by Motzen | Jan 26, 2022 | Sermons
This drasha was given on February 25, 2017. It has been updated slightly.
This morning I’d like to share with you three stories; the names and details have been changed and you will quickly see why.
Story number one involves a young boy, who we’ll call Avi. Avi was a bit of trouble-maker, he was always getting himself into conflicts with classmates and with teachers. One day he confided to an adult family friend that his father was touching him inappropriately. The family friend informed the school that Avi was attending, but the school, knowing this boy and his allure to controversy and attention-seeking behavior, they dismissed the allegations and did nothing about them. “The boy’s a liar.” “The boy’s a trouble-maker.” “It doesn’t involve us so we’re not getting involved.”
This patter continued for some time; Avi would again confide in this adult, the adult would follow up with the school, and the school would ignore it.
Finally, two years too late, the family friend called the police, who stepped in, arrested Avi’s father, and put Avi in the care of a foster family. At this point, Avi had been sexually abused for years, deeply scarred, and would need intensive therapy to teach him to trust others and to not be ashamed of himself.
Someone once asked me if the Torah speaks about child abuse. While it is not mentioned explicitly, I would suggest that it is the Mitzvah mentioned the most times in the Torah: “Do not oppress a convert, an orphan, or a widow.”
Variations of this prohibition are mentioned 46 times in the Torah! This week’s Parsha, which is all about social justice and how to build the fabric of a healthy society, begins and ends with this prohibition. This prohibition is not limited to converts, widows, or converts. It is a principal demanding of us to look out for those who are vulnerable. “G-d hears their cry,” the Torah tells us. And we are enjoined to emulate G-d and to listen ever so closely to the voice of the vulnerable and to the pleas of the powerless. There is no one more vulnerable in society than children as they are powerless and completely dependent on adults. So yes, the Torah does speak of child abuse, 46 times, and it teaches us to listen to their cries.
I hope this goes without saying, but a story like Avi’s should have never ever taken place. When a child, regardless of how big of a “trouble-maker” or “liar” they may be, shares with us an allegation, we have an obligation, a legal and moral obligation to pick up the phone and inform the police. We have an obligation to help the child and his family and care for them. Does an allegation mean something is true? Not necessarily. But if someone cries, especially a child it’s our responsibility to hear their cry and help them. And let me emphasize, helping them and supporting them is not synonymous with passing judgment on the accused. Not knowing whether or not the allegation is true does not prevent us from providing the support needed.
Is Child Protective Services perfect? Far from it. Do people get accused for things they did not do? It is extremely rare, but it could happen. But I would hate to be the one who made that decision on my own and turned out to be dead wrong. A good society, a righteous society heeds the cry of the vulnerable, and children are most vulnerable of all.
Story #2 involves a different type of cry. There are audible cries and there are silent cries and this story is about a silent cry. Sarah was a quiet, well-liked sweet young teen. At one point, in her freshman year of high school, she started to withdraw from her friends and family. Her grades began slipping and her usual put-togetherness was replaced with a complete disregard for hygiene.
Her friends were so caught up in their own lives that they stopped checking in with her, and just moved on. Tragically, but also tellingly, she didn’t have much of a relationship with her parents and although they saw many red flags, they didn’t really know what to say, and so they said nothing. Sarah fell and fell and fell.
Sarah was being abused by a sibling, emotionally, and eventually sexually. She was crying, she was sobbing, but they were silent tears that no one bothered to listen for.
As a community, as good citizens, we have an obligation to make ourselves aware of these silent cries inasmuch as we do to the audible ones. Being attuned to the silent cries means being aware of family members, or friends who have a change in behavior and start acting differently. And it may not be abuse that’s going on. But when someone suddenly starts acting very different, when someone is behaving and speaking in a way that they never did before, it may be their way of crying out to you – help me!
But it’s more – Listening to those silent tears means that you are a person who your friends and family could turn to and share with the darkest of secrets, knowing that you won’t judge them.
A colleague of mine once commented that he thought there are no issues of abuse in his shul because no one ever spoke to him about it. And then one Shabbos he decided to talk about abuse. He spoke about child abuse, spousal abuse, elder abuse, all in a compassionate and understanding way. Following that Shabbos, people began approaching him and sharing their stories of abuse and he quickly realized that of course abuse exists everywhere. It’s a universal problem, and it exists in our community as well. If we want to save people from harm, which we all want to do, we need to transform ourselves into people who are so accepting, so loving that others can share anything with them.
And here I’m going to add something you’re not going to like. There’s an international organization called Stop It Now. It is a hotline for men with deviant attractions. It is set up for people who have not acted on their attractions but are desperately in need of help controlling them.
I don’t envy their fundraiser. That’s a hard sell. But it’s also such a crucial service. The opening section of this week’s Parsha speaks of a thief who instead of throwing into jail, the Jewish courts give him responsibilities in the hope that this will help change the criminal. Judaism believes in rehabilitation, in trying to help even the sinner, and most certainly to help someone before they’ve ever committed a crime.
Are we accepting enough that if, just maybe, a friend of ours had issues that we would justifiably be disgusted by, would they feel comfortable turning to us? Would we be their destination?
Because those people are also crying silently. They are drowning in shame, in self-loathing, and they could be helped. If someone listens to their silent cries, whether that’s by checking in when we see warning signs or by being an available and accepting person, letting our friends and family know that we are there for them always, no matter what. Helping them is also helping the victim. Those are also silent cries we cannot ignore.
We’ve spoken about ignoring cries, we’ve spoken about silent cries, but far more important than those two is preventing those cries in the first place. Our community has made many positive strides in dealing with abuse and abusers. Thank G-d, most schools would not ignore the claims of Avi and will do what they are mandated to do by law. Most schools and institutions would not ignore the signs of Sarah being a victim and would get her help. Recently, many of the Jewish schools participated in a community-wide program called Safety Kid, under the auspices of CHANA, that educates children about personal safety. If your child’s school did not participate, I urge you to speak to them and ask them what education and tools they are giving your children. (Full disclosure, my wife is their local coordinator.)
But in addition to the institutional changes, there is a basic change that needs to take place at home. Our children have to be showered with unqualified love and acceptance. Our children have to know that there is nothing they can do that would make them undeserving of our love. Our children have to know that they could turn to us and confide in us. Our children have to know that we are their rock. Because that is one of the best ways to prevent abuse.
Institutions can come up with the best practices and policies that will limit the possibility of abuse. But the best prevention starts at home. The safer a child feels, the stronger connection the child has with his or her parents, the more educated the child is as to what is acceptable and what is not, the safer your child will be.
Which leads me to the third story, a story about Michael. Michael was about as average as a 7th grader could be; he had some friends but not too many, he was a B student, nothing special.
Michael went to sleep-away camp. A counselor at camp befriended him, gave him lots of attention, and they developed a close relationship. One night, the counselor tried to make sexual advances on Michael. Michael felt very uncomfortable, and he had been taught to trust his intuition. And so he said, no. And that was it, the counselor backed off.
Then Michael called his parents who he knew loved him and who he knew accepted him and who he knew would listen to him and believe him. He told them what happened and they called the camp. The camp had protocols which they followed and put the counselor on leave and immediately called the people in to investigate.
That’s my favorite story and that’s the story line we’re all shooting for.
G-d calls us a holy people in this week’s Parsha. As a holy people, it is incumbent upon us to listen when people cry, to not act as judge or jury, to simply follow the law, and call the police. As a holy nation it’s our duty to look out for friends and family, to hear their silent cry, both actively by being attuned to our surroundings, and also passively, by being non-judgmental and accepting. And as a holy nation, it is incumbent upon us, more than anything else, to foster trust, love, and acceptance in our households so that there will be no more cries.
by Motzen | Jan 21, 2022 | Sermons
I will not talk about antisemitism.
I will not talk about antisemitism.
I will not talk about antisemitism.
Guess what I’m not talking about today?
Do you want me to tell you things you already know? That antisemitism exists and that it’s getting worse? Do you really need me to tell you that? I respect your intelligence and your time way too much to do that to you.
So I will not talk about antisemitism because it’s preaching to the choir.
I will not attempt to find a new angle on antisemitism that no one came up with before. Of course, everyone is trying to do so this week after watching antisemitism once again rear its ugly head. The latest new angle? The latest hot take? A well-written article in the Atlantic suggesting that antisemitism is really an anti-democracy movement. That’s what it is really all about. It’s a fascinating read, but go tell that to my great-great-great-great-grandmother who was persecuted by Cossacks, and Crusaders, and burned at the Auto-de-fe. No. The Torah was given at Sinai, our Sages teach us, from the word, Sinah, hatred. At Sinai, our national identity was born with a bastard-twin called antisemitism. It’s appealing to make antisemitism a universal enemy, but I don’t think it’s true.
So I will not talk about antisemitism because there’s nothing new to say.
This past week I went to a shul in Florida for a weekday minyan. Before entering the premises, I was asked to empty my pockets and walk through a metal detector. I walked by an imposing looking security guard, past shatter-proof windows, and security cameras. There were police cars lined up in front of the shul. I could have spent my few minutes this morning describing the sad scene. But you know what also happened? Hundreds of people started streaming in, wearing streimels, baseball hats, shorts, white-shirts, green-shirts, pink shirts, you name it. Why were they there? There was no speaker, there was no event. They were there to daven mincha! Mind you, most of these people were on vacation. But they wanted to pray, to connect to G-d, to maintain a Jewish practice that dates back at least two thousand years. And then, after davening, I went around the block, and there were at least five or six kosher restaurants, with outdoor seating, overflowing with Jews; Jews who were keeping the longest-lasting diet of all of time. That – mincha, kosher is what I saw, or at least that’s what I chose to focus on.
So I will not talk about antisemitism and how terrible it is to live in the US because it is an incomplete picture; it’s not even a good percentage of the story. The story I see is one of population growth and growing connection.
I will not talk about antisemitism because it hands a win to antisemites, and I don’t know about you, but I am very competitive…
I have davened in many airports in my life. Usually, I find the most private corner where no one can see me. But this week? I was tired of being afraid and uncomfortable. I found a seat near a wall, took out my talis and tefillin, and I davened. I shuckled. I bowed. I wore my talis over my head. You know why? Because I am proud to be a Jew; I will not allow my Judaism to be defined by fear. Which brings me to the following and final point:
This past week, I made a shiva call to Alan Jacob, Max Jacob’s nephew, as his mother, a survivor, passed away. Alan described his upbringing as completely oblivious to the horrors of the Holocaust; he described an idyllic childhood. And for the first time it occurred to me, maybe survivors did not talk about the Holocaust not because of the trauma, or maybe not only because of the trauma, but because they wanted their children to have a Jewish identity defined not by hate, but by love. A Jewish identity defined not by terrible persecution, but by great promises. A Jewish identity defined not by running away from non-Jews and decrying the “evil goyim,” but by running to the nations of the world, to serve them as a “Mamlechet Kohanim/ a kingdom of priests;” acting as role models to the nations of the world! It occurred to me that in a warped way, by associating the memory of these survivors with the horrors of the Holocaust, we are doing a disservice to their legacy. Their legacy was one of positivity, of building, of hope, of rebirth.
We promised survivors Never Again, but we did not do a good enough job articulating why we’re so desperate to survive. We never finished the sentence. Never again. But why? So let me tell you why.
Never again BECAUSE – G-d charged us with an eternal mission of being a light unto the nations. Never again BECAUSE – if lived properly, a Torah-guided lifestyle could and should create armies of driven people who are self-aware, constantly self-actualizing, and acting as spiritual magnets to those around them, not by proselytizing but because we’re so darn uplifting. Never again BECAUSE – we keep Shabbos that reenforces relationships in a world of loneliness. Never again BECAUSE – of prayer that reminds us to take a deep breath, of a G-d that watches over us, and that we are not in control. Never again BECAUSE – of lashon hara that reminds us of the incredible power of speech and our social responsibilities. Never again BECAUSE – of Talmud Torah, connecting ourselves to ancient wisdom and engendering humility for exploring topics beyond our regular interests and knowledge.
So no, I will not talk about antisemitism out of respect for my grandparents and the many other survivors whose definition of Judaism was not survival for the sake of survival; it was survival for the sake of spirituality. It was survival for the sake of hope, of growth, of G-d, of Torah, of Tefillah, of joy, of community, of everything that is beautiful about our lives.
I will not talk about antisemitism.
I will not talk about antisemitism.
I will not talk about antisemitism.
And in my humble opinion, neither should you.
There is nothing new to add, it hands our enemies a win, it steals a disproportionate amount of our attention, and it is decidedly not our identity. We are not the world’s scapegoat, punching bag, or enemy. We are a kingdom of priests, a light onto the nations, and we are responsible for the spiritual and moral wellbeing of the world, and I am incredibly proud to have such a calling. I am incredibly proud to be a Jew.
by Motzen | Dec 26, 2021 | Sermons
Es chato’ai ani mazkir hayom.
I am going to share something I am a little ashamed of, but I think it’s rather instructive, so I am going to swallow my pride.
This took place in 2013, I had just started at Ner Tamid. I remember exactly where I was standing when I took the call I am bout to describe. It was from a member of the shul who had recently lost a loved one. They had not asked me to officiate the funeral – I was new to the shul, and I didn’t really know them and that was just fine. However, I did not attend the funeral. Not only that, I did not attend the shiva. I had no shortage of excuses as to why I didn’t attend; I didn’t have the time, it was a “crazy week,” etc. etc. But the truth is, I really didn’t know them, and I was nervous; what was I going to say to these people who were grieving? Nothing. I barely know the individual who passed and I didn’t know them at all. So I came up with every legitimate excuse not go.
And now, I was on the phone with the family who were quite upset at me for not coming to the shiva house. And they were 100% right. I should have swallowed my pride, gotten over the fact that I had nothing to say to them, and just showed up.
I apologized, of course. Profusely. But they ended up leaving the shul.
Rabbi Berel Wein, the famous Jewish historian and former congregational rabbi, wrote a book about his experiences as a rabbi. He has a section on funerals in which he describes the many times he’d be enjoying a hard-earned vacation and he’d get a call that someone had passed away. He’d deliberate, going back and forth in his mind if he should travel home, and his wife’s advice would win out every time. She’d say, “Berel, people only die once in their lifetime. This is your only chance to be there for them.” (As an aside, after too many cancelled vacations, he decided to only vacation overseas so he wouldn’t be forced to make these difficult decisions.)
His wife’s somewhat comical line how people only die once in their lifetime is something worth reflecting on, not just for rabbis, but for all of us.
Thank G-d, for the most part we are all self-sufficient. We’re hopefully employed. We have some basic level of social support. We’re okay. But invariably, in a person’s life, there will be times when our basic support is insufficient. Moments of crisis, moments in which we feel like we’re free-falling, lost, living in a deep, deep fog. For most people, thank G-d, that’s rare. But it happens. It happens to all of us. Often, other people don’t know when we’re free-falling or struggling. But there is one time when it is apparent to all, and that’s when we experience a loss. And it’s at moments like those, that we need each other, not just our rabbi, but each other, all of us, to just be there for us.
The traditional words that we say to a mourner are, Hamakom yinachem eschem. May G-d, who we refer to as ‘Hamakom’ – the place, G-d who fills all the space of the world, may He comfort you. There are many explanations as to why we refer to G-d with this unique name of ‘the place.’ But today, I’d like to share with you a homiletic interpretation on the word, Hamakom, suggesting that it does not refer to G-d. Rather, it refers to the place that is surrounding the mourner. If the space, the room in which the mourner is sitting is filled with people, not necessarily saying anything, but just being there, that provides nechama, comfort. If the place is empty, if there are no calls, no texts, no gestures, and instead the mourner free-falls on their own, if instead the mourner is lost on their own, if instead the mourner navigates the fog on his or her own, then there is no nechama.
It’s been well-documented how wise the laws of shiva are for the mourner. Burying their loved one as soon as possible as a way to give closure. Taking a break for seven days to give emotional space to focus on the loss. And the notion of visiting the mourner, making a shiva call, to receive comfort and strength from one’s community.
To fulfill the law of nichum aveilim, comforting the mourner, one need not say anything at all. All you need to do is show up, to be there, to demonstrate that you are with them. The Halacha actually states that you are not meant to say anything until the mourner speaks first. And if they don’t speak? You don’t speak. That’s okay, you’re there for them. That’s what’s important.
We’re not very good with silence and so we end up talking about silly things. Or far worse, we’re afraid, like I was, that we have nothing to say, or that they don’t even know us, so we protect our pride and we let our community member sit all alone, in an empty place.
In the very first message that Hashem conveys to Moshe to tell the Jewish People, G-d does not say, tell them I will save them, G-d does not say, tell them I will assist them. Rather,
כֹּ֤ה תֹאמַר֙ לִבְנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל אֶֽהְיֶ֖ה שְׁלָחַ֥נִי אֲלֵיכֶֽם
Say to the Jewish People, “’I will be’ sent me to you.” (Shemos, 3:14)
G-d describes Himself with this new name, a name we don’t see anywhere else; “I will be.” What does I will be mean? Says Rashi, I will be with you in your pain. Imcha anoch b’tzara. The very first message that Hashem conveys to His enslaved people is not one of redemption or even of hope, but rather, it is one of presence. I will be with you. I am here with you.
We often don’t know when people are going through a hard time, we have no way of knowing. But when someone experiences a loss, we know. We may not know them all that well. We may not have anything to say. But being a member of a community means being there for one another, not by doing or saying, just by being there. Imcha anochi b’tzara, I am here with you, to listen if you want to talk, but even if you don’t, I am here for you with my presence.
I often speak to people who are going through hard times. More often than not, I don’t have any solutions or cannot find words of chizuk, of encouragement, that will resonate; I know they will come out flat. But I’ve realized over these past years that my job, and not just my job, but the job every human being, every member of a community, is just to be there. Not to problem-solve, not to fill the silence with noise, but to touch and feel and taste the pain our community member is experiencing to the best of our ability and to just be there.
That means showing up to shiva houses. That means sending someone a one-line text even if we don’t know them that well, “thinking about you.” That means clicking the “care” button on Facebook when someone posts something sad. Imcha anochi b’tzara.
I’ll conclude with a poem I wrote a year ago. It was born out of my discomfort with the silence that being there so often entails.
I struggle for words, I bite my tongue, I sigh from the depth of my soul,
Your pain’s so deep, my words so weak, am I helping or hurting you more?
My mind can’t stop racing, ideas, solutions, I am trying to not waste your time.
My eloquence fails, my wisdom sails, all I muster is one more deep sigh.
To the sleepless parent whose child is lost, to the orphan with nowhere to turn,
To the suffering in silence, calming minds that can’t stop, and fears that always return,
To those stuck in bed, with nothing to live for, fighting to go on for one more,
To those haunted by demons, by loved ones who hurt them, who robbed them of all youthful joy.
To those hiding in closets, living two lives, torn into pieces and shreds,
To the voices not heard, the people not seen, they walk among us, the living dead.
To the lonely soul yearning for connection and love, whose hope hardened into despair,
To those who heard (/read) this and wept, their pain not expressed, truly, my greatest fear.
So as I struggle for words, as I bite my tongue, as you wonder if I’m even still there,
I am trying my best to feel your pain, and to be there with you, and to care.
I don’t have solutions, or words of wisdom, I don’t mean to waste your time.
I just want you to know that no matter the reason, imcha anochi b’tzarah.
We may not always have the words, we may even be afraid to share that we do not have the words, but as community members, let’s take a page out of G-d’s playbook, let’s be there for each other in times of pain.
by Motzen | Dec 11, 2021 | Sermons
This past week I had an extremely disturbing conversation. I was attending a dinner in support of the FIDF, the Friends of the Israeli Defense Force. It was a beautiful and moving event that highlighted the amazing work this organization does in supporting Israeli soldiers. I was talking to one of the event organizers who was thanking me for being there. I rolled my eyes and shrugged my shoulders, “Thank me? C’mon, of course I’d be here. It’s in support of the IDF – it’s a no-brainer.” Besides, someone paid for my seat…
But he disagreed and said it was a big deal that I was there. He explained that over the past couple of years, fewer and fewer rabbis were willing to attend their events and partner with them. First it was in the Reform movement and now, he told me, in the Conservative shuls as well. They cannot afford – politically – to align themselves with the IDF.
If that wasn’t bad enough, a few minutes later, someone who is heavily invested in Israel Bonds told me that fewer and fewer non-Orthodox shuls are willing to make campaigns for Israel Bonds. Israel Bonds?! Israel Bonds is the most classical Jewish cause. That’s like saying you don’t want bagels and lox! Israel Bonds, for the record, does not send any funds to Israel’s defense. 100% of the funds go to national infrastructure. But in too many circles, affiliation with Israel is out of vogue.
Maybe I shouldn’t have been so surprised.
A month or so ago we had an event here in conjunction with BZD and Stand with Us. One of the speakers got up and pointed out that the average age in the room was closer to 50, maybe 60. Where are the young supporters of Israel? She asked.
We know where they are. They are on college campuses which by and large paint support of Israel as evil. That’s where they are. They are indoctrinated by messages that equate support of Israel with support of Nazism. They are surrounded by peers who see the Israeli government, be it a liberal or conservative Israeli government, as anti-democratic and evil. Of course, they’re not showing up to FIDF events. Of course, they’re not supporting Israel.
So what do we do? How do we respond?
What we’ve done so far is create campaigns that show the world how multi-cultural and democratic Israel is. We teach people history so that they understand that Israel is far from perfect and yet has attempted to make peace many times and has been rejected. And with those who share our belief in G-d, we speak to the Biblical promises and their unbelievable fulfilment.
But clearly, it doesn’t work. We’re still told that Israel is an apartheid state. We are still told that Jews are colonizers who stole Palestinian land. We are still singled out time and time again despite a decent human rights track record, certainly in comparison to other nations. Why don’t these talking points resonate? Why don’t they make a difference?
We could chalk it up to antisemitism and that would undoubtedly be true. Not antisemitism in the secular sense, but a mystical idea of antisemitism, that no matter what, the Jewish People will be despised. Anyone with a basic knowledge of history cannot escape this truth.
However, there is something else here that I think we’re missing. When we try our talking points – speaking to Jewish and Israeli history, making logical arguments proving how Israelis are, for the most part “good guys”, we fail to realize that we are speaking a different language than your typical kid on campus. And when I say, typical kid on campus I mean our kids – too many of the young adults giving voice to the most anti-Israel sentiments are Jews. We do not speak the same language as a good portion of our society. We do not think the same way.
The most prevalent mode of thought in this day and age is something called, post-modernism. I am no expert on philosophy, but the basic gist of post-modernism is that there are no objective truths, that my lived experience is true, and I don’t have to defend it or prove it. This is why if you ask a teenager to share their opinion on something they will say, “I feel XYZ” whereas you and I would say, “I think…” Their reality is a feeling, a sense; logic, in its classical form, is dead. You cannot prove anything. No religion is more correct than any other. Every opinion is valid. Try explaining to my grandfather that a boy is a girl. That only makes sense in a postmodern world, where my lived experience is a reality. Argument, in such a reality, is futile. Everyone has been lamenting the death of discourse. But how can you talk to one another when there are no shared truths? When I see black, and you see white? And we’re both right.
It’s very hard to change someone’s mind on Israel in a postmodern reality. It’s not to say we should not try; we should, and we must. It’s not to say that everyone under 35 thinks this way. But it’s worth noting the generational divide is vast and that we, us old ones (and yes, I am old in this regard), and the younger generation are talking different languages.
We could tsk tsk this new way of thinking or throw up our arms in despair. Or – we could recognize how deeply this way of thinking has impacted all of us. As I alluded to, the challenge of postmodernism impacts not only our connection to Israel, or social issues, it impacts our connection to our faith. If all religions are created equal, why should I do this? Because it feels good?! Well, what if it doesn’t feel good? Because you believe in it? Prove it! I ‘feel’ differently.
Though the philosophy of post-modernism dates back to the 80’s, maybe the 50’s, but us Jews have been grappling with post-modernism since the beginning of our history. The prophets of ancient Israel lambast the Jewish People not for serving idols, but for serving idols and Hashem. In the words of Eliyahu Hanavi, עַד־מָתַ֞י אַתֶּ֣ם פֹּסְחִים֮ עַל־שְׁתֵּ֣י הַסְּעִפִּים֒ אִם־יְהֹוָ֤ה הָאֱלֹהִים֙ לְכ֣וּ אַחֲרָ֔יו וְאִם־הַבַּ֖עַל לְכ֣וּ אַחֲרָ֑יו “How long will you continue to skip between two opinions? If you want to go after Hashem, do so, and if you want to go after Baal, then go after him!”
We may not be chasing Baal, but we’re also skipping between the options. How many of us believe and how many of us believe – sort of? How many of us observe and how many of us observe – unless it’s really inconvenient? Too many mistakenly confuse this way of life as Modern-Orthodoxy. It’s not. It’s Post-Modern-Orthodoxy.
The Maharal (I believe?) explains that the reason the Jewish People, as opposed to any other nation, embraced such a large pantheon of gods, the reason Jews have always gravitated to so many diverse ideas, is because we recognized the slivers of truth that existed within each ideology. There is something good to be found everywhere! There is some truth in every faith! But you cannot live a life holding on to everything at the same time. It does not work, and it certainly does not last. Those Jews that Eliyahu railed against, they were lost to history. They didn’t make it.
You see, the greatest casualty of postmodernism is the lack of conviction that comes in its wake. The greatest threat to Orthodoxy, and Modern-Orthodoxy in particular, is this lack of conviction. (See the theme for this year’s Torah Umesorah convention and the take-aways from the most recent Pew report in Jewish Action). If our connection to Judaism is lukewarm, then our children’s connection will likely be cold, and their children… they likely won’t be Jewish.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. On the contrary, our community is most well-positioned for the exact opposite. We, who are not afraid of the outside world, we, who like the Maharal writes can see the good in the cultures and philosophies that surround us, we, who can take the good from the bad, and come back and say, we’ve seen it all and we choose to embrace Judaism, that’s a most powerful statement. There is one language that cuts through the apathy and the relativism and the confusion, the language of conviction and of passion. Because if our connection to Judaism is hot, then our children’s connection will be boiling, and their children – off the charts.
As B’nei Yisrael prepared to enter the land of Egypt, Yaakov and Yosef were concerned – how would the family survive? How would they make it out of this land with their faith intact?
Yosef’s strategy was to send his family to live in Goshen, away from the center of Egypt, away from the competing views. This, he believed, was to be their salvation – the very first self-imposed ghetto, shielding them from the foreign world around them. But there was a certain naiveté that Yosef had, thinking that distance or walls would shield his family from the seductive ideas of Egyptian culture.
Yaakov took a very different approach. אֶת־יְהוּדָ֞ה שָׁלַ֤ח לְפָנָיו֙ אֶל־יוֹסֵ֔ף לְהוֹרֹ֥ת And Yaakov sent Yehuda ahead of him l’horos, to show the way. To show the way?! Did Yaakov need directions? Rashi quotes the Medrash that explains: לְתַקֵּן לוֹ בֵּית תַּלְמוּד שֶׁמִּשָּׁם תֵּצֵא הוֹרָאָה He sent him ahead to establish a school, an academy, from which hor’ah, or Torah will come forth.
Yaakov recognized that you cannot run away from the draw of Egypt just like you cannot run away from the draw of Western civilization. Yaakov recognized that his descendants would thrive not by ignoring the world around them, nor by arguing with those around them, but by steeping themselves in what they believe. Then and only then did they have a chance to survive.
Our answers may not always resonate with everyone around us. Our answers may not always resonate with ourselves!! But apathy and lukewarm commitment is not a viable option. If we want to ensure that our values are passed on to the next generation, they need to be hot, they need to be on fire! What that means is not just getting by Jewishly, checking off the boxes. It means developing a deeper faith, deeper belief and constantly expressing that in action. More Torah study! More Mitzvos! more Tefilah! More Israel! It means passionate engagement with our faith, and it means sacrifice. It means cherishing ideas that are not so popular like the notion that not all beliefs are created equal, that not all truths are true. It means telling our children and telling ourselves, in word and in deed, that in a world of many gods, we can, and we will choose one.
by Motzen | Dec 5, 2021 | Sermons
Chanukah is a holiday of bad takes. No one, absolutely no one, seems to know what this holiday is all about. Two weeks ago, in the New York Times food section, a recipe for Chanukah food was listed. Not for latkas, not for sufganiyot, not even for Greek salad, which would have been kinda funny. Instead, it was a Chanukah recipe for Matza ball soup. You know, the quintessential Chanukah food…
And that is nothing compared to the Bed Bath & Beyond Chanukah-themed pillow. It was a beautiful pillow with the words, “Why is this night different from all other nights? Happy Hanukah!” Do they not know Jews?! They literally could have walked into any Bed Bath & Beyond and asked every second shopper. The Bed Bath and Beyond parking lot is Chabad’s favorite place to hunt Jews. None of us can resist those oversized coupons! “Okay, okay, I’ll put on tefillin, just let me through!”
It’s not just non-Jews who don’t have a clue. I just saw a special edition of Chanukah gelt created by a certain Jewish-led group. Instead of Happy Chanukah written on the tin foil, it said, Free Palestine. Yes, the holiday upon which the Jewish People, two thousand years ago, defended their homeland – I don’t see it. Or, less egregious, but equally wrong is the narrative that Chanukah was established as a holiday to celebrate religious freedom. Which is sort of true. Yes, religious observance was under attack. But the Maccabees weren’t fighting for a laissez faire acceptance of all faiths, an Imagine-esque live and let live reality. They were fighting a life and death battle to promote the Jewish faith to the absolute exclusion of all others.
As we all know, the real Chanukah story involved two groups of Jews fighting over the soul of the Jewish People. There were the traditionalists, holding on for their dear life to the ways of their parents, arguing that the Jewish People must never change their ways, and the Hellenists, who sought to merge the wisdom of Aristotle to that of Moses, and wanted to part ways with the laws that seemed outdated. Antiochus, the Greeks, they were supporting actors at best in this epic drama of Jew vs. Jew.
I don’t blame people for not getting it; it’s a complicated storyline. And making it even more complicated, and what made the battle so fierce, was not the great divide between Athens and Jerusalem, but their many similarities. Yes, there were barbaric fights taking place in the coliseums, there was the Greek focus on aesthetics, and a certain amount of hedonism. But at the same time, there was no other culture that shared so much with our Torah. In the Hellenized states, the great Greek thinkers were pondering the meaning of existence and promoting an ethical life. It was the Greeks who put the word civil into civilization; they were creating an international community, not out of oppression and terror, but out of tolerance and the mixing of old and new. “Yaft Elokim l’Yefet” (Bereishis, 9:27) – There is good reason that the Torah describes Greece as beautiful, or that the Talmud (Megillah, 8b) allows for a Torah scroll to be written in no other languages other than Hebrew and Greek, and that the Zohar (Shemos, 237a) proclaims that “Yavan/ Greece is close to the path of true faith.”
Despite the great joy that surrounds this holiday – I love watching the dancing flames and singing with my family and with eight days of fried food and family fun it’s hard to complain – But in truth, I struggle mightily with fully embracing this holiday. The Greeks we defeated were the forefathers of Western civilization and all that it has to offer; public education, equality, civil responsibility, the arts; so many of the positive features of our society can be traced back to those ancient Greeks. Yes, there are elements of this Greek beauty that conflict with my religious value system, but there is also so much I adore.
Each year on Chanukah, I try to ask myself which ideas and values that I hold near and dear are Jewish values or which are Greek values. Because – and I’ll speak for myself when I say, the battle of the Maccabees is far from over. It’s no longer taking place in Israel. It’s alive and well and raging inside – inside me, and I imagine inside many of us. And so every year, I return to the notion that there is a part of me that is Greek and a part of me that is Jewish. Each year, I change, as we all do. Some things I struggled with in the past are no longer struggles. Some things are even greater struggles. But one way or another, I am still both a Jew and a Greek.
There is a part of me that is Greek – a part of me that believes that quality of life is paramount, and a person should have full autonomy over his/her own body. And there is a part of me that is Jewish, that believes that our bodies are a gift from G-d, not ours, and that every moment of life, as painfully challenging as it may be, is priceless, and that G-d is the One to choose what I can and cannot do with my body and life.
There is a part of me that is Greek – a part of me that believes in a plurality of ideas, in everyone being entitled to their viewpoint, or as we like to say in our society, to their “truth.” And there’s a part of me that’s Jewish, that believes that Moshe Emes v’soroso emes, that the Torah is true and while Judaism embraces plurality far more than other faiths, it believes in an objective right and wrong.
There is a part of me that is Greek – that believes, in the words of Mark Manson, that “One day, you and everyone you love will die. And beyond a small group of people for an extremely brief period of time, little of what you say or do will ever matter… We are inconsequential cosmic dust, bumping and milling about on a tiny blue speck. We imagine our own importance. We invent our purpose—we are nothing.” And there is a part of me that is Jewish that believes that every act, every word, every thought impacts the cosmos and is so incredibly precious to G-d.
And lastly, there is a part of me that is Greek – a part of me that if I were to be totally honest, at times is troubled with miracles I did not witness, in authorship I cannot verify, and in a future that seems so distant and foreign. And yes, in the darkest of times, even struggles with the existence of a Being I have not heard from. And at the very same time, there is a part of me that is so powerfully Jewish – a part of me that is over-awed by the majesty of the world, the profundity of the Torah, the arc of history, and even if it cannot be articulated, just knows that there must be an Author. A part of me that is awakened during prayer and feels a presence that shatters those doubts into millions and millions of pieces.
No, this battle is not over. All night long we struggle. It’s not easy celebrating Chanukah when you’re both Jewish and Greek.
***
My grandmother is here with us today. She grew up in Winsted, Connecticut. There were hardly any Jews, and no religious Jews. Her father died when my grandmother was 14. Her mother, my great-grandmother, struggled to support her family and so my grandmother who was in high school at the time, decided to do some work after school. She got a job as a typist and was told that she had to work on Shabbos. My grandmother, knowing that the family needed this money desperately, obliged and went to work.
As she describes it, “I sat there with the typewriter but my fingers wouldn’t type. I just sat there and sat there and sat there.” Finally, she decided that she couldn’t do it. She told her boss that she has to quit because she can’t work, and she decided right there and then that she wouldn’t work on Shabbos.
Today, we’re celebrating my grandmother’s 90th birthday. She has a large family, children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren. Who knows, but had she chosen to type on that fateful Shabbos and not made that commitment to keep Shabbos, it’s likely that she would not have met my grandfather and none of us, no one in my family, would be here today.
But we are here. We are here because she believed in a G-d she could not see. She believed in a Torah that everyone around her ignored. She believed in a value system that didn’t immediately gratify her. She wrestled but she chose to light a candle.
And because of her, I too will light a candle into this dark and confusing night. Not a torch, a small humble candle. A light that increases its glow every night ever so subtly.
To me, that small flame represents the march of history. It reminds me that this is not the first time that Jewish values were viewed as archaic or backward. It wasn’t always easy or fashionable to be Jewish and to live by its laws, but that ner tamid, that ever-lasting flame represents a history which has shown us time and time again that today’s morality is tomorrow’s backwardness.
To me, that small flame reminds me of another small flame, one I do not see but believe in; my soul, a Godly gift that is imbued with holiness and thirsts for meaning. She is a powerful rebuke and rebuttal to the aimlessness, meaninglessness, and hedonism that is rampant in society. As believers in a soul, meaning is not a figment of our imagination; our neshama represents a purpose and calling that is intrinsic to our existence.
To me, that small flame reminds me of G-d Himself. A fire in a burning bush. Reminding me that although I cannot see Him, He is there, specifically in the darkest, most painful and most seemingly G-dless places. Like the fiery pillars that protected my ancestors, I am warmed by the knowledge of His ever-present care and concern.
Like my parents and grandparents before me, I will light a candle, I will give voice to my beliefs, with the hope that my convictions will be passed on to my descendants who will light candles just like me.
I am a Jew, and I am a Greek, but ultimately the Maccabees continue to persevere. And that’s because “Just a little bit of light,” the Lubavitcher Rebbe once said, “can banish a whole lot of darkness.”
Let’s use the remaining three days of chanukah to strengthen our beliefs, to strengthen our resolve, to be honest with the conflict inside, but to allow the light of our faith to shine through.
by Motzen | Nov 20, 2021 | Sermons
In 1965, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, penned what is possibly his most famous essay, the Lonely Man of Faith. It spoke of the tension that the ideal individual feels, torn between the devotional life, a life of G-d, on the one hand, and a life engaged in the sciences and physical accomplishments on the other. Rav Soloveitchik’s thesis was that it need not be an either/or. Inasmuch as there is value in the world of the spirit, there is value in the physical, material world as well; our scientific, intellectual, and professional accomplishments are a healthy part of our life. An essential part of life, and perhaps where the greatest growth can be found, is navigating between these two poles, that of spiritual and the physical, and creating a life where every part of our personality, body and soul, is fulfilled. He described the religious individual as lonely because such a person lives in two worlds, never fully embracing either one, and therefore never really feeling welcome.
Today, 56 years later, the tension still exists, the loneliness does not. One can so easily be a man or woman of faith and very much part of society. This is true not only in the Modern Orthodox world, but even in the Chareidi world as well. Best-selling musician, Alex Clare, Deputy National Security Advisor, Chani Neuberger, lawyer, David Schoen, and these are just some people mentioned in the news in the past few weeks. The notion that a person who is deeply religious and professionally and academically ambitious will, by definition, feel isolated is no longer true.
If anything, loneliness seems to be more of a non-religious issue than a religious one. Well before we were talking about Covid, we were discussing a different pandemic, the pandemic of loneliness. Robert Putnam was the first to sound the alarm twenty years ago with his book, Bowling Alone, arguing that Americans had become increasingly disconnected from friends and family. In 2018, a study that was blasted all over the country told us that loneliness can be just as damaging to one’s health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. The same year, the UK created a new government position, the Minister of Loneliness, to tackle this problem. But faith-based communities, like ours, have a built-in antidote to loneliness, and that is our obsession with communal life. We are forced to live within walking distances of our shuls creating close-knit communities, we promote family life and intergenerational involvement, minyan forces people into the same space three times a day, and we value studying with a partner. If Rabbi Soloveitchik would be here today, I wonder what he would call his essay. The man and woman of faith are the least lonely of all.
But there is another form of loneliness that a person faith must still grapple with. It is a form of loneliness that exists in every type of society, regardless of how welcoming they are to people of faith. It is a form of loneliness that we can trace all the way back to our most social forefather, to our most materially successful forefather, to our most spiritual forefather, and that is Yaakov. Surrounded by his four wives, twelve sons, a dizzying amount of wealth, and unparalleled spiritual accomplishments, Yaakov, nonetheless feels alone. “Vayivaser Yaakov l’vado, and Yaakov remained alone.”
According to one interpretation, Yaakov is not wrestling with an angel, he is wrestling with himself (see the Malbim and Rabbeinu Bachya). He recognizes that despite all he has accomplished, he is still not content with where he is in life. Despite all the people around him praising him and seeing him as their hero, in his own eyes, he is nothing. And perhaps we can say that it is not just despite his accomplishments, but it is because of them that he feels this way. Looking at him and what he has done, no one can possibly appreciate the sense of longing and the sense of inadequacy that Yaakov experiences. Imposter syndrome describes someone who feels like a fraud. What Yaakov experiences is far deeper. He is authentic, there is no fraud, but he knows that it’s not enough. A person of faith, a person who is alive to their soul, knows that feelings of spiritual satisfaction don’t exist in this world, that the thirst for G-dliness is never satiated, that the work, the inner work, is never done – even though everyone around him thinks that he’s on top of the world.
“Vayivaser Yaakov l’vado, and Yaakov remained alone,” is not just a physical description of his being left alone in middle of the night, it is his inner state – he is restless, he is agitated, and no one can understand why, and so Yaakov, surrounded by adoring family and friends, is forced to remain alone.
Yaakov does not ignore his loneliness. So often, we sense that there’s more to life. So often, we hear the primal scream of our soul. So often, we feel as if something about the way we live is off. And how do we respond? We turn up the volume of life. We throw ourselves deeper into our work, we binge on a new tv series, we get into a new hobby. Or, alternatively, we are so consumed by this unsettling feeling that we get depressed.
But not Yaakov. Yaakov wrestled with his loneliness; Yaakov embraced the fact that a man or woman of faith will always feel unsettled. The goal is to accept that there will always be a gap between who we are and who we need to be, between our soul’s yearnings and her ability to express herself in this world, and to stop! And to listen! To be guided by our soul, as she pushes us and pulls us to change. But to also accept that no matter how much we accomplish, we will never arrive at a settled destination. The spiritual life is one of never arriving. The wrestling match lasts the whole night, all of life. The wrestling match involves injury, it’s not easy and it could be painful. The worst pain of all, is the terrible loneliness that comes along with this spiritual struggle. We could share stories about our professional challenges with colleagues, familial challenges with friends, but the inner challenge, this battle with ourselves, is one that no one can fully understand.
I’d venture to say that Yaakov’s life of challenge and dare I say, trauma, and his inner struggle with loneliness are related. It is most often people who have been forced to face the abyss, people who have been forced to second-guess everything they know and love, people who have been through the crucible of life’s challenges, who feel the gap between who they are and where they need to be most acutely. Though we never would wish hardship on anyone, I have consistently found that those who experience earth-shattering hardship develop a sense of unsettledness like no one else. The loneliness of trauma is not only that no one knows what you’ve been through, it’s that no one cannot relate to how you now see the world.
***
The Medrash, commenting on the words, “vayivaser Yaakov l’vado/ and Yaakov remained alone,” quotes a verse in Yeshaya, “v’nisgav Hashem l’vado, and Hashem will remain alone.” There is one Being that could understand our loneliness. It is not our parents, it is not our lover, nor is it our best friends. A life of spirituality, a life of listening to one’s unique soul is a life of inner turmoil that is unrelatable to other human beings. We will try to share the height of our exhilaration, and it will fall flat. We will try to share the depth of our despair, and it will come out all wrong. Just like we can never fully appreciate who G-d is, no other human being can fully appreciate who we are. And so, G-d, the loneliest of Beings is the only being that can truly understand who we are and what we are going through.
To be a person of faith in 2021 does not involve the same sense of loneliness that it did 60 years ago. Tension, yes, loneliness, no. But to be a person of faith in any generation means to be alive to one’s inner world, to be attuned to a soul that is not satisfied with all the popularity and material success in the world, nor is she ever content with all of our great spiritual accomplishments. Our soul knows how much we can accomplish – it is endless. To be a person of faith is to spend time alone, listening to those yearnings, and allowing them to guide us wherever it may take us, to not be swayed by public opinion, to do what’s right for ourselves. To be a person of faith is to recognize that we will never be satisfied and to not allow that thought to overwhelm us, but instead to never stop wrestling, knowing that the wrestling stops when life stops. To be a person of faith means to be a part of society, but to also be alone, knowing that one can only fully be understood by G-d. It’s a lonely life, but it’s the only life worth living.
