Parshat Tetzaveh

Sermon Saturday Morning

2011

1. Shabbat Shalom

2. When studying Torah, one of the first lessons we learn is that everything in the Torah is important. What is written is important. What is missing from the text is important. Every word and every letter is important. The Talmud teaches us that the sages were able to derive all manner of laws from every little nuance in the written text of the Torah. In fact, we learn that the great Rabbi Akiva was so adept at this style of learning that he could infer great heaps of laws from the decorative crowns that adorned the letters.

3. We have a textual anomaly at the very beginning of this week’s Parsha. God commands Aaron to bring pure olive oil to the Mishkan in order to have a light continually burning in the Menorah. The problem is that the text uses two different words to convey the same thought. “L’meir L’ha-alot” To kindle and to light – Why is the same command used in two different ways?

4. Sampson Raphael Hirsch, in his extensive Torah Commentary, makes note of the double wording in the text and he makes this comment: “This term for kindling lights (L’ha-alot) is used only in connection with the care of the Menorah. It precisely describes the task of the keepers of the flame; i.e. to hold the kindling flame against the wick to be kindled until the wick ‘continues burning on its own.’ The task of the Torah teacher is to render his services unnecessary. His task is not to keep the ‘laity’ forever dependent upon him. This is meant as an admonition to both teachers and students that they should be patient and persevering.”

5. Writing almost 200 years ago, I think Hirsch is on to something here. One of the great issues in education is all about the role of the educator. There is a midrash about a pagan who came to the great sage Hillel and asked him to convert him to Judaism on the condition that Hillel only teach the Written Law to the student and not the Oral Law. The man only wanted to learn Torah and not Mishna or Midrash Halacha. Hillel accepted the condition and the next day the man came for a lesson. The first lesson was learning Hebrew so Hillel taught him “Aleph, Bet, Gimmel…” The next day, the second lesson, was “Gimmel, Bet, Aleph” “You taught it to me differently yesterday,” complained the student. Hillel replied, “Just as you must depend on me to teach you the letters, you must also depend on me to teach you Torah through the Oral Law.”

6. One way of looking at education is to find a teacher who can enlighten us as to what Torah is all about. Whenever we have questions, we go to our teacher and we learn the answer to the mysteries at hand. Teachers are very powerful people. We learn to see the world through the eyes of our teacher and we come to appreciate how our teacher combines knowledge and logic to find the answers, not only to the great questions of the past, but to questions that are new and difficult to understand. Such a teacher can make us feel at home in the world, safe with the knowledge that every problem does indeed have a solution and every question has an answer. If we don’t know what to do, we can always rely on our teacher to set us on the right path.

7. I understand the reason why people would want to have all the answers; it really makes living much easier. To know that every problem has a simple solution makes all of our problems disappear. If I don’t know the answer I need, I can go to my teacher and the teacher will tell me what I need to know to solve the challenges I face. But as one philosopher notes, “Every problem has a simple solution; that is usually wrong.” Aristotle, the great Greek teacher taught that if you were to drop a stone and a feather, the stone would fall faster than the feather. Heavier objects fall faster than lighter ones. Over a thousand years later, Galileo, the Italian scientist, decided to finally test the teachings of Aristotle. He took iron balls of different weights and had them dropped from the tower in Pisa. The heavier balls should have landed first, but every time he tested the theory, they landed together in one thump. Galileo had no choice but to say that Aristotle was wrong, and no matter what the weight of an object, gravity pulls on them with the same force.

8. Hundreds of years later an Apollo astronaut, standing on the moon, a planet with no atmosphere to disrupt the fall of a feather, dropped a hammer and a feather and both landed at the same time. Aristotle’s answer was not the right answer. It took a greater understanding of gravity, to finally see where Aristotle had gone wrong.

9. Hillel is not the only kind of teacher in Judaism. There is, in our faith, another model for educators. The philosopher, Martin Buber tells a story of a man who came to the Kotzker Rebbe with a problem. “I keep brooding and brooding and I am unable to stop!” “What do you brood about? Asked the Rabbi. “I keep brooding about whether there really is a judgment and a judge.” “Does it matter to you?” asked the Rabbi. “Rabbi! If there is no judgment and no judge, then what does all of creation mean?” “Does that matter to you?” asked the Rabbi. “Rabbi! If there is no judgment and no judge, then what do the words of the Torah mean?” “Does that matter to you?” asked the Rabbi. “Rabbi! Does it matter to me? What do you think? What else could matter to me?” “Well, if it matters to you so greatly,” said the Kotzker Rebbe, “then you are a good Jew after all. And it is quite all right for a good Jew to brood; nothing can go wrong with him.”

10. The Kotzker Rebbe was a very different kind of an educator. He was not interested in teaching facts to his student. He was all about asking questions. He did not instruct the man, he guided the man to understand his questions better and to see his concern not as a problem at all, but as an opportunity to really live his life as a good Jew. Through his constant questioning of the student, the student was able to step away from his brooding long enough to see that it was not taking him in the wrong direction in life, rather his brooding was the logical result of one who has learned many facts but is now struggling with the very essence of life. The learning, says the Kotzker Rebbe, is not in the facts and not in the answers, but the learning is found in the struggle to understand.

11. Just as there are different kinds of teachers, there are also different kinds of learners. When a student who wants to know the answers to questions, looks for a teacher, the student is looking for someone who will give him or her all the answers. If such a student were to find a teacher who only asked questions, he or she might find that teacher very difficult to understand. In the same way a student who is looking for a mentor and guide needs a teacher who will gently guide the student to find the answers for him or her self using basic questions and principles. If that student were to have a teacher who only gives the facts the student might find that teacher and his teachings very frustrating.

12. Rabbi Hirsch teaches us with his comment on the Torah that he is a follower of the style of the Kotzker Rebbe. One needs to teach basic principles and then get out of the way, as the student finds his way through the world. In some ways, this is the more mature way of teaching students. When we are young children, the question is always “Why? Why? Why?” demanding answers from our parents and teachers. Later, as we grow, we try to use our knowledge to understand more difficult problems, testing our understanding with experiments and with sharp discussions with those who disagree. As we mature, the answers are less important than the way we arrive at our answers. It is not enough to learn one haftara, we want to learn the Trop, the ancient musical markings so we will be able to read, on our own, any haftara.

13. One of the effects of internet and cable television is that there is more information available to us than ever before. Every minute there is another talking head telling us some facts about something he thinks is important. Since news is always on, the newscasters must always have something to say, there must be a constant flow of facts to match the images and the news as it unfolds all over the world. For some people this constant flow of information is wonderful. These people live for facts and they collect them as one would collect stamps or coins. But what can they do with their facts? They need the advisers, the experts and the pundits to tell them what all the facts mean. They rely on their teacher to show them what they should do.

14. But others are not seeking facts, they are seeking light. They don’t want anyone to tell them how to think or what to think; they want to hear and form their own opinions. They do not rely on one line of thinking or another, but take what they know and weave their own outlook on the world. It is true, that from time to time they find that they have drawn wrong conclusions, but they are less interested in the conclusions than they are in the process of how they can decide between differing possibilities.

15. What makes this approach interesting is that each person who is added to the discussion is like another candle lit up against the darkness. All it takes is one candle to push back the darkness, but if one candle lights other candles, the light of the first one is not diminished; in fact, as more and more candles are added to the room, the light only increases and the darkness is pushed back to the farthest corners of the room. So it is with learning. The more a teacher helps a student understand difficult concepts, the more light is added to the discussion and the darkness of ignorance is pushed farther and farther back. Even if the student is far from his teacher, the light of learning never really abandons him to the dark. Like the Menorah in the Temple, the light of wisdom burns eternally.

16. Rabbi Hirsch has given us great insight into the workings of a good teacher. Light the lamp of learning in your students and then get out of the way. Let them grow and find their own answers to life’s most difficult problems. The meaning of life is not found in the answers, but in the way we search for our answers. As we share our light, we spread more light throughout the world.

May God give us the learning we will need to find our way in the world. And the proper teachers, who may not give us the answers we seek, but who will challenge us by asking, “Why do you want to know?”

Amen and Shabbat Shalom

1. Shabbat Shalom

2. When it comes to spiritual terminology, the English language always leaves something to be desired. Every language has certain terminologies that it uses very well and some words whose definitions that leave more questions than answers. French is considered a language of love. German is a technical language that is useful in science. Latin was used for years to describe many different branches of botany and biology. English is the language of capitalism and is very useful in describing financial instruments and the details between similar items for sale. For example, English has more words to describe cars than any other language.

3. But English is less useful for describing God and religion. We use words like blessing, divine, spiritual and prayer, but we only have a vague idea of what these words mean. How would we define what it means to “bless” someone? What exactly are we doing when we “pray”? It is kind of like trying to define a color, like Red or Blue. We know what colors are but they seem impossible to define.

4. “Holy” is one of these words that English has so much trouble with. What do we mean when we say that something is holy? We talk about holy books, but what is actually the difference between holy books and secular books? We can point to the “holy ark” but what makes this ark more “holy” than any other ark (by the way, what exactly is an “ark” anyway?) The Hebrew language is a better language for spiritual terminology than English. The Hebrew word for “holy” is “kadosh” and it implies that something is separate, set apart as special.

5. In the Torah, there are only three things that are called “kadosh”. The first is the seventh day, Shabbat. In the book of Genesis, God creates Shabbat and declares it a holy block of time. The second use of “kadosh” is found in the term “am kadosh” a “holy people.” The People of Israel are designated holy, set apart from all the other nations of the world. The third “kadosh” of the Torah is found in this week’s parsha. Moses is commanded to design and build the Mishkan, a sanctuary to God. God has commanded us to set apart a holy space.

6. Pagan cultures have always had a hard time with the Jewish concept of holy space. This is not because Pagans did not have temples and other holy sites. It is because the space designated as “holy” in Judaism is not any one space. Pagans would latch on to a tree, a mountain, a large stone and declare that it is a holy site. The People of Israel built a Mishkan, a holy site that was PORTABLE; it moved from place to place. Any place where it was set up was, for that time, “holy space” and when the Mishkan was moved, the physical space was no longer set apart. Only when King Solomon built the Temple of Jerusalem, did one space become holy for Jews. Until that time, wherever the tent, the Mishkan, was set up, that would be separate and sacred space until the tent was folded up and moved to another site.

7. God does declare another place holy. When Moses discovers the burning bush, he is commanded to remove his shoes because the ground upon which he stands is holy. Once the revelation ends, Moses can put his shoes back on as the sanctity of the place is gone. The priests who officiated in the Mishkan wore elaborate robes and headdresses, but they did not wear shoes; the land upon which they officiated was holy. Once the Mishkan was packed up and moved, they could put their shoes back on and the land returned to its normal state.

8. Perhaps now we can understand why, for two thousand years, we mourned the destruction of our Temple and the violation of our sacred space. It was one of the three original holy items in the world. When the Temple was destroyed, sacrifices stopped, Temple worship stopped and the pilgrimage stopped. The only way of prayer our ancestors knew was gone. Synagogues were important and became central to the Jewish community, but they never replaced the Temple of Jerusalem. We can even say that the Judaism we know today was built on the ashes of despair our people felt when the sacred space of Israel was destroyed.

9. If you have ever visited Israel (and if you have not visited Israel, you should) you know that when you visit the Kotel HaMaarivi, the Western Wall, the only remaining wall from the Temple of Jerusalem, there are big signs that inform Jews that it is forbidden to go up to the top of the Temple Mount, lest someone who is not a High Priest walk on the place where the Holy of Holies once stood. There are some very super pious rabbis who think that the place the High Priest only entered once a year should still be off limits for ordinary Jews.

10. But we must remember that once the Temple was destroyed, there was no lingering sanctity of the space. We don’t recall any of the places the Mishkan was set up, nor do we consider those places holy once the Mishkan moved on, so too, once the Temple was destroyed, there should be no lingering holiness that Jews or anyone else should fear. To venerate the Temple Mount as the last place the great Temple of Jerusalem stood is a worthy activity, but to suggest that Jews should not go there because it once was holy ground is flawed. There may be good reasons not to go on the Temple Mount, not the least of which is a matter of personal safety, but I don’t believe that it is holy ground anymore.

11. We live today in a world where sometimes it seems as if there are no holy spaces. Security cameras view our every move when we move from place to place in our cities. Many a famous athlete has found pictures and video of what he thought was done behind closed doors posted on the internet. Even politicians have found their secrets published for all to see, both for good and for bad. Stores have cameras that watch who goes in and out of the public bathrooms and dressing rooms; and to get on a plane today, we have the virtual equivalent of a strip search. There is no sacred space.

12. In fact, the only place where one can really be anonymous is in the virtual world. Hiding behind a screen and a keyboard, we can pretend to be whoever we want to be in a world so vast that it is very hard to discover who is behind what we see, hear and read on the internet. It is a world where secret people reveal the secrets of others. The internet, however, is certainly not a sacred space.

13. So where is the holy space for Jews today? The answer may surprise you. First of all, the Sages of the Talmud, who lived through the destruction of the Temple and had to face an uncertain future, declared that the new Jewish holy place would be the homes where Jews lived. That the family dinner table was the new alter, the food served there as if they were holy sacrifices and the rituals of the Table mirrored the destroyed Temple with its Hamotzi over bread and salt and closing with a Birkat Hamazon, prayers of thanks for not only the food but for the spiritual time of eating a meal in the presence of God. This holy meal, when served on the holy Shabbat was set apart from every other meal and the tradition tells us that for Shabbat dinner, angels escort us home from the synagogue so that we may eat our Shabbat meal in peace.

14. Getting back to our Parsha, Rabbis today have discovered the truth in the story of the Mishkan. Any space where a person seeks to find God can be holy space. At that moment, for that man or woman, when he or she opens a heart to all the spiritual possibilities, that space becomes Kadosh. It is not the particular place that matters; it is the heart of the person who is standing there. If we are standing on the beach watching a sunrise, or witnessing a sunset or if we see majestic mountains or gaze up to the starry night sky, the place we stand may be awesome but it is not holy until we utter a blessing “Oshe Maase Berayshit” for “ making the glorious works of creation”.

15. People come to synagogue for many reasons. Some come here to see friends they have not seen all week. Some come to shul to celebrate personal or family life cycle events. Some people come to synagogue to catch up on the latest gossip or to get the latest investment tips. Some come to shul for the outstanding brownies that we serve during the Kiddush and some come because they need to say Kaddish for a loved one. But the synagogue is not a holy space until we open our hearts in prayer. It is not enough to just read the words in the Siddur, we must let the words and their meaning open our heart, mind and soul to the sacred that is beyond. Only then can we say that the ground upon which we stand is holy.

16. God declares that the seventh day is Holy and God is the one who anoints the People of Israel as holy, but in any place we open our hearts to God, to the wonders of God’s creation, to the possibilities of God in our life; when we open our hearts to fulfill the Mitzvot, including the commands to love God and to love humanity, at that moment, the place we stand becomes holy ground.

17. We can turn any place into a holy place and any moment can become a sanctuary to God. It all depends on what we are doing in that place and in that moment. It is possible to make every place we stand holy and every moment a Temple to God. All we need to do is to use every minute of our life as if we are standing in the presence of God. It is not as hard as you might think. All it takes is the decision to turn our thoughts to God.

May we find God in the places we stand. And when we find ourselves feeling lost and alone, may we open our hearts, and the ground underneath us will become holy ground. Just don’t forget to take off your shoes!

Shabbat Shalom

1. Shabbat Shalom

2. In the Fourteenth chapter of Exodus, we come to one of the great climaxes of the story of the Exodus from Egypt. Three days have passed and even though Moses promised Pharaoh that they would return after three days, they do not return and the Egyptians send out the army, a host of chariots, to attack the former slaves and bring them back to Egypt.

3. When the People of Israel look up and see the Egyptian army advancing in the distance, they react as you might expect, with panic. In one of the less flattering moments in the Torah, Israel turns on their leaders and on Moses with all kinds of accusations. “Why did you bring us out into this wilderness?” “Why did you bring us here to die?” “Didn’t we tell you that we wanted to stay and serve the Egyptians rather than leave and die in the wilderness?” My favorite accusation was “There were not enough tombs in Egypt that you needed to bring us here to die?” Considering that Egypt was the classic land of tombs, it is a really ironic complaint.

4. Moses tries to calm them down and they stop complaining to see what Moses wants them to do. But Moses really doesn’t know what to do. God has not given him any instructions. So Moses turns to God to ask, “What should we do?” The Rabbis of the Talmud say that there was a difference of opinion as to what the best course of action should be. Should they stand and fight? Should they surrender and go back to slavery? Should they run? If so, where should they run? If they run north they will encounter the border garrison of Egyptian soldiers. If they run south they will enter a sandy desert. If they run west they will encounter the attacking army. If they run east, they will drown in the sea. What should they do?

5. God finally says to Moses, “What are you doing, wasting time and praying to me? Lead the people into the sea and hold your hand over it and see what happens.” Moses does and the greatest miracle the world has ever known opens up before them as the water parts, giving Israel a path to freedom and serving as a grave to the Egyptian soldiers.

6. This is just the first time that Israel will get nasty with their leaders. By the end of our Parsha they are complaining about the lack of good food and water. No matter what God does for them they have something new to complain about. There is never a council where the leaders and representatives of the people gather to discuss the challenges that they are facing and how best to address them. The people act spoiled and mean. It always seems to be about “What has God done for us lately?” Moses says one thing and the people often do the opposite. Finally, God will get so disgusted with the people that God decrees that they will all die in the wilderness and only their children will inherit the Promised Land.

7. This was not a really good week here in the United States. Last Shabbat, a lone gunman attempted to assassinate the member of Congress who represents Tucson, AZ. She did not die but seven others who were with her, including a nine year old child, were killed, and Representative Giffords and a dozen others were wounded and taken to the hospital. Only Ms. Giffords remains in critical condition but she appears to be making remarkable progress, a miracle that I am sure her family sees as great a miracle as the crossing of the sea. The deranged shooter was tackled by some bystanders, a small woman wrestled the ammunition away from the shooter so he could not reload his gun and a young aide ran to save Ms. Gifford’s life. In those horrifying minutes, there were heroes, or maybe angels, who rushed in to save lives.

8. Just like our ancestors, the entire country then erupted into a debate on the reasons for the shooting and how it could have been prevented. Is this a good example of why we need better gun safety laws? Is this a good example of how our mental health programs are lacking? Is this a testimony to how limited our law enforcement officers are in handling criminals since they stopped him for running a red light but all they could do was give him a ticket? If they had arrested him, the tragedy could have been averted.

9. I can tell you now that I am a big supporter of better gun laws in this country, and I do believe that we could treat those with mental illnesses better. But the real issue, both for President Obama and for former governor Sarah Palin, the real issue is civil discourse. What used to be intelligent debates about real issues in this country, has mostly settled down into two sides shouting at each other, not listening to what the other side has to say and not caring that the other may have a few good points. It is all about yelling the loudest and getting your opinion out on the right cable or radio news talk station.

10. We like to think that such raucous debates are only in the political realm, but it can be found almost everywhere these days. The news shows often feature one side shouting at the other side. Talk show hosts regularly shout down the people who disagree with their opinions. People will publish on the internet and in letters to the editor the most vicious attacks on those who do not agree with their position. Most people with an idea or a position, if they don’t want to be attacked, keep their heads down and their mouths shut, thus cutting off the kind of debate that is the heart and soul of democracy. Town hall meetings, city council meetings, county commission meetings even condo owners meetings, can quickly escalate out of control as people scream that they are right and everyone else is wrong.

11. Some people say that this state of affairs is because we no longer have the relationships with our neighbors that we used to have. We spend our time watching TV, listening to the radio and surfing the internet that we don’t have regular human contact anymore. I have to remind everyone that we need to welcome the Temple Emeth newcomers that we do not know. We are no longer practiced at welcoming strangers. Politicians don’t live in Washington DC anymore; they finish their work and fly back home to their families, to their local offices and to the fund- raising they need to do. If we don’t talk to each other, we end up shouting at each other. How can we have civil discourse if we don’t practice often what it means to be civil?

12. The Talmud is based on Sages debating the issues with each other. They were very good at debating points of law and sometimes they are so good, that we can’t really tell which side finally won the debate and which opinion is to be considered the law. The Sages debated with people they liked, with people they did not like, with Jews and with Romans, with friends and foes and they even debated with Sages who lived in the generations before their own. Only a few times did the debate erupt into personal attacks; when it did, it never ended well. A mean word from one Rabbi resulted in the death of his closest friend. A moment of disrespect caused the head of the rabbinical court to resign and they only reinstated him after some serious repentance and a commitment to living a more humble life. In the Bible, a mean word from King David brought about the death of a great Jewish general. The sages teach us that “Life and Death are in the Power of the Tongue”

13. In the race toward ever more shocking attacks, political enemies begin to start contemplating not just destroying their opponents ideas, but destroying the opponent as well. And if we complain that this kind of incitement could cause serious repercussions, we are laughed at and accused of being just like the opponent and worthy of being destroyed as well. This is far from civil discourse. This is no different than speaking inappropriately in public. Freedom of speech may be one of the four freedoms we celebrate in this country, but it does not give us the right to hurt others either physically or emotionally. We can hurt feelings as easily as we can hurt bodies.

14. Judaism reminds us that we need to watch what comes out of our mouths as much as we watch what goes into our mouths. We are not genetically disposed to be mean and cruel to others. We are not hard wired to be kind. We need to learn how to do both and Judaism would have us practice being kind and concerned rather than combative and angry. Judaism still encourages students to study with partners, debating back and forth the meaning of Jewish texts and learning from the position that each of us takes. Calling names does not resolve a problem. Only speaking clearly and listening to others will bring about the resolution of issues.

15. There is a story told of a man who on a dark and stormy night gets a flat tire on a dark country road. As the rain pours down, the man tries to change the tire. The darkness is only broken by flashes of lightning followed by the crash of the thunder. The man is completely miserable and the repair takes a very long time. Finally as the lightning gets brighter and the thunder louder, the man finally turns his eyes to heaven saying, “Dear God, I could use a little more light and a lot less noise.”

16. Last weekend a Congresswoman stopped to talk to voters in front of a supermarket. As she spoke to a young girl, shots were fired. The killer clearly wanted to murder the congresswoman. This deranged man might have killed with or without the highly charged speeches of the most recent election in Arizona. There is no evidence that civil speech would have saved lives that morning in Tucson. But civil speech can save our country, making it a better place for each other, a better place for the sharing of ideas and a better place for democracy. Let us resolve to be the one who listens at least as much as we speak. Let each of us be responsible to bringing more light into our discussions and removing the noise that isolates us. Let us resolve to make our words strong, informative and passionate, but never hurtful, mean or inciting. Only if we can hear what our opponents say, can we hope to have them hear what we have to say. And when we listen to each other, we can solve problems, make friends and literally change the world.

May God help us make our words a blessing and not a curse, and may we use them to build bridges between ourselves and others, and not tear apart the ties that bind us to each other in freedom and blessing

As we say Amen and Shabbat Shalom.

1. Shabbat Shalom

2. With a mandate from God, Moses and Aaron appear for the first time, before Pharaoh, the ruler of all Egypt, and demand that Pharaoh let the people of Israel go from their slavery. But Pharaoh throws all their hopes out the window and asks a cold and perhaps cruel question.

“Who is the Lord that I should heed Him and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord nor will I let Israel go.”

3. I have always held that when the Torah has someone ask a question in the text, the question is not only about moving the plot of the story along, but that question is being addressed to us. For example, the first question in the Torah is God asking humanity, “Where are you?” The story of Joseph hangs on a question asked by a stranger, “Who are you looking for?” In the story of the Exodus from Egypt, it all hangs on this one question Pharaoh asks “Who is the Lord that I should heed Him?

4. All ten plagues are God’s answer to this one question. As each plague comes, Pharaoh begins to understand that Moses is neither a rival for the throne of Egypt, nor is he a rebel seeking to overthrow the king. Pharaoh says at the end of last week’s Parsha “I stand guilty this time. The Lord is in the right and I and my people are in the wrong. Plead with the Lord that there may be an end of God’s thunder and of hail. I will let you go; you need stay no longer.” Pharaoh has given up; he now knows exactly who God is and what God is capable of doing. Pharaoh knows who the Lord is and why he needs to let Israel go. But he will once again change his mind. He may know God, but he is not yet prepared to capitulate to God. His heart will harden and there will be three more horrible plagues until the Exodus can happen.

5. There is no shortage of people today who ask the same question as Pharaoh every day. “Who is the Lord that I should listen to Him?” After all, this Lord is a very demanding God. God tells us when we can work and when we must rest. God tells us what we can eat and when we can eat it. God gives us laws to observe and sends punishments when we disobey. If we were to read our Siddur carefully, we would find a God that is very demanding, violent and seems to be in need of a lot of praise. Is it any wonder that people ask themselves about who is this God who requires my worship?

6. God seems to be jealous, demanding our full attention and not permitting any other “god” in our lives. God seems to be a punishing God. The second paragraph of the Shema tells us that communal disaster will result from the sins of just one person. The Torah teaches us that every time the people of Israel sinned, they were met with plague, war and disaster. God does not seem to forgive the Canaanites for their sins, requiring that the Canaanites and the Amalakites be entirely exterminated. For a minor infraction, Moses will be denied entrance into the promised land.

7. We too have had our moments when we have wondered about what kind of a God we worship. This loyalty to God is a great burden. It is not easy to be an observant Jew. Even the most pious person has doubts about the worship of God toward the end of Yom Kippur and a long day of fasting and prayer. What Jew, in the final dash to make our homes ready for Shabbat or to clean our homes of Hametz before Pesach, has not wondered if all of this work is worth the effort? We thank God with a blessing for just about everything imaginable. And, when we watch our friends and loved ones, who seem so innocent of any wrongdoing, suffer terribly with illness, can we say that we understand ourselves who God is that we should keep God’s commandments? It sometimes seems easier to just forget the whole thing and do whatever we want.

8. And yet, we realize that throughout history, Jews have been prepared to die in the name of our God. In every generation there have been those who have risen up against us, demanding that we forget God, defame God, reject our God or deny God. For thousands of years our people have been rock solid in our faith, facing torture, inquisition, pogroms and gas chambers rather than deny who we are and the God who is central to our lives.

9. Even the Torah admits that it is not the persecutions that will bring us to deny God, but the blessings we receive. It is when we are settled in our land, safe in our homes, when we are well fed and prosperous that we begin to think that “My own hand as gotten me all of this” and we forget God, reject God and ignore God’s commandments. Like in the Fable of Aesop, when the winds blow cold and hard, we cling to our faith and hold on tight. But when the sun shines down on us, warming us in its rays, we shed our faith as we might take off a coat, leaving ourselves and our families unprepared for whatever challenges may come next.

10. That is why it remains so important for us to consider the question of Pharaoh. Who is God that we should be listening to God’s voice? The Rabbis and Sages in every generation have given us many reasons to stay loyal to the God of Israel. Many times in our liturgy we are reminded that God was there for us when our people were enslaved in Egypt. That God rescued us from our prison there, bringing us from slavery to freedom. Each Pesach we proclaim that WE ourselves were slaves and that God rescued us.

11. Judaism teaches us that life is a blessing and that we have at least 100 reasons each day to express our gratitude to God. Not because God needs to hear our praise, but because we need the lesson in humility. If we can find 100 reasons each day to thank God, we will find that life is not about chasing success or material goods. Life is about being thankful for all the good things in life that we often overlook or forget.

12. Sometimes, we complain about all the commandments that God places on our shoulders. There are holidays to observe throughout the entire year, there is Shabbat that calls us every week and there are a host of Mitzvot that we are called to perform every day, beginning from the moment we awaken to the last Shema we recite before we go to bed. And yet, if we stop to consider what we are being called to do in God’s name: To be kind and considerate, to love our neighbor as ourselves, to care for the sick, the homeless and the mourner; God requires that we give charity to the poor, clothe the naked, feed the hungry, teach our children, care for our parents, pay attention to what we eat and take time from our busy day to pray; We are commanded to stop working one day in seven, to study Torah, be faithful to our spouse and then pray three times a day so we don’t forget what is really important in life; If we consider all of this, we realize that Mitzvot are not designed to be a yoke around our necks, but a reminder of our responsibilities to ourselves, to those we love and to the stranger and those helpless in society.

13. And there is one more freedom that we are given that we must not forget. God gives us the freedom to choose if we will follow the path that God gives us or not. When the Torah comes to its concluding words, we hear these final lessons from Moses: “Surely this Torah which I enjoin upon you this day is not too baffling for you, nor is it beyond reach. It is not in the heavens that you should say ‘Who among us can go up to the heavens and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea that you should say ‘Who among us can cross to the other side of the sea and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?’ No, the thing is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart to observe it. See, I set before you this day life and prosperity, death and adversity. … I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day: I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life – if you and your offspring would live – by loving the Lord your God, heeding His commandments and holding fast to Him.”

14. The entire Torah is one long answer to the question of Pharaoh. The history of the Jewish People is one long answer to the question of Pharaoh. And we have to decide each day if our lives will be part of the eternal answer to the question, “Who is the Lord that I should heed Him?” How will you answer Pharaoh’s question? Your answer will make all the difference in your life, in this synagogue and it may make the difference in the lives of many people all over the world.

May we search our souls for the answer to this question and may God grant us the strength, wisdom and faith to be true to what we believe as we say…. Amen and Shabbat Shalom

1. Shabbat Shalom

2. When Jacob stretched out his hand to bless his grandchildren, Ephraim and Menashe, he blessed them saying, “In them may my name be recalled, and the names of my fathers, Abraham and Isaac, and may they be teeming multitudes upon the earth.” (Gen. 48:16) Jacob is saying that through these two young men, the names of the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob will be remembered forever.

3. The founder of Chabad Hasidim, the very first Lubavitcher Rebbe, Shneur Zalman of Lyady, makes this great observation on Jacob’s blessing. Shneur Zalman says; “May God bless them as long as they call themselves by traditional biblical names. The most valuable legacy we can leave our children and grandchildren is bequeathing to them the faith that sustained us.” I don’t quote the Lubavitcher Rebbe very often but I thought that this was a remarkable insight. If our children and grandchildren will remain true to our faith, then they will find that the faith that sustains us, will sustain them as well.

4. So let me cut right to the chase here. There are Rabbis today, who don’t seem to understand that they should pass on to our children the faith of our ancestors; they instead preach and practice a faith that, instead of sustaining our children, will be a faith that will destroy them. I am not referring to Reform or Reconstructionist rabbis, not even to the New Age rabbis who don’t seem to connect their faith to much of anything traditional. I turn my attention today to the Ultra-Orthodox rabbis, both here and in Israel, who speak of a faith of fear rather than a faith of hope and who teach bigotry rather than peace. To these extremist rabbis on the far Right, no Jew is good enough. Jews have to be weighted down with every conceivable law to prevent them from going astray.

5. When I first went to college, and began my studies of history, I found historians who noted that the reason the Pilgrims and Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony had so many laws that regulated their life was because they feared every moment was an opportunity to go astray. That is the way things are in any religion that seeks to control its members. But it is impossible to create a law for every possible action. We human beings are way too complex to be able to restrict in every fashion. Eventually there is rebellion and the pendulum swings back, away from the extreme, and back to the center.

6. For the past 30 years, from the time I first started Rabbinical School, I understood right away that the trend in Orthodoxy to shift to the Right would be a dead end street for them. I like to apply what I call “the Gunfighter Rule” to their understanding of Jewish Law. A gunfighter in the old west always knew that someday, he would meet another gunfighter who was quicker on the draw than he was. Probably it would be the last person he met. The problem with the Orthodox shift to the Right was that no matter how strict a person could be with Jewish Law in their life, it was inevitable that someday they would find someone else who was stricter than they were.

7. First you had to be Kosher. Then you had to be Glatt Kosher. Now even Glatt is not enough, and there are, in Israel, stricter rules for meat; and even the OU is not good enough for them anymore. Food not only needs to be supervised, but it needs to be supervised by someone who is stringent enough or else, even if he has been supervising for 80 years, his word is no longer good enough. It is not enough that there is a certificate of Kashrut in the window, it has to be the RIGHT certificate or it means nothing.

8. But if we are just arguing about food, then we just have a difference of opinion. However when it comes to personal status issues, then it involves people’s lives. Until about 50 years ago, it was assumed that a Yeshiva student would spend many years in school, even after he was married, but eventually, he would go into business and earn a living to support his family and provide for his retirement. Today, it is expected that the student will remain a student all of his life and his wife, or the parents, will provide him with money to allow him to study full time. If they cannot do this, in Israel this means that they will be subsidized by the State for their studies and live off the taxes of others.

9. Such students don’t serve in the Israeli Army. There are Yeshivot, called “Hesder” Yeshivot, where study is combined with military service. But to these Ultra-Orthodox Jews, such students who serve the State of Israel are not the kind of Jews they would allow their daughters to marry. There are also soldiers who serve in the Israeli Army and convert to Judaism as a result of their service to Israel. The rabbis of the Israel Defense Forces do these conversions all the time. The ultra-Orthodox rabbis refuse to accept their conversions. This week, in the Knesset, a bill passed its first reading that would force the Ultra-Orthodox rabbis to accept these conversions. Shas is now threatening to break out of the coalition. Israel Beiteinu, the party of Russian Jews, who are the ones most likely to be converted in the IDF, insists that they must be accepted.

10. And then, there were, among the Ultra-Orthodox rabbis, a petition, signed by 300 rabbis who are paid by the Chief Rabbanut as municipal rabbis for the different cities and communities in Israel, a petition that declared that it is forbidden to rent an apartment in Israel to a non-Jew. Anyone who rents his or her apartment to a non-Jew would be told that it is forbidden and if they rent it anyway, they would be shunned and refused permission to daven or have an aliyah in shul. I should add that this ruling is against the law in the United States and in Israel. Such a blatant form of bigotry is forbidden by the declaration of independence in Israel and now the Attorney General of Israel is considering charges against these municipal rabbis. Thousands of rabbis all over the world have decried this ruling. But the Ultra-Orthodox rabbis don’t care because they are their own law. They don’t follow Israeli law. They only follow God’s Law, as they interpret it.

11. This is what happens in every case where religious authorities are given political power. Such power eventually brought down the Hasmonean family, the descendants of the Maccabees, who became so corrupt that the Romans eventually came and took over the country from them. It was this kind of political power that brought down the Pope because of the Mortata affair, when he refused to release a child back to a Jewish family after the boy had been kidnapped and converted. Political power among Muslims has led some very wealthy countries to remain, for all purposes, stuck in a medieval mentality, unable to function in the modern world. These two issues in Israel, may finally lead to the end of the Chief Rabbanut in Israel, a governmental body that is so routinely ignored that Israelis don’t pay any attention to their Judaism at all anymore.

12. Religion is a path for each of us to find peace in our lives and peace in living with each other. It is not a contest to see which denomination is the best. Our only task is to see how well we live by the tenets of our faith. Just because someone is stricter in his or her observance, does not make them a better person. A mentch is someone, no matter how meticulous they may be in their observance, is kind, caring and considerate. I would love to see more Jews eat kosher. I would love to see more Jews observe Shabbat and come to pray three times a day. I would love it if every Jew took the time to have a Seder, build a Sukkah and study Torah for at least a few hours every day. But I would prefer that all Jews be mentchen. An observant Jew who is a bigot, racist or prejudiced performs a Hillul HaShem, he desecrates the Name of God. A Jew who cares more about what goes into his mouth than what comes out of his mouth, does a Hillul HaShem, he desecrates God’s name.

13. I started this with a quote from Shneur Zalman, the first Lubavitcher rebbe. I have lots of issues with Chabad, but this is not one of them. They are dedicated to living in the real world. I am not an Orthodox Jew but I understand their position in Judaism and while I don’t share their stand, I know that every Jew has to find the way to God that works for them. If Orthodox Judaism works in their life, then that is fine. But when Ultra-Orthodox Jews define themselves as the only true Jews and all the rest of us are sinners, and not worthy of their time and attention, when they claim that their path is the only correct path, when they use political power to force everyone into compliance, they are not significantly different from the religious Right in this country who are constantly trying to write their religious positions into the law for everyone.

14. There must be a full separation of church and state, in this country, and full separation of synagogue and state in Israel. This will not damage the Jewish nature of Israel, in fact, it will strengthen it. When Israelis are finally able to practice Judaism in a way that meets their own spiritual needs, they will turn to Judaism as a place to find peace in their hearts, peace in their communities and peace in their corner of the world.

15. I don’t know if land for peace will really bring peace or not. I don’t know if Israel has a real partner for peace in the region or not. I don’t know what it will take to have secure borders under a two state solution. That is for the politicians to decide. For Jews, we should be preparing for that day, when we will live in peace with our enemies and thus pave the way for the Messianic age. That is the Judaism that I know. That is the Judaism I preach and that is the Judaism that I live every day of my life. I pray that our children attach themselves to this kind of Judaism, the Judaism of our ancestors, and not the kind of Ultra-Orthodox Judaism that brings dishonor to the memories of our Patriarchs.

A faith that would make us bigots and tyrants is no faith for me. I pray that we give up political power to free us so we may live by God’s law in a way that will bring love to our homes, peace to our communities and will bring God into our hearts. May this be our constant prayer.

AMEN AND SHABBAT SHALOM