Correction

24 Tuesday Oct 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in Uncategorized

Dear Readers:
I posted earlier this morning about a community meeting last night with Israeli Ambassador to the United States Ron Dermer here in Los Angeles but mistakenly named him as Ron Prosor. Please note that I have corrected the original post and I express apologies to Ambassador Dermer.

Thanks.

An Evening with the Israeli Ambassador to the United States

24 Tuesday Oct 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity

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Right to left – Ambassador Ron Dermer, Israeli Consul General Sam Grundwerg, and me. (Photo by Rabbi Stanley Davids)

Israeli Ambassador to the United States Ron Dermer is an impressive, intelligent, and well-spoken advocate for Israel and the American-Israel partnership.

In meeting him last evening at Stephen S. Wise Temple I was impressed by his rhetorical skills, intelligence, optimism, and comprehensive presentation that touted all the positives about the State of Israel. Among other things, he noted that Israel is now regarded as the 8^th most powerful nation in the world according to US News and World Report (https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/power-full-list). Its world leadership in start-ups are second only to the United States. Its ongoing positive diplomatic efforts with large nations around the world along with its strong economy, military, intelligence services, innovative technology, and Jewish values represent the fulfillment of one hundred generations since the destruction of Jerusalem by Rome.

The several hundred in attendance were overwhelmingly friendly and the Ambassador was gracious and felt clearly at home.

He began his talk by arguing why the Iran Agreement must be renegotiated. He saw us walking towards “a cliff” because he said that at the end of the term of the agreement, he claimed that there will be nothing stopping Iran from gaining a nuclear bomb.

Despite his dark assessment, others in the Israeli intelligence and military community believe that this agreement, while imperfect, is effective and must remain in place and that Iran is abiding by what it signed.

I refer you to an article that addresses his fears about what happens after the 15-year term of the agreement and what restrictions and safeguards will remain in place. Though no one, me included, trusts Iran, without this agreement Iran would be within months of the development of nuclear capability. The agreement did in fact result in the destruction of much of Iran’s nuclear capacity.

The Ambassador supported President Trump’s desire to renegotiate this deal which would blow the deal apart altogether and undermine international trust in the United States by our allies.

For a deeper explanation read “The world can’t afford a nuclear Iran. Keep the current deal” – by Ernest Moniz, one of America’s chief negotiators:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2017/10/04/the-world-can-afford-nuclear-iran-keep-current-deal/9d7JW61RDyRwQWQNoT2HCP/story.html

Ambassador Dermer noted that the single most existential threat to Israel is the spreading influence of Iran throughout the Middle East. It has armed Hezbollah in the north, has a growing relationship with Hamas in Gaza, and is attempting to take over Yemen so as to threaten Saudi Arabia. Ambassador Dermer said that when Arab countries and Israel are on the same page, one has to take notice. He is right. I had no disagreement with him on the threat against Israel, but I do disagree with his assessment of dangers of the Iran Agreement.

I was pleased to hear the Ambassador thank President Obama for signing a ten-year security agreement with Israel.

There were two other existential threats to the people and state of Israel that Mr. Dermer did not mention. Though he noted in passing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that must be addressed, he said nothing about the corrosive effect of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank on both Palestinians living under the Israeli military administration there and upon Israeli soldiers who serve as occupiers. And he said nothing about the growing ultra-Orthodox stranglehold on the ruling governing coalition.

Before the meeting, with his childhood friend Consul General Sam Grundwerg, I told Mr. Dermer in my role representing the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA) that the liberal American Jewish community has lost trust in Prime Minister Netanyahu primarily because he cancelled the Kotel agreement that he has advocated for the passage of the Conversion Law that would disenfranchise all Diaspora Jewry from the State of Israel.

I told him that we liberal American Zionists need Israel and I asked him to communicate our love of Israel and our concerns about his government’s direction to the Prime Minister. He said he would do so, but sadly, I have no expectation that Prime Minister Netanyahu will do anything that threatens his own government’s survivability, including standing up to the anti-democratic hegemonic intentions of the ultra-Orthodox political parties in his coalition.

This week I will be traveling to Israel to participate in meetings of the Board of Governors of the Jewish Agency for Israel and the Vaad HaPoel of the World Zionist Organization. The main challenge in our meetings with the WZO is to fight back the attempts of Israel’s right-wing parties to change the WZO constitution that would weaken Diaspora Zionism with Israel.

I will write from Israel, so stay tuned.

God’s Promise and the Rainbow – A Midrash

19 Thursday Oct 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in Beauty in Nature, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Stories

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rainbow-sky-over-the-rainbow

God looked out upon creation and saw that violence, chaos and mean-spirited self-centeredness engulfed the human heart. There was neither kindness nor justice in the world. Empathy had ceased. Fear and hatred supplanted peace and love. In Divine disappointment and righteous rage God determined to destroy creation and return everything to primordial darkness.

The Eternal mourned and recalled how great was the effort to create the heavens and earth, give life to growing things, design and fashion the birds, sea creatures and animals in all their variety, shape, color, function, and form. That thought grew within the Divine mind, and so the Creator hesitated and stepped back from the brink thinking how great a tragedy it would be to destroy that which had once been thought “good.”

God wondered: ‘Is there one human on earth, different from the rest, who can still fathom Me, who hasn’t been consumed by the sitra achra, the evil that brought such darkness to My creation.’

God peered into every human soul seeking that one, better than the rest, who though not yet a complete tzadik might be good enough to hear the Divine voice and save what could still be saved.

To God’s relief, there was one human named Noah, so God spoke to Noah and told him to build an ark and save his family and two of every creature that all might not be lost and that the world might begin anew.

As the Eternal wept in contemplating the devastation, Divine tears fell heavily to earth and continued forty days and nights.

When finally God’s tear ducts were dry the waters receded, dry land appeared, and the ark docked. The Eternal God spoke to Noah:

“I am God, Noah, Who created you and brought you into this new land. Look around you and see the cleansed earth. The world is once again new. There is no longer rage or hatred, violence or hubris in the human heart. I will make with you a covenant marked by a sign that will remind us both how I created the world in peace, but then destroyed it, and then allowed it to begin anew that it should remain a place of peace for all time.

And the sign of this covenant will be a radiant smile that stretches across the heavens and fills the sky, an arc of light shining through the flood waters, a vision of loveliness that will inspire awe and love for Me.

This promise, Noah, shall be called the ‘rainbow,’ and this bow in the sky will remind you, Me and your progeny that I will never again bring such devastation to the earth.

Your duty and that of your children and children’s children must be to protect My creation, to preserve and nurture it, for there will come no one after you to set it right if you destroy it.”

Then God bent towards the earth and stretched the Divine arm mightily across the sky and made an arc. And just where God’s hand had been, there appeared a sheltering bow of every color spread out across the blue canvas of sky.

And God spoke of the colors and the sign of the rainbow:

“First comes red to stand for the blood pulsing through human veins that carries My Godly soul and makes all things live; orange is for the comforting warmth of fire and its potential to create, build and improve upon what I created; yellow is for the glory of the sun that lights the earth and gives vision to earthly souls that they might see Me in all things and live; green is for the grass and the leaves of trees and their fruit, that all creatures might be sustained in life; blue is for the sky, sea and rivers that joins air and ground and makes clear that all is One, divinely linked and a reflection of Me; indigo appears each day at dusk and dawn to signal evening and morning, the passage of time and the seasons, the ever-renewing life force that is intrinsic to all things; violet is for the coming of night when the world rests and is renewed, and it carries the hope that all might awake in the morning and utter words of thanksgiving and praise.”

God explained that the rainbow appears to the human eye as a half circle, and said to Noah:

“Do not be fooled, my most righteous one! There is more to life than what the eye can see. There is both the revealed and the hidden, and the hidden half of the bow reaches deep into the earth that you and those who yearn after Me might come and discover Truth, and reveal and make whole both the revealed and the hidden in My world.”

God told Noah:

“Remember this blessing, My child, and you will remember My promise – Baruch Atah Adonai Eloheinu Melech ha-olam, zocheir habrit v’ne-eman biv’rito v’kayam b’ma-amaro.

Praised are You, Eternal our God, Sovereign of the revealed and the hidden, Who remembers, is faithful to, and fulfills the Divine covenant and promise.”

Compiled and written by Rabbi John Rosove. Inspired by classic Midrashim. First published in October 2010.

Talking with 5th Graders about Prayer and God

16 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, Beauty in Nature, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Social Justice

≈ 1 Comment

This past week I spent an hour with 40 fifth grade Day School students talking about prayer, faith, rational and intuitive thinking, science, religion, and God.

I found these eleven-year-olds not only keenly interested in our conversation but sophisticated thinkers already at their young age.

My goal was first to open with them a conversation in which they felt comfortable thinking freely and expressing themselves without being judged. I explained that when it comes to matters of faith there is no right or wrong, that faith is deeply personal.

I explained to them the fundamental Jewish idea of achdut, the oneness of God, the Jewish people, humanity, nature, and the metaphysical, and that this idea is carried fully in the Sh’ma. They understood.

I also talked about the limits of the rational mind and the intellect, that faith is a function of the non-rational mind that it is beyond linear thinking and does not depend upon that which can be proven through observation or empirical evidence. Faith is founded, I explained, upon the intuitive capacity and is based on our experience of awe and wonder.

I asked the students what they believe is the purpose of prayer. They responded that prayer is our opportunity as individuals and as a community to praise, to give thanks, to feel appreciation, to forgive, and to hope. These were their words, not mine.

I asked whether prayer changes us or God. They said that prayer changes us, not God, though one boy said that prayer is also about asking God for things. I probed – “What kinds of things?” He answered, “When we most need something from God, when we’re sad or sick, and when people we love die.”

“Yes,” I said, “but what is it that we are likely to receive?”

We kept talking. I suggested that when we’re really sad prayer can help us feel less alone, that God is the loving unifying and creative force in the universe and that can be a source of comfort. When we pray, I explained, many people gain the sense that we are all part of something far greater than ourselves and beyond our capacity to understand, that we can gain in courage through prayer to face the sadness and loneliness we feel and feel inspired.

One girl asked about the fairness of human suffering and why God allows people to die when they are young. I spoke to them about two of the many names for God in Jewish tradition. The holiest Name is YHVH, the Name we call God that appeared to Moses on Mount Sinai and inspired the writing of the Torah. The other common name is Elohim, the God of the Book of Genesis Who creates the heavens and the earth (the Torah portion last week was Bereishit, the first chapters of Genesis). Elohim is the Name of God that sets the physical world according to the laws of nature.

Whereas Elohim is the Name of God that is the author of natural disasters, illness, and death, I explained that I do not believe that God singles out any individual human being to suffer. We are human and mortal and some people unfortunately get sick while others stay healthy for most of their lives.

I emphasized, however, that YHVH is the Name of God that met Moses on Mount Sinai and inspired Torah, and that when we act in a Godly way by virtue of our being created in God’s image, we bring God’s love and generosity into the world. When we do that, we inspire hope.

As is the case in the adult Jewish population, there were doubters among my fifth-grade students. I asked, “Do you think you can be a Jew without believing in God?” Some thought so but others weren’t so certain.

I told them “Yes,” because Judaism is far more than a religion. We are a people, a culture, civilization, and a faith tradition with a vast literature, four Jewish languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, Ladino, and Yiddish), philosophy, rite, ritual, holidays, life-cycle events, and ethics codified in law. I explained as well that Judaism is the longest continuous surviving tradition on the planet reaching back to Abraham and Sarah 3600 years ago.

I reminded our students that a Jew is someone born of a Jewish mother in traditional communities or of a Jewish parent in the American Reform movement, and that Jewish identity is established and thrives when we study Torah and our tradition, perform the mitzvot (commandments), stay close to Jewish community, and identify with the people of Israel around the world and support the State of Israel.

Our mission as a people, I explained, is Tikkun Olam – repairing an imperfect, unfair, and sometimes unjust world. There is much work to do, I said, and that each one of us has the responsibility to make a contribution to a better world.

I left this conversation feeling hopeful. Our young people are thinking, smart, kind-hearted, and committed to our community, and they are asking all the right questions and struggling to understand who they are in these initial decades of the twenty-first century.

We are not the “ever-dying” people. We are alive, and when I am with young people like these fifth-grade students, I feel alive!

When attacked on Kol Nidre, President Obama was my model of dignity

03 Tuesday Oct 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Holidays, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations, Social Justice, Women's Rights

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For the first time in my 38 years as a congregational rabbi during a High Holiday sermon, a visitor to our congregation stood up, yelled out in protest, and slammed the sanctuary door on his way out.

It was Kol Nidre and our Sanctuary was packed with 1200 worshippers. My sermon that so disturbed him is posted on my synagogue website and it can either be read there or watched on Youtube – see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQyxdgcspw0 – I ask only that you read or listen to the entire address, which this man did not do.

As I do for all my High Holiday sermons, I spent a great deal of time over the summer thinking, researching, writing, and rewriting. It is important for me to be as clear and considered as possible while being as edifying and uplifting as I can be in these addresses. In this Kol Nidre sermon (“We the People”) I sought to address issues that transcend the daily politics that have consumed and stunned our nation in the last two years and focus instead on the greater Jewish and American values at stake.

I drew parallels between our liberal Jewish values based on the Biblical prophetic tradition, the ethics and compassion of the rabbis, and the values of American democracy, inclusivity, and exceptionalism. I called out the intolerance, bigotry, extremism, racism, nationalist nativism, Islamophobia, and xenophobia of “American Firsters” and drew parallels to a movement of the same name that was supported by 80% of Americans before World War II.

I offered thoughts about the long generational trend in America that put President Trump in the White House, and noted that he is there in part due to the Balkanization of America, the ignorance of American history so rampant in large portions of the population, the dismissal of the virtues embodied by American exceptionalism, and self-centered “me-ism” that Trump reflects in his own life, stokes and encourages among so many frustrated Americans.

Clearly, I hit the right note in my community resulting in a standing ovation at the conclusion.

The man shouted as he left “This is a house of prayer!”

I returned to the microphone to cite the Talmudic requirement (Berachot 34b) that every synagogue must be built with a window so that those praying inside will never be separated with what is going on in the street. I recalled the example of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel who joined with Dr. Martin Luther King in a march from Selma to Montgomery during the civil rights era and who explained that by marching he was “praying with his feet.”

After Yom Kippur, a distinguished member of my community and a Jewish leader in Los Angeles told me in an email that for a rabbi not to address the serious conditions of this country today as I did would be nothing shy of “spiritual malpractice.”

When this man screamed out I thought immediately of President Obama when he addressed a joint session of Congress in 2009 on health care. In the middle of the President’s speech, Republican Representative Joe Wilson of South Carolina screamed out “You lie!”

I recalled President Obama’s restraint and dignity. I remembered his refusal to be distracted from his message. Following his example, I ignored the man’s outburst and continue to deliver my sermon.

This man’s behavior on the holiest night in Judaism, just as Representative Wilson’s behavior in a joint session of Congress, is exactly what’s ethically and morally wrong with large portions of our own Jewish community and the American population as a whole. The man’s intolerance, lack of civility, and nasty self-righteousness makes dialogue between people who hold legitimate differences of opinion difficult. Hate and rage replaced love and understanding. The lack of civility has replaced respect for the dignity of the other. That this should occur on the holiest night of the year is particularly disturbing but also revealing about our imperfections and need for moral and ethical improvement.

I wrote to President Obama today to thank him for modeling for me how to handle such a situation as a leader. This is what I said to him:

Dear Mr. President:

I write to thank you for … giving me courage in the middle of my Yom Kippur sermon … as what constitutes dignified behavior as a leader.

A visitor in my congregation stood up as I was speaking before 1200 congregants on Kol Nidre and began shouting at me before walking out and slamming the Sanctuary door behind him.

The episode was shocking not only to me but to our community as a whole much as it was shocking when a congressman called you a “liar” in the middle of your address on health care before both houses of Congress before the ACA became law in 2009.

I remember your dignity then, that you paid him no heed and went on with your speech.

… I decided on Kol Nidre to follow your example…and I write to thank you for this and for so much more.

With respect,

John L. Rosove, Rabbi

Temple Israel Rabbis’ High Holiday Sermons – 2017/5778

02 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Social Justice, Women's Rights

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For those interested, the High Holiday sermons for our three rabbis at Temple Israel of Hollywood, Rabbi Michelle Missaghieh, Rabbi Jocee Hudson, and me are available on line at http://www.tioh.org/worship/rabbis/clergystudy.

The Themes of our sermons are as follows:

Rabbi John Rosove’s High Holyday Sermons:

Rabbi Michelle Missaghieh’s High Holyday Sermons:

Rabbi Jocee Hudson’s High Holyday Sermons:

Rabbi John Rosove's Blog

Monthly Archives: October 2017

Correction

An Evening with the Israeli Ambassador to the United States

God’s Promise and the Rainbow – A Midrash