KEEPING IT TOGETHER

Sermon for Erev Rosh Hashanah 5781

September 18, 2020

This is not a normal year. 

Right now, I am standing in an almost empty sanctuary talking to you over a computer. 

That’s not normal. 

Some of us may be calling this “the new normal” but from my perspective it is still the temporary abnormal. 

But we don’t yet know how long that “temporary” will be.

In the program calendar for 5781 that those of you who are Temple members received in the mail as part of your High Holiday packet, you might have noticed that we wrote that we hoped we could start having in-person services at Temple again in late November.  But really, we don’t know.  It’s all still a question mark.

When Covid-19 related closures started happening back in March we hoped that they would be short lived.  But here we are in September, still trying to figure out how to live in the midst of a pandemic.

At least, through the miracle of Zoom, we can interact with each other, albeit in a somewhat awkward and clumsy way.  So, how about this – would you all do me a favor right now and please unmute yourselves and let’s all say “Shanah Tovah” or “Happy New Year” or “Gut Yuntif” to one another --- decidedly not in precise unison.  Okay – GO!!!

[ALL EXCHANGE GREETINGS]

Ah, that’s nice.  I really miss seeing you all together here at Temple in person!

But I’m so glad that you’ve made the effort to sign on to this Zoom call to take part in the service tonight.  And I hope to see you (and I DO see you – at least if you haven’t turned off your video camera) on other Zoom services throughout the High Holidays and, indeed, on Shabbat as well until this horrible pandemic has been vanquished and we can go back to meeting in person. 

(And I hope that, if your own health concern calculations permit it, that I’ll see some of you --- socially distanced as appropriate – at our congregational Tashlikh at Chester Bowl tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. or at our Rosh Hashanah family service (including children’s tashlikh) at Chester Bowl at 4:00 p.m. on Sunday.)

But, still, this is not a normal year.

I’ll share an anecdote from my own spiritual practice that illustrates what it has been like for me:

In the “V’ahavta” we read about the mitzvah:

וּקְשַׁרְתָּ֥ם לְא֖וֹת עַל־יָדֶ֑ךָ וְהָי֥וּ לְטֹטָפֹ֖ת בֵּ֥ין עֵינֶֽיךָ׃

“You shall bind them (i.e., bind God’s words) as a sign upon your hand and let them serve as a symbol before your eyes” (Deut. 6:8)

Traditionally, on mornings that are not Shabbat morning and not the morning of a major Jewish holiday, that commandment

קְשַׁרְתָּ֥ם לְא֖וֹת עַל־יָדֶ֑ךָ וְהָי֥וּ לְטֹטָפֹ֖ת בֵּ֥ין עֵינֶֽיךָ׃

is concretized through the wearing of tefillin on the arm and the head. 

In recent weeks and months when I have tied the tefillin straps on my arm and hand and placed the other tefillin on my forehead, I’ve had this weird feeling that the tefillin straps were holding me together, as if I were like a scarecrow that would fall apart but for these cords keeping me in one piece.

Perhaps some of you have felt this way lately as well – Maybe it’s not tefillin straps that are symbolically keeping you in one piece; maybe it’s yoga or meditation or running or playing music.

Whatever you are doing to cope and stay centered – whatever you are doing to keep it together -- more power to you!  Keep it up!  Find what works for you!

(Though I can personally recommend that if you are ever feeling stressed, picking up a siddur and davenning can be a very comforting, stabilizing experience.)

Here’s another Jewish teaching that has stuck with me lately – it’s a commentary on a verse from that same Torah portion, Parashat Va’etchanan, that includes the Shema and V’ahavta. 

The opening verse of that parasha, Deuteronomy 3:23, says this:

וָאֶתְחַנַּן, אֶל-ה', בָּעֵת הַהִוא, לֵאמֹר.

“I pleaded with Adonai at that time, saying,”

That’s Moses talking there.  It’s part of his farewell speech to the Israelites that takes up virtually the entire book of Deuteronomy.

So what was Moses pleading about to God when he said:

וָאֶתְחַנַּן, אֶל-ה', בָּעֵת הַהִוא, לֵאמֹר.

“I pleaded with Adonai at that time, saying,”

The verses that follow say that Moses was pleading to enter the Promised Land but that God said “No!”

All of us right now are fervently hoping (whether or not we do so in the context of pleading to God) for an end to this pandemic, for an end to racial injustice, for an end to economic insecurity, for an end to hate, for an end to war, for an end to despair.  We hope God won’t tell us “no” like God told Moses “no”.

We want to enter that promised land:  That promised land of recovery, that promised land of economic security, that promised land of justice, and brotherhood and sisterhood, that promised land of shalom. 

In short, we want to be written in the Book of Life.

God said no to Moses.  Will God say no to us?

So, anyway, here’s that commentary that I have found so insightful and comforting these past weeks and months:

Rabbi Lev Yitzchak of Berditchev, who lived in Eastern Europe from 1740 to 1809 says this about the verse

 וָאֶתְחַנַּן, אֶל-ה', בָּעֵת הַהִוא, לֵאמֹר.

“I pleaded with Adonai at that time, saying,”

He notes that the word “לאמר” – which we usually translate as “saying” can also be translated as an infinitive verb: “to say”.  So we can read the verse as follows:

וָאֶתְחַנַּן, אֶל-ה', בָּעֵת הַהִוא, לֵאמֹר.

I pleaded with Adonai at that time to say,”

-- or to put it more elegantly –

“I pleaded with Adonai at that time for the ability to say   -- for the ability to express my thoughts, my hopes, my prayers.” 

Lev Yitzchak says this:

קודם לא היה יכול לאמר, כי היה בוש מלפניו יתברך

“Before that time Moses was unable “leymor”/ unable “to say” (which we understand to mean “unable to pray”) because he felt ashamed before God.”

והיה צריך להתפלל שיוכל להתפלל

“So he needed to pray that he would be able to pray.”[1]

Thus, the “pleading” referred to in Deuteronomy 3:23 doesn’t refer to the request to enter the land that we find in the subsequent verses.

Rather, the pleading (according Lev Yitzchak) is simply for the ability to pray at all.

And yes, Moses goes on to pray eloquently for the ability to enter the Land of Israel with his people. 

So, in that sense, God did grant Moses’ first prayer – the prayer that he be granted the ability to pray.

I have thought about that commentary a lot recently. 

When we are stressed out and upset --- as we have had ample reason to be in recent weeks and months --- sometimes the healthiest, most healing thing we can do for ourselves is simply to slow down, to breathe deeply, to reflect deeply, and to express what is in our hearts.

If we can formulate the prayer – that, in and of itself, is an answer to our prayers.

Even if what we desire might or might not come to pass.

Whatever happens in this crazy moment in which we are now living, may we at least be granted that prayer – that we be able to pray.

Dena Weiss, the director of the Bet Midrash at the Hadar Institute in New York, says it better than I can. 

She writes:

“We often feel stymied by our inability to say exactly what we want to or to put our complex thoughts or feelings into words.  Moshe’s plea to be allowed to pray emboldens us to try.  It may be embarrassing, we may feel unworthy, we may feel frustrated, but the venture is worth praying for and waiting for. […] Whenever we pray to pray, the response from God is always yes.” [2]

We’ve got a lot of praying to do in the next ten days.  May it be a meaningful, healing and restorative experience that we can share together as a holy congregation. And as for the year ahead ---

Lshanah tovah tikatevu/ May we all be inscribed in the Book of Life and may life itself get back to some semblance of normality before too long.

Amen.

© Rabbi David Steinberg  (September 2020)

[1] https://www.sefaria.org/Deuteronomy.3.23?lang=bi&aliyot=0&p2=Kedushat_Levi%2C_Deuteronomy%2C_Vaetchanan.1&lang2=he

[2] https://www.hadar.org/torah-resource/think-you-pray#source-7531

RABBI’S BULLETIN ARTICLE FOR SEPTEMBER 2020/ ELUL 5780 – TISHREI 5781

The month of Elul on the Jewish calendar this year began at sundown on August 20th and concludes with the arrival of Rosh Hashanah (1st of Tishri) at sundown on September 18th.  This is traditionally a time for each of us to undertake cheshbon hanefesh  (“an accounting of the soul”) as we review our deeds, misdeeds, acts and omissions of the year that is ending.  Part of this process is the making of amends with those in our lives whom we may have hurt or offended.  The process culminates at Yom Kippur (the “Day of Atonement”), on the 10th of Tishri, which this year begins at sundown on September 27th.  The sages teach that the 10th of Tishri was the day on which Moses returned from the mountain top with the second set of tablets, replacing the first set that he had smashed in the wake of the incident of the Golden Calf. 

The second set of tablets thus symbolizes the possibility of forgiveness and of moving forward despite the mistakes of the past.  It’s not exactly about “letting bygones be bygones.” Our tradition teaches that the broken fragments of the first set of tablets were placed next to the unbroken replacement tablets in the Ark of the Covenant.  They remain part of our “permanent record.”  And indeed, the literal translation of the Hebrew word “kippur” is not exactly “atonement” but rather “covering over.” (The cover of the ark of the covenant in Hebrew is called “kapporet,” from the same Hebrew root as “kippur”.).  Covered, not erased.

To me, what this teaches is that our experiences in life remain with us.  There is no “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.”  In the normal state of affairs, we don’t obliterate past sins and hurts so much as we move past them and incorporate their lessons into our future behavior.   So too do our acts of kindness, our joys and our loves in our past remain part of who we are even after they are behind us chronologically. 

We hope and pray that all our experiences leading up to the present moment can help us to be better people in the new year.  

The year 5780 that is now ending has been more of an emotional roller coaster than any time I can remember in my life, with the possible exception of the days and months following the attacks of September 11, 2001.  We are all trying to live our lives as normally as possible while 170,000 of our fellow Americans have died from Covid-19 and while our world is still in the throes of the pandemic.  And we are all trying to be Rodfei Tzedek  (“pursuers of righteousness”) while the legacy of our society’s “original sins” of slavery, Jim Crow and systemic racism have yet to be even covered over, let alone erased. 

It’s a time of cheshbon hanefesh not just in our personal lives but in the life of our nation. And as national elections loom ahead, we find ourselves in the midst of some of the worst societal fissures that I can ever recall.  

And we won’t even get to hug each other in shul this High Holiday season!

But let’s not despair.  We still, each and every one of us, have so many blessings to appreciate and so much to be thankful for each and every day.  We do plan to meet in person at Chester Bowl for Tashlich (on the first afternoon of Rosh Hashanah) and for a family service (on the second afternoon of Rosh Hashanah). And our High Holiday services on Zoom will be a time when we can connect as well – with one another and with the Divine.

As the saying goes “gam zeh ya’avor” (“This too shall pass.”)

I wish for everyone a meaningful High Holiday season.  As 5781 approaches, let us be gentle with ourselves and one another – yet fierce in our pursuit of a more just and compassionate society.

L’shanah tovah tikateyvu 

(“May you be inscribed for a good year”),
Rabbi David Steinberg
rabbidavid@jewishduluth.org

FUGGEDABOUTIT!

Thoughts on Ki Tetze (Deuteronomy 21:10 – 25:9)

(Dvar Torah given at Temple Israel on Friday evening 8/28/20)

This week’s Torah portion, Ki Tetze, has the distinction of containing more mitzvot in it than any other parasha – 72 to be exact, according to Maimonides’ counting.

I want to focus this evening on the particular mitzvah stated in Deuteronomy 24:19 ---

כִּ֣י תִקְצֹר֩ קְצִֽירְךָ֨ בְשָׂדֶ֜ךָ וְשָֽׁכַחְתָּ֧ עֹ֣מֶר בַּשָּׂדֶ֗ה לֹ֤א תָשׁוּב֙ לְקַחְתּ֔וֹ לַגֵּ֛ר לַיָּת֥וֹם וְלָאַלְמָנָ֖ה יִהְיֶ֑ה לְמַ֤עַן יְבָרֶכְךָ֙ יְהוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ בְּכֹ֖ל מַעֲשֵׂ֥ה יָדֶֽיךָ׃

"When you reap the harvest in your field and you forget a sheaf in the field, do not turn back to get it; it shall go to the stranger, the orphan and the widow – in order that Adonai your God may bless you in all your undertakings."

At first glance, this seems like a wonderful, straightforward sort of law.  It seems to show a praiseworthy sensitivity to the needs of the poor.  Indeed, some of you will no doubt recognize this mitzvah from its description in the Book of Ruth, traditionally read on Shavuot:  Ruth and her mother-in-law Naomi have fled from famine in Moab back to Naomi’s birthplace in Jewish Bethlehem.  Chapter 2 of Megillat Rut describes Ruth gleaning behind the reapers in the fields of her kinsman Boaz.

However, closer examination of the mitzvah of the forgotten sheaf reveals two major difficulties:

First, from a practical standpoint, this is a pretty half-baked way of providing a safety net for the poor.  There may very well not be enough of these forgotten sheaves to provide the basic food supplies of those who are in need.  For example, in the case of Ruth, Boaz ultimately needs to load her down with another six measures of barley in order to be confident that she has enough for her needs (Ruth 3:15).  That’s why the Jewish mitzvah of tzedakah extends far behind the provisions of this particular mitzvah of the forgotten sheaf.

Secondly, from a religious standpoint, what sort of a mitzvah is this that can ONLY be fulfilled UNINTENTIONALLY?  Isn’t it true that one of the most important pillars of Judaism is that human beings have free will   --- free will to choose how and whether to fulfill the commandments that tradition says were given to us by God?

A classic midrash from the Tosefta illustrates this conundrum.  It goes like this:

"A story is told of a pious man who forgot a sheaf in his field.  He said to his son – Go and offer a bull for a burnt-offering and a bull for a peace-offering.  [His son] answered: Father! What makes you want to rejoice in this mitzvah more than in all others in the Torah?  [His father] said to him: The Omnipresent has given all the other mitzvot in the Torah to be observed consciously.  But this one is to be unconsciously observed.  Were we to observe this one of our own deliberate freewill before the Omnipresent, we would have no opportunity of observing it! Rather [scripture] says –“When you reap your harvest and have forgotten a sheaf in the field…” (Tosefta, Peah 3:8)   

So, what ARE we, religiously speaking, to make of a mitzvah that you can’t carry out intentionally?  The "punchline," as it were, of the midrash spells it out:

“Scripture ordains for this a blessing.  Have we not here a kal vechomer (a fortiori) argument?  If when a person has no deliberate intention of performing a good deed it is nevertheless reckoned to that person as a good deed, how much more so when one deliberately performs a good deed?”

In other words, the purpose of this "unintentional mitzvah" is to sensitize us to the even greater importance of doing "intentional mitzvot!"  

I think we can derive an additional lesson from this ----

There are times in each of our lives when, even without consciously realizing it, we are doing good deeds, we are helping others, we are forging connections with God, we are making the world a better place --- just like that farmer in our Torah portion who unwittingly did a mitzvah by “forgetting” to gather some sheaves of the harvest.

So, if you are ever feeling like your life doesn’t matter, like your existence makes no difference in the world --- then this mitzvah of the forgotten sheaf inspires us to give ourselves a second look.  Each of us DOES matter.  Each of us DOES make a difference in the world, even when we don’t have the ability to perceive the subtle ways in which our presence is felt.  Each of us have helped others even when we didn’t know we were doing so.

This realization helps ground us as we approach the new year, as we examine our deeds of this year that is ending. For in this season of teshuvah (return), we are not starting from scratch.    Surely, just as God, as it were,  knows our faults, God must also know how each of us has been a blessing --- even when we didn’t know it.

Shabbat shalom.

© Rabbi David Steinberg

August 2020/ Elul 5780

SOME THINGS ARE PUZZLING -- SOME THINGS NOT

Thoughts on Chukkat  5780/2020

(Dvar Torah given Friday 6/26/20)

Our Torah Portion this week, Parashat Chukkat, begins with the description of a strange sacrificial ritual involving פָרָ֨ה אֲדֻמָּ֜ה תְּמִימָ֗ה אֲשֶׁ֤ר אֵֽין־בָּהּ֙ מ֔וּם אֲשֶׁ֛ר לֹא־עָלָ֥ה עָלֶ֖יהָ עֹֽל / “Parah adamah temimah asher eyn bah mum, asher lo alah aleyha  ol”/ “a red cow without blemish, in which there is no defect and on which no yoke has been laid” (Num. 19:2).  The ashes of said cow, after being mixed with other special ingredients, would be sprinkled on a person who had become ritually impure as a result of being in proximity with a corpse.

This treatment would serve to return a person back to a state of ritual purity so that they could be permitted to enter the holy precincts of the Tabernacle or Temple and so that they could be permitted to partake of sacrificial offerings.  

You may recall that this passage is also read, as an additional maftir reading on a second Torah scroll, on “Shabbat Parah” --- the special Sabbath that arrives each year about three weeks before Passover.  Its liturgical usage in that context reminds us to start getting ourselves and our houses ready for Passover.

For me this year, the passage has special resonance because that maftir reading of Numbers chapter 19, the law of the Red Heifer, was the last Torah passage we read in an in-person Shabbat morning service in our Temple Israel sanctuary before we suspended services on account of the Covid-19 pandemic. 

How poignant it is now, when that reading comes around in the annual cycle of weekly Torah portions, to think about all of the precautions we are now taking – all the masks, the social distancing, the intensified sanitizing…  We’re doing this to protect ourselves from the contamination of Covid-19.  Our ancestors were trying to protect themselves from what they saw as the ritual impurity associated with coming in contact with death.  As it says in Parashat Chukkat ---

זֹ֚את הַתּוֹרָ֔ה אָדָ֖ם כִּֽי־יָמ֣וּת בְּאֹ֑הֶל כָּל־הַבָּ֤א אֶל־הָאֹ֙הֶל֙ וְכָל־אֲשֶׁ֣ר בָּאֹ֔הֶל יִטְמָ֖א שִׁבְעַ֥ת יָמִֽים׃

וְכֹל֙ כְּלִ֣י פָת֔וּחַ אֲשֶׁ֛ר אֵין־צָמִ֥יד פָּתִ֖יל עָלָ֑יו טָמֵ֖א הֽוּא׃

וְכֹ֨ל אֲשֶׁר־יִגַּ֜ע עַל־פְּנֵ֣י הַשָּׂדֶ֗ה בַּֽחֲלַל־חֶ֙רֶב֙ א֣וֹ בְמֵ֔ת אֽוֹ־בְעֶ֥צֶם אָדָ֖ם א֣וֹ בְקָ֑בֶר יִטְמָ֖א שִׁבְעַ֥ת יָמִֽים׃

This is the ritual: When a person dies in a tent, whoever enters the tent and whoever is in the tent shall be impure seven days; and every open vessel, with no lid fastened down, shall be impure.  And anyone who touches, in an open field, one slain by the sword, a corpse, a human bone, or a grave shall be impure seven days. (Num. 19: 14-16)

We have sound, easily understandable reasons for our contemporary precautions against the coronavirus.

As the Minnesota Department of Health reminds us:

·         People can spread the COVID-19 disease to each other.

·         The disease is thought to spread by nose and mouth droplets when someone who is infected coughs, sneezes or exhales.

·         The droplets can land in the mouths or noses of people nearby. It may be possible for people to breathe the droplets into their lungs. It is important to stay 6 feet away from other people in public. At home, someone who is sick should stay alone, in one room, as much as possible.

·         Droplets can land on surfaces and objects that other people then touch. It is important to wash your hands before you touch your mouth, nose, face or eyes. Clean surfaces that are touched often. Clean surfaces often if someone in the house is sick.

·         Infected people may be able to spread the disease before they have symptoms or feel sick.[1]

And further, they remind us that

·        Wear[ing] a cloth mask over your nose and mouth in grocery stores and all other public places where it is hard to stay 6 feet away from others.[…] can help to stop your germs from infecting others. This is extra important [since] people without symptoms can spread the virus that causes COVID-19 disease.[2]

None of this is puzzling if we “follow the science.”

By contrast, Jewish commentators over the centuries have been puzzled as to why sprinkling red cow ashes mixed with spring water would take away ritual impurity. They also were puzzled about how it could be that the same mixture that made the impure person pure simultaneously made the pure person who had administered the procedure impure.

No less a personage than King Solomon, praised for his wisdom, is described in a classic midrash as being stumped.  As we learn from Midrash Tanchuma:

Solomon said, “About all these things I have knowledge; but in the case of the parashah on the red heifer, I have investigated it, inquired into it, and examined it. Still (at the end of the verse in Eccl. 7:23), ‘I thought I could fathom it, but it eludes me.’” [3]

But that’s the whole point – say the sages of the Talmud and later commentators like Rashi:

The ritual of the Parah Adamah/Red Heifer is introduced in our parasha as “chukat hatorah” --- “the chukah of the Torah.” The term “chukah” (חקה)  (or its variant “chok”) is generally described in Jewish thought as referring to a law that has no obvious rational meaning.  As the classic commentary asserts --- God simply declares “I have decreed it, and you are not permitted to question it.” (Rashi on Num. 19:2)

For those of us of a liberal religious bent, we certainly do question any claims of Biblical inerrancy.  Our sacred texts were written by people.  And even the religious traditionalists acknowledge that even if it is God’s word, it’s still transmitted through imperfect human language by imperfect humans.  So, things get lost in translation --- or, to put it another way – some things just aren’t even capable of being expressed in human language.

This Torah portion --- the law of the Parah Adamah/ The Red Heifer – then invites us to sit with a basic existential question:

In the face of death, in the face of mysteries that are beyond our comprehension, what do we believe?

Do we believe that there is no meaning in life so that there is ultimately nothing to understand?

Or do we believe that there is infinite meaning in life  -- so that ultimately we should cultivate a stance of religious awe, rather than a stance of cynical nihilism.

The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates is famously credited with declaring
“I know nothing but the fact of my own ignorance.”

Judaism seems to agree with that to a certain extent, at least with subjects like the law of the Red Heifer.

But what do we know?

Some wise words were penned on this subject by the early 20th-century British Jewish communal leader Lily Montague and I’ll conclude these parashah thoughts with her words:

I find by experience, not by reasoning,

but by my own discovery that God is near me,

and I can be near God at all times.

I cannot explain it, but I am as sure of my experience

As I am of the fact that I live and love.

I cannot explain how I have come to lie and love,

But I know I do.

In the same way, I know I am in contact with God.[4]

Shabbat shalom.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg (June 2020/ Tammuz 5780)

[1] https://www.health.state.mn.us/diseases/coronavirus/basics.html

[2] https://www.health.state.mn.us/diseases/coronavirus/prevention.html

[3] https://www.sefaria.org/Midrash_Tanchuma%2C_Chukat.6.1?lang=bi&with=all&lang2=en

[4] Quoted in Mishkan T’Filah: A Reform Siddur (Shabbat edition), p. 91.

THOUGHTS ON KORACH

(Num. 16:1 – 18:29)

Dvar Torah delivered on Friday evening 6/19/20

This week’s Torah portion is Parashat
Korach.  It tells the story of a major
rebellion against the authority of Moses that takes place within the Israelite
camp during the second year after the Exodus from Egypt.

Korach’s rebellion is really two
stories in one. Literary critics theorize that there were two separate stories
passed down through the ages. One story was a story of Moses’s and Aaron’s
cousin Korach and his Levite followers complaining that they should get to be
Kohanim/Priests like Aaron and his family.

A second story is about Datan and Aviram,
from the tribe of Reuben leading a revolt on behalf of a varied constellation
of Israelites who are entirely fed up with Moses’s leadership and want to
return to Egypt. 

Later editors synthesized the two
stories into a single narrative.  In the
synthesized narrative, Korach is portrayed as the leader of both camps.

Or, from a more traditionalist
viewpoint, this is all one story about one rebellion encompassing varying
subgroups, each with their own grievances.

However we approach the genesis of the
tale, the standard, mainstream, traditional rabbinic line on what to make of
this story is that it is a paradigm for the concept of makhloket shelo
beshem shamayim. --- a dispute that is not for the sake of Heaven. 

As it says in Pirke Avot in the Mishna:  "Any dispute which is for the sake of
Heaven will ultimately be of enduring value, and one which is not for the sake
of Heaven will not be of enduring value. What is a dispute for the sake of
Heaven? This is a debate between Hillel and Shammai. What is a dispute not for
the sake of Heaven? This is the dispute of Korach and his assembly." 
(Pirke Avot 5:20)

What did the rabbinic era sages have
against Korach?  They regarded him as a power-hungry
demagogue.  They thought he was simply
lusting after power and was not being honest when he complained to Moses:

רַב־לָכֶם֒ כִּ֤י
כָל־הָֽעֵדָה֙ כֻּלָּ֣ם קְדֹשִׁ֔ים וּבְתוֹכָ֖ם יְהוָ֑ה וּמַדּ֥וּעַ
תִּֽתְנַשְּׂא֖וּ עַל־קְהַ֥ל יְהוָֽה׃

“You have gone
too far! For all the community are holy, all of them, and Adonai is in their
midst. Why then do you raise yourselves above Adonai’s congregation?” (Num. 16:3)

As for the masses of people following
the ringleaders in rebellion against Moses and Aaron, their complaint ---
expressed by the words of Datan and Aviram -- 
is even more pointed:

הַמְעַ֗ט כִּ֤י
הֶֽעֱלִיתָ֙נוּ֙ מֵאֶ֨רֶץ זָבַ֤ת חָלָב֙ וּדְבַ֔שׁ לַהֲמִיתֵ֖נוּ בַּמִּדְבָּ֑ר
כִּֽי־תִשְׂתָּרֵ֥ר עָלֵ֖ינוּ גַּם־הִשְׂתָּרֵֽר׃

“Is it not enough
that you brought us from a land flowing with milk and honey to have us die in
the wilderness, that you would also lord it over us?” (Num. 16-13)

Yes, I know it seems crazy that they
would refer to EGYPT as a “land of milk and honey” – but for them it seemed
like Moses and Aaron’s leadership was only going to result in death and more
death.  Egypt was looking better by the
day.

You can read the story for yourself,
but the denouement is that those who dare to question the ruling authorities
wind up either consumed by fire or swallowed up into the bowels of the earth.

That’ll teach ‘em.

One wonders how it all came to this.

Certainly, the people have been a
bunch of complainers and kvetchers from the very start --- both before and
after the departure from Egypt.

However, this time around they’ve
reached the end of their patience.  In
last week’s Torah portion, Parashat Shelakh Lekha, after the pessimistic report
of the spies had angered God, God had decreed that the entire generation who
had left Egypt (or at least everyone age 20 and over)  would die out in the wilderness, and only a
subsequent generation would get to complete the journey to Eretz Yisrael. 

And then, after that, in a chilling
incident that we tend to gloss over when we read Parashat Shelakh Lekha each
year, an Israelite man is stoned to death for the crime of gathering sticks on
the Sabbath.  As we read in Numbers
15:32-36.

“Once, when the Israelites were in the wilderness, they came upon a man
gathering wood on the sabbath day. Those who found him as he was gathering wood
brought him before Moses, Aaron, and the whole community. He was placed in
custody, for it had not been specified what should be done to him. Then Adonai said
to Moses, ‘The man shall be put to death: the whole community shall pelt him
with stones outside the camp.’ So the whole community took him outside the camp
and stoned him to death—as Adonai had commanded Moses.”

Rabbi Elyse Frishman in an essay in the volume “The Women’s Torah
Commentary” observes:

“The punishment of stoning the wood gatherer is the first and only incident
of capital punishment actually applied in the Torah.  The episode must have been devastating for
the people.” [1]

The poor wood gatherer remains nameless in the Torah.  But a later midrash says that the wood gatherer
who was stoned to death was Tzelophchad, whose daughters would later be moved
to activism against the inequities of the inheritance system.[2] 

Sure, the rules were set out for all to hear, but the killing of the wood
gatherer always strikes me as more of a lynching than any preservation of law
and order.

So maybe those who joined Korach in a struggle against the status quo were
infuriated by the lynching of the wood gatherer.  Just as today, multitudes of Americans are
rising up against the status quo in fury over the police killings that amount
to lynchings in our own day.

The wood gatherer is unnamed in the Torah – but as for those of our day –
we can and should say their names.  Those
names include, among others:

Eric Garner 

Ezell Ford

Michelle Cusseaux

Tanisha Anderson

Tamir Rice

Natasha McKenna

Walter Scott

Bettie Jones

Philando Castile

Botham Jean

Atatiana Jefferson 

Eric Reason 

Dominique Clayton 

Breonna Taylor 

George Floyd 

Rayshard Brooks.

No doubt, Parashat Korach presents us with a complicated and ambiguous mix
of ambivalent messages when it comes to questions of authority, hierarchy and
justice. 

But this time around I’m rooting for the rebels.

Shabbat shalom.

© Rabbi David Steinberg

June 2020/ Sivan 5780

[1] Rabbi Elyse Frishman, “Korach: Authority, Status, Power” in The Women’s
Torah Commentary: New Insights from Women Rabbis on the 54 Weekly Torah
Portions, Rabbi Elyse Goldstein, editor (Jewish Lights Publishing, 2000),
pp. 286-87.

[2] Numbers 27: 1-11; T.B Shabbat 96b.

RABBI DAVID'S JUNE 2020 BULLETIN ARTICLE

Throughout the month of June this year we find ourselves in the Book of Numbers in our lectionary
cycle of weekly Torah readings.  This fourth book of the Torah, called “Sefer Bemidbar” in Hebrew, is probably
my favorite of the five books.  It contains beautiful prayers like the priestly blessing:

“May the Eternal bless you and protect you!
May the Eternal deal kindly and graciously with you!
May the Eternal bestow divine favor upon you and grant you peace!”

(Num. 6: 24-26)

And it includes teachings about the importance of learning from everyone, as when Moses berates
Joshua for wanting to jail the young upstarts Eldad and Medad for unauthorized prophesying:

“And Joshua son of Nun, Moses' attendant from his youth, spoke up and said, ‘My lord Moses,
restrain them!’ But Moses said to him, "Are you wrought up on my account? Would that all the Eternal's people were prophets, that the Eternal put the divine spirit upon them!"

 (Num. 11:28-29)

And it contains the list of way stations through the forty-year wilderness journey through
Sinai (Num. 33: 1-49), a passage that has the feel of an incantation when chanted in Hebrew or read in English.  Rashi and other commentators teach that the long list of starting and stopping points in Numbers 33 is there to remind us of God’s kindness and providence at each stage of our life journeys – a teaching that is very much near the heart of my own Jewish spirituality.

But perhaps the profundity of the Book of Numbers can be most readily found in its very
title.  Not the English title, but the Hebrew title – “Bemidbar” [במדבר]    which means “In the wilderness”  (or, more accurately, “In the wilderness of…”, the start of the noun phrase “Bemidbar Sinai”/ “In the wilderness
of Sinai.”

The word “midbar”/מדבר (“wilderness”) is derived from the Hebrew root letters dalet-bet-resh/ דבר, a Hebrew root whose primary meaning is “speak.” (For example, “Ani medaber ivrit” [for a male] or “Ani medaberet ivrit” [for a female] is the way you say “I speak Hebrew” in Hebrew, and the word “dibbur” [דיבור] means “speech” or “utterance.”)    

I visited the Sinai Peninsula back in December 1981, during my first trip to Israel when I was a college junior.  I can well imagine how being in that midbar - that wilderness - could become connected in our ancestors’ understanding with the ultimate dibbur – the ultimate “speaking” --  that our tradition calls “Torah.”

This year, the concept of midbar/wilderness has an added, metaphorical significance for
all of us.  We are still in the midst of a deadly pandemic – and our efforts to deal with it – personally, locally,
nationally and globally – have left us feeling unmoored and disoriented, as if we too were wandering in a wilderness. Our tradition teaches that the Shechinah – God’s immanent presence – did not desert us during that temporary Sinai sojourn.  We are not being deserted now either – and we are not deserting one another. 
Our faith reminds us that we remain connected though our methods for connecting have to be adjusted for the time being. 

Please let us all continue to do our part by staying safe as we enter the summer season.   And thank you to everyone who has been reaching out to fellow congregants, and other neighbors and friends during this
challenging time.    

L’shalom,

Rabbi David Steinberg

rabbidavid@jewishduluth.org

RABBI DAVID'S MAY 2020 TEMPLE ISRAEL BULLETIN ARTICLE

[Note: Since this article was published in our Bulletin at the beginning of May, the continued pandemic has led us to continue keeping our building closed. Zoom Shabbat services are now taking place, but we decided to postpone the Confirmation service until we are doing in-person services again. In the meantime, please enjoy this article that talks about the connection between Shavuot and Confirmation. Chag Shavuot Same’ach — DS 5/28/20]

Shavuot (along with Passover and Sukkot) is one of the Shalosh Regalim/ the "Three Pilgrimage Festivals" of the Jewish religion.   The Torah speaks of it as an agricultural festival ("Chag Habikkurim"/"Festival of First Fruits"), but rabbinic tradition early on identified it with “Zeman Matan Torateynu” / “The Time of the giving of our Torah.” 

 A classic midrash imagines God being reluctant to present this gift unless it would be appreciated by its recipients:

 At Sinai, when the Jewish people were ready to receive the Torah, God said to them, “What? Am I supposed to give you the Torah without any security? Bring some good guarantors that you will keep it properly, and I will give it to you.” They said: “Our ancestors will be our guarantors.” God said: “They themselves need a guarantor!” […] They said: “Our prophets will be our guarantors.” God said: I have complaints against them, too […]” They said: “Then our children will be our guarantors.” God said: “Now, those are good guarantors!” (Shir Hashirim Rabbah 4:1) 

 Since its institution by Reform Judaism in the 19th century, Confirmation has been an occasion for young men and women to acknowledge publicly that they are in fact prepared to be such guarantors. 

 At the time that I am writing this article (April 23rd), our current moratorium on in-person gatherings at Temple Israel is in place until May 14th and our Shavuot/Confirmation service, at which Sam B. and David W. are scheduled to be confirmed, is scheduled to take place during the Friday night service on May 29th.  

 However, it seems entirely possible that our closure might be extended beyond May 14th, and conceivably beyond May 29th.  It is difficult to know for sure at this moment. So please stay tuned for further announcements after the Temple Board next meets on May 14th about plans beyond that date.  If our closure continues beyond May 29th then the current plan is that Confirmation would be rescheduled to coincide with our next in-person Friday night service.  That would make that first time back in the sanctuary that much more special and festive! 

As for Shavuot (which actually begins at sundown on Thursday, May 28th), I’m currently consulting with my colleagues in the Minnesota Rabbinical Association about the possibility of scheduling a virtual statewide “Tikkun Leyl Shavuot” program. This would be a late-night study session on Thursday, May 28th to take place over Zoom, with various presenters from several Minnesota congregations leading mini-lessons on a variety of Jewish topics. If we do end up scheduling this, further information will be forthcoming.  [Note: Since this article was published my plans have changed. Instead of the MRA program, I will be participating in a Tikkun Leyl Shavuot program of the Reconstructionist Movement. Details can be found here: https://www.reconstructingjudaism.org/news/shavuot-coming-together-across-globe-learn-through-night-our-homes ] 

(And here is a link to an article that gives further information about the custom of “Tikkun Leyl Shavuot”:  https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/tikkun-leil-shavuot/ ) 

 In the meantime, may we all stay safe and healthy during these stressful times. Whether we end up being together in person by the end of May, or whether we are continuing to maintain physical distancing at that point, may we all have a happy Shavuot --- and we look forward to being able to say mazal tov to our confirmands soon.  

 Chag Same’ach, 

Rabbi David Steinberg 

<rabbidavid@jewishduluth.org> 

PROGRESSIVE ZIONISM PEP TALK

Sermon for Yom Kippur morning 5780

October 9, 2019

The program booklet you have in front of you includes a brief overview of the Yom Kippur liturgy. And I wrote a similar overview in the program booklet for Rosh Hashanah that we distributed last week.  I hope you have found these useful.  In previous years I had gotten feedback that people wanted me to provide this sort of information from the bima.  Frankly, I had often found that when I did do that it disrupted the flow of the service.  So, this year, instead of talking a lot from the bima about the structure of the services, I thought I would rather put it all down in writing for you to peruse at your leisure.

In any event, when I decided to write those liturgical overviews for the Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur program flyers it seemed very clear to me that the first thing I should write about was the Shema, and, in particular, the first line of the Shema. 

So much is wrapped up into that one Biblical verse, Deuteronomy Chapter 6, verse 4:

SHEMA YISRAEL ADONAI ELOHEINU ADONAI ECHAD

You’ve got your dynamic between the two names for the Deity --  ADONAI (which the sages say represents divine compassion and mercy) and ELOHIM (which the sages say represents divine judgment and justice).  And that dichotomy prompts all of us to reflect on how those values should be balanced in our own lives.

(HINT:  When in doubt, opt for compassion….)

And you’ve got your dynamic between universalism and particularism: 

On the one hand, the monotheism proclaimed in the Shema is the epitome of universality: There is only One God :   One God who has created all of existence including our one home planet and our one human species. 

We --- the global “we” --- are all in this together. 

Or as Rabbi Maurice Eisendrath, who for some three decades was the President of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (as the Union for Reform Judaism used to be known), expressed it (and please excuse the dated language which is not as explicitly inclusive as we would express it today):

“Judaism gave mankind its first civil rights program. It was expressed in the Sh’ma, the watchword of the Jewish faith: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.” As God is one, mankind is one, for each is created equally in the image of God.” (See https://rac.org/shma-vahavta)

But on the other hand, there is also the particularist aspect of the Shema. 

For that first line of the Shema is not addressed to all humanity but rather, to one particular subset of humanity, i.e. our particular subset of humanity.  As it says:

Shema YISRAEL – Listen Israel, Listen Jewish people – Moses is saying -- I’m talking to YOU  --- YISRAEL --  in particular! 

All humanity are brothers and sisters, all humanity shares in the responsibility to take care of this one precious world in which we live.

But you, Israel – or –when we recite the Shema ourselves let’s make that – WE Israel – we the Jewish people – have a bond with one another, have a common history, have a common destiny, have --- God willing – a common purpose.

Why are we Jews dispersed among all the other nations of the world?

From a purely non-theological perspective, we can blame the persecutions of one ancient empire after another and one modern nation-state after another.  And we can also factor in the various economic push and pull factors that have informed mass migrations of millions from ancient times to the present day. 

During the rabbinic and medieval periods, the dominant philosophical view among our people was to put the blame on ourselves for being tossed and buffeted about the world. 

A classic line in the traditional liturgy declares --- umipnei chata’einu galinu mey’artzenu --- “because of our sins we were exiled from our land.”

That theological claim has been expunged from Reform and Reconstructionist machzorim and siddurim.  As theologically liberal Jews we generally do not buy into that “blame the victim” mentality when it comes to our people’s history of exile and dispersion.

A more optimistic view regarding the nature of the diaspora takes as its starting point Biblical verses like those found in the second half of the book of Isaiah. 

Addressing the Judean exiles in Babylonia after the Destruction of the First Temple in the sixth century BCE, Isaiah 42:6  proclaims: 

אֲנִ֧י יְ-ה-וָ֛-ה קְרָאתִ֥יךָֽ בְצֶ֖דֶק וְאַחְזֵ֣ק בְּיָדֶ֑ךָ וְאֶצָּרְךָ֗ וְאֶתֶּנְךָ֛ לִבְרִ֥ית עָ֖ם לְא֥וֹר גּוֹיִֽם׃

I the Eternal have called you in righteousness.  And I have grasped you by the hand.  I created you, and appointed you a covenant people, a light of nations—

And Isaiah 49:6 proclaims in similar fashion:  

וּנְתַתִּ֙יךָ֙ לְא֣וֹר גּוֹיִ֔ם לִֽהְי֥וֹת יְשׁוּעָתִ֖י עַד־קְצֵ֥ה הָאָֽרֶץ

I will make you a light of nations so that My salvation may reach the ends of the earth.

The early leaders of Reform Judaism drew richly on this vein of tradition in seeing the dispersion of Jews around the world as a blessing rather than a curse – for they saw the Jewish mission as that of being exemplars to the world of ethical living. 

A light unto the nations if you will.

And so, in the 1885 Pittsburgh Platform the rabbis of the Reform movement resolved: 

“We recognize, in the modern era of universal culture of heart and intellect, the approaching of the realization of Israel's great Messianic hope for the establishment of the kingdom of truth, justice, and peace among all men. We consider ourselves no longer a nation, but a religious community, and therefore expect neither a return to Palestine, nor a sacrificial worship under the sons of Aaron, nor the restoration of any of the laws concerning the Jewish state.”[1]

The upheavals of the 20th century sufficed to convince Reform Judaism to modify this stance.  In the Principles of Reform Judaism platform adopted in that same city of Pittsburgh a century later in 1999, the Central Conference of American Rabbis movement did still affirm the global mission of Judaism. The 1999 Pittsburgh Platform declares:

We are Israel, a people aspiring to holiness, singled out through our ancient covenant and our unique history among the nations to be witnesses to God’s presence. […] 

In other words, the universalistic notion of Israel being “a light unto the nations,” a mission that our very dispersion could help us to fulfill. 

But this time around, the 1999 Pittsburgh document now also embraced the idea of the importance of the nationalist aspect of Jewish identity:

As it stated:

“We are committed to (Medinat Yisrael), the State of Israel, and rejoice in its accomplishments. We affirm the unique qualities of living in (Eretz Yisrael), the land of Israel, and encourage (aliyah), immigration to Israel.

We are committed to a vision of the State of Israel that promotes full civil, human and religious rights for all its inhabitants and that strives for a lasting peace between Israel and its neighbors.

We are committed to promoting and strengthening Progressive Judaism in Israel, which will enrich the spiritual life of the Jewish state and its people.

We affirm that both Israeli and Diaspora Jewry should remain vibrant and interdependent communities. As we urge Jews who reside outside Israel to learn Hebrew as a living language and to make periodic visits to Israel in order to study and to deepen their relationship to the Land and its people, so do we affirm that Israeli Jews have much to learn from the religious life of Diaspora Jewish communities.”[2]

What a difference a century makes!

Meanwhile, our liturgy --- in all its versions – Orthodox, Conservative, Reconstructionist and Reform – still includes a poetic vision about the centrality of the Land of Israel.  I started this sermon by talking about the importance of the Shema.  But in any siddur or machzor the paragraph immediately prior to the Shacharit recitation of the Shema includes this ancient hope:  

וַהֲבִיאֵנוּ לְשָׁלום מֵאַרְבַּע כַּנְפות הָאָרֶץ. וְתולִיכֵנוּ קומְמִיּוּת לְאַרְצֵנוּ

 “Bring us in peace from the four corners of the earth and lead us with upright pride to our land.”

--------------------------

In recent years the interdependent relationship between the diaspora Jewish community and the State of Israel has come under increasing attack and challenge.  There are some Jews today, even including some rabbis, who no longer identify themselves as Zionists.  Who no longer see the value and necessity of the existence of a Jewish State in our people’s ancestral, indigenous homeland.

And so, I am glad that, at present, both the Reform and Reconstructionist movements still embrace the ideals of a progressive Zionism -- notwithstanding some outlying voices of dissent on the margins.

ARZA, the Association of Reform Zionists of America, defines its mission statement like this: 

“ARZA strengthens and enriches the Jewish identity of Reform Jews in the United States by ensuring that a connection with the Land, People, and State of Israel are fundamental parts of that identity.”

ARZA is the representative voice for American Reform Jews in the elections to the World Zionist Congress, which take place every five years.  And the Reconstructionist Movement, which endorsed and partnered with the ARZA slate for the 2015 elections to the World Zionist Congress, is doing so again for next year’s World Zionist Congress election.  

More information about how we can exercise our right to vote in the 2020 World Zionist Congress election will be forthcoming soon.  But if you want to get a sneak peek into all this just visit www.arza.org.

Meanwhile, in June of this year, the Reconstructionist movement became one of the founding organizational members of the “Progressive Israel Network” --- along with such other Progressive Zionist organizations as Americans for Peace Now, J Street, the Jewish Labor Committee, the New Israel Fund and T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights.

The constituent organizations of the “Progressive Israel Network” have adopted the following list of principles:

• Grounded in our Jewish and democratic values, the Progressive Israel Network calls to action all those who are committed to Israel’s future as the national homeland of the Jewish people and as a democracy that lives in peace and security with its neighbors.

• We are inspired by Israel‘s Declaration of Independence – establishing a state “based on freedom, justice, and peace,” that ensures “complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants, irrespective of religion, race, or sex.”

• We are alarmed by the threats to that vision from the increasingly extreme actions, policies, and ideology of the Israeli far-right with cover provided by its supporters in the Diaspora.

• Our commitment is to peace for Israel and its neighbors – through a two-state solution to the long and destructive conflict with the Palestinians and an end to the occupation and the expansion of settlements.

• Our commitment is to Israel’s security – understanding the many and real security threats Israel faces and that Israel does not bear sole responsibility for its conflict with the Palestinians or other regional powers.

• Our commitment is to democracy and the rule of law – believing that all citizens of Israel must be treated equally, and their civil and human rights protected.

• Our commitment is to religious pluralism – and the belief that all forms of Jewish practice deserve equal protection and recognition in the state of the Jewish people.

• Our values and our commitments make us proudly progressive and proudly pro-Israel and speak for the majority of Jews around the world.

• We call on Jews who share our values to join us as we work to shape opinion, policy and discourse.

• Together, let’s ensure that the Israel we leave to future generations best reflects the values and traditions we have inherited from those who’ve come before.[3]

I’ll be attending the J Street national conference in Washington, DC the end of this month where I’m really looking forward to learning more about how we can act to further these principles.  And I’m looking forward to helping to bring these messages to our representatives and senators during the lobbying day on Capitol Hill which will also be part of the scheduled activities of the J Street conference.

And I’m really excited that our program committee is bringing here to Temple Israel on Sunday, November 3rd, the Israeli writer and activist Hen Mazzig, who will be speaking on the theme:   “On Being a Liberal, Gay, Person of Color, a Progressive and a Zionist."

[NOTE: At this point, I gave a couple of shout-outs by name to specific members of the congregation who will be visiting Israel in the coming weeks and months. — DS]

And I really encourage any and all of you to experience Israel in person if you are at all able to do so.  It will strengthen your Jewish identity and help you to understand how our communities are intertwined.

Here comes the caveat now:

Just as American political life right now is stymied by partisan gridlock, so is Israeli political life. 

And in both of our countries, the forces of extremism threaten fundamental national values.

But as the Union for Reform Judaism’s immediate Past President, Rabbi Eric Yoffie wrote last year in Haaretz, Reform Jews “must be the voice of the sensible center.”[4] 

(and I would add, that goes for Reconstructionist Jews as well, as well as any of us who support a Progressive Zionist outlook)

Whatever you may think of the strength of the Trump administration’s support for Israel or the strength of the Obama administration’s support for Israel before it, and whoever ends up occupying the White House come January 2021 --- it remains critical for the American Jewish community to remain steadfast in our support for the security of the State of Israel – and for the American Jewish community to remain steadfast in our commitment to the creation of an independent Palestinian state existing peacefully alongside Israel.

Our brothers and sisters in Israel need our support and advocacy – and our involvement and our critique.

American foreign policy will always be transactional to a certain extent. 

Ask the Kurds.

Ask the Ukrainians.

And so, as we gather in synagogue today and recall the ancient rites of Jerusalem of old let us remember to keep in mind the Jerusalem of today.

As the psalmist reminds us:

אִֽם־אֶשְׁכָּחֵ֥ךְ יְֽרוּשָׁלִָ֗ם תִּשְׁכַּ֥ח יְמִינִֽי׃ 

If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither; let my tongue stick to my palate if I cease to think of you, if I do not keep Jerusalem in mind even at my happiest hour.[5]

May we, and all Israel, and all humanity, be blessed with peace and justice and reconciliation bimheyrah veyameinu/ speedily in our days.

And may we do our part in making it so.

Gmar chatimah tovah ve tzom-kal / A good final sealing and any easy fast.

Amen.

© Rabbi David Steinberg

Tishri 5780/ October 2019

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pittsburgh_Platform

[2] https://www.ccarnet.org/rabbinic-voice/platforms/article-statement-principles-reform-judaism/

[3] https://www.progressiveisrael.org/progressive-israel-network-launched/

[4] https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-what-on-earth-can-rabbis-say-about-israel-this-rosh-hashana-1.6433074

[5] Psalms 137:5-6

HERE TODAY...

Sermon for Kol Nidre Night 5780

October 8, 2019

A few days ago, I was proofreading the “Roll of Remembrance” that we will be distributing at the Yizkor service tomorrow afternoon.  Of course, since my parents are memorialized by plaques here at Temple, I wanted to check to make sure that they were listed in the booklet.  Yup.  Their names were right there.

Not that I needed reminding. 

I think of them every day – as I’m sure is the case for any of you who have lost next of kin.  They may have yahrtzeits once a year, and we might remember them on Yom Kippur at Yizkor, but still, they remain in our hearts each and every day.

But then, as I looked just below my parents’ names on page 13 of the Roll of Remembrance, I was momentarily, instinctively startled. For the next name on the list is “David Steinberg.” 

Now I assure you I’m alive and well at this juncture.  That “David Steinberg,” for whom there is also a plaque here at Temple, was not related to me.  He was the father of Lillian Alpert.  Lillian was a former member of our congregation from before my time who died in Florida a couple of years ago at the age of 101 and is buried up here in Duluth at Tiffereth Israel Cemetery.  Zichrona livracha/May her memory be for a blessing.

Still, seeing my own name in the Yizkor booklet, and also seeing it pop on our yahrtzeit list every year when the anniversary of Lillian Alpert’s father’s death comes up, reminds me of my own mortality. 

In the Torah’s telling, after God had proclaimed the Ten Commandments, when Moses went up the mountain to get the first set of tablets and to learn from God all the rest of the laws of the Torah, and when he remained out of sight and incommunicado for forty days   ----  the Israelites thought he was dead.  In panic, they rebelled and pressured Aaron into fashioning a golden calf for them to worship instead of worshipping this unseen God who had been announced by their now equally unseen prophet. 

Rowdy chaos ensued, and not in a good way.

After forty days, when Moses does come down the mountain, he smashes the first set of tablets in anger and then spends another forty days in a general funk, praying to God for mercy for his people.  Then God invites him to come back up the mountain for a third forty-day period, teaching him the Torah anew and inscribing the Ten Commandments once more on a second set of Tablets, this time tablets hewn by Moses himself.  

Jewish tradition teaches that the date on which Moses came back down from Mt. Sinai with the second set of tablets, that this date was the 10th of Tishri, Yom Kippur. 

As we learn in Parashat Ki Tisa in the Book of Exodus, when Moses returned,

 קָרַן עוֹר פָּנָיו /   “karan or panav” / “the skin of his face was beaming” from having been in such close communion with God.  That unusual Hebrew verb “karan” is related to the word “keren” meaning “horn.”   Rashi comments on this verse that this implies:  שהאור מבהיק ובולט כמין קרן / “sheha’or mavhik uvolet kemin keren” (“that the light shines out and projects like a sort of horn”).   This linguistic similarity between the noun “keren” (“horn”) and the verb “karan” (“beamed”) , which Rashi makes note of, is the root of some old anti-Semitic misunderstandings that claimed that Jews had horns. 

But In a more sympathetic, contemporary context we might describe Moses here as having a sort of “aura.”

However, a question remains for us:  Moses had spoken with God many times before without getting these beams, or horns or rays of light.  So what was different about this latest encounter with God compared to his previous encounters with God? 

What is different is that it is on this occasion that Moses learns of the possibility of teshuvah/repentance/turning.  The very fact that Moses could come back with a replacement set of tablets was a sign that God had decided to give the people a second chance.

And so we find, that when Moses had asked God to show him God’s ways, God’s response was all about teshuva ( Indeed, although the most common translation of “teshuvah” is “repentance,” the word “teshuvah” can also, literally, be translated as “response”). 

We are well familiar with that response, the Shelosh Esrey Midot/ “The Thirteen Divine Attributes.”  These words from Exodus 34, in slightly abbreviated form, are a key part of our Yom Kippur liturgy:

יְ-.ה-וָ-ה יְ-ה-וָ-ה, אֵל רַחוּם וְחַנּוּן--אֶרֶךְ אַפַּיִם, וְרַב-חֶסֶד וֶאֱמֶת.

Adonai, Adonai, God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth

נֹצֵר חֶסֶד לָאֲלָפִים, נֹשֵׂא עָו‍ֹן וָפֶשַׁע וְחַטָּאָה; וְנַקֵּה

keeping mercy unto the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin; and acquitting the penitent.

It is in this new, deeper experience of God, this new perception of God’s aspect of granting pardon and forgiveness, that Moses acquires that aura, or those “horns” of light if you will.

The gift of the second set of tablets teaches Moses, and teaches us, that it is never too late to start over, to refocus, to return to our better selves. 

And just as God gives us the possibility of being forgiven, so also ought we to be forgiving to others who may have messed up in one way or another in their relationships with us. 

For, ultimately, healthy relationship is not about being perfect and never making a mistake.  Rather it’s about having faith and trust in the long run.  Indeed, in the Hebrew language, the verb “l’ha’amin” (להאמין) from the root letters aleph-mem-nun/א.מ.נ. ) (and the related noun “emunah”  אמוניה include the English concepts of faith, belief and trust – all in the same word. 

So, to use another word derived from the same root letters (aleph-mem-nun):  Whenever we say Ameyn (or “Amen” in English) --- we are not just saying that we believe the message of a particular prayer to be factually true.  More importantly --  we are saying that we have faith and trust in the ongoing relationship between ourselves and God.

Faith and trust in God helps us to overcome our fear of mortality.

Faith and trust in others helps us to build relationships and to repair them when they have been disrupted. 

The people thought Moses had died.  He had not.  He would live another forty years, until the proverbial ripe old age of one hundred and twenty.  But 120 years is still not forever.

And, as for us, however long or short any of our own individual lifetimes might be, we know that they too are limited. 

I guess this knowledge is ultimately a good thing.  That’s why the psalmist asks of God  ----  

לִמְנ֣וֹת יָ֭מֵינוּ כֵּ֣ן הוֹדַ֑ע וְ֝נָבִ֗א לְבַ֣ב חָכְמָֽה׃

Teach us, therefore, so to number our days that we may attain a heart of wisdom.[1]

In other words, Judaism is teaching us that we should make every day count.  Every day is a gift.  We should strive to appreciate this gift of life, and to appreciate the gift of the presence of others in our lives.   

The sages taught that we should say 100 blessings every day.  That seems like a pretty daunting challenge!

Well, I know folks who try to do 100 pushups each day, or walk 10,000 steps each day. Such physical regimes take dedication and focus.

So does the spiritual regime of being conscious of our blessings. 

Many of us don’t manage to fulfill such spiritual or physical goals on a consistent basis. 

Heck, many of us don’t even get around to eating five servings of vegetables each day. 

But we get the basic idea.   Life is short.  Don’t waste it.  Don’t walk through it on auto-pilot. 

That message comes up loud and clear during these Yamim Nora’im/ Days of Awe.  In the “Unetaneh Tokef” on both Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur we wonder aloud who will live and who will die between now and this time next year. 

And, indeed, the rituals of Yom Kippur have been likened to those surrounding death and mourning.  The kittel that I am wearing and that a few others of you are wearing, resembles the traditional tachrichim or shrouds in which Jewish dead are traditionally enwrapped before burial.   They have no pockets.  We are not taking our material possessions with us when we go.

Even if any of us live to Moshe’s lifespan of 120 years, life is still too short to stand on ceremony. 

Life is too short not to be forgiving of others. 

Life is too short not to be forgiving of ourselves.

I love that famous concluding line from the poem “The Summer Day” by the American poet Mary Oliver who died earlier this year.

Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

We should be asking ourselves that question every day. 

But, to the extent that we may forget or neglect to do so, Yom Kippur reminds us. 

This day of introspection, Yom Kippur, brings with it an acknowledgement of our mortality.   

You all know the old saying,  “Here today, gone tomorrow.”

But Yom Kippur also turns that saying on its head. 

For with the tekiyah gedolah shofar blast that concludes Yom Kippur we are, as it were, reborn. 

With that imminent rebirth, may we all be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life for health and happiness in this new year of our wild and precious life.

Gmar Chatimah Tovah.

(c) Rabbi David Steinberg 5780/2019

[1] Psalms 90:12

STRANGERS AT THE GATES REDUX

(Sermon for First Morning of Rosh Hashanah 5780/ September 30, 2019)

This is my tenth Rosh Hashanah in Duluth, enough time to start to feel a little settled in.  Some of you, of course, have lived your whole lives here.  I bet you really feel at home – especially those of you whose families have been here for generations.  And for those of you who are newer to our congregation, or who are visiting us from out-of-town --- Beruchim Haba’im  -- welcome – and we hope you will feel at home here too.

However, no matter how heimish an atmosphere we might create here at Temple Israel, we also remember that we are a people whose history is filled with experiences of exile, displacement and wandering.

Torah speaks of Abraham and Sarah’s journey in response to God’s call   --- LEKH LEKHA --- “Go forth from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you.” (Genesis 12:1). 

Somewhat more problematically, those veteran wanderers subsequently force out Hagar and Ishmael to wander in a harsh and forbidding wilderness in this morning’s Torah reading.  Abraham and Sarah may be the ones whom we acknowledge as our spiritual forbears. But, nevertheless, we cannot help but identify with Hagar and Ishmael as well when we confront their plight each year on the first morning of Rosh Hashanah.

And in tomorrow morning’s haftarah, the prophet Jeremiah poignantly evokes the memory of our ancestral mother Rachel crying from beyond the grave as she witnesses the forced exile of the Jewish people a thousand years later:

כֹּ֣ה ׀ אָמַ֣ר יְהוָ֗ה ק֣וֹל בְּרָמָ֤ה נִשְׁמָע֙ נְהִי֙ בְּכִ֣י תַמְרוּרִ֔ים רָחֵ֖ל מְבַכָּ֣ה עַל־בָּנֶ֑יהָ מֵאֲנָ֛ה לְהִנָּחֵ֥ם עַל־בָּנֶ֖יהָ כִּ֥י אֵינֶֽנּוּ׃

Thus said the Eternal:  A cry is heard in Ramah—  Wailing, bitter weeping—  Rachel weeping for her children.  She refuses to be comforted for her children, who are gone.   (Jer. 31:15)

But the Babylonian Exile wasn’t forever.

And the occupation of the Land of Israel by foreign empires wasn’t forever.

Israel now once more --- as was the case in the days of Kings Saul, David and Solomon --- is once again home to the world’s largest Jewish population. 

In this Jewish year 5780, we are no longer a displaced people.

And here in the United States – home to the second largest Jewish community on the planet --- we are blessed to be in a country which, for all its faults, has afforded us those opportunities envisioned back in 1790 by President George Washington in his letter to the Jewish congregation of Newport, Rhode Island when he wrote:

May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants—while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid.

May the father of all mercies scatter light, and not darkness, upon our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in His own due time and way everlastingly happy.[1]

In this secular year 2019, we are no longer a displaced people.

But the memory of exile, of wandering, of forced migration, remains in our guts.

All of us who are Jewish, whether by birth or by conversion, share this history and this heritage of wandering and homelessness.

And so it is not surprising that Jewish voices have been prominent recently among those concerned with the plight of the displaced millions of today:  Those displaced millions who find themselves buffeted about by the traumas of war and famine and violence which lead them to follow the age-old path of “LEKH LEKHA” --- to go forth from their native lands and from their ancestral homes to a place they do not know. 

But there is much to be concerned about with respect to current U.S. policies around these issues.

Most recently, the Trump administration just last week reduced the annual ceiling for refugee admissions to a record low never before seen under either Democratic or Republican administrations.

At the end of the Obama administration, the cap was at 110,000. The Trump administration cut it to 45,000 for the 2018 fiscal year, and then to 30,000 for the current fiscal year. The new figure just announced for the 2020 fiscal year is just 18,000.[2]

HIAS President and CEO Mark Hetfield issued the following statement last week in response:

“With the stroke of a pen, President Trump plans to once again abdicate American leadership, by playing to fear rather than showing strength. Refugee resettlement saves lives. The U.S. commitment to refugee resettlement has a global effect, setting an example for the world, in a moment when international leadership is sorely needed. Refugee resettlement assures that at least some of those forced to flee their homes have a safe and legal pathway to refuge in the United States. This administration has once again brought our country to a new low, by pledging to resettle fewer refugees than any other administration in history.”

 “HIAS, the American Jewish community, and our local resettlement partners across the country have welcomed immigrants and refugees for well over a century, and we will continue to do so long after President Trump is out of office. We will help resettled refugees rebuild their lives, become contributing members of their communities, and walk along the pathway to citizenship. America is a courageous and generous country with a tradition of welcoming refugees. In spite of the administration's blows to HIAS and other faith-based partners welcoming refugees to the United States, we will survive and help refugees thrive.”

The HIAS press release quoting Hetfield’s statement concludes by noting: 

“Historically, the annual refugee admissions ceiling has averaged 95,000 per year. This year, according to the U.N Refugee Agency (UNHCR), there are nearly 26 million refugees worldwide, the highest number ever recorded. According to UNHCR, more than 1.4 million refugees cannot remain safely where they are and are in need of resettlement.”[3]

 *******************

The Trump administration’s main argument for its slashing of the refugee numbers is that they are doing this because we already have a huge backlog of asylum seekers on our southwestern border. Refugee advocates counterargue that the asylum situation at the southwestern border should not be an excuse for abandoning potential refugees from hot spots around the world. 

As the New York Times reports, “they point out that the backlog in the immigration courts is largely the result of cases where the asylum seekers’ requests need to be evaluated, [whereas,] most refugees who arrive in the United States have already been screened and vetted before they arrive.[4]

What about our Southwestern border?

The situation there reached crisis proportions earlier this year, with children separated from parents, and with many asylum seekers treated as common criminals and kept in harsh conditions where some children died.  The situation seems to have calmed down somewhat recently, in part because the Trump administration is now compelling asylum seekers to remain in Mexico, or El Salvador, Honduras or Guatemala while their claims are adjudicated.  But this has the potential to leave them in danger of being caught up by the violence that they are seeking to escape in the first place. 

At a deeper philosophical level, the distinction between migrants and asylum seekers remains problematic.  Isn’t extreme poverty and the risk of starvation just as oppressive as being targeted for one’s beliefs or opinions?  

Over the last couple of years, many Jewish folks have repurposed the summertime day of mourning, Tisha B’Av, which is when we mark the anniversary of the destruction of the First Temple in 586 B.C.E. and the Second Temple in 70 C.E., and a number of other tragic events, including the expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492.  Tisha B’Av gatherings on behalf of would-be asylum seekers took place all over the United States, including one that Danny Frank and I attended on August 10th along with approximately 150 other Jews and allies at the Sherburne County Jail in Elk River, Minnesota.  A number of would be asylum seekers are imprisoned there after having been apprehended by agents from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Division (“ICE”) of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Here in Duluth, an interfaith local advocacy group has been active in this issue in recent months.  The Twin Ports Interfaith Committee for Migrant Justice includes representatives from various local faith traditions.  Andrea Gelb from our congregation has been particularly active in this group. (More information can be found on their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Interfaith-Committee-for-Migrant-Justice-112495940104721/ )

The group sponsored a walk and vigil in downtown Duluth back in June in which I and a few other folks from our congregation participated.   Here is what I said at that gathering:

 The Torah in Exodus 12:38 reports that when the children of Israel left Egypt to journey to the Promised Land “a mixed multitude went up with them.”  It’s hard not to see a parallel between the mixed multitude who wanted to join up with the Israelites in the time of the Book of Exodus and the mixed multitude of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers who want to come to the United States in our own day and who seek a path towards citizenship. Once we get past the xenophobic tweets of those who would falsely brand them as rapists, terrorists and drug smugglers, we realize that most of those who yearn to come to our country are motivated by the same forces that brought so many of our own ancestors here: The search for a safer and better life. We in the Jewish community can identify with them because we too are immigrants or the descendants of immigrants.

***************

I must admit that, when it comes to talking from the bima about current political issues, I always feel much more ambivalent and unsure of myself than when I just stick to teaching about our Jewish literary heritage of Torah, Talmud, and rabbinic commentary through the ages.  I’m well aware that we as a community are not monolithic in our political leanings.  And I’m well aware that all of you can read newspapers and listen to podcasts and stream the internet just as well as I can --- even if nowadays it can be challenging to come to a balanced analysis of the issues amidst all the propaganda and partisanship. 

But the stakes are high.

“Unetaneh Tokef”, which we chanted earlier this morning, includes some dramatic warnings:

Who shall live and who shall die?

Who by fire and who by water?

Who shall have rest and who can never be still?

Who by famine and who by drought?

These questions are not just rhetorical for many who seek refuge within our borders.

You might recall that we talked about exactly these same questions on Rosh Hashanah morning one year ago.  Here’s how I ended my Rosh Hashanah morning sermon last year.  It bears repeating.  So I’ll just conclude with those same words I spoke last Rosh Hashanah, simply adding a “plus one” to the mention of the new  year:   

********************

As we gather today to mark the Jewish New Year, issues surrounding the plight of would-be migrants, refugees and asylum seekers continue to be fought over in a hyper-partisan way.  However, surely there exist legislative and administrative solutions that can address both humanitarian concerns as well as concerns for border security and the rule of law.  

Such issues have been with us from time immemorial.  Today’s Torah reading from the Book of Genesis spoke of the plight of Hagar and Ishmael as they wandered through the wilderness of Beer-Sheva, but of course all four of the remaining books of the Torah are filled with accounts of our ancestor’s wanderings through the wilderness of Sinai in search of a better life.  And, speaking of Genesis --- even its opening saga of Adam and Eve tells of their expulsion from Eden and the trials and tribulations that would follow. 

As we move into this new year 5780, may we be granted the wisdom and the perseverance to advocate for our nation to live up to its highest ideals in offering refuge to those in distress, and the chance for a better life to those who would seek to join our society. 

May we sort out the means for doing so in a spirit of mutual respect – leshem shamayim – for the sake of heaven.

And may all of us ---- friends, neighbors and the strangers at our gates, be inscribed in the Book of Life for a year of health, happiness, prosperity and peace.

Amen.

© Rabbi David Steinberg (September 2019/ Tishri 5780)

[1] https://www.tourosynagogue.org/history-learning/gw-letter

[2] https://kvoa.com/news/2019/09/20/pentagon-is-last-holdout-as-stephen-miller-tries-to-slash-number-of-refugees-allowed-in-u-s/

[3] https://www.hias.org/news/press-releases/hias-statement-proposed-fy20-refugee-admissions-18000

[4] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/26/us/politics/trump-refugees.html