Mishpatim

By Melissa Berenbaum, Feb 22, 2020

Shabbat Shalom. Mishpatim. Is there a better parsha for a lawyer? This parsha can be described as a combined class in criminal law, property and torts – all in one. This parsha sets out the laws, intended to create a just and equitable society, and is referred to as the Book of the Covenant.

The laws are grouped together. The first section addresses wrongdoing that is redressed by courts, including treatment of slaves; behavior which for which the death penalty will be imposed; lesser offenses, causing physical injury to one person against another and injuries to animals and injuries caused by animals, which result in the imposition of damages or restitution; laws of theft and property damage, and the seduction of a virgin.

The second section addresses moral and ethical behavior, behavior not necessarily redressed by a court or government. These pronouncements are intended to set up norms – expected conduct and behavior – for society. We police ourselves when it comes to these commandments. And it includes directives on how to treat the less fortunate and the stranger. This section also includes the sabbatical year for fields and another reminder that the seventh day is a day of rest, as well as to refrain from invoking other gods.

The parsha also lays out the observance of the “shalosh regalim” – Feast of Unleavened bread (Pesach), Harvest (Shavuot), and Ingathering (Sukkot). Just as an aside – no mention of an extra set of dishes for Pesach… just saying!

The prescripts laid out in this parsha are meant for a people settled, living in a particular place. But the Israelites are not yet in the land that God has promised. The parsha includes a description of the road ahead – and what obstacles God will clear for them. And the parsha concludes with Moshe ascending Mount Sinai.

Let’s take a deeper dive into the second section of the Covenantal Code.

Chapter 22, Verses 20 – 26: (Robert Alter translation)

“You shall not cheat a sojourner and you shall not oppress him, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt. No widow nor orphan shall you abuse. If you indeed abuse them, when they cry out to Me, I will surely hear their outcry. And my wrath shall flare up and I will kill you by the sword, and your wives shall be widows and your children orphans. If you should lend money to My people, to the pauper among you, you shall not be to him like a creditor, you shall not impose interest on him. If you should indeed take in pledge your fellow man’s cloak, before the sun comes down you shall return it to him. For it is his sole covering, it is his cloak for his skin – in what can he lie? And so, when he cries out to Me, I will hear him, for I am compassionate.”

This is not the only time the God tells the Israelites not to oppress the widow, orphan and sojourners. It comes up in the next chapter, v. 9:

“No sojourner shall you oppress, for you know the sojourner’s heart, since you were sojourners in the land of Egypt.”

And again, in V’Ikrya, ch. 19, v. 33-34:

“And should a sojourner sojourn with you, you shall not wrong him. Like the native among you shall be the sojourner who sojourns with you, and you shall love him like yourself, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt.”

And 4 times in D’varim: Ch. 10, v. 17-19:

“For the Lord your God, He is the God of gods and the Master of masters, the great and mighty and fearsome God Who shows no favor and takes no bribe, doing justice for orphan and widow and loving the sojourner to give him bread and cloak. And you shall love the sojourner, for sojourners you were in the land of Egypt.”

Ch 24, v. 14:

“You shall not oppress a poor and needy hired worker from your brothers or from your sojourners who are in your land within your gates.”

Continuing at v. 17-18:

“You shall not skew the case of a sojourner or an orphan, and you shall not take as pawn a widow’s garment. And you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt, and the Lord your God” ransomed you from there.”

And as the Israelites are poised to enter the land, in Chapter 27, as the Levites are calling out the commandments to the people, in v. 19, they say, “’Cursed be he who skews the case of a sojourner, orphan or widow.’ And all the people shall say ‘Amen.’”

So why all the repeated references to protecting the sojourner – or stranger – the widow and the orphan? Why the constant reminder that the Israelites were strangers in Egypt?

Rashi comments on the verses of Mishpatim, regarding the giving of credit to a poor person, that God is reminding the people that the poor person is one of God’s people, too. And to look at yourself as if you are the poor person.

This is God’s directive that we have empathy and compassion for those around us. So we are continually reminded in the Torah that we were strangers, we knew how it felt to be at the bottom rung of society, and we should never forget that.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has written:

Empathy is not a lightweight, touchy-feely, add-on extra to the moral life. It is an essential element in conflict resolution. People who have suffered pain often respond by inflicting pain on others. The result is violence, sometimes emotional, sometimes physical, at times directed against individuals, at others, against whole groups. The only genuine, non-violent alternative is to enter into the pain of the other in such a way as to ensure that the other knows that he, she or they have been understood, their humanity recognised and their dignity affirmed.

Rabbi Sacks’ teaching continues:

But active empathy is life-changing, not only for you but for the people with whom you interact. Instead of responding with anger to someone else’s anger, try to understand where the anger might be coming from. In general, if you seek to change anyone’s behaviour, you have to enter into their mindset, see the world through their eyes and try to feel what they are feeling, and then say the word or do the deed that speaks to their emotions, not yours. It’s not easy. Very few people do this. Those who do, change the world.

Empathy and compassion begin with kindness. Before we can put ourselves in the shoes of another and try to understand their circumstances, we have to suspend judgments and open our hearts.

About 10 years ago, as Josh and Mira were at the age of middle schoolers and I began to realize that I didn’t have a window on all facets of their lives, I struggled to engage them in conversation. “How was school?” “What’s new?” “What happened today?” These were inadequate questions to draw them out into a meaningful conversation. So what did I do in this modern age – search the Internet! And I found some article that contained a variety of questions designed to elicit more than “yes” “no” and “fine” and “good” as answers. I realized if I posed these questions on a daily basis, my kids might never come out of their rooms. But I distilled them and thought it would be a good way to engage them at Shabbat dinner. And we ask 4 questions on Friday nights around our table:

How were you kind this week?

How were you brave?

Can you share a success with us?

Or is there something that didn’t go so well this week that you want to share, so we can support you?

They only have to answer one question, and many weeks the answer was simply a good grade on a test. But some weeks it was more – helping a fellow student with some work, giving someone a ride who needed one. And for their parents, it causes us to go through out week knowing we will have to provide an answer to one of the questions.

God commands us to never forget our experience in slavery – of being the other in a society, and to never treat a stranger the way we were treated, and to give special consideration to those who are less fortunate – the widow, the orphan, the poor.

If that is how God expects us to treat the less fortunate, what could God expect from us with regard to the people we know, the people with whom we share community? I believe the commandment has broader application than how we treat the stranger and the less fortunate.

First, we can’t always know what’s going on in the lives of those with whom have relationships: who may be dealing with the needs of a parent, or another relative, or a child. And we can’t necessarily know about the challenges someone may be experiencing at work, or a financial challenge. So in our interactions, it’s important that we be mindful of what we might not know about a person.

Second, is there any downside to being empathic and showing compassion? It may actually produce a better and more productive relationship. For example, during my time as Rosh (now really concluded!), a good part of my role was about working to make sure we had appropriate space to daven each Shabbat, making sure we had the right equipment, even the right chairs. I had to appreciate that while our space was the most important thing for us, those with whom I interacted had a lot of things they were juggling. And by my recognizing their responsibilities and obligations, I was more likely to be heard.

Another priority has been addressing the needs of those who need assistance with hearing. Steady persistence and consistent engagement may finally payoff, with the hearing loop being installed in the coming months.

I have tried to advocate for the Library Minyan, in the context of respecting the other stakeholders in Temple Beth Am and finding a means of accommodation, rather than confrontation. Co-existing in a mutually enhancing way benefits all of us and the larger Temple Beth Am community.

It may be a variation on the theme of remembering the stranger when we take care in our interactions to respect one another. And I think the wisest Torah commentator was my mother, zichrona l’vracha, when she lovingly looked at my brother and me as we were fighting and admonished us to, “Be Nice.” In being nice – showing empathy and compassion — in our interactions with one another, we are doing God’s work.

Shabbat shalom.

Lecture by Steve Sloame, Feb 8, 2020

It is generally known that the UN has been dealing unfairly with Israel. But the the details are generally not known. So before I turn to what my organization does, I think it would be helpful to give some history.

The UN was formed in 1945. Its basic purpose was to empower the cause of world peace. But after 1974 efforts were made to end the existence of Israel as a majority Jewish state through support of the so-called “right of return” and force Israel to accept the 5.5 million so-called refugees who call themselves Palestinians which would result in the end of the Jewish majority in Israel. The effort was also aimed to weaken the US position internationally by isolating it and Israel from the rest of the international community.

How would this be accomplished? In 1974 Fidel Castro, who was determined to weaken the US internationally, and Muammar Quaddafi, determined to eliminate the Jewish state, and who were both candidates for leadership in the Non-Aligned Movement, joined forces and succeeded in putting together a majority coalition in the UN General Assembly. It consisted of the Soviet bloc, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (now known as the Organization of Islamic Cooperation), and a majority of African states that were attracted by slogans of anti-colonialism and “Zionism is Racism”. Neither goal was achieved, but the UN support of the right of return remains to this day a major obstacle to the conclusion of a meaningful peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. Further, the penetration of the UN Secretariat by anti-Israel operatives has had the effect of installing anti-Israel sentiments into a large part of the UN staff.

How was it done? One of the first steps was to invite Yasser Arafat to address the UN General Assembly in September 1974. He delivered a speech that lasted more than 2 hours. A few weeks later the GA adopted Res. 3236 in which it recognized “the inalienable right of hte Palestinians to return to their homes and property from which they have been displaced and uprooted”. The resolution then declared that the UNGA “calls for their return”. In 1975 the GA took a critically important step. It created the UN’s central anti-Israel apparatus, which operates to this very day, by establishing the Committee on the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (CEIRPP). The Committee’s work in getting the anti-Israel message out was undertaken by the staff with Cuban staff members in the lead. Two years later the organizers of the anti-Israel campaign took the critically important step of requesting the Secretary General to establish within the Secretariat a Special Unit on Palestinian Rights which would prepare studies and publications relating to the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people. It annually holds 4 major conferences around the world to bash Israel. In 1979 its name was changed to the Division for Palestinian Rights, on the same organizational line of the Secretariat as the Europe Division, the Americas Division, the 2 African Divisions, the Asia and Pacific Division and the Middle East and West Asia Division. Its statement of purpose is to support the Right of Return. It has 15 people on the payroll with the task of spreading the anti-Israel message. Thus in violation of its charter, the UN has built within its system an apparatus designed to destroy one of its 193 member states. You have all heard of UNRWA, an agency of the UN whose purpose is to maintain a list of millions of people of Arab ethnicity whose mass migration to Israel the UN plans to sponsor. CEIRPP get the message out in support of this mass migration. The DPR uses the UN system to win international support of the cause which would destroy the state of Israel. The ultimate goal is to get the UN Security Council to sponsor the mass migration, ordering Israel to accept them. A US veto can, of course, prevent this. But the proponents believe that by attaining worldwide support they will ultimately cause the US to give in and allow the SC to adopt a right of return resolution which would enjoy the status of international law.

How can one expect a Palestinian leader to give up the Right of Return if year after year the UN endorses it? This is not known by most heads of state and therefore it is up to the US to get this message out. What can be done to minimize the harm?

My organization, AJIRI, was founded in 2005 with a strategy to combat the UN effort to delegitimize Israel, first by reducing the need for the US to veto anti-Israel resolutions in the Security Council and over a longer period to reduce the about 20 annual overwhelmingly anti-Israel resolutions in the General Assembly. It is important to distinguish among those resolutions between those that are merely declarative (and do not have adverse operational consequences), and those that have such consequences, and thus are damaging to Israel. The vast majority of the annual anti-Israel resolutions are actually declarative only, in other words, “hot air”. Before getting to the 2 annual destructive General Assembly resolutions, I’ll turn to the Security Council where the resolutions have the force of international law. For years the US as a permanent member of the Security Council exercised its veto to protect Israel. For example between 1972 and 2006 the US cast 41 vetoes. This had the effect of making the US and Israel pariah nations against the will of the international community. And what if an American administration refused to veto an anti-Israel resolution? We saw that happen at the end of 2016.

The strategy was devised by former Deputy Ambassador to the UN Richard Schifter and currently the Chairman of AJIRI. It is predicated on the little known fact that quite a few countries’ UN ambassadors vote

without consulting with their heads of government. Decisions are made by their UN ambassadors or, in some cases, foreign ministries. It is easier and more rewarding for the UN ambassadors of countries with no dog in the fight to go along to get along. We also knew that for a Security Council resolution to pass, thereby forcing the US to veto it, it needed 9 affirmative votes out of the 15 members — 5 permanent and 10 non-permanent members representing regions and rotating for 2 year terms. When an anti-Israel resolution is proposed in the SC, Israel can generally count on the votes of the US, the UK and France and the 2 non-permanent EU members for a total of 5. This means that the proponents of the resolution need 9 of the remaining 10 members to vote in favor of the resolution and force a veto. But we only need 2 abstentions, not even no votes, to prevent the necessary 9 yes votes, and as a practical matter since votes are solicited and counted ahead of time the resolution would be tabled and no vote would be held.

So the questions we faced were how to identify and persuade the two members we needed to abstain.

First, we divided the total UN membership into 4 parts: friends of the US and Israel, enemies of Israel such as the 57 members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation sure to vote for anti-Israel resolutions, members that vote against the US and Israel for purely geopolitical reasons such as Russia, China, Cuba, Venezuela, Ecuador and until recently we hope Brazil, and members that are essentially neutral in that they have no major foreign policy differences with the US but vote along with the majority against Israel, generally in those countries where the heads of state pay no attention to the votes of their UN Ambassador. We examined the members of the latter group and identified those countries that receive US foreign aid.

Second, In 2006 Ambassador Schifter and I met with the two House of Representative whips, Democrat Steny Hoyer and Republican then Congressman now Senator Roy Blount, both staunchly pro Israel. We outlined our analysis and suggested they identify and give their blessing to members who are likely to play a role, especially those on the Foreign

Relations Committee which overseas the foreign aid budget. They agreed and brought to the meeting a number of like minded members who would agree to adopt a country, starting with those newly elected to the Security Council. The plan was that AJIRI would do the research, in part by examining the State Department’s annual voting coincidence report which tracks the votes of all UN members on the 25 annual resolutions the State Department deemed important and compares their votes with how the US voted. AJIRI would then draft a letter addressed to the head of state of the individual country which would be signed by the Congressman. The letter would start by reciting the friendship between our countries and the absence of major foreign policy differences. It would go on to point out that that the country had over the past 3 years voted, for example, 67% of the time against the way the US voted, and concluded by urging the head of state to request the country’s UN Ambassador to alert him or her the next time the ambassador learned that the US intended to vote against a resolution. (We always wrote about votes against the US, not Israel, as the resolutions often involved Israel anyway.) The Congressman would then invite to his office the country’s bilateral ambassador in Washington, whose job is to maintain good relations with the US and keep the money flowing. The Congressman would discuss the contents of the letter and then hand it to the ambassador for delivery to the head of state in the diplomatic pouch.

The strategy worked virtually every time. As proof, between 2006, when we started, and today the US has had to exercise its veto only 3 times. Let me give you a couple of examples and anecdotes of our success.

Columbia was consistently voting against Israel despite receiving the third most foreign aid after Israel and Egypt (to combat the cartels). In this case we involved a Senator. the late Arlen Spector of Pennsylvania, who was personally friendly with Columbia’s President Uribe. The Senator called Uribe and the votes in the UN shifted more favorably. Uribe was unaware of how his ambassador voted.

A few years ago a small African country, Burkina Faso, which had just been elected to the Security Council, was consistently voting against the US and Israel despite having received from the State Department a Millennium Challenge Grant of $400 million, awarded to nations which had taken positive steps toward democracy, transparency and the rule of law, Northern Virginia Congressman Frank Wolf, now retired, volunteered. He called the Embassy and asked for the Ambassador. He was told that the Ambassador was back in the capital and suggested that the Congressman call the UN Ambassador. Frank blew up, exclaiming “What the hell do you people have an embassy for?” Within 48 hours the Ambassador was in Frank’s office together with the Secretary of the Cabinet. A month later the State Department reported that Burkina Faso had done an about face and was now voting with the US.

When the proponents of the anti-Israel Security Council resolution discover they don’t have the 9 affirmative votes to force the US into an embarrassing veto, the resolutions are tabled. Thus, for example, after Gilead Shalit was abducted in Gaza and Israel mounted an excursion, the UN Human Rights Council took up the matter and referred the infamous Goldstone Report to the Security Council with a recommendation to take action against Israel. No vote was taken. The same with subsequent Gaza wars. In 2012, however, Mohammad Abbas thought he had the votes for Palestinian Statehood and the Arab representative on the SC introduced the resolution. But to Abbas’ surprise, Togo and Nigeria abstained after heavy lobbying and the resolution failed to get 9 affirmative votes. The decision by Nigeria to abstain came in the final hour. Ambassador Schifter called a former Israeli ambassador to the UN who, in turn, called Bibi to point out that we were just a vote away from a setting in which no veto would be needed. Bibi called the Nigerian President, Jonathan Goodluck, who called his ambassador to the UN to instruct him that Nigeria should abstain.

The 2 annual General Assembly resolutions that are the most critically important are the resolutions that extend the mandates and the funding authorizations for the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, in which 26 UN member states are represented, and the Division for Palestinian Rights in the Secretariat. As I mentioned, these provide UN support for the claim of a “right of return” and with a massive population transfer of Palestinians end of the State of Israel as a majority Jewish state. As AJIRI sees the situation, there are indeed a number of UN member states that would favor efforts to end Israel’s existence. But we also believe that the heads of government of a significant number of the states that vote for the resolutions or abstain are simply not aware of the true meaning of these resolutions. (The Palestinian leadership, of course, understands the meaning of the resolutions very well.) The failure of many officials to understand the true meaning of the resolutions is due to the fact that their texts are cleverly worded so that the term “right of return” does not appear in them. Instead, the relevant texts use wording that needs to be carefully examined to lead the reader to recognize that the resolutions espouse the “right of return.” It is by making both diplomats and Members of Congress aware of the true meaning of CEIRPP and DPR that AJIRI has gotten the word out on the UNGA role in interfering with the efforts to attain an Israeli/Palestinian peace agreement.

CEIRPP and DPR resolutions were once again adopted by the UN General Assembly on December 3, 2019. There were a number of very favorable developments. We believe that the AJIRI effort played a role in important vote changes, brought about through the intercession of Members of Congress with Presidents and Prime Ministers directly.

Significant Change in the EU Voting Pattern

As you know, across the years the United States and Israel have been joined in casting No votes on CEIRPP and DPR by Australia, Canada, and a few Pacific Island states. A few years ago Congressional intercession helped by AJIRI paid off by adding Guatemala and Honduras to the No votes.

What really drew a great deal of attention on December 3, including highly positive statements from the Israeli Foreign Ministry and Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, was the change in the voting pattern on the DPR resolution by European Union states, led by Germany. For many years the voting pattern of the 28 EU member states was the following: Yes — 2 (Cyprus, Malta), No — 0, Abstain — 26. In 2019 we saw a truly striking change: Yes — 2, No -12, Abstain — 14. I should add that the 2019 change was preceded by a slight change in 2018, when Hungary switched from Abstain to No. But Hungary was no longer alone in 2019. It was joined by 11 other EU member states.

We believe that Germany played a key role in this change in voting pattern. With the help of AJIRI, Congressman Steny Hoyer sent a letter to the Foreign Minister of Germany, Heiko Mass. We believe that letter positively influenced the vote of not only Germany, but 10 other EU members: Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Greece, Lithuania, Netherlands, Romania, and Slovakia. It should be possible to pick up additional European votes in 2020. In light of the UK election result we think the UK may be ready to vote No next year. We also hope that in 2020 the states that voted No in 2019 only on DPR would add CEIRPP, a committee of ambassadors from 26 states that meet periodically for sessions at which Israel is denounced and the Right of Return is emphasized. Hungary and the Czech Republic have already begun to vote No on CEIRPP as well.

Latin America

In 2017 it was Guatemala which was the first country to cross over to vote No on CEIRPP and DPR. In 2018 it was joined by Honduras. And in 2019 Brazil and Colombia made it four. Brazil is, of course, a country with significant worldwide standing. Colombia plays an important role in Latin America. In both states the political outlook of their respective Presidents played an important role, but it was still necessary to call their attention to the meaning of CEIRPP and DPR. Heads of government do not normally spend time focusing on UN resolutions. It is necessary to call their attention to the fact that certain UN resolutions contravene the basic policies of their respective governments.

The challenge for 2020 is to identify those states that can join the foregoing four. The other 15 Latin American states divide as follows on the CEIRPP an DPR: Voting Yes: Bolivia, Chile, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Uruguay, Venezuela (10). Voting Abstain: Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru (4). Argentina (1) voted Yes on CEIRPP and Abstain on DRP. The states on which we have no chance are Chile (because of the influence of the Chile’s Palestinian community). and Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, now joined by Argentina (because of their unfriendly outlook toward the United States). The outcome of the Uruguayan election and the developments in Bolivia offer real opportunities for change.

Caribbean

The 14 Caribbean states are divided equally between those that vote Yes and those that are Absent. Voting Yes in 2019 on CEIRPP and DPR were Antigua & Barbuda, Belize, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, and Suriname. Absent were Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Haiti, St. Kitts, and Trinidad & Tobago.

We have to assume that Cuba plays an important role in the region, yet given the close economic relationship between many of these countries and the United States, it is important to stay in touch with most of them.

Africa

There are 54 states in the UN’s Africa Group. They can be divided between the 10 North African states, all of which are members of the Arab League, and the 44 states in Sub- Saharan Africa. AJIRI’s attention obviously focuses on Sub- Saharan Africa. Here we can note a significant change between voting patterns on DPR in 2018 and 2019: In 2018 28 states voted Yes, 6 Abstain, and 10 were absent. In 2019 21 states voted Yes, 7 Abstain, and 16 were absent.

Please note that in 2019 only a minority of the 44 Sub- Saharan African states voted for DPR. That, too, was the first time. In this context, let me offer an observation on the difference between an Abstain vote and an Absence.

An “Abstain” vote means that a state casting that vote makes it clear that it is “not for” the resolution, but does not feel strongly enough to vote No. An Absence, on the other hand, may in some cases mean that the delegation in question does not have an officer available to be present at the UNGA session. In many cases, however, it means something quite different, namely that the state is “not for” the resolution but wants to obscure that fact. (Ambassador Schifter tells the story that at the beginning of a session of the UN Human Rights Commission, at which he represented the United States, an Ambassador from one of the smaller countries came up to him and said the following: “I have been instructed to tell you that any time you don’t want me to be in the room, tell me that, and I won’t be in the room.”)

Summing Up

As you may know, the UN has 193 members. That means that a bare majority of the membership would be 97. At the current session, for the first time in decades, the Yes votes on both resolutions were less than a majority of the UN membership. That, of course, does not mean that the resolutions were defeated, because the No votes were still quite low, but it appears that a number of states are reached by the message that they should not vote Yes on these anti-Israel resolutions.

On CEIRPP the Yes vote was down from 100 to 92. The 2019 vote total was 92 Yes, 13 No, 61 Abstain, 27 Absent.

On DPR the Yes vote was down from 96 to 87. The 2019 vote total was 87 Yes, 23 No, 54 Abstain, 29 Absent.

Let us keep in mind that as CEIRPP and DPR raise budgetary questions in that their operations need to be funded out of the UN budget, the resolutions require, under the UN Charter, a two-thirds majority for them to pass.

As we look ahead to the 2020 session, we certainly need to identify again the Yes votes cast by states whose heads of government would not vote Yes if they understood the meaning of CEIRPP and DPR.

Finally, a few words about Israel’s and American Jews’ view of the UN. For a long time, Israel didn’t really care about the UN and it’s anti-Israel activities. In fact, David Ben-Gurion coined an expression to show where he stood: UM SHMUM. In colloquial English, it would mean UN? Forgetaboutit. But even General Assembly advisory resolutions are important. Resolution 181 in 1948 partitioned the British Mandate of Palestine into 3 parts — Israel, Palestine and an independent Jerusalem. But due to Arab opposition there was no Security Council vote.

Nevertheless that resolution triggered Israel’s declaration of independence. Then there was the case of South Africa. The GA passed a very strong resolution boycotting and sanctioning South Africa for its apartheid and set up an office in the Secretariat to track how each country implemented the resolution. Although the UK would not permit a Security Council resolution to pass, the GA resolution effectively brought down the South African government. Today, thanks in part to Israel’s Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer, Israel has since 2016 changed its view about the UN. Previously, Israel was content with having bilateral relations with as many countries as possible and would overlook the UN votes of those same countries who would wink and nod about their UN votes, For the first time, in July of 2017 at a summit with African leaders, Prime Minister Netanyahu listed as one of Israel’s priorities in international affairs the changing of anti-Israel votes in the UN when he discussed how Israel could help other countries with agriculture, energy, water conservation and technology. AJIRI works very closely with Israel’s embassy in Washington.

As for American Jews, we have discovered that many feel that the UN is a lost cause. We don’t agree. We recognize the enormous damage that the UN can do to Israel, but we deny that it is hopeless and have seen a change for which we take a small modicum of credit. It is our mission, in addition to help change UN votes, to alert the Jewish community about both the dangers and opportunities.

Thank you and I welcome questions.

Lech Lecha לֶךְ לְךָ

By Zwi Reznik, November 9, 2019, 11 Heshvan 5780

I don’t recall the exact date, but sometime this month will be the 70th anniversary of my arrival in the United States. Along with my parents we arrived at the Brooklyn Navy Yard on a converted merchant ship along with a large group of refugees from Italy. While the destination may have been uncertain Europe was clearly someplace to leave.

About forty years ago I read a book by Chaim Potok titled “Wanderings”, a history of the Jewish people. The title itself was intriguing in suggesting that our peoples’ history was one of being unsettled and restlessly moving on from place to place. Yet growth and transformation is achieved by that wandering. I also read Potok’s “My name is Asher Lev”. I recall the description of how young Asher would create an art work. He would mark a point on a surface, then draw a line and then, without any further description, the art work would be complete.

I was reminded of young Asher’s artistry a few months ago when I was having a conversation with one of my learned Library Minyan friends who was describing how she approached composing a Drash. The process involved an initial thought and then allowing one’s mind to wander from that thought. Productive wandering does not necessarily involve physically moving.

So, when I started thinking of doing a Drash again I remembered all of the above and I arrived at Lech Lecha.

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר יְהוָה֙ אֶל־ אַבְרָ֔ם לֶךְ־ לְךָ֛ מֵאַרְצְךָ֥ וּמִמּֽוֹלַדְתְּךָ֖ וּמִבֵּ֣ית אָבִ֑יךָ אֶל־ הָאָ֖רֶץ אֲשֶׁ֥ר אַרְאֶֽךָּ׃ *

12:1 And the LORD said to Abram, **”Go forth from your land and your birthplace and your father’s house to the land I will show you”.

Chapter 12 opens with a direct command from God to Abram, who we have only just met. Noach ended with just a brief mention of him. Most of us learned a midrash story about Abram which told of Abram, as a child, smashing his father’s idols, refusing to apologize and challenging his father as to why he would pray to such objects. Yet here in the Torah the first story of Abram occurs ten generations after Noah and we can only make inferences to his earlier life. God speaks directly to Abram with a clear command (lech) לֶךְ, i.e. GO. Go is the second person imperative form of the verb ללכת-to go. The following word לְךָ (lecha) is not really necessary for the verse to have a clear message. However, adding lecha can give the two word phrase an enhanced meaning. Literal translations could be “Go to you” or the similar “Go to yourself”. In other words you must GO to become what you are supposed to be and not remain as you are. A commonly cited saying of Rabbi Zushya of Hanipol, which I think relevant, states: “When I get to Heaven, they will not ask me, Zushya, why were you not Moses. They, will ask me, why were you not Zushya?” With this first verse we can understand that Abram has been selected to begin a transforming journey to become his true self, and as we’ll see later that transformation will be marked by a name change. And what of God’s purpose? By ten generations after Noach something different had to be done other than saving one family and wiping out everyone else. A transformation was needed that will result in a new people being formed. None of that could happen without Abram first removing himself from the environment which had formed him and in which he did not fit. After all, smashing idols does not endear one to the neighbors.

At the beginning of Chapter 12 Abram is living in Haran—identified as someplace in South Eastern Turkey. He had previously arrived there from Ur of the Chaldees, somewhere in modern Iraq, with his father, Terah, his barren wife Sarai and his nephew Lot. Promises are made to Abram by God if he does what he is told. Without any questions or discussions by Abram he leaves at the age of 75. Now his wanderings begin in earnest. He leaves Haran with his still barren wife, his nephew Lot, and everything they had including their slaves. They arrive at Shechem which is north of Beth-El. From there they move on to the Negeb and a famine occurs. In a bit of foreshadowing they move to Egypt.

In Egypt Abram is seen to be less than a righteous person in relation to his wife Sarai. Fearing for his life he tells Pharoah that Sarai is his sister rather than his wife. Pharoah takes her in and Abram starts doing real well. 12:16—”And it went well with Abram on her count, and he had sheep and cattle and donkeys and male and female slaves and she-asses and camels”. Then in another bit of foreshadowing Pharoah suffers plagues because of Sarai and he has them both, and all their property and escorted out of Egypt. As you might imagine there has been ample discussion of this incident. As an example consider the commentary of Robert Alter regarding this: “17. plagues. The nature of the afflictions is not spelled out. Rashi’s inference of a genital disorder preventing intercourse is not unreasonable. In that case, one might imagine a tense exchange between Pharaoh and Sarai ending in a confession by Sarai of her status as Abram’s wife. In the laconic narrative art of the Hebrew writer, this is left as a gap for us to fill in by an indeterminate compound of careful deduction and imaginative reconstruction.”

What is the point of this story? Abram’s words to Sarai are disappointing. 12:11-13” 11 And it happened as he drew near to the border of Egypt that he said to Sarai his wife, “Look, I know you are a beautiful woman, 12 and so when the Egyptians see you and say, ‘She is his wife,’ they will kill me while you they will let live. 13 Say, please, that you are my sister, so that it will go well with me on your count and I shall stay alive because of you.” There are a number of places in Torah where research shows that the details of a particular story can be explained by cultural norms that were contemporaneous with the patriarchal period. Apparently there were societies at the presumed time of Abraham where the social status of a sister surpassed that of a man’s wife. While that reality may have been a foundation for this story and would not make Abram look so bad it is not relevant. What we have is the story of a Patriarch who is an imperfect human being. What we learn is of the possibility of improvement in the future.

After Egypt the family, including Lot, return to the Negeb and eventually Beth El. They separate amicably and Abram speaks to his family member Lot with kindness which differs from the fearful Abram we just saw in Egypt and Lot went on to 13:12”…set up his tent near Sodom”. Abram moves on eventually to Hebron and God continues to affirm his promises to Abram. There is a poignant note that can be appended to one of the promises. 13:16” And I will make your seed like the dust of the earth—could a man count the dust of the earth, so too, your seed might be counted”. Alter adds the note: The great Yiddish poet Yakov Glatstein wrote a bitter poem after the Nazi genocide which proposes that indeed the seed of Abraham has become like the dust of the earth

At the end of the chapter God advises Abram to 13-17 “Rise, walk about the land through its length and its breadth, for to you I will give it.” Apparently this is an ancient manner of acquiring title to a parcel of land. So Abram has been promised the land and in the next chapter we find him playing an integral part of the international affairs of that land.

Chapter 14 seems out of place in this Parsha. There is no interchange at all between God and Abram. It is a story of the invasion of four Mesopotamian kings to do battle with five Canaanite kings. One could romanticize this “epic” and refer to this as the Battle of the Nine Armies—similar to a phrase occurring in the Ring Trilogy by Tolkien. There is ample scholarship to indicate that this chapter is an adaptation of a much earlier story or type of story. In his commentary Alter notes that “The dating of the narrative is in dispute, but there are good arguments for its relative antiquity: at least four of the five invading kings have authentic Akkadian, Elamite, or Hittite names.”

The Mesopotamian invasion does not go well for the Canaanites. 14:10-11:” 10And the Valley of Siddim was riddled with bitumen(חמר) pits, and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled there and leaped into them, while the rest fled to the high country. 11And the four kings took all the substance of Sodom and Gomorrah and all their food, and went off.”

The Mesopotamians looted Sodom and Gomorah, including their food, and also seized Lot and all his substance. Abram was informed of this 14:14: “14 And Abram heard that his kinsman was taken captive and he marshaled his retainers, natives of his household, three hundred and eighteen of them, and gave chase up to Dan”. (I think the movie version should be called “Abram and the Magnificent 318). So now we see Abram as action hero, assembling an army and attacks the Mesopotamian kings and their forces. He pursues them as far north as Damascus and rescues Lot and everyone else and all their substance. He is given a hero’s welcome by the Kings of Sodom and Salem (שלם)-now Jerusalem. The King of Sodom asks just for his people back and offers Abram everything else. Abram, in an act of magnanimity responds. 14-24: “Nothing for me but what the lads (נערים) have consumed. And as for the share of the men who came with me, Aner, Eshkol, and Mamre, let them take their share.” (Note: Current usage defines נער as youth, adolescent, teenager etc. the term armsbearer also appears in my dictionary. These were not merely servants. They were trained soldiers). Once again, as in his dealings with Lot when they separated we see a new Abram. He seeks nothing for himself, only for the men who fought with him. Also, we see an Abram the Hebrew who is an integral part of the community of national groups in Canaan and appears to be the equal of their kings. I would conclude therefore that this portion of the Parsha, while clearly adapted from earlier sources, is an essential part of the story of Abram becoming Abraham.

Another new development in Abram’s character appears in Chapter 15. For the first time Abram engages God in conversation and actually complains about the lack of children. More conversations, and even argumentation, will be seen later.

I will stop my drash at this point. The story of Hagar and Ismael are deserving of their own drash.

*All Hebrew quotations are from Westminster Leningrad Codex. The Hebrew Tanak: Hebrew Bible Edition (Kindle Locations 699-701). Kindle Edition.

**All English Quotations are from Alter, Robert. The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with Commentary. W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

Yom Kippur 5780

Rabbi Jim Rogozen, October 2019

What Happened to the Dancing?

Years ago, when we had first moved to Cleveland, I was asked to lead overflow High Holiday services at a shul in Toronto. It was great: I could say whatever I wanted to…and then leave town, actually, leave the country. For some reason, they kept inviting me back.  I did it for 5 years in a row, until my wife and young children said they really wanted to be home for the holidays. Well, it’s been 22 years since I’ve spoken on the high holidays. It’s an honor to be asked. I am aware, however, that I don’t get to leave town after this. Or at least, I hope I won’t have to.

So let me begin with something clear, easy, and not in the least provocative. Ready?

I hate Yom Kippur.

I don’t like fasting

I don’t like sitting in shul for a long time.

And…I don’t always connect to the messages or language in the Mahzor.

But the real reason, and this might sound funny, is that on Yom Kippur, it’s all about me. Usually that would be ok…but not today.

Before I tell you why, let’s take a step back. For your literary and spiritual edification, I undertook a thorough and exhaustive frequency-of-use linguistic analysis of the Mahzor and determined that these are the top 6 Yom Kippur metaphors or themes:

1. 1. Sin
   2. Stain
   3. Debt
   4. Judgment
   5. Mercy, and
   6. Cleansing

And the top three action items for this day are:

1. 1. To Atone
   2. Repent, and
   3. Seek Forgiveness

If this were the agenda for a staff meeting at your place of work, I’m guessing you’d all call in sick.

Let’s go back and explore those metaphors and themes, and the thought process of the Mahzor:

Sin: According to our liturgy, we are all nosei avon. Sin is a weight that we carry, it stays with us, it’s a burden, it affects our thoughts and actions. This metaphor implies that, like a landfill, if you keep adding to it, you’ll run out of room, or, in our case, we’ll run out of strength to carry it all. So, as Professor Baruch Schwartz writes, we spend this day asking God to remove this burden.

Stain: Sin clings to us, it stains our souls, it colors our view of ourselves and others. Isaiah refers to sinners as having “unclean lips” (Is. 6: 5). כִּ֣י אִ֤ישׁ טְמֵֽא־שְׂפָתַ֙יִם֙ אָנֹ֔כִי Even though there is no visual quality to it, we see it, and we imagine others see it in us as well.  It defiles us and leaves a stain on our character.

The Ramban says that all sins, even those committed inadvertently, “leave a stain on the soul and constitute a blemish on it, and the soul is only fit to meet its Maker when it has been cleansed from all sin” (Ramban to Lev. 4: 2).

Debt:  Our sins are also thought of as a huge pile of bills or IOUs. Just knowing they are there makes us miserable. While guilt can feel infinite and unmeasurable and insurmountable, a financial debt is limited and finite.  The good news? According to Jeremiah, sin is a debt that God can pay off on our behalf.

The first three metaphors describe our problem; the next three steps outline how we get to the solution.

Judgment: As much as we’d like to think of ourselves as good, or somewhat good, the Mahzor reminds us, in the Untane tokef  that time has run out:  “V’tiftach et sefer Ha’zikhronot” – God, you open The Book of Memories “u’may’alav yika’reh”  all the evidence, all the facts are in there, they speak for themselves, and “v’hotam yad kol adam bo” and every person’s name, everyone’s case file, is in there. Uvyom tzom kippur yechataymun, and on Yom Kippur final judgments will be made. Step one: we need to own that.

Mercy: Once we own our mistakes, we ask for mercy. Our hope on Yom Kippur is that God will take everything into account, and help us beyond what we deserve. What kind of God would do that? The Talmud in Berachot 7a asks “mayee matzlay?” – When God prays, (not if, but when God prays) what does God pray? Rav said:  May it be My will that My mercy will overcome My anger; may My mercy prevail over My other attributes; may I conduct myself toward My children with the attribute of mercy, and

ואכנס להם לפנים משורת הדין  May I stop short of the limit of strict justice, or, May I not exact the full penalty from them. Bottom line, God would like mercy to be God’s default setting, but God has to pray on it. That’s step two.

And, if all goes well…

Cleansing: Step three: Sins before God can and will be washed away, by God. Mikol hatotechem lifne hashem tithaaru  “from all of your sins before God you will be cleansed.”

I don’t know about you, but this is a lot to think about, too much really.

But here’s the thing: these metaphors don’t even express all the ways we can think about Yom Kippur – just what’s in our Mahzor.

Here are two quotes, separated by 19 centuries that give us a wider range of what Yom Kippur was, and what it is like now:

The first is from Mishna Ta’anit 4:8

אָמַר רַבָּן שִׁמְעוֹן בֶּן גַּמְלִיאֵל, לֹא הָיוּ יָמִים טוֹבִים לְיִשְׂרָאֵל כַּחֲמִשָּׁה עָשָׂר בְּאָב וּכְיוֹם הַכִּפּוּרִים

Rabbi Shimon ben Gamaliel said: There were no days of joy in Israel greater than the fifteenth of Av (Tu B’Av) and Yom Kippur.

שֶׁבָּהֶן בְּנוֹת יְרוּשָׁלַיִם יוֹצְאוֹת בִּכְלֵי לָבָן שְׁאוּלִין

On these days the daughters of Jerusalem would go out in borrowed white garments (borrowed in order not to shame anyone who had none). The daughters of Jerusalem would go out and dance in the vineyards. And what would they say? “Young man, lift up your eyes and see what you choose for yourself…  Don’t set your eyes upon beauty; rather, set your eyes upon family…”

So the women were out and about, hoping to find a spouse. But why were these young women out and about on Yom Kippur?  The Gemara in Taanit says:

בשלמא יום הכפורים משום דאית ביה סליחה ומחילה יום שניתנו בו לוחות האחרונות

Yom Kippur is a day of joy because it contains the elements of pardon and forgiveness, and moreover, it is the day on which the last pair of tablets were given.

The idea here is that God was so angry with the Israelites over the Golden Calf incident that he destroyed the first set of 10 Commandments. But He then decided to forgive the People, and give them a second set of tablets.

Forgiveness means another chance, and the freedom of a new start. Freedom means hope and opportunity, so yes, the young women went out, to find a spouse and look to the future. I’m just imagining it. A warm afternoon, up in the hills, people are dancing. What a great way to end Yom Kippur…and rather early in the day. Just saying…

Now, compare that image to comedian Lewis Black’s description of Yom Kippur: “The music of Kol Nidre is the basis of every Alfred Hitchcock soundtrack. You look around expecting bats to fly into the synagogue.”

Somewhere along the line the range of ideas and goals for the contracted and shifted, especially for Ashkenazic Jews.  It’s worth noting that the Sephardic Mahzor doesn’t include U’netaneh Tokef, nor the Eleh Ezkerah. That Mahzor has much less “trauma” and much more hope.

Yes, there are indeed sources that claim that Yom Kippur is the exact opposite of Purim. Purim focuses on a physical struggle, while Yom Kippur emphasizes a spiritual one…but it’s all about the struggle.

But some sources actually say that the holidays are quite similar:  Yom K’purim – Yom Kippur is like Purim, because, in both cases, while lives are hanging in the balance, there is hope for a positive ending.  In the Purim story, people’s emotions went miyagon l’simcha, from sorrow to joy, but Yom Kippur these days seems to be all about the yagon (the sorrow) but certainly not the simcha.

Let’s put it this way: there is no longer dancing after Mincha.

If I were going to take the long history of Yom Kippur and do a factory re-set, what would be the main focus of the day? What’s in the zone? What’s the one thing I have to accomplish?

When I take all the liturgy, all the metaphors, all the customs, all the expectations of Yom Kippur, from the time of the Torah to today, and distill them all down to its essence, here’s what I think it is:

For 25 hours my job is to face myself – with brutal honesty – before God. I may be at my seat, surrounded by hundreds of people, but I have my job to do.

And, when the day is over, if I’ve done my job well, I can go outside, and, with an updated to-do list, step into a world filled with hope, and opportunity. After that shofar blows, I get to start writing a new page in The Book.

So, yes, today is all about me (and you, and you, and you), but…(you knew there was a ‘but’)… all of this takes work and it takes courage.

So how do we do Yom Kippur?

Rabbi Harold Schulweis wrote that we usually hide from ourselves, but on Yom Kippur we must seek what is hidden. Yom Kippur is self-discovery in silence.

One thing we hide behind is the beautiful notion that our confessions are said in the plural: In the Vidui ­ we say Al chet she’chatanu lefanekha  – we committed these sins before you, and we say Ashamnu, bagadnu  – We have sinned.   What a People we are. We are so good, we’re all in this together. Now, I certainly didn’t do this sin, or that sin, but maybe someone else did, so I’ll pray for them. We’re a team!

Or, maybe it’s a way to call God’s bluff. “God, You want to punish one of us, you’d better be prepared to punish all of us!” It’s a nice thought, and there is definitely some truth to it.

But (you knew there was a ‘but’)… today is the day we shouldn’t hide. We each have to own the consequences of our choices. We know we’ve made mistakes – each one of us. We know we’ve hurt others. We know we haven’t lived up to our own ideals. As Rabbi Abraham Twerski puts it, guilt is to the emotions what pain is to the physical body – a helpful signal that something is wrong. Moral guilt makes us uncomfortable, and because of that, we’re motivated to change.

In order to make sure we truly face ourselves, to get un-stuck, our liturgy requires us to recite our sins out loud, over and over again. There is value in this repetition. It destroys our defenses. It allows us to admit things we’d rather keep hidden.

A story: In Cleveland, where I was a Head of School for many years, the local school districts provided free bus transportation to the private schools, including the Jewish day schools. On Halloween, one of my more adventurous students set off a little smoke bomb on the Cleveland Heights bus. The district’s transportation coordinator came to my school and questioned the top suspects, all 4^th grade boys. I watched in awe as he quietly spoke to each one of them, asking them to tell their stories. Then he brought them back in, one at time, again and again, to compare their stories with the others. With each re-telling the list of suspects narrowed. By round five, one of the kids came in, put his head down and his hands out and said, “Cuff me, I did it.” I gave him credit for creativity, and a sense of drama.  Clearly, the constant repetition wore him down.

That’s why we recite the al het over and over again. Today we don’t hide from God.

We also don’t hide from our friends and family. Before Yom Kippur, we have to reach out to them and ask for forgiveness.

There is a fascinating discussion in halakhic literature about just how much detail you have to reveal when you admit or recite your sins.

In the Arukh HaShulchan:  Orach Chaim 606 we read:

ויש לו לפרט החטא שחטא לו.

A person who is asking his friend for forgiveness must provide details of exactly how he sinned against him

 אך אם חבירו מתבייש מזה – לא יפרט, אלא יבקש ממנו שימחול לו סתם

But if his friend would be embarrassed by this, there is no need to go into detail. Rather he should just ask his friend for blanket forgiveness.

If you are chanting the standard Vidui out loud in shul, especially if the Hazan is going to repeat it, Rabbi Moshe Isserles, the Rema, says you should not say the details out loud, because then it’s just a canned formula.

But when it comes to confessing one’s sins to God quietly, he says you have to provide details.

Underlying this discussion is a key question: Who benefits from these detailed confessions? It’s not God. God already knows the details. Clearly, it’s for the benefit (or the discomfort) of the person who is confessing.

This attention to the details of our sins reminded me of something I learned in my college statistics course, which was itself an entire semester of pain and suffering.

In the world of statistics and research, one way to show the range of responses on a test or a survey, is to use a bell curve. The center of the bell curve shows the mean – the average score. The term “standard deviation” is used to quantify the expected variation in that set of results. The results that fall beyond the expected “standard deviations” are the ones you want to pay attention to.

As we examine the details of the past year, we need to ask: what does our bell curve look like? Is it a narrow curve with all of our thoughts, words, and actions close to the mean, in line with our usual way of being in the world? Or is it spread out because some of what we said or did this year went beyond the standard deviation? In some cases, these variances can be good. We may have been nicer, or more helpful than usual. On the other side of the bell curve would be times we went off course, in a bad way.

When I learned orienteering by map and compass in the Boy Scouts, there were no GPS devices. So we were warned to be very, very careful as we plotted out our hikes. The saying was, “The more you go off course, the longer the walk back to camp.” When you’re traipsing through the woods, schlepping a heavy backpack, the walk back can be painful.

On Yom Kippur we ask ourselves: how far have I gone off course? And, how much work do I need to do to correct that?

I think these are questions we can ask about a community, and a country as well.

T’shuva is our attempt at re-alignment, it’s the way we come back, to way we get closer to the mean, and closer to what we already know is good.

As my classmate Rabbi Alan Lew, alav ha’shalom, wrote, “The great journey of transformation begins with the acknowledgment that we need to make it. It is not something we are undertaking for amusement, nor even for the sake of convention; rather, it is a spiritual necessity.”

The gift of Yom Kippur is knowing we can do T’shuva, that we know we can return, no matter how far or disconnected from ourselves we’ve become. We’re not stuck, there is still a second, or third, or even a fourth act in our lives…and even more, if necessary.  Perhaps the words “v’eeneetem et nafshotechem” don’t mean “you shall afflict your soul.” Maybe it means “v’aneetem” this is the day when you respond to your soul – in the affirmative.

So, yes, I hate Yom Kippur because it is all about me. I am forced to take a hard look at myself. I can’t hide, I can’t pretend. But I do have to remind myself: today isn’t about doom and gloom and tears. It’s about getting back to the good in me, it’s about re-orienting myself. It’s about the gift of a new opportunity. After Neilah, when that shofar blows, a door will open and I will walk through it with a sense of hope and renewal.

I probably won’t start dancing, but I’ll have a lot to look forward to.

May we all have good things to look forward to, today, tomorrow, and in the year to come.        G’mar Hatima Tova.

Simchat Torah 5780

By Joel Elkins, October 22, 2019

Welcome to Last Week Tonight. I’m John Oliver Shalom, sitting in for Carl Dodi.

Original Creation: It’s that thing you are forced to do when you’ve completely run out of sequels and reboots to make.

This week, the creator-in-chief was extra busy, creating time, space, the heavens, the earth, and sliced bread. We have high hopes for that last one, believing it will be the standard by which everything else will be compared.

The celestial senate acted quickly to approve the creations, declaring each to be “good” and, in the case of mankind, “very good.” Based on that, the creator-in-chief created and then tweeted the thumbs up emoji no less than 8 times over the course of the week.

However, the votes were strictly along party lines, the opposition calling each day’s creation either “flawed” or, in the case of mankind, “very flawed.”

Let’s briefly go over the events of the week. On day one, the creator-in-chief created light, and then separated the light from the dark, apparently so that they could be washed separately.

In order to do so, the creator-in-chief had to create water, which she immediately separated into two: hot (for the light) and cold (for the dark). (Later she would have to create a gentle cycle for delicates, also known as millennials, but that’s for another time.)

At this point the opposition tried to filibuster any further creation, but was unsuccessful because, alas, that had not been invented yet. So instead they did whatever was in their power to undermine them.

For example, on the next day the creator-in-chief created vegetation: fruits, vegetables, grains. In response, the opposition created peanut allergies and sensitivity to gluten.

Not to be outdone, the following day the creator-in-chief created the sun, the moon and the stars. In response, the opposition created Sun-yung Moon and reality TV stars.

Next, the creator-in-chief created birds to fill the sky, fish to fill the seas and crawly things to fill her moat.

And then all the other animals, male and female (or non-binary). The creator-in-chief told them to be fruitful and multiply. “Just up my alley,”  said the rare East African strawberry-flavored abacus monkey. And it was still all good.

Not leaving well enough alone, the creator-in-chief then decided to create mankind, in her image. Think about this, mankind was created in God’s image. This can only mean one thing: God must also have earwax. Hashtag: #godhasearwax

As with the animals, she instructed mankind to be fruitful and multiply, but also to subdue the earth and to eat of its blessings. The earth held a press conference to announce that it was not going down without a fight.

Then, the Torah says, and I quote:

 

		וַיְכֻלּ֛וּ הַשָּׁמַ֥יִם וְהָאָ֖רֶץ וְכָל־צְבָאָֽם:
		וַיְכַ֤ל אֱלֹהִים֙ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔י מְלַאכְתּ֖וֹ אֲשֶׁ֣ר עָשָׂ֑ה וַיִּשְׁבֹּת֙ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔י מִכָּל־מְלַאכְתּ֖וֹ אֲשֶׁ֥ר עָשָֽׂה:
		וַיְבָ֤רֶךְ אֱלֹהִים֙ אֶת־י֣וֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔י וַיְקַדֵּ֖שׁ אֹת֑וֹ כִּ֣י ב֤וֹ שָׁבַת֙ מִכָּל־מְלַאכְתּ֔וֹ אֲשֶׁר־בָּרָ֥א אֱלֹהִ֖ים לַֽעֲשֽׂוֹת

So, apparently, at this point somebody, we don’t know who, made kiddush.

And the creator-in-chief’s week came to a close. All told, She created time, space, the universe and everything in it. In comparison, my week consisted of unsuccessfully arguing with a representative from Spectrum to get a refund for my cable service because the reason I had gotten it in the first place couldn’t protect a 2 run lead with 6 outs to go. So my week wasn’t quite as productive, but at least I didn’t create mosquitoes.

This is John Oliver Shalom, sitting in for Carl Dodi, until next week.

Ki Tetse — Dad’s 1^st Yartzheit

By Meyer Shwarzstein, September 14, 2019, 14 Elul 5779

You see, the thing is…my father often like to start conversations that way. You see, the thing is…the 14^th of Elul last year was Shabbat. Today is the 14^th of Elul and it’s Shabbat. My father was in the hospital in Har HaTzofim in a remarkable place – one where Christians, Moslems and Jews are the doctors, patients, caretakers, friends, family…probably all praying separately together. I wonder if in heaven those voices sound like a chorus.

My father had been getting better the whole week and we’d been looking forward to moving him to another location the next day. He had many of his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren visit him in small groups – giving him a gift he adored – we sang Zemirot to him. The next morning, he took a steep turn for the worse and that afternoon, he died.

The law to bury on the same day comes from today’s parsha. We had his funeral at 9 pm on Sunday and we buried him in Jerusalem – the birthplace of his father and his father’s parents.

His great-great-grandmother was born in Tzfat and his great-great grandfather went out – Tetse – from Hungary to live his people’s dream in the land of Israel. My father – Tetse – also went out – from Chicago to live the same dream.

In our parsha, the phrase Ki Tetse talks about men who went out to war. My father, the first college graduate in his family, never went to war – he went to work. He taught music at a public high school during the day, took a nap after school and went out at night and Sundays to teach Hebrew school. He did have his battles – mostly with a principle who made his life difficult for taking off all those dang Jewish holidays.

Growing up, I thought of Judaism as the religion of “no”. You see, the thing is, this parsha contains lots of mitzvot – 74 to be exacts – more than any other Torah portion. My father had a lot of rules too – I felt that he said “no” a lot. Indeed, when he said, “we’ll see”, we learned that that meant “no” too. He also had a very strong sense of what is “right” even though he couldn’t or wouldn’t always explain why.

Like the Torah laws themselves which are often not self-evident. Consider today’s parsha:

Why shouldn’t we have an ox and a donkey plow together? The commentators note that it’s unfair to expect a donkey to do the work of an ox. And, if they’re pulling a plow side by side, it may also be unsafe.

in the matter of dispatching a mother bird before taking her chicks (22:7), there are many reasons given including the idea that animals have emotions and rights. 800 years ago, the Ramban and Ibn Ezra pointed out that, if we kill the mother and child of a species, we may destroy the species altogether…and that’s what why we’re given this law.

To digress a bit, I read recently that the idea of burying our dead the way we do is more ecologically sound – not burning or embalming a body nor burying it in a casket that will not disintegrate naturally. It turns out that the Jewish way leaves the smallest footprint.

I’m not trying to over-idealize my father’s rationale for when he’d tell us yes or no though time does allow me to be more generous. Nor am I using this as a means to over-explain confusing passages in the Torah. But in there is a potential to find truth and meaning if one cares enough to give people and the text the benefit of the doubt.

Now, there were things that bothered me about my father. When I was a kid, I hated the fact that he wouldn’t vocalize his feelings and tell me what he really meant. When my parents were on a path toward divorce, my mom would say terrible things about him, and he’d be quiet. It drove me crazy.

We are reminded in this Parsha to learn from Miriam’s mistake. She suffered a physical rebuke after saying terrible things about Moshe and his wife behind his back.

I know my father took the laws regarding gossip quite seriously — but how could I get real information – the real skinny? I’d have long conversations with my father who would update me on the news of his friends and our family but he’d literally ignore the bad news and he would talk about certain people so he wouldn’t fall into lashan harah (gossip). It was one of those things that was both frustrating and yet admirable. It took such self-discipline to keep those thoughts to himself.

My father used his voice for a different purpose; singing, teaching, laughing and, most importantly, cracking bad jokes.

Our Haftorah says, rena vatzhali, “Sing aloud for Joy.” That’s how my parents met – he was a choir director in Detroit where my mother first landed in the US – They both loved to sing and that brought them together. Our Shabbat tables were filled with song. They also both loved to teach.

My father invited his high-school students to bring in the music they loved, and he broke the structure down for them. He told me about Pink Floyd before I’d heard of them. No wonder his students loved him.

I sang in a high holiday choir with my father since I was 9 years told – first, soprano, then alto, and finally bass.

After my father passed away, a man who sang in my father’s choir sent me a wonderful card. I called him and we reminisced – I sent him a scan of my father’s music – some of which my father composed. He wrote me back and told me he was sitting in front of his computer singing for at least an hour. He also told me how a friend of his who was also in the choir today use my father’s hand movements to signal to each other when someone davening should be stopped, and they signal the use of a tuning fork as a sign that someone is off key.

He also knew how to laugh, to enjoy the moment and to love.

When his 2^nd wife, my stepmother, had lost much of her cognitive ability, he’d treat her like she could understand his every word. He’d sit next to her with her arms in his, tell her the recent news and looked at her as lovingly as he did when they first got married – maybe even more. I’d never seen a love like that before. He’d share with her information about his whole family – you see, the thing is, I no longer had one sister, I now had five.

He was also always proud of me and he showed it. Now I have to live without that.

Divorce is a subject of this week’s parsha too. My parents came from a difficult upbringing and weren’t able to see their relationship through, but they had hope and tried to improve their world. Maybe that’s why they named their children Meyer and Rena – light and joy.

In this parsha we’re also commanded to remember. That came easily to my dad. My father would remember each of you if he talked to you – he cared so much about people, about friends, and about family that he’d remember details you may have only mentioned once.

For one moment; imagine a world in which disparate people stand next to each other in an orderly manner and are forced to listen to each other before a sound comes from their mouths. That’s my father’s world. A chorus. His choirs were filled with joy and prayer.

He would take out his tuning fork, find the right key, look at each of us in the eyes, make sure we were paying attention, and lift his arms…

…we’d wait for him to drop them to signal us to start singing. This disparate group of people held our breaths ready to join together in harmony filling our world with song, order and blessings.

But now there’s only silence.

You see, the thing is…I miss him.

Shabbat shalom.

Parshat Eikev

By Larry Herman, August 24, 2019

Are we Listening?

Shabbat Shalom.

Diane and I just returned from a family cruise to Alaska to celebrate my mother-in-law’s 90^th birthday. It was wonderful. Seeing the massive glaciers as they meet the sea is breathtaking. I hope that those of you who have not yet done so, will have the opportunity soon. Don’t wait.

This trip left me exhilarated and filled me with awe and appreciation for the handiwork of God and nature. But it also left me just a bit more depressed, as I become increasingly convinced that my generation of that of my children may well be the last to experience these wonders.

On our Alaska cruise we visited Hubbard Glacier, the largest tidewater glacier in North America, stretching back more than 75 miles, 7 miles wide at its face, and 600 feet tall. This glacier flows at a rate of about 1,000 feet a year, that’s almost three feet a day. In fact it is one of the few glaciers that is growing. There are more than 100,000 glaciers in Alaska and 95% of them are thinning, receding and shrinking, most of them at an increasing rate. It was shocking to watch the time-lapse video of the Mendenhall Glacier as it recedes and to see the maps showing the 65 mile-long expansion of Glacier Bay as its feeding glaciers have retreated.

This phenomenon is happening all over the world. Scientists predict that by 2070 Glacier National Park in Montana will be Glacier free.

Perhaps you saw on the news last week that a glacier in Iceland has disappeared. A lake now takes its place. It was a relatively small glacier, but scientists say that in 200 years every glacier in Iceland will follow suit due to climate change.

While in Vancouver we visited the Maritime museum there and saw the St. Roch, the first ship to successfully navigate the Northwest Passage from west to east in the 1940s. Now freighters and even cruise ships successfully sail through these once permanently frozen waters.

Just before we left for Alaska I saw a news story showing the accelerated melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet, something that scientists thought would not happen until 2070. And then I saw another story about how scientists are concerned about a domino-like collapse of parts of the Antarctica Ice Shelf, by far the world’s largest store of fresh water

There is little dispute in the scientific community that all this melting and heating of the oceans will lead to accelerating rises in sea levels. To put this in perspective, since 1900, sea levels have risen by about 7 inches. Scientists now predict that by 2100 sea levels will most likely rise by three more feet, but that accelerated ice sheet melt could raise this to almost 9 feet. Miami, New Orleans, parts of New York, and Tel Aviv will be underwater or subject to massive flooding. This will happen in the lifetimes of your grandchildren.

Of course, loss of ice and rising sea levels are not the only effects of anthropogenic climate change. Scientists tell us that average temperatures will continue to rise, winters will get milder, rainfall and snowfall patterns will change, droughts and heat waves will be more prevalent and severe, hurricanes will become more frequent, intense, and longer.

We’re already experiencing the effects. While not every fire is directly attributable to climate change, who can doubt that the tragic fires last year in northern California or right next door in the Santa Monica Mountains weren’t exacerbated by global warming.

And speaking of fires, right now the Amazon is burning. This is important because the Amazon rain forest absorbs a huge amount of the CO₂ that is a leading cause of global warming. While the fires are not directly the result of climate change, they can give us an insight into some of its causes, and perhaps an insight into some solutions. To explain, allow me quote at length from a Facebook posting by a Brazilian friend of ours, Gustavo Niskier. Gustavo and his family lived in Mozambique for about three years and were active members of our shul there. Gustavo wrote:

This post is for you who are outraged by the burning Amazon.

I am glad to see all this concern for the destruction of our forests. But it is curious that most of the public think that the Amazon is being destroyed for no reason by others, and that they have no responsibility for what is happening.

Sorry to ruin your appetite, but that’s not exactly true.

The Amazon is burning in order to open pastures and areas for grain production. It’s that simple. 60 to 70% of deforested areas of the Amazon are used for livestock, creating new pasture land. Even more disturbing, 50% of the world’s grain production is used for animal feed (mainly beef production). In Brazil this number exceeds 60%.

Do the math. The Amazon is burning to support your meat-eating habit.

It is not rational or logical to rage against the destruction of the Amazon and maintain a meat-eating habit that increases the demand for new areas for meat production.

It’s time for us to understand that we are accountable.

Gustavo continues:

Want to see the Amazon stop burning? Easy. Reduce the demand for animal products – especially beef. Reduce demand and our forest is saved. Nothing could be easier, nothing could be simpler.

With each meal you can make a difference. You have the opportunity to make daily choices that will lead to a true transformation in the way we take care of our forests. If you are not ready yet to make the transition to a vegan life, consider vegetarianism, pescatarianism, eliminate red meat from your diet, or even reduce meat consumption gradually.

Be part of the great transformation underway today and together we can reduce the destruction of the Amazon and forests elsewhere.

Interestingly, Gustavo’s words echo my own when I spoke about kashruth and vegetarianism in a drash on parshat Shemini last year. For the record, Diane and I are in the process of transitioning.

I’m happy to report that there is a Jewish connection to all of this. Countless sites and on-line articles refer to Jewish environmentalism, most of them selectively citing Tanach. My favorite text is from Psalm 148, lines that I recite aloud every morning to the annoyance of most of my fellow minyanaires:

אֵ֣שׁ וּ֭בָרָד שֶׁ֣לֶג וְקִיט֑וֹר ר֥וּחַ סְ֝עָרָ֗ה עֹשָׂ֥ה דְבָרֽוֹ׃

הֶהָרִ֥ים וְכָל־גְּבָע֑וֹת עֵ֥ץ פְּ֝רִ֗י וְכָל־אֲרָזִֽים׃

הַֽחַיָּ֥ה וְכָל־בְּהֵמָ֑ה רֶ֝֗מֶשׂ וְצִפּ֥וֹר כָּנָֽף׃

Fire and hail, snow and smoke, storm wind that performs His command,
The mountains and all the hills, fruit trees and all the cedars,
Wild beasts and all the cattle, crawling things and winged birds.

But let’s face it, you don’t usually associate environmentalism and concern for climate change with major Jewish social causes.

I was pleased to find a 2015 Rabbinic Letter on Climate Action, initiated by seven leading rabbis including our own Elliot Dorff. The letter was signed, at the time, by 425 Rabbis. It got a lot of press and you all probably know more about than I do – what can I say, I was in Mozambique.

The first thing that pleased me is that their first scriptural reference was to the very lines from Psalm 148 that I love so much. Hey, I’m in good company. I also especially liked the introduction of the letter:

We come as Jews and rabbis with great respect for what scientists teach us – for as we understand their teaching, it is about the unfolding mystery of God’s Presence in the unfolding universe, and especially in the history and future of our planet. Although we accept scientific accounts of earth’s history, we continue to see it as God’s creation, and we celebrate the presence of the divine hand in every earthly creature.

The letter goes on to explain the Torah connections to the natural world and man’s guardianship of it. It acknowledges clearly the science-based description and explanation of the problem. They ask “whether the sources of traditional Jewish wisdom can offer guidance to our political efforts to prevent disaster and heal our relationship with the Earth.” Their answer is “Yes” and they conclude that “justice and earthiness cannot be disentangled.”

They “call for a new sense of eco-social justice – a tikkun olam that includes tikkun tevel, the healing of our planet.” And then they suggest several ways for individual Jews and their institutions to address “our own responsibility” by moving our money from spending that burns our planet to spending that helps to heal it. They also advocate, rather softly political action.

I like it. It’s a bit too America-centric and not very concrete on the political action side, but I like it. If you haven’t read it, you should. If you have, read it again. And if our movement has an official position, let me know.

My goodness, I haven’t even begun to talk about the parsha!

It’s all there, in the second paragraph of the Shema. Chapter 11, verses 13 through 21 of this week’s parsha. You say it twice a day (ok, maybe once a week for some of you). But are you listening? I wasn’t, until perhaps 20 years ago Diane made me hear. More recently, I came across an interpretive translation really made me hear. I’d like to share it.

Shabbat Shalom.

והיה אם שמע

A Prayer in a Time of Planetary Danger

Rabbi Arthur Waskow

וְהָיָה אִם שָׁמֹעַ תִּשְׁמְעוּ אֶל מִצְוֺתַי אֲשֶׁר אָנֹכִי מְצַוֶּה אֶתְכֶם הַיּוֹם, לְאַהֲבָה אֶת יְיָ אֱלֹהֵיכֶם וּלְעָבְדוֹ בְּכָל לְבַבְכֶם וּבְכָל נַפְשְׁכֶם׃		Im Sh-Sh-Sh-Sh’mo-a Tish’sh’sh’sh’ma-u: If you hush’sh’sh’sh, truly hush’sh’sh’sh To hear my Name, yes to hear and to listen —Adonai, the name; If you Breathe in my quiet, Interbreathe with all Life Still small Voice of us all —-
וְנָתַתִּי מְטַר אַרְצְכֶם בְּעִתּוֹ יוֹרֶה וּמַלְקוֹשׁ, וְאָסַפְתָּ דְגָנֶךָ, וְתִירֹשְׁךָ וְיִצְהָרֶךָ: וְנָתַתִּי עֵשֶׂב בְּשָׂדְךָ לִבְהֶמְתֶּךָ, וְאָכַלְתָּ וְשָׂבָעְתָּ׃		You will feel the Connections; You will make the connections And the rain will fall rightly The grains will grow rightly And the rivers will run So you and all creatures Will eat well in harmony, Earthlings / good Earth.
הִשָּׁמְרוּ לָכֶם פֶּן יִפְתֶּה לְבַבְכֶם, וְסַרְתֶּם וַעֲבַדְתֶּם אֱלֹהִים אֲחֵרִים וְהִשְׁתַּחֲוִיתֶם לָהֶם׃		But if you break the One Breath into pieces If you erect into idols these pieces of Truth, Bowing down to Big Oil, to Big Coal – If you heat my Breath with your burnings —
וְחָרָה אַף יְיָ בָּכֶם וְעָצַר אֶת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְלֹא יִהְיֶה מָטָר וְהָאֲדָמָה לֹא תִתֵּן אֶת יְבוּלָהּ, וַאֲבַדְתֶּם מְהֵרָה מֵעַל הָאָרֶץ הַטֹּבָה אֲשֶׁר יְיָ נֹתֵן לָכֶם׃		Then my Breath will flare up into scorching, The corn will parch in the field, The poor will find little to eat, And my Breath, my Wind, Holy Spirit Will become a Hurricane of Disaster: Floods will drown your cities, My Wind will tear down your Power.
וְשַׂמְתֶּם אֶת דְּבָרַי אֵלֶּה עַל לְבַבְכֶם וְעַל נַפְשְׁכֶם, וּקְשַׁרְתֶּם אֹתָם לְאוֹת עַל יֶדְכֶם וְהָיוּ לְטוֹטָפֹת בֵּין עֵינֵיכֶם: וְהָיָ֣ה לָכֶם֮ לְצִיצִת֒ וּרְאִיתֶ֣ם אֹת֗וֹ וּזְכַרְתֶּם֙ אֶת־כָּל־מִצְוֺ֣ת יְהוָ֔ה וַעֲשִׂיתֶ֖ם אֹתָ֑ם וְלֹֽא־תָתֻ֜רוּ אַחֲרֵ֤י לְבַבְכֶם֙ וְאַחֲרֵ֣י עֵֽינֵיכֶ֔ם אֲשֶׁר־אַתֶּ֥ם זֹנִ֖ים אַחֲרֵיהֶֽם׃		What must you do? Connect what you see with your eyes To what you do with your hands. Look with joy and respect On the threads of connection That you tie as fringes On the edges of your self. Smooth Mountains of Power Into valleys of abundance. Turn to sun and My Wind To empower my people. Make My breath amidst you A Hurricane of justice — Then the grass will grow, The forests will flourish, And all life will weave the future in fullness.
לְמַעַן יִרְבּוּ יְמֵיכֶם וִימֵי בְנֵיכֶם עַל הָאֲדָמָה אֲשֶׁר נִשְׁבַּע יְיָ לַאֲבֹתֵיכֶם לָתֵת לָהֶם, כִּימֵי הַשָּׁמַיִם עַל הָאָרֶץ׃		Then eysh and mayim, Will join in shamayim: Fire and water, No longer in battle, Will each find its place In the balance of Earth: The heavens will clear And your lives will be lived in heavenly joy.

 

opensiddur.org/prayers/solilunar/everyday/shema/a-prayer-in-a-time-of-planetary-danger/

 

Parshat Mishpatim (5779)

Larry Herman Davar Torah, February 2, 2019

God is in the Details

Shabbat Shalom.

And he who kidnaps a man and sells him, or he is found in his hands, is doomed to die.

וְגֹנֵ֨ב אִ֧ישׁ וּמְכָר֛וֹ וְנִמְצָ֥א בְיָד֖וֹ מ֥וֹת יוּמָֽת:

Mishpatim, Chapter 21, verse 16.

Once again I dedicate this davar Torah to the humanitarian, Dr. Ken Elliot, who was abducted by al-Qaida linked jihadists in northern Burkina Faso in January 2016 and remains captive, now for more than 3 years. Ken is in his eighties and one wonders how much longer he can survive. A deeply religious man and a physician, he dedicated his entire adult life to providing health care to one of the poorest regions in the world. Ken and his wife Jocelyn regularly hosted Diane and me in 1970s during our travels to northern Upper Volta as it was then called. He deserves to be freed and united with his family. May the day come soon.

Sometimes things take a turn in a direction you just don’t expect. Like opening up your Facebook and finding that your Rabbi has stolen your thunder. Well, it’s not all bad. If you’ve already read Rabbi Kligfeld’s parsha drash in the bulletin, go ahead and take your nap. On the other hand, maybe I have a slightly different take on the question of Rashi’s explanation of the vav in וְאֵ֨לֶּה֙ at the beginning of this week’s parsha.

Rashi along with many other commentators wanted to link the lengthy list of laws and ordinances that occupies the majority of this week’s parsha to the dramatic revelation at Sinai that concludes last week’s parsha, Yitro. In brief, and perhaps not entirely fairly, the problem is to ensure that we recognize that these mishpatim were also given at Sinai and have the same status as the Aseret Hadibrot, the Ten Commandments

As Rabbi Kligfeld explains, Rashi manages this by explaining that the vav in וְאֵ֨לֶּה֙ connects the following verses with what came before, or as Rabbi Kligfeld writes “and these things, as well!”

Not to quibble with either Rashi or Rabbi Kligfeld, but I think that this explanation is somewhat problematic, because of what came directly before the וְאֵ֨לֶּה֙ that begins this week’s parsha. In the text it was not the Aseret Hadibrot, as I’ll explain. But I do agree with their conclusion about the status of the 99 verses of Mishpatim in this week’s parsha, just not with how they both got there. Allow me to explain it my way.

Here we are, in the middle of a great long-arcing story. Five weeks of serial narrative that makes us thirst for more each week. Tons of drama and suspense. Fabulous description and grand themes. When suddenly, without the slightest hint or warning, we encounter a parsha that switches from narrative to code, from engrossing thriller to mostly detailed legislation.

But does it really?

It reminds me of two literary experiences. I remember reading Moby Dick, Herman Melville’s American classic about the sailor Ishmael’s description of Captain Ahab’s obsessive quest for the great white whale, where the captivating narrative is interrupted by extended passages describing the minutia of cetacean taxonomy and whale boat construction.

Or Tom Clancy’s The Sum of All Fears, where Jack Ryan is chasing terrorists who are about to detonate a nuclear bomb when on page 615 Clancy launches into a very lengthy detailed description of exactly what happens in a nuclear warhead in the several nanoseconds that it takes for the warhead to actually explode.

Both Melville and Clancy go on for pages, thousands or tens of thousands of words interrupting their narrative. The reading can be a tough slog instead of an enjoyable long-distance sprint. One is tempted to skim or skip. But the intrusions are important parts of the story and if you read them as such, they are as thrilling as the narrative. Melville and Clancy resume their tales and your appreciation for what comes next is enhanced by their detour into the science and technology that are an intrinsic part of the story.

I think that the same can be said for the three full chapters and 99 verses of our parsha which appear to interrupt the text and suddenly and without warning thrust us into a rather dry and seemingly disorganized hodgepodge of rules and laws that Moses is instructed to set before the people. But to understand it as such, I think that we have to slightly rearrange the narrative.

In the handout that I’ve prepared, I’ve summarized the story of revelation in 15 scenes, beginning with Chapter 19 in parshat Yitro through to the end of our parsha. I’ve tried to pay special attention to Moses’ comings and goings, since I think that that’s one of the give-aways that the story is written out of order. One side of the page shows the order as it appears in the Torah and the other the order that makes logical sense to me, and in the process, solves the וְאֵ֨לֶּה֙ problem.

To explain, let me review succinctly, in my own way, the narrative to this point starting from just after Moses’ father-in-law has helped him establish an administrative structure for governance. Note that at this point there is administration without established law.

In Scene 1 the Israelites come to the wilderness of Sinai and camp against the famous mountain, where all the subsequent action will take place. In Scene 2 Moses goes up the mountain for the first time. God instructs Moses to offer the people a deal: heed my voice and keep my covenant … [and] you will become for Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (19:5-6). Who could refuse such a good offer?

In Scene 3 Moses descends, calls the elders and puts the offer before them (וַיָּ֣שֶׂם לִפְנֵיהֶ֗ם) at which point “all the people answered together, כֹּ֛ל אֲשֶׁר־דִּבֶּ֥ר יְהוָֹ֖ה נַֽעֲשֶׂ֑ה, everything that Adonai has spoken we shall do (19:8). Both of these formulations are repeated in parshat Mishpatim.

In Scene 4 Moses brings the people’s words to God (2^nd going up), but before he can tell Him, God speaks first saying, Look, I am about to come to you in the utmost cloud, so that the people may hear as I speak to you, and you as well as they will trust for all time.

Only then does Moses give the Lord that the people have already agreed. The deal is done so God gives Moses the instructions of how everyone is to prepare, including the warning against the people going up or touching the mountain.

In Scene 5 Moses comes down the mountain and prepares the people.

In Scene 6 the show begins, starting with verse 16: thunder, lightning, clouds, smoke and shofar blasts as the people advance to the base of the mountain as instructed. At that point there’s a peculiar statement:

Moses would speak and God would answer him with voice.

משֶׁ֣ה יְדַבֵּ֔ר וְהָֽאֱלֹהִ֖ים יַֽעֲנֶ֥נּוּ בְקֽוֹל:

Is this what God meant by so that the people may hear as I speak to you? Remember, Moses had not yet gone back up the mountain, he was with the people where they could hear him and God in the midst of all the tumult.

Up to now, I haven’t rearranged a thing. But in Scene 7 in the text Moses goes up for the third time, at which point God tells him to go back down and warn the people not to come too close. Moses tells God to chill, he’s already warned them as instructed. But God finds another reason for Moses to hike down the mountain, this time to bring Aaron, and to remind the people and priests anyway. So in Scene 8 Moses heads down the mountain and speaks to the people.

But why did Moses have to go up the Mountain a third time in the midst of the dazzling display?

Scene 9 in the text is the beginning of Chapter 20. Remember, Moses is down with the people. God speaks the Aseret Hadibrot, the Ten Commandments in verses 1 through 14. But to whom is God speaking? Didn’t he just tell Moses to come back up with Aaron? There’s no specific record of exactly who heard what God was saying.

Scene 10 in verses, 15-18 is usually understood to be the people’s response to having heard the Aseret Hadibrot and witnessing all the pyrotechnics. They beg Moses to intercede for them and he agrees, calming them. Then Moses goes up for the fourth time.

In Scene 11 God tells Moses to tell the Israelites

You yourselves saw that from the heavens I spoke with all of you

אַתֶּ֣ם רְאִיתֶ֔ם כִּ֚י מִן־הַשָּׁמַ֔יִם דִּבַּ֖רְתִּי עִמָּכֶֽם

This is the only hint that the people may actually heard the Aseret Hadibrot even though the text clearly says that the people saw that God spoke to them, not that they heard him speak to them. Couldn’t He be referring to the previous unspecified conversation with Moses when he was with the people?

Continuing Scene 11 in the very last bit of Yitro, God instructs Moses to tell the Israelites regarding not making gods of silver or gold, to make earthen alters on which to sacrifice, that if they do make alters from stone that they should not be hewn by sword, and that they should not expose themselves when they go up upon the alter. This placement is very peculiar. Especially since it is immediately followed by Rashi’s famous וְאֵ֨לֶּה֙ introducing this week’s parsha. In other words, Rashi is connecting the 99 verses of laws and ordinances in Mishpatim to a prohibition against exposing oneself when mounting the alter, or more generously, to the specific requirements for construction of an altar.

But this is not what Rashi or Rabbi Kligfeld or the other commentators really want to do. They want to connect the Mishpatim to the Aseret Hadibrot.

And that’s exactly what I want to do by switching the chronology of what happened.

Say that upon experiencing all of the thunder, lightning, smoke and shofar blasts in Scene 6, the people ask Moses to intercede for them prior to hearing the Ten Commandments. In other words, Scene 10 follows Scene 6. Then Moses goes up and approaches the cloud and is instructed to warn the people not to get too close and for Moses to bring Aaron back up with him (the original Scene 7).

At this point, Moses descends and tells the people, i.e., Scene 8.

But now we have to jump to a scene at the end of our parsha in Chapter 24, Scene 13 in the original which reminds us that God had instructed Moses to ascend with Aaron, this time adding also Nadav, Avihu and the 70 elders. They all go up but only Moses approaches the Lord.

Only now in the rearranged order do we get to Scene 9, the first part of Chapter 20, with God speaking directly to Moses, starting with

God spoke all these d’varim

וַיְדַבֵּ֣ר אֱלֹהִ֔ים אֵ֛ת כָּל־הַדְּבָרִ֥ים הָאֵ֖לֶּה:

Followed by the Aseret Hadibrot.

What comes next, without interruption is Scene 12, the beginning and major part of our parsha, with God still speaking to Moses, starting with,

And these are the mishpatim that you shall set before them.

וְאֵ֨לֶּה֙ הַמִּשְׁפָּטִ֔ים אֲשֶׁ֥ר תָּשִׂ֖ים לִפְנֵיהֶֽם:

It makes perfect sense, God first transmits the main principles of faith and over-arching moral precepts contained in the Ten Commandments and follows this up with the details. Both are given at the same moment. The narrative is not interrupted by our parsha. Rather all of the law, devarim and mishpatim are transmitted without interruption to Moses who in turn, and as agreed by the people themselves, will transmit them to the people.

And what of Scene 11 in the original, this somewhat strange and strangely placed passage which in the original interrupts the Aseret Hadibrot and mishpatim? It now makes perfect sense, having given Moses the entire law in two parts, he instructs Moses to tell the people that they have seen that he spoke (which they did, it just wasn’t the Aseret Hadibrot) so they can rely on Moses’ report.

And now the instructions regarding the alter makes sense because it is required for the ceremony where the full covenant is ratified by the people.

In the penultimate Scene 14, Moses finally comes down. And what does he tell the people?

And Moses came and recounted to the people all the “divrei Adonai” and all the “mishpatim ”

וַיָּבֹ֣א משֶׁ֗ה וַיְסַפֵּ֤ר לָעָם֙ אֵ֚ת כָּל־דִּבְרֵ֣י יְהֹוָ֔ה וְאֵ֖ת כָּל־הַמִּשְׁפָּטִ֑ים

Moses transmits to the people both the Ten Commandments and the Mishpatim, one following the other, just as he heard it directly from God. Rashi’s vav in וְאֵ֨לֶּה֙ makes perfect sense. First the Aseret Hadibrot and these Mishpatim as well.

Both the main principles of faith and the detailed laws originated from Sinai and have equal importance.

They are as an intrinsic part of our narrative as Melville’s whale taxonomy and Clancy’s nuclear fission description.

Except in our case, it’s God that’s in the details.

Shabbat Shalom.

Parshat Kedoshim

By Larry Herman, May 6, 2017

Holiness and Community

Shabbat Shalom.

קְדשִׁים תִּֽהְיוּ כִּי קָדוֹשׁ אֲנִי יְהוָֹה אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶֽם:

This is the introduction to Parshat Kedoshim, when God instructs Moses,

Speak to the whole Israelite community and say to them: YOU shall be holy, for I, Adonai YOUR God, am holy

Now my Hebrew isn’t perfect, but it’s good enough to realize that here, as in many places in the Torah and the rest of the Tanach, the translation doesn’t do justice to the power, or even the pshat or simple meaning, of the original.

English lacks the distinction between the singular and plural forms of the pronoun YOU. It also lacks the specifically plural forms of verbs and adjectives. In the seven words of God’s initial instruction there are three words addressing the entire community, קְדשִׁים, תִּֽהְיוּ, and אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶֽם, which make it clear that this instruction to be holy is for the community as a whole and not for the individual members of the community.

Older translations might have helped a bit with all their, Thou, Thee, Thy, Thine and Ye’s. So the King James translation reads:

YE shall be holy: for I the Lord Your God am holy

Now, if I still lived in South Carolina – more on that in a bit – I might rather translate it as:

Y’all be holies, for holy am I, Adonai, Y’all’s God.

There’s no further mention of holiness in Chapter 19. What follows in the next 35 verses is something akin to the Greatest Hits of the commandments. They contain 44 commandments, by my count, of which:

• 25 are addressed in the plural while 19 are addressed to individuals.
• 26 are ethical commandments, of which, 11 are addressed the community as a whole and 15 are addressed to individuals.
• 18 are ritual commandments, of which 13 are addressed to the community as a whole, and only 5 are addressed to individuals

I’m sure that there are good explanations for these distinctions, and some of you will certainly enlighten me during Kiddush, if not before.

Chapter 19 also includes 15 reminders that Adonai is God, 14 of them interspersed with the various commandments. Of these, 7 are in the form of

אֲנִי יְהוָֹה אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶֽם.

I am Adonai YOUR – read that as “Y’all’s” – God.

Seven other reminders are in the simple form of:

אֲנִי יְהוָֹה.

I am Adonai.

Only in verse 14 is the reminder specifically addressed to the individual.

לֹֽא־תְקַלֵּל חֵרֵשׁ וְלִפְנֵי עִוֵּר לֹא תִתֵּן מִכְשֹׁל וְיָרֵאתָ מֵֽאֱלֹהֶיךָ אֲנִי יְהוָֹֽה:

You shall not insult the deaf, or place a stumbling block before the blind. You – THOU, the individual – shall fear your God: I am the Lord.

What to make of all this? If it’s so important for us to be holy as a community, why all the confusion about commandments that apply to the individual and those that apply to the community. Do we have to fulfill these commandments to be holy? If so, as individuals, as a community, or both? I think I know the answer, but first, I want to explain how I have come to that answer.

Today is the anniversary of my bar mitzvah. I shared a bar mitzvah with Marshall Gordon at Beth Shalom in Oak Park Michigan. Marshall’s father was the president of the shul so Marshall got a bit more of the spotlight. But I had my share. My father worked at the Detroit Free Press and arranged for the famous, at least in Detroit, photo-journalist, Tony Spina, to shoot pictures of my bar mitzvah preparations and then publish them in the Sunday Rotogravure. That’s what we used to call the magazine that came with the Sunday paper.

Oak Park was a great mostly Jewish community and Beth Shalom was a wonderful Conservative shul with a good afternoon Hebrew school and a great rabbi. Mordecai Halpern, z’l, a disciple of Mordecai Kaplan, was the first of many rabbis and teachers who have influenced me as a Jew. But it wasn’t until many years later that I actually read Parshat Kedoshim and decided that it was one of my favorite torah portions. Especially Chapter 19. Chapter 20, not so much.

Recently, I looked it up and found out that my bar mitzvah should have been the previous week, the double parsha of Tazria-Metsorah. To tell you the truth, I’m really happy that I ended up not getting afflicted with Tazria-Metsorah. But I had a long way to go before I would really come to appreciate Parshat Kedoshim.

Diane and I spent two years in Upper Volta, now Burkina Faso, in West Africa in the mid-seventies. It was one of the two most transformative experiences of our lives. Ouagadougou, the capital, was a city without a Jewish Community of any kind, and pretty much a city without Jews. There were a few Jewish Peace Corps volunteers and I’m sure that there were a few Jews among the international community. For the first time we were forced to confront how to be Jewish in the absence of Jewish community. What we did we mostly did for ourselves. Having arrived with only our backpacks, we had Shabbat candle sticks made by the local bronze artist. We learned to bake matzah by ourselves. We did have the benefit of being able to buy challot for our Shabbat dinners from Charlie, the Jewish Moonie, whose recipe Diane still occasionally uses to this day. Professionally, culturally and in terms of our world view, Upper Volta laid the ground work for the people we are today. Jewishly, it taught us that we need community, and that if it did not exist, we somehow had to find a way to create it ourselves.

When we moved to Columbia, South Carolina, Jewish community entered our lives again. Beth Shalom was a traditional but not very observant southern congregation led by a European Orthodox Rabbi, Edward Kendal. We formed a havurah with some other young adults and helped each other learn and practice Judaism in a way that was meaningful for us. The Jewish Catalog was a big help. We were learning about community building. There were a few sparks of holiness there. But we were mainly focused on our own lives, our careers, and starting our family. We were not fully ready for the holiness of community to inspire us, and perhaps the community was not quite strong enough to inspire us in that way.

In the early eighties, we moved to Gambier Ohio, sixty miles from Columbus. We lived on the campus of Kenyon College which had a number of Jewish faculty and students. Services were held in the basement of the College’s Church of the Holy Spirit. The basement was drafty but not all that holy, and so we soon moved the services to the more uplifting Philomathesian Hall.

By then, we were better prepared for building community. And the Jews of Gambier were responsive. We led services and organized holiday celebrations, represented the Jewish community at College functions, and ran the College’s community Seder. During the ten years that we were there, that community grew and became more cohesive, especially after the arrival of Rabbi Leonard Gordon and his wife Lori Lefkowitz. But we still had to travel to Columbus and Tifereth Israel for Shabbat morning and holiday services, and to enroll our oldest son, Reuven, in their Sunday school. We were still struggling to find the holiness of Jewish community.

Our second transformative experience was our Sabbatical year in Jerusalem. It transformed us Jewishly, and that was due entirely to community. Not the macro-community of Israeli Jews, but the local micro-community in which we lived and learned. The Masorti Kehilat Moreshet Avraham, and a few families served as models of what rich and fulfilling Jewish life could be like. Our childhood friend Maureen Stahl and her husband Rabbi Marvin Richardson, z’l, were guides and mentors, as was the family of Noam and Marcella Zion. At Moreshet Avraham we benefitted from the teaching and leadership of Rabbis David Golinkin, Reuven Hammer and Benji Segal, and from many others who became life-long friends. But more important than any formal teaching and guidance was the modeling that living in a rich community of knowledgeable, thoughtful, and committed Jews did to inspire us. It wasn’t that we became more aware of and committed to mitzvot, as much as the fact that we were enveloped by a community of people who shared practices and values that gave their lives, and ours, meaning and a sense of specialness. Many of these people were and are surely Tzadikim, but as a community they were definitely Kedoshim, holy in the sense of being special.

When we returned to the States we wanted to find such a community. As much as we loved Gambier and our life and friends in rural Ohio, we decided to move to Columbus to find it. We sent our children to the community Jewish Day School, Torah Academy, whose faculty and families quickly and warmly welcomed us. We ended up joining an Orthodox shul, Agudas Achim, where again we were warmly embraced and found teachers, models and mentors, including Rabbi Alan Ciner. Now our community included the Torah Academy, Tifereth Israel, Agudas Achim, and our Kenyon community. We continued to grow as Jews, mainly because of these overlapping communities.

Our decision to make aliyah was a difficult one, as we loved our community in Columbus. But we knew that we also had a special community waiting for us in Jerusalem. In our years there we became members, participants and even leaders in Kehilat Moreshet Avraham. We had many years benefitting from and contributing to that holy community.

As many of you know, Diane and I ended up in Mozambique, leading a small and interesting Jewish community there for most of 16 years. Of all of the Jewish communities in which we lived, it was the least able to provide us with knowledge, instruction, and examples of Jewish life. The Jewish Community of Mozambique has existed since the end of the nineteenth century. It had a beautiful – although at the time, dilapidated – synagogue, and just a handful of people who used it. It was incumbent on us to provide the modeling, mentoring and instruction to a diverse group of people who had very limited Jewish backgrounds and understanding.

We were ready.

Over time the Jews of Mozambique coalesced into a true community and ended up supporting us even as we provided them with learning and leadership. By the time we left last summer, the Jewish Community of Mozambique had formally reorganized into Honen Dalim, restored the shul building, and provided maintenance and security for the historic Jewish cemetery.

More importantly, services were being held Shabbat evening and morning, and on Sunday mornings. Holidays were celebrated, the Torah was read regularly, and the community came together for life-cycle events including bnei mitzvah, a wedding, and supporting mourners.

The mourners included myself and Diane when we each lost our father. For us, that community was never as important, as special and as holy as when they stood with us and responded while we recited the mourners’ Kaddish.

When the time came to leave Mozambique we once again faced a difficult decision. Return to our home, life and community that we loved in Jerusalem, or move to Los Angeles to be closer to our children and families. Diane did the hard work, researching the shuls and neighborhoods of Los Angeles and determining that the Library Minyan and Pico Robertson was the place for us. She was right, of course.

We once again found ourselves in the midst of a community that could nourish us, spiritually, intellectually, and culturally. Unlike our lives in Ouagadougou, Gambier and Mozambique, we don’t have to be the ones to make community for ourselves and others. As in Oak Park, Columbia, Columbus and Jerusalem, we feel uplifted community. And to the extent that our abilities permit, we hope to contribute to the holiness of the community.

I don’t think that we would be the people or Jews that we are today had we not had the challenges and opportunities to try to build stronger communities where they were weak. We might have been more learned and capable Jews had we lived our entire lives in places like Oak Park, Columbus, Jerusalem, and Los Angeles. But we never would have appreciated in the same way what makes a community holy.

קְדשִׁים תִּֽהְיוּ כִּי קָדוֹשׁ אֲנִי יְהוָֹה אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶֽם:

So now I think I know the answer to the question of whether we need to fulfill the commandments in order to be holy. The commandments in this parsha and in the rest of the Torah are not prerequisites for holiness. Rather, we need to be part of a holy community that supports and inspires us to fulfill the commandments. Holiness is not an individual quality that follows out of one’s actions. It is, instead, a collective state that comes about when we join together to create an environment in which we can grow as spiritual and ethical Jews. And that makes us all better people, better Jews, and if we are fortunate, a bit holy.

Shabbat Shalom