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Jerusalem – A City of the In-between and Not-Yet Peace

15 Friday May 2015

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Jerusalem, itself on a mountain, is made up of a series of mountains. On top of each mountain is an important symbol sacred to a religion or people. Taken together, these multiple symbols represent perhaps the most significant city in world history.

Har Habayit – The Mountain of God’s House, also known as Har Moriah – The Mountain of ‘Sight’ is, of course, the most sacred place in Judaism. Legend teaches that the dust that formed the first human being, Adam, was gathered here, and this mountain top is the place on which Abraham bound his son Isaac. It is here that King Solomon built the First Temple and King Harod built the Second Temple.

Har Habayit- Har Moriah is the gateway between heaven and earth, the umbilicus through which the milk of Torah flows from the Divine breast to the children of Israel, where there is Divine sight and insight.

This most ancient of Jewish mountains is claimed by Islam as its third most sacred site after Mecca and Medina. Muslims call it Haram al Sharif – The Noble Sanctuary where Quran says Mohammed ascended to heaven.

On another small mountain is the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, now shared in a delicate and sensitive balance among Armenian, Greek Orthodox, Coptic, Roman Catholic, Syrian, and Ethiopian Christians because Jesus was crucified there.

To the east is Har Hazeitim – the Mountain of Olives at the foot of which is the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus prayed and his disciples slept the night before their Lord’s crucifixion.

Har Hazeitim contains the most holy Jewish cemetery in the world, the closest burial ground to the “The Golden Gate” of Jerusalem that was sealed by the 16th century Ottoman Qalif, Suleiman the Magnificent, because he feared that the Jewish Messiah would pass into the holy city through this gate in the end of days. Jews have been burying our dead on the Mountain of Olives for centuries so their souls would be close and ready to follow the Mashiach.

Just south of the Old City walls is Har Tziyon – Mount Zion from where the prophets Isaiah (2:3) and Micah (4:2) said that Torah and God’s word came into the world. For Christians, Jesus and his disciples celebrated the Last Supper here.

A few miles west is yet another mountain made sacred by Zionism and the state of Israel, Har Herzl, on which is built the military cemetery for those who died in the defense of the state and the nation’s leaders. Har Herzl is walking distance from Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust Memorial and museum.

Thirty-four times since the age of David Jerusalem has been conquered. It is arguably the most famous and fought over real estate in the world. It is a city of the in-between. It embraces old and new, past and present, east and west, reason and faith, earth and heaven, this world and the world to come, imperfection and messianic dreams, temporal and divine power. It has been and remains the symbol of a history of intensely competing interests.

Israel celebrates “Jerusalem Day” this Sunday, May 17 (28 Iyar), marking 48 years since Israel reunified the city after the 1967 Six-Day War. Though Jerusalem has rarely known peace, it is an enduring symbol of our people’s yearning for peace nevertheless.

What is to become of this sacred city for so many going forward? Most Israelis do not want it ever divided again. For the past 48 years Israel has maintained the peace and security of Jerusalem and free access for peoples of all faiths to the city’s holy sites.  Yet, distrust and hatred fills still too many hearts and pollutes too many minds. Spitting and shoving, vandalizing and threats, provocation and incitement, violence and murder continue despite efforts by Israeli security to prevent it.

The problems that continue are compounded by the absence of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. East Jerusalem’s Palestinian Arabs, non-citizens of Israel who live under Israeli military rule, do not share equal rights with Israeli citizens, nor is their property necessarily respected by Israeli military law and ultra-Orthodox Jewish squatters who use every opportunity to occupy Arab homes.

Two different sets of law are enforced and non-Israeli citizens almost always come up short.

For Israel’s sake as a Jewish and democratic state and for the sake of the Palestinians the status quo is unsustainable, and if Jerusalem is to be the beacon of and symbol for peace throughout the world, it will take our two peoples, Israeli and Palestinian, every ounce of courage, patience, creativity, understanding, and mutual respect to make it happen.

I believe, despite the deep distrust and hostility, that there is a solution, but that will take the willingness to compromise and accommodate the needs of the “other” not as some kumbaya liberal dream, but for the sake of peace, security, the survival of and the dignity of all peoples.

“Racism and Gender in Israel” – Guilt and Accountability

10 Sunday May 2015

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Now that the new Israeli government will be sworn into the Knesset this week, an issue that has festered unchecked for too long needs to be addressed more extensively – racist and gender-inspired incitement against Arab citizens of Israel. Though President Reuven Rivlin began his presidency by shining a light on this scourge in Israeli society and initiated a nationwide conversation and campaign to emphasize that anti-Arab racism has no place in the democratic state of Israel, bigotry continues against Arabs, and in a different way against Ethiopian Jews. The large presence of Eritrean and Sudanese asylum seekers has, at the very least, exacerbated the problem.

The Israel Religious Action Center (IRAC) and the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism (IMPJ) have published a report called “Racism and Gender in Israel.” It includes introductory remarks by Rabbi David Saperstein, formerly the Director of the RAC in Washington, D.C. and now a Presidential appointee as United States Ambassador for Religious Freedom, and by Rabbi Rick Jacobs, President of the Union for Reform Judaism (URJ). Anat Hoffman, Executive Director of the IRAC, wrote the Preface (see below to obtain a copy).

This 66-page pamphlet was written by Israeli attorney Ruth Carmi who notes that though the assassinated MK Meir Kahana was condemned for his racist and extremist remarks in the 1980s when he charged that Arab men were threatening to steal “our” wives and daughters, such comments today by the most extreme Hareidi rabbis are “no longer confined to the margins but are becoming increasingly common in Israeli discourse, and have even found their way into official debates in the Knesset…. [these comments pray upon] emotions exploited with the goal of imposing complete segregation between Jews and Arabs in Israel, isolating and humiliating the Arab community in Israel, and depicting it as a dangerous enemy against which defense is essential… The goal is to marginalize Arab citizens in Israel, to prevent coexistence between Jews and Arabs, and to impose a misogynist perception of women as passive pawns in the conflict who lack any will of their own.”

Racial incitement is prohibited under Israeli law as a criminal and a disciplinary offense.

The “Gender and Racism” pamphlet describes how extremist orthodox religious organizations, associations and some ultra-Orthodox rabbis in Israel have devoted themselves to a campaign to “defend the honor of Jewish women.” The primary offending organizations are Yad L’Achim, Lev L’Achim, Lehava, Hemla, Derekh Chaim, and the website Hakol Hayehudi, and the chief rabbi of Safed, Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, is most identified with this racist campaign to mark Arabs as schemers, seducers and abusers.

Carmi notes that “throughout history national humiliation has been closely associated with the sexual humiliation of women…and that a Jewish woman who submits to wooing by a non-Jewish man brings dishonor on herself and shame on the entire nation.” (p. 52)

“The woman’s body is the nation, and accordingly the war over this body is the war of the entire nation and becomes the focus of the conflict. Jewish women who have relationships with the enemy – Arab men – are perceived as contributing to the defeat of the Jewish people and the State of Israel and as humiliating Jewish men. The bodies of Jewish women become the focus of the Arab-Jewish conflict and ownership over these bodies determines the balance of power in the conflict.” (pp. 53-54)

This growing movement in Israel is promoted by flyers in Safed warning about “Arab Seducers,” posters in Jewish neighborhoods of Jerusalem and Beitar Illit opposing employment of Arabs, flyers in the Pisgat Ze’ev neighborhood of Jerusalem calling for the expulsion of Arab residents, and letters given to IDF soldiers declaring “The War is at Home.” Statements by ultra-Orthodox rabbis warn against encounters and fraternization between Jewish women and Arab men and against Arab students and letters by some Rabbis’ wives are posted and distributed beseeching Jewish women not to date Arab men. In Ashkelon, there are efforts to exclude Arabs citizens from local places of entertainment, and kashrut certification is granted to businesses that follow this racist agenda. On the Lehava website there is a “Page of Shame” that lists names of Jewish women involved in intimate relationships with non-Jewish men. An Informers’ Hotline enables people to report incidents of Arab-Jewish fraternization.

Violent attacks against innocent Arabs whose sole “offense” was to be present in areas where there is a Jewish majority, have all created “an atmosphere of terror and intimidation that serves the agenda of those organizations and individuals that advocate for the total segregation of the two populations in the State of Israel.” (p. 13)

It remains to be seen whether this new government including two ultra-Orthodox parties, United Torah Judaism and Shas, will prosecute this moral scourge in segments of Israeli society.

The Talmud is clear when it says “One who is able to protest against a wrong that is done in his family, his city, his nation, or the world and doesn’t do so is held accountable for that wrong being done.” (Bavli, Shabbat 54b).

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel echoes that reminder when he said, “We must continue to remind ourselves that in a free society all are involved in what some are doing. Some are guilty, all are responsible.”

Note: Contact the Reform Movement’s Religious Action Center for a free copy of “Racism and Gender in Israel” – 2027 Massachusetts Ave NW, Washington, DC 20036 – Phone: (202) 387-2800 – http://www.rac.org/.

“The Disaster that Judaism Won’t Survive” – A Response to Haaretz Op-Ed

06 Wednesday May 2015

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Tomer Persico is an Israeli intellectual, a popular blogger on religion and spirituality, an advocate for freedom of religion, and a serious observer of Israel’s religious life. When he writes, Israelis take him seriously.

Persico has concluded in a recent Haaretz op-ed (“The Disaster that Judaism Won’t Survive,” April 25  http://www.haaretz.com/news/features/.premium-1.653125) that after the shelving of the vision of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, “Israel will not be able to continue being both Jewish and democratic.” He is alarmed that Judaism in Israel is increasingly being equated with autocratic despotism and oppression, and this turn away from both democracy and liberal Judaism to extremism will eventually lead to disaster for the Jewish people and state of Israel:

“When our best friends, the countries with which we like to boast that we share values, increasingly perceive Israel’s Judaism as an antithesis to the state’s democratic character and a threat to the liberal approach and equality of rights to which Israel committed itself in its Declaration of Independence – it appears that we are closer than ever to having the Jewish tradition relegated to the abhorrent status of Communism in the past and of Salafi Islam in the present. We are witnessing Judaism being tarred-and-feathered, and the charges will stick to it more than any anti-Semitic calumny in the past, simply because this time no blood libel will be involved.”

For an increasing number of Israelis, Persico says, Judaism is regarded as inconsistent with democratic values and when asked to choose one over the other, they prefer Judaism over democracy. He worries that when western Diaspora Jews fully understand what has happened in Israel they will separate their practice of Judaism from the state of Israel and turn their backs on Zionism and the Jewish state.

Based on data collected by the Israel Democracy Institute, he reports: “If in 2010, 48.1 percent of Jewish citizens replied that the two elements [Judaism and democracy] are equally important to them, in 2012 this fell to 41.9 percent, and in 2014, it was 24.5 percent. At the same time, the proportion of Israeli Jews for whom the Jewish element is the most important rose to as high as 38.9 percent; 33.5 percent of the respondents opted for democracy as most important.”

Despite these disturbing trends, I believe that Persico’s fears are overheated, exaggerated and misleading. Non-Orthodox liberal Judaism and interest in the study of classic Jewish texts are being embraced by significant numbers of Israelis who seek meaning in Jewish life-cycle and holiday celebration outside of Orthodoxy. These Israelis are western and liberal in outlook and they highly value the life that democratic institutions support. Nevertheless, Persico’s alarming conclusions have to be taken seriously because so many Israelis, fed by the settler movement, extreme right-wing orthodoxy, and the politics of fear, believe today that democracy and Judaism cannot co-exist.

The original sin leading to this polarized view was committed by Israel’s first Prime Minister David Ben Gurion who gave a monopoly of control over Jewish religious life to a then very small right-wing orthodox community. Successive Israeli governments have allowed the polarization to continue over the entire 67 years of statehood because of pragmatic coalition politics and the ruling party’s need to secure a majority of mandates in the Knesset.

The second sin was committed after Israel conquered the West Bank during the 1967 Six-Days War. Then Israeli right-wing religious nationalists, seeing God’s hand behind the redemption of Judea and Samaria into Israel proper, conflated Judaism with the Greater Israel movement thus morally justifying Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and giving the settlement movement religious and national credibility.

Historically, there has always been tension in Jewish tradition between tribal and universal impulses and values. However, we Jews need not have to choose between being patriotic to the Jewish state or being universal humanitarians concerned about justice for Palestinians and other peoples. We can be both. Each trend ought to be a check against the other’s excesses, and though Persico is right in his worry that the two-state vision has been shelved after the Kerry mission, the two-state solution is still the only concrete assurance that Israel can remain Jewish, democratic, just, peaceful, secure, and part of the family of nations.

It must be said that Judaism as a whole embraces both orthodoxy and liberalism. It’s neither a fair demand that all Jews be either liberal or orthodox. It’s also inaccurate to claim that Judaism can survive only if Jews become right-wing extremist nationalists or live in consonance with the left’s worldview as expressed regularly in Haaretz.

What is, I believe, a certain threat to the Zionist enterprise, arguably the greatest single achievement of the Jewish people in two millennia, is the pitting of Israel’s Judaism against democracy and the continuing monopoly over Jewish life by the ultra-Orthodox political parties and rabbis.

The only way to buttress democracy in Israel is first and foremost to support the two-state solution, and at the same time encourage all efforts to separate church from state because that will also support the health and vitality of Judaism and Jewish life.

The New Israeli Government and Ultra-Orthodox Parties – More of the Same and It Isn’t Good

03 Sunday May 2015

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We Jews are good at worrying, and I’m worried.

When speaking about the state of Israel, American Jews always need to remember that we’ve chosen to live here and not there and so we must be deferential to our Israeli brothers and sisters who are on the front lines and not second-guess them. They are the ones who must make the tough decisions and live with the consequences. They have done so in free elections last March and are now forming a new ruling coalition government.

Though Israelis have every right living in a democracy to choose their leaders, what Israel does affects Jews living in the Diaspora too, and it is on this basis that we living here have a right to speak and be part of the conversation. This conversation, of course, isn’t easy. We are, after all, a complicated people living in a complicated time, and Israel is situated in a dangerous region of the world.

Though the Israeli right-wing prevailed in this last election, I don’t believe that liberal Zionism is dead. Liberal Zionist values are still held by the majority of Israel’s political center, center-right and center-left. Israelis still want a Jewish democratic state. Though racism and anti-democratic trends are intensifying in certain segments of Israeli society egged on by elements in political parties that will be part of the ruling coalition government, and extremism is growing, Israelis as a whole are neither racist nor extremist.

A free press and independent judiciary are still alive and well in Israel, and every issue is debated thoroughly out  in the open. Human rights organizations advocating and working on behalf of immigrants, asylum seekers, women’s rights, civil rights, religious freedom, democracy, and pluralism are doing their work without interference.

As he strives to form a government, Prime Minister Netanyahu is making deals with small parties in exchange for their support. My fear is what those deals mean for the health of Israeli society, its open Jewish character and its democratic institutions all of which will affect continuing support for Israel in the international community and in the United States, and that support has a direct influence on Israel’s security.

The last Israeli ruling coalition government, for the first time in Israeli history, included no Orthodox religious parties. Consequently, progress was made in the Knesset to reduce the amount of money automatically granted to support ultra-Orthodox synagogues and yeshivot. The goal of that policy was to force thousands upon thousands of non-productive Hareidi students to learn general studies in order to be able to enter the Israeli work force and thus reduce the unfair financial burden carried by Israeli tax-payers having to support them and their very large families indefinitely.

Prime Minister Netanyahu has brought back into power the very ultra-Orthodox Religious Parties (i.e. Shas and United Torah Judaism) that opposed this policy thus representing a major step backwards and a threat to social and economic fairness and equality, religious pluralism, and diversity in Israeli society.

Hiddush, an Israeli organization committed to the separation of church and state in Israel, just published an analysis of what the new coalition agreements with the Ultra-Orthodox religious parties mean. Among its findings are:

1. 4 billion NIS of Israeli taxpayer money once again will be diverted to ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students at a time when Israel’s middle class is squeezed and poverty in other sectors is increasing without equal redress. Unfair preferential and discriminatory use of public funds will be given to the Hareidi population, declared illegal by Israel’s High Court of Justice. Netanyahu’s agreement with these parties undermines efforts to reduce massive subsidies and removes incentives for yeshiva students to seek gainful earning potential and not rely on welfare thus handicapping them from integrating into an education-based workforce.

2. Public transportation – There is no public transportation available anywhere in the state of Israel on Shabbat and Holidays. Hiddush shows that public support (among the adult Jewish population) has reached an all-time high of 74% in favor of public transportation on Shabbat and Holidays including 72% of Likud voters (PM Netanyahu’s own party). This is important because the very people at the lowest end of the economic ladder who cannot afford a car are discriminated against. But the Orthodox parties are against it, and the current prohibition will likely continue.

These are but two consequences in bringing in the ultra-Orthodox parties back into the government. There will likely be more.

You can access Hiddush’s findings here:

1. “Hiddush analysis of new coalition agreement with United Torah Judaism”  

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?ui=2&ik=c2d9440b24&view=pt&search=inbox&th=14d0d0c8bfef89ae&siml=14d0d0c8bfef89ae

2. “74% of Israelis want to change the status Quo – What gives Israel its Jewish character? Is it liberty, justice and peace, as taught by the Hebrew Prophets, or is it the lack of public transportation on Shabbat, which greatly restricts the weakest sectors of Israeli society?” 

http://hiddush.org/article-12729-0-Support_for_public_transporation_on_Shabbat_at_highest_level_ever.aspx

As My Mother Disappears Before My Eyes

27 Monday Apr 2015

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As my mother nears her 98th birthday in June, the dementia that has consumed her brain is taking more and more of her away. It’s as if there’s been an invasion of a body snatcher.

My mother is, on the one hand, still there. She sounds, smells and feels the same. But increasingly, she has entered into oblivion.

In my last three visits, she didn’t know who I was – I, her son of 65 years.

In my visits these days, I try and discover where she is and what she thinks about and remembers. I’m no longer asking her if she knows who I am. She may indeed know, but I don’t think she easily remembers my name.

One of the tragedies of advancing dementia is the utter isolation that sufferers progressively experience as they move through the fog left by lost memory. It’s also difficult and painful for us who love them because we can’t help but grieve as we watch them disappear.

My mother’s world has become so very small. She had always lived an active and fully engaged life invigorated by family, friends, people, Jewish community, causes, and ideas. Then, she began to forget things. She couldn’t find the words that had once flowed so easily past her lips. She couldn’t recall the memories that made her who she was and defined her world. She didn’t know the names of the people she loved. And she couldn’t recognize anyone in the room.

My mother has always been exceptionally verbal, and though she still talks up a storm, her words are nearly impossible for me to understand, and I know her better than most people.

I’ve asked myself what is actually left, what remains of all that she was, learned and knew. Thankfully, certain things haven’t yet left her. She retains her essential sweetness, gentleness, kindness, generosity, and joy when she looks into my face and has some recognition that I’m an important and familiar person to her, but I wonder what the content of the familiarity is.

For those who suffer with dementia, it’s as if the life cycle has been reversed. They undergo a great unlearning, an unmaking of themselves, a reversion to a uncluttered brain – but this time, the mind is shutting down and not opening up.

Sometimes, nevertheless, my mother offers a pearl of wisdom. Last week she said, “We all have to love each other – for what else is there!?”

Because my mother can’t hear, can’t see and can’t walk, I sit very close to her when we interact, touch her constantly, look into her face from five or six inches away, and speak very loudly into her left ear, the better ear of the two. If I’m able to break through the fog of her confusion, she may know me, but most of the time I’m not sure that she does.

In being with people with dementia, it’s important for us to remember that when the mind goes our bodies carry powerful memories too that may remain. A mother never forgets the vibrations, smell and energy of her child, and I, her son, certainly have never forgotten my mother’s vibrations, smell and emotional presence.

After all the years, what’s left between her and me has come down to this – the purity of a love between a mother and a son. I cherish this and pray that she still does too.

Each time I leave her I kiss her and say directly into her ear: “Mom – I love you!”

“I love you too,” she always says.

I hope she knows that it’s ME who has spoken those words, and not just some stranger showing her love and kindness.

Yom Haatzmaut – Reflections 2015

22 Wednesday Apr 2015

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Who could have imagined 67 years ago that Israel would become as economically viable, politically and militarily strong, technologically advanced, and creatively cutting-edge as it is today?

Who would have dreamed that Israel’s Jewish population would grow from 600,000 souls in 1948 to nearly 6 million today?

Who would have thought that after having had to fight seven wars, endure two Intifadas and bear-up against ongoing terrorist attack that the Jewish state would remain democratic and free despite little peace with its neighbors and no resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?

All told, even with her imperfections and serious challenges, Israel is a remarkable nation, testimony to the spirit, will, ingenuity, aspiration, creativity, and sacrifice of generations. Today Israel is like none other in the world, more culturally, linguistically, and religiously diverse, more intellectually, artistically and academically productive. The depth and breadth of her accomplishments are nothing shy of breath-taking.

On the occasion of Israel’s 67th Independence Day, Jews the world over are well to take stock, celebrate her massive accomplishments, mourn and honor her dead, and ask what unique place the Jewish state holds in the innermost heart, mind and soul of the Jewish people.

This is no easy task. Permit me to offer some thoughts as I reflect on Israel’s meaning:

Israel is far more than a political refuge as envisioned by political Zionists. It is more than the flowering of the Jewish spirit as dreamed about by cultural Zionists. It is more than the fulfillment of Jewish memory and religious longing as experienced by the entirety of the Jewish people.

Israel starts with the land, with Jerusalem at its heart, for the land has been a key focus of Jewish consciousness for three millennia. The land of Israel is at the center of our history and is an essential element of our Jewish faith. But Israel is far more than land.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel put it this way in his moving volume Israel – An Echo of Eternity: “Israel reborn is an answer to the Lord of history who demands hope as well as action, who expects tenacity as well as imagination.” (p. 118) “The inspiration that goes out of Zion today is the repudiation of despair and the example of renewal.” (p. 134)

In this spirit the Zionists sought to create a new kind of a Jew, at home in the land, self-activated, self-realized, independent, creative, and free. They understood, however, the limitations of their state-building endeavor. Heschel said: “The State of Israel is not the fulfillment of the Messianic promise, but it makes the Messianic promise plausible.” (Ibid. p. 223)

In other words, the political state is not and cannot be regarded as an end in itself. Rather, the Jewish state represents a challenge and a promise that will rise or fall based on how our people and Israel’s government uses or misuses the power that comes with national sovereignty. With this in mind a Jewish state that was founded upon the principles of democracy and that is worthy of its great mission must challenge our individual and communal ethics, our nationalism, our humanity, and our faith.

May Israel be an or lagoyim, a light to the nations, and may her citizens and all the inhabitants of the land know justice and peace.

What We Jews Can Do In Their Name

19 Sunday Apr 2015

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We Jews are living this week between two significant holidays of commemoration. Last Wednesday evening and Thursday the Jewish world mourned those who perished in the Holocaust on Yom HaShoah. This Wednesday evening and Thursday we will mourn those who died defending the people and state of Israel on Yom HaZikaron.

The breadth and depth of the losses of the Jewish people in the Shoah (The 6 million plus 5 million others) and the land of Israel since 1860 (25,000 Jews killed with many more thousands injured and maimed) to our people confounds the mind and breaks the heart. It doesn’t matter whether we were alive or personally affected in our own families by the events that these holydays commemorate. Just knowing about them creates familial memory.

We are a people defined, in part, by memory. The good and noble deeds our families and forebears performed during their lives, upon their deaths, pass to us as zechut (merit), and we live in the after-glow of their accomplishments, decency and nobility, and we dwell in the shadow of their suffering and unjust deaths.

How ought we to remember our people’s history of suffering?

In the wake of so much tragic history, how ought we to understand our lives today?

What ought we do to emulate that which was most noble in their lives?

The Talmud teaches that miracles ceased with the Temple’s destruction, but since, miracles of another sort have occurred.

When we’re seen and heard for what we really are as Jews, is this not a miracle?

When we love our people and tradition fully, is this not a miracle too?

Now that the Jewish people has lost so many innocent and righteous men, women and children to violence and hate over time, what ought we to do in their memory?

We can speak in their place, and pray in their name.

We can do what they are no longer capable of doing and let our lives be an extension of theirs.

We can learn and live our people’s tradition, language and history since they can no longer learn, speak and carry forward the life of our people.

We can love and support the state and people of Israel because their hands and hearts have been stilled.

We can comfort others who grieve loss because they can no longer offer solace.

We can be happy since they can no longer laugh, love our children and all children because they can no longer love, and carry their memory and good deeds forward so they will be remembered and the world will become kinder, more just, and more peaceful in their name.

Zecher tzaddikim livracha! May the memory of the righteous among the Jewish people be a perpetual benediction.

Vote ARZA Slate Before April 30 in WZC Elections

17 Friday Apr 2015

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If you have not already done so, please click now onto this link https://www.reformjews4israel.org, register and vote for the ARZA Slate (i.e. the Association of Reform Zionists of America).

As a delegate on the ARZA Slate (I am #25), we America Reform and Reconstructionist rabbis and leaders of the Union for Reform Judaism represent 1.3 million American Jews.

Here is the complete Slate of ARZA Delegates: https://www.reformjews4israel.org/slate/

There is a one-time only administrative charge of $5 for young Jews (18-30) and $10 for Jews (over 30).

I love this video by a fellow ARZA delegate – great video from slate member Yael Dadoun!

Questions and Answers!!!!

What is the World Zionist Congress? The Parliament of the Jewish People representing all of world Jewry.

What is the ARZA Platform?

  • Support for gender equality in the State of Israel
  • Support for religious equality in the State of Israel
  • Support for peace through commitment to a two-state solution of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Why does it matter that you vote for ARZA?

ARZA currently holds 39% of the US representation in the World Zionist Congress based on the results of the last election for the WZC. Consequently, over the past five years $20 million has been given to the Israeli Movement for Progressive Judaism (IMPJ) to support its programs, congregations, rabbis, outreach, and social justice work. The Israeli government has also provided 4 new buildings for Reform communities around Israel because of our large American Reform Zionist representation.

The government of the state of Israel does not give any money directly to the Reform movement except through special programs. However, the government does fund generously orthodox schools and synagogues. This is not only unfair; it is a violation of the spirit of Israel’s own Declaration of Independence. We American Reform Zionists support our movement and others in Israel struggling through the courts to be treated equally under the law.

In the meantime, we must raise money to support our Israeli Reform movement, and our success in this WZC election is one sure way to do that.

Note that the Israeli Reform movement is a significant leader in support of the Israel Religious Action Center in Jerusalem and our 45 congregations, 2 kibbutzim, strong youth programs, nursery schools, Tali schools, and pre-military programs all over the country.

Our movement supports civil marriage unions in Israel without having to involve the Chief Rabbinate, egalitarianism at the Western Wall, anti-Racism laws, anti-Poverty activism, and many other social justice causes.

A vote for the ARZA slate will also deny funds for settlement building in the West Bank.

ARZA needs your vote and I am asking that you and every Jewish individual in your household register today at the above site, pay the $5 or $10 administrative fee depending on your age, and then vote for the ARZA Slate. Thank you in advance!

If you have trouble voting, please call (844) 413-2929 or email AZM@election-america.com

Rabbi John Rosove, Delegate – ARZA Slate #25

Terezin – a poem by Hanus Hachenburg z’l

15 Wednesday Apr 2015

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Tonight and tomorrow is Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Memorial Day.

This past October, I was with a group from my synagogue that visited Terezin. We were led by a survivor of Terezin, Auschwitz and a death march back to Terezin, Pavel Stansky – now 93 years old. Pavel was a teacher then, and devoted his time with the children to try and bring them some happiness in those dark days, weeks and months.

A total of 15,000 children under the age of 15 passed through Terezin. Of these, about 100 came back.

This poem was written in 1943 by Hanus Hachenburg, z’l.

“That bit of filth in dirty walls,
And all around barbed wire,
And 30,000 souls who sleep
Who once will wake
And once will see
Their own blood spilled.

I was once a little child,
Three years ago.
That child who longed for other worlds.
But now I am no more a child
For I have learned to hate.
I am a grown-up person now,
I have known fear.

Bloody words and a dead day then,
That’s something different than bogie men!

But anyway, I still believe I only sleep today,
That I’ll wake up, a child again, and start to laugh and play.
I’ll go back to childhood sweet like a briar rose,
Like a bell which wakes us from a dream,
Like a mother with an ailing child
Loves him with woman’s love.
How tragic, then, is youth which lives
With enemies, with gallows ropes,
How tragic, then, for children on your lap
To say: this for the good, that for the bad.

Somewhere, far away out there, childhood sweetly sleeps,
Along that path among the trees,
There o’er that house
Which was once my pride and joy.
There my mother gave me birth into this world
So I could weep . . .

In the flame of candles by my bed, I sleep
And once perhaps I’ll understand
That I was such a little thing,
As little as this song.

These 30,000 souls who sleep
Among the trees will wake,
Open an eye
And because they see
A lot

They’ll fall asleep again. . .”

Notes: This poem is preserved in a typewritten copy. In the right corner, “IX. 1944” is written in and on the right side, the following is written in pencil: “Written by children from the ages of 10 to 16, living in homes L 318 and L 4176.” The poem is unsigned, but the author was identified by O. Klein, a former teacher at Terezin, as Hanus Hachenberg. He was born in Prague on July 12, 1929, and deported to Terezin on October 24, 1942. He died on December 18, 1943 at the age of 14 in Oswiecim (i.e. Auschwitz). The copy is likely from a later date.

The above notes and the poem are taken from “I never saw another butterfly… Children’s Drawings and Poems from Terezin Concentration Camp 1942-1944.” McGraw-Hill. New York. Printed in Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic). 1971. Pages 22-23 and 78.

A decision that should have been resolved before marriage

14 Tuesday Apr 2015

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Life Cycle

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Nathan’s father died soon after he was born, and before his death he asked his wife to be certain that their son would become bar mitzvah at age 13. His wife Joanne created a warm Jewish home, joined our synagogue, entered Nathan into Religious School, celebrated Shabbat every week bringing an assortment of friends into hers and Nathan’s home, and Nathan became Bar Mitzvah.

I met Nathan when he was six years old. He was, even as a child, smart and thoughtful, kind, talented, and graced with a gentle charisma that drew people to him.

I stayed close to him and his mother, but tragically, Joanne was diagnosed with cancer and died when Nathan was 17. Before her death, she arranged for him to live with dear friends who took Nathan into their home as their own, and I made Nathan pledge to stay in touch with me as I would do with him.

I’ve always believed in Nathan, and once suggested to him during his college years to consider the rabbinate, as he had everything it took to be an effective rabbinic leader. He appreciated the thought and my confidence in him, but explained that since he didn’t believe in God this was a path he could not take honestly.

Nathan went on to become a teacher and worked in the inner city public schools for five years with 4th grade children and their parents trying to help these kids to love learning, to develop strong study habits and to work their way up and out of poverty.

Like many teachers in these circumstances, Nathan burned out. The work was tough and he found himself fighting against a strong current of family illiteracy, gangs and drugs. He wanted to help others, but he had to find a new way. So he applied to law school and now is working as a public defender.

Nathan and I talk infrequently, but we’ve maintained a special bond. He’s now 34 years old and married to a wonderful non-Jewish woman who is generally supportive of his raising their children as Jews, to a point. Three months before the baby would be born he called me to talk about brit milah. He wanted it. His wife didn’t. What to do? I spoke at length with him about this and offered to speak with his wife, but she didn’t want to then. Nothing was resolved.

Four days after Nathan’s son was born, he called me desperately needing to talk. He explained that he was on cloud nine and in the dumps. On the third day of his son’s life, he raised the issue of a brit milah again with his wife, and they had the most alienating fight of their relationship.

He explained that his wife couldn’t imagine taking a knife to her new-born baby. She charged that the circumcision was a form of mutilation, and her maternal instinct wouldn’t permit it.

Once again he explained to her all his reasons why he wanted his son to enter the Covenant of Abraham, saying to her, “I feel deeply Jewish in my guts and I want my son to be Jewish too, that not doing this meant distancing himself even further from the father he’d never known who wanted him to be a Jew, from the mother who raised him as a Jew, and from his Jewish heritage altogether. “

He asked me for wisdom about what to do.

I suggested that he also say the following to her:

“Yes – the bris can be momentarily painful to our child, but mohalim (ritual circumcisers) use wine as a way to calm the baby while the brit occurs. The wound may be sore for a couple of days, but that’s it. Compared to the birth experience, a brit milah is far less traumatic, and it heals quickly. It isn’t mutilation at all. It’s the most fundamental and ancient of Jewish rites going back 3600 years. This is something very deep for me and I am asking you to allow it.”

“Nathan,“ I then said. “Your instincts are right. Those Jewish parents who choose not to bring their sons into the Covenant of Abraham separate themselves and their children from this 3600-year rite of passage and ineffable relationship with God. This is about Jewish identity and continuity. Since you and your wife have agreed to raise your son as a Jew, you must do this.”

We left it there, but I checked back with him a couple of days later. He said: “We had another argument last night with a friend trying to mediate, but she has decided that she can’t abide with the circumcision. I’m very angry, but she’s not changing her mind… I can’t maintain my anger and tarnish what is the happiest moment of my life. I have no choice but to move forward. All of this has reinvigorated my desire to give my son a Jewish education, for him to become Bar Mitzvah. My wife has said that she is supportive of that. She recognizes the huge sacrifice I’m making…I hope my son will some day make a choice to have a brit. Will you perform a naming even without a brit?”

I told Nathan I would. He understands, however, that the naming without the brit milah is half-done.

Nathan’s situation confirms my conviction that this kind of a decision has to be made before marriage even takes place.

I have confidence in Nathan and trust him to do everything he can to raise his son as a Jew. I hope his wife comes around one day on the brit milah, and sooner rather than later. Time will tell.