: Predictability: Does the Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings in Brazil set off a Tornado in Texas. Chaos Theory has applications to physics, economics, microbiology, meteorology, politics, and even philosophy. It’s also a pretty good model of our lives.

Our lives are chaotic processes in the mathematical sense. Small changes beget unforeseen transformations and even violent eruptive changes. If we are pleased with the outcome we call it growth; if we are not we call it catastrophe. And because it is unpredictable and often unnerving, we may seek to rein it in by imposing order and structure.
The Book of Numbers (Sefer B’midbar), the fourth book of Torah, recounts our ancestors’ trek through the wilderness, from the “first day of the second month in the second year following the exodus from the land of Egypt” (Numbers 1.1) until Moses stands on the steps of Moab, preparing to address his people for the last time before ascending Mt. Nebo to die. For four decades, the Israelites follow a circuitous and winding route through the wilderness, cohering as a nation, learning to live as free people committed to God’s Torah, encountering existential perils and internal hazards. Forty years of Chaos Theory in action: every small event has large and unpredictable consequences down the road.

Yet B’midbar opens with a recitation of the first census take in the Wilderness. Chapters 1 and 2 consist of a long litany of names and population numbers – tribe by tribe – to assess how many men were available to serve as foot soldiers in defense of the fledgling and exceptionally vulnerable Israelite nation. In the Hebrew trop (traditional chanting) this long passage with many repetitive phrases is almost singsong, much like the ditties of young children in which the world is portrayed as organized, under control, and comfortably predictable. Chapters 1 and 2 tell us precisely how the Israelites encamped in the Wilderness: the Ohel Moed (Tent of Meeting) was erected in the center, and the tribes were arranged in a meticulously specified array around it – four groups of Levites surround the Tent on each of the cardinal directions; a division of three tribes encamped behind them, each with its own flag. A rigid, military configuration; everyone assigned a precise place. The very idea of a census to raise a standing army acknowledges unforeseen dangers. At the same time it suggests that the perils of the Wilderness can be controlled, contained, and overcome.
As the Jewish community turns yet again to B’midbar in our annual cycle of reading, we again breathe the Israelites’ rarified air of naïve confidence in organization and control. Yet we, who return to this parashah year after year, know what will transpire over the next 38 years. In the coming ten weeks we will recount the failed mission to reconnoiter the Land of Israel, the revolt of Korach and his minions, the traumatizing deaths of Miriam and Aaron, numerous battles, egregious idolatry, and numerous internal rebellions. All this is punctuated by hunger, thirst, fear, complaints (endless complaints), greed, and plague.

Torah’s description of the Israelites’ encampment is a remarkably apt metaphor for our lives: we attempt to impose structure and order on our lives, but then life happens (remember the bumper sticker?). Small perturbations beget enormous oscillations and changes. We struggle to recover, regain our balance – and most often we do – but we come out transformed. Perhaps underlying our resilience is that ideal of organization and control, the image of the Israelite tribes arrayed peacefully in the Wilderness around the Ohel Moed (Tent of Meeting). The primordial image of order (think of the Garden of Eden) assures us that it is possible to get our feet back on the ground even amidst chaos.

What was your Wilderness experience? Was there a formative or life-altering event in your life that led to significant transformation? Perhaps it happened in childhood, college or graduate school, in the crucible of parenthood or grandparenthood. Perhaps you’re traversing the Wilderness now.

It helps us to remember that in chaos there can be great beauty, including the revelation of our resilience, strength we never knew we had, and growth. There are insights and truths we acquire along the trek, and the relationships formed and deepened along the journey – these are often truly beautiful. Chaos Theory has also spawned a beautiful offshoot: geometric fractals. A fractal is a beautiful figure with recursive structure keeps repeating itself again and again on an increasingly small scale. (The graphics in this posting are fractals. My favorite demonstration of how a fractal is formed is the Koch snowflake that begins as a Magen David, and forms an increasing intricate structure as the 6-pointed star is replicated at each point again and again. You can see an animated version of the process here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koch_snowflake.)

Sven Geier, who works at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of CalTech, loves fractals and has made many of his creations available for your pleasure and enjoyment. You can find them at: http://www.sgeier.net/fractals/indexe.php. Perhaps you’ll find one you’d like to use as your background for a while to recall that often beauty emerges out of chaos.
© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Tackling reward & punishment / Bechukkotai

2011-05-16T13:55:00.000-07:00

I participate in an “Ask the Rabbi” website. Periodically questions submitted on the site are forwarded to me for response.

Last week, this thoughtful question came my way: “In B'hukotai Leviticus 26:3-27:34 God enumerates the rewards for keeping the commandments and the punishments for violating them. I have difficulty… understanding how to make connections to the severity of these words. It is almost like a parent/child relationship.”

The questioner refers to the famous Tokhechah (Reproach or Execration). It is traditionally read in an undertone because the very thought of these curses evokes fear. How are we to interpret this section of Torah that depicts God as a Being who coerces Israel into obeying his commandments and throttles them if they deviate from his will? I cannot believe in a God so cruel. The Jobian argument that we are too small to understand God’s Big Game Plan doesn’t wash with me: if God can be just on the cosmic scale, God can be just on the micro scale, which is your life and mine. Arguments about God's forgiveness and mercy which are supposed to balance the scale of God’s threats and curses don't hold water for me either, because reward for righteousness and punishment for wickedness are certainly not built-ins of the universe. Perhaps that’s why beliefs about the afterlife (which arose after the Torah was closed and canonized, but are a natural outgrowth of biblical thinking) abound: Bechukkotai’s description of God is powerful but repugnant, and Deuteronomy’s description of reward and punished simply isn’t a reality in this world.

Therefore I was delighted by this marvelous question. I couldn’t wait to dive in. I don't believe that God controls the processes of the universe; the laws of physics do. However, I believe that God is the underlying reality that makes existence possible, and that all existence is part of God.

Here, in part, is my response:

The first thing I want to say is this: The Torah is the first Jewish word on God, but far from the last. It's the beginning of a 3000-year conversation we've been having among ourselves about God that has taken us to some pretty amazing places.

The second thing I want to say is that how we understand God and how we regard Torah are inextricably intertwined ideas. (I invite you to read a piece I wrote on Revelation. You can find it here. Click on "Ideas and Ideals" in the left column, and then on "Revelation.")

Torah speaks of God through images familiar to people in the ancient world: Ruler, Parent, Shepherd. These are metaphors, attempting to stretch our minds toward an idea and reality that is beyond words. The challenge is to determine how to frame Torah and therefore how to interpret it. Specifically:

Did God give Torah, word-for-word?
Is Torah the product of human minds and hearts, expressing their understanding of God and what God requires of them?
Is Torah a divinely inspired document?
Is Torah an ancient law code developed by people and that has no real connection to God?

For me, Torah is a reflection or outgrowth of our people's encounter with God in ancient times. It reflects their understanding of God and their place in God's Creation. It is, by necessity, written in the zeitgeist/mindset of the ancient world. (We do the very same thing when we talk about God.) The notion of reward and punishment seems to be hardwired into the human brain. Very small children not only expect it, but even desire it – it somehow makes the world seem "fair" and therefore "balanced" to them. Very small children grow up into adults, of course, and often continue to require reward and punishment to bolster their sense of "fairness" and "balance." As you have no doubt surmised, I'm not a fan of "fair." I think the combination of justice and compassion ethically trumps "fair."

Having said this let me add that I do not believe in a personal God (i.e. a God who is a Being with will and agency as the Torah describes). There have been many Jewish thinkers throughout the ages who did not believe in a personal God, ranging from Moses Maimonides to the Kabbalists, and many in between. (Some are discussed in the piece on Revelation.) I would locate myself among the Process Thinkers.

Torah is a sacred book for me, a repository of extraordinary wisdom and insight that has unified and fueled Jewish life for many centuries. I do not feel compelled to accept everything as wonderful or appropriate – not by a long stretch. Some elements reflect the ancient world more than they do God (e.g. slavery, treatment of women). Just as our ancestors’ understanding of God was shaped by their world, I am quite sure that my understanding of God is shaped in large measure by the world in which I live. For me that includes the world of mathematics, quantum physics, and evolution). How could it be otherwise? That does not mean this generation’s view of God is the last word, of course. We certainly don’t have a “lock on God," just as I am certain that there are things we tolerate but which future generations will consider completely unacceptable (e.g. poverty).

Allow me to give you two examples of how I might deal with Bechukkotai.

1. Lev. 26:3-13 paints a picture of what happens if we fail to live according to God's values. The passage is couched in the plural – it's all "we" and begins with how we steward the earth. For me, there is great truth in that: how we treat the earth –whether we are caretakers or despoilers – will make all the difference in the quality of everyone's life, including issues of poverty, war and peace, health, and more. To get this right, we have to learn to see that our lives and destiny are inseparably linked to everyone else's, and that we are not separate from "the environment” but rather part of it. When we get that right, God will indeed dwell among us – an integral part of our thinking, acting, living:

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… I will look with favor upon you, and make you fertile and multiply you; and I will maintain My covenant with you… I will establish My abode in your midst, and I will not spurn you. I will be ever present in your midst: I will be your God, and you shall be My people… (Leviticus 26:6, 9, 11-12).

2. The threats/punishments I don't take literally. (To be precise, I don't believe there is a literal meaning to any text. All texts are interpreted.) However, the threats in Bechukkotai paint a picture of pain, dislocation, and trauma. Indeed, that is – in general terms – indeed what we see when people do not live up to the moral standards of the Torah (again, not on an individual basis – Leviticus isn't saying that – but on a communal basis). I think those overarching moral standards boil down to three:

• Regard others as the image of God and treat them accordingly.
• Protect human dignity.
• Strive for justice and balance it with compassion.

The stern warning in Bechukkotai becomes a prescient warning concerning what we are doing to the earth and its inhabitants.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Cultivating habits of freedom / Parshat Behar

2011-05-11T09:06:00.000-07:00

On April 1, 1996, Taco Bell ran a full-page ad in newspapers across the country. The headline read: Taco Bell Buys the Liberty Bell. Under a large photograph of the Liberty Bell, the text read: “In an effort to help the national debt, Taco Bell is pleased to announce that we have agreed to purchase the Liberty Bell, one of our country's most historic treasures. It will now be called the "Taco Liberty Bell" and will still be accessible to the American public for viewing. While some may find this controversial, we hope our move will prompt other corporations to take similar action to do their part to reduce the country's debt.” Timely, no?

(The Bell's First Note, by artist Jean Leon Gerome Ferris)

Happily, the Liberty Bell is still ensconced in its rightful place in Philadelphia. Engraved on its side are words from this week’s parashah: U’k’ratem dror ba-aretz / proclaim liberty throughout the land (Lev. 25:10). Here Torah is speaking about the Jubilee year, and the release from slavery and indentured servitude that occurred during the Jubilee year. Let’s toss the Liberty Bell’s phrase back into its original context and take a look. Torah tells us:

You shall count off seven weeks of years – seven time seven years – so that the period of seven weeks of years gives you a total of 49 years. Then you shall sound the horn loud; in the seventh month, on the 10th day of the month – the Day of Atonement – you shall have the horn sounded throughout your land and you shall hallow the 50th year. You shall proclaim release throughout the land for all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you: each of you shall return to his holding and each of you shall return to his family. [Lev. 25:8-10]

This passage is about the Yovel, the Jubilee year. Every 50th year, debts were forgiven, slaves were set freed, and all property sold out of the clan to alleviate oppressive poverty reverted to its original owners.

If you now reread the passage above, you’ll see that Torah says something confusing: The Yovel begins on the first of Tishrei (Rosh Hashanah), but the announcement of the Yovel, heralded by the blowing of the shofar, comes at the close of Yom Kippur, ten days later. Why announce the Yovel 10 days after it begins? Isn’t this tantamount to allowing masters to keep their indentured servants another 10 days gratis? Doesn’t this deny people 10 days of freedom?

It seems terribly unjust, until we look into the Talmud, masekhet Rosh Hashanah 8b, where we learn that during the ten days from Rosh Hashanah until Yom Kippur, former slaves were neither sent home nor compelled to work. Rather, they spent these 10 days in the homes of their former masters transitioning from servitude to freedom. Former slaves feasted together with their former masters in celebration of their impending freedom and then, after Yom Kippur, their former masters sent them off with generous gifts that enabled them to begin their lives anew, re-created.

There is a lesson here for all of us. The former slaves could not jump straight into freedom and assume the attitudes and behaviors of free people. It didn’t come naturally to them. They needed to practice being free.

We, like those who were released in the Jubilee year, need to learn how to be free by cultivating the habits of freedom. That happens through practice. (How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice.)

In our day – when we enjoy physical, political, and religious freedom – we are most likely to seek freedom from what enslaves us within. Consider for a moment what holds you back from reaching your full potential, or from genuine happiness? It’s different for each of us.
Taking a cue from parshat Behar’s discussion of the Jubilee year, I want to suggest three types of freedom many of us seek. Perhaps one or more of these will resonate with you. Like the freed slaves who remained with their former masters for 10 days, we must practice these freedoms in order to make them our own.

The first is freedom of communication. By this I don’t mean that you can say what you want. What I mean is that you are free to say what you truly mean. Many of us have learned to lie – a lot. We say what others want to hear, or what we want others to hear us say, or what we want to believe is true. We say we know something when we don’t because we fear the consequence of not knowing. Many people fear the shame they experience if they don’t say “the right thing” or have the “right answer.” Certainly our true thoughts are not called for when there is risk of hurting someone’s feelings or spreading lashon hara. But beyond that, we need to practice freedom of communication and taking some risks to learn how to be our authentic selves and say what we mean.
The second freedom many of us need is the freedom to fail – without blaming others and without denigrating ourselves. Most of us have been taught that failure means we are inadequate. Not so! The truth is: everyone fails at something. It’s part of life. Ask Abraham Lincoln or Thomas Edison – well, that would be hard since they’re dead. But ask J.K. Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter books. (Any fans out there?) Their lives were long, frustrating strings of failure – for years and years – until they finally achieved success. I had the opportunity to hear J.K. Rowling talk about the blessing of failure; and although everyone was outside and it was 55 degrees and raining, Rowling kept a crowd of several thousand people mesmerized. The deep truth of her message is one we all need to hear. Failure is the best teacher; we need to see it as a teacher, not a source of shame. I think Rowling, Lincoln, and Edison ultimately succeeded not just because they persevered, but because they accepted their failed efforts without thinking that they themselves were failures. Accepting our failures takes practice (hopefully not too much of it!) but it frees us to succeed in ways we have never imagined.
The third freedom is from the need to control. Life is a wild ride – unpredictable and at times scary. And it’s not fair. So much is chance – when and where we were born, what family we were born into, who we met along the way. What’s more, we never know what is around the corner; everything can change in the blink of an eye. So we live our lives in the illusion that we are in control, making choices, and choosing our destiny. Yes, we do exert some control, but less than we think. It’s great to plan, even to over plan, but then we need to go with the flow. If we can free ourselves from the need to control, we can cultivate the habit of flexibility and respond to what’s thrown our way with integrity. But letting go and being flexible need to be practiced. My favorite prayer – the one I find most meaningful – was written by the Protestant minister and theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr. You’ve probably heard it. He called it the Serenity Prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” It takes a lot of practice to live up to this prayer, but the payoff, as the title suggests, is serenity – such an important freedom!

All three of these freedoms must be practiced, again and again, to make them habits. We need to practice saying what we mean. We need to practice failing gracefully so we can pick ourselves up and move on. We need to accept that we have far less control than we would like, but freedom to respond to what comes our way with patience, love and compassion. When we practice these habits, and make them fully ours, we will find we are kinder to ourselves and therefore kinder to others, and overall much happier.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

The death of Osama bin Laden: is this an occasion to rejoice?

2011-05-06T09:54:00.000-07:00

(This is an extra posting. A drash on parshat Emor is below.)

The current conversation in the press, blogs, classrooms, dinner tables concerning whether or not it is appropriate to celebrate the death of Osama bin Laden – and particularly what to tell our children – intrigues me. As my daughter Rachel pointed out, you can go with either Proverbs 11:10 or 24:17.

When the righteous prosper the city exults; when the wicked perish there are shouts of joy. (11:10)

If your enemy falls, do not exult; if he trips, do not let your heart rejoice. (24:17)

Are we to rejoice at the demise of bin Laden, or restrain ourselves because a human being has died?

Having recently celebrated Passover, the memory of removing wine from our glasses – wine that symbolizes our joy – when we recall the Ten Plagues upon Egypt is freshly in my mind. Does this accord with Proverbs 24:17? We lessen our joy not because of Pharaoh’s downfall, but because innocent Egyptians suffered from the plagues. It is the pain and suffering of the innocent victims (would we apply the term “collateral damage” today?) for whom we feel compassion more than three millennia later.

Also associated with Passover is a famous midrash from the Talmud. In Megillah 10b we are told that when the Israelites crossed through the Reed Sea on the seventh day out of Egypt, and the waters closed in on the Egyptians, the Israelites sang a song of redemption – the Shirat ha-Yam (Song at the Sea, Exodus, chapter 15). The angels in heaven wished to join in Israel’s song of victory by singing “Halleluyah” but God rebuked them, saying: “How can you sing Halleluyah when My creatures are drowning?” God silenced the angels (Psalm 24:17). But God did not silence the Israelites (Psalm 11:10). They were free of their oppressors. And so we sing Shirat ha-Yam each year on the seventh day of Passover.

I worry that we are losing the ability in our society to label what is evil as evil. It is certainly good and appropriate to understand another’s experience, outlook, and narrative – especially those we deem to be our enemies. But one who plots the murder of thousands of innocent people is evil, in fact such a one is a monster. The game of moral equivalence in the name of “tolerance” should not be played in the face of a mass murderer. Have we not learned that? That bin Laden was killed on Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Memorial Day), and coinciding with the birthday of Adolf Hitler, should give us great pause to examine our perspective.

Talmud (Berakhot 10a) tells us that Beruriah, the brilliant and remarkable wife of R. Meir taught a valuable lesson to her scholar-husband. Hoodlums living in their neighborhood were harassing R. Meir. Rabbi Meir prayed for their death. Beruriah quoted to him Psalm 104:35, “May sinners (chata’im) disappear from the earth and the evildoers (r’sha’im) be no more.” There were no vowels yet, making it possible to read words with alternative pointing. Beruriah did just that: do not read “sinners” but rather “sins,” she said. And further, do not read “evildoers” but rather “evil deeds.” (Only a change in vowels makes these readings possible.) If their sinning stops, Beruriah pointed out, there will be no more sinners. Therefore, rather than pray for their death, prayer that they repent.

For powerless people beset by neighborhood hooligans, this may be sage advice. But it does not translate to an international mass murderer who will never repent, whose life’s purpose is to engage in terrorism until he reaches the goal of throwing the royal rulers out of Saudi Arabia and installing in their place a medieval caliphate.

We can rejoice at the death of Osama bin Laden because he was a font of evil and would have spent his life planning more terrorist attacks against innocent people. That does not mean we need to bring out the party hats and streamers, and uncork champagne (though I would happily deliver champagne to the brave Navy SEALs who risked their lives to prevent future deaths and carnage).

I hope parents will teach their children that Osama bin Laden was a loathsome terrorist, a mass murderer who is responsible for the murder of thousands and the suffering of countless people and intended to destroy countless more; therefore his death is a good thing. At the same time, I hope these same parents will teach their children not to hate all Arabs. It’s a message we can remind ourselves of, as well. Our prayer is for the end of evil, and we celebrate taking a life only when that is the only way to protect innocent life.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

The curse of Narcissus, the requirements of the priesthood / Parshat Emor

2011-05-02T11:17:00.000-07:00

In an essay for the Los Angeles Times, Victoria Looseleaf wrote last January:

With Darren Aronofsky's Oscar-nominated ballet thriller, "Black Swan," lasering in on rail-thin physical perfection… coupled with the firestorm created by New York Times dance critic Alastair Macaulay's sniping that ballerina Jenifer Ringer looked as if she'd "eaten one sugar plum too many" in a recent "Nutcracker" performance, the notion of body fascism — placing a value on one's physical appearance — is flaming on today's cultural radar.

From the first moment a human saw his or her reflection in a body of water (recall the legend of Narcissus?) people have cared about human physical perfection beauty. The Greeks immortalized their version of human perfection in marble. In how many societies throughout the ages have those who do not "rise" to the perceived level of beauty or physical "normalcy" been made to feel inherently inferior or inadequate?

Parshat Emor opens with instructions to the priests, sons of Aaron, including this:

The Lord spoke further to Moses: Speak to Aaron and say: No man of your offspring throughout the ages who has a defect shall be qualified to offer the food of his God. No one at all who has a defect shall be qualified: no man who is blind, or lame, or has a limb too short or too long; no man who has a broken leg or a broken arm; or who is a hunch back or a dwarf, or who has a growth in his eye, or who has a boil-scar, or scurvy, or crushed testes. (Leviticus 21:16-20)

Most of us squirm uncomfortably when these verses are read. Does Torah really say this? Commentators also squirm uncomfortably, desperately trying to explain away what is, in the last analysis, deeply troubling. Etz Hayim comments:

The reader may be troubled by these rules disqualifying physically handicapped kohanim from officiating in pubic. Perhaps their disfigurements would distract the worshipers from concentrating on the ritual and, like the offering of the blemished animal, would compromise the sanctuary’s image as a place of perfection reflecting God’s perfection (cf. Lev. 22:21-25, where similar language is used for the animals brought to the altar).

Etz Hayyim offers us two possibilities, neither of which succeeds. Can anyone believe that people who are physically different from the “norm” might be distracting in a society where many people (as in any society) have disabilities and deformities and there existed no orthopedic or plastic surgery to remediate even a fraction of them? And even if we could buy this reasoning, shouldn’t Torah be teaching compassion? Wouldn’t God’s acceptance of kohanim (priests) with disabilities and deformities be a powerful example?

The second suggestion, that the priests should be perfect physical specimens just as the animals offered for sacrifice had to be without blemish, derives from a mistaken notion that Jews at that time considered God “perfect.” Simply reading the Torah disavows us of that. God frequently misjudges, changes his mind, and revokes decisions. The notion of God’s perfection (like God’s omnipotence) derives from medieval Christianity, and while it is true that many Jewish philosophers of that era adopted it, it post-dates the Bible by more than a millennium. It is Israel that sought to give God the "best" of what they had -- a lesson learned from Cain and Abel -- and construed "best" as requiring physical "perfection."

This passage begs for interpretation in an age where steroid use is rampant, anorexia has spiked alarmingly (there are websites with tips on how to starve yourself and sport the claim that anorexia is a “lifestyle choice”), those who are physically disabled still lack full access to our buildings and our society, and those who do not tow the straight heterosexual line continue to face discrimination and physical assault.

The quest for, or value placed on, human perfection and the myth of "normalcy" is all-consuming for some, harmful to the esteem of many, and downright dangerous for others.

A young woman named Chrissy Lee Polis was so savagely beaten in a McDonalds restaurant in Baltimore two weeks ago, that she had an epileptic seizure. As the beating – by two teenagers – went on and on, one employee videotaped it all with his cellphone and another stood back watching and laughing. Why? Because Chrissy Lee Polis is transgendered.

Human physical perfection is a myth – and a very dangerous one at that. Mishnah teaches us to always see the individuality and uniqueness of each soul and distance ourselves from the sort of language and thinking that objectifies people. Mishnah tell us:

For this reason a single human being only was created at the time of Creation: to teach you that whoever destroys a single life, Scripture reckons it to him as though he had destroyed a whole world; and whoever saves a single life, Scripture reckons it to him as though he had saved a whole world. (Mishnah Sanhedrin 4:5)

Mishnah doesn’t mention people-without-disabilities, people who are heterosexual, people who are gorgeous, or people who qualify to be kohanim serving in the Tabernacle. Every person is precious. The Mishnah continues:

And [a single human being only was created at the time of Creation] to also proclaim the greatness of the Holy One. If a human being stamps several coins with the same die, they all resemble one another. But the Supreme Ruler, the Holy One, stamps all human beings with the die of the first human being; and yet not one of them resembles the other. Therefore every human individual is obligated to say: For my sake was the world created!” Mishnah teaches us to remember always that each human being is unique and unparalleled.

Could there be a more beautiful exaltation of human diversity? The Mishnah wants us to revel in human variety. This is not to say that we are happy about those who suffer from disabilities; we do everything in our power to help them reach their goals. But we may not devalue them or disregard them.

In the extreme, the attitude that people with disabilities, deformities, and differences are “less than” leads to what we saw in the 1940s. This past Sunday was Yom haShoah, a day of solemn memorial for six million of our people who were systematically murdered because they were deemed to be biologically – and hence morally – inferior: virus or contagion among humanity.

The Nazis also went after the disabled. The “Law for the Prevention of Progeny with Hereditary Diseases” (1933) mandated the sterilization of those who had conditions considered hereditary, including mental illness, physical deformities, epilepsy, learning disabilities, blindness, and deafness. Later, sterilization of the disabled gave way to mass murder.

For there to be change, it must begin with us – each and every one of us. We must, if we haven’t already, confront our own inner prejudices so we can value people without reference to their beauty, abilities, bodies, or sexuality. We must come to revel in the diversity around us. When we look into the eyes of another person, we must train ourselves to see not someone who is beautiful or not, perfect or not, fully abled or not, heterosexual or not, but rather, we must see in the countenance before us the image of God peering back at us.

Vicky Thoms knows this in her gut and she lives it. Thoms entered the McDonalds while Chrissy Lee Polis was being brutally beaten. Although Thoms was recovering from a back injury, she intervened. Chrissy’s attackers kicked Vicky Thoms in the head, but that didn’t deter her. Later, when someone asked whether Thoms knew that Polis was a transgendered woman, Thoms replied, “No, I didn’t, and I don’t care.” Vicky Thoms has been lauded a hero, but she doesn’t see herself that way. When asked why she took such a risk to intervene, Thoms quoted a verse from last week’s Torah portion, “Because the Bible tells us not to stand idly by.” Check out Leviticus 19:16 – lo ta’amod al dam rei’echa “do not stand idly by while your neighbor bleeds – that’s a value to live by.

I don’t have an answer to why the Torah tells us that the priests must be “without defect” to serve in the Tabernacle, but I do know that the requirement for physical “perfection” should never be generalized or normalized. It was then and there, and there we should leave it. Yet imagine with me the message that would have been delivered had Torah said:

The Lord spoke further to Moses: Speak to Aaron and say: Every one of your offspring throughout the ages is qualified to offer the food of his God. I, the Lord your God, cherish each individual, whether blind, or lame, or with a limb too short or too long; with a broken leg or a broken arm; or a hunchback or a dwarf, or with a growth in his eye, or a boil-scar, or scurvy, or crushed testes. They are all precious to Me.

What is Holiness? / Parshat Kedoshim

2011-04-25T17:34:00.000-07:00

We have arrived at the peak of the Torah. Imagine Torah as a mountain – like Everest or Sinai. Think of Genesis and Exodus as the ascent up one face. The first half of Leviticus is the final assault on the peak. The latter half of Leviticus is the first step of the trek down the other side, with Numbers and Deuteronomy comprising the rest of the trip to the base camp.

Each year we climb the mountain. Year after year. At the peak of the mountain is the 19th chapter of Leviticus, which has come to be dubbed by Bible scholars “The Holiness Code” because it spells out in detail, and by example, what it means to live a holy life in covenant with God. Fulfillment of the Holiness Code is the greatest height to which we, as human beings, can ascend.

At the very moment Moses ascended Mount Sinai, God instructed him to tell the people, “you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:6). The Holiness Code begins with these words:

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the whole Israelite community, and say to them: You shall be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy. (Leviticus 19:1-2)

Is “holy” here description or prescription? This is not a description of the Israelites. It is a prescriptive statement: Be holy because I, the Lord your God [in whose image you were created] am holy.

What follow in rapid succession are three commandments (Leviticus 19:3-4), which I present as a bulleted list for clarity:

You shall each revere his mother and his father,
and keep My Sabbaths: I the Lord am your God.
Do not turn to idols or make molten gods for yourselves: I the Lord am your God.

Respect your parents who gave you physical life. Keep my Sabbath celebrations of creation, and thereby appreciate God, the ground of existence, who made it possible for the universe to come into being. Do not be led astray and invest your spiritual energy running after idols; focus on what is ultimate.

Phrased another way, this is the beginning of the formula for becoming a holy people:

appreciate your life;
know the Source of existence;
focus on what is ultimate, not distractions.

Most of the mitzvot in chapter 19 are bein adam l’chavero; they concern human relationships: leave part of your harvest for the poor, do not steal from or deal deceitfully or dishonestly with others, do not take advantage of the frailties and weaknesses of others, judge all impartially, do not harbor hatred or resentment, do not eat the blood of any living creature, do not sell your daughters into harlotry, rise before the elderly and show them respect, treat strangers decently, conduct business honestly. What underlies all these is the recognition and conviction that humans have dignity bestowed by God, and to be holy, we must uphold that dignity in all our interactions with others. That’s a tall order. Do you do that most of the time? Are there times when you haven’t and wish you could have what we called on the playground a “redo?” If you think you don’t always get it right, life will provide you many more opportunities.

Some of the mitzvot of chapter 19 are bein adam l’makom; they concern our relationship with God: peace-offerings, kilayim (crossbreeding animal or plant species), abstaining from collecting the produce of fruit trees for their first three years. These are often called chukim, mitzvot for which there is no clear rational basis. How can these make us holy? Perhaps the purpose of chukim is to help us train ourselves to do things that would not automatically or naturally be our choice, but to do them because they are related to a higher purpose.

There has long been a debate about what was given at Mount Sinai. The whole Torah (including Leviticus 19)? All but Deuteronomy (again, including Leviticus 19)? Just the Ten Commandments? Only the first two commandments? Just the first word, Anochi (“I”)? The Hasidic teacher, Rabbi Mendel of Rymanow (1745–1815), taught that at Sinai only the aleph of Anochi was revealed – a letter that is silent, human breath. The aleph is the One, God Who is the ground of being, beyond words. Yet we humans have to attach words to express our experience. And so, amending the words of Hillel, at Sinai the silent first letter aleph was revealed and “All the rest is human commentary.” Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel expressed it similarly: What God revealed at Sinai was God; the rest is midrash.

Talmud (Shabbat 105a) interprets Anochi as an acronym for Ana Nafshai Katvit Yahvit (“I Myself wrote it and gave it”), but I much prefer the explanation of the Sefat Emet (Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter, 1847–1905) who interprets Anochi this way: “I wrote and gave Myself.” At Sinai, Israel encountered God and bound themselves to God in their own unique way.

The essence of that way is spelled out in the 19th chapter of Leviticus: we are to live in such a way that we uphold the dignity of every human being and treat them as the image of God before us. In that way, we will earn the designation “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”

What more can you do to live in this way?

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Do we ever really leave Egypt? / Shabbat during Pesach

2011-04-20T09:43:00.000-07:00

This shabbat we deviate from the yearly cycle of Torah readings, and read a special portion in honor of Passover: Exodus 33:12–34:26. It’s tricky to find mention of Passover in this portion, but it’s there briefly toward the end, between the prohibition against idolatry and the declaration that every firstborn (human and beast) belongs to God.

You shall not make molten gods for yourselves.

You shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread – eating unleavened bread for seven days, as I have commanded you – at the set time of the month of Aviv, for in the month of Aviv you went forth from Egypt.

Every first issue of the womb is Mine, from all your livestock that drop a male as firstling, whether cattle or sheep. But the firstling of an ass you shall redeem with a sheep; if you do not redeem it, you must break its neck. And you must redeem every firstborn among your sons. None shall appear before Me empty-handed. (Exodus 34:17-20)

In short order, Torah tells us about idolatry, Passover and the Exodus, and redemption of the firstborn. Is there a connection here? And if so, what does it mean for us?

The prohibition against idolatry is ubiquitous in the Torah. It seems that every column is laced with concern that the Israelites not turn away from their covenant with God and engage in the idolatrous practices of their neighbors. But the biblical picture of what constitutes idolatry is rather narrow: making offerings to pillar, posts, and statues that others take to be their gods. (This is not even an accurate understanding of ancient idolatry, but that is a subject for another day.)

I understand idolatry as anything we hold to be of ultimate importance that commands so much of our worshipful devotion that it shapes our values, determines our priorities, and steers our choices in life. Modern idolatry comes in many forms. Commenting on the Golden Calf the Israelites built at Sinai, one Christian writer offered this list of the idolatries of modern Christian men: Cars. Pickup trucks. Convertibles. Motorcycles. Notebook computers. Cell phones. Big screen TVs. GPS navigation systems. Cordless power tools. Here’s my list: money, status, self-esteem, body image, consumption, political ideologies. Do any of these resonate for you?

It is only when we push aside our various idolatries that we can experience God within us and glimpse God beyond us.

Judaism enshrines the prohibition against idolatry in the second of the Ten Commandments, found in Exodus 20:4-6 and Deuteronomy 5:7-10. What’s the big deal about building an idolatrous image? We can’t really create something that is God’s image, so why so much emphasis on the prohibition? Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel taught that creating and erecting images is a distraction from the profound and sacred truth that we are God’s image in this world. You cannot fabricate God’s image, but you can be God’s image.

The story of Passover and the Exodus illustrate this magnificently. The Israelites are slaves in Egypt (literally, “the narrow straits”) – dehumanized, degraded, demoralized. The Egyptians do not recognize the tzelem (image of God) in each of them, and even they cannot recognize it. Perhaps that is why it takes them 400 years to cry out to God for help: 400 years to recognize God in themselves. We are commanded to remember and relive the Exodus as a reminder of that each human being – Israelite, Egyptian, and every other – is the very image of God and should be honored as such. No wonder Jews recount travesties of social justice at their seder tables: these are all examples of the consequences of idolatries that prevent people from seeing and honoring the tzelem (image of God) in others.

Would that we could all understand our connection to God, that God is within each of us, animating our souls, prodding us to be our best, offering us moral choices at every step of our life journeys. In fact, in the sense that each of us is created b’tzelem Elohim (in the image of God), each of us belongs to God. This is not another form of slavery, but rather the ultimate liberation to be who we are and were meant to be, to reach for the moon and realize our true potential. But how many of us have truly left Egypt, the “narrow straits”? Not all of us are ready, so God claims the firstborn. We can understand the firstborn not in strict familial and biological terms, but rather as those who are first ready to see the potential inborn in them. Who are the figurative “firstborn” in your life? Who are the ones who model liberation and strive to reach their potential? Who are the ones who inspire you to become all you can become?

Do we ever really leave Egypt? Yes, in fits and starts, again and again and again. That’s why we re-enact this powerful drama year after year. Our task, as Jews, is to free ourselves from idolatry and Egypt – emotionally, psychological, physically, politically, or in any other way. To do that, we need to divest of the idolatries that hold us back, and recognize in ourselves the tzelem (image) of God shining forth. Sometimes the best way to liberate ourselves is to help those around us free themselves. Sometimes we need to accept a loving, helping hand extended toward us. Then we can join the ranks of the “firstborn” and see ourselves and indeed all humanity, as the living, breathing, walking, talking, loving image of God; when we do, miracles will happen.

May this Pesach bring you liberation, love, and happiness.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Guilt Trip / Parshat Acharei Mot

2011-04-11T09:05:00.000-07:00

I'm told we Jews are masters of guilt. At least, that’s the myth, especially with regard to the stereotype of Jewish mothers inducing guilt in their children to manipulate their behavior. I myself never experienced it, nor did my husband, but the jokes still abound. Q: How many Jewish mothers does it take to change a light bulb? A: Never mind, I’ll just stand here in the dark and suffer.

One night, more than a decade ago, I found myself in conversation with a Catholic priest at 3 am. We were standing outside Shock Trauma in Baltimore. As volunteer chaplains for the police department, we were there to attend to two police officers undergoing treated, and we were outside for a short break and fresh air. Somehow the conversation turned to guilt, and I mentioned that Jews have a reputation for doing guilt well. “You just think you do,” he laughed, “but you’re rank amateurs. We Catholics do guilt better than anyone!”

Guilt is a strange thing. When appropriate, it serves us well. When inappropriate, it strangles us.

Guilt is that feeling of responsibility, remorse, and regret that creeps into our minds and takes hold of our souls when we have done something wrong, or failed to do what was right. It is the voice of conscience calling us to task. We can think of it as an ethical early warning system: it alerts us to make a change. In that regard, it is good.

It also has a flip side. While guilt can arise from real events, it can also arise from imagined wrongdoing – and that is a big problem. How can you mitigate something that never happened? What is more, guilt can hang on, clinging to our souls, long past the event that provoked it has been resolved. It can generate a host of suffocating feelings, including failure, unworthiness, shame, anxiety, and self-loathing. This is not good.

(There are also far more complicated types of guilt, including Survivor’s Guilt. In this drash, I am speaking only of the guilt we all feel from time to time, not exceptional cases.)

Parshat Acharei Mot describes a ritual that seems at one and the same time bizarre and familiar. It is familiar because we recount it each year not only when we read this parashah, but also on Yom Kippur during the Avodah service.

Aaron shall take two he-goats and let them stand before the Lord at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting; and he shall place lots upon the two goats one marked “for the Lord” and the other marked “for Azazel.” Aaron shall bring forward the goat designated by lot for the Lord, which he is to offer as a purification offering; while the goat designated by lot for Azazel shall be left standing alive before the Lord, to make expiation with it and send it off to the wilderness for Azazel. (Leviticus 16:7-10)

The first goat is offered up as a sin offering: it atones for sins committed against God. But what becomes of the second goat?

Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat and confess over it all the iniquities and transgressions of the Israelites, whatever their sins, putting them on the head of the goat; and it shall be sent off to the wilderness through a designated man. Thus the goat shall carry on it all their iniquities to an inaccessible region; and the goat shall be set free in the wilderness. (Leviticus 16: 21-22)

What a bizarre ritual! The scapegoat bears the sins of an entire nation on its back. Later tradition tells us the goat was pushed off a high precipice, but Torah says nothing of that. Torah is very clear: the goal shall be set free in the wilderness. In a deliberative and public ritual, the goat carries away sins the people had repented. The goat – burdened with the people’s sins – unburdens them. The goat not only carries away their sins, it also carries away their guilt. And everyone knows it.

This is a brilliant ritual. It signals the people that once teshuvah (repentance) has been done, they should expunge guilt from their souls. It no longer serves a healthy purpose.

So should we. In fact, after guilt has served its purpose and signaled the need for change, it has done its job. Chronic guilt can hold us back from moving forward to become better versions of ourselves. What is more, continuing guilt can open the door to those suffocating feelings of failure, unworthiness, shame, anxiety, and self-loathing.

The message of the goat sent to Azazel is that we must learn to forgive ourselves, just as God forgives. God doesn’t expect us to be perfect. Indeed, perfection is not a Jewish value or goal. The Jewish goal is improvement. Perfection is a goal we can never attain: no matter how hard we try, we will fail. But improvement is always within reach, again and again. I have always appreciated sports teams that award children ribbons and trophies for self-improvement. Competing against others may be a natural human proclivity, but it is not a religious value. Competing against our own selves – to improve ourselves – is a religious value of the highest order.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Together and Apart / Parshat Metzora

2011-04-03T08:38:00.000-07:00

Just when you thought we were done last week with tzara’at (skin eruptions, often erroneously translated “leprosy”)… it returns this week. In most years, the Torah portions Tazria and Metzora are read the same week. Because this is a leap year, featuring a second Adar, they are each read on a separate shabbat, so that we read about tzara’at for two weeks running.

Few people turn cartwheels at the prospect of reading Metzora. We generally find the notions of tum’ah (ritual impurity or uncleanliness) and tahara (ritual purity or cleanliness) difficult to conceive, and the rituals pertaining to purification arcane and incomprehensible. I once heard someone compare tum’ah to “cooties” (remember that from second grade?) – you cannot see them, but everyone in second grade recognizes who has cooties and who doesn’t, and there are elaborate rules about how they are contracted and how one rids oneself of them.

A more sophisticated approach is to view tum’ah as negative energy flowing between heaven and earth, deriving from death (or anything that is evocative of death) or that which doesn’t fit neatly into the natural order as God is understood to have created it. Accordingly tahara is positive, life-promoting energy flowing between heaven and earth. Tum’ah and tahara are still difficult to get a fix on.

The concern with tum’ah and tahara is tied up with other biblical concerns, specifically the laws of kashrut (found in parshat Shemini, Leviticus chapter 11) and childbirth (found in parshat Tazria, Leviticus chapter 12). A midrash in Vayikra Rabbah (Leviticus Rabbah 14) links the two together and ties them to Creation:

R. Simlai teaches: just as the creation of humanity followed that of animals, beasts, and birds, the rules pertaining to humans are presented after that of animals, beasts and birds. That is why, This is the instruction for animals [that may be eaten] (Leviticus 11:46 - 47) precedes, When a woman who has conceived gives birth (Leviticus 12:2).

R. Simlai frames the rules of both kashrut and impurity in childbirth using the story of Creation in Genesis (chapter 1). He tells us that just as animals are created before humans, so too rules pertaining to animals (specifically, which may be eaten, and which are forbidden as food) are presented in the Book of Leviticus before the rules pertaining to human beings.

This seems a most peculiar observation. We might be inclined to say: so what? Both sets of rules are for humans, and there seems little connection between eating animals and human childbirth, after all. (All you men who happily ate for two alongside your wives while they were pregnant are the exception.)

There are several possibilities here.

One possibility is that R. Simlai has in mind that the rules of kashrut and impurity due to childbirth might strike anyone as “artificial” and an imposition by the priests on the personal lives of the people. If that is the case, R. Simlai tells us: no, these rules are imbedded in the very fabric of creation. They are not extraneous, but rather fundamental to God’s creation and intention.

A second possibility is that R. Simlai is telling us that humanity is distinct and separate from the animal kingdom because only humans are required to follow prescribed rituals and practices, and adhere to limitations in their diet and behavior set down by God.

A third possibility seems, at first glance, to contract the second possibility above. The third possibility is that R. Simlai seeks to impress upon us our place in Creation – not separate and apart, but integrated into the whole of Creation. That has profound implications for our relationship with the natural world, one that ought to command far more of our attention than it does.

With the second possibility, we are apart from Creation. With the third possibility, we are a part of Creation.

Thus far, I have barely mentioned this week’s parashah. R. Simlai’s midrash speaks to the two preceding Torah portions. Metzora explains – in excrutiating detail – the procedure for purification of one afflicted with tzara’at (an eruptive skin condition). Now Torah explains that tzara’at can extend beyond our bodies to…

When you enter the land of Canaan that I give you as a possession, and I inflict an eruptive plague upon a house in the land you possess, the owner of the house shall come and tell the priest, saying, “Something like a plague has appeared upon my house.” The priest shall order the house cleared before the priest enters to examine the plague, so that nothing in the house may become impure; after that the priest shall enter to examine the house… (Leviticus 14:34-36)

A house? How can a house can be struck by an eruptive skin condition? The commentary in Etz Hayim tells us:

The appearance of tzara-at in the stones of a house was a mysterious event. Some Sages doubted it ever happened, and others consigned it to a distant past. Commentators consider the afflicted house (ha-bayit ha-m’nugga) to be a moral warning rather than a natural consequence, even more emphatically than they consider cases of skin disease to be a moral warning. (Etz Hayim, p. 664)

In other words: this has no basis in physical reality, so we interpret it as a spiritual/moral phenomenon. I’m totally on board with that approach. When I line this up with R. Simlai’s comment about animals and people being integral to creation, the image of the bayit (house) that emerges is the planet earth – our global home. There was a time when “half way around the world” meant too far away to be connected, but that is no longer the case. What we do to the environment in one place on planet Earth has repercussions “half way around the world.” The polar cap is melting, destroying the habitat for many species. The sea levels are rising, and salinity changing. The Gulf Stream that protects Europe from bitter cold is shifting. Our heavy use of chlorofluorocarbons is punching a hole in the ozone layer in the upper stratosphere; the upper ozone layer protects us from electromagnetic radiation. Clear-cutting forests destroys the habitats of countless species and causes soil erosion; destroying vegetation along the seashore depletes a resource that protects against hurricanes. Increasing levels of pollution may well be a cause of increased cancer rates, autoimmune conditions, and more. And all the while we produce more, consume more, and discard more in landfills.

We can no longer speak about "the world" and “the animals” and "human beings" -- as if they are separate entities -- without realizing that our lives and welfare are integrally interwoven with the well-being of the entire planet. The bayit (house) is afflicted with a plague we cause by our unwillingness to respond to R. Simlai’s prescient warning that everything goes back to Creation, and creation must be cared for and renewed at every moment. We cannot live apart from Creation; we must become fully a apart of Creation.

Above, I suggested several interpretations of R. Simlai’s midrash. One was that we are apart from Creation. Another was that we are a part of Creation. I would suggest to you that both pertain: we are a part of Creation in that our live and well-being cannot be sustained apart from the well-being of planet Earth. We are apart from Creation in that we, alone, of all God’s creatures, are tasked with the responsibility to be responsible stewards of God’s Creation (as Adam was charged with tending and tilling the Garden of Eden, so are we charged with the stewardship of Earth). And that brings us to the first interpretation of R. Simlai’s teaching: perhaps one of the purposes of rituals and practices that sometimes seem bizarre and often lacking a rational foundation is to inspire in us a mindfulness in all that we do, including our relationships with the natural world, with animals, and with other people.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Skin and Tongue / Parshat Tazria

2011-03-21T13:49:00.000-07:00

Parshat Tazria deals with its namesake, tzara’at, a group of skin ailments that were deemed to cause ritually impurity.
Of the 43 sins enumerated in the traditional Al Cheit confessional of Yom Kippur, eleven are sins committed through speech.

These two facts are intimately connected in the minds of the Rabbis.

First, a few words about tzara’at. The term tzara’at is often erroneously translated “leprosy.” Leprosy is known in the medical world as Hansen’s disease, a conditional of the peripheral nerves and mucosa of the upper respiratory tract. Tzara’at is a biblical term that covers a variety of diseases that cause sores and eruptions of the skin, and can also affect clothing and houses. Tzara’at conveys ritually impurity and therefore its diagnoses and “treatment” fall within the domain of the priests. The rituals surrounding a person afflicted with tzara’at are complex. Here’s a sample from the beginning of our parashah:

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: This shall be the ritual for a leper at the time that he is to be cleansed. When it has been reported to the priest, the priest shall go outside the camp. If the priest sees that the leper has been healed of his scaly affection, the priest shall order two live clean birds, cedar wood, crimson stuff, and hyssop to be brought for him who is to be cleansed. The priest shall order one of the birds slaughtered over fresh water in an earthen vessel; and he shall take the live bird, along with the cedar wood, the crimson stuff, and the hyssop, and dip them together with the live bird in the blood of the bird that was slaughtered over the fresh water. He shall then sprinkle it seven times on him who is to be cleansed of the eruption and cleanse him; and he shall set the live bird free in the open country. The one to be cleansed shall wash his clothes, shave off all his hair, and bathe in water; then he shall be clean. After that he may enter the camp, but he must remain outside his tent seven days. On the seventh day he shall shave off all his hair – head, beard, and eyebrows. When he has shaved off all his hair, he shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water; then he shall be clean. (Leviticus 14:1-9)

The Rabbis had difficulty making sense of tzara’at. Seeking to identify a cause, they explain that Miriam is stricken with tzara’at (Numbers, chapter 12) in consequence of speaking out about Moses. They explain that she is guilty of lashon hara (evil speech, gossip), which they derive by a slight of hand: metzora’at (“stricken with tzara’at) sounds like motzi shem ra (spreading malicious lies about someone).

Lashon hara (gossip), rekhilut (tale bearing), and motzi shem ra (spreading malicious lies about someone) – all forms of objectionable speech – cause emotional damage and compromise the integrity of many. The Rabbis railed against lashon hara, knowing at the same time (or precisely because they understand) that it is in human nature and difficult to curtain.
In the Babylonian Talmud, tractate Arakhin 15 we find this explanation:

Tzara’at was a “miraculous” disease that occurred when the Bet ha-Mikdash was still standing. If a person spoke evil about someone else, first his home was affected. If he did not repent, his clothes were affected. If he still did not repent, his body was ultimately affected. He had to separate from civilization. He was publicly proclaimed an "impure person" as a result of his evil speech.

Midrash Tanchuma, however, addresses the ethical underpinnings. While the claim that lashon hara makes one worthy of death is hyperbolic, the ethical principle cannot be overstated: we can do enormous harm with our words.

If a person involves himself in lashon hara, he makes himself worthy of death, because lashon hara is as serious as murder, for one who murders only takes one life, while the bearer of lashon hara kills three: the one who says it, the one who listens to it, and the one about whom it is said.

The last line bears considerable attention: the bearer of lashon hara kills three: the one who says it, the one who listens to it, and the one about whom it is said. When we speak gossip, tell stories about other people, or tell outright lies about them, three are damaged. Then one who says it compromises his dignity by stooping to a low level, marking him as untrustworthy. Certainly the one who is the subject of gossip and lies is harmed. We know we shouldn’t talk about others, and we know that when we do they are harmed. But how often have we considered that being a listener, an audience, makes lashon hara possible? The one who listens is guilty because without an audience, the speaker would not commit lashon hara. Alice Roosevelt Longworth is said to have quipped, “If you haven’t got anything good to say about anyone, come and sit by me.” As difficult as it is, we need to resist sitting beside the Alices of the world. It’s not easy, but it’s also not impossible.

The Sages tell us that whoever engages in lashon hara, God says of him: “He and I cannot inhabit the same world. (Arakhin 15b). I think they mean for us to copy God’s example and distance ourselves as best we can from lashon hara.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Filling the Barrel / Parshat Shemini

2011-03-21T07:59:00.000-07:00

The images of the pain and suffering in Japan caused by the earthquake and tsunami are devastating to see. How are we to respond?

The Jerusalem Talmud records a debate between Akiba and Ben Azzai, second century sages and contemporaries.

You shall love your neighbor as yourself (Leviticus 19:18). R. Akiba says: This is the great principle of the Torah. Ben Azzai says: This is the book of the generations of humanity (Genesis 5:1) – this is a greater principle of Torah. (Yerushalmi, Nedarim 9:4)

While there are many ways to interpret the distinction Akiba and Ben Azzai make here, I want to offer one that speaks to the question of how we respond to suffering and devastation halfway around the globe. Let’s begin with Ben Azzai, who tells us that Jewish ethics derive from an appreciation of our common humanity, our connection to all people on earth. R. Akiba seems say that this is more than any one human being can truly feel or act upon; a more realistic and modest goal is to feel kinship with those around us – our “neighbors” – and to act on that connection. If each of us responds to those in our “neighborhood,” and others do the same, our neighborhoods are sufficiently overlapping that, at least in theory, everyone’s needs can be met.

Today, R. Akiba and Ben Azzai meet on the plane of modern technology, where our “neighborhood” is global. Thanks to the Internet, cameras convey video at lightning speed, and together with 24/7 newsfeed, we are instantly and continually keenly aware of what happens on the other side of Planet Earth. It is all piped into our living rooms, iPads, and droid phones.

Parshat Shemini begins:

On the eighth day Moses called Aaron and his sons, and the elders of Israel. He said to Aaron: “Take a calf of the herd for a purification offering and a ram for a burnt offering, without blemish, and bring them before the Lord. And speak to the Israelites, saying: Take a he-goat for purification offerings; a calf and a lamb, yearlings without blemish, for burnt offering; and an ox and a ram for an offering of well-being to sacrifice before the Lord; and a grain offering with oil mixed in. For today the Lord will appear to you.

They brought to the front of the Tent of Meeting the things that Moses had commanded, and the whole community came forward and stood before the Lord. (Leviticus 9:1-5)

How is it possible that the entire community fit in the small space in front of the Tent of Meeting? Is this merely a fanciful exaggeration. Or is Torah teaching us something about the community?

A story:

Once there was a town where it was the custom that when a mayor died, the new mayor would place a large barrel outside the front door of his home. Everyone in town would bring a bottle of wine sometime during the night to contribute to the barrel. The following day, the town would gather to celebrate the installation of their new mayor and together drink the wine in the barrel.

It happened that the mayor died. The new mayor set out a barrel as custom dictated. The people of the town thought, “Why should I bring a bottle of wine? If I pour one bottle of water into such a big barrel, who would ever know?” Throughout the night, people came in the dark and emptied bottles of water into the barrel.

In the morning, the mayor dipped a cup into the barrel to initiate the festivities. He knew immediately, even before sipping it, that the barrel was filled with water. Nonetheless, he took a sip, then another sip, and announced, “I can tell that someone in town contributed a bottle of water rather than wine. Moreover, I knew who that person is. Rather than announce aloud who it is, I want to give that person an opportunity to correct the deed. Therefore, we will postpone our celebration until tomorrow. Tonight I will place another barrel outside my house so that person can bring a bottle of wine and tomorrow we shall all celebrate together.”

That night, each and every person in town came in the dark and emptied a bottle of wine into the barrel. They came all night long under the cover of darkness, ashamed that they had expected others to contribute but had failed themselves to make a donation. Only after pouring a bottle of wine into the barrel did each person feel that he or she had made a proper contribution.

The next day the town held a festival more joyous than ever before.

We each have a contribution to make that truly matters. No one of us has to fill the barrel, but each of us has a bottle of wine to bring.

Last week we read Parshat Tzav. It’s curious how this parashah, which describes the initiation of worship in the Tabernacle, begins with Moses (The Lord spoke to Moses saying… -- Leviticus 6:1), then enlarges the circle to include the priests (This is the offering that Aaron and his sons shall offer to the Lord on the occasion of his anointment… -- Leviticus 6:12), then enlarges the circle further to encompass the Israelites (Speak to the Israelite people thus… -- Leviticus 7:22), and ends on this note: …and assemble the whole community at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting (Leviticus 8:3).

Torah teaches us to begin locally and grow outward in our awareness, concern, and compassion, until we encompass the “whole community.”

Parshat Shemini, which we read this week, picks up where Tzav leaves off (as quoted above):

They brought to the front of the Tent of Meeting the things that Moses had commanded, and the whole community came forward and stood before the Lord. (Leviticus 9:1-5)

Shemini (which means “eighth”) tells us about the eighth day – the day after the seven-day inauguration of the Tabernacle.

What’s the big deal about the eighth day? The seven-day initiation celebration mirrors the creation of the world. God created the universe in seven days; the Tabernacle, whose rites will keep the world spinning, is initiated in a seven-day ceremony. The eighth day is the day of completion, perfection, beginning anew at a higher level. (So, too, with brit milah: a child lives for seven days, reproducing the Creation in his own short life, and then on the eighth day he is completed, perfected through circumcision, and begins his covenantal life.) The Talmud links Creation and the Tabernacle. Megillah 10b tells us that the day the Tabernacle was erected was as joyous for God as the day when heaven and earth were created.

The eighth day is the new beginning when we assemble together and all of us stand before the Lord. It is the ideal. Perhaps we cannot feel toward everyone as we feel toward those in our local neighborhood, but we can respond nonetheless. R. Akiba’s and Ben Azzai’s principle have a meeting ground in our actions.

Shortly after the disaster in Japan, many organizations in the Jewish community opened boxes to accept donations. The Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (http://www.jdc.org/) is accepting donations. Within days, ZAKA was on the ground in Japan doing what it does so well (http://www.zaka.us/). The Associate in Baltimore responded quickly (http://www.associated.org). We live in a global neighborhood. Let’s bring wine to the barrel.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

Holy versus Holier-than-thou / Parshat Tzav

2011-03-12T08:52:00.000-08:00

SPECIAL NOTE: If you are looking for avenues for making donations to help the victims of the earthquake and tsunami
in Japan, please consider:
The Jewish Joint Distribution Committee
ZAKA
The Associate of Baltimore
May the victims in Japan soon know comfort and consolation.

When my children were young, they had clothing reserved for messy activities like painting, working with clay, and playing in the dirt. My husband and I reserved t-shirts and shorts for indoor house painting – the shirts “artistically” reflect every paint color we’ve ever used. We wouldn’t have considered wearing good clothes for dirty tasks.

There was messy work to do in the Mishkan (Wilderness Tabernacle) and later in the Temple in Jerusalem. Among the messy daily chores was cleaning the ashes off the altar pyre, where many sacrifices were burned to ashes each day. You might think that the priests would reserve work clothes for this dirty job, but that’s not the case. Torah tells us that they were especially instructed by God to wear their priestly linen raiment:

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Command Aaron and his sons thus: This is the ritual of the burnt offering: The burnt offering itself shall remain where it is burned upon the altar all night until morning, while the fire on the altar is kept going on it. The priest shall dress in linen raiment, with linen breeches next to his body; and he shall take up the ashes to which the fire has reduced the burnt offering on the altar and place them beside the altar. He shall then take off his vestments, and put on other clothing, and carry the ashes outside the camp to a clean place. (Leviticus 6:1-4)

The priest did not participate only in the exalted and awe-inspiring elements of the sacrificial cult. They got their hands dirty, too. When the Second Temple stood, the mitzvah of removing the ashes – called Terumat HaDeshen – was originally undertaken by whichever priest arose early in the morning. In time, however, there evolved a daily footrace up the ramp to the altar for the privilege of the dirty chore of removing the ashes. Even the inglorious tasks that contributed to the holy work of the Temple were considered an honor and a privilege. I think of that when I have to do something I don’t want to do. I ask myself: Is there a holy component to this? Who will benefit from what I should be doing? That helps me find motivation not only to get the task done, but also to see that the potential for holiness is inherent in every act. Much of Jewish living – and here I mean the Jewish attitude and values for living, not the particular obligations and rituals of daily life – is to sanctify the mundane, to find in everything a connection to the bigger picture and to God.
It is also possible to go too far and end up in a dangerous place. The human psyche is complex and we often have a tough time keeping things in balance. Mundane and even banal chores can indeed be, or lead to, acts of holiness. But when our thinking becomes skewed, rather than approach tasks with humility, we risk poisoning the very sanctity of the act. This happens when we transform what should be a sacred act into a means for boosting our own status (recall the joke whose punch line is, “Look who thinks he’s nothing!”).

The Talmud illustrates this with a disturbing and graphic story that presumably occurred during the Second Temple period. The footraces up the ramp had become increasingly competitive. The young priests who participated in them lost sight of the fact that removing the ashes was a mitzvah, a sacred task. They were fixated on winning. For them it became an opportunity for self-aggrandizement. One day, the race erupted into violence: one young priest thrust a knife into his competitor to prevent him from reaching the altar first. Here’s the grisly account from Yoma 23a:

It once happened that two [of the priests] were neck and neck as they ran and ascended the ramp [to the altar]. One of them came within four cubits [of the top of the ramp]. His colleague took a knife and drove it into his heart.

R. Tzaddok stood on the steps of the Hall and cried, “Our Brothers, O House of Israel, listen! Behold it says: If a corpse will be found on the land… your elders and judges shall go out… (Deuteronomy 21:1-2) [to perform the ritual of the eglah arufah to effect atonement]. As for us: upon whom [rests the responsibility] to bring an eglah arufah? The city? [The priests who guard] the courtyard? All the people burst out crying.

The father of the boy came and found him writhing [but not yet dead]. He said: “Behold he is your atonement. My son is still writhing so the knife did not become ritually unclean.”

This teaches you that they regarded the ritual purity of the vessels more seriously than murder. Thus [Scripture] states: Manasseh also shed much innocent blood, until he filled Jerusalem from end to end… (2 Kings 21:16).

This account is unlikely to be historical. It is most likely a constructed story – based on a reality that the footraces had become excessively competitive – that provides the Rabbis the opportunity to teach us about misplaced priorities.

What happens is clear enough: a squadron of young priests races up the altar ramp toward the pile of ashes. The one who arrives first wins the privilege of Terumat HaDeshen for that day. So intense is the competition, that one young man thrusts a knife into the chest of another to prevent him from winning the competition.

What are we to make of the bizarre responses to this act of horrific violence in the name of a sacred task?

R. Tzaddok, viewing the race from below, fails to show concern for the life of the young man who has been knifed. Instead, he expresses concerned that his corpse will convey tum’ah (ritual impurity) to the Temple area, and asks how atonement should be affected in this unusual circumstance. He cites a completely inappropriate verse in Deuteronomy that explains how atonement is affected in a case where a corpse is found in a field outside town and it is not known who the murderer is. Torah tells us that the elders gather to perform a rite of atonement through which they declare they are not responsible for the death. R. Tzaddok is asking: who should perform that ritual? In this case, the murderer is known and there is a multitude of witnesses. Citing this verse from Deuteronomy suggests that in addition to allowing the inappropriate race to take place each day, the priests in charge are unwilling to take responsibility for the violence that ensues.

R. Tzaddok’s tragically misplaced priorities are shared by the people present that morning. Please don’t miss the cruel irony: the people are crying not because innocent has been shed in a vulgar perversion of the sacred rituals of the Temple, but because they’re worried about tum’ah (ritual impurity) and ritual atonement.

This brings us to the father’s enigmatic statement. It becomes apparent that he is the only one who has approached the young man’s body to see if he is, in fact, dead! He sees that his son is still alive. Responding to the concern about tum’ah (ritual impurity), he assures those present that so long as the boy remains alive (writhing in pain on the ground!) the knife in his chest is not yet tamei (ritually impure) and therefore does not convey tum’ah. The father is delivering a chilling and (from the perspective of the Rabbis well-placed) condemnation of priorities so skewed that they are an utter perversion of Jewish values.

The Rabbis echo the father’s condemnation with these words, “This teaches you that they regarded the ritual purity of the vessels more seriously than murder.” They also add a verse from Second Kings concerning King Manasseh of Judah who ruled for more than four decades in the seventh century B.C.E. Manasseh reversed the religious reforms of his father Hezekiah, brought idol worship into the Temple, consigned his son to fire, and practiced necromancy. He also killed a great many Jews to consolidate his power. The Rabbis quote only the first half of 2 Kings 12:16. It’s always worthwhile to check out the entire verse, as well as the context, to get a fuller sense of what the Sages have in mind. Here’s the whole verse:

Manasseh also shed much innocent blood, until he filled Jerusalem from end to end – besides the sin he committed in causing Judah to do what was displeasing to the Lord.

Manasseh, as the leader, led others astray. The Rabbis warn us that those in authority have a sacred responsibility not only to do the right thing, but also to model that for others.

The Radak (Rabbi David Kimchi, Provence, 1160-1235) comments on this verse:

Menasseh had systematically destroyed all the Torah scrolls and alienated the nation so thoroughly from the Torah, that the people were completely unfamiliar with its contents.

King Menasseh is used in our story – in Yoma 23a – as the poster-boy for people in possession of power and authority who utterly pervert the values of Torah and lead others to do the same, to such an extent that they don’t even know what Torah is about. What a fitting verse to quote as the epilogue to this story!

The mitzvah of Terumat HaDeshen (clearing away the ashes) teaches that even banal tasks can be sacred – indeed everything in our universe and our lives has the potential for holiness if approached with the right attitude. At the same time, it is altogether too easy for that attitude to be drowned by human tendencies to compete and achieve status, in which case not only is the holiness lost, but sacred rituals become unholy perversions of Torah.

© Rabbi Amy Scheinerman