Last week, as if I needed another thing to occupy all my VAST amounts of free time, I was asked to speak to a group of High School students about the Jewish High Holidays. Some background: I was honored to give an invocation at the installation of new Delaware County Judges back in January, one of whom was Stephanie Klein, a member of our congregation. At that ceremony, I met a fellow clergy member, The Rev. Tim Gavin, who asked if I could come to a morning assembly at Episcopal Academy, to speak about Pesach. Well, I’m sure you’ve all COMPLETELY forgotten this by now, but back in March-April, this whole pandemic-thing broke out, and like everything else at that time, our plans were cancelled.
A few months later, Tim reached out to me again, and asked if I could now speak to the High Schoolers about Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, though this time over zoom. I agreed, and to be totally honest with you, kind of sketched out a plan in my mind but didn’t really write down what I wanted to say. Wednesday morning came around, five days ago, and I signed onto their zoom meeting. I see a group of students and a few teachers, and a zoom technician person. I thought there would be a few more students listening, but no big deal, 10-15 people is fine too. I gradually come to realize that the people I’m seeing are all doing some presentation or reading in the assembly, but more people will be joining imminently. Sure enough, at precisely 9:08, I see the attendance list shoot up from 10 to 50, 100, 125, 175, 230, 280, and ultimately settle around 375 zoom connections. Later, I found out that some of those videos were broadcasting to even more students, so by 9:08 and 30 seconds, just over 500 people were watching and listening. And I suddenly thought to myself, “Should I have written out more formal remarks?”
Ultimately, it went great. Thankfully, I’ve done this a few times now, led a few High Holiday services - here and there - and I got in what I wanted to say about our 4,000 year old Jewish tradition and our centuries of evolving Jewish tradition and meaning-making into my allotted 8 minutes. I’m telling you all this, because one of the things I focused on in speaking to that small gathering of teens was THIS morning’s Haftarah. Tim asked me to provide a reading to go with my remarks - you know, from the “Old” Testament… - and I automatically knew it would be from Isaiah, 58. (Read 1-10, 13-14)
I don’t know how to stress this reading more emphatically. I feel - wholeheartedly - that this text is to Yom Kippur what the Golden Rule is to the whole Torah. As Hillel the Elder said 2,000 years ago, it is the ENTIRE Torah; now go and study it. This text says everything you really need to know about Yom Kippur.
And it’s actually a two-fold statement. A very Jewish one, in my opinion, as opposed to a secular one, a social action one, or even a Christian message. Many years ago, I was speaking about Judaism at a church in North Carolina, and they asked me how I resolved texts like this one, from Isaiah. Their question was something like, “What does it mean to you when Isaiah - speaking for God - says ‘I do not want your sacrifices. I do not want your sabbaths. I do not want your fasting’ ?” And I was so grateful for this question; I had never seen it from their perspective before. To me, to us as Jews, Isaiah is calling out and saying “I do not want your sacrifices, sabbaths, fasting, or any other mitzvot… IF you simultaneously oppress the poor, the orphan, and widow!” But it had never occurred to me to read the text as God saying “I actually don’t want any of those things.” If that were the case, why write an entire Torah, then follow it up with prophetic writings and other texts, what we tend to call our Tanach, our Bible, full of laws that God then rejects completely? 613 Commandments, in fact!
No, no, no! That is not what Isaiah is saying. At the end of that quote, he says, “IF you honor my Shabbat, take care of my creatures and my creation, THEN you can seek the favor of Adonai.” But ONLY THEN!!!! So I have to say, when I hear about prosperity gospels, meaning churches that solicit and receive incredible amounts of donations, because if the church and its clergy members are wealthy, that must mean God is showing them favor, and that will trickle down to all of you. Or when I visit European towns where everyone lived in a one-room hovel, and I see that EVERY town has a giant, beautiful church, that surely cost the impoverished citizens ridiculous amounts of money they didn’t have. Or the main feeling I had when I visited the Vatican, and saw marble sculptures and golden artifacts. And honestly, it is a similar sense of queasiness that I feel in the state-of-the-art JCC buildings around the US. Or when I hear about synagogues that charge for High Holiday tickets or to give someone an honor. Look, Ohev isn’t perfect. We have to solicit throughout the year and raise money like everyone else. And I’m sure it sounds VERY odd coming from me, the most expensive line-item on Ohev’s budget.
But I’d like to think we’re good stewards of the resources people invest in us. And I know synagogues and churches and mosques and temples are ALSO doing great work. This is the challenge of Isaiah’s prophecy! It isn’t all about nefarious deeds and corruption. Sometimes the intentions are good, and some good is being done for the people being served as well. And yet, there is something particularly cringeworthy about charging a congregant any amount of money for the privilege and honor of reading THIS PARTICULAR Haftarah on Yom Kippur morning. Because when donations are tied to ritual participation, it DOES create status and hierarchy, and this whole text - for goodness sake - is about THE OPPOSITE of that!!
Another major challenge to all this, is that we’re so tempted to say, “no one can point this out, unless they are blameless and innocent; otherwise it’s hypocrisy.” But I’m not suggesting we’re perfect, or that I, personally, would be able to avoid Isaiah’s (or God’s…) scrutiny and sharp tongue. But that’s ok. The alternative is that no one says anything, and we never make efforts to change our society. Our Torah reading this morning explains all the practices of Yom Kippur that were essential to the institution of sacrifice in the ancient temple. And then the Haftarah tears all that down and says none of that matters… IF, IF, IF, IF, IF you don’t also care for the vulnerable and defenseless in society. I love that the ancient rabbis chose this text as our Haftarah for today; I absolutely adore them for it. And it was also why I wanted 500+ students at Episcopal to know how central this message is to us as Jews, and as human beings. And that’s also why I wanted to reiterate that message to you all this morning. But this time, I was much more prepared to speak in front of a large crowd! :-)
Our Torah reading begins on page 278 in the High Holiday Machzor.
No comments:
Post a Comment