How I fell in Love with Israel and Jerusalem - 8th day of Pesach

This past week (Passover) I fell in love….with Israel and Jerusalem. I have always loved Israel but now I am in love with Israel. It happened when I wasn’t even in Israel. All I did was read a book, Abraham Joshua Heschel’s “Israel: An Echo of Eternity.” I have read many books, articles and essays about Israel but I have never been touched in the way that this book touched me.

The book is really Heschel’s reflections on his trip to Israel in the summer of 67 just a few months after the 6 Day War. Allow me to quote one passage:

“Jerusalem, all our hearts are like harps, responsive when your name is mentioned. Jerusalem, our hearts went out to you whenever we prayed…For so many ages we have been lovesick…In our own days a miracle has occurred…What happened on June 7, 1967? G-d’s compassion has prevailed. So many devastations. Thousands of communities wiped out. Synagogues burned, people asphyxiated. No tombstones, no graves, all monuments meaningless.

In its solitude the Wall was forced into the role of an unreachable tombstone for the nameless dead. Suddenly the Wall, tired of tears and lamentations, became homesick for song. “O Come, let us sing to the Lord, let us chant in joy to the rock of our salvation!” (Psalm 95:1). It will be called the Rejoicing Wall.”

As I read this passage and so many others, I fell in love. Heschel tells us that when he arrived at the Kotel for the first time, he understood that the Bible was still Alive. That chapters were still being written.

All Pesach long as I would read these poetic passages and think of Jerusalem, I was confronted with a difficult question. Pesach has everything in it. The seder is so rich. But it is missing one important element. It is missing Israel and Jerusalem.

Sure, there are nods to Jerusalem (e.g., Next Year may we be in Jerusalem). But the seder primarily ignores its importance. To give but one example, consider the four cups. They represent the 4 articulations of redemption.

והוצאתי והצלתי וגאלתי ולקחתי

1.)   I will take out, 2.) I will save you, 3.) I will redeem you, 4.) and I will take you.

But any sensitive reader of the Torah knows that there is a really a 5^th verse which is left out. והבאתי – “I will bring you” to the land of Israel. Sure, some say that this is the Cup of Elijah and others had a custom to have a 5^th cup, but the primary custom left out the 5^th cup. It left Israel out of the seder. Why? How can we leave out Israel which was the goal of the Exodus in the first place?

So I heard an interesting answer to the question. We have to remember that the Passover Hagadah was largely put together in the Gaonic Period (8^th and 9^th century Babylon). It is a book produced in Exile so it has been suggested that it would have been too painful to focus too much on Israel. What kind of Passover celebration would it have been to focus on Israel when they were in Exile. So they left it out.

This answer might be sufficient on the psychological level but not on the theological level.

If we go back to the Covenant of the Parts, G-d promised Abraham that his children will be slaves but then they will go out and return to the Land of Israel. Slavery was just a prelude to Redemption and Entering the Land, so how can Jerusalem and Israel be left out of the Seder and Passover?

This morning (8^th day of pesach), my daughter came down for breakfast and I asked her if she wanted cream cheese on matzah. “Daddy,” she said, “I am sick of cream cheese and matzah.” How about macaroons? Not a chance! Are we not all feeling this way? Dayeinu, haven’t we had enough. What is the 8^th day all about anyways? We have already celebrated leaving Egypt, crossing the sea, what is left?

The answer is a beautiful image from our Haftorah. The beautiful Haftorah for the 8^th day of Pesach is also the Haftorah for Yom Ha’atzmaut. It opens with a messianic image. ויצא חטר מגזע ישי

What is “Geza Yishai”? The stump of Jesse. Jesse is of course King David’s father, representing the Davidic line and Judaic sovereignty. The problem is that it has been cut down. The jews are in Exile. What was once a thriving tree is now a stump. When I think about a tree stump, I always think of “The Giving Tree,” by Shel Silverstein. At the very end, when the boy (now an old man) comes back, the tree has nothing left to give except its stump to sit on. It says in the book that the boy was happy, but I am always sad. The last image is an old man on a tree stump. I look at that and see no future. The man will die and the tree has no hope. Right under the picture are the words, “The End.” This is what I feel. It is the End, no hope, no future.

But what does our Haftorah proclaim? A shoot or a branch will go out of that stump. A miracle. It is not the end. There will be life again. The Davidic kingdom will be restored, Jews will return to the land and a thriving tree will grow out of that stump. It is no wonder why they chose this reading for Yom Ha’atzmaut.

This also makes me think about the Haftorah for Shabbat of Chol Hamoed Sukkot. The Haftorah all about the Dry Bones of Ezekiel. G-d tells Ezekiel to prophecy to the bones. They begin to come together but then they say, “ישבו עצמותינו ואבדה תקותינו” (“Our bones have dried and our hope is lost”). G-d tells Ezekiel to tell them that G-d will open their graves and you will return to the Land and thrive again. The Bones were saying, “we have lost our hope,” and G-d said עוד לא אבדה תקותינו – The hope is still alive. We have not lost out hope (Hatikva).

This is the message of the 8^th day of Pesach. The message is that even though the joy of Pesach has been tempered somewhat for the last 2000 years of Exile, we have not lost hope. Even though the Gaonim might have left Israel out of the Seder and the 1^st days of Pesach, the 8^th day is about the possibility of the Messianic Era. It is about a branch shooting out from the stump. It is about Dry Bones living again. On Pesach we begin by going way back into the past but we conclude with hope for the future.  

This takes me back to Heschel and Jerusalem. Heschel has a beautiful line in the book where he says, “Jerusalem is the Past meeting the Present to encounter the future.” Jerusalem is the only place on Earth where I can be riding on the most modern light rail system, I look around and see people using their smart phones which have chips in them that were invented just kilometers from the train stop. I then get off the train and see modern, sleek hotels built with the most innovative architecture. And then I go in through the Jaffa Gate and I am in the Old City. I travel over cobble stone roads, I pass archeological digs, I see rocks and stones where Isaiah and the prophets shared the word of G-d and then I arrive at the Kotel near the spot where Abraham almost sacrificed Isaac. In a matter of moments, I have gone from the newest of the new to the oldest of the old and then back to the new again. Jerusalem is certainly the place where “Past meets present and present encounters the future.” This is the trajectory of Pesach as well. We begin from the beginning of our peoplehood. We were slaves to Pharoah. G-d took us out. But then at the end of Pesach, we look to the future. We look to the revival to what is new and renewed. The branch will come forth from the stump. On Pesach, the Past meets the present and the Present encounters the future.”

But I would like to take this one step further. This motto is not just a description of Jerusalem. It is not just a description of Pesach. It is what Judaism is all about.

“Judaism is our attempt to allow the Past to meet the present so that we can encounter our Future.” It is through our celebration of Pesach and our Love for Jerusalem that we join this redemptive process!

Talk at 5th annual Pre Pesach Seder Summit at Beth Sholom

Jewish Role Modeling at the Seder

There is a very funny piece from Jon Stewart called “Faith off.” In the piece he compares the Easter basket full of chocolate with the seder plate. “Which one will kids prefer, chocolate filled eggs or the bone of a dead baby lamb!” He reminds us that “the key, is the children” and he begs his “mishpacha” (the jews) to step up our game so that we can win this one!

Jon Stewart is correct. The “key is the children.” But we are probably never going to win with the food. There has to be something more meaningful that we give our children on seder night.

The “gift” is of course the primary mitzvah of the seder, “Tell it to your children.” Seder night is the most important night of the year because it is our chance to tell our children why Judaism is so important. Why did the Jews have to suffer in Egypt only to be set free? Why is this the foundational story of our people? If we see ourselves as having been enslaved, what would our obligations be in our everyday life every time we pull up to a red light and someone is asking for food? These are the kinds of conversations we should be having at the seder. We tell our children why Judaism is so important to us and why we are so committed. This is our gift to our children.

The problem is that we all know that words are cheap. We cannot tell our children "Do as I say and not as I do." In other words, the only way that the Hagadah (literally, telling or talking) will work is if the words are backed up by action. “We must be the people that we want our children to become.” In other words, we have to be good jewish role models.

What is so interesting is that there are studies that demonstrate that when you ask children who is their #1 role model, over 50% of them say a mom or a dad! Those who say someone else (rock star, athlete etc) will say that mom or dad is #2 or #3. In other words, our children (and young people in general) are looking to us to be role models.

Are we doing a good job? How does the seder (which is really all about talking and not doing) help us succeed as role models?

To illustrate the challenge, I recall a beautiful insight by Rabbi Yosef Blau regarding the story of  Joseph and Potiphar's wife. Potiphar's wife tried to seduce Joseph. The rabbis understand Jospeh's test as being more than sexual temptation. If Joseph succumbs, he will be giving up his Jewish identity and assimilating into Egypt. This is one of those “make it or break it” moments for Joseph. We know what happens. He runs away and passes the test. But the rabbis want to know, what gave Joseph the strength to run away from such a temptation? The rabbis say that at the last moment, Jospeh saw an image of his father. It popped into his mind and he realized who he was and what he to be and he ran away.

We all have to ask ourselves a difficult question. If our children are in a situation where they have a make it or break it decision about Judaism (and these decisions usually happen when children are not with parents), what will happen? Will an image of us pop into their minds? And if that image does pop into their minds will it help them make the correct decision?

This will only happen, if we role model our Judaism. If our kids know that we are not Jewish for them but because we genuinely love judaism.

There is a secret among rabbis that the only way you will get parents in 30's - 50s' to come to shul programming is if you do something for the kids then the parents come. This is important but we will only transmit to the children if they know we love it.

This takes us back to the seder. Where is the role modeling?

I think it can be found in the opening paragraph of Magid.

"This is the bread of affliction….all who are hungry come and eat…"

Two questions:

1.) What kind of an invitation is this? We invite people over to eat poor person's bread (Matzah). This is what slaves eat, why would we serve it to our guests?

2.) Isn't it a little late for the invitation? We are already at the seder. The brisket is in the oven and the guests (if there are any) are here. Who is going to come now?

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks shares the powerful story of Primo Levi. The most difficult 11 days in Auschwitz were the 11 days after the Nazis ran away but before the Russians came. It was awful when the Nazis were there but at least they fed them (as meager portions as they were). However after the Nazis left, they were literally starving.

One day, there was a commotion out in the fields so Primo Levi goes out to see what is happening. It turns out that some people have found some potatoes. Then Primo saw something amazing. The people were sharing their potatoes with others. Primo said that it was at that moment that he knew they were free. People who are enslaved do not share. whatever they get they hoard. If they are sharing that means they have hope and they are truly free. So sharing means taking the meager potatoes or Matzah (poor persons bread) and sharing it with others.

So when we begin the seder with the invitation, we are really turning to our family and saying, look what we have done. We have invited guests. We have given Maot Chittin (charity so that people who are poor can also have a seder). We are sharing whatever we have because this is what it means to be free, to have faith and to have hope.

So the role modeling that we do at the seder must come before the seder. It is about sharing what we have. Only then will the lesson of "we were slaves but now we are free" have any impact. We know (in the collective jewish conscious what it means to be hungry so we say (and have hopefully already said), "all who are hungry come and eat." These aren't just words, It is the reason we exist.

I encourage everyone to tell their families about the mitzvoth they performed tonight. Whether it was bringing suits for people who cannot afford one for a job interview, whether it was contributing job offering to our job bank or contributing money for maot chittin so that other local families can enjoy a seder. I encourage people to explain to their children why these mitzvoth directly emerge from the lessons of the seder. I encouraged the dads to not only tell their children but to be living role models of what is important in life.

May we all enjoy a meaningful Passover 5775!

"So I won't cook a kid in its mother's milk, but a cheeseburger sure sounds good" - Parshat Mishpatim 2015

I would like to open with a joke. But it is one of those jokes that is hard to deliver so if I mess-up, please laugh anyways…!

Here is a little background to the joke (you can already see that it is a hard joke because I have to give background!). The Torah tells us three times לא תבשל גדי בחלב אמו - “Don’t cook a kid (the baby goat kind!) in its mother’s milk.” The rabbis derive more and more restrictions from each repetition of the command until they get to all of our current restrictions against mixing milk and meat.

So here is the joke. G-d calls Moshe into His office and says “Moshe, I have a new law that I want you to tell the people, “Don’t cook a kid in its mother’s milk.” So Moshe says, “I get it. When you say “kid” you dont really just mean a baby goat you  mean all animals. And when you say “mother” you dont really just mean its mother, but any mother and really all dairy.” So G-d says back, “Moshe, I will tell you a second time, ‘Don’t cook a Kid in its Mother’s milk.” Moshe says, “Oh, I get it. When you say ‘don’t cook’, you really mean don’t cook, don’t eat and just for safe measure we should wait 6 hours between milk and meat.” Now G-d starting to get upset says, “Moshe, let me say a third and final time, ‘don’t cook a kid in its mother’s milk.” To which Moshe says, “Ok I get it now. You don’t want us to cook any animal with any dairy, you want us to wait between milk and meat and you also want us to have separate dishes and maybe even a separate dishwasher.”

At this point, G-d’s looks at Moshe in frustration, and says “Ok Moshe, you win. Have it your way!”

So that is the joke. But I think it is really more than a joke. At a certain level, it is a challenge to the entire corpus of Rabbinic Judaism. How do the rabbis get from one little verse (even if mentioned three times) all of the laws of Meat and Milk. I spent 6 months in yeshiva studying the details of all of the possible laws of meat and milk and how they are derived from one little verse.

To ask the question a different way, I always think about the 20 year old Jewish college student who is starting to rebel. He asks his parents, “why do I have to keep kosher? Even if I accept the Torah, so I won’t literally cook a kid in its mother’s milk, but I still want a cheeseburger”! How do we answer that rebellious 20 year old? What is so bad about mixing meat and milk and why are there so many extensions to the law?

So there are basically three answers to the question, 1.) the talmud, 2.) Maimonides and 3.) Rav Kook. The Talmud’s approach to “why is meat and milk so bad” is to basically to ignore the question. I dont think that in the entire Talmud or rabbinic literature you will find an answer to this question. It reminds me of my yeshiva days when after studying all of the details of a certain area of law someone would finally ask the “why” question. “Why do we do this?” The answer would often be in Yiddish (I will try not to butcher this!), “freg nisht far vos, uber vus” - “Don’t ask “why” only “what”. In other words, we should only be concerned with “what” and “how” to act not “why we do what we do”. This is certainly an approach but it probably will not work on your 20 year old questioning young adult.

So we turn to Maimonides (12th century). Maimonides, in explaining the prohibition against meat and milk, tells us that “in my opinion not improbable that .... idolatry had something to do with it. Perhaps such food was eaten at one of the ceremonies of their cult or at their festivals.” (Guide for the Perplexed 3:48).

Maimonides idea might be interesting from an historical perspective and Abarbanel even tells us that in his time (15th century Spain) there were still Pagans who ate meat and milk as part of pagan worship. But I ask you, will this work on your 20 year old? Try telling him not to eat a cheeseburger because thousands of years ago people mixed meat and milk in pagan worship. I dont think it will work.

There is one other idea that Maimonides mentions. He says that in addition to the idolatrous overtones of meat and milk, “it is undoubtedly very gross food.”

I object to this reason! I am going to make an admission right here in front of the Holy Ark! I crave cheeseburgers! I have never had one but I crave them! Let me tell you a story. A few years ago, a young woman came to convert. She was totally observant. She kept shabbat, Kashruth and she even went to the Mikvah every month. I asked her, “why do you need to convert, you are 100% jewish.” She told me that she was doing genealogical research and she discovered that her great grandmother was not Jewish. She had simply married her great grandfather and nobody asked any questions. She lived like a jew and everyone thought she was Jewish. This means that the young woman’s grandmother and mother were not jewish and she was not jewish. I, of course, converted her with two other rabbis.

However, the experience made me ask a question. What would happen if I did genealogical research and I discovered that I was not halakhically Jewish. Would I convert? G-d would have no expectations that I convert. I could keep the 7 Noahide laws, be a good person and not be jewish. After thinking about the question (a lot!), I decided that I would convert. After all, I love judaism. I love torah, my family and everything else. I also need to be jewish for my job!  But even though I would convert, I would give myself 24 hours! And during those 24 hours I would have every cheeseburger imaginable and oysters, shrimp, bacon and everything else. Then I would convert!

So Maimonides idea that cheeseburgers are gross wouldn’t work on me and I am sure it will not work on our theoretical 20 year old.

So I now turn to an idea from Rav Kook (1st Chief Rabbi of Mandate Palestine in the early 20th century). Rav Kook is really expanding on a statement from Nachmanides (13th century Spain). Rav Kook (in On Vegetarianism and Peace) opens with what should be an obvious statement about (cow’s or goat’s) milk that I never thought of before.

יסוד מציאות החלב בשדי האם החיה לא למען יוכל הוא בחזקתו לעשוק אותו לעצמו, כ"א למען תוכל להניק את ילדה הרך

“The purpose of the milk... is not for Humans with strength to take it (or exploit it) for ourselves, rather for the mother to nurse her child.”

In Rav Kook’s thought, everything has a purpose, even milk, and it is not for us but for the baby animal. This idea would almost push us more to veganism but I digress. So he continues…

הגדי הרך לא יעמוד לפי ערך מוסרו השפל להתרפק גם הוא על אהבת אמו ולשמח גם הוא בזיו החיים, כ"א ישחט ויהיה לאכלה לקבת האדם הזוללה לנפשו הנשפלת האומרת "אוכלה בשר".

“The goat is not going to live to its potential (my loose translation) but will rather be slaughtered and be food for man’s lowly stomach which says ‘Give me meat!’”

You can hear Rav Kook making fun of meat consumption. Rav kook now says, “what will be with the leftover milk, now that you have slaughtered the intended drinker of that milk? You will cook the kid in the mother’s milk. You will take the very substance which was supposed to nurture this animal and you will cook it in that substance. To this, the Torah and the voice of G-d screams out “Don’t cook a kid in its mother’s milk.” Nachmanides says that it would be cruel to do this.

Very powerful. But why do we have to expand it to not cooking any meat with any milk, separate dishes and the entire corpus of laws of meat and milk which really govern every day of our lives? The answer is because if we only refrained from cooking a kid in its mother’s milk, we would never think about it. But the expanded version of the halakha turns an abstract value into a real spiritual daily practice. It takes the lofty ideas of Parshat Yitro (the thunder and lightning, the 10 commandments, the revelation at Sinai) and makes them real and particular and something we encounter all of the time.  This is what all of Halakha is about. Take the laws of kosher. Why do we eat? In Judaism, we eat in order to have strength to serve G-d to be better parents and friends. We eat so that we can be grateful for the wonderful tastes and smells. The laws of Kashruth, the laws of blessings are all designed to make this value real and practical in our daily lives. Think about shabbat. We can talk about the value of rest on shabbat. But if we don’t make it real with the 39 melachot (categories of work) and all of the details, it will just be an idea. Halakaha makes it real. It allows us to take the ordinary moments and make them holy. So if we separate our meat and milk dishes and wait 6 hours but it is just a burden then it won’t really make us better. But if every time we have a halakhic question about kosher, we think of Rav Kook; If when we go to a business lunch and we order the salad (and don’t even eat the onions - a different discussion!) and we think about the little goat and what it means to eat in a selfish way versus a spiritual way, then we are elevating our daily lives. This is the whole point of Jewish practice.

So I am not ashamed to say that I crave cheeseburgers (and shrimp and bacon!). And if I found out that I was not Jewish, I would probably give myself 24 hours! But then I would go back to all of the rules.

i hope that I will remember and I hope that we can all remember that when we follow these rules they are meant to elevate and enhance our lives. I dont know if even Rav kook’s approach will satisfy the 20 year old. But I know that it could enhance our own practice and if our 20 year olds see us practicing these laws with more meaning; If they see that following Torah makes us more sensitive and better people then they will consider making it part of their own lives as well.

Shabbat Shalom!

The Har Nof Kedoshim; A Spiritual Response - Drasha Parshat Toldot 5775

The Har Nof Kedoshim; A Spiritual Response

Every morning as soon as I wake up, I check the news. It is a bad habit which started this past summer when Israel was at war. Even before I go to shul, I always check to see if anything happened in Israel.

This past Tuesday, when I woke up I read the awful news. Two Arab terrorists entered a shul in Har Nof, Jerusalem with guns, knives and meat cleavers and murdered 4 rabbis.

All terrorism is awful but there was something about the image of these 4 rabbis in the middle of shmoneh esreh (silent prayer) wearing tallis and tefilin that just makes this unbearable.

All Tuesday, I was numb trying to think of what we can do here in Potomac. Someone posted a link to the audio lectures of Rabbi Moshe Twersky (one of the victims and a teacher at Yeshivas Toras Moshe). I decided to have a special class at Beth Sholom on Tuesday night where I would teach over some of Rav Moshe’s torah. I spent about 4 hours on Tuesday just listening to Rav Moshe’s audio lectures just hours after he was murdered. That night over 60 of you came to learn Rav Moshe’s torah on Eretz Yisrael and Kiddush Hashem (the mitzvah of martyrdom). We read the biographies of those who were murdered (including 30 year old Zidan Sayif, the 30 year old Israeli Druze police officer who heroically saved many on that morning and then succumbed to his wounds on Tuesday afternoon). Finally, we recited the Kel Maleh memorial prayer in memory of the victims.

On Wednesday morning, Rabbi Linzer (Rosh Hayeshiva of my rabbinical school, YCT) and Rabbi Lopatin (president of YCT) were in Israel and went to the Twersky shiva home. Rabbi Linzer told Rav Moshe’s children about how we studied his fathers lectures here in Potomac and apparently the fact that their father’s Torah was being taught brought them a sense of comfort. When Rabbi Linzer and Rabbi Lopatin shared this with Rabbi Moshe’s mother, Atara, she said that “she never thought her son would experience his own shiur (lecture) [on Kiddush Hashem] by dying al kiddush Hashem.”

I was very moved that our little act of learning here in Potomac brought nechama (comfort)  to the family of the one of the Kedoshim.

But I have been thinking a lot about the term Kedoshim (martyrs) and its application to the 4 men who were murdered in Har Nof. According to Halacha (Jewish Law), dying al kiddush Hashem has a very specific meaning. A classic example would be the first crusade in 1096 when Jews were given a choice by the crusaders to either convert to Christianity and live or to die as a Jew. Kedoshim (martyrs) were those people who chose to die as Jews rather than live as Christians. This was also true when the Almohads (a fanatical muslim sect) in North Africa in the 12th century gave Jews a choice; either proclaim the Shahada (The only G-d is Allah and Muhammad is his prophet) or die and many Jews (the Kedoshim) preferred to die as Jews than proclaim the Shahada. However, in Har Nof, the victims were never given a choice. They were murdered in the middle of prayer. Are they to be referred to as Kedoshim (Martyrs)?

It turns out that there is actually a lot of research on this subject. The very concept of dying al kiddush hashem has gone through somewhat of a transformation. While it originally referred to someone who was killed making a choice to be a Jew instead of converting out, over time (especially during the Holocaust) it came to also refer to people who were killed because they were Jews even if they were given no choice.

Let me give two examples from the Holocaust. The first comes from Rav Ahrele Rubin, rabbi of Dinovitz. When his community was being taken out by the Nazis to be murdered, he put on his Kitel and told them the following:

אחים יקרים, אנו עוברים עתה אל מלכות שמים...לכו בשמחה לקראת גורלכם. אשריכם, אשרינו, שזכינו למות כיהודים, מוות כזה נחשב כמוות על קידוש השם, כי כל פשעינו בכך שאנו יהודים.

“My precious brothers. We are now about to enter the Kingdom of Heaven….Go in joy to meet your fate. You are praised, we are praised, that we have merited to die as Jews. This death is considered a death consecrating G-d’s name (al kiddush hashem). For our only ‘sin’ is that we are Jews.”

In other words, Rav Ahrele tells his community that when one is murdered because he or she is Jewish, they are dying al kiddush hashem.

One more source from the Shoah. Rabbi Elchanan Wasserman was one of the most respected rabbis in pre-war Europe. He was the Rosh Hayeshiva of the yeshiva in Baranovich. During the war he ran away and eventually found himself in the Kovno Ghetto. In June 1941, Rabbi Wasserman and 11 other rabbis were arrested. When they were taken out to be slaughtered, Rabbi Wasserman encouraged the other rabbis with the following words:

עלינו לזכור, שבאמת נהיה מקדשי השם. נלך בראש זקוף...אנו מקיימים עתה את המצווה הגדולה של קידוש השם. האש תשרוף את גופנו וזה יתקן מחדש את עם ישראל.

“We must remember that we are sanctifying G-d name. We should go out with our heads held high….We are now performing the great mitzvah of Kiddush Hashem (sanctifying G-d’s name through martryrdom). The fire that will burn our bodies will renew the Jewish People.”

And then Rabbi Wasserman instructed his colleagues to make a blessing, Blessed are you Hashem who commanded us “to sanctify his name in public” (לקדש שמו ברבים).

During the holocaust, a new definition of martyrdom crystallizes. Martyrdom is not only dying in order to practice Judaism, it is also when when one dies because one is Jewish. These people are also Kedoshim. And certainly the Har Nof Kedoshim who were killed while davening and wearing tallis and tefilin are Kedoshim.

But this left me with a major halakhic dillemma for today. Today is shabbat mevorchim chodesh Kislev. We blessed the new month of Kislev which begins on Sunday. There is one prayer that we don’t say on shabbatot when we bless the new moon. The prayer of “Av Harachamim.” Let me explain.

Av Harachamim was composed after the crusades of 1096 when Christian Crusaders butchered thousands of Jews in Northern France and Germany. The prayer asks G-d to remember the pious and upright who gave up their life “al Kiddush Hashem,” sanctifying G-d’s name (שמסרו נפשם על קדוש השם).

We say this rather emotional and tear jerking prayer every shabbat except for weeks when we bless the new moon (as the sadness of the prayer is considered to conflict with the joy of the new moon). However, since we are jews, we have exceptions to our exceptions! The exception to the exception is that even though we normally do not say “Av Harachamim” on shabbat when we bless the new moon, we do say it on those shabbatot during the Omer period (between Pesach and Shavuoth). The reason for this exception to the exception is because it was during the omer period when the crusades happened.

My halakhic dilemma (which was raised on a number of rabbinic listserves) was should we say Av Harachamim this shabbat or not? On the one hand, this week is shabbat of blessing the new moon, so maybe we should not say it. On the other hand, the words “who gave their souls sanctifying G-d’s name) just seemed so appropriate for this shabbat so maybe we should say it just as we say it during the Omer Period?
I went back and forth on this question every day. To say or not to say until I finally made my decision based on the following chilling story told by Rabbi Riskin.

Rabbi and Rebbetzin Schwartz lived on the upper west side of Manhattan. They had lost their parents and grandparents in the Holocaust. They now had two sons and in 1964, they made Aliyah. In 1967, during the 6 day war, their older son was killed. How sad. They had lost their entire family in the shoah and now they lost their older son. At the end of the Yom Kippur War (in 1973), Rabbi Riskin travelled to Israel. Upon landing, he read in the Jerusalem Post that the Schwartz family’s younger son was killed in the Yom Kippur war. Now they had lost their entire family during the Holocaust, their older son during the 6 day war and their younger son during the Yom Kippur War.

Rabbi Riskin rushed to their house for a shiva visit. When he arrived he sat for about a half an hour without saying anything and then he had to get up to leave (he was leading a mission to Israel). On his way out, he said the traditional words of comfort, HaMakom Yenachem Etchem Betoch Sha’ar Aveilei Zion Ve’yerushalayim - May G-d comfort you among the mourners of zion and Jerusalem. As he was leaving, Rabbi Schwartz asked, “Are you Rabbi Riskin”? Rabbi Riskin said, Yes. “I have a question for you, Rabbi Riskin. Why is it that when we offer we comfort, we say Hamakom Yenachem? There are many names for G-d. Hashem, Elokim, Harachaman. Many other names would have been more appropriate. Why the name “Hamakom” which literally means “the place”? Rabbi Schwartz then answered his own question. “When my parents and grandparents were murdered in the Holocaust, it was pointless. It was senseless. I have never felt any nechama (consolation) from it. However, the death of my two boys even though it is so awful, I have a little nechama. Hamakom Yenachem Oti. The place comforts me. Which place? This place, Yerushalayim, Eretz Yisrael and Medinat Yisrael. My boys died fighting for this place which will provide a better future for the Jewish People and this place comforts me.”

I think we can say something similar about the Har Nof Massacre. These Kedoshim were spiritually protecting Hamakom, the place when they died. The Druze policeman was physically protecting Medinat Yisrael when he died and Hamakom Yenachem Otanu. The place, Har Nof, Yerushalayim, Eretz Yisrael, Medinat Yisrael will offer us comfort.

In that same “place,” the very next day where the morning before was tragedy, hundreds of Israelis packed the shul in Har Nof wearing Tallis and Tefilin and davened with so much Kavannah. In that “place” in Israel in the Druze village, the next day Zidan was laid to rest in a coffin draped in the Israeli Flag with Druze and Jews offering Eulogies and comforting each other. We have the place and the place comforts us.

I therefore decided that we would not say, “Av Harachamim.” Because our situation is very different from 1096 and from the Almohad persecutions in the 12th century. It is different from the Spanish Inquisition and from the Holocaust. Because in all of those situations, we had no place. Av Harachamim was really a prayer of desperation. We could not protect ourselves so we asked G-d to take revenge. But in this case, the terrorists were actually killed by a Jewish/Israeli police force protecting ourselves. This was unimaginable in 1096 or 1941. And now, the Israeli Government, Military and Shin Bet will decide what to do to protect the residents of Jerusalem and Israel. Some of us might not agree with every decision but we must be grateful for the fact that our protection is in our hands (of course with G-d’s help). How unimaginable this would have been in 1096 or 1941. And I therefore decided that we should not say Av Harachamim. Hamakom Yenachem Otanu. The place (Yerushalayim, Har Nof, Israel) will certainly comfort us.

I would like to conclude with the letter written by the 4 wives of the Har Nof Kedoshim. It is signed by Chaya Levine, Bryna Goldberg, Yaakovah Kupinsky, and Bashy Twersky.

A plea from the bereft widows and families

From the depths of our broken hearts melted with tears over the spilled blood of the kedoshim, the holy heads of our families – may Hashem avenge their blood:

We turn to our brethren, the entire Jewish nation in every place they are found, to unite and elicit the mercy of heaven upon us by accepting upon ourselves to increase love and brotherhood, from friend to friend, from congregation to congregation, and from community to community.

We request that every individual endeavor to accept upon themselves on Friday, the eve of Parshas Toldos, that the day of Shabbos (the eve of Rosh Chodesh Kislev) be sanctified as a day of unconditional love of our fellow Jew; a day on which we refrain from divisive speech, lashon hara and slander.

This will serve as a great elevation for the souls of the fathers of our families who were murdered in the name of G-d.

May Hashem peer down from Heaven, note our trials and tribulations, wipe away our tears and proclaim, “Enough!” to our suffering. May we merit to witness the arrival of Mashiach speedily, in our days, Amen!

Thank You - I would like to thank Rabbi Barry Gelman for many insights that helped in writing this drasha.

Why does G-d Test Us? Sermon Parshat Vayera 2014

I would like to open with a scene from a movie that I cannot get out of my mind. I don't remember the movie or the actor. The main actor is retiring from his firm after many years of hard work. There is a beautiful retirement party where wonderful speeches are delivered about how valuable the retiree was to the firm. The retiree has also spent a lot of time with his successor giving over all of his files so that his successor will know what to do in different situations that can come up. The next morning the retiree wakes up and realizes that he forgot something at his office. He gets in his car, drives to the office, drives around the back to the parking lot. When he passes the garbage dump, he sees all of his files put out in the garbage.
So sad on so many levels.
One of the reasons that this scene is so sad is because we desperately want to believe that we are unique, special and even irreplaceable. Yet at the end of a long career, the retiree realized that he was completely replaceable. A new person would come in with his own ideas and after a few weeks, the old guy would be forgotten. From time to time, I go back to that scene and it saddens me. If you think about almost every aspect of our lives, we are so replaceable. Even if we work hard on something and do a good job, the reality is that many others could do the same if we were not there. So sad….
But this week, I discovered a beautiful insight from our parshah that I think offers a much more positive perspective.
Let us begin with some questions. We have been learning all about Avraham's life the last two weeks. If you were asked to sum up Avraham's life in one sentence, what would you say? Well the mishna in Avot says this:

עשרה נסיונות נתנסה אברהם ועמד בכלם להודיע חבתו של אברהם אבינו…

Avraham was tested 10 times and he withstood every test to demonstrate his love for G-d. 

The mishna summarizes Avraham's life by basically saying that he was a test-passer. Two questions. First, is this the greatest thing we can say about Avraham? What about all of his chesed? What about הנפש אשר עשו בחרן. Avraham was the first to discover monotheism and then he spread it to so many others. What about the fact that according to the midrash, Avraham and Sarah kept the entire Torah even before it was given. We have a hard enough time keeping it now that we have the text, yet Avraham and Sarah kept all of the torah before it existed in this world. Not bad! 

Yet, when we summarize Avraham's life, we talk about the tests and trials. Why?

Question #2 is a theological or philosophical one. Why does G-d test us? When you think about most tests, there are two parties; the tester and the testee. The tester (say, a teacher) tests his or her students to find out if they know the material. If you take a driving test, the tester (the state) tests the driver to find out if he or she has the knowledge and skill to not kill anyone with the car. But why then would G-d ever have to test Avraham or anyone. Didn't G-d know before the trial of the Binding of Isaac that Avraham would do it. Why all the drama if G-d knew in advance. Why does G-d have to test us. Doesn't G-d know whether or not we will pass the test?

So we have two questions on the table. #1 - Why are tests so important? #2 - Why would an all knowing G-d have to test?

Well the Ramban (Nachmanides) is bothered by the second question. He therefore claims that הנסיון מצד המנוסה- Tests (at least divine tests) are for the Testee and not for the tester….להוציא הכח אל הפועל - to actualize our potential. In other words, G-d tests us not to to find out if we will do the right thing. G-d already knows. G-d tests us so that we can take all of our latent potential that we worked hard at by performing mitzvoth and good deeds and through the test, the difficult situation, we actualize our latent potential and become even better and stronger people. 

This is a very powerful idea but I want to take it even deeper by sharing a teaching of the Meor Eynayim, Reb Nochum of Chernobyl (18th century Chassidic Master). 

Every once in a while, I will read a text (often a chassidic text) and it will hit in such a deep way that it forces me to rethink everything I do. This text was one of those. Listen closely (with an open heart).

כל יהודי יש לו שליחות מלמעלה שלמענה ירד לעולם…

"Every Jew (I would say every person) has a unique special mission that for it, he or she descended to this world"

Let me pause here. You ever ask yourself, "why am I here?" Why was I created? The answer (according to Reb Nochum of Chernobyl) is that I was created to complete my special mission which nobody else can do. It is completely unique to me. 

There is only one problem. I don't know what my mission is. We are not born with a little instructions book telling us what our mission is. So how do we know what our mission is?

Reb Nochum of Chernobyl continues. 

וכל יהודי יש לו עשרה נסיונות כפי ערך שלו

We all have 10 tests throughout our lives just like Avraham. We all have our Lech Lecha moment when we have to pick up and go, we all have our moment of arriving at that place where we promised that it would be better and then what happens, ויהי רעב בארץ - there was a famine and they had to go down to Egypt. Instead of getting better, it got worse. 

We all have our Hagars and Yishmaels with family struggles and tests and trials. And just like Sarah was barren, we all have difficult tests around health and medical issues. And finally, we all have our Akedah. We all have something (or somethings) in life that are so valuable and then we realize that for our spiritual/emotional/family growth and wellbeing, we must sacrifice that thing. 

We all have 10 tests throughout our life. And Reb Nochum tells us that while it is true that we are never explicitly told what our mission is but to the extent that we withstand those tests, to the extent that we muster all of our strength and find people and community that can help us pass our tests, to that extent we will fulfill our mission. And that mission is something which is completely unique to us. Nobody else could accomplish it. This is why when the mishna summarizes Avraham's life in one sentence, it tells us that he passed those tests. Because all of the other things were wonderful but the way that he fulfilled his unique divine mission was by stepping up to the very challenging tests. 

So I return to the scene from the movie. Our retiree realized that he was completely replaceable. So sad. 

But we must remember that even though it is true that professionally, socially and in almost every area of life we are replaceable, there is one area that we are unique and completely irreplaceable. That is our spiritual mission for which we descended to this world. Only we can accomplish it. Only we can fulfill that mission and we do it through realizing those 10 moments in life and stepping up to the challenge. 

Let me conclude with a story. Rabbi Mendel Futerfas was a chabad chasid from Russia. During the soviet regime, he continued to teach torah to children. He was caught and sent to the Siberian Gulag for  14 years. Even though it was freezing and the work was back-breaking, Mendel always walked around with a smile on his face. Mendel had a fellow inmate, a non-jew, who had been a prominent banker before his arrest. One day, the banker asked Mendel, "How can you walk around this awful place with a smile. it is so dreadful here."

Mendel said the following to the banker. "I understand why you are so depressed. Your identity had been completely crushed. Before you came, you were a prominent banker. You loved your work, your wealth and the prestige. Now that you are here, you are an inmate in the Gulag. Your identity has been shattered. But for me, I have the same identity here as I had before my arrest. Before my arrest I was a teacher of Torah and now, perhaps to a different audience, I try to teach Torah. Before my arrest I tried to spread the love of G-d and now I do the same. Before my arrest, I tried to fulfill my divine mission by stepping up to my challenges and now I do the same. So even though it is freezing, the work is so hard and I miss my family, I still walk around with a smile. I am fulfilling my unique mission which only I can fulfill in this world."

We all have a divine mission. That mission is unique to us. Nobody else can do it. I am spiritually irreplaceable and completely indispensable. Lets learn the lesson from Avraham and Sarah. Lets grab those moments and with everything we have step up to our challenges in life. 

Shabbat Shalom. 

Parshat Noach and the Sins Committed at the DC Mikveh

This past week, the Greater Washington community has been dealing with the outcome of a terrible crime that was committed in Georgetown. Rabbi Barry Freundel, the rabbi of the synagogue, (allegedly) committed awful acts of electronic voyeurism in the mikveh. The initial evidence is damning and is becoming worse every day. Many members of our shul previously were congregants of the accused and have been greatly impacted by the events. I have been struggling with how to respond and I think that this week’s parshah, Parshat Noach, can help us at least begin to discuss this topic.  

Upon leaving the Ark, G-d utters one of the most dramatic and surprising commandments in all of the Torah:

פרו ורבו ומלאו את הארץ

procreate and multiply and fill the Earth.

Why is this so dramatic? Isn't this pretty standard fare for the Bible? Well the truth of the matter is that this is not the first time we hear this command. When did we hear it first? Back with Adam and Eve.

On the 6th day after creation the Posuk says

וירא אלקים את כל אשר עשה והנה טוב מאד

“G-d saw everything he had made and it was very good.” The plants, the animals, the rivers, mountains, and valley; everything was beautiful. Now Adam and Eve were asked to procreate. To go out and do good, to create and to achieve. “Everything was good.”

But in between the two commands to procreate, much negativity takes place. First, Adam and Eve sin with the Tree of Knowledge. Then we have the first murder as Cain kills his brother Abel. Things go from bad to worse until G-d decides to bring the flood and destroy the world.

Well what was the terrible sin that finally convinced G-d to destroy the world?

The Torah at the end of last week’s parshah tells us the sin.

ויראו בני אלהים את בנות האדם כי טבת הנה. ויקחו להם נשים מכל אשר בחרו.

The sons of Elohim (we will translate this word in a second) saw the daughters of people that they were good (or beautiful). They (the sons of Elohim) took whichever women they wanted.

Who were the sons of Elohim. Rashi says that Elohim means judges and princes, meaning the powerful men. In other words, men who were in position of power abused their power and authority and took advantage of women who were vulnerable. Ibn Ezra says that these were people who upheld the “Mishpat Elohim” or divine law. The judges or those who upheld divine law, the Dayyanim and members of the Bet din were the abusers. They took women who they chose without consent. Nachmanides makes it even more damning.

הדיינים, אשר להם לעשות המשפט, בניהם עושים החמס בגלוי ואין מונע אתם.

The judges, those who we turn to for justice, those who we trusted, they and their children committed acts of violence and theft in the open and those who should have stopped it and did not (loose translation).

And how does G-d respond. G-d says

אמחה את האדם אשר בראתי

I am going to destroy humanity which I have created.

I recently saw  the Darren Aronofsky movie “Noah.” One of the themes of the movie was that G-d’s original plan (at least as Noah understood it) was to destroy all of humanity forever. Noah and his family were supposed to save the animals. After the flood, the animals would survive but Noah and his family would die. The world would revert to the 6th day of creation before Adam and Eve. It would be a world of plants and animals and rivers, lakes, mountains, valleys. A pristine and pure world without humans to mess it up. There is a actually a midrash that somewhat supports this reading. The midrash juxtaposes אמחה את האדם….ונח - “I will destroy humanity and Noah with it…”

But then what happens. At some point during the flood, G-d remembers Noach and the Brit (covenant). G-d remembers why he created the world to begin with. G-d remembers all of the potential for good. I dont think G-d will ever say again that “he saw everything that he created and it was very good.” It is simply not true. There is murder, sexual abuse, theft, crime. There are people who are in power who take advantage of the vulnerable. But even if not everything is good, there is still so much good and so much potential.

And this leads me to the verse that I opened with. After the flood, G-d’s first command to Noah is the same as he commanded Adam and Eve. Procreate, Multiply achieve wonderful things in this world. Not because everything is good. There will still be bad. In fact, the verse preceding the command to procreate discusses the laws of murder. But still go out and fill the world. We must learn from our mistakes, we must change and then we must continue as before.

The crimes that we have been learned about in the last 10 days have completely sullied some of the most beautiful aspects of judaism. The Mikveh, the conversion process, trust in leadership and rabbis who have taught amazing Torah.

Our job is now threefold. 

First we must do everything we can to support the victims. Of course the primary concern is for those who directly were the victims of voyeurism and then we must also support all users of the mikveh and all converts and congregants of the accused.

Second, we must make change. I have heard it said that we as rabbis have to do more to protect the female converts. This is not the correct approach. We dont need more men protecting women. We need women to be empowered in our community. We need to give the Keys of the Mikveh to the women (see here). We need to do a better job at regulating the rabbinate - I say this as a pulpit rabbi (see here). We also must figure out a way to greatly expand women’s spiritual leadership in our schools and shuls. In fact, I should not be the one giving this speech. We should have a professional female spiritual leader at Beth Sholom who should be offering her reflections on the past 10 days and how we should move forward. There are many wonderful programs that train orthodox women to be spiritual leaders ranging from Yeshivat Maharat to Rabbi Riskin’s program in Israel, the Yoatzot Halacha, Stern/YU GPATS. While Beth Sholom had a Maharat Intern last year, this is not enough. We must look to the above programs to find strong female spiritual leadership at Beth Sholom. And finally, we must do a better job following the laws of Yichud (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yichud). Male rabbis (and really all males) should not be meeting women alone at night in the shul office or other private places. This will protect the women and the rabbis. It is amazing that if we only followed our ancient traditional laws, many of our problems would be averted. One challenge of the laws of Yichud, especially as applied to rabbis and congregants, is that female congregants might not have as much access to their rabbis for pastoral and spiritual counseling. To remedy this, see my comment above about the necessity to have female spiritual leadership in shuls.

Third - After we have supported the victims and after we have made the necessary changes that allowed this to happen in the first place, we must remember the first command after the flood. We must continue building and strengthening our Jewish community and Mitzva Observance. We must learn to trust (with necessary safeguards) again our spiritual leadership (male and female) and we have to reclaim all that is good in Orthodoxy, Mitzvoth and Judaism. We will do this not because there is no bad but because there is so much good.

May Hashem give strength to the victims and may we all have the courage to learn from our mistakes and create a better future for all of us.