Heritage Trumps Hatred

As we begin the book of Shemot / Exodus and recount once again our descent into Egypt as a family and our ascent from slavery as a people, I am reminded by current events of the enduring value of peoplehood, and how it is a source of comfort in dark times. Within the first few verses of this book, the Egyptian pharaoh describes us as "benei Yisrael," the people of Israel (Ex. 1:9), the definition serving to set us apart as the other, as distinct from the native Egyptian population.

With today's hostage-taking episode in a kosher grocery in Paris, resulting in at least four dead and five wounded, our "otherness" was once again served to us in a particularly cruel stew of terror and hatred. On the heels of the killings earlier in the week at the office of Charlie Hebdo, it is evident that bad actors in this world include both Jews and free speech in the same cross-hairs.

In moments like these, when our inclination might be to respond in anger, I look to our tradition for strength. We are not a vengeful people; we are not bloodthirsty. Rather, tragedies such as these should be met with the same response that Jews have always had to anti-Semitic acts: to rally around our heritage, our tradition; to return to our mitzvot, our Torah; to remain stubbornly proud of who we are and who our God is. Our pride is more powerful than their hatred.

We mourn for those fellow Jews who fell at the hands of terrorists; our hearts go out to their families, to those of the French Jewish community who are feeling ever more besieged, and to all lovers of peace and freedom throughout the world whose hearts ache over the events of the past week. And we reach once again for the story of our national foundation, invoking as we do every time we finish reading the Torah the words of Eikhah / Lamentations (5:22): Hashiveinu Adonai eilekha venashuva, hadesh yameinu keqedem. Return us to you, O God, and we shall return; renew our days as of old.

Let this be a Shabbat shalom, a Shabbat of peace, for benei Yisrael.


~
Rabbi Seth Adelson

Honesty in Tefillah on Yom HaShoah - Thursday Kavvanah

Today, Yom HaShoah, the one day of the year on which we specifically recall the horrors of the Nazi genocide, is unquestionably the hardest day of the year for tefillah / prayer.  Chanting the Psalms of the morning service, which speak of God's delivering us from danger and frustrating the designs of our enemies, I find it difficult to achieve a sense of kavvanah / intention that reflects the mood of the day.  Even venerable Ashrei, Psalm 145, which Jews recite three times each day, includes the following:

שׁוֹמֵר יְהוָה, אֶת-כָּל-אֹהֲבָיו;    וְאֵת כָּל-הָרְשָׁעִים יַשְׁמִיד

Shomer Adonai et kol ohavav, ve'et kol haresha'im yashmid.
God guards all who love Him, and destroys all wickedness.  (Psalm 145:20)

If this were objectively "true," then how could Hitler and his murderous partners have killed so many of our people, 2,000 times the number that Al Qaeda managed on 9/11?  Shouldn't God have interceded after the first righteous person was martyred?  Or even after the first million?

Theology being an inexact science, there are no good answers here.  And tefillah too, on this day when liturgy fails us, falls flat.

Perhaps we should remember the following: the words of prayer reflect an ideal, a vision of what could be.  But this is a deeply fractured world, a universe that has never functioned according to the Neo-Platonic perfection that some in our tradition have cited.  The language of tefillah remains unfulfilled until we ourselves make this broken world whole once again.

And so, to draw my attention away from the empty words of the Psalmist, I found myself repeating the next to last verse of the book of Eikhah / Lamentations, the same words that we said when we put the Torah away this morning, the same way that we repeat it on Tish'ah Be'Av / the Ninth of Av, when we conclude the reading of that book:

הֲשִׁיבֵנוּ יְהוָה אֵלֶיךָ וְנָשׁוּבָה, חַדֵּשׁ יָמֵינוּ כְּקֶדֶם

Hashiveinu Adonai elekha venashuvah, hadesh yameinu keqedem.
Help us turn to You, Adonai, and we shall return.  Renew our lives as in days of old. (Lamentations 5:21)

~
Rabbi Seth Adelson