What do I say to my daughter?

What Do I Say to My Daughter?

The human mind is an amazing organ. It works at speeds we cannot even measure, yet leaves us feeling as if we are in total control. When the phone rang Tuesday at about 1 PM, and Elizabeth beeped through on the intercom to say that it was Emily, I had a second, maybe 2, to react between hearing the words, uttering “Thanks,” and clicking the button to talk to my 17 year old daughter.

In that second or two, like a classic scene from an old Marx Brothers’ film, I had done the full inventory. I had seen her leave the house to go student teach. If something had happened in that mile and half to her or the car, I would already have known before I had left the house to come into the office. So she was at school, where she should be working with her second graders, not calling me. Something must be wrong. Or maybe not – maybe they are in a special, and she has a minute or two, and she forgot to tell me something, or something just came up.

By the time I heard her voice, I was already regaining my sense of calm. As soon as I heard her, I no longer was. I could hear her pain and confusion. The words, clearly spoken, made no sense, as much as I understood exactly what she had said. “Where are you?” I asked. “Still at school,” she replied, “But about to head home.” “Would you rather come here?” I asked. “Yes, daddy,” she cried.

Even as I fretted about whether she was in any condition to drive, my training as a Rabbi kicked in. I knew I had roughly 12 minutes. Not much time. And much to do. I needed to confirm that the news that had started this whole scene in motion was, in fact, true, even though I knew that it must be, for not even a teenager could make something like this up as a joke. I needed to figure out who I could safely call to get that confirmation, and whatever other information was available to try to make sense of the unimaginable. And I needed to hold it together, at least for a few more minutes, because the worst was still to come.

The first three phone calls all went to voice mail. I rechecked my e-mails and Facebook, looking for that telltale first sign of the impending deluge. Still nothing there. In desperation, I called the Camp Harlam office, not at all sure that they would know, but knowing that if they hadn’t heard anything, I would be able to get the next number I needed to call from them.

I knew the person who answered the phone. I could have asked her. But I needed one of the stalwarts – someone to whom I could risk saying the unthinkable without fear of losing face. I had just connected to Howard when I heard the doorbell. I realized that Emily would not hear the confirmation she was dreading from me, but rather with me.

And so it was that as Emily walked into my office, we both heard Howard say, “Sorry to say, it is true.” With that, Emily collapsed on my couch and broke down. I attempted to confront the emotions I could no longer control while asking the needed follow-up questions, that sadly brought no useful information, before hanging up and returning to Daddy mode.

Yesterday was the day that every parent fears. It was the day my daughter came face-to-face with life, when one of her close friends died. Sure we had been through two grandmothers and two great-grandmothers, even in an unfortunately compressed time period that cast a shadow on Emily’s Bat Mitzvah celebration, still. Sure, we had been through my surgery in that same period. Serious, to be sure, but thankfully, I am still around for moments like this. And yes, I have buried teens and twenty-somethings, and somehow found the words to say and the ways to say them and keep my own emotions in check.

But none of that can possibly prepare you for having to console your own child while she is mourning the death of someone as close as Mitch was to her. Not when, as was the case here, I knew the kid. I liked the kid. I respected the kid. And I like and respect his parents, too. What must they be going through at this moment?

That thought cleared my self-indulgence for a second. How dare I whine at this moment – I can hug my daughter, and try to comfort her, and wipe her tears away, and tell her I love her. Rex and Rachel no longer can. The only thing that would prevent them from trading positions with me at this moment is the knowledge of what they would be subjecting me to – and even that probably wouldn’t stop them, through no weakness of their own!

I held her close to me, and encouraged her to let it all out. I think, I hope, I told her I loved her at that moment – I know I did several more times throughout the day (and I can only hope she heard it, and allowed it to sink into her through the pain and questioning).

And I admitted the truth to her – that I had no idea what to say to her in this moment of pain and grief. It wasn’t until much later in the day that I even stopped and wondered if she might have heard in those words not the permission for her to be without words that I had intended, but rather some weakness or shortcoming in her father that kept him from being all that she needed in her hour of need. After all, Daddy – you are a Rabbi. You are supposed to get this death stuff. And we all know you have words for EVERY occasion!

And the truth is, I had many words. Just none that would help. None that yet made sense. A 17 year old boy had died. Not in a car accident on slick roads. Not from anything suspicious looking – not this kid. Mitch was a kid who if, God forbid, he had been found dead next to an empty bottle of wine, and an empty pill container, your first reaction would have been “Who else has been here, and left these bottles!” Not that either of those circumstances would have lessened the pain any – now or later.

But, at least, they would have provided a sense of a familiar paradigm, something to grasp onto in this moment of asking WHY? in the face of the unimaginable. Whenever a parent has to bury and mourn a child, the sense of a break in what we consider to be the natural order of life adds profoundly to the sadness. At least one of the more familiar scenarios would have given back at least (at most?) a small corner of that order.

But, instead, Mitch’s parents, two Rabbis, found their good kid, who was loved by everyone who knew him, that morning, and the medical folks could not revive him. No obvious cause. No clear sense that something was out of the ordinary. One minute, he was chatting online with Emily and some other friends. The next, he was going to sleep, never fully to wake up again!

How could I, the father of a grieving teenage daughter, hope to help my child deal with what she would later call, “ for real, the worst thing I have ever had to deal with”? How could I answer her questions, that she could not even bring herself to frame yet, when I could not answer them for myself? How could I help her to help her boyfriend, Mitch’s best friend, as he was first hearing the news, and then trying to make sense of it himself? Where could I find the strength to reassure her that it will be okay, when I was not yet convinced myself? Dealing with our own mortality leads to this kind of challenge!

I need to find these answers for myself. I need to be able to help her find them for herself. Only THEN can I help her to help her friends. Only then can I be the Rabbi that these kids expect me to be, and will need me to be tomorrow at the funeral. Only then can I help my friends deal with the death of their son. No one ever said being a Rabbi would be easy. No one ever said life was easy. Today, at least, it still is not!

In their own words

[Ed. note: Of course, after I posted these, our President spoke last night as well. Rather than give his words their own place -- as richly as I personally believe that they deserve such honor -- I choose to add them here, as part of the larger discussion.

http://thepoliticalcarnival.net/2011/01/12/video-president-obamas-entire-memorial-speech-in-tucson-az/ ]


It has been a VERY busy weekend and start to the week, and sadly, little of the news was good. Having felt the need not only to post my sermon early, but to add 2 additional posts on the shootings in Arizona, and the death of Debbie Friedman, I am truly tapped out at this moment.

So allow me to do one of the other thinks this blog was created to do -- expose other opinions and words that I find particularly well written, insightful, or merely significant enough to share to those whose opinions matter to me.

Those who are friends with me on facebook have already gotten access to all four of these. I recommend each highly, in its own way:

1. USA Today's Mike LoPresti compares apples to oranges in Arizona, and scores a huge success that should make us ll stop and think -- a Pulitzer worthy column if I have ever read one...

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/columnist/lopresti/2011-01-10-bcs-early_N.htm

2. Jon Stewart's opening monologue from Monday evening, in full context, in his own voice. Regardless of your politics, this is a must listen. Remember when the movie Network first came out, and we all cringed at the idea of news becoming entertainment? Here is a guy who has turned entertainment into news, and does it darned well...

http://thecelebritycafe.com/feature/jon-stewarts-moving-monologue-arizona-shooting-01-11-2011

3. Again, irrespective of your politics, both the video itself, allowing us all to hear her words in her own voice, and the analysis that accompanies it, are de rigeur:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/12/AR2011011202145.html

and, btw, when you are finished, listen to it again, and start to deconstruct what you are seeing and hearing, because:

4. Palin's clearly deliberate use of the phrase "blood libel" in her response to the Arizona shootings and their aftermath is one that should make those of us who are Jewish, and all people, a little uncomfortable. Here is a VERY restrained but on the money, response to that usage and more:

http://www.njdc.org/blog/post/palinrelease011210/

If these 4 don't get people thinking and talking and acting for the better, I don't know what might.

"By Spirit Alone..."

Debbie Friedman, zichronah livrachah
An appreciation and reminiscence
Rabbi Steve Weisman – Temple Solel, Bowie MD – January 9, 2011

I should be watching a football game right now. Or getting information out to my congregation, or finishing those recommendations that have to get into the mail tomorrow. But at this moment I can do none of those things. Instead, I am remembering one of the towering Jewish personalities of my own lifetime, Debbie Friedman.

If you are reading this, you know me well enough to know the powerful place that Jewish summer camping had in my youth, and continues to have in my life still today as a 50 year old Rabbi. I think it is very safe to say that Debbie was among the most, if not THE most, significant influences on me in that environment.

It was my very first summer at Camp Harlam. Late June and July of 1971. I was a little shy of my 11th birthday, having just completed 5th grade, still an only child, in a new place. My family had joined the white flight from Queens, NY to Long Island. My Jewish education from my very secularized parents at the time of our move consisted of a year of Workman’s Circle Sunday school at the local YM-YWHA learning Yiddish and Jewish culture, and whatever little bit I had picked up from my great-grandfather, mostly at Passover seders that were a mystery to me. Despite this, I was thrust into the religious school of the Conservative congregation in our new home town, because membership in the Reform congregation had been capped. I had learned a lot, even enjoyed that learning, but, honestly, it was all theoretical. There was little grounding in the reality of my parents’ home. We attended services only on the High Holy Days, and there was ambivalence about my participation with them on those days.

It was from that environment and experience that I drew as I tried to adjust to this amazing new world of Jewish summer camp. In the dining hall the very first evening, we were all introduced to the diminutive young woman with the guitar who would be our songleader. She may have been short in stature -- but we quickly learned that what she lacked in altitude, she more than made up for with ru'ach -- with spirit! She led us that first night in a few songs, mostly from the Zionist classics (I know now!), so a couple were actually familiar.

But it was at Shabbat evening services, themselves a new phenomenon for me, that I was to get my first taste of what the rest of my life would be. For it was there and then that Debbie Friedman was free to be her real self. We sang several of her melodies to the prayers, which themselves were only mildly familiar. But there was English! So I could understand what was being said, unlike at home. And guitar! And melodies that were upbeat, and welcoming. Little did I realize that I was far from the only one experiencing this phenomenon for the first time. But it mattered not – even though it was foreign, and new, I was hooked!

I, and we, soon came to learn that Debbie herself had written several of these melodies. She had even recorded an album. This knowledge made her a rock star – literally – in our young eyes. But, far from separating herself from us, Debbie was an integral part of our camp experience. When, during the second week of camp, she came into our bunk at bedtime to sing some songs with us and help put us to bed, we saw the person up close. She was real, and even though not much older than us, clearly someone to be admired and looked up to.

When I returned home, it was as much Debbie and the music that came with me, energizing my stories, as anything else I experienced. That was also the year that we switched over, finally, to the Reform congregation, and I began to be prepared for my Bar Mitzvah celebration. It was a perfect storm. And at the eye of that storm, the heart of our youth programs through the following years, the center of my own Jewish soul as it developed, was the music, nurtured literally by EVERY major name of that amazing first generation, between my involvements at Harlam and then Eisner, as well as NFTY in the New York of the 70’s. But it all began for me, as it did for so many others, with Debbie Friedman – her music, her spirit, her example.

As I look back, I marvel to remember that our Cantor, like so many others in the 70s, would not allow Debbie’s music into the sanctuary for far too many years. It seems inconceivable now, but it was true. We had to fight to be allowed to use our own guitars and choose on own music, even for youth group services! Thankfully, that turf-driven myopia passed long ago, if far after it should have!

I remember my daughter Emily’s first experience of Debbie – in a concert at Carnegie Hall. By then I was a guitar-playing Rabbi, Debbie’s music was already familiar to my young daughter. I remember seeing Peter Yarrow – Peter Yarrow! – sitting in the third row, center aisle, through most of the concert, until he got up and walked through a side door, only to reappear onstage with Debbie. And I remember how her music even influenced my parents, and was one of the avenues that they followed to comfortable involvement in congregational life themselves!

Despite the slights of the professional Cantorate early on, despite the incredible delay in welcoming her to the faculty of the Cantorial school at HUC-JIR only in relatively recent years, I will remember what a role model Debbie was to an entire generation of woman Cantors, and how she supported their efforts and encouraged them as both performers and spiritual leaders. Those who have enjoyed and been spiritually moved by a female Cantor in the last 20 years, probably owe a similar debt of gratitude directly to Debbie Friedman.

She gave Miriam the voice at the moment of our salvation at the Sea that the text tradition seems to have limited. She taught us at Chanukkah to respect the words of the prophet Zechariah, “Not by might, and not by power, but by (God’s) spirit – shall we all live in peace.” She even taught us to think of the batter of the latkes sitting in a blender, and learn from it to care more about those in need around us!

She taught us how to pray, and how to work, to bring healing to ourselves and to others. Sadly, now, we must come to grips with the fact that our singing her words and her melodies in her hour of need were not enough to bring her back to us in health. Apparently, God has need for a singer and songwriter and mentor and teacher and role model in the afterlife – and God has made the best choice possible.

I end, with thanks to my colleague and friend, Don Rossoff – she DID teach us all to “Sing a new song, sing a new song unto God.” And to Rabbi Rob Nosanchuk, whose use of these words got up on facebook before I could post, the words Debbie adapted from the tradition and set to music as The Travelers’ Prayer (adapted only slightly to fit this moment):

May you be blessed as you go on your way.
May you be guided in peace.
May (your) strength and compassion find their way to every soul.
This (is) your blessing (-- and your legacy). Amen.

A Nation in Shock

A Call for Calm Words and Action in an Hour of Crisis
Rabbi Steve Weisman – Temple Solel, Bowie MD
January 8, 2011 6:30 PM EST

The shocking and senseless shooting attack on Representative Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona earlier today leaves all people of conscience stunned and outraged. That this event occurred during a public event in which she was doing her job of meeting with her constituents, so that she might better represent them in Congress, in this era of widespread discontent with our elected leadership for being out-of-touch, adds a touch of painful irony to an already horrendous event. That at least 5 innocent bystanders, among them a federal judge and a 9 year old girl, died in this assault, and as many as a dozen others were wounded, adds further pain to this inconceivable occurrence.

At this relatively early hour, so close to the event, we already have a suspect in custody and publicly identified – a 22 year old, described in some reports as a military veteran. Such an identification would be even more troubling, but it is important to remember that his arrest does NOT mean he is guilty, or even involved. Only time and further investigation will be able to prove – or disprove – that assertion, or any of the many of the “details” currently being aired.

There are many – from all positions on the political spectrum, who have already rushed to judgment in making connections or proposing motivations, and causes. NONE of these have yet been proven either, and in this moment of our shocked response to tragedy, they do little to help bring calm or understanding. Indeed, initial reports had the Congresswoman dying in the attack, a report which has thankfully proven erroneous. And many of us remember the hours following the attack on the federal building in Oklahoma City, in which most media outlets assumed, erroneously, a connection to foreign terror groups.

What is needed right now is national calm, prayer and caring concern for all of the victims and their families – those who have suffered losses that thankfully, few if any of us can imagine. That, and a unanimous condemnation of the actions of those responsible. Nothing else would be an appropriate reaction.

However, as the hours and days will pass, we will likely learn a great deal more about those involved – whether we wish to or not. What we have learned already has led to wild speculation in numerous areas of national policy debate and disagreement, and irresponsible calls from both sides that are neither supported by facts nor an adequate expression of responsibility on the part of our political system.

The best result we can demand as a nation for an outcome from such a tragedy is a full and transparent investigation which leads to a clear and unquestionably accurate conviction of those responsible, with appropriate sentencing to follow. Those whose sense of outrage has led them to make intemperate statements about those accused of such a crime being unworthy of Constitutional protections fail to grasp the true significance of those rights guaranteed to all citizens of our country.

But similarly, those who have called for a deliberate attempt NOT to politicize the shooting of a politician in broad daylight seem more motivated by fear of what a full investigation might disclose than a sincere desire to protect our nation from additional pain.

Whatever motives and connection may yet be proven, it is clear that this tragedy obligates our nation, in its aftermath, to seriously, and honestly, without politics or rhetoric, explore deeply a number of issues which may have entered into this shooting. These include, but are not limited to:

Gun control
Protection of our elected leaders
Immigration and border policies
Care of military veterans
The tone and tenor of political campaign materials
The tone and tenor of political discourse, and our continuing rush to the extremes as a nation
The level of violence in our society in general.

Only then can the victims of this attack, which tonight includes every American, hope to achieve closure, and gain some sense of normalcy in the aftermath of this tragedy. Let us all pray and work for our country, now even more than ever.

An Ethical Challenge of Biblical proportions

Ed. Note: That this sermon was delivered in the shadow of a series of terror-inducing mail bombs in our immediate area, and on the eve of the cowardly shooting of an elected United States Congressperson, and murder and injury to multiple innocent bystanders, the questions raised seem only MORE significant as I post it, less that 24 hours later, and earlier than usual.

Be Careful What You Think You Know –
Sermon for Parshat Bo January 7, 2011
Rabbi Steve Weisman – Temple Solel, Bowie MD

Friends, my words tonight will be an incredible challenge to many of us. They were an incredible challenge to write, and an even greater challenge to decide to share. But, in a week in which we learned that a jury found innocent the man whose car struck and killed our friend, Dick Greenstein, we are already troubled and challenged, as we seek to make sense of an unthinkable tragedy, to reach out to our friends whose grief and mourning for a beloved parent and grandparent has been denied the full closure they sought and needed, even as we need to adjust our assumptions about what happened and why, yet still maintain our faith! In a week in which I have shared with our congregation, online, an incredible article by Rabbi Schmuley Boteach on the proper role of the Rabbi, I, and we, SHOULD be moved to embrace our roles, even in the most challenging moments.

I warn us of the impending potential discomfort that I am going to create, not from a desire to remain well-liked in the face of diasagreement, nor from a desire to lessen the challenge of our text tonight, but rather from a sense of fairness and concern. Not all of us who came to services tonight came in a mood to be challenged. Those of you who did not, I extend my apologies to you in advance. But I cannot, and will not, refuse to share these thoughts on our portion this week merely out of fear that some might be made uncomfortable by them. For if I did, I would be guilty of what Rabbi Boteach accuses the Rabbinate of in his article. I would be guilty of perpetuating a silence that, to my mind, has gone on for far too long in our tradition. And, worst of all, I would deny us the opportunity to possibly resolve what appears to be a huge disconnect between our faith and our ethics, that stems from the content of our portion for this Shabbat!

You see, we come back to our Torah text for another Shabbat, and we find ourselves with a very familiar and expected story on the one hand, yet, if we are careful readers, a couple of daunting challenges to what we think we know and believe. And that is outside of the usual difficulty we have simply in dealing with a text that appears to have God limiting Pharaoh’s free-will as an excuse to kill many Egyptians!

In parshat Bo, our story picks up with the lead-up to the 8th plague – locusts. Before the plague is sent, however, there is some significant by-play. The portion actually begins with a conversation between God and Moses that leaves little doubt but that we are supposed to understand that God is pulling the strings on Pharaoh like a master puppeteer. God is doing this, according to the text “that you may recount in the hearing of your children and of your children’s children how I made a mockery of the Egyptians…” This idea should give us pause, as I hope it is contrary to the theologies that most of us are comfortable with in our own lives. I am sure there must be times that believing that your God will abuse your enemies might be a valuable psychological construct, but it sure is a poor basis for an ethical system by which to live our lives!

Fortunately, the same explanation concludes, “in order that YOU may know that I am the Eternal.” The REAL reason for this elaborate puppet show, we are told, is because WE need to be reminded what our God is capable of doing to others, for us. A powerful statement of why we should worship God – and one that works as both positive and negative reinforcement. For those who are motivated by the carrot, we are thankful for all that God has done, and for God’s protection. For those who need the stick, look at what God did to the Egyptians, and imagine what God is capable of doing to us if we ever deserve punishment!

This last bit turns the heat off of God’s behavior, and focuses it on ours. What does it say about US that we need our God to go to such extremes in order for us to recognize the power of our God?! So, from the opening paragraph, we are already being forced to confront ugly truths about our ancestors, if not ourselves, and to deal with theologically challenging events. And it is only going to get worse as we go!

Pharaoh’s courtiers question the wisdom in continuing to prevent the Israelites from going out to worship, as Moses has requested. Even those advisors closest to Pharaoh have already read the handwriting on the wall far more accurately than Pharaoh is being allowed to do. And this change of heart from his most trusted advisors leads Pharaoh, still BEFORE the onset of the locust hordes, to summon Moses and Aaron, and accede to their last request to go to worship their God. Once again, Moses, instead of accepting the change of heart, ups the ante on what Pharaoh needs to allow, leading to further stalemate, and leading to the onset of the plague.

With the arrival of the plague, it appears Pharaoh is ready to cave in completely. He immediately admits his guilt before Moses and Aaron, and begs for an end to the plague. Moses must have been impressed by Pharaoh’s sincerity, as he immediately asked God to relent. And God did, but then immediately pulled the strings again on Pharaoh’s heart, to justify the 9th plague – darkness. The impact is clear – Pharaoh again accedes to the last set of demands, only to have Moses AGAIN up the ante, and again we end up in stalemate and confrontation when it appears that resolution is at hand.

All of this, even before we get to the killing of the first born, HAS TO make us wonder what is really going on here. Scholars have, for years, viewed the plagues in mythological terms – as a confrontation between godheads. Our One God on one side, and the pantheon of Egypt on the other. Starting with the Nile River God, and working in crescendo up to these last three plagues – in which first holy scarabs are turned against Egypt, then the Sun God Aton-Ra is literally eclipsed. Only the Pharaoh himself – seen in ancient Egypt as divine – remains of the Gods of Egypt. And the 10th plague will surely take care of that last item as well!

For the ancient world, such a story was clear – it worked. AND, because it worked, because OUR God emerged supreme, whatever ethical issues might have been raised would have been dismissed as minor quibbles. But for us modern readers, too many of whom already have God issues, we find the ethics troubling, and are not as easily assuaged to dismiss those concerns in acknowledging the victory of our God. This, too, is not our theology. But the REAL problems are about to begin!

At the start of the SECOND chapter of Bo, God is about to prepare us for the 10th and last plague. But first, God gives Moses THIS astounding command: I will bring but one more plague upon Pharaoh and upon Egypt; after that he shall let you go… Tell the people to BORROW, each man from his neighbor and each woman from hers, objects of silver and gold.” Borrow? After telling Moses that we are about to leave for good? How is this BORROWING? There can be no intent to return these items!

We moderns hear this story, and are troubled greatly – or should be -- even though the text tells us that the Eternal disposed the Egyptians favorably toward us and our request. So, we do what, surprisingly, our ancestors do not seem to have been willing or able to do. We ask the tough question, and make the challenging comparison.
We remember the midrash on Noah, that asked whether he was absolutely a blameless man, despite living in an age of violence and lawlessness, deserving to be wiped out. Or was he merely apparently a righteous man – nothing more than the best of a bad lot?

We remember the similar midrashic debate about Moses at the Burning Bush – did the Bush confirm Moses’ status as the one to lead us out of Egypt, because only Moses saw something worth turning aside and investigating that everyone before him had missed? Or did God place the bush there FOR Moses to see, to justify a decision already made?

But then WE compare Moses to Abraham – just as the Midrash tried to compare Noah to Abraham. The Abraham who seemed to blindly follow God’s commands, and attempted to sacrifice Isaac, seems VERY similar to the Moses we see here. BUT, the Abraham who argued and negotiated with God over the fate of the inhabitants of Sodom and Gemorrah, and didn’t rest until he would only have been negotiating for those who were his own family, clearly seems morally superior to the Moses we see here. Where, after all, is Moses, questioning the idea of BORROWING that is not borrowing, but is clearly meant to serve as a way to give reparations to God’s people for their years of servitude? Where is Moses, after the stunning reversals of Pharaoh; the words of God, almost bragging about being the puppet-master; and the suffering he has seen inflicted on the PEOPLE of Egypt through 9 plagues, showing even a shred of the caring and concern towards others which led him to slay the task-master in his youth?

Moses, our great LEADER, appears at this critical juncture to have been reduced, himself, to being just another pawn in God’s chess game with the gods of Egypt. While THAT, in itself, may NOT be so troubling to us – would that more leaders today, in all walks of life, had the hubris to acknowledge THAT truth – it raises other issues for us as modern readers. Are we ALL just God’s pawns? If so, where then is free will?

The Rabbis of old were troubled by this as well. They phrased their question far differently, however. They PRESUMED that we DO have free will, and therefore needed to find what it was that distinguished THIS generation as the one worthy of being redeemed! And they found answers that worked for them. However, taken together, those answers, at least to me, do not outweigh the negative of, effectively, wholesale THEFT from the Egyptians! Even as some kind of reparation.

And, I believe, even the Biblical author(s) and editor(s), were troubled here as well, because the last huge problem of the text tonight appears to be an attempt to ANSWER this question of worthiness – an answer, interestingly, that the Midrash itself does not choose to use!

Chapter 12, the third and final chapter of Bo, begins with God giving Moses further instructions for the people to follow. God tells Moses: “Speak to the whole community of Israel, and say that on the 10th of this month, each of them shall take a lamb to a family, a lamb to a household.” After some discussion of what to do when a family can’t consume a whole lamb themselves, and what qualities the lamb should have, God continues: “You shall keep watch over it until the 14th day of this month; and all the assembled congregation of the Israelites shall slaughter it at twilight.” The instructions continue by telling us to use the blood of this sacrificial lamb to mark our homes so the Angel of Death will know to Pass Over us, and telling us to eat the lamb afterwards, dressed and ready for flight, because the 10th plague is coming, and all the first born of Egypt shall die.

The last words of the text before the onset of this 10th plague tell us: “The people then bowed low in homage. And the Israelites went and did so; just as the Eternal had commanded Moses and Aaron, so they did.” It is clear that the people obeyed what they were told to do by God through Moses and Aaron! One might think that by protecting themselves from the Angel of Death, our ancestors proved worthy of being saved, by following God’s commanded word!

However, looked at another way, this actually becomes the greatest indictment of the people and Moses -- for allowing unnecessary pain and suffering and wholesale death! Assuming that these words were delivered by Moses no later than the 9th day of the month, to allow the people to prepare to take the lamb the following day, our people had at least FIVE DAYS WARNING of what was to come! Where was the effort to save their neighbors from the horrible fate that awaited them? Why (and how) was there not even a leak of information to the Egyptians? Were Moses and our ancestors SO consumed that, after so long, the freedom that they had waited for was finally at hand, that they allowed a sense of entitlement or a desire for revenge to silence them to the ethical challenge of knowing that a holocaust was about to occur? If so, HOW could this generation been deemed worthy of salvation?
How has a text that leaves open such damning questions become canonized, and gone unchallenged by our tradition? And what does it say about those who came before us, and about us, that there has been virtual silence in the face of such an accusation? Has generation after generation been so blind to this reading? Is that whither the silence? Or is something more conspiratorial or fear-induced at work here? Is the silence caused by the unease of generations of learned Jews at the thought that opening the question might force many to question the origins of the Biblical text, or worse, the text’s ethical imperative for us? Even if that IS the explanation, it has been a couple of centuries since scholars have let the genie of the text’s origins out of the lamp. And since the genie isn’t going back into the lamp anytime soon, why haven’t WE moderns done what those before us were unable or unwilling to do? Especially we post-moderns, who experienced the Holocaust of World War II, and its aftermath, ourselves? I do not know! But I am INCREDIBLY troubled to recognize that this still appears to be the case!

Sure, there are answers given in every era of our tradition to justify God’s behavior during the Egyptian plagues. But suddenly, they seem far emptier than before, far more rationalization than acceptable answer. But then again, isn’t that true of most efforts to make theological sense of what the Nazis did to us and to so many others? Why shouldn’t that same sense of emptiness apply here for us?

And honestly, compared to this indictment, the inconvenient truth that is usually raised about this early warning to the people of what is about to come in the 10th plague, and how to prepare themselves for it – that it completely puts the lie to the traditional reason why we eat unleavened bread at Passover (namely, that we didn’t have enough time to let the dough properly rise) seems trivial at best!

Friends, tonight we begin a textual celebration of our ancestors’ freedom from physical servitude in Egypt, one that concludes next Shabbat, when our Bat Mitzvah will read of our escape at the Sea. It so happens that she will do so this year on the weekend on which we celebrate the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., whose life and death were themselves a text of speaking truth to power – exactly what appears to be missing in our text for this Shabbat! That celebration in our text is capped off on the following Shabbat when we and our ancestors directly experience God at Sinai. Heady stuff, indeed!

At this season of a new secular year, I pray that we might find the strength, and the integrity, to confront these brutally challenging issues for us as Jews, raised by our own text; to regain a sense of consistency and meaning in our sacred text that helps us to make sense of our lives and brings an order to our world. I pray this not merely for its own sake, and ours, but so that we might once again be elevated by our Jewish tradition, moved to work for what is right for all people, empowered to question what needs to be questioned, and willing and able to sit together with others to seek real and lasting solutions. Until we can come to that table relatively untroubled by our own experiences and understandings, we can hardly be expected to give our best efforts to finding the common ground that unites us all as God’s creation, nor to recognize and value the differences in others that make us all unique.

I warned you this wasn’t going to be easy! It still isn’t. I pray that we are willing and able to rise to the challenge, and in the process, help to make it easier in the future! KYR

A New Year's Resolution -- And a Link to Challenge us All

I begin by wishing everyone a Happy 2011! As I pointed out in my remarks to my congregation on New Year's Eve -- a sermon given with no notes, hence its absence from these pages -- there is assuredly no more arbitrary celebration in the human history of time than making Midnight on January 1st into New Years! Nonetheless, it IS a new year, and with that observance goes a strong tradition of making resolutions -- even if this was likely transferred from the self-inventorying that our Jewish New Year -- Rosh Hashanah -- obligates us to undertake.

My own resolution, acted on here today, is to catch up and keep current in the Weis Man corner of the blog-o-sphere. Between my injury, our anniversary celebration, the Bar Mitzvah, and the follow-up to those events, it was not easy -- but I make excuses. I invite you to catch up, and to stay tuned. There is much more to come in 2011!

And I start, besides by filling in all that was missing, as I have now done, with this link to an incredibly challenging and powerful blog by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. One that challenged me when I read it, and one which I hope will challenge ALL of us. And, in this case, one which I believe deserves an honest and open discussion.

And so, even as I list the link below, I hope that my readers (do I still have any readers) will take the couple of minutes to read Rabbi Boteach's column, and then respond to it here. For me personally, this will be a far more valuable discussion, as it will allow me to see how those who have already allowed me to be an influence in their lives feel on the issue of the role of the Rabbi today.

So, here is the link -- enjoy:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rabbi-shmuley-boteach/the-end-of-the-rabbi-as-m_b_801710.html

As always, I am never sure whether this is being read as a link or not. If you cannot click on the address above and get directly to the article, please cut it and paste it into your browser.

On Being Prepared

Be Prepared! – A Sermon for Parshat Mikeitz –
December 3, 2010 – 3rd Candle of Chanukkah
Rabbi Steve Weisman – Temple Solel, Bowie MD

Tonight, we celebrate the Shabbat that falls during Chanukkah. These 2 celebrations jammed together actually create a couple of conflicts for us, as we celebrate as the Solel mishpachah this evening. Shabbat, in our congregational practice, is a Friday night thing. We come together, recreate our extended communal family, and pray together, supporting each other in good times and bad. As part of that, we have included the traditional rituals of the Shabbat table in our communal celebration – the lighting of Shabbat candles, the qiddish over the wine, the offering of blessings, and the breaking of the challah bread together. According to the historians, Reform congregations started to add these home rituals when it became clear that the vast majority of homes no longer regularly practiced them.

But then, there is Chanukkah. One of the two most celebrated Jewish holidays in modern practice (the other is Passover). A much bigger deal in our era than it ever was before in Jewish history. The reasons for both of these phenomena seem clear. The celebration of Passover and Chanukkah are both centered in the home, not the sanctuary, and both revolve primarily around the children, making them both very attractive for celebration. The timing of Chanukkah, even this year, when it is about as far away from that other holiday as possible, is assuredly the reason for its growth in significance – it allows us to have our own celebration during the “Christmas season.” This, even though the truth is that there are only 3 elements that the two seasonal holidays share – the season, the giving of gifts, and the focus on celebration in the home with the kids and family. And, by the way, a good case can be made that there is a hugely artificial basis for all THREE commonalities!

But I do NOT want to preach about the December dilemma, or even about the Chanukkah story tonight. My message for this evening CAN be found in the Chanukkah story, if one looks closely enough. But it comes from the Torah portion, Mikeitz, which is ALMOST always the portion read during Chanukkah. However, to fully get the message, a quick synopsis of Chanukkah is necessary.

Many of you know that when it comes to Chanukkah, I take what can only be described as a “conspiracy theorist” point of view. Chanukkah was a holiday celebrating the Maccabees great victory – surviving against ridiculous odds against the Syrian-Greeks, who were hell-bent on wiping out Judaism, if not Jews. It was assuredly instituted by the Hasmoneans, the descendants and close followers of the Maccabees, who prevailed in the long drawn out civil war for the soul of the Jewish community that began BEFORE Antiochus, and did not end until almost 20 years AFTER the Temple was rededicated.

The Hasmoneans turned out, over the course of their almost 80 years in power, to be something other than the religious zealots we were mostly taught to view them as in our own youth. “Let all who are zealous for God follow me,” the rallying cry of Judah Maccabee during the fighting against Antiochus, was replaced with a clear willingness to assimilate both Greek and Roman trappings in subsequent generations. Indeed, so successful were the Hasmoneans, that MANY non-Jews were drawn to Judea and Judaism in their time. So much so, that the Chasidim, the most pious followers of the Hasmoneans, felt compelled to remove their support from their ruling party, for fear that the Jewishness of Judea was being compromised by this influx of outsiders.

That departure had two simultaneous effects. It weakened the Hasmonean rule enough to justify direct intervention by the Romans, a reality which eventually led to the destruction of the Temple. And when the Temple was destroyed, the Pharisees (the word means “Outsiders” in Hebrew) were there to take charge and keep things Jewish, albeit in a VERY different form. The Pharisees, no longer the outsiders, changed their name to the Rabbis, and re-formed Judaism for the next 2000 years. They were also, largely or wholely, quite likely the same group that used to be known as Chasidim when they supported the Hasmoneans!

Once in control, the Rabbis went about establishing their new vision of Judaism – where prayer from the heart offered in public, but locally, replaced physical sacrificial offerings at the central shrine in Jerusalem; where Torah was read publicly as part of the worship; and where the kitchen table became the miqdash m’at – the small sanctuary at which the ritual purity connected to the sacrifices was maintained through kashrut and the other traditions that evolved. They redid the festival calendar, adding some items, strengthening others, and removing still others. And, having been almost wiped out twice in 65 years by the Romans, they adopted a strong pacifist approach, in an effort to survive.

Chief among the changes to the calendar made by the Rabbis was the removal of almost all the Hasmonean created holidays and observances, since almost all were based on military victories or defeats. But, it wasn’t JUST their pacifist needs that motivated THESE changes – it was also their origins in, and eventual rejection of, the Hasmonean dynasty! And yet, for all their efforts, one holiday remained so popular that it could not be removed – Chanukkah. It struck a chord, AND, it fell at the darkest and slowest time of the year, one already being celebrated by the Romans around them. Try as they might, the Rabbis could not rid themselves of this last reminder – and trust me, they tried EVERYTHING. The Books of Maccabees kept out of the final canon of TaNaKH. No scroll assigned to be read on the holiday. No mention in the Mishnah, the 2nd century retooling of Jewish law for this new reality. Nothing!

Only when they realized they could not make this holiday go away, some 500 – 700 years AFTER the events it celebrated, did the Rabbis attach the story of the miracle of the oil to the celebration! If they couldn’t wipe Chanukkah out, they would at least tie it to their world view, however artificially. Don’t believe their embrace was late and artificial? According to the Rabbis themselves, the rule for saying the longest blessing formula limits its use to actions that are mitzvot – commanded in Torah. Yet, think about the first blessing we say for Chanukkah – the holiday surgically removed and excluded from ALL of TaNaKH! It still starts with those ten words of the long blessing formula, as if the basis for lighting the Chanukkiyah is Biblical!!

The LAST trick of the Rabbis was to jigger the annual cycle for reading Torah. They left us no smoking gun statement that THIS is WHY the cycle runs as it does, but I have always found it far more than a coincidence that Mikeitz is almost always read during Chanukkah. Could the story of Joseph’s survival and re-elevation from the depths of the jail to rise to second in command of Egypt, all while maintaining his Jewish identity be any MORE of an indictment, from the Rabbinic perspective, of why they split with the Hasmoneans in the first place?! The Haftarah they assigned to this portion is the story of Solomon, the two prostitutes, and the baby, as depicted on our windows – one which features cunning logic over brute force, and in which, like Joseph’s interpretative skills, Solomon’s wisdom is ascribed to God! And then, the kicker. The special haftarah for Chanukkah, from the prophet Zechariah, where he teaches “Not by might, and not by power, but by wisdom…”

Yes friends, this Shabbat’s message IS all about… PREPAREDNESS! And it begins in the Torah, which I believe was deliberately chosen for this Shabbat! Joseph was ready when called upon. His response to Pharaoh allowed Egypt to be prepared for a killer famine, and kept his own family alive when they sought food with him. The Rabbis were prepared to take control in the chaos that followed the destruction of the second Temple, and able to make their changes into the norm for years to come. Even when, as with the celebration of Chanukkah, the Rabbis couldn’t completely get their way, they had a Plan B prepared to fall back on!

Just imagine, for a second, where our country could be today if our elected leaders, over the last several decades, had been more interested in getting us prepared for the seismic changes in reality that we have experienced. Virtually EVERY major problem facing our country today could have been avoided, if we had been prepared, and able to be pro-active, rather than reactive. Now, on issues like our own economy in the global world, immigration, security, global warming, we are far behind the 8-ball, unable to find meaningful compromise between competing political ideologies to solve these real life problems! Tell the worker who has been unemployed since January why he still can’t find a job – because we were unprepared for the shift that globalization and technology would create! Tell them why they are in danger of getting a double whammy tacked on – an end to their long term unemployment benefits AND a loss of their tax cuts – because our elected leaders cannot compromise their antiquated ideologies, even to help those so obviously in need of assistance. No WONDER the Tea Party movement, and Obama before that, struck a chord with their calls for change!

But how can we change when no one has laid the proper ground work for it, when we weren’t prepared for the changes thrust upon us? This goes beyond the politicians – we have a system that has grown too large too fast, and now threatens our long term survival. Pollution is what we create best today, still; the natural resources with which we stoke the fires of progress are finite, yet we still have not accepted that truth. We have allowed technology to rule us, because we had no Joseph, prepared to tell us a bitter truth in advance, able to prepare us and guide us through a tough and challenging time.

Even in our own lives, how prepared are we for realities we could face? Coming up on 10 years after 9/11, not even a full year removed from the worst winter in a century, how many of us have taken the recommended precautions and routinely keep our home stocked with what we would need to remain indoors completely for 7 – 14 days? How many of us have the battery powered radio, the rotary powered phone, the back-up generator, to allow us to continue to live if and when the power goes out and stays out for a while, and we are unable to move? Sadly, I think we know the answer is that few of us are! And if we choose to remain unprepared on an individual level, it assuredly makes it that much harder for us to be a part of the solutions to the more global challenges we face.

So, on this third night of Chanukkah, as we come together as a congregational mishpachah, chanukkiyot in hand, to sing songs and light lights and exchange gifts, we owe it to ourselves and to our world to dig a little deeper into our Torah portion for this Shabbat and into the story we celebrate on this Chanukkah eve. We owe it to ourselves and our children to give the gift of being prepared – able and willing to respond to the challenges we face today, and preparing to face the challenges that assuredly await us tomorrow. Anything less would be to sit, cowering in the dark, when all we really needed to do was to light a light! KYR