To be Embraced Fully in Body and Spirit

A man went to see his physician because he wasn't feeling well. "Doctor," he said, "I am suffering from a dark and unshakable depression. Nothing I do gives me any relief. I am overwhelmed with pain and most days, I can't even make it out of bed. Doctor, what should I do?" The doctor thought for a moment then offered the following treatment plan. "This is what you need to do. Tonight, go to the theatre where the Great Carlini is performing. He is the funniest man in the world. He is guaranteed to make you laugh and drive away your depression." Upon hearing these words, the man burst into tears and sobbed uncontrollably. "But doctor," he said, "I am Carlini."

This story sounds eerily familiar, reminding us of entertainers, like the late Robin Williams, who harbored such deep depression that they took their own lives. I share it to illustrate the way that mental illness can be invisible to outsiders. It also demonstrates that the ways that we choose to help others, even with the best of intentions, may have nothing to do with what a person truly needs.

I won’t ask people to raise hands, but I suspect that many, if not most of us, have encountered mental illness in our families. You understand better than most the stigma surrounding mental illness as well as the destructive impact of discrimination and of silence. Still, rarely do we feel safe enough to talk about the distress of people we know and love, or especially, our own struggles.

Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav suffered bouts of depression in the midst of his inspired leadership. He taught his followers, “Sometimes, people are terribly distressed but have no one to whom they can unburden themselves. If you come along with a listening heart, you uplift them and help them find new life.”

At our congregational retreat in June, a dozen adults gathered with a listening heart. We shared stories of our own experience with mental illness in our families. Parents who attempted suicide. Children who could not find a bed in a mental health facility. Siblings who required life-long attention and support. The open-hearted discussion reminded me of the heart-stopping Personal Offering that a mother gave several years ago about her son’s ongoing bouts of depression. She revealed that he had spoken of wanting to end his own life from the time he was four years old. Listening to these stories, our community can began to recognize how many of us know the frustration, pain, and helplessness of mental illness. Through these openings we begin to speak honestly and listen patiently. In these conversations we can bring light and comfort to the darkest corners of people’s lives.

This year Ed Levy invited Dr. Tanisha Pinckney to speak about the impact of the criminal justice system on people who have mental illness. She described how police can respond more effectively to someone who is acting strangely if they are made aware that the suspect has a history of mental illness. The difference can be a matter of life and death. Dr. Pinckney opened our eyes to look at mental illness in new ways.

In these perilous times, I sense a higher level of anxiety, depression, anger, and isolation among us all. Many of us are blessed to have support systems, spiritual practices, and the inner resilience to live our lives in tension with the never-ending cycle of breaking news and broken hearts.

For those of us without a diagnosis of a chronic mental illness, such emotional swings are often temporary. Grief, illness, and trauma can touch anyone, and yet we find ways to overcome them, or at least live with them.

Imagine how much harder it is for someone who is already living with social anxiety or chronic depression to “bounce back” after a day’s bad news? Imagine how much worse it is for those who live with the existential fear of being deported, or experience harassment and abuse for being gay or trans, and people of color who encounter racial profiling every day and live in fear of being shot, whether on the street or in their own home.

More than any time in my life, I believe we all need to be aware of the prevalence of mental illness in our midst. More than any other place, our synagogue, this holy community, should be vigilant in creating a safe space for people living with mental illness.

Because they are among us, whether we know it or not. One in five Americans experiences a form of mental illness in a given year. Severe mental disorders among youth between the ages of 13 and 18, is shockingly also one in five. Mental illness is the leading cause of disability in America today.

The Centers for Disease Control reported this summer that suicide rates are on the rise. More people die by suicide than in automobile accidents. Someone is twice as likely to die from suicide as homicide. Twice as likely. Children, veterans, and the elderly are particularly vulnerable. Worldwide, suicide is the 2nd leading cause of death for those aged 15-24 years. Among LGBT youth, three times as many contemplate suicide as their straight friends.

Experts tell us that 90% of those who take their own lives have suffered from mental illness, though many have not been diagnosed. We also know that proper treatment can prevent most suicides. Fully 80-90% find relief from their symptoms and pain through treatment, continuing to live full lives.

Unlike broken limbs, the flu, or a debilitating physical condition, mental disorders are often hidden from view. And we treat them differently. As a congregant of another local synagogue wisely noted, “When someone is in the hospital, we send them a brisket. We visit them. We check in on them after they get home. But when someone is at McLean (which specializes in psychiatric care) we do nothing.”

Mental illness is not a new phenomenon, but it has not always been hidden in the shadows. In our own tradition, we read of King Saul’s ruach ra’ah, the “bad spirit” that manifested in uncontrollable anger that led to violent eruptions against young David and against Saul’s own son, Jonathan. In the Torah, Moses himself declares to God,

"I can no longer bear the burden of this people alone...it is too heavy for me...Please kill me, let me no longer see my wretchedness."

Rabbi Elliot Kukla of the Bay Area Jewish Healing Center explains that, "What the biblical stories teach us is that mental distress is a natural part of human life and a part of every society. Surviving our own moments of emotional suffering and finding the strength to walk with others through incredible pain are ancient and sacred obligations."

Many of us who do not live with chronic depression or experience serious mental disorders are troubled, anxious, or depressed these days. Still, our own emotional turmoil can open our hearts in compassion to walk with those whose suffering and pain often take control of their lives.

It is not our community’s privilege to diagnose others. Just as we can’t set a broken limb or diagnose cancer, we are not equipped to provide therapeutic services. What then is our synagogue’s responsibility? What can we do?

One of my favorite verses in the evening service of Yom Kippur reads: Haneshama lach vehaguf p’olach, chusa al amalach

Our soul comes from you. Our body is your work. God of mercy, have compassion on us, the fruit of your labor.

Within our tradition we find confirmation that our physical and emotional selves are intertwined, equally in need of compassion.

Each time we offer the prayer for healing, the mi shebeirach, we acknowledge equally those who need healing of body and spirit—refu’at hanefesh v’refu’at haguf. We easily share that a certain individual is recovering from an accident, someone else had surgery, or another person has a terminal illness. And yet, when someone has been hospitalized for psychiatric reasons, how do we share that?

First of all, it is not up to us to decide. If we ask, those with a mental disorder will tell us how they see themselves and want to be seen.

For some, mental illness is a fact of life, something one wishes that others would simply accept. We want others to treat us with respect, without trying to change us or even expecting us to change. Others would rather not live with the illness and would love to be different.

In either case, we can’t presume to know what they need. Each individual may be doing everything he or she possibly can to attend to their mental health. Sadly, our health care system does not provide enough doctors, beds or affordable care for people with mental disorders. For example, only half of Americans who experience a serious episode of depression receive proper treatment.

Despite the wisdom I’ve received from congregants, teachers, and colleagues, I’m left with many questions.

How do we, as individuals, respond to people whose minds work differently from our own? Are they shunned? Ignored? Tolerated? Pitied? Embraced?

How do we respond when someone’s behavior frightens us?

Do we seek safety? Do we consider whether that person is in danger?

Do we ask appropriate questions? Inappropriate questions?

How do we respond when we hear of a diagnosis? Is it a relief, a comfort, knowing the source of someone’s words or behavior? Does it spur us to want to help, to fix, to direct? How can we be respectful of the different ways that individuals experience their diagnosis?

Can we learn to notice and hold back our own need to diagnose others, without having real expertise or direct understanding of the individual?

How can we be supportive without projecting our own needs on others?

When is it appropriate to help someone who is not asking for help?

And what are respectful ways to find out what people want?

Today I have more questions than answers. Fortunately, in the coming year our congregation has two opportunities to delve into these questions further and perhaps arrive at some answers. Thank you to Ed Levy for arranging for Dr. Tanisha Pinckney to return this year. Those who missed her last year will not want to miss her again.

I am also pleased to announce that Hillel B’nai Torah has been invited to participate in the Ruderman Synagogue Inclusion Project, in partnership with Combined Jewish Philanthropies. With the help of the Ruderman Foundation, we will consider what we need to expand our congregational resources to be more welcoming to people with all kinds of disabilities, mental illness included. We will begin by forming an Inclusion Task Force, a group of congregants and staff to do a thorough inventory of our synagogue’s strengths and weaknesses. Following the slogan from the disability community, “Nothing about us without us,” we invite anyone with an interest, especially those who are living with a disability of any kind, to volunteer for this task force. You will be hearing more about this soon.

Over the years, our congregation has laid the groundwork for considering how we welcome marginalized individuals. Members of Hillel B’nai Torah have engaged in multiple conversations about race, sexual orientation, and gender. Our school spent a year in a reflective process to better serve students with different abilities. These conversations have led to concrete and visible changes in how our synagogue looks, how our teachers teach, and how we talk about ourselves with honesty and ongoing self-assessment. These past experiences can help us enter into this new discussion with compassion, openness, and our accumulated wisdom to guide us.

Tonight I invite you to enter into this conversation. Quietly, in prayer, we can each begin a private internal dialogue with the Source who endows each one of us with a pure soul.

May the prayers this Kol Nidre night, cause our hearts to break open with compassion for the fragility of every human being. May we find the patience to listen, the attention to truly hear, and the genuine capacity to care. May we never lose hope of repair, reconciliation, and redemption.

Together on this holy night, pouring our hearts out to God each in our own unique voice, may we plant the seeds to cultivate a holy place where every one of us is embraced, body and soul.

Ken yehi ratzon.

Rabbi Barbara Penzner/Kol Nidre 5779

Mining our Tradition for Guidance in Tough Times

JUDAISM’S TOP TEN:
Mining our Tradition for Guidance in Tough Times

There was once a man by the name of Reb Isaac ben Yekel who lived in Cracow. He lived in poverty for many years, not knowing where his next crust of bread would come from.

One night, someone came to Reb Isaac in a dream, telling him to go look for a treasure under the bridge to the royal palace in Prague. Like most of us, when he awoke he forgot about the dream. After all, who doesn’t dream of riches? But when the dream repeated itself night after night after night, he decided to set off for Prague.

When he arrived there he saw that the bridge was heavily guarded day and night. Yet every day he returned to the bridge. Finally the captain of the guards asked him, “Why do you come to the bridge every day? Are you looking for something? Are you waiting for someone?”

Reb Isaac told them about the dream that had brought him from his village far away. The captain began to laugh. “You came all this way because of a silly dream? If I had such faith in dreams, I would have picked up and gone to Cracow because someone in a dream told me to go there to dig for treasure under the stove in the home of a certain Jew. What was his name? Isaac ben Yekel, yes that was it! I can just imagine knocking on the door of every house, where half the Jews are named Isaac and the other half are named Yekel.”

Reb Isaac thanked the guard, and hurried off to return home to Cracow. Sure enough, when he shoved the iron stove out of the way and began digging at the hard dirt floor he uncovered the treasure. With the money he took care of his family’s needs and then, out of gratitude, he built a synagogue there.

I offer this tale as a reminder of why we gather together in this synagogue, on this holy day in the Jewish year.

We come together on this first day of a New Year with a lot of hope. Hope to be embraced by community. Hope to be inspired by meaningful stories and teachings. Hope to quell the anger and to dispel the despair.

And we return to dig under our own Jewish stove, to find answers in our texts and in our past. Today we will take a look under our stove, to dig into one of the most quoted and least understood of all biblical texts: the Ten Commandments.

Do you ever think about them? Are they important to you?

Can you name them?

Or are they so obvious or so unchallenging or so antiquated that they are meaningless to you?

Let me share two things you may not already know about the Ten Commandments. We don’t know that there are ten. And they are not commandments.

The Torah itself does not count them. It never evens acknowledges that there are ten of them. That accounts for the variant traditions between Jews and Christians of how to divide them.

In Hebrew we call them Aseret hadibrot, meaning, Ten Utterances. They are not mitzvot, not commandments. Dibrot comes from the same root as dvar, as in dvar Torah. Davar is a word, and a dvar Torah is a word of Torah. And these Aseret hadibrot are essential words.

I have drawn on the help of two 21st century teachers, Dr. Jeremy Benstein, Associate Director of the Heschel Center for Environmental Learning in Tel Aviv, and Ana Levy-Lyons, author of No Other Gods: The Politics of the Ten Commandments. Digging into the meaning of Aseret Hadibrot, both of these scholars interpret this fundamental Jewish text, not simply as a list of do’s and don’ts, but as the very foundation of a sustainable life and a sustainable world.

So imagine today that you are standing at Mt. Sinai. The ground is shaking, the lightning is flashing, the shofar is sounding. Hear these words again, as if you have never heard them before.

(If you’re worried that ten is a lot to cover this morning, be grateful that, as Mel Brooks pointed out, Moses started off with a third tablet, telling the people, OH HEAR ME! The lord Jehovah has given unto you these fifteen... (drops stone tablet) Oy. Ten! Ten commandments.)

1. I am the Lord Your God, the One who took you out of Egypt

Who knows One? Most of us don’t. What kind of instruction can we find in this statement? It doesn’t tell us to do—or not to do—anything. Among the ten utterances, this one stands alone. It is the preamble, the foundation, the essential teaching that underscores all the rest.

The most important aspect of this verse is not the beginning, but the ending: I am the One who took you out of Egypt. Not, I am God the all-powerful and all-knowing. Not, I am the Creator of the Universe. But I am the Power of justice and liberation, who took you out of Egypt.

With this first statement we draw a direct line between Egypt and Sinai. Jews cannot have one without the other. When Moses approaches Pharaoh, he asks him to “let my people go to worship in the wilderness.” Moses wants the people to have much more than physical liberation. He has a spiritual revolution in mind.

While Moses did tell the people of a Land of Milk and Honey, the first and most important stop on the journey was at Sinai, where all the people—former slaves, men and women, outsiders who were travelling along with them, elders and children, heard these very words. They learned the purpose of the Exodus. They learned the meaning of freedom. And they learned that freedom is not free of responsibility.

In the Biblical context, freedom does not mean freedom of the individual to do whatever we want. Freedom functions within community, and freedom must be shared equitably. Because God took us out of Egypt, we are not to turn around and become oppressors ourselves. Because God took us out of Egypt, we are called to be vigilant in protecting others’ freedoms.

Egypt in Hebrew, Mitzrayim, means a narrow place, As we read in Psalms, God takes us from our narrow place and brings us to a broad, open place. God gives us the possibility to expand: expand our understanding, expand our perspective, expand our compassion.

In contrast with Mitzrayim, God is an ever-expanding force for life. Because God is expansive, God cannot be contained in an idol or a word or a philosophy. And because God took us out of the narrow place of Egypt, we thrive by living our lives with awareness, with respect, and with gratitude.

In the words of Mordecai Kaplan, founding thinker of Reconstructionist Judaism: “You shall love your God intellectually, emotionally and with all your deeds. Whatever you love most in these ways is your god. For the Jewish people, the deepest love should be for freedom, justice and peace.”

2. You shall have no other gods beside me

Idolatry in itself is a kind of slavery. Idolatry is by definition limited, narrow, contained. In the children’s book, Abraham’s Search for God, Abraham is a boy who asks a lot of questions and senses that there is something more powerful than the idols his father makes. He stays out in the field so long one day that darkness falls and he sees the moon rise. He decides that the moon is more powerful than the idols and prays to the moon. Then the sun rises and seems to push the moon away, so he decides that the sun is the ruler. But then clouds cover the sun, so they must be even more powerful. The clouds are blown away by the wind. You get the picture. At the end of the story, the moon rises once again, and Abraham has a flash of insight: there is something bigger that made all of this happen.

We may not know what God is exactly, but the second utterance instructs us not to fall for the false gods.

Just as slavery reduces the human being to an object, idolatry elevates objects to gods. We begin to confuse ends and means. We might not think that we worship money, but who hasn’t made incessant work into a god? We might not think that we worship fame, but every time we post photos on Snapchat or FB, aren’t we chasing that god too?

These may seem harmless, but idols also limit the scope of our perspective, justifying our actions without regard to their impact. I didn’t abandon my child by working so much; I did it so they would have a better life. I didn’t intend to hurt my friend by sharing a funny photo of her on Instagram; I just wanted to make other people laugh. I wasn’t thinking about global warming when I cranked up the ac and kept it on even when we left the house; all I wanted was comfort. These small everyday acts do have an impact, and the choices we make reflect the gods we worship.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote,

“Truly, the gods we worship write their names on our faces. A person will worship something—have no doubt about that.... That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives and character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship for what we are worshiping, we are becoming.”

If you hear nothing else this Rosh Hashanah day, contemplate this for these next ten days. Be careful what you worship for what you are worshipping we are becoming.

3. Do not take God’s name in vain

To take God’s name in vain, is to use God in an empty, useless way. It is to try to control God into doing what you want. That is the way that the ancients prayed: they bribed their gods with gifts. They used their god’s name in magical ways to bless or to curse. But the God of Moses, the God described by these ten utterances, is beyond our control. As the prophets explained, God does not need food or drink. God doesn’t even need our praises! So why try to bribe God? There is no way that humans can control God. God is most often found in those moments when we have very little control: at the birth of a child, in the kindness of a stranger, or in a sudden breakthrough to a new way of understanding.

Not only that, how can we claim to know God’s mind? Those who make political arguments by claiming that it’s God’s will are actually trying to control God too. Rabbi Joseph Telushkin points out that this third utterance was routinely violated by Americans who claimed that slavery was God’s will. Likewise, attacks on the LGBTQ community are justified today by the claim that God abhors all forms of sexuality outside of straight marriages. Those who cite the Bible as their proof of God’s will casually forget other statements in the Bible: fundamental assertions that every human being is created in God’s image, love your neighbor as yourself and do not oppress the stranger.

No individual or group, no matter how holy, can lay exclusive claim to God. I once heard the late Bishop Tom Shaw, Episcopal Bishop of the Boston diocese, teach at an interfaith clergy gathering that we should not make our religions into idols. In other words, none of us can claim that we alone know God’s will.

And if you don’t consider yourself religious, you’re not off the hook either. We shouldn’t worship political movements or philosophies, None of us has the full truth, not our parents and not our children. Not even our sports teams. And by the way, God does not take sides in the Super Bowl. (The World Series, perhaps.)

By extension, we take God’s name in vain when we shut down possibilities for change, by saying “this is what I was brought up with,” or “this is how it’s always been” or “people will never change.” To claim to understand humanity based on our limited experience of reality is to cling to another idol. To refuse to change is to be enslaved to false gods. “Boys will be boys” is no excuse. It is irresponsible to pretend that things cannot change. It is another way we try to control God. And it just doesn’t work.

While it’s important to notice what is truly wrong with our world, injustice, inequality, corruption, and lies (we will get to these later), we bring harm by believing these evils are immutable. Despair kills hope, and it robs us of our faith in the inherent goodness of our world. If the first utterance is about liberation, then the third utterance is a reminder that God’s name should always be linked with goodness and hope.

4. Observe the Sabbath day and keep it holy

Shabbat is the ultimate reminder that liberation is possible. Once a week, we pause to reignite our passion for freedom and renew our capacity for goodness. On the Sabbath we declare a moratorium on destruction as well as creation. We suspend work, not only for ourselves but for those who work for us, who enable us to rest.

Shabbat is not just day of rest for us but the world’s day of rest from us. Shabbat is a cease-fire between people and the environment. It is a day to do and to be and to think differently. It is a day devoted to non-material ends. It is a day dedicated to spirit and to community.

The best way to defy the idols of money and power is to pretend they don’t even exist for one day a week. The best way to disentangle ourselves from the lies and desecrations is, for one day a week, to simply ignore them. The best way to gain perspective on the idols we worship is to refuse to worship them for one day a week.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel already in the middle of the twentieth century called attention to the oppression of work and the demands of capitalist society that plague us today. In his short poetic treatise entitled The Sabbath, which I recommend to everyone, Heschel asked:

“Is our civilization a way to disaster, as many of us are prone to believe? Is civilization essentially evil, to be rejected and condemned? The faith of the Jew is not a way out of this world, but a way of being within and above this world; not to reject but to surpass civilization. The Sabbath is the day on which we learn the art of surpassing civilization.”

Once a week, at least, we need a reminder that the world is essentially good, that liberation is always possible, and that we need to slow down and simply be part of the human community if we want to get there.

5. Honor your parents that your days may be prolonged

Several years ago, I began to look at this differently when I was teaching the Aseret hadibrot to the sixth graders. As I repeated “honor your father and your mother,” one girl looked puzzled, if not a bit annoyed. As I read her expression, I realized that she, like others in our school, had two mothers, and no father.

So we need to understand “father and mother” in a broader way that represents the experience of every child: children brought up by two moms or two dads, or by a single father or by an aunt and uncle. Our parents, then are those to whom we owe our lives, who made choices for us (for better or for worse), and who provided for us (for better and for worse).

To honor our parents is to acknowledge that we did not create ourselves. And whether we are following in our parents’ ways or whether we have abandoned them decisively, we are still the products of those who came before us. We are here because of them.

Utterance Number Five is the only one that states a reward: “that your days may be prolonged on this land that God gives you.” Honoring those who came before us not only connects us to our past; it connects us to our future, “that your days may be prolonged on this land that God gives you.” Our responsibility to our parents is a responsibility to preserve this planet for the next generation as well.

In the Talmud, the mystic known as Honi the Circle-maker came upon an old man planting a carob tree. He asked, "How long does it take for this tree to bear fruit?" The man replied: "Seventy years." Honi looked at the man and laughed, "Are you certain that you will live another seventy years?" The man replied, "I found carob trees in the world; as my forefathers planted those for me, so I too plant these for my children."

To honor those who came before is also to honor those who will come after us, to remember that all generations are interconnected. To honor our parents is to honor our responsibility to the earth, knowing full well that others handed the world off to us in the best way they knew how.

So far we have looked at the first five utterances, each of them pointing us toward a more sustainable way of life, a life devoted to liberating our bodies, minds and souls, to hearing different ways of thinking, to nurturing hope and faith, to creating connections to the past and to the future, and to dedicating one day a week to cherishing these foundational ideas.

Next comes the easy list, the ones we all know, and yet we could dig deeper into each of the next five as well. I will briefly remind you of the last five. Your homework for your Rosh Hashanah gatherings, is to consider how to think about each of these more broadly as well.

6. Do not Murder.

Do not take someone’s life—unless they are coming to take yours.

In our complex world, “Do not murder” is not only a call for a personal morality but a demand that we take responsibility for the systemic violence that plagues our planet.

7. Do not commit adultery

What are the roots of adultery? What drives someone to find a new partner, even casually, thereby breaking a life-long commitment?

The desires that lead to adultery can teach us a lot about the way our society encourages us to follow any and all desires, and to dispose of what no longer serves us. We need to learn to be true and faithful, to cherish what we have, and to find pleasure in knowing that what we have is enough.

8. Do not steal

This should also be pretty straightforward. But the Rabbis specify that stealing does not apply only to property. According to some, we are stealing whenever we benefit by paying someone else unfair wages, whenever we put someone else’s life in danger for our own comfort or enjoyment. Whenever we make our relationships transactional, we have turned a human into an object. Stealing is akin to slavery, and all the aseret hadibrot are rooted in the idea that we should never enslave another human being, or treat them as a means to an end.

9. Do not testify against your fellow as a false witness

It would have been easy for the ninth utterance to be formulated like the last three: do not lie. But that’s not what it says. ”Do not testify against your fellow as a false witness” involves something greater than telling a lie. It involves fraud. This commandment demands honesty and transparency in all our dealings, from the personal to the public.

10. Do not covet anything that is your neighbor’s

You can’t legislate feelings. But coveting means more than to desire. To covet means to want something that someone else has. If I’m hungry and I want a sandwich, that is a natural appetite. If I’m not hungry and I want your sandwich, that is coveting.

This last instruction reminds us that our sins are most often committed unwittingly. Our unchecked desires actually take away our freedom to choose. Desire itself is not necessarily harmful. But blindly following desire, without forethought or restraint, turns us into slaves once again.

Today, we begin a New Year. In the hours that we spend together in prayer and contemplation, around your holiday table, and in the quiet moments of these 10 days leading up to Yom Kippur, we set aside time for our souls to be watered by the flowing streams of ancient texts and the tributaries of the generations who taught them before us.

These ten utterances, these words, are meant to be spoken. They are a spiritual gift from the Jewish people to the world. Discuss how they impact you today. Speak about them with your children. Teach them to notice the idols that occupy their minds and drive their actions. Instruct them how to be liberated from slavish desire.

And may these ancient ideas help you start this New Year with renewed purpose, restored hope, and revived faith. Ken yehi ratzon.

Rabbi Barbara Penzner/Rosh Hashanah 5779

SOMETHING BIG IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN

SOMETHING BIG IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN

AND IT STARTS WITH SOMETHING SMALL

Change is Gonna Come

It’s time for a change of direction. Time for a change of heart. Time to look back at the past year and make plans for the year to come.

It starts with a sliver of light that will grow into a beacon illuminating the night sky. This weekend, look for the appearance of the New Moon. It’s the harbinger of our Season of Change, the Jewish season of repentance and renewal. This new moon marks the beginning of the Hebrew month of Elul, just four weeks and change (!) before Rosh Hashanah.

I know it’s still summer, and believe me, I’m feeling it. I still have a few weekend getaways planned: time with our kids, time for concerts, and time for celebrations, including a 35th wedding anniversary for Brian and me. Yet during the workweek, I’m leafing through the machzor (High Holy Day prayerbook), meeting with service leaders, searching for inspiring readings and inspirational texts to teach.

Change, as we all know, takes time. It takes intention. It takes practice. This past month I focused on learning Spanish in an intensive summer session at Boston University. Though I had little space for thinking about the Holy Days, I became keenly aware of the importance of preparation. Without spending time on homework every day, I would have missed out on learning during class.

The same is true for the preparation for coming to the synagogue on the High Holy Days. While we may think of the 10 Days of Repentance from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur as our spiritual booster shot, the month of Elul is our Jewish time for reflection, becoming healthy enough to benefit from the annual shot in the arm. Whether learning a new language or learning to be kinder; to think before we speak/email/post/tweet; to have the courage to act on our principles and the humility to admit our mistakes, that reflection gives us the foundation for the work of Tishri, the first month of the Jewish year.

Let the moon in the sky be your reminder to take a few minutes each day to do your Rosh Hashanah homework. Consider the inner changes you need to practice, and acknowledge the strengths and successes that you want to celebrate and perpetuate.

I look forward to seeing the small changes in each of us and in our community that will lead to a great change in our country and our world. I firmly believe that a change is gonna come.

Rabbi Barbara Penzner

Thank you for making the dew fall

"Thank you for making the dew fall"

This simple prayer is added every summer to our daily prayers. In the rainy winter months (in Israel’s climate) Jews freely pray for wind and rain. But it’s audacious to ask for such abundance in a season of natural scarcity. And yet, the prayer for dew expresses our gratitude for continued sustenance, insufficient as it may seem, during the dry summer season.

This summer, while many of us will be enjoying vacations walking along a beach or hiking in the mountains, others getting away to new destinations or sharing extended family time, we feel another kind of scarcity. That is the scarcity of relief and respite from these troubled times. You don’t need to be an activist to feel an overwhelming sense of unease these days.

In our current drought of compassion, we can all appreciate a few drops of dew. The rallies this coming Shabbat can nurture our sense of purpose, the power of community, hope for the future, and gratitude for all the gifts that we have. We need this dew to drive despair from our souls. I applaud each of you for acts of kindness, generosity, and sharing, small and large. I admire each act of courage, to speak out and to stand up for others, especially if this is your first time. You bring the dewdrops that water our souls.

I want to give you an update on some work that I’ll be doing this summer and in the coming year to nurture my own soul. I’ve just been selected for the Global Justice Fellows program of the American Jewish World Service (AJWS). With the stellar staff of AJWS, including Ruth Messinger, our group of rabbis will be trained to become better advocates for human rights. This learning will be highlighted by spending a week in Guatemala in January and a trip to lobby our representatives in Washington, DC in March.

In anticipation of that trip, I’ve chosen to spend my summer learning Spanish at BU through the Evergreen Program. Spanish will also come in handy when I visit Immokalee, Florida in a few weeks and talk to workers of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW). I enjoy learning languages, so this should be fun.

In the increasing moral turmoil of this moment, it is important to enjoy the pleasures of relaxation and renewal even as we continue to work for justice and compassion. As each of us finds some space for the joys of summertime, I hope that you will join me in finding time to give thanks for the dew that sustains us each day.

Thoughts on the Story Slam

Everyone has a story.

And from the Jewish people’s earliest communal memories, story has been a central vehicle for teaching, as well as for humor, entertainment, and for sharing our common human experience. Torah is at heart, an unending collection of stories.

From Adam and Eve in the Garden to Moses at the burning bush, from Miriam to Deborah to Esther to Ruth, from Joshua blowing the walls of Jericho down with a shofar to King David dancing in the procession as the Holy Ark was carried into Jerusalem, from tales of Rabbis in the Land of Israel to tales of ordinary Jews living in Poland or Yemen or Morocco or America, stories have established the foundation of Jewish life and illuminated our heritage.

Master storyteller Elie Wiesel taught us, “God made humans because God loves stories.”

This past week our friends and acquaintances provided a window into their lives that most of us have never seen. Listening to their stories, not only did we get to know one another better, we began to deepen our connections as a community. Their stories become part of our collective story. Everyone here, whether speaking or listening, is privileged to be part of writing the Torah of Temple Hillel B’nai Torah.

Thank you to our storytellers, to our master teacher Judith Black, and to all who worked tirelessly to make our Story Slam possible.

May we be blessed to tell and hear stories that amuse, inspire, awaken compassion, and teach us all our days.

May the Holy One love our stories!

Israel At 70

 Is today a day of joy or a day of sorrow?

 Today Israelis and Jews across the world celebrate Yom Ha’atzma’ut, Israel’s Independence Day. It’s a very special anniversary: 70 years since Israel was welcomed into the family of nations as an independent Jewish and democratic state.

Looking back to 1948, we have much to celebrate. The ingathering of Jews from displaced persons camps in Europe, from anti-semitism in the lands of North Africa and the Middle East, from starvation in Ethiopia and from oppression in the former Soviet Union, are a modern miracle for the Jewish people.

Israel catalyzed the revival of the Hebrew language, the foundation of contemporary literature, music, and art that draw on the two-thousand-year-old heritage of Jewish text and thought expressed in our ancient tongue.

Israel is the only place on earth where Jews welcome Shabbat and holidays in the spirit of a myriad of Jewish ethnicities that characterize our people’s global sojourns and refracted through multiple lenses of Jewish religious observance.

I’ve traveled to Israel over 20 times, including 2 extended stays: one with my husband, and one with our children (our son Yonah was born in Jerusalem). For me, Israel is home and family, a source of joy and pride. I am fully an American Jew, but for me, there’s just something different about being in the land of our ancestors and in a society where Jewish creativity is part of the landscape.

We also have reason for sorrow. Our gratitude for a homeland stands in sharp contrast to the displacement of people who call our shared land by a different name, Palestine, and who have been denied full rights, whether as citizens of Israel or as an occupied people. To the Palestinian people, today commemorates the Nakba, the catastrophe, which followed when the British ended their mandate and Israel arose as an independent state.

And yet….

And yet, this year I have found reason to hope.

Returning from our visit to Israel in February, I felt hopeful because of the unsung remarkable, passionate, and effective Palestinian and Jewish leaders who are working together on the ground to create a better homeland for all.

Returning from the JStreet 10th Anniversary Conference this week, I feel hopeful because of the open-hearted dialogue between Israeli Jews, American Jews, and Palestinians who spoke. I feel hopeful because of the 1200 JStreet U college students at the conference who are vigorously protesting the demolitions of Palestinian homes in the South Hebron Hills. I feel hopeful because of our meetings with Congressional representatives and Senators who hear and respect the voices of thousands of JStreet supporters who seek to maintain Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, committed to a two-state solution that brings peace and security to the region.

In this world of pain and possibility, it is our obligation to hold on to both realities, the celebration and the sorrow. It is up to us to remain engaged with our Jewish homeland, to continue to support those in Israel and Palestine who are working for human rights, economic sustainability, and peace and security, and to stand against those who continue to deny the rights of Palestinians, who reject moderate Palestinian leaders, and who attack the forces for civil society and equality.

On this 70th anniversary of Israel’s birth as a modern nation, I recommit myself to do all that I can to work for the kind of Jewish and democratic state envisioned by its founders.

I turn to Psalm 30 to remind me of the long view:

Redeemer, you have raised my spirit from the land of no return,

You revived me from among those fallen in a pit;

For God is angry for a moment, but shows favor for a lifetime,

Though one goes to bed in weeping, one awakes in song;

You changed my mourning to an ecstatic dance

You loosed my sackcloth, and girded me with joy.

May the next 70 years bring more song than weeping, more joy than mourning, for our people and for those with whom we share our sacred land.

Where Were The Jews?

April 4, 2018
Memphis
Where Were the Jews?

The American Jewish community harbors nostalgia for a storied time of cooperation between Jews and blacks. While those memories loom large in our consciousness, it is nearly absent from the narrative of non-Jewish African Americans. We Jews celebrate Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, a close friend of Dr. King. We applaud all the clergy who answered the call to march in Selma. (The rabbi I grew up with in Kansas City, Morris B. Margolies, was there. Was yours?) In Memphis, Rabbi James Wax of Temple Israel led an interfaith service following Dr. King’s assassination, and marched to City Hall to urge the mayor to end the ongoing sanitation workers’ strike that brought Dr. King to the city. They confronted Mayor Henry Loeb, who had previously been a member of Temple Israel. But Rabbi Wax’s long-standing advocacy for civil rights had little support among the rest of the Jewish community at the time. Like many of the bold Jewish leaders who advocated and marched for civil rights, he understood how vulnerable the Jews felt in their southern and Midwestern towns. No wonder many non-Jewish African Americans remain unaware of the role that we Jews consider as significant.

Walking through the National Civil Rights Museum, I found one photo of Rabbi Heschel with Dr. King, with no caption, no explanation. In the exhibit recounting the founding of the NAACP the term “philanthropists” whispered to me the names of many Jewish founders and leaders of the NAACP. Among them, many of us recall Kivie Kaplan, who served on the board beginning in 1932 and as president from 1966 to 1975. Yes, there were many Jews involved in founding and funding civil rights organizations (SCLC, SNCC). The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were drafted in the conference room of Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism in Washington, DC. Their names and accomplishments do not enter the museum’s narrative. And why should they? After all, the leadership of most Jewish groups were not actively engaged with this movement.

Likewise today, when we seek an historic reconciliation between Jewish groups and African-American groups, we rely on the presence of individual leaders and the activism of powerful small progressive groups. In the current call for racial justice, major national Jewish organizations have yet to step up. In Memphis during the commemorations of 50 years since the sanitation workers’ strike and Dr. King’s assassination, I witnessed a powerful wave of leaders rededicating themselves to his legacy. Not only the legacy of racial justice and civil rights, but the less popular legacy of his final three years (1965-1968) when King organized and spoke out for the Poor People’s Campaign, protested to end the war in Vietnam and militarism, stood with union workers, and frequently called for economic justice as a way to bind all peoples together. It was Dr. King who asked the question, “What good is having the right to sit at a lunch counter if you can't afford to buy a hamburger?” Those challenges remain with us fifty years later.

While sitting in the historic Mason Temple, with 3000 invited guests, I felt moved and uplifted, despite the sadness of the occasion, not to let Dr. King die a second death. As his friend and fellow civil rights leader Andrew Young said, quoting an African proverb, “you’re not dead until the people stop calling your name.”Dr. King’s daughter, Dr. Bernice King told us that her father had called his mother the night before he died. He wanted to give her the title of his sermon for the next Sunday just in case something happened to him. It was “America May Go to Hell.” Without missing a beat, she echoed her father’s call fifty years later: America may still go to hell. The crowd murmured in agreement. Rather than use this occasion to mourn, Bernice King called the congregation to take up her father’s challenge. She declared “it’s time for America to repent.”  She noted with urgency that in the past fifty years our country has failed to respond to the three evils of racism, poverty, and militarism. Bernice King quoted her father: “A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than programs of social uplift is rapidly approaching a spiritual death” and reiterated her father’s challenge “to shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society, from sectional to ecumenical loyalties.”

As her voice rose, the congregation rose with her, cheering every word as she proclaimed “we are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny and what affects one directly affects all indirectly. I cannot be all that I ought be until you are all you ought be, and you cannot be all you ought be until I am all that I ought be.”In that spirit, the next day ten thousand marched in the streets of Memphis: union representatives, people of all races and classes, from Memphis and across the country, led by great civil rights leaders including Rev. James Lawson who invited Dr. King to come to Memphis in 1968. As I marched along with our small contingent of the Jewish Labor Committee, I wondered, “Where are the Jews?” In the crowd I met a few Jews who had come to Memphis for the occasion. I’m sure there were others. Many Jewish labor leaders and activists were there. But aside from the JLC, there was no representation of the Jewish community.I understand there were many reasons the Jewish community was not visible. This event took place in the midst of Pesach, a time when many of us had already traveled for the holiday and others thought the challenge of observing the holiday too daunting. I know that many Jewish leaders observed the event in their home communities. Perhaps the heavy union focus made some organizations uncomfortable. Perhaps no one reached out to Jewish organizations to take part.

I came to Memphis thanks to the JLC, and because of a vision that arose at the Jewish Social Justice Roundtable (57 organizations pursuing social justice from a Jewish perspective). This year’s conference studied issues of racism. From that discussion, Marya Axner and Jonathan Rosenbloom of the JLC and Rabbi Mordechai Liebling of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, shared a vision of increasing engagement between Jewish and African-American organizations. From that discussion came the idea of a Labor Seder in Memphis. I went to Memphis to lead that seder. On the night of April 4, 2018, in the sacred space of the Clayborn Temple (where sanitation workers gathered and organized 50 years ago during the strike), 100 union leaders, Jewish leaders, and political leaders read the Haggadah, told stories of liberation, and shared a meal with the purpose of bringing us closer into relationship. We reaffirmed the Jewish commitment to Dr. King’s legacy, to work toward economic justice, to end racism, and to share the wealth of this country with the goal of lifting us all up in that “inescapable network of mutuality and single garment of destiny.”

My purpose is to charge us, authentically and fully as Jews, to answer Dr. King’s resounding call. As in the past, we may not see official Jewish organizations answer that call. Our presence may still remain invisible to the African American community. In the long tradition of Kivie Kaplan and Julius Rosenwald, of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel and Rabbi James Wax, of Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, we need to be there. Like those bold leaders of the past, it is time for us to join the fight and to stand up for justice, regardless of our numbers, regardless of the risks, regardless of whether we get credit, and to commit ourselves to create that beloved community and to transform our nation, fulfilling Dr. King’s dream.

Words into Actions

We Jews talk a lot. Our prayerbooks are full of words. Our libraries are filled with books: holy texts and philosophy and history and literature. We have no shortage of words.

The Passover seder is known for lots of words as well. The book we use is the Haggadah, which means “the telling.” We are all storytellers, retelling ancient tales from one generation to another.

But the seder is not a passive event. In addition to the words, our rituals help us to learn and to experience the story of the Exodus for ourselves. Ultimately, the words of the Haggadah should also move us to action. Though the story of the Exodus from Egypt is in the past, the experiences of slavery, poverty, oppression, and redemption are always current. After the seder, there is still work to be done.

We have one week to prepare for the momentous holiday of Pesach. Whether you are hosting a seder or you’re a guest, whether you are cleaning or cooking or choosing your haggadah and readings, or getting ready for the holiday, there is work to be done now.

This coming Shabbat we have packed in a variety of ways to prepare for Pesach: physically (baking matza with our own hands), spiritually (hearing a renowned preacher speak on Shabbat about sanctuary for people fearing deportation), intellectually (studying the themes of Pesach) or emotionally (finding others to share a seder). See the rest of the newsletter to take part in these events.

I am busy preparing for my own seder at home, as well as two events that are as much about action as words.

I invite you to join me as I lead the annual Jewish Labor Seder this Sunday, March 25 at Temple Israel, Boston. In addition to honoring leaders who have contributed to major victories for workers (including a rabbi, a labor leader, and two organizations working for worker justice) this year’s seder will take note of the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Our Labor Seder Haggadah will quote a variety of thinkers on issues of racial and economic justice.

In the middle of the Passover week, I will be leading another seder. On April 4 I will be in Memphis, Tennessee in the historic Clayton Temple, where MLK spoke to the Sanitation Workers fifty years ago, the night before he was assassinated. To commemorate those historic events, the Jewish Labor Committee is co-sponsoring a national interfaith Labor Seder with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) as part of a three-day commemoration in Memphis. (See this link for more information about the commemoration of the Sanitation Workers’ Strike and this link for a photo and description of the Clayborn Temple). I look forward to sharing more about that when I return, as we all work together to bring justice and liberation to our world today.

One more event later in April:

For the first time, I’ll be attending the JStreet National Conference in Washington D.C. April 15-17. I know others in the congregation who have gone, or may be planning to attend this year. JStreet is offering a discount for congregations sending 5 or more participants, so please let me know if you’re coming. I would love to see you there!

So many words, and so many ways to make a difference.

I wish you good preparations for a joyous Pesach holiday!

A Little bit of Heaven, Hardship, and Hope

A Little bit of Heaven, Hardship, and Hope:

Seeing Israel and Palestine with New Eyes

We are back from our ten-day congregational deep dive into the many narratives of Israel and Palestine. Our two guides, Gal (an Israeli Jew in his thirties from a kibbutz north of Tel Aviv) and Ramzi (a Palestinian Christian in his forties from Beth Sahour, a neighborhood of Bethlehem) were as much a part of our learning as the places they showed us. Their model of asking questions and sharing their different perspectives (sometimes very congruent and sometimes divergent) demonstrated complexity, curiosity, and civility. As we said goodbye, it was clear that each one of us had been transformed by the experience.

Below are a few of my personal impressions, highlighting how our tour lived up to its title. (Here is a detailed itinerary, though some aspects were changed at the last minute.)

A little bit of Heaven:

Picking beets in a muddy field for Project Leket, an organization that brings fresh produce to food pantries throughout Israel.

Enjoying Druze hospitality, eating a lavish meal while listening and dancing to the musicians playing the oud and drum.

Seeing signs of Purim fun throughout Tel Aviv and Jerusalem (costume shops, treats and decorative containers for making mishloach manot --   Purim gift baskets, posters for Purim dances and events, and hamantashen.

Joining progressive Jewish congregations for joyous and inspiring Friday night services in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

A little bit of Hardship:

Learning about the ongoing decades-long struggles of residents of Arab villages, Palestinian citizens of Israel, to have their villages recognized by the government and to receive basic services like electricity, running water, roads, and education.

Walking through the checkpoint from Jerusalem to Bethlehem with teeming multitudes of Palestinian men returning home from work at the end of the day.

Experiencing the anger and the pain of Palestinian refugees in Bethlehem whose main goal is to return to their homes in Israel’s cities and villages (whether those homes still exist or not).

Viewing the separation barrier up close, both from the Israeli side and the Palestinian side, and the stark difference between the two.

Visiting Jewish holy sites that have become either fortifications or fundamentalist shrines, and somehow do not convey a sense of holiness.

A little bit of Hope:

Meeting inspiring visionary young women like Sheereen and Genevieve who are leading efforts to empower others, including Arab farmers in the Galilee, Arab women, and at-risk youth in impoverished villages.

Seeing graffiti, banners and signs all over Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, protesting the government’s intention to deport asylum seekers.

Visiting places where people meet to learn about the other and to build bridges, like the Tent of Nations, Muslala Artists’ Collective and Women Wage Peace.

Witnessing steadfast resilience and courageous perseverance in the fact of heartbreak and hardship.

In coming weeks, we hope to share more stories and photos from the members of the group.

If you’re interested in participating in a facilitated conversation about Israel at HBT, mark Saturday, April 14 (6 to 9:30 pm) on your calendar for Resetting the Table. More information to come.

I Was Arrested On Capitol Hill While Protesting For A Clean DREAM Act

Last week I joined 100 Jewish community leaders from around the country in the rotunda of the Russell Senate Office Building. Organized by Bend the Arc Jewish Action, we marched in together, many in Jewish ritual garb, sat down, and sang about building a world of compassion. When the U.S. Capitol police warned us that we were breaking the law and would be charged with obstruction and “incommoding,” we had a ready response. We sang “We Shall Not Be Moved.”

My own arrest was shown on MSNBC, reporting our action live to a million viewers and zooming in on the zip ties that the U.S. Capitol police put on my wrists.

It took the police forty minutes to move us all, and we continued singing down to the last two leaders who were arrested, handcuffed, and led away. Our answer to the police was melodious but not commodious.

We were singing and praying for hundreds of thousands of Dreamers, that youthful subsection of our population that, from childhood, has known no real home but the United States. One hundred of these young people surrounded our hundred, chanting “Dream Act Now!”

As Rev. Dr. William Barber has inspired the nation with North Carolina’s “Moral Mondays,” this was our “Moral Minyan.” Meanwhile, conservative Congressional leaders have been so afflicted by these young people that they shut down the U.S. Government for three days to avoid giving them a path to citizenship. Congress now faces a deadline of February 8 to act or shut down again. We have much work to do to obtain a clean Dream Act.

My arrest was one of the most empowering days of my life. I stood up when ordered by the Capitol Police and put out my hands for Dreamers, for Temple Hillel B’nai Torah in West Roxbury, and for the Jewish Labor Committee (JLC), whose regional board I co-chair. JLC has carried out a unique historical struggle for justice, which began with rescuing refugees in Europe in 1934. (Standing beside me in the video is JLC Executive Director Jonathan D. Rosenblum.) While my hands were pinned behind me, I had a visceral understanding of the vulnerability that others experience with the police. But I was not risking brutality or death. Our arrests resulted in no conviction on our records. We ended up in a frigid police garage for four hours and we had to pay a fine, but we did not truly encounter our country’s criminal justice system. As one man of color commented afterward, this was the easiest arrest he would ever know.

Still, all of the leaders from across the Jewish spectrum, from 18 to 78 years old, took time from their lives and took a risk, not knowing exactly what might happen in the Capitol. Through steadfast loving commitment, spirited singing, and connection with the Dreamers who stood as witnesses, my life felt transformed that day.

Why did I risk getting arrested?

I could put my body on the line, but the Dreamers cannot.

My arrest did not lead to a conviction. Their arrest could lead to deportation.

I wanted the Dreamers to know that we stand with them.

Wearing stickers that read “Jews for Dreamers,” we communicated to these brave immigrants that they are not alone. With tears in their eyes, and solidarity orange knit caps on their heads, they told us how isolated they felt because people in our country have told them they don’t belong here. Our action, our singing, our presence showed that we are with them.

I represented multitudes of Jews who support the Dreamers.

This arrest was not about the bravery of the Jewish leaders. It was a way to communicate to our elected officials that the Jewish community, recalling the Biblical injunction to protect the stranger, is solidly with the majority of Americans who polls show overwhelmingly want to give the Dreamers a path to citizenship.

I want others to stand up for the Dreamers in any way you can.

Congress may have reached an agreement to restore government operations, but our government remains far from an agreement to recognize the contributions of these individuals to our communities. In fact, 90 percent of these Dreamers have jobs, from fast food to the Fortune 500. In order to continue to protect education and work opportunities and facilitate a path to citizenship, we have much work to do.

Call your elected officials in Congress and tell them you’re also behind the Dreamers. They need to support a clean Dream Act, with no deal for walls, and no tradeoffs for military budgets.

Many Jews, like myself, recall our own immigrant forebears. We must not betray our ancestors or our American ideals by abandoning children or separating families. We must not become an America of concrete walls and broken dreams.

Read more: https://forward.com/scribe/393448/i-am-a-rabbi-and-i-was-arrested-on-capitol-hill-while-protesting-for-a-clea/

Article in the Jewish Advocate: https://www.thejewishadvocate.com/articles/penzner-protests-in-dc/