Chol Ha-Moed Sukkot: Do You Remember MY Name??

I’m good with names. It’s a particularly useful talent to have when you’re a rabbi and/or when you do community organizing. Fortunately, I’ve just always had this ability - I see a face and a related name jumps back in my head - and I’m very, very grateful for it. Because names are tremendously important. Our identity is bound up with our name, and it’s a major element of each person’s self-perception. Even after years in the rabbinate, I’m still amazed at how critical it is for people, and how a person’s face softens and brightens when s/he feels seen and remembered. Even God identifies this as a value and a symbol of relationship, as expressed in this week’s Torah reading. 

As it is Chol Ha-Moed (the intermediated days of) Sukkot, we take a break from our weekly cycle, and instead read a section specifically associated with the holiday. Interestingly, the rabbis assigned to us a reading for this Shabbat that takes place right after the sin of the Golden calf. God is still angry, and so is Moses, but having weathered this heretical storm together, the two of them have actually formed an even closer bond! Moses asks to see God, but God informs him that’s impossible. However, God can place Moses in the cleft of a rock and let him see the Back of the Divine Presence as it passes by the mountain. It’s still more than any other human has seen, or ever will see…

When God agrees to do this for Moses, God says: “I will do this thing that you have asked; for you have truly gained My favor and I have singled you out by name.” (Ex. 33:17) I don’t love the translation “singled out,” because the Hebrew is, “Eida’acha b’Sheim,” meaning “I know you by name.” To me, it’s almost like God is saying, “you and me, we’re on a first-name basis.” The text is, essentially, using this expression as a term of closeness and intimacy: “Ours is not a formal relationship; we call each other by our personal names.” Maybe they even have nicknames for one another! It is the same between any two friends, or for a clergy member and her/his congregation; names facilitate closeness and bonding, and make us feel seen and acknowledged.

I know not everyone does or can have as easy a time with names as I do, and for some people it’s genuinely hard to remember them. But it’s also a skill we can work on. I have tricks and methods for recalling names, and I’ve encouraged clergy colleagues and students to really prioritize this skill when working in a congregational setting. Our names come with stories, memories, loving relationships with family, perhaps trauma, nicknames and possibly teasing, and so much more. It is a foundational part of who we are, and when someone knows us well, it is a way that we can bring them closer: “please, just call me ____.” When we share this bond with another, and feel present to them just as they are present to us, it can truly become a genuine and lasting friendship. And it started with that moment of being introduced and learning one another’s names. And even a simple, close friendship like that still holds sparks of the relationship between God and Moses. Even for the Ruler of the Entire Universe, that kinship begins with knowing one another by name.

CC images in this blog post, courtesy of:
1. Emily Rose on Flickr 
2. ELG21 on Pixabay
3. pxfuel.com
4. blairwang on Flickr

Yom Kippur 5782 (2021) - Neilah (End of Yom Kippur)

This evening, as the sun begins to set and we prepare for the end of Yom Kippur, with the service known as Neilah, I want to tell you about a song. The first time I heard it, a few years ago, I stopped in my tracks and my ears perked up… but for really the silliest reason. The first line of the song is, “old pirates, yes, they rabbi.” And I was soooo confused! Why would the famous singer, Bob Marley, be singing a reggae song about rabbis?!?! It turns out, of course, that he wasn’t saying that at all. The song is called “Redemption Song,” and is very soft and unassuming… but so, so powerful and profound. 

I discovered that Marley often in his songs uses the 1st person pronoun, “I,” which usually refers to the subject, the one actively DOING in the sentence, instead of “me,” which is the pronoun for the person receiving or having something done to them. The lyric I was mishearing ACTUALLY says, “Old pirates, yes, they rob I,” and he doesn’t mean some hook-handed, eyepatch wearing pirate; nor does he mean that he was robbed of some possessions. No, he’s talking about the slave traders being pirates, and they kidnapped me, they stole ME from my home. Marley is saying I - and my people - refuse to remain objects; the people to whom something is done. I am I; I am active, engaged, and able to influence what happens to me in this life. I am not passive, so those despicable pirates “robbed I.” They dragged my ancestors from my home and enslaved them for generation upon generation. But every time I hear the song, for just a quick moment, I still think Bob Marley is singing about rabbis… 
    

For a couple of years, I questioned whether I should ever share that funny, almost silly, little association in a sermon, because the song is about slavery and oppression, and furthermore, it has come to mean a great deal to me. It’s profoundly inspiring, achingly and tragically prophetic, and yet it insistently and stubbornly maintains a sense of hope and light at the end of the tunnel; no matter what. Marley sings, “Won’t you help to sing these songs of freedom. Cause all I ever had… redemption songs.” In other words: yes, we sing redemption songs about eventually being free… but we sing them for right now, to work TODAY towards these goals we must all pursue; only then can we hope for redemption and peace in the future. So how can we focus on the task at hand, getting through the challenges of today, to hope for a better tomorrow?
    

Neilah is, in many ways, a Redemption Song. The introductory piyyut, medieval poem turned into a prayer, of Neilah, that Rabbi Miller just led for us, is Eil Norah Alilah. It is replete with the theme of redemption, even as each line sings about “this closing hour”: “Renew our days as of old,” “Restore your remaining flock to their former glory,” and the final line refers to the angels Michael and Gabriel, as well as the prophet Elijah, always the harbinger of the Messianic Era, and prays that they “bring tidings of redemption in this closing hour.” We then conclude Neilah, and thus the entire holiday, with the blast of a shofar and a chant of “L’Shanah Ha-ba’ah Birushalayim! - Next Year in Jerusalem.” Again, it’s about the ingathering of exiles, hopes for peace, and a prayer for salvation and redemption.

But I wanted to start with Marley’s Redemption Song, to remind us that our hopes and inspiration don’t only have to come from within our own community, or just from Jewish sources. If we truly ever hope for redemption and peace on earth, we are all going to have to learn from one another, respect the traditions and practices of other religions and communities, and work HARD for redemption TOGETHER. There’s one line in Redemption Song that always gives me chills: “How long shall they kill our prophets while we stand aside and look? Some say it’s just a part of it; we’ve got to fulfill The Book.” There are always prophetic voices around us; people of morality and ethics, compassion and love, who challenge us to face what is broken in our society. We’re not anywhere near ready to work on fixing the biggest systemic problems; let’s just work on SEEING them for now, acknowledging their existence, and accepting that our status quo is NOT working for the majority of people as well as animals and plants on this planet. 

It’s daunting to look at these deeply-rooted traumas, like the enslavement of African people, and the oppression that languishes on to this day, where some people find it offensive to say aloud that those people’s Black Lives Matter. It is, in fact, so hard to face the ills all around us, that we often prefer to silence those who point out the problems, rather than address them. Hence Marley’s ominous line, “how long shall they kill our prophets, while we stand aside and look?” When we chant the Al Cheit and the Ashamnu, the confessional prayers of our sins, and we beat our chest… how can we avoid the pitfall of just standing aside and gawking when truth and fairness is being silenced? That is truly a failing that we can all strike ourselves for, and try and resolve to do more in the year ahead.

The second half of that line is mainly meant for a Christian audience, I suspect. That the suffering of the prophet (or Messiah…), according to some, is just a part of the grand scheme of human existence, and the martyrdom of those individuals who speak truth to power is itself fulfilling and leading up to the prophecies of the End of Days as told in the Bible. But I just can’t shake that line. I think Marley is kind of saying it tongue-in-cheek, that those people, who say it’s all just a part of God’s Plan, are absolving themselves of responsibility. And this feels like a particularly Jewish point-of-view. We are not meant to stand aside and look, stay on the sidelines and let whatever is supposed to happen, happen. Why else would we strike our chest, if not to shock our system and try and get in the game, affect change?! Why blast the shofar repeatedly, and mandate that everyone needs to hear the cry of the shofar… and respond with action?! No, I firmly believe the only thing that is “a part of it,” of fulfilling The Book, is human beings taking responsibility to partner with God in Tikkun Olam, Repairing the World.

After I finish speaking, the Ark is going to be opened and remain open for another half hour or so, throughout nearly all of Neilah. I encourage each and every person in this room to not just “stand aside and look.” Come up to the ark and offer your own prayer, or think about a commitment or resolution that you would like to undertake in the new year. Not because God is up here, and not down there. Not because your prayers are stronger next to a Torah scroll. But because getting out of your seat, walking up these steps, in front of everyone, might just be the first steps you take towards affecting change, and helping to bring about redemption for yourself, your community, and maybe even beyond that.

I agree with Bob Marley, that we should all see ourselves as “I” and not “me,” as active players who make things happen in the world. We were not stolen away and sold into bondage, but the Jewish People have also suffered over the centuries and millennia, and our prophetic voices have also been silenced and killed. Another favorite line of mine from his song is “Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds.” Tonight is a wonderful night to free our minds from mental slavery, from the belief that we can’t change anything, and nothing is ever going to get better. It can. It will. This evening can be the beginning of redemption, as we sing about throughout Neilah. But not without our help, not if we stand aside and look. Free your mind, help redemption come about, and THAT is how we’ll fulfill the Book.

Yom Kippur 5782 (2021) - Morning Sermon (Final in the Series)

Shanah Tovah!

If you were here at Ohev Shalom for Rosh Hashanah services last week, and/or last night for Kol Nidrei, you’ve potentially already heard my previous three sermons on the theme of resilience. Or perhaps you read the texts online or watched the recordings. AND therefore, you might be getting a little sick of hearing me talk about the town of Lostice and our new Megillah. I’m not going to review everything I’ve said thus far over the course of our time together, except to say that we’ve been looking together at four paintings by Siona Benjamin, and coupling each with a different method of growing our own internal resilience. I also want to repeat my main point that I’ve tried to cultivate, expand upon, and build up over the course of these four sermons: Resilience is a learned skill and a muscle that we develop. And doing so may help us not just endure and persevere… but actually thrive and become stronger individuals. 
    

So I’m not going to devote too much time in this sermon to the town of Lostice. In examining our fourth and final painting, we don’t need to go back and revisit that history. Instead, I want to tell you about perhaps my most favorite symbol, which Siona and I incorporated into this last image. Not just yet though; I’ll get there.
    

Our four core aspects of increasing resilience have been: creating connections, healthy thinking, wellness and self-care, and now, meaning-making. In essence, I see this fourth element as being the most critical, which is the ability to mine our own experiences for meaning. Too often, we are tempted to label what happens to us in life as “bad” or “good.” Things that make us happy and are fun - they are GOOD. Things that make us sad, cause pain, or are unpleasant - they are BAD. And yet, we also know this isn’t always the case. Sometimes, an experience that appears good and fortuitous comes with unexpected challenges, new heartache, and problems we didn’t see before, and now we wish that seemingly positive experience never happened in the first place. The opposite, of course, is what we might call a “blessing in disguise.” This is the one that I find the most intriguing. In my years in the rabbinate, I have often been struck by the stories I hear from people that are, perhaps, counterintuitive. Addictions, illnesses, accidents, and misfortunes that are, in and of themselves, tragic… yet I’ve repeatedly heard people say something to the effect of: “I’d never wish this struggle on anyone… BUT it actually taught me a lot about how precious life is, how much I have to be grateful for, and the true meaning of life and of living. 
   
The American Psychological Association, which I’ve been quoting for all four aspects of building resilience, states early on in its description: “The road to resilience is likely to involve considerable emotional distress.” Well, that doesn’t sound fun! Or enjoyable. We don’t want or seek out emotional distress… but it’s hard to deny that those experiences help us grow, evolve, and build new, vital skills for survival. While we may strive to obtain safety, security, comfort, and contentment in life, we do not actually grow in those situations. Think of it, if you will, like exercise. It would be wonderful if the way to increase our stamina, strengthen our muscles, and fortify our bodies was to sit for an hour in a sauna. Or get a relaxing massage. Or sleep restfully all through the night. But that simply isn’t the case. We build muscle when we PUSH our bodies, through exercise, weight lifting, and strenuous, exhausting exertion. No pain, no gain. Trauma is VERY hard… but we can learn so much from it.
    

We may ALSO need that massage, the sleep, or the soothing sauna. Like the times in our lives when we are comfortable and at ease, that is when we replenish, rest, and relax. But we do so IN ORDER TO then push ourselves yet again, whether through physical exercise, or yes, through tough experiences that will increase our resilience. This is, in fact, also a central message of our
Jewish tradition, and certainly a central lesson we can take from Jewish history. We are “Yisrael,” meaning “one who wrestles with God.” We push, we question, we challenge the status quo and established norms, it is what we do and always have done. It allows us to form closer, more intimate connections with our heritage. 

“Love thy neighbor as thyself,” the Golden Rule in the Torah, is also about bucking the status quo. It involves stepping OUTSIDE your own needs, your own safety, and extending a hand to someone else… which lo and behold, then turns out to be one of the main reasons we receive God’s favor and rewards. The APA’s description of this fourth element of resilience-building, Meaning-Making, states simply: “Help others.” What a simple, yet powerful, key to improving our lives. Help other people. The definition goes on to say: “Whether you volunteer with a local homeless shelter or simply support a friend in their own time of need, you can garner a sense of purpose, foster self-worth, connect with other people, and tangibly help others, all of which can empower you to grow in resilience.”
    

When we give, we receive. That sounds so elementary, it’s almost cliche. And when we feel stressed, under pressure, or afraid - say during a pandemic - every fiber of our being might be saying, “not now. I need to focus on MY needs and MY well-being right now… I can’t give.”
And sometimes that’s true, and it’s perfectly reasonable that we are stretched thin and don’t have the bandwidth to do more. But let us also remember how counterintuitive - yet 100% true - it is, that helping someone else makes us feel better, increases our sense of self-worth, and gives our lives purpose. What may seem like too much to take on, may indeed turn out to be the very thing that helps us deal with the rest of our burdens. You might even call it a blessing in disguise.
    

As you may have already heard me say, the symbol of resilience in our Lostice Megillah is light. It perseveres. It cannot be destroyed. Connecting it now to our principle of helping others, think about the simple image of a candle. When one flame lights another, is the first one diminished? No, not at all. Then the second wick lights a third, then a fourth, and eventually one hundred. A room that was once dark is now bathed in light, glowing and warm from the heat of so many lit candles. And was any one candle ever burdened by lighting another? Of course not. We should see our own ability to give and to bless others like its own light-source; sharing with others without depleting itself… and in fact growing stronger and more luminescent with each act of kindness and selflessness.
    

I see the entire story of our Lostice Torah as a blessing in disguise. Clearly, it is born out of tragedy, and the devastation of the Shoah. And finding meaning and purpose in the story of this scroll does not mean we’re saying what befell the Jews of Europe or of Lostice was “good.” Again, that label is actually unhelpful. Mining our experiences for value and significance is NOT about reframing it to be a “good thing.” Addiction, illness, tragedy - I am not suggesting you should now see these experiences as terrific, joyous, or desirable. No. They simply are. 

What happens in life is so often out of our control and unavoidable. That also means it is actually quite pointless to label it as “good” or “bad.” Instead, we should be looking for ways and opportunities to grow from EVERYTHING that happens to us. The APA description encourages us to “be proactive [and ask]; what can I DO about a problem in my life?” And we should also “Look for opportunities for self-discovery.” It doesn’t matter if that self-discovery comes from something fun or painful, desirable or not, strenuous and tough or safe and comfortable. How can we dig into it, and make meaning out of all we experience?
    

In the fourth painting in the Megillah, we are now looking at our Ohev Shalom Sanctuary. You can see the red glass of these windows behind me on both sides, framing the scene. The central figure is a rabbi, arms held up in the air. Siona and I talked about this rabbinic fellow for a while, and ultimately settled on it being an amalgam of myself and our beloved Rabbi Emeritus, Louis Kaplan. The figure is tall and thin… so not really me, but is also wearing a tallit that is modeled after mine; which also happens to be the tallit that you - Ohev Shalom - gave me on my tenth anniversary here. There would be no Lostice scroll here at Ohev, if it weren’t for Rabbi Kaplan corresponding with, and ultimately traveling to, the Westminster Synagogue in London to procure one of the 1,564 Czech Torahs that were saved from the Holocaust. But I like to think of myself as partnering with my good friend and colleague, Lou Kaplan, on taking this precious treasure that he brought us, and mining, excavating its story for meaning and purpose, which can then enlighten and enhance our community. 
    

So now to my favorite symbol perhaps in the entire Megillah: The rabbi’s arms are stretched aloft, ready to receive a scroll that is being passed down. And the hands that are gifting that scroll to Rabbi Kaplan and myself are the same hands that are embroidered on the Lostice scroll’s Torah mantle. Elsa Wachs, a member of our congregation and world-renowned artist herself, created that mantle when the Torah came to Ohev Shalom in 1980. I have always found its imagery so powerful and inspiring. The hands, wearing the striped uniform of the concentration camps, reach up from the ground with the words “Am Yisrael Chai” (The Jewish People Lives) floating upward - L’Eilah ul’Eilah; higher and higher - along with them. They are the hands of the people of Lostice, whose scroll - and legacy - are now ours to carry forward. But for our Megillah, I wanted to invert the hands, as the souls of our Czech ancestors now reside in heaven, and they are bequeathing this story down to us from above.
    

I also think that flipping this powerful symbol upside down reminds us - again - not to take things at face value and assume they are inherently “good” or “bad.” Whether sent from above or below, a blessing or a curse, the opportunity is always there for us to create meaning and purpose. Standing around that rabbinic character are the silhouettes of congregants; basking in the light and being drawn towards this compelling story of resilience. Young and old, women and men, of all races, sexual orientations, and abilities, Jewish or not; we - YOU - are part of this story now. 

I feel so immensely blessed to have come to Ohev Shalom, and to now have entered my 13th Bar Mitzvah year with this community. And I feel awed and humbled to have discovered so much about the people of Lostice, including Fanny Neuda, and the miraculous road to salvation for this beautiful, mystical scroll. 
Our partnerships with Siona Benjamin, Judith Joseph (the calligrapher), and Dinah Berland (who translated Fanny Neuda’s prayer book into English) have also been such blessings for us, for which I am eternally grateful. And the result of it all is this document, our Megillat Lostice: A Scroll of Resilience.
    

I hope that this sermon series has helped you learn more about the absolutely invaluable, priceless jewel that resides here in our Sanctuary Ark. I pray that in this challenging, uncertain time of the coronavirus pandemic, that I have given you new resources to build resilience for yourself, so that we can all - united together - face the future and keep our community strong, no matter what may come. Each of us is truly a candle, and each can add light, warmth, understanding, and brilliance to this congregation and to our wider community. I hope you now feel aglow. And can pass on some resilience to other candles, just waiting to shine along with us.
    

Shanah Tovah!

Kol Nidrei 5782 (2021) - Main Sermon on Yom Kippur Evening

Shanah Tovah!
 

Right before the pandemic, you may recall that we undertook a major project, in repairing our Lostice Torah. Seems like ages ago! It had been examined and assessed several times since the scroll came to Ohev in 1980, but the cost of repairing the text was well-into five figures, and four times the cost of any other “regular” scroll that might also require extensive repair work. Why does this matter? Well, you see, we cannot read from a Torah scroll if it isn’t Kosher, and it isn’t considered Kosher if even a SINGLE letter is faded or erased to the point where you can’t read the word. And this is across a scroll that, if unrolled, would stretch around this entire Sanctuary! You can imagine how many words, paragraphs, and entire columns were cracked, peeling, hard to read, and badly damaged, after the Lostice Torah endured fire, then water damage, then mold and humidity for decades. 
         

It was a daunting project to envision, but with the help of a generous donation in memory of Sheila and Benjamin Garberman, themselves Holocaust survivors and partisan fighters in WW2, we were finally - after four decades - able to make it happen. I remember looking at the scroll laying on the table, as the Sofer would place one person’s hand after another on top of his hand, while he carefully wrote a letter. 

At that moment, a funny thought jumped into my head: how brilliant of the rabbis to decree that our holiest texts be written specifically on animal hide parchment. You see, there are some very interesting properties that come with animal skins, including things like parchment and leather. They need to be used, handled, maneuvered, to stay in good shape. If you leave a set of tefillin on a shelf or in a closet for decades, it too will atrophy. But if you wear it, bind it, and regularly bring it into your worship experience, the leather becomes smooth and soft, and it even molds itself to its owner’s arm.
    

Torah scrolls also need to be manipulated; they need to be rolled. Years ago, our sofer told us we needed to keep rolling each Torah, so it would remain limber and fresh. I love this image! Just as we need the Torah, the Torah needs us. Just as we keep the rituals and traditions, those same rites and ceremonies help us stay together, united, and in relationship with one another across the generations. It is a symbiotic and beautiful relationship. This was once fabulously articulated by an early 20th century essayist and founder of the cultural Zionism movement, Achad Ha-Am, who stated: “More than the Jewish People have kept Shabbat, Shabbat has kept the Jews.”
    

So you can imagine how terrible it was for the Czech Torahs to be neglected in a damp, cold, jam-packed warehouse. Some of the most irreparable damage came from just decaying in anonymity, year after year. 1,800 Torah scrolls were crying out for Jewish communities to come and roll them back and forth, dust them off, read from them, and dance with them on Simchat Torah. When Siona Benjamin and I imagined our Lostice Megillah, which tells the story of how our particular scroll came to Ohev Shalom, we talked a lot about the third chapter. The first chapter was about history and home, or what I referred to as “connection” from the American Psychological Association’s description of four ways to build up resilience. We need to increase our resilience, in order to mold ourselves into more durable individuals and to withstand the pressures and stresses of our time… much like the scrolls and the tefillin are at their healthiest when they are worked on and manipulated. The second chapter was about the destruction of the Holocaust, but I also hope it was very clear to those of you who heard me speak, that resilience comes from sitting *with* the pain of trauma. We must acknowledge it, be in relationship with that hurt… and then intentionally shift our minds to Healthy Thinking, to turn our traumas into triumphs; our pains into perseverance. 
    

The theme of this third chapter is “Healing.” In the top-left corner of the painting, we see the same Michle synagogue that was being flattened, and nearly toppled, in the previous painting. Smoke rises in the background, symbolizing the devastation of the Shoah from which these scrolls were rescued. A road snakes its way from the Michle synagogue and Prague down into the center of the painting, where you see two trucks driving up to the Westminster Synagogue in London. From inside the trucks, we see the light of the glowing scrolls emanating. Light is a trope through all four images, representing the immortal, unbreakable spirit of our people. It was dimmed and badly bruised in the Holocaust, but now it radiates once again. And why? Because the scrolls - and with them the soul of our people - knew they had not been fully wiped out. Healing and rejuvenation were coming soon.
    

In our Megillah, waiting by the synagogue, already working on previously delivered Torahs, is a little-known sofer named David Brand. He came from a long line of professional scribes. He himself lived in Jerusalem, happily immersed in an Orthodox community. But in order to make a living, he would travel around Europe repairing scrolls. Legend has it that one day in the early 1960s, he knocked on the door of the Westminster Synagogue, and was greeted by the caretaker of the building, Ruth Schaffer. In Yiddish, he softly asked her, “Do you have any Torahs to repair?” She replied, in classic, British deadpan fashion: “We have 1, 564. Come in!” Mr. Brand, as he was known, wouldn’t just begin the work of healing and restoring the Czech Torahs; he wound up staying in London for nearly THREE decades, dedicating his entire life to these Sifrei Torah. 
    

The Memorial Scrolls Trust is the caretaking organization of all the scrolls, and we are in contact with them regarding the stewardship of our beloved Lostice Torah. Their website talks a lot about this amazing and devoted sofer, writing: “Mr. Brand (no-one ever used his first name) stayed to work on these rescued Scrolls for twenty seven years. Rabbi [Harold] Reinhart obtained permission for him to remain and work in Britain and for his family to join him from Jerusalem. He was to be seen regularly at his work desk on the third floor, at a window giving him the best natural light, welcoming guests in his rapidly improving English, chatting to the children and showing them how he made his ink, sharpened his quill pens, and lovingly attended to his sacred work.”
    

In the third panel, inspired by a powerful photograph of the man from the 1980s, Mr. Brand is seen pouring over a scroll, intensely focused on his work… and there are more scrolls behind him, waiting for his tender care and much-needed rolling, touching, and handling. I also love how the description of him emphasized how he sat by the window to receive the most natural light possible. For his own nourishment, perhaps, but also to recharge the flickering embers of light hidden inside each Torah. 

A key aspect of increasing our resilience, according to the APA, is called Wellness. They state, “Take care of your body... stress is just as much physical as it is emotional. Like the Torah scrolls, it isn’t enough to know the teachings or retell the stories; they need physical, tangible care as well. We too need to nourish ourselves - with natural light AND healthy sustenance - with sleep, exercise, and hydration, among other things. We sometimes think of these things as separate, but they are not. Bodily self-care is, according to the APA, “a legitimate practice for mental health AND building resilience.” 

Sadly, I have experienced how intricately linked the physical and mental can be, up close during this horrific pandemic. I have officiated at several funerals in the last 18 months, sometimes actual COVID deaths, and other times deaths that I thought of as COVID-adjacent. For example, someone who was ill, but not life-threateningly so. But when they needed to be hospitalized, they were tragically isolated from family, friends, and their emotional support networks. The mental toll was nearly as devastating as the virus. Now, I’m not saying this should have been handled differently, nor am I placing blame. I just want to bring to light the cruel repercussions of the necessary social distancing of this cursed pandemic… and thus emphasize all the more strongly how we MUST focus on our own wellness, our emotional and physical needs, and our internal storage of resilience.  

Another aspect of Wellness that is crucial for increasing our perseverance, is what The American Psychological Association describes as, “Avoiding negative outlets,” which I actually think doesn’t mean what many people might think it means. It is NOT directing us to avoid sadness, pain, or distress. No, they mean that we have to have healthier outlets and processes for the inevitable trauma and challenges of life. They instruct the reader to avoid numbing the pain with alcohol, drugs, or other distracting agents, which ultimately push us further and further away from being mindful and present to our own pain. We HAVE TO allow ourselves to feel that pain. The APA says that otherwise those other outlets are “like putting a bandage on a deep wound.” Not only isn’t it leading to healing… but the neglect actually makes the wound fester longer and become more dangerous.

I find the metaphor of the Torah parchment or the leather straps of the tefillin to be helpful and inspiring. Because they are indeed metaphors for our own bodies, and for how we incorporate our values and beliefs into our lives. If we relegate them to a dark place - whether a cold warehouse or an abandoned part of our own psyche - they WILL atrophy. But when we bring our Jewish tradition into our lives, actively debating Biblical texts, questioning assumptions, and learning new things; then it becomes a LIVING tradition. And attrition may seem like the preferred option, compared to actively engaging with our own internal pain, grief, struggles, and trauma. That too needs to be handled, tenderly cared for, and brought into the light, in order for us to be the healthiest versions of ourselves we can be.

 

I wanted to add one final image to these reflections on Wellness. Last week, after one of my first sermons, our synagogue president, Joel Fein, pointed out to me the glowing lights in each of our mosaic panels on the side walls of the Sanctuary. He referenced my focus on the notion of light, and how prominent it is in so many things all around us, like the mosaics. I really appreciated that observation, especially because it reminded me how that artist, Heather Bryson, who created all 14 incredible mosaics, intentionally placed the sun (or moon, potentially, in a couple of them) in different positions of rising or descending. 

Initially, I imagined the sun might start low at one end, then gradually rise across the seven panels on one side, then descend slowly along the other seven on the other side. But she said, “the sun represents the life of the community.” Just like life, we ebb and flow. We have great successes, feel vibrant, and alive… and failures, where it feels the energy is gone and the building is empty… say in the middle of a global pandemic. And it doesn’t go in a predictable, linear trajectory. It waxes and wanes, shifts constantly. Sometimes, what should feel like a happy occasion is tinged with bitterness for whatever reason, while conversely, a major challenge and obstacle can become the source of surprising triumph and rejuvenation. 

We don’t know what the future holds. That is one of the reasons why Yom Kippur feels so precarious. When Rabbi Miller sings the Un’tane Tokef, about who shall live and who shall die, we feel that uncertainty quite viscerally. This year, perhaps, more than ever before. And we may be tempted to hide from that truth and instead numb it with some substitute. I mean, isn’t that likely to make it feel a little better in the short term??? But what about the longer term? What about our emotional AND physical well-being, and the slow-but-insistent toll that neglect can take? Ignoring our own pain is like, well, leaving a Torah scroll in a damp warehouse for decades. It slowly disintegrates, eventually beyond repair. We all need an internal Mr. Brand, a sofer who will take care of our needs and make sure we are building up our own resilience to keep going and growing. Because like the Torah scrolls, we don’t function too well when parts of us are cracking, fading away, or breaking. 

One final thought about our Lostice Scroll. It was mostly repaired off-site, and the scribes left a single paragraph at the end of the Torah, so that members of the congregation could hold the hand of the sofer, as I mentioned, when he finished the last letters, and ultimately made the scroll Kosher for use again, after 75 years of disrepair. On the first day the scroll came back to us, the sofer unravelled it to the last paragraph. And I asked him, why did they finish the very last line of text? It was darker than anything before it, and the writing was clear as day, no cracked letters, and appeared to have been fully restored to its original form. He said to me, “We haven’t touched that line.” Inexplicably, a single line of text never wore out; it looked nearly as fresh as the day it was written.

That last verse, Deuteronomy 34:12, talks about the wonders performed by God and Moses, “l’Einei Kol Yisrael,” witnessed by all of Israel. Those last three words, “l’Einei Kol Yisrael,” were the ones that never wore down. It took my breath away, and I’m glad I had the wherewithal to take a picture, which I now keep on the back of the door in my office. “L’Einei Kol Yisrael,” our Lostice Torah waited 75 years for the eyes of Israel, of the Jewish People, to once again look inside the scroll. To once again use it, love it, and care for it. We need this Torah scroll, and the incredible lessons it has to teach us. And in return, it needs us too. 

Shanah Tovah!

Rosh Hashanah 5782 (2021) - Second Day Sermon

RH2 5782 - Main Sermon

Shanah Tovah! 

I wonder if some people in the congregation were surprised when they first heard that our Scroll of Resilience, written about the miraculous journey of our Holocaust Scroll from the town of Lostice in Czechoslovakia to Wallingford, PA, was called “MEGILLAT Lostice”? Why Megillah? Isn’t there already another book called “The Megillah” And don’t we have expressions like “the whole Megillah,” meaning “everything,” that would make it particularly ironic to then write a totally *separate* Megillah? I said people were perhaps surprised, but maybe they - or you - were more accurately confused… and maybe a little suspicious.

Who writes a new Megillah anyway? Is that even allowed?? Ok, so allow me to explain. First of all, the word “Megillah” just means “scroll,” and there are officially five Megillot in the Tanach, the Jewish Bible: Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, and - most familiarly - the Book of Esther. Esther is of course the one that has come to be known as THE Megillah, which we read aloud on Purim and boo every time we hear Haman’s name. However, there is yet another Jewish concept, mainly established in the Middle Ages, that involves repurposing the word “Megillah.” And that is going to be the focus of my sermon here this morning. 

Going back as far as the 2nd century of the common era, we have historical examples of authors writing OTHER Megillot. The first such example is Megillat Antiochus a.k.a. Megillat Hashmonai, which was written to commemorate the story of Chanukah. Italian and Yemenite Jewish communities would read the scroll aloud - almost exactly as we do with Megillat Esther on Purim - for centuries… even some still do to this day! 

Subsequent to that, there are actually an impressive number of accounts - over the course of centuries and ALL around the world - of Jewish communities writing much more unique and unexpected forms of Megillot. The formula essentially goes like this: The Jewish community of a town or city is threatened with major violence, a conspiracy or plot, a natural disaster, or some other calamity. Miraculously, the crisis is averted, or at least mitigated, and in celebration of their survival, the rabbi or leader of the community would write or commission a scroll as a record of their salvation.

A few quick examples: The Purim of Narbonne, France, from 1236, involved the averting of a deadly riot. Purim Saragossa, Spain, 1380, the Jews were able to disprove slanderous accusations against them. Purim Cairo, Egypt, 1524, kidnapped Jews were released. Purim de Los Lodrones (Purim of the Bandits), Gumeldjina, Ottoman Empire, 1786, accusations of disloyalty. Purim Burghul, Tripoli, Libya, 1795, an anti-Semitic reign of terror abruptly ended. Others took place in Hebron and Tiberias in Israel, and still more commemorated communities surviving earthquakes, fires, and of course, the infamous blood libels of having killed Christian children. Additionally, there was a whole tradition of Family Purim celebrations, where a wealthy or revered community member would write a Megillah of his (not shockingly, these were all men…) escape from prison or other averted calamities. There are records from the 1600s and 1700s, from Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Bohemia, of several such family Purim celebrations.

It’s almost intriguing how common these were, for us to then have so little awareness of them today! What captured my interest and fascination about these communal and personal holidays, was how much they personalized the Jewish experience. As rabbis and educators, we work hard to try and make Judaism feel relevant and current, to show how our Tradition doesn’t just speak of ancient matters, but addresses what each of us is going through right now, today. These private Purims, with their individual Megillot, demonstrate how one can - even now! - use the vehicle of Judaism, the practices, trappings, and traditions of millennia of our ancestors, and channel them into something deeply personal, current, and meaningful. 

As you can probably tell, I’m a big fan of this practice. I never had a chance to implement it myself… until I learned the incredible story of our Holocaust Scroll, and how it was transported from Lostice to Prague to London to Wallingford, in a series of incredible stages along a most improbable journey. Now, there is a very serious pitfall that we risk falling into. Some of you might be teetering on the edge already. Yes, I told you about an interesting and unfamiliar Jewish practice of ritualizing personal history… but you may have gotten stuck on my rattling off riots, pogroms, kidnapping, blood libels, slander, and violent persecution after violent persecution. How depressing! 

But I want to strongly emphasize that it is a pitfall, a hurdle, a stumbling block, and even a distraction. You may know by now that my theme for this year’s High Holiday sermons is “resilience.” And what I’m about to say is going to be a central message of mine regarding building resilience in the face of all that has befallen us, both over the centuries as Jews… and even in the last couple of years, enduring the pandemic and climate change. We COULD focus on the very upsetting aspects of either our history or our current predicaments… or we can choose to celebrate our perseverance and endurance.

It isn’t just me saying this, by the way. I take my inspiration from perhaps the preeminent Jewish historian of the 20th century, Salo Baron. In 1963, Baron published a paper entitled “Newer Emphases in Jewish History,” where he presented what became known as his “Lachrymose Conception of Jewish History.” Lachrymose, meaning tearful or mournful. Baron’s contention is also the primary message of my sermon to you here today: “Jewish history is not to be seen simply as a series of persecutions, which determined its nature and its course, but rather as a process of ongoing engagement between the Jews and their surroundings.” In other words, when we look at our history and see all that we endured and survived, let’s actually talk about and praise how we endured and survived!

Let’s apply this notion to our Holocaust Scroll. 1,500 Torahs were saved from Czechoslovakia; the majority of which now live in Jewish communities around the world. Why are we calling them “Holocaust Scrolls”? Yes, of course, it’s because of what they were subjected to, and the main reason why they now live OUTSIDE the Czech Republic. But we are doing a great disservice to our history and ourselves, when we permit our hearts and minds to descend into this lachrymose conception. We are defining the scrolls by the worst thing that ever happened to them, and to their original owners.

We do this to Jewish history a lot! If I reference the Jewish communities of Europe around the year 1000 or 1100, you might envision how they were decimated by the crusades. Spain in the 1400s, you likely think of Inquisition and Expulsion. I say Russian Jews in the 1800s, pogroms. And of course, German Jews, murdered by Nazis. 

Now, of course we ALSO need to know our history of woe and oppression. We must study it, and then educate our children as well as our neighbors, so that we may learn from our history and not doom ourselves - and everyone around us - to repeat it. But too often that is ALL we learn. It is all we know. Yesterday I told you about the definition of resilience and how to fortify it, from the website of the APA, the American Psychological Association. The APA offered four tools for building up our internal resilience. Yesterday we spoke about connection and being part of a community. Today, we add the idea of Healthy Thinking. The APA states: “keep things in perspective…Accept that change is a part of life… maintain a hopeful outlook… and learn from your past.”

So much of this is absolutely essential for us; both in everyday life and when examining Jewish history. We should 100% learn about and from our past… AND we also need to keep the tragedies firmly in perspective, accept that change is and always will be a part of life, and as fervently and stubbornly as possible, insist on maintaining  at least SOME hopefulness in our outlook on everything. Let us keep both Baron’s directive against the Lachrymose Conception AND the APA’s vital recommendations about Healthy Thinking in mind as we return to our Lostice Megillah. 

This is hard, because the second chapter of the Megillah is indeed about the Holocaust. It is the darkest of the four chapters, as it describes the transporting away of all of the Lostice Jews to Theresienstadt, where nearly all of them were murdered… or shipped along elsewhere to their eventual deaths. Furthermore, the Nazis looted these communities, stealing just about anything they could get their hands on. It is an upsetting story, albeit sadly a familiar one. But even in this second chapter, I have chosen to emphasize the Jews of Prague who preserved and protected 1,800 scrolls, of which 1,500 were later rescued. And the artwork for Chapter Two reflects Siona Benjamin’s and my insistence on maintaining a  hopeful outlook… even in chapter two. 

The backdrop of the painting is the gate and barbed-wire-lined brick walls of Theresienstadt. It looks almost like an evil face, meant to consume and annihilate all who enter. But in this picture, the gates are on fire. Their sinister intentions are already being thwarted. And out of the mouth of these nightmarish gates, the stolen Jewish artifacts are bursting towards freedom. Nothing was supposed to EVER escape the concentration camps, but the Jewish spirit was NOT obliterated. The very same artifacts confiscated by the Nazis became damning proof of their crimes. Here, the items depicted are a pocket watch, rings, Torah finery, scrolls, personal Judaica items, a yellow star that says Jude on it, and a large menorah that Siona found in a very powerful photograph. In it, a beautiful menorah had been mangled, twisted, and deformed by fire and war… but it was unmistakably still a menorah. It is the central item in Siona’s captivating painting… and it has been lit again. 

It was also critical to me that along with these items, we also see light bursting forth. I mentioned yesterday, a source of light, glowing and indestructible, can be found in each painting, and it is perhaps most prominent in this one, as the immortal, RESILIENT spirit of our people pours out of the Nazi clutches. At the bottom of the painting, you see the Michle synagogue in Prague, where the scrolls were housed for decades. The building itself is on a slanted angle, seemingly close to collapsing into ruin. But it doesn’t fall. Like the Leaning Tower of Pisa, it bends but does NOT break. Like the Jewish spirit, it too bends - sometimes incredibly far over - but does not break. 

We have endured a lot. From Biblical times fighting Amalekites and Canaanites, to the Babylonians, Greeks, Romans, Ottomans, crusaders, inquisitors, Cossacks, and Nazis over the course of millennia. And we all know that fight is not over. Yet here we are. Not only have we persevered, but we have written about our survival and continued to read it to one another, generation after generation, Dor l’Dor va’dor. It CAN be depressing, I know. It is exhausting, disheartening, and frightening. 

But it is ALSO a story of an unbreakable spirit. Of a people that has endured everything imaginable, but through applying the principles of learning from our past, maintaining a constant sense of perspective, and stubbornly, even seemingly foolishly holding onto a hopeful outlook that redemption would come and God was on our side… we survived. For nearly two millennia, Jews have not just told and retold the old stories of resilience; they have added their own as well. This year, we submit our story to that canon. We remember what we’ve lost, but we refuse to remain lachrymose. Instead, we celebrate… and our light continues to burst forth. 

Shanah Tovah!

Rosh Hashanah 5782 (2021) - First Day Sermon

Rosh Hashanah, Day 1 - Sermon
Every year, I deliver four main sermons on the High Holidays. I also speak at the Erev (evening) RH service, offer introductions to the Torah reading, kavvanot (prayer intentions) through the service, and speak at the afternoon (Mincha) and evening (Neilah) services on Yom Kippur. BUT, the four primary, top-billed, big ticket sermons are the morning of Rosh Hashanah (so right now), tomorrow morning for the second day of the holiday, Kol Nidrei at the start of Yom Kippur, and Yom Kippur morning. This is my thirteenth High Holiday season at Ohev Shalom, so I guess it’s kind of like my Bar Mitzvah celebration year! Mazal Tov to me!

For each of the previous twelve years, all four of those principal Divrei Torah have been on one, shared theme, which I try to expand and expound upon as the holidays pass. This year is no different, both with a single-word theme that I will return to four times, as well as an image that I plan to associate with each talk. So, let’s dive right in:

For the High Holiday season of the Hebrew year 5782, I am going to offer four sermons on the theme of resilience. First, because we desperately need to tap into our own, internal resilience and perseverance, as we muddle our way through the start of another year in the shadows of the coronavirus. We worry and speculate about what lies ahead, with vaccines, boosters, variants, mask mandates, social distancing, and all the other terms we’ve had to learn over the past year-and-a-half that we would love to just forget and never have to contend with ever again. But we can’t forget them, can we? Not now, and likely not for a while. Our resilience is also called upon in facing the environmental disasters plaguing our planet, the constant polarization of our politics, various crises abroad in Afghanistan, Syria, or elsewhere, including, of course, ubiquitously, volatility and violence in Israel. 

That is A LOT. I want to pause for a minute in my sermon to invite us all to breathe, whether here in person or at home. Close your eyes, focus on breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth, several times, with your feet planted on the ground and sitting upright but relaxed. We need so much resilience right now. This is tough. If we’re going to focus on building strength and endurance, we need to be kind to ourselves, acknowledge the challenges… and breathe. So let’s do that for a minute, as you think about what resilience means to you. (If you’re reading this sermon on the blog, you may want to pause and breathe for a minute or two as well…)

Many of you are probably aware that resilience is also an important theme in something else happening at Ohev Shalom right now. This incredible curtain you see behind me was designed by the phenomenal Indian-Jewish artist, Siona Benjamin. And Siona has just concluded a SECOND project for us, which we’re calling Megillat Lostice; A Scroll of Resilience.

Over the course of several years, I had been researching the history of our Holocaust Scroll, our special Czech Torah that survived the Second World War. And its story left such an impression on me - and I feared that very few people might ever actually know this awe-inspiring tale - that I wrote a four-chapter history of how this particular Torah came to Ohev Shalom. A few years ago, Ohev Shalom started celebrating Lostice Shabbat, an annual commemoration of the small Moravian town whose Jews were killed by the Nazis, and we incorporated the reading of these four chapters as a ritual to solidify the tradition.

If you think about it, that’s how Chanukah became a holiday, or Purim, or even secular holidays like the Fourth of July or Thanksgiving. They come with origin stories, frequently written down so as not to forget, that are then ritualized to help explain what we’re doing, and why this matters. In an effort to formalize further this particular legacy, our four-chapter account was handwritten on parchment paper by another artist, Judith Joseph, and then Siona Benjamin created four amazing painted illustrations, making our new Megillah an illuminated manuscript (of sorts). 

Each of my four sermons on resilience is going to focus on one of Siona’s four pieces of artwork, which will also allow me to explain some of the imagery she and I chose for each. It is also important to me that this not just be a convenient vehicle for my talks, or that I merely tell you about historic resilience; I want us to think about how to build ourselves up. We have endured a lot, and this historic pandemic isn’t over. We need some new tools and ideas for how to cope, endure, and even - just maybe - thrive and grow stronger as a result of our perseverence. 

Therefore, I also intend to incorporate a few essential practices for building greater resilience. You see, we might *think* that some people are just more resilient than others; it’s just a personality trait or a characteristic that some have and others don’t. I disagree. And according to the American Psychological Association, there are actually four elements (conveniently for me and my sermons…) that we can develop in order to build resilience. So one painting for each sermon, and one internal assignment for each of us to work on. 

So why is it important to work on these skills? Well, the APA’s definition of “resilience” helps to explain this a bit better than I could. It states: “Becoming more resilient not only helps you get through difficult circumstances, it also empowers you to grow and even improve your life along the way.” In other words, it’s not just about coping, enduring, hanging on, and barely surviving. Cultivating our capacity to be more resilient allows us to also excel! How does this happen? Well, trauma is unavoidable. It is simply part of life.

At some point, we will each have to confront illness, tragedy, loss, and death. Now, you can hear that statement and feel totally depressed: “Gee, rabbi, thanks for being so positive and so light-hearted.” However, I maintain that pretending those things won’t happen just makes us *less* prepared or mentally fortified to deal, when bad things inevitably DO occur. Burying our heads in the sand won’t stave off hardship and pain… it’ll just leave us less prepared when it happens. Instead, we can learn to not just bounce back from difficulty and be ok; we can grow, learn, improve, and become stronger BECAUSE of what we’ve experienced. 

The APA’s website goes on: “like building a muscle, increasing your resilience takes time and intentionality. Focusing on four core components - connection, wellness, healthy thinking, and meaning - can empower you to withstand and learn from difficult and traumatic experiences.” I think of them as fortifying four areas of our core being. Connection - physical and spacial; wellness - emotional and spiritual; healthy thinking - mental and intellectual; meaning - intentionality and purpose. 

So let’s look at the first one, connection. We cannot do this alone. Which is a particularly frustrating principle, when COVID-19 guidelines tell us to socially distance, avoid gatherings, stay at home, and remain in quarantine. Nevertheless, we need to remind ourselves, and be reminded by others, that we are NOT alone in our difficulties. Struggling alone can make problems seem infinitely more insurmountable, and we descend into self-critical, toxic thinking. We need one another, we need community, and we need to feel supported and held. This can be challenging, because it’s easier to be there for other people, to make yourself a resource and a support for someone ELSE. It’s harder to admit when you’re the one who needs help. But we DO need help, and we need one another. 

The first chapter of Megillat Lostice is about that small little bustling town in the region of Moravia, in northwestern Czechoslovakia. Jews had been living in that area since 1571, and that’s only according to official records! I’m sure it wasn’t an easy life, but I also know that Jews were successful and regionally influential for much of that time. I won’t go into all the details now, but if you come on Lostice Shabbat, you can hear all about it when we read from the scroll for the first time! One thing that Siona and I discussed at length was the LIFE of the Jewish communities of Europe, not just their deaths. Some of you have heard me repeat this frequently, but it bears frequent repeating: We do ourselves a great disservice when we associate so much of Jewish history with oppression, persecution, and death. Yes, the fate of Lostice’s Jews, like millions all across the continent, ended tragically in concentration camps. We cannot ignore that, and we forget about it at our own peril. But shouldn’t we also celebrate the joy of being Jewish? They lived there for four HUNDRED years! Is it really fair to sum up their entire existence with train cars sent off to Theresienstadt? 

The painting that Siona created for this first chapter features Fanny Neuda, the wife of Lostice’s rabbi, Abraham Neuda, in the 1840s, who wrote the first Jewish prayer book ever written FOR women BY a woman. We also see the synagogue sanctuary in Lostice, with scrolls sitting in its Ark; one of which would eventually make its way to the cabinet just behind me right now. To me, this first painting is about community and connection. The synagogue was truly a Beit K’nesset, the Hebrew word for synagogue which literally means, a House of Gathering. It was full of life, study, singing, and worship. And it was a place of safety, security, and home for the Jewish residents of Lostice.

One of the ways we build resilience is to surround ourselves with community. The APA website, the one that defines resilience, suggests: “[Find] trustworthy and compassionate individuals who validate your feelings.” It also recommends that you join a group. The social support of either a civic group or, conveniently enough, a faith-based community (ehum, ehum) can help us reclaim hope, feel like we’re working for something larger and longer-lasting than just ourselves, and can remind us over and over again that we are not alone. We are here for one another, and we are stronger, more resilient, together.

In the painting, Fanny Neuda’s skirt melds into the rolling hills of the Moravian countryside. She is seemingly part of the land, just as the place and the community are a part of her. Which is not to say that we, or she, or anyone should be subsumed in community, but just that it should hopefully and ideally be a symbiotic relationship. You put a lot in, and you get a lot back. Fanny is a part of her community, and it is a part of her. It may also remind us of the power of home, and how rooted and confident we feel when we belong somewhere. 

There are additional symbols and intentions in this painting, as there are in each of the four, and I can’t point out all of them now. But I do want to highlight and shine a light on… well, the light. Siona and I asked ourselves, how do you paint resilience? For us, and for our Megillah, the answer became “light.” You’ll see in each image that light is indestructible. It shines through. It cannot be contained or blotted out, no matter how hard someone may try. For Chapter One, the light source is the glow of the Shabbat candles. This represents history, tradition, ritual, and communal warmth. When we embrace the light of connection, of leaning on one another in tougher times, it can warm us, heal us, and light our path forward. 

I hope you’ll come along on this journey with me, and with Siona Benjamin, whether in-person or over zoom. And my sermons will be on my blog online, after first Rosh Hashanah, and then Yom Kippur. I am certain we could all use some more training to build or rebuild our resilience. This year, the High Holidays aren’t just about apologies and forgiveness, being written into the Book of Life, or hearing those shofar blasts. We need more from, and for, one another. Together we can work on building up our resilience, and we can grow and even thrive, despite the obstacles and the concerns that lay before us. So let us walk this journey together, as we prepare to take on whatever lies ahead in the new year. 

Shanah Tovah!