Hametz and the Everyday Struggle

“You shall not eat anything leavened for seven days…”

Deuteronomy 16:3

Very soon, we will begin the ritual search for hametz, leavened bread, that takes place the night before the Seder. My Zeide, of blessed memory, loved to find difficult places to hide ten pieces of bread wrapped in foil all around his house, and we walked around with candles and hot wax dripping on our hands trying to find them. I am now the hider, but my memory often fails me so I have to write down where I hide them. The next day, we burn the hametz we find and recite an ancient “cleansing” formula: “All hametz in my possession, whether I have seen it or not, whether I have removed it or not, shall be nullified and ownerless as the dust of the earth.” We may not be able to extricate all our hametz, but we affirm that our intent was to do just that.

Mystical writers often regarded hametz as a visual symbol of arrogance. Leavened bread is made with yeast, a chemical agent that causes dough to rise, puffing up that which would ordinarily remain flat. Since arrogance is at the root of so much wrongdoing, many equate hametz with the yetzer ha-ra, the drive to do evil and behave in a self-centered, self-absorbed way, rather than with the humility of matza, our beloved flat bread.

The Babylonian tractate of Sukka [52a-b] offers us much insight into the nature of the yetzer ha-ra that, when processed, helps us understand Passover in a different way. I have taken a few excerpts from these Talmud pages to help us think about that which drives us to betray our best selves on occasion.

“Rabbi Ashi said: Initially, the evil inclination is like a strand of a spider’s web and ultimately it is like the thick ropes of a wagon.” What starts off as a small temptation that remains unchecked quickly becomes an immense seduction.

“The evil inclination has seven names: evil, uncircumcised, impure, an enemy, a stumbling block, a stone, a hidden one.” Our drive for wrongdoing comes in many forms and not in one-size-fits-all. It is called the hidden one because, according to the Talmud, “It is always hidden in the heart of man.” Ironically, the word for hidden used her is tzafun, another word we use at the Seder, referring to the Afikoman, the matza that we hide and then have as the last taste in our mouths when we end the meal at our Seder.

“The school of Rabbi Yishmael taught, ‘If this scoundrel [the evil inclination] accosts you, drag it into the study hall.’” If you feel overcome by the desire to do wrong, help your self-control by going to a sacred place and engaging in an elevating activity that can make you realize that the wrong you were thinking of doing will compromise the integrity and the life you really want.

“Rabbi Samuel bar Nahmani said that Rabbi Yohanan said: ‘The evil inclination incites a person to sin in this world and then testifies against him in the next world’” We want the legacy that we leave the world to be free of scandal and gossip. We can’t control our reputations, but we can control ourselves.

“Rava said: ‘Initially the evil inclination is like a traveler coming from afar. It is called a guest...Ultimately, it becomes the homeowner.’” Through complex word plays, Rava tells us something very profound about the evil inclination. When it first enters our minds, it is like a stranger. We don’t recognize it. It is like a traveler about to walk away. But when we invite it in, it soon becomes the owner of our house, if we let it, taking over the way we think and act.

“Rabbi Simon ben Lakish said: ‘A person’s evil inclination overcomes him each day and seeks to kill him, as it is stated, ‘The wicked watches the righteous and seeks to kill him’ (Psalms 37:32). And if not for the Holy One, Blessed be He, who assists him with the good inclination, he would not overcome it...” The struggle to overcome unwanted cravings and desires is with us always. This spirit of wrong-doing does not characterize who we are as much as offer us a daily challenge. It is no wonder that a lot of mussar writers, those who contemplated character development, make the desire for good and the desire for evil into soldiers constantly waging war within us.

The verse that we began with from Deuteronomy tells us that it is not enough to eat matza. We must refrain from leaven, hametz, for seven days. Not one day. One day is not enough to rid us of excessive self-love and self-absorption. Understood mystically, we might regard Passover as a personal humility retreat, a chance to break away from our overly sensitive egos and our puffed-up sense of self to tell a majestic story that demands self-sacrifice and humility. We don’t only throw away our hametz, we burn it. We know just how divisive the ego is so we give ourselves a better chance to fight our daily struggles when we try to eradicate the obstacles completely.

Let’s use this Passover as the humility retreat it is meant to be because when we are too full of ourselves, it is hard to make room for others, for community and for God.

Shabbat Shalom

Full of Kindness

“Rabbi Elazar said, ‘Anyone who performs charity and justice is considered as if he filled the whole world in its entirety with kindness.’”

BT Sukka 49b

Ever have a bad day that takes an unusual turn because of a small act of kindness? Sure  you have. Moments like that make us wonder about the magic of kindness. And here Rabbi Elazar tells us that we don’t even realize the full power of kindness because if we did, we’d know that it not only transforms our day but that one some level, it transforms the world. How can it be that one act of kindness fills the entire world with kindness? The talmudic statement found above is supported by a biblical proof from Psalms about God, who “loves charity and justice; the earth is full of the kindness of the Lord (33:5).

To answer this, we turn to a number of other statements that Rabbi Elazar makes on the very same folio page of Talmud: “One who performs acts of charity is greater than one who offers sacrifices, as it is stated, ‘To perform charity and justice is more acceptable to the Lord than an offering’” (Proverbs 21:3). God wants us to give more to each other than to make divine offerings. And Rabbi Elazar keeps going: “Acts of kindness are greater than charity, as it is stated, ‘Sow to yourselves according to charity, and reap according to kindness (Hosea 10:12). If a person sows he is uncertain whether he will or will not eat. If a person reaps, he will definitely eat.’” You can give charity and not be sure if it will have the desired effect. But if you do an act of kindness you can always be sure that your warmth, affection, generosity and concern will touch someone.

To this, the Sages added that acts of kindness are superior to charity in three respects: Charity can be performed only with one’s money while acts of kindness can be performed both with one’s person and with his money. Charity is given to the poor while acts of kindness are performed both for the poor and for the rich. Charity is given to the living while acts of kindness are performed both for the living and for the dead.

These statements all place acts of kindness within a competition for what behaviors yield the most results, impact others most and engage the majority of our own resources. Kindness wins each time. Kindness involves the totality of ourselves in relationship to the totality of another, rich or poor, living or dead. Acts of kindness offer us more ways to express goodness than any other way we might engage others.

And the winner is (drumroll please)…kindness. Such goes the commercial for kindness. This does not, however, explain why kindness changes the world, only why kindness may change the one who offers it and the beneficiary of it.

When you think about that bad day you’re having, your mind creates a landscape of pessimism. You imagine that whatever can go wrong will go wrong and then even when good things happen, you manage to twist their meaning or ignore them in preference to the emotional narrative you have created around personal failure. Your gloom and doom begin to wear away at the rosy picture you may have had of the world at large. Any act of cruelty or insensitivity – from a newspaper article about genocide to a simple episode of road rage – confirms this mental spiral descent. Suddenly, a stranger does something unexpected and full of grace, and the downward plunge you were taking has to recalibrate itself. Maybe the world is not that bad after all, if a total stranger can reach out and do something nice for me or for someone else. Maybe I have to revisit the interpretation of events that I have conjured and come up with a landscape of greater optimism. It is not that the world has changed because of one act of kindness. It is that you have changed your view of the world through an act of kindness.

Desmond Tutu once said: “Do your little bit of good where you are; it’s those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.”

Let’s overwhelm the world today. Do something unusually kind today for someone you don’t know. It may change the world.

Shabbat Shalom

Welcoming Spring

“For lo, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone. The flowers are springing up, the season of singing birds has come, and the cooing of turtledoves fills the air.”

Song of Songs 2:11-12

Today is the official first day of spring. I know what you’re thinking. You’re looking out the window at ten inches of snow and saying, “I don’t care what the calendar says. Until the snow melts, it’s not spring.” You have a point. What we are waiting for after this long, long winter are some signs: the budding of trees, the appearance of a crocus or two, a blink of sunshine. It may not feel like spring today, but just as time always marches on whether or not we are ready, spring will arrive soon enough. Pablo Neruda once wrote, “You can cut all the flowers, but you cannot keep spring from coming.”

You cannot stop spring. In Hosea, we read that spring comes upon us sometimes suddenly, even after a long wait. “Let us acknowledge the Lord; let us press on to acknowledge Him. As surely as the sun rises, He will appear; He will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth" (6:3). One set of rains presses upon us and then another, the way that the reality of the divine presence in our lives is not always apparent but then its signs are suddenly everywhere. Spring, in the Bible, also presaged another season: the season of war, as we read in II Samuel: “In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David…” (11:1). A number of medieval commentators point out that kings declared war in the spring because they did not have to battle other obstacles, like rain and mud. If spring is good for flowers, it is also good for soldiers. These two images do not come together for us organically but highlight the anticipatory nature of the season.

The burgeoning sense of anticipation and excitement that comes with spring is apparent in the verses above from Song of Songs, which are part of a famous passage that, on the surface, describes the sensual release of winter as the earth transitions into another season. The winter rains once pelting us dry up. The small signals that the earth is awakening appear in the form of flowers just coming up, and birdsong can be heard everywhere in the morning light.

The mention of the turtledove is important because the birdsong is not only from birds native to the region, but also from the dove that migrates to Israel in the spring. The dove has returned. In Hebrew the turtledove is similar to its word in English, “tur” – which represents its cooing sound. Thus, we smell, feel and hear spring in the air, with its surround-sound capabilities. Everything breathes with anticipation. The verses continue: “The fig tree puts forth her green figs, and the vines in blossom give forth their fragrance.” Nothing is quite ready in nature, but all is in a state of preparation. It is with this heady sense of an abundant future, that the text closes, “Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.” All of this newness signals romance. It is time for love. Move from the dormancy of winter and welcome possibility in all its forms.

The Israeli botanist Yehuda Feliks, in his commentary on Song of Songs, observes the opening of the world that takes place, “The migrant birds wheel around in the skies and the song of native birds is heard. Within a few weeks, turtledoves throng in from the south. The unripe figs begin to reach out, the vine displays its beguiling blossom.” He makes us aware of a message that all of nature is saying to us: Pay attention to the small ways that possibility surfaces in your universe. It will all grow in intensity and appearance, but don’t forget to have your eyes wide open now so that you can see it at its very beginning. Experience the opening up of nature early on and you will add weeks to your experience of the happiness that it brings.

We can’t rush spring, but we can go outside and look for its signs early on. And when we see that nature anticipates a wonderful transition, perhaps we can internalize its message: What possibilities will open up for you this season if you pay careful attention?

Shabbat Shalom

A Place Called Home

by Erica Brown

“Great sages would kiss the borders of the land of Israel, kiss its stones and roll in its dust, as it says in Psalms: ‘Behold, your servants hold her stones dear and cherish her dust’ [102:15].”

Maimonides, Laws of Kings, Mishne Torah 5:10

The past few weeks have been our season of Jewish peoplehood. We move from Passover to Shavuot - exodus to Sinai - and in between we observe Holocaust Remembrance Day, Memorial Day for Israel’s fallen soldiers and Israel’s Independence Day. These are the days we became a nation, celebrate our collective shared history and values and mourn those who made it happen who did not survive. It’s a good time, in the thick of so many mixed emotions, to take a moment to think about the role Israel plays in our own lives. Maimonides, in a collection of law, felt it important to inject a note of deep emotion. Great scholars kissed the stones of Israel and rolled in its dust.

“For most Jews, Israel is Zion. Zion has a special meaning for our people everywhere. Ultimately, it is the meaning of home. Israel is the Jewish home. As such it is a haven. But it is also a functioning enterprise with a future to fulfill and to look forward to.” These are the words of David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, in his memoirs. He did not want Israel to be an ephemeral idea but a reality that required constant work and effort. And he felt that Israel was not only a haven for Jews in need. “We are a busy, forward-looking nation with much more work to accomplish. Israel cannot just be a refuge. If it is to survive as a valid nation, it has to be much, much more.”

And it is. Because there is an Israel, Jews under distress in today’s Ukraine have somewhere to go, as do Jews world over. Israel is not just a refuge. It is a place where Jews express their national identity, creativity, scientific accomplishments and are active in international trade and politics. Torah emerges out of Zion, as the expression goes, in many different ways, as a locus of Jewish educational institutions that prepare rabbis and educators to share Jewish values across the globe and as a place that thousands of young adults visit to strengthen their commitments.

Can there be a Zionism without aliyah? This question has long been the subject of controversy among early and later Zionist thinkers. In Ben Gurion’s memoirs, Israel is both a geographic location and a metaphor for collective Jewish contributions on the world stage. It is about a particular type of character informed by years of history, destiny and sacred literature. Anyone who has been in Ben Gurion’s home in Tel Aviv and seen his library can appreciate that as a secular Jew, he was highly literate in Jewish life and believed that this should be the national standard.

“Outside Israel, the growth of secularism brings the Jewish communities of the world ever closer to assimilation. Secularism is a fact of our time and since I am not religious I have no reason to deplore it. But if I’m for secularism, I’m certainly not for the ignorance that comes in its wake. In areas where Jews are not persecuted, an increasingly high number vanish, not dramatically but passively, passing into an anonymity born of lack of conviction.”

Ben Gurion spoke like a true prophet. Our distinctiveness may vanish passively because of our lack of conviction. Zionism gave us a renewed sense of passion embedded in possibility. But we cannot let go of the knowledge that creates our distinctiveness.

For Ben Gurion, Israel represented the center of Jewish idealism: “You cannot reach for the higher virtue without being an idealist. The Jews are chronic idealists which makes me humbly glad to belong to this people and to have shared in their noble epic.”

How have you shared in this noble epic?

Shabbat Shalom

Sacred Aging

“One must never grow old, neither as an old saint nor as an old follower. Being elderly is a vice; a person must always renew, begin and go back and begin anew.”

Rabbi Nahman of Breslov

Last Friday, I lost my beloved Bubbie, Celia Raicher. Mind you, no one really knew her name. She was just everybody’s Bubbie, a woman from another era, a quintessential Jewish grandmother who plied you with food, sweaters and stories. Bubbie was 100 years old when she died, and when you have someone in your life for so long, you think she will live forever. She celebrated her 100th birthday with friends and family and made a speech about how blessed she was. She got her congratulatory letter from the White House, and lived independently and with vitality until the very last weeks of her life. At 99, I took my grandmother to Israel because she wanted to dance at the first wedding of her great-grandson, one of her 18 great-grandchildren. When I flew to Florida to say goodbye to her last week, as she came in and out of lucidity, she kept saying “I love you.” Her last days brimmed with that love. Bubbie was absolutely infatuated with her grandchildren and great grandchildren. When her doctor heard that she died, he cried.

Hers was a redeemed life. Born in the south of Poland in 1913, she lost both her parents as a young woman and not long after suffered the ravages of life in concentration camps. Within a year after liberation she was reunited with her husband and my mother, and together they rebuilt their lives. When my grandfather died several years ago, they had been married for 72 years. A special Torah was commissioned by my mother to mark their 70th anniversary. Zeide couldn’t have been happier.

I’ve spent the past many months and especially these last days, during her shiva, thinking about aging and the many life lessons she imparted to me. Chief among these is one: don’t grow old. She refused to age. It’s true, she got shorter. She had arthritis. She went in and out of the hospital for various procedures and operations. She became increasingly unfiltered and spoke her mind regularly. Her driver’s license was revoked (this was a blessing for everyone), but outside of these more obvious signs, her mental state was one of a young person.

Abraham set out for Canaan at the age of 75. When Abraham died at 175, Genesis records that he left this world at “a good, ripe age, old and contented” (25:8) When Moses died at 120, we learn that “his eyes were undimmed and his strength was unabated” (34:7-8). There is this underlying sense that old age in the Hebrew Bible was not a time of arm-chair wisdom but a time for unexpected change and opportunity, a seizing of life with ferocity.

Rabbi Nahman’s quote above seems, at first blush, offensive: To state that one must never grow is an affront to the reality of aging: “One must never grow old, neither as an old saint nor as an old follower. Being elderly is a vice; a person must always renew, begin and go back and begin anew.” But Rabbi Nahman is not talking about the body but about the emotional landscape of someone who is rigid and unchanging, afraid of personal renewal, resigned to increasing narrowness. His recommendation: use the years to grow and re-grow, shed old lives and adopt new ones.

Rabbi Reuven Bulka compared old age to a Talmudic understanding of what happened to the first set of tablets that Moses smashed in the wilderness in relating to the Jewish attitude to aging: “The shattered tablets containing the Ten Commandments were placed in the ark together with the intact second set, as if to accentuate that one whose reality is shattered remains holy.” The fact that an object has no current utility does not make it less holy when it was created for a sacred purpose. A person’s body may fail, but he or she is still a sacred vessel in need of reinvention through renewal while anchoring oneself to the principles that constitute the core self.

Thank you, Bubbie, and go in peace. I appreciate all you gave to me and to so many others. But mostly, I thank you for teaching me through the story of your momentous life not how to grow old but how to stay young.

Shabbat Shalom

Temporary Housing

“The Sages taught: All seven days of Sukkot, a person renders his sukka his permanent residence and his house his temporary residence.”

BT Sukka 28b

Robert Frost popularized a certain view of home in North of Boston: “Home is where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” This is, on some level, a very negative view of home, a place where people accept you for the way you are only because there seems to be no other choice. The problem is, of course, there are always choices. We hope that home offers more than a last-ditch refuge when there are few other options.

We find a different view of home in an unexpected place: the tractate of Talmud that is currently being studied in the daily Talmud cycle that deals with the building of a sukka, a temporary home. To relive history and mimic the lives of the ancient Israelites, Jews are commanded to build huts in the fall season – to coincide with the annual harvest - and to dwell in them. This led to the formulation of the legal clause above; one should make his sukka permanent for that week and his house temporary. In order to facilitate this, we have to understand what makes a house feel temporary and what makes it feel permanent.

Leviticus states, “In sukkot you shall reside…” (23:42). The Talmudic sages interpreted this to mean that you should reside in the sukka the way that you reside in your own home. The text elaborates: “If one has beautiful vessels, he takes them up to his sukka. If one has beautiful bedding, he takes it up to his sukka. One eats, drinks and relaxes in the sukka.” One should also study Torah in the sukka unless the matter requires an unusual degree of concentration that cannot be facilitated in the sukka.

If you want to make a space feel permanent, you have to bring to it your favorite things, those of both beauty and comfort since home should be a space that incorporates both together. Additionally, home should be a place where one both fulfills both basic needs – like eating and drinking – and higher needs, like the need for serenity and peace encapsulated by the fact that we should relax in the sukka.

While it is hard to imagine that home is simply a place that we stage by moving objects, think of a hotel room when you first enter it or the day when you rent an apartment or purchase a house. Alternatively, you can think of what a space looks like when you exit it. The walls are blank and sterile. Nothing contains your signature items. The “you” of the place has been replaced by the anonymity of it. Once you place your favorite things there, it has your stamp of uniqueness.

But there is something else that determines the quality of a home in addition to your personal effects and activities. Home is a place where your table is and your guests are. On Sukkot, we go out of our way to entertain friends and strangers precisely to give the message that we make a house permanent when we bring people together under its roof, even if the roof is not extremely stable. Until the moment you have your first guests, your house is not really a home.

Tennessee Williams regarded home the same way: “I don’t mean what other people mean when they speak of a home, because I don’t regard a home as a…well, as a place, a building…a house…of wood, bricks, stone. I think of a home as being a thing that two people have between them in which each can…well, nest.” A sukka, with its twig and leaf roof, is a great nest.

Home is not a last resort, although it may be at times. For us, it is closer to a luxury resort: a place of beauty, comfort, solace, good food, and most of all, good company.

Shabbat Shalom

Two Hearts

“You shall love God with all your hearts…”

Deuteronomy 6:5

We’ve had a lot of hearts this past week. Stores are trying to offload heart-shaped chocolates, balloons and necklaces at deep discounts, as if love a little late is no longer love. If you buy now, you’ll be ahead for next year. Since this is a dvar Torah about love written a week after Valentine’s Day, it is also available at a bargain price: free. Free seems to be just the right price.

I also just finished Jan Philipp Sendker’s novel, A Well-Tempered Heart. Sendker is a German writer who wrote non-fiction until his first novel, The Art of Hearing Heartbeats, shook the reading world with its innocent and compelling love story set in Burma. He portrays the heart as an instrument of romance, intuition and deep connection. Hearts seem to be everywhere lately.

Everywhere includes our prayers. Our most central prayer, the Shema, contains an often mistranslated expression: we need to love God with all our “hearts.” Tractate Brakhot (26a-b) suggests that this is no mistake but an intentional demand – that we love God with the two inclinations that reside within every human soul: the good inclination and the bad inclination. We were created with the breath of God and the dust of the earth. This duality must be present in what we give back to our Creator – the highs and lows, the contradictory mix of our more animal nature and the holiness of our transcendent nature.

Love - to be rich, full and complex - needs to express the entirety of the human heart, our profoundest longings, our doubts, our trust, our suspicions, our weaknesses and inadequacies. If we bring God any less, we are not bringing God our total selves. If we give others less, then they, too, are not experiencing the multi-faceted dimension of a relationship. The heart talks, and as Milan Kundera tells us in The Unbearable Lightness of Being, “When the heart speaks, the mind finds it indecent to object.”

Maimonides in his “Laws of Prayer” understands this demand – to love God with all our hearts – in concrete ways. Prayer requires our utmost concentration and focus. He writes that when one recites the Shema one should not gesticulate with one’s eyes, lips or fingers since these are bodily ways of speaking and reduce our concentration. To increase focus, one should recite the Shema so that the words are enunciated clearly and audibly to oneself (note: people who mumble loudly during prayer, however, take away from the concentration of others). In the enunciation, Maimonides tells us specifically that we should pause very slightly between the words “b-khol” and “levavekha” – with all your heart. Each word should be crystal clear and stand on its own so that we understand as we read it that it is important not only to give our “hearts” but that we must give all of our hearts, directed and intentional. True love never demands less.

The poet Pablo Neruda, in his famous collection of love poetry, writes of the heart as a compass, a guide to direct and uncompromised attention:

“Then love knew it was called love.

And when I lifted my eyes to your name,

Suddenly your heart showed me my way.”

We offer our hearts to people and causes, in love and in friendship, and sometimes they get bruised. But sometimes we make our offering of affection, lift our eyes and see that someone else’s heart has received our gift and returned it because we gave it with all our hearts.

Shabbat Shalom

Is Gossip Good for You?

“Who is the man who desires life and will lengthen days that he may see good? Keep your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking lies.”

Proverbs 34:12

This week The Washington Post ran an article in its health and science section on gossip. Gossip is good for you. Yentas unite! Researchers tried to convince us that gossip is an important cement for good behavior.  It minimizes bullying by calling out bad behavior and creates an understanding of the rules and boundaries of our values because those who break them usually become the subject of our gossip.

“Groups that allow their members to gossip sustain cooperation and deter selfishness better than those who don’t. And groups do even better if they can gossip and ostracize unworthy members,” concludes a researcher at Stanford University. The study created conditions for people to align themselves with the most cooperative in the group by identifying those who were not as helpful. Often a selfish or exploitative person will be left out of a group intentionally and may have to adjust behaviors or language to be accepted. If we know people are talking then we may adjust ourselves to be more generous than we naturally are to create a better impression and reputation.

OY. But wait…before you pick up the phone, let’s take a look at four verses from Proverbs to see what they have to say about gossip.

“One who goes about as a talebearer reveals secrets. But one who is trustworthy conceals a matter” (Proverbs 11:13). When you gossip, you might create short-term intimacy, but no one will trust you. Tomorrow you may be their favorite subject.

“A dishonest person spreads strife, and a whisperer separates close friends” (16:28). Gossips create a toxic atmosphere that can potentially ruin otherwise good friendships and relationships, even when the content of the gossip is not true. It can become a wedge that creates such a deep crack between people that it becomes impossible to heal.

“Whoever goes about slandering, reveals secrets; therefore, so not associate with a simple babbler” (20:19). You will be judged by the company you keep. Spend time with high-minded individuals. Don’t waste time babbling. Gossip is a waste of time and can hurt your reputation.

“For lack of wood, the fire goes out, and where there is no whisperer, quarreling ceases. As charcoal to hot embers and wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome person for kindling strife. The words of a whisperer are like dainty morsels; they go down to the innermost parts” (26:20-22) Gossip can only spread like fire when people want to hear it. Gossip heats things up to a temperature that may not be bearable. If you change the subject, then there is no kindling and the air and appeal of gossip dissipates.

This last verse tells us why we gossip, even if it can cost friendships, create toxic work and family environments and ruin reputations. Simply put, gossip is a “dainty morsel.” It is delicious. It slides down from the ear into our “innermost parts,” satisfying our need to put someone else down to bring us up or even out the playing field. If I hear that a super rich, super blonde, super tall and thin model really has a terrible drug addiction, I’ll feel so much better about my life. Or will I? I am not going to get better by making anyone else worse. Even those who promote themselves by hurting the reputation of others rarely have long-term success. If trust is not the currency of relationships, then they won’t last long.

Perhaps this is why the verse above says that those who refrain from speaking badly about others are “lovers of life.” When you don’t gossip, it may be an affirmation that you have better things to do that keep your life buoyant, happy and virtuous.  Modern research may sound compelling, but it should be balanced by ancient wisdom. It’s ancient for a reason.

Shabbat Shalom

Yentas Unite!

“If you haven't got anything nice to say about anybody come sit next to me,” said Alice Roosevelt Longworth.

This week The Washington Post Researchers are trying to convince us that gossip is good for us and our communities. It minimizes bullying by calling out bad behavior and creates an understanding of the rules and boundaries of our values because those who break them usually become the subject of our gossip. ‘Groups that allow their members to gossip sustain cooperation and deter selfishness better than those who don’t. And groups do even better if they can gossip and ostracize unworthy members,” concludes a researcher at Stanford University. The research construct allowed people to learn through gossip about the behavior of others to align themselves with the most cooperative members of the group. Often a selfish or exploitative person will be left out of a group intentionally and may have to adjust behaviors or language to be accepted. If we know people are talking then we may adjust ourselves to be more generous than we naturally are to create a better impression and reputation.

But wait a second before you head out to the water cooler. This approach fails to take into account the atmosphere of distrust and toxicity that pervades office cultures where gossip is an accepted norm. You cannot limit the subject of gossip to mean people. Gossip is not that discriminating. Don’t forget, if you leave the water cooler too early, then you become the topic of conversation.

When you are in a leadership position, your gossip can be the most dangerous and enervating of all, draining the energy and vitality of your work community. And that’s not only because you can probably dish up the most dirt on your employees, but because you have the influence to create an atmosphere of trust and safety or drama and fear.

Proverbs tells us that gossip is simply delicious. It’s a dainty morsel, a little treat for the ear that provides deep satisfaction: “The words of gossips are like choice snacks; they go down to the inmost parts,” (18:8). But the satisfaction is only temporary, like that piece of rich cake that you probably should have refused. A moment on the lips, forever on the hips. When it comes to gossip, a moment on the lips and our relationships slip, taking our credibility and trust with them on the way down.

The Weight of Leadership

“A community is too heavy to carry alone.”

Deuteronomy Rabba 1:10

This has been a consequential week of leadership. With the inauguration of an American president, another Israeli election, and heated issues about gun control against the background of another shooting on a college campus, we are all aware that leadership is being sorely tested and desperately needed. At the same time, we understand the critical and symbiotic relationship between leaders and followers. As the midrash says, a community is too heavy to carry alone. We all carry it together.

In a beautiful poster produced for the “Visions and Voices” project of the PJ Library, Danny Gordis offered his interpretation of the above midrash. He writes of the power of solitary spiritual experiences that offer us much in the way of peace and growth but are limiting: “Alone, we may feel a special calm, but there is no one to challenge us, to urge us to further exploration or commitment. Alone, we have no one to model for us genuine courage, deeper commitment, engagement with people we hadn’t thought to include in our lives.” When we act together, God dwells in our midst.

This notion of the interconnectivity and interdependence of human beings in community is inspiring but perhaps does not capture some of the pain of the midrashic sentiment. We need each other, but no one person can carry the load.” We all know leaders who shoulder an unfair burden of responsibility. They often initiate, advocate, and sign-on for tasks that others avoid. The phone rings, and they actually answer it. We move them from organization to organization because they are willing and committed. But, too often, they lead without sufficient help. This reading highlights the word “alone.”

Since we are thick in the Moses narratives in our Torah cycle, we can use insights from Exodus to help us understand another word in the midrash: heavy.

When I read this, I thought instantly of another midrash that has always moved me and sometimes moved me to tears. When Moses received the Ten Commandments in stone, how did he carry them and why, later, did he throw them? They were so heavy. They were so holy.

Moses lifted them with ease, with the adrenalin of excitement and passion. But when he saw the Israelites worshiping the golden calf, the tablets suddenly felt so heavy. They were heavy before, but driven by ambition and mission, he did not realize how heavy they truly were. He did not throw them. He dropped them in heartbreak when the people let him down. He suddenly became aware of just how heavy they were and just how tired he was.

The poet and artist, Brian Andreas, in his book Traveling Light, has a picture of a creature holding a pile of objects. Next to the drawing are the following words: “This is a giant block of whatever is most difficult for you to carry & trust me on this, you’ll carry it more times than you can count until you decide that’s exactly what you want to do most & then it won’t weigh a thing anymore.”

What Andreas points out in his little drawing/saying is that the very things which feel like a burden can become lighter for us when we decide we want to carry them. What the midrash points out is that the very things which feel light to us can become a burden in the absence of love or in the presence of disappointment. All that we love – our families, our jobs, our volunteer commitments – all can become burdens when we feel their heaviness: taking care of children, caring for elderly parents, supporting employees who are struggling, being there for friends in need. But we can also decide to lighten the load by changing our perspective and loving the burden until it no longer weighs a thing.

Shabbat Shalom

Prison Blues

“Come back to a place of safety, all you prisoners who still have hope.”

Zechariah 9:12

It was hard to miss this week’s New York Times article on kosher food served in prisons, “You Don’t Have to Be Jewish to Love a Kosher Prison Meal.” Taxpayers, we have a problem. In Florida, the cost of 3 kosher meals daily in prison is $7, a hike up from the standard $1.54. Can you blame non-Jews for choosing kosher? If it costs more, it must be better. Some inmates believe that if it is kosher, the food is a higher standard, tastes better or is especially blessed. This last feature is critical when your blessings run thin. Gang members sometimes choose kosher so they can sit separately in the dining room and conduct their business. The article reported that New York State had 1,500 inmates who keep kosher out of 56,000, but the kosher meals there are two dollars cheaper.

It’s hard not feel cynical and wonder how kosher-eating inmates engaged in morally unkosher behavior. It’s no comfort to know that there is actually a website called “Jews in Prison.” It’s landing page offered this reassurance: “Your complete resource center.” The website makes an emphatic point of saying that one can keep kosher in prison, especially if the judge knows that the convict is a religious Jew before sentencing, but reminds us that it isn’t easy. “True, it isn’t Brooklyn, but it can be done.”

The website also warns against hypocrisy:

It is important that an inmate be consistent with what he or she demands, especially with regard to religious practices. It has happened more than once that a Jewish inmate has "demanded" kosher food. Then, that very same day, that inmate is seen eating on the main line - non-kosher food. In order to establish credibility, being truthful is of utmost importance. Being consistent will also earn you the respect of the other inmates and staff.

Being truthful is of the utmost importance, and if you didn’t realize that before your sentence, perhaps it became more obvious in your cell. We recognize that people make mistakes, sometimes grievous ones that deserve incarceration, but that does not mean that we can or should diminish their capacity for repentance or remove the anchors of stability that will bring them back. We take the words of Zechariah seriously: “Come back to a place of safety, all you prisoners who still have hope.” Sometimes prison is actually the only safe place for a person to confront his or her past and create a new, more hopeful future. For this reason, we believe that proper treatment and conditions of prisoners is our ethical obligation.

The Supreme Court of Israel has this to say about the Jewish values underlying prison conditions:

"The right to physical integrity and human dignity is one to which prisoners and detainees are also entitled. The prison walls do not separate between a detainee and his human dignity… See how concerned the Sages were for a person's dignity and his rights, even if he had sinned. Maimonides, after discussing the various penal sentences available to the court, including imprisonment (Maimonides, Laws of Courts, 24:9), makes the following concluding statement: 'All of these [punishments] are to be used at the discretion of the judge, in accordance with their appropriateness and their time. And in all these actions his intent must be for the sake of Heaven, and human dignity may not be a trivial matter in his eyes… for he must be cautious not to slight their honor'…

One of the reasons that non-Jewish prisoners choose kosher meals, according to the article, is that they have so few opportunities to exercise choice, they take the ones that come to them – like picking dinner. This insight into the difficult mental challenge of incarceration helps us better understand the blessing that a prisoner recites upon achieving freedom: “Blessed are You, King of the Universe, who bestows kindness upon the vulnerable, for He has bestowed goodness to me.” The prisoner thanks God for the gift of choice and personal autonomy that has been returned to him upon his release.

Freedom of choice – even the sliver of freedom to decide what you eat – is a fundamental condition of human dignity, and it is our obligation to preserve it, especially for those who cannot speak up for themselves.

Shabbat Shalom

Regret in the Flesh

"Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the Lord."

Leviticus 19:28

In the 1990s, there was a band called Rocket from the Crypt out of San Diego. They made a bargain with their raving fans. If you tattooed their rocket logo on your person and you flashed them a peek, you could go to every one of their concerts for free. Talk about membership rewards! The owner of a Cleveland area restaurant tried a similar offering, giving a 25% discount to lifetime diners for anyone with their signature sandwich-and-crossbones logo. He wasn’t sure many would take him seriously, but to date there are over 550 very serious customers. A young man my daughter met while volunteering at a juvenile detention center had three tattoos that were each crossed out: the names of his ex-girlfriends. I hope he finds true love soon because he might run out of space.

Jewish law forbids permanent tattoos, as we learn in the verse above. Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch (1801-1888), a German scholar, interprets the Leviticus command specifically to refer to “…an inscription so deeply impressed into the flesh that it remains permanently.” He writes cogently of the problem of permanence in a world that is not permanent. Rabbi Hirsch interprets the problem with tattoos relevant to their use in the ancient world – and still often today. Tattoos were mourning markers, ways to remind oneself of the loss of someone special by inflicting external pain to match internal anguish, to carry a constant reminder on one’s flesh. But we usually do not need reminders of those we have loved and lost because we are constantly surrounded by reminders. Our heart remembers.

“The prohibition is so, simply expressing the loss we have sustained by wounding ourselves, inflicting pain on ourselves…” We harm our bodies like a rent in a mourning garment that “expresses our acknowledgment that the departure of the one who has died has made a ‘rent’ in the closest surroundings, the intimate world, of those left behind.” The cut in the flesh expresses that, “However dear and valuable, however important the existence of somebody else may be to us, our own importance and our own worth may never end with the end of his existence, may never even been allowed to lessen. Every person had his own importance and meaning for God in his existence here below.”

Rabbi Hirsch was worried that if we make permanent marks on our body to honor someone else, we might minimize ourselves, believing that our lives are nothing without the someone we tattooed on our person. Swept up in someone else who can no longer be with us, we would lose our independent sense of purpose. Beyond mourning, tattoos are often the ultimate emblem of regret because they represent times, fads or people in our lives who come and go. Perhaps this is why the verse ends with the dramatic flourish: “I am the Lord.” God represents eternity in contrast to marking our bodies that often represents what we care about at the moment.

The good news: the band Rocket from the Crypt just got back together after almost ten years in hiatus and their shows have been selling out. The bad news: they can no longer honor their tattoo bargain. They didn’t know just how many people had bought into this deal. It was so many more than expected. They simply cannot afford it. One tattoo artist in San Diego alone has done hundreds. Their most ardent fans are understandably disappointed because the tattoos aren’t getting them in and they are not going away.

Shabbat Shalom

A Little Perspective

“Every single person must say, ‘The world was created for me.’”

BT Sanhedrin 37b

A few weeks ago, I came across a book of Native American wisdom and encountered a saying by Big Elk (1770-1853), the chief of the Omaha Native Americans. Big Elk lived at a time of hardship and transition for his tribe. Foreigners threatened to take his land, and the Sioux were a warring tribe against his. But the biggest danger he faced was small pox, which had come to America via Europeans and was a rampant cause of death among Native Americans. Big Elk needed to give his people a sense of hope and perspective on managing a difficult past and having strength to face the future. Here is what he told his tribe:

“Do not grieve. Misfortunes will happen to the wisest and best of men. Death will come, always out of season. It is the command of the Great Spirit, and all the nations and people must obey. What is past and what cannot be prevented should not be grieved for…Misfortunes do not flourish particularly in our lives – they grow everywhere.”

No one can escape the clutches of death nor will excessive mourning bring anyone back. Sometimes we believe that we are the only ones to suffer, but misfortune is not ours alone. We share it. It grows everywhere.

Contrast this to a fascinating legend in the Talmud about the sage Hanina ben Dosa:

“Hanina ben Dosa was walking on the road when rain fell upon him. He said: ‘Master of the Universe, the entire world is comfortable and Hanina is suffering. The rain stopped. When he came to his house, he said: ‘Master of the Universe, the entire world is suffering [for lack of rain] and Hanina is comfortable. The rain returned” [BT Yoma 53b].

Rather than accept the ways of the world, Hanina asked that they be manipulated to suit his own needs. He was willing to forgo the benefits of rain for others simply to ensure his own personal comfort. He only asked that the rain return when he got to the shelter of his own home. If this is not narcissism, what is?

And yet, we read in another passage of Talmud excerpted above that the world is created for our own individual benefit. “And the King of Kings the Holy One Blessed Be He minted every person with the stamp of Adam
And not one of them is the same as his fellow
For this reason, every single person must say, ‘The world was created for me.’” If the world was created for each of us, then Hanina did nothing wrong in praying for his own comfort at the expense of the rest of the world.

Talmud commentators were obviously troubled by Hanina’s audacious request and tried to soften it. One said that Hanina had no fields as a poor man, and could not, therefore, empathize with the suffering of his fellow farmers who needed rain for their sustenance. Another claims that Hanina was not asking God to change the world for him but rather making an observation about the world. Something that can be good for almost everyone can be bad for us and vice-versa.

It would be interesting to have Hanina ben Dosa in conversation with Big Elk. Big Elk may have told Hanina to man up and get an umbrella. Hanina may have told Big Elk that only those who really believe in their uniqueness will change the world and Big Elk should be careful not to encourage people to resign themselves to suffering. If you really believe that the world was created for you, then you also become a better custodian of it. You have greater responsibility for it. You have the power to change and improve it.

In this story, God listens to Hanina not because he accepted the perspective of the world but because he believed that he had a right to be comfortable and dignified. Not that the world had to serve him but that he had the power to change the universe. This perspective does not obligate us less when it comes to being stewards of the universe but obligates us more.

What would you do differently if you believed that you could really change the world?

Shabbat Shalom

Eat Something

“Be happy as you sit at your table and the hungry are enjoying your hospitality”

Derech Eretz Zuta 9

The big news in Washington is that Michelle Obama’ 50th birthday party is coming, and the invitations are out. But – get this – the DC gossip columns are all buzzing about a small sentence on the invite: “Eat before you come.” Jewish event? I think not. Now I’m not even upset that I’m not invited. Tacky? The debate is serious. Does it show fiscal responsibility that the White House is adjusting its belt, literally, in the shadow of the sequestration or is it just cheap?

Lizzie Post, great-great granddaughter of etiquette queen, Emily Post, didn’t care for it but not because it looked skimpy. “My advice to people would be not to put ‘eat before you come’ on an invite. And this is not a specific etiquette thing. To me it just sounds so instructive.” It’s bossy. We’ll eat if we want to, thank you very much.

Nothing could be more counter to a Jewish approach. As we read above, a host takes joy in watching his or her guests enjoy food, feeling privileged and blessed to fulfill the mitzva of bringing others around our table to break bread together and enjoy life’s bounty. In fact, in Jewish law, a host is supposed to serve and apportion food so that everyone gets more than what they might have taken on their own. Essen.

In the Talmud, the sage Rava was speaking to Rafram bar Papa, and said to him “Tell me some of the good deeds which Rabbi Huna has done.”  Rafram replied: “Of his childhood I do not recollect anything, but of his old age I do. When he had a meal he would open the door wide and declare, ‘Whomever is in need let him come and eat,” [BT, Taanit 20b]. It’s a beautiful verbal transaction on so many levels. Instead of engaging in the usual legal debate, these two scholars want to discuss the kindnesses of a third. What sticks out in Rafram’s mind is the way in which Rabbi Huna opened his doors wide. His table was open because his heart was open. He lived in a state of perpetual generosity.

Naturally, Rabbi Huna learned this from somewhere, and chances are good that food generosity came to him – and us – as a legacy from Abraham in Genesis 18. Abraham was sitting at the threshold of his tent in the heat of the day, scouring the landscape for strangers. He sees three in the distance and rushes out to greet them. He offers much more than they expect. “‘Let me get you something to eat, so you can be refreshed and then go on your way--now that you have come to your servant.’ Very well,’ they answered, ‘do as you say.’ So Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah. ‘Quick,’ he said, ‘get three seahs of fine flour and knead it and bake some bread.’ Then he ran to the herd and selected a choice, tender calf and gave it to a servant, who hurried to prepare it.  He then brought some curds and milk and the calf that had been prepared, and set these before them. While they ate, he stood near them under a tree.”

Notice the way the text shares details of the meal. No skimping here. He rushes to get them the food but does not serve them drive-by style but with a formal multi-course and expensive feast. He does not eat with them but stands near them, an additional way he shows them that his aim is their comfort, not his own.

Hachnasat orkhim – welcoming strangers – is not a chore, a burden or the wasted expense of social capital. It is pure joy to serve others. If you ate before you arrived you would be denying your host this happiness. So don’t eat before you come. Eat after you show up. Show the White House how it’s done. And bring a serving of affection and generosity to your table.

Shabbat Shalom

Changing Years, Changing Lives

“Righteous people say little and do much.”

BT Bava Metzia 87a

“Every minute - every single second - there are a million things you could be thinking about. A million things you could be worrying about. Our world - don’t you feel we’re becoming more and more fragmented? I used to think that when I got older, the world would make so much more sense. But you know what? The older I get, the more confusing it is to me. The more complicated it is. Harder. You’d think we’d be getting better at it. But there’s just more and more chaos. The pieces - they’re everywhere. And nobody knows what to do about it.”

These words from a conversation in David Levithan’s young adult fiction, Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist, create a picture of a frustration. The sadness in the world at times feels crushingly overwhelming. John-Paul Flintoff articulates this paralysis concretely in How to Change the World. “Surprisingly often, we find ourselves impaled on a paradox: we desperately want to do something, but have no idea what it may be.” This impulse often escalates in intensity as a new year approaches. There is a new chance to make this the year that we end poverty, hunger, cancer, etc.

But our impulse to do good in the world is often thwarted by the practical problem of how to do so. To help us change the world, Flintoff includes and index called “198 Ways to Act” excerpted from Gene Sharp’s The Politics of Nonviolent Action and includes suggestions we might expect – demonstrations, pressure applied to political figures, boycotts, leaflets – and includes rude gestures, self-exposure to the elements, satyagrahic fasting (look that one up), mutiny, mock funerals, silence, teach-ins and, of course, protest disrobings.

Many of these suggestions involve communication in different modalities. But the rabbinic response seems, instead, to prefer silence and action, as the Talmud says above.  “To be is to stand for,” as Rabbi A. J. Heschel says. Standing is not speaking. In fact, sometimes speech masks inactivity. We talk about goodness instead of embodying it.

Our expression for social change, tikkun olam, is most famously expressed at the end of traditional prayer services “Le-taken olam b’malchut Sha-dai.” Critics of the tikkun olam impulse in contemporary Jewish life complain that too much energy is spent on environmental awareness or poverty in other countries but very little is expended on embracing Jewish law and ritual. We are a small people and if we do not help each other, who will take care of us? The Alenu prayer tries to focus our works under the shadow of the kingdom of God. Social justice is twinned with spirituality.

Permit me to offer an alternative reading. Perhaps the idea of fixing the world in the kingdom of God is recognizing our humility when we set out to repair something we deem broken. There is often a smug or self-righteous approach that accompanies social justice work that is condescending and intimidating. Even the presumption that we can change the world sounds arrogant. I can barely change my shoes on harder days.

Flintoff returns us to more modest goals: “…if we are really interested in changing the world, we have to put other people first. Every attitude we assume, every word we utter, and every act we undertake establishes us in relation to others.” Tikkun olam is less about changing the world in this view and more about attuning ourselves to the needs of others through curiosity and empathy.

Leviathan captures this sentiment majestically in his novel:

“…Then it hits me.

Maybe we’re the pieces,”



“What?”



“Maybe that’s it. With what you were talking about before. The world being broken. Maybe it isn’t that we’re supposed to find the pieces and put them back together. Maybe we’re the pieces. Maybe, what we’re supposed to do is come together. That’s how we stop the breaking. Tikkun olam.”

Maybe it is audacious to think that this is the year we will change the world. Maybe it is enough to believe that this is the year we will change the brokenness ourselves. And maybe that too is audacious.

Shabbat Shalom

Distance Yourself

“Escape quickly from the company of fools; they’re a waste of your time, a waste of your words. The wisdom of the wise keeps life on track; the foolishness of fools lands them in the ditch. The stupid ridicule right and wrong, but a moral life is a favored life.”

Proverbs 14:7-9

This week I have been thinking a lot about the difference between escapes and exits. I finished Ira Wagler’s book, Growing Up Amish, about his multiple escapes from the Old Order Amish lifestyle in which he was raised. Wagler grew up with 11 siblings in a strict and regimented household. They spoke Pennsylvania Dutch (I didn’t know this was a language. I thought it was a type of pretzel). The Old Order is distinguished from other types of Amish in that it is less progressive. Electricity is not allowed in the home nor are phones. All clothing is homemade. Women wear bonnets. They drive buggies with steel rims, unlike those that permit rubberized tires.

The Amish fascinate us. Mired in technology and modernity, we find their lifestyle quaint and simple and imagine the retreat it would be from the world to drop everything and plow alongside Harrison Ford in Witness or build barns together. But as Wagler writes, being Amish is really hard at times. The strength of the community can be its weakness. “As I would come to discover later in life, one shouldn’t be condemned for simply craving freedom,” he writes.

The Amish preach Anabaptism, an adult choice to be a member of the church. The famed Rumspringa break that is permitted adolescents to experience the world is to provoke a definite choice about an Amish future and usually ends with a return to the fold. Amish children do not go to school beyond 8th grade. Their lives are so deeply enmeshed in a closed society that it is hard to envision oneself apart from it.

Wagler left his home for the first time at 17 in the middle of the night, leaving a brief note for his father to find at dawn. This is a common way of leaving the community. But because it was an escape and not an exit, Wagler never really articulated and owned the reasons he had for leaving. He just left. And then came back. And left and came back. He was engaged to an Amish woman and took church vows but broke the engagement and left again. Now, more than two decades apart from his leave-taking he realized the difference between his escapes and his final exit. He says that when he finally broke off, he “was not running in frantic despair into some wild and dangerous horizon. For the first time, I was leaving with a clear mind, quietly focused on faith, not fear. For the first time, I was leaving behind all the baggage, all the tortured, broken dreams, all the pain of so much loss and heartbreak.”

When we look at the verses from Proverbs above, they, too, speak about escape – leaving those who are fools. The medieval Spanish commentator, Abraham ibn Ezra, says that the word escape here means to distance oneself. Understand the risks and move away. Sometimes when we are too close to fire, we get burned. If you know what ignites that fire for you emotionally, then stay far away. Escape.

Rashi, who lived a bit earlier, takes a softer view. He might not translate the word as escape but rather as separate yourself. He contends that Proverbs is advising us not to be around a fool often, not to make him into regular company rather than moving far away. We cannot always distance ourselves physically from forces that constrict or diminish us. But we can make mental and emotional distances to protect our own health and well-being. In Proverbs, those distances are in defense of our moral values. Stay away from what damages your principles and from those who question or ridicule them. When you cannot be apart from bad influences, learn to negotiate how you react to them so that you do not feel compromised.

Running away isn’t always the answer. Sometimes, it’s better to make a slow and dignified exit.

Shabbat Shalom

Sweet Revenge

BT Yoma 22b-23a

We all know people who hold grudges so long that they can’t even remember what they were angry about in the first place. The words no longer matter. The negative emotional associations they have with the person who offended are so overwhelming and insulting that the feelings linger. Try as we might, we have difficulty unseating these feelings. And perhaps this makes us feel bad because we know that the Torah forbids any form of revenge or bearing grudges, as we read in Leviticus 19:18: “You shall not take revenge nor bear any grudge.”

But then we read the statement above and it makes us wonder. How is it that a Torah scholar who is insulted should actually bear a grudge, and not only a little grudge, a grudge of snake-like proportions? No doubt, this sort of venomous anger will not go away. In fact, this person loses his scholarly credibility if he does not bear a grudge. It makes no sense.

The Talmud, being a document of dissent and debate, asks this question and raises the Leviticus verse. The last person we would expect to bear a grudge is the one who studies the stuff in the original. The Talmud then discusses the prohibition of revenge and says that the Leviticus text is specifically about monetary revenge rather than personal insult. “What is revenge? One said to his fellow: ‘Lend me your sickle,’ and he said, ‘No.’ The next day, he (the one who refused) said to the other, ‘Lend me your ax.’ And he said, ‘I will not lend to you just as you did not lend to me.’ That is revenge.”

What then is bearing a grudge? That’s the Talmud’s next question: “If one said to his fellow, ‘Lend me your ax,’ and he said, ‘No,’ and the next day he (the one who refused), said to him, ‘I am not like you, who would not lend to me. That is bearing a grudge.’”

In the first instance – revenge – monetary stinginess is, in many ways, an act of personal insult. I am saying that I do not trust you with my things, and you, in turn, are telling me that a deficiency of trust will come back to bite me. It is a zero-sum game, this game of revenge.

In the second instance, bearing a grudge seems to be an act of moral superiority. You give me something not to help me but to show that you are better than me, a bigger, more generous person. But in truth, you are not a generous person because you could not give me something without hurting me at the same time.

The Talmud distinguishes between monetary insult and personal insult in this way: in a case of finance, you can control how you spend your money or share your possessions and make choices. We hope you will make choices that engender trust and parity but if you cannot, at least be gracious to those who cannot. But the Torah scholar is not representing himself alone. The Torah scholar represents a universe of ideas and values that is being insulted and must protect that universe with ferocity. The scholar must uphold the honor of the Torah, its students and its institutions. The shame that a scholar experiences is the shame we all bear. For example, one may not support a particular president, but one should not call a  president by his first name or last name without reference to his office. It protects the honor of the office even if the candidate in question does not represent one’s politics.

In the chapter “Who Gets Hurts?” in William Irvine’s book about insults, A Slap in the Face, he writes that when we have self-confidence, we regard ourselves as being worthy. We feel proud of ourselves and “wealthy enough in self-esteem that we can afford to let others have fun at our expense.” This is not permission to insult us, but a possible explanation of why some people nurse old wounds for a lifetime, and others let them slide. Perhaps in this piece of Talmud, there was a worry not only about the status of scholars in society but also a need to help them de-personalize an insult and understand when it was directed to the enterprise of study and not to them as individuals.

Learning should never be diminished and insulted if we prize it as foundational to our Jewish identity. And we must protect the dignity of those who represent it.

Shabbat Shalom

Familiar Strangers

“As soon as Joseph saw his brothers, he recognized them,

but he pretended to be a stranger..."

Genesis 42:7

Philip Galanes, in his advice column “Social Q’s” in The New York Times, fielded a question about the usual holiday joy: family get-togethers. David claimed that he has officially begun to dread Thanksgiving. Within 30 seconds of being in the same room as his immediate family, they all assume their old roles even when those roles are outdated. His question: “Do you have any ideas for short-circuiting those same old dynamics this year? It is really demoralizing for me.”

Galanes suggested inviting some new guests who might fast-forward the ancient dynamics by expressing interest in what everyone is up to now. Funnily enough, the Torah portions of the past few weeks have dished up variations of this theme, so I thought in the spirit of ancient dynamics, we might ask our old friend Joseph how he might have handled the contemporary Thanksgiving feast with his family.

Dear David,

I know exactly where you are, friend. You cannot imagine what it was like for me every Thanksgiving in Canaan. Dad would always make me carve the turkey in front of everyone in that ridiculous striped jacket; the dolman sleeves always dipped into the gravy and, let me tell you, it was an absolute beast to clean.

Every year Reuben and Judah fought constantly over the drumsticks, and in the early days before Mom passed away, she and her sister Leah would always be competing for who had the better sweet potato casserole recipe. My father basically sat on the couch watching football, while my other brothers practically killed each other. My sister Dina was so bored and upset, she would just wander off. I think she was looking for Black Friday sales in Shechem.

After I was thrown in the pit and taken to Egypt, Thanksgiving was different for me. I was all alone, often in prison with a baker who had no flour and a sommelier without wine. What good are they at making a party?

But I will never forget the year that my brothers came down to Egypt to find some stuffing – and anything else - because there was basically a famine in Canaan. I was already high-ranking in the Egyptian government and was sporting an Egyptian haircut and the latest in Prada tunics when ten of them walked in. I knew them instantly and found that despite my confidence, I was shaken. I hadn’t seen them in 13 years. I wanted so badly to say, “Look at me now and look at you,” but I bit my tongue and spoke in Egyptian. They clearly had no idea who I was. I wanted to see if they had changed. If there was any brotherly feeling, I would reveal myself. But otherwise, I had found safety only among strangers; my own family was too threatened by my success. I would stay in Egypt, thrive and have to give up on the Andrew Lloyd Webber play that would sustain my name for an eternity.

In the end, I am glad that I made myself a stranger to them because it was only as a stranger that they came to see me for who I really was. David, I wept so profoundly on the day that I told them my secret because by the time I told them, I was no longer filled with revenge. I was filled with love.

I learned then that the best way to handle the annual return of the ancient family dynamic is not to invite strangers to your table to distract you but to turn your own family into strangers, to ask them questions about their lives that you might ask strangers, to treat them with the courtesy you treat strangers. Strangers can become friends; friends can become family. Sometimes when families make each other into strangers, they can also become a better family.

I have had an amazing life, David. I have been successful beyond expectation. Some call me a dreamer. Some call me a dream interpreter. Some just call me “sir.” But it took me a lifetime to realize that what was most important to me was to be called a brother.

Happy Thanksgiving (And a joyous Hanuka),

Joseph

Ending Hunger

“All the troubles of the world are assembled on one side and poverty is on the other.”

Midrash Rabbah Exodus 31:12

All the talk today is about turkey: how to baste one, how not to baste one. Sutffing or no stuffing? Ethnic recipes for American favorites. It’s getting pretty tiring, especially because when we reflect on world hunger, poverty and vulnerability right now, the talk seems even more trivial. It makes us even more conscious of Elie Wiesel’s words, “Hunger is isolating; it may not and cannot be experienced vicariously.  He who never felt hunger can never know its real effects, both tangible and intangible.  Hunger defies imagination; it even defies memory.  Hunger is felt only in the present.” When you are hungry, you can never imagine being full. When you are full, it is too easy to forget just how hungry you once were.

Perhaps because of the difficult of empathy in this instance, rabbinic literature had to express itself on the matter emphatically, like the quote above. No matter what your problem, put it on one side of the scale and add on to it, and you will still not match the weight and burden of poverty. Poverty is never seen as a religiously redeeming state, as it is in some other faiths. In some faiths, those most spiritual beg for their food from others to teach humility. In our tradition, each person is mandated to give a fraction of his or her own food to the priests, levites, poor, widowed and orphans before eating, making a critical distinction between humility and indignity.

Jack London, author of The Call of the Wild, started his life as a poor man and observed that, “The very poor can always be depended upon. They never turn away the hungry.” When you know hunger that personally, it is impossible to turn away. A recent New Yorker profile on Jack London contends that this view of the universe was, for him, a basis of love: “…love is more likely to flourish amid need.”

The difficulty of feeling another’s poverty when you are not poor yourself, gave rise in rabbbinic literature to praise for those who do. “God says to Israel, ‘My Children, whenever you give sustenance to the poor, I regard it to you as though you gave sustenance to Me.’ Does God then eat and drink? No, but whenever you give food to the poor, God counts it as if you gave food to God” [Midrash Tannaim, Deuteronomy 15:10]

It is remarkable that in the rabbinic imagination humans are asked to transfer caring about the poor to caring about the divine since we associate one with great need and the Other to be without any need. But if you cannot muster the compassion to give because your heart aches in the presence of the hungry, then at least give because God shines on you at that moment.

This coming week, many people will overspend their normal budget to purchase beautiful food for a holiday table, much of which will become leftovers and then – as it molds in the fridge – get thrown out. What will you do this week to reduce the waste and share the abundance you have been given, to make this a week to give thanks for being the hand that can give rather than the hand that receives?

We will close with another stunning midrash, this one on Pslams 118:17: “When you are asked in the world to come, ‘What was your work?’ and you answer: ‘I fed the hungry,’ you will be told: ‘This is the gate of the Lord, enter into it, you who have fed the hungry.’”

Shabbat Shalom

Preserving History

“Get a scroll an write upon it all the words that I have spoken…”

Jeremiah 36:2

In the book of Jeremiah, as the political situation of the Jews crumbles in Judah, word came to the prophet to write down what was happening and exhort the Jews to change lest they suffer exile. Jeremiah was in prison at the time and requested a scribe who took dictation and then read the scroll to the public. A member of the listening audience took these words and brought them to officials who brought them to the king, whose rule was maligned in the scroll.

The king asked for the scroll, and when it was delivered, the king cut it into pieces and threw it in the fire. His ministers begged him not to destroy it, but to no avail.

In May of 2003, 16 American soldiers entered the Mukhabarat, Sadam Hussein’s intelligence service headquarters, looking for weapons of mass destruction. Instead, they found “weapons” of mass instruction: 2,700 Jewish books and tens of thousands of documents related to the Iraqi Jewish community. There were also 48 Torah scroll fragments but no whole Torahs. Most of them were damaged – water-logged, dirty or ripped. What were these documents doing there?

If we back up more than a half-century, to 1949, there were 130,000 Jews living in Iraq. But the political situation for Jews living in Iraq had begun heating up more than a decade earlier; many senior Iraqi officials were Nazi sympathizers and supporters. As tensions increased, 120,000 Jews took advantage of Operation Ezra and Nehemiah in 1950-51 and were airlifted to Israel. In 1967, nine Jews were publically hanged, and the last Jewish school closed its doors in 1973. In the 1960s, the Baath party confiscated Jewish documents as an act of scrutiny and anti-Semitism, disabling the Iraqi Jewish community from preserving its documentary history.

Enter the Americans. When these soldiers discovered this treasury, they contacted America’s National Archives for recommendations on how to salvage the mess. They recommended freezer trucks to stabilize the documents from water damage. In the middle of a hot summer, they managed to locate a freezer truck and later sent 26 trunk-loads to Texas for drying and cleaning that then went to the National Archives. Today, you can see some of these finds on exhibit there, documenting not only the community but also the remarkable, painstaking process of salvaging, preserving and digitalizing the documents before sending the collection back to Iraq.

Naturally, there are people questioning whether a return to Iraq is advisable given the investment the US government has made in saving a collection that could have easily gone to ruin under Iraqi government hands. Who will ultimately hold the keys to this important piece of our history?

Walking through the exhibit, I saw a page of Talmud, published in Venice in 1793 open to Tractate Yoma, the very tractate currently being studied today in daf yomi, our daily Talmud study project. The Torah fragment contained the Torah reading of Lekh Lekha, Abraham’s journey in ancient Mesopotamia to Canaan. The Talmud itself was developed in study halls and academies originally located in an around Iraq. But almost all that rich and celebrated history is gone now.

Returning to the book of Jeremiah, word got to Jeremiah in his prison cell that the king destroyed his scroll. And then he got his next order: “The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah after the king had burned the scroll…Get yourself another scroll, and write upon it the same words…”

We are deeply grateful – at this time of Thanksgiving – for the intervention of the United States government in preserving our history. We also know from the ancient days of Jeremiah, that you can destroy our books, but they are so much a part of who we are, we will write them down again. “Get yourself another scroll and write upon it the same words…” Parchment may be destroyed, but our words live on and on.

Shabbat Shalom