From the Bimah: Jewish Lessons for Life

Shira and I spent the last two weeks of December at Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem being with our father. While attending to a loved one in these circumstances is obviously painful, at the same time, we marveled at how day-to-day life at Hadassah Hospital felt not only like Israel at its best, but almost like the fulfillment of prophetic visions of peace, of the lion and lamb dwelling together in harmony.   The patients, doctors, nurses, medical crews, cleaning and maintenance crews, cashiers in the restaurants and cafes, represent the enormous diversity of Israel: Haredi, religious Zionists, secular Israelis, Arab Israelis, Palestinian Israelis, Druse, side by side, in harmony. We were there during Hanukkah. Every night we would go to the community room on our floor and light candles with all the above. Outside of Hadassah, there would have been no connection. Inside of Hadassah, there was no distance. The only Haredi Israelis I have ever talked to were at Hadassah Hospital.   We are so blessed this Shabbat to have with us Hadassah’s head nurse, Rely Alon. Michelle, Elias and Dan will be in dialogue with Rely to ask her: Why do complex human relationships work so well in spite of difference at Hadassah, and not outside Hadassah? What can the rest of Israel and the Jewish people learn from Hadassah?

Dan is a board member of Repair the World (Jewish engagement through service) and the Friends of the Arava Institute (bringing Arabs and Jews together in Israel to address environmental and climate issues). He is a long-time member of Temple Emanuel and has, over the years, volunteered with other Jewish organizations, including Combined Jewish Philanthropies, JCDS, the Newton Centre Minyan, and Our Generation Speaks. In his free time, Dan created a software package for calculating income tax, as well as software to help attorneys and individuals with the financial aspects of divorce.

How do we think about Mother’s Day when our own mother has passed away? Even if we are blessed to have our mothers alive,  how do we think about lots of joyful moments in the spring season when that joy belongs to other people, but not to us?  How do we dance at somebody else’s adult child’s wedding when our own adult child is still looking? How do we feel joy for somebody else’s graduations when our own season of graduations is long gone, when young family energy is a distant memory? How do we attend a brit milah or baby naming for somebody else when there are no babies in our family? In our parched season, can we truly feel joy for somebody else? This is the question of the prophet Habakkuk in the Haftarah for Shavuot, second day:              Though the fig tree does not bud            And no yield is on the vine,            Though the olive crop has failed            And the fields produce no grain,            Though sheep have vanished from the fold            And no cattle are in the pen,             Yet will I rejoice in the Lord,            Exult in the God who delivers me. (3: 17-18)   I have bolded the word Yet to highlight the question: how, in a down time, do we exult, do we feel joy, do we nevertheless sing?  There is a Hebrew word to the rescue which we will discuss in Talmud tomorrow: firgun, which means to be genuinely happy for somebody else’s happiness.  Firgun has been described as the opposite of Schaudenfreude.  Firgun is such a spiritual challenge that there is no English equivalent. Can we do it? Are we capable of it? Can we nurture it within our own parched hearts?   Happy Mother’s Day.

If you are a Boston sports fan, two words inspire pathos: Boston Bruins. This past regular season, the Bruins enjoyed not just a successful season, but a historically successful season. The National Hockey League, NHL, is 106 years old. In the long history of the league, this year’s Bruins set the record for most wins in a season. They set the record for most points in a season. Not only did they win lots of games; they usually trounced their opponent. The NHL keeps a record of what is called goal differential: by how many goals did the winning team beat the losing team. Boston’s goal differential ranks second in history. During the regular season the Bruins could not have been more dominant. Meanwhile, their opponents in the playoffs, the Florida Panthers, could not have been more mediocre. Literally an average team, actually below average. Out of 32 teams, the Panthers had the 17th best record. They just barely made the playoffs. When the series started, the Bruins took a commanding 3-1 lead in a best of seven series. All they had to do was win one more game, a reasonable expectation for the team with the most points and wins in the history of the league. And yet, remarkably, the Bruins lost three games in a row, including game 7 at the Garden on Sunday night. In the wake of this historic collapse of this historic team, sports commentators broadly pointed out that the Bruins failed to finish. Failed to close. How should we think about finishing, about closing out a project?

When the history of twentieth-century Jewry is written, I believe that one of the most important, impactful, influential thinkers will be Rabbi Harold Kushner, who was laid to his eternal rest this past Monday. I do not know of a rabbi whose teaching had a broader reach or a bigger impact.  It is not just that his books sold millions of copies.  Not just that his books were translated into many languages.  Not just that his work was read by Jews and non-Jews alike.  Rabbi Harold Kushner did something else virtually miraculous: he talked about God in a way that landed for ordinary people who do not usually talk about God. What was his secret sauce? How did he make God real and relatable for millions of people, Jews and non-Jews alike? Now that he has passed, how can his Torah on God connect with you?   May Rabbi Harold Kushner rest in peace. May his Torah deepen our relationship with God, with Torah, with mitzvah, and with the very special community we are blessed to have at Temple Emanuel.

Join Rabbi Michelle Robinson and Jill Ebstein as they discuss Jill's book, "Alfred's Journey to be Liked". Find the book here!

April 29, 2023

Join Oren Kessler as he discusses his book, Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict.

For some reason--I don’t know why it happens, I just know that it happens--tensions seem to rise in a family before a big milestone or family simcha. People tend to argue. To bicker. To get into negative energy patterns. The classic example of weird negative energy preceding what should be a happy family time is a wedding. If you have ever planned a wedding, you know this. As the day draws near, anxiety rises. Lists proliferate. Who is going to go to Costco to get the bottled water and the small bags of Cape Cod potato chips? Who is going to the hotels to drop off the gifts baskets? We just had a Covid cancellation. We need to redo table 11. Simcha anxiety is such a well-known phenomenon that I tell every couple that I have ever worked with for their wedding to get out of the wedding business a week before their wedding—no more wedding details, no more wedding to do lists—so that they can spend that last week focusing on what matters: their love for one another. We the Jewish people are now having a case of simcha anxiety on steroids. Just 10 days from now—today is April 15, on the evening of April 25—we will mark what should be the most joyful milestone imaginable for our people: Israel’s 75th anniversary. This should be the happiest, or among the happiest, moments in Jewish history, but it is not. Three years after the Holocaust, three years after one-third of our people perished in the flames, three years after our lowest low, the State of Israel was founded, and we were recreated as a people. It is not just that there was a new Jewish state, but a new Jew: a Jew who was strong and vigorous, who had a home, who was not subject to pogroms and massacres. The State of Israel would provide not only a safe home, a sanctuary, for the Jewish people, but also a place of Jewish thriving, a renaissance of Jewish culture and letters and music and language. It would be a place where the finest Jewish values of our prophets and rabbis could be actually fulfilled in a sovereign state. Against all odds, what a miracle, Israel was created, and it is here 75 years later. And yet, like the joyful family milestone where the joy is not felt, but the bickering, the worrying, the quarreling, the joy of Israel is largely not being felt in this season of its 75th anniversary.

When I was home for Thanksgiving this year, my mom and I were going through some old boxes at the bottom of a closet when we came across a bag of colorful fabrics.  “What’s this?” I asked my mom. With a funny look on her face, my mom took the bag and started looking through it.  “This is the quilt I was going to make you when you were a baby.” Apparently, when I was born, my mom didn’t want to just be a stay-at-home caretaker.  She wanted to feel productive.  To be able to show something beyond a growing baby for the time she was spending at home.  Naturally, she decided to make a baby quilt.  She went to the fabric store and picked out a book of quilt patterns, she bought fabric and washed it, and then every day, when she would put me down for a nap, she would go and work on that quilt.  It all seemed to be going well until it came time to put the squares together.  Then, somehow, they wouldn’t fit.  At the time, my mom was so sleep-deprived that she couldn’t figure out how to make it work.  She threw those squares into a bag in frustration, and that bag of fabric squares and scraps has been sitting at the bottom of her closet for the last 33 years. When it was time to head back to Boston, I absconded with the bag intending to finish the quilt my mom started all those years ago.  I thought it would be a beautiful surprise for her and a gift for our baby—a quilt made over two generations.  I didn’t realize the quilt would come to teach me about what it means to honor legacy and to transmit values over the course of generations.

For those of you hearty enough to come to shul on the seventh day of Pesach, I want to share with you a love story—in fact a Pesach double love story.  But to appreciate this double love story, we need first to talk about halakha, Jewish law.  When was the last time that happened in a sermon?  The Torah commands us to have no chametz in our possession during the holiday of Pesach.  Chametz is  defined as five species of grain: wheat, barley, spelt, rye, and oats.  It is not just that we can’t eat chametz.  It is also that we cannot have chametz, cannot own chametz.  Our homes have to be chametz-free. Now we have all had the experience, when cleaning our house for Pesach, of finding in the back of the food pantry a stale box of crackers with the expiration date of February 2020.  We happily dispose of the stale crackers grateful for the impetus Pesach gives us to do a deep cleaning of our kitchen once a year. But what do we do with all the chametz that is fresh, the fresh boxes of pasta and crackers?  It would be wasteful to throw out perfectly good food.  So our tradition has evolved this legal fiction called mechirat chametz, selling our chametz to a gentile, to a person who is not commanded to have no chametz in their home.  Dan loves this mitzvah.  Starting around Thanksgiving, he will announce that it is time to start selling our chametz for Pesach.   This year Dan sold our chametz to our wonderful receptionist Rhiannon.  Since she is not Jewish, she is allowed to own as much chametz as she wants.  She owns the chametz of the members of Temple Emanuel who empowered Dan to sell to her.  Theoretically Rhiannon is legally allowed to enter your home, go to your basement, eat your crackers and pretzels, drink your beer, imbibe your scotch.  But it is a legal fiction.  It would never happen.  The point of this legal fiction is to gesture towards two competing values.  One, no chametz during Pesach. Two, don’t waste food.  When the holiday is over tomorrow night, Dan will buy back your chametz from Rhiannon.  As a result of this legal maneuver, you did not own any chametz on Pesach, and you did not waste perfectly good food. What does this dry legalism have to do with a love story?  Last week the Journal had a story about the halachic problems posed by observant dog owners during Pesach.  Dog food is rife with chametz.  It is made of forbidden grains.  It is true of course that we don’t eat dog food.  But the legal prohibition is not just not to eat it, but also not to have it in our possession.  Feeding our beloved dog Rover means having chametz in our homes.  What is an observant dog owner to do?

I recently heard a teaching that I experienced as an epiphany. The context was the Spark mission to Israel to celebrate its 75th anniversary leaving in a few weeks. Three hundred people from Greater Jewish Boston are going on nine buses. Marc Baker, the CEO of CJP, was speaking to the folks who were leading each of these buses. He shared that when he was still at Gann Academy, he was hired by CJP to lead a mission of young Jewish leaders from Boston called Acharai. The first thing he did was to change his title. He was hired to be a scholar. He did not want to be a scholar. He wanted to be a Jewish journey facilitator. The purpose of a scholar is to share facts. The purpose of a Jewish journey facilitator is to work with, to walk with, the people in your group to help them make meaning of the experience that they are in the middle of. He shared that on one very hard day the group went to one of the Nazi concentration camps. After confronting this unimaginable inhumanity, they were on the grounds outside the camp. All they wanted was space and silence to process the enormity of what they had just seen. But there was a concentration camp tour guide who started talking at them. Facts and factoids and figures about the camp. This talking head went over very badly. Marc cautioned us not to be that kind of talking head, who does not read the room, who sees their job as a one-way path of transmitting content and not as a two-way relationship of making sense of complexity. Then Marc shared a question that I have been turning over in my head ever since: Do you make space, or do you take up space?

Lhakpa Sherpa grew up impoverished in the shadow of Mount Everest.  Her father worked as a shepherd and her mother raised her along with her ten siblings.  They were dirt poor.  So poor that they couldn’t afford to buy shoes for the children, let alone to send Lhakpa to school.  Instead, she spent her days wandering barefoot through the mountains. Ever since she was little, Lhakpa has had one dream: she wanted to climb Mount Everest.  At the time, women were not welcome to try.  Every climber was male, every Sherpa porter was male, and even the thought of a woman trying to climb Mount Everest was enough to make experienced mountaineers laugh out loud.  When Lhakpa was about 15, she started hanging around base camp and begging the Sherpa porters there to give her a chance.  She spent two years pleading, begging, lobbying, and trying to persuade them before Babu Chhiri Sherpa, a legend in his own right who once spent a record-breaking 21 hours on the top of Mount Everest without oxygen, agreed to give her a chance. She quickly rose through the ranks.  She started as a regular porter, just carrying wealthy tourists’ oxygen canisters and tents and supplies and then became a “kitchen boy.”  She would rise before the tourists, hike with all the supplies to the next base camp, set up camp, and then cook dinner all so that when the tourists arrived, they could have a hot meal and go to sleep. But that wasn’t enough for Lhakpa.

Israel. The images of civil unrest playing out in Israel this past Monday are images we never thought we would see. Demonstrations of hundreds of thousands of Israelis; counter demonstrations; the airport closed; IDF soldiers and reservists and pilots refusing to serve; general strikes; universities closing; ambassadors resigning; a high government official, Yoav Gallant, fired for speaking his mind and asking for dialogue. All this happening just as Israel is about to celebrate its 75th anniversary. And all this happening just as we are about to sit down to our seders Wednesday and Thursday nights. How, if at all, do we talk about Israel at our seders?

“The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” - William Faulkner  Faulkner’s famous quotation underlies all of Rachel Korazim’s sessions in this series about the crisis in Israel today. To understand the push for reform, and the protests against reform, we went back to the Altalena incident in 1948 (March 18 Talmud class) and to what Arabs in Israel have come to call their naqba, also 1948 (March 25 Talmud class).  Rachel takes us to the Wadi Salib neighborhood of Haifa on July 9, 1959, when police shot and wounded a man named Yaakov Elkarif, as a result of which riots ensued. These riots were fueled by tensions between Ashkenazis and Mizrachis—all of which is brought to life by the poems we will consider tomorrow. The tensions today are in part fueled by unresolved tensions between Ashkenazis and Mizrachis. The past is never dead. It’s not even past. We here may not be able to solve the tensions at play on the streets of Israel today. But Rachel’s teaching will enable us to better understand them. Learning is always good.