Author Archives: rabbijohnrosove

Telling Children that Parents are Getting a Divorce – Another Difficult Conversation

21 Tuesday Jan 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Life Cycle

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Few events are as destabilizing, disappointing, painful, and sad as divorce, and when children are involved the potential for real harm to them is great if parents are not careful about what they say and how they behave.

No matter how contentious the parents’ relationship has become, they should strive to do everything possible to spare their children unnecessary exposure to their anger and disappointment. Since every age of childhood requires special understanding relative to the child’s developmental and emotional needs, child development experts should be consulted to assist parents and teachers in helping children cope with the dramatic changes taking place in their family.

Both parents should agree on how and when they explain their divorce to their children and how they will relate to their children following the announcement. It is best when children are told with both parents present.

Parents should never speak ill of each other to the children, as doing so will be emotionally damaging.

When telling their children, I recommend that they say something to this effect:

“We both love you. We will always be your parents. Sadly, we have decided that it would be better for us not to live together or to continue being married. Our decision has nothing to do with you. There is nothing you did that caused us to end our marriage and there is nothing you can do to bring us back together. We know that our divorce is deeply disappointing and distressing to you, as it is to us, and that you are very sad about it, as are we, but we believe that this change will be better for us, and we hope in time that you will understand. We are both here for you. We both love you.” 

It is a mistake for parents to share details of what went wrong in their marriage with their children. The children may know that there have been problems, but they do not need to know specifics, for that is the parents’ business and theirs alone.

Parents need to remember that their children are watching them. Everything they say and do affects them, and they will learn to cope with their own life challenges by the example their parents set as they cope with the end of their marriage.

Parents need not be stoic in front of their kids, but neither should they show constantly to them how grieved, angry, pained, and disappointed the parents feel.

Parents should strive to keep the children’s lives as normal as possible, should be open to hearing what their kids think and feel, and should not try and convince their kids that they are wrong to feel as they do, that they should “get over it” before they are ready, or ignore the pain they feel. Parents should accept what their kids say on their terms and affirm that their feelings are legitimate.

Parents should hug their children a lot and tell them how much they love them.

It is important that the children of divorcing parents have the support of close family, friends, clergy, therapists, and teachers. Parents should explain to their children how important it is for their teachers to be aware about the divorce so that they can emotionally support them as needed in the classroom.

The time following divorce, like that following a death, needs a grieving period. Shock, denial, anger, sadness, and acceptance are part of what divorcing parents can anticipate from their children. Children might act out in a variety of ways. Some may not react during the first months, and their reactions will vary according to age and respective relationships with each parent. As parents and children move through this transition together, children should understand that they must speak respectfully to their parents and siblings even if they are furious at their parents for this change that has been imposed on their lives.

It is a mistake for parents to over-compensate in what they allow and give to their children. Parents should not attempt to buy their child’s happiness. Among the most important things parents can do is to agree together on their expectations, privileges and punishments. This is often difficult, but if parents, despite their antagonisms, are willing to communicate and coordinate regarding their children, so that neither home is viewed as a sanctuary from the other home, then the stability and constancy children need will be more likely to occur.

I have written a booklet called “When Jews Divorce” that more completely discusses the Jewish view on divorce and other options for divorcing partners. It can be found on my synagogue’s website at http://www.tioh.org/images/Worship/ClergyStudy/when%20jews%20divorce.pdf.

Note: This is one in a series of blogs I am writing about difficult conversations that come up in families, among friends and in the workplace that we sometimes avoid or do badly. For a complete list, see my blog “More Difficult Conversations – January 17, 2014.”

Helping a Grieving Child after the Death of a Loved One – Another Difficult Conversation

19 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Health and Well-Being, Life Cycle, Poetry

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Death is the greatest destabilizing and shattering of life experiences, and is particularly challenging to children who, for the most part, have not as yet developed the life-skills necessary to effectively cope emotionally and spiritually with this magnitude of loss. They consequently need all the support  that extended family, friends, clergy, teachers, therapists, classmates, and community can give them.

What do children know about death and when do they know it?

Very young children under the age of six years approach death with a kind of “magical thinking.” For example, the coyote in the Roadrunner cartoons is consistently pulverized in his pursuit of the Roadrunner. Yet, after every crushing experience, he is reconstituted, comes back to life and continues his pursuit of the Roadrunner. Cartoon characters do not stay dead, and very young children assume that people who die will also return to life.

Some children believe, from an egocentric perspective, that they might have caused the death, and it needs to be explained to them that all people die and that they themselves had absolutely nothing to do with Grandma’s death.

Children over the age of 7 are already beginning to understand concretely and abstractly the meaning of death. Many are fearful for their own safety and the safety of other close adults in their lives. They need reassurance from their surviving parents, grandparents and extended family that everyone else is healthy and has many more years to live, that this was a very sad and/or tragic experience and that it is likely not going to be repeated for many years.

They need to understand, as well, that most illness is treatable and people recover. Just because someone gets sick does not mean that they will die.

Children need to understand that death and sleep are different in order to keep at bay their fear that going to sleep means they, or their loved ones, won’t awaken in the morning.

Children need to know the truth about what causes death, that the disease that killed their loved ones is not necessarily contagious and that their surviving family members are safe.

If children ask about God, I urge you not to say: “God must have wanted Grandma!” “Grandpa is now in a better place!” “God gives us only those burdens that God believes we can handle!”  Such thinking pits God against human beings rather than offer us a divine source of solace and comfort in our loss. The Kotzker Rebbe (Rabbi Menachem Mendel Morgensztern of Kotzk, 1787-1859) said that “God is closest to those whose hearts are broken.”

I am moved by the perspective of the French theologian Teilhard de Chardin, who observed that

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”

You might share this idea with your children as it may open their hearts, minds and souls to a greater understanding of who they are at their essential spiritual core.

As a practical matter, I do not encourage children under the age of 5 to attend funerals because they do not understand what is taking place and are often distracting to the mourners. Children over the age of 5 or 6, however, should be given the option to attend after understanding what will take place and what will be expected of them.

Children should be involved in helping to make decisions about the funeral and what happens later in the home.

When the child returns to school, his/her friends also need to be prepared to receive them. The child should be greeted warmly by everyone, invited to join a group of kids at lunch, to walk with classmates between classes, to schedule play dates, and to do homework together.

Classmates should acknowledge what has happened by saying such things as, “I am so sorry that your Dad died.” “I’ve missed you.” “I’ve been thinking about you.” “I can’t imagine what it feels like.” “I’m here for you if you ever want to talk.”

For all of us, there is nothing more painful than the loss of the people we love. This unknown poet, offers comfort, perspective and hope:

“Four things are beautiful beyond belief: / The pleasant weakness that comes after pain, / The radiant greenness that comes after rain, / The deepened faith that follows after grief, / And the re-awakening to love again.”

I have written a booklet (“Preparing for Jewish Burial and Mourning”) that describes in some detail concisely Jewish burial and mourning customs. I believe it can be helpful for you and your children in better understanding how Judaism understands death and mourning and why we do what we do. See my synagogue’s web-site:

http://www.tioh.org/images/Worship/ClergyStudy/preparing%20for%20jewish%20burial%20and%20mourning.pdf

 

Difficult Conversations

17 Friday Jan 2014

Posted by in Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Life Cycle

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My post “Helping Families Have the Most Difficult Conversation” (December 31, 2013) touched a sensitive chord with many people. In that blog I encouraged adult children and their parents to talk openly about the most difficult and challenging of life’s transitions at the end of life.  See https://rabbijohnrosove.wordpress.com/2013/12/31/helping-families-have-the-most-difficult-conversation/

After reading the first blog, a good friend suggested that I address other difficult conversations as well. I thought he had a good idea, and so in the coming weeks I will address each of these themes below, and where possible, to cite Jewish text and values.

A disclaimer – I am not a psychologist, though working in synagogues over the past 40 years as a student rabbi and then an ordained rabbi I have addressed these issues in one way or another many times.

Here are the issues (to be addressed in no particular order) that I will discuss going forward:

·       How to best discuss death, divorce and sex with children

·       How to talk about God with children whether we are believers or not

·       How to share bad news

·       How to tell those who behave unethically and mean-spiritedly the truth about what they do and the impact they have on others

·       What to say to those with addiction problems

·       How to deal with the person who is always right, never wrong, and resistant to apologizing when wrong

·       How to be a friend to those with serious illness

·       What to do and say to those who self-reference in every conversation

·       What to say when others make racist, sexist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic comments in a business or social setting, or to you personally

When the time comes, I invite your insights and wisdom. You can post your comments directly on my blog.

I hope these blogs will stimulate us to address those difficult interpersonal issues and issues that come up among friends and in the workplace that we have avoided or done badly.

 

The Most Important Book to Come out of Israel in Years – “My Promised Land – The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel” by Ari Shavit

14 Tuesday Jan 2014

Posted by in Book Recommendations, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity

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Much has been written already about  Ari Shavit’s “My Promised Land – The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel” (just published).  I have included the links to four reviews below, and I add my accolades to theirs.

This new book is a must read for anyone wishing to understand the complexity of the competing ideologies, nationalisms, politics, cultures, religions, ethnicities, histories, and narratives  that make up modern Israel. The left-leaning Israeli author shines a light as well on how the Zionist movement,  the establishment of the State of Israel and Israel’s wars and security concerns have transformed the Jewish people and state for better and worse, and impacted the lives and aspirations of the Palestinian people.

Ari Shavit is a veteran journalist at Haaretz, Israel’s equivalent of The New York Times. His book is not an historian’s objective record of events, though there is much history in it. Rather,  this is both a memoir and a journalistic investigation into the nature of modern Israel using hundreds of interviews of Israelis and Palestinians conducted over many years.

The strengths of the book are many. It is the story behind the headlines as told personally by the leading players. Whether Shavit agrees with them or not, he lets them tell their own stories. He is a gifted writer, and his depth of knowledge and insight into Israel’s history and into trends within the various narratives is second to none.

The book at once informs, enthralls, inspires, disgusts, and breaks your heart, whether you be an Israeli Jew, an Israeli Arab citizen, a Palestinian, an American, or anyone else who reads it and is open to Israel’s triumph and tragedy. Tom Friedman wrote in the NYT that everyone involved in the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations ought to read this book immediately.

Finally, if you are a Jew living in Israel or the Diaspora, this book will likely challenge the meaning of your Jewish identity – so beware! However, as a good friend likes to say, “Love is what remains when you know the whole truth.” I pray that she is correct in this case.

I believe that “My Promised Land” is the most important book to come out of Israel in many years, and I recommend it without hesitation.

Here are four additional reviews worth reading:

Dwight Gardner of The New York Times – http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/20/books/ari-shavits-my-promised-land.html?_r=0

Michael Berenbaum of The Los Angeles Jewish Journal – http://www.jewishjournal.com/books/article/michael_berenbaum_review_ari_shavits_my_promised_land

Noam Sheizaf of +972 Magazine – http://972mag.com/book-review-on-ari-shavits-my-promised-land/83686/

Jane Eisner of The Jewish Daily Forward – http://forward.com/articles/187813/art-shavit-still-believes-in-a-promised-land/?p=all

 

Ariel Sharon – Among Israel’s Greatest Leaders – z’l

12 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by in Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Uncategorized

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How does one eulogize the passing of an Israeli Prime Minister, especially one who was so colorful a personality, so great a general, so influential a national leader, and so committed to the security and viability of the democratic state of Israel as Ariel Sharon?

I saw Ariel Sharon twice, though I never met him. The first time he was leaving in a hurry, almost running out of the King David Hotel after having met with US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in the mid-1970s during Kissinger’s shuttle diplomacy after the 1973 Yom Kippur War. The second time was when I had joined a delegation of American Reform Rabbis in 1998 to meet with PM Netanyahu and urge him not to bend to the ultra-Orthodox on changing Israel’s “Law of Return” to exclude Jews as Israeli citizens who had converted to Judaism with Reform and Conservative Rabbis. Sharon was walking through the halls of the Knesset and he glanced at us knowing who we were and why we were there, as the news of our mission were headlines throughout our stay.

He was a huge distinctive charismatic and handsome man Israelis nicknamed “HaShamen” (“The fat one”) – and he was indeed.

Despite Sharon’s mixed history, I became a fan – I admit it. I liked his spirit even if I disliked what he did in Lebanon and his settlement policies. I consider him a bonafide hero because he saved the state of Israel from destruction in the 1973 War of Yom Kippur.

My friend and congregant, Eli Yoel, was a commander of Israel’s Navy Seals in the Sinai before, during and after that terrible war. General Sharon, though not Eli’s immediate commander, ordered Eli nevertheless to prepare his men to cross the Suez Canal by laying down a bridge and fighting whomever they encountered. Sharon knew that this operation, as dangerous as it was for the soldiers leading it, was the only way to turn the war around and prevent the worst nightmare the Jewish people had experienced since the Holocaust.

Eli did as he was commanded, though he knew that half his 100 man strike force would be killed, including maybe himself, as he was leading the charge. Eli survived, but he lost half his men.

The operation was successful. Bridges were laid across the canal, and the Israeli Defense Forces entered Egypt and surrounded the Egyptian 2nd Army thereby compelling the United States to force a ceasefire.

The ’73 War was a tragic experience for the Jewish state. Yet, it laid the groundwork for the cold peace with Egypt that came out of the Camp David Accords in 1978.

Sharon also led Israel into the disastrous 1982 Lebanon War. He was the architect of Israel’s massive settlement policies in the West Bank. And he waged a relentless war against Yassir Arafat during the 2nd Intifada. Many Palestinians believe that Sharon was even responsible for the poisoning of Arafat.

It used to be said in Israel that when Syria’s President Hafez El Assad (the current President’s father) looked into a mirror each morning he would see the image of Ariel Sharon looking back at him. Sharon was at once the leader of a state, a military hawk, and a tribal chieftain who with paternal love embraced his people, but with ice in his veins would pursue any enemy threatening his people and the State of Israel.

The Arabs hated him and called him “the Butcher of Beirut” (though it was the Phalangist Christians who slaughtered over 900 innocent Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps, not Israel).

Israelis trusted Sharon’s strength and resolve, his political savvy and cunning, and his courage even if they disagreed with him and his politics. When he became Prime Minister, some of my leftist Israeli friends confessed that they were glad that Sharon was the leader of the state of Israel, that only he had the character, credibility and guts to lead the state to peace.

Sharon understood the snake pit that was the Gaza Strip for Israelis, and that Israel had to disengage which he did unilaterally. He could have done so in conjunction with Mahmud Abbas and Fatah, thus giving them the credit and preventing (perhaps) the take-over of Gaza by Hamas, but he did not.

Sharon also came to recognize, as Yitzhak Rabin did before him, as Ehud Olmert did after him, and hopefully Bibi Netanyahu will going forward, that a two states for two peoples solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict is the only way to preserve Israel’s democracy, Jewish majority, security, and international standing.

Had Sharon not suffered the stroke, it is possible that a two-state solution would already have emerged. We will never know.

Ariel Sharon will go down in Jewish history, and deservedly so, as one of Israel’s greatest leaders. We may never see another leader like him.

Zichrono livracha – May his memory be a blessing.

Before and After Sinai – A Poem/Drash for B’shalach

10 Friday Jan 2014

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Almighty One: / Was not Moses Your most intimate friend / With whom you spoke face to face / Who You sent to confront Pharaoh / To diminish his name / That Yours might be established / As The Creator and Redeemer of heaven and earth?

Was not Moses Your most cherished shepherd / Who stood strong before the despot / Spoke with broken and heavy speech / Words You placed in his mouth?

Was not Moses Your voice, / And extended hand, / And fingers touching / Water, earth, wind, / And fire, / The all of the all / And beyond?

This friend, shepherd, and prophet / Tended Your people / Through salt-water walls, / Mud and muck / To birth them / And lead them / To You on the mountain / To be Your treasured and cherished people.

But You used Moses / And worked against him / By stiffening Pharaoh’s heart / To demonstrate Your power.

He was Your proxy / And it was You / Who polluted the waters, / And destroyed the crops, / And killed the cattle, / And the first-born.

Moses deserved better / For all he did / On Your behalf / For the sake of Your Name / Than to die alone / And forsaken / In a wilderness grave?

Yes – We can understand / That justice needed a strong fist / Against Pharaoh’s tyranny. / Small minds needed to cower / Before the shock and awe of Your power.

Yes – We can understand  / That You did what You had to do / And used Your prophet / As a means to a greater end.

Before Sinai You commanded Moses / To take his stick and hit a rock / When the people complained of thirst – / And he did as You told him to do.

Moses brought them to You at Sinai / To see Your clouds of fire, / And he taught that in place of the fist / Words are stronger / The spirit sharper than swords / And all must live peacefully / Under their vines and their fig trees / With none to terrorize them.

That was Your dream / Carried by Your prophets / And Moses was the most beloved of all.

Yet, after Sinai / Little changed in the human heart. / Your people are still small-minded / And constricted by need and jealousy / Anger and hate. / They were not ready to live by Your Word alone; / And as the days passed, / And the years rolled by,

Miriam died, / And her waters dried too / And the people complained again / Having forgotten Your dream / And the shock and awe of You.

Now Moses became old / And he lost patience / For the bickering and complaining.

He had restrained You once / At the Golden Calf – / Or have You forgotten? / You sought the destruction of the world / But Moses stayed Your Hand / Quelled Your rage / Because he cared more / About the innocent among his people / Than honoring You.

After Sinai You commanded Moses / To speak – this time – to the rock / That water would flow / And quench their thirst; / But he took the stick / And beat the rock / As he had done before.

This time You punished him / And took from him his cherished dream / To glimpse the Promised Land.

He did everything you asked of him, / Except this once. / In spite You made him die alone / Amid bare thorns and weeds / Without the angels knowing / The Place from which his soul left him.

Moses disappointed You / As we have disappointed You / As You have disappointed us!

 

 

 

 

“Jaw jaw is better than war war!” – Sir Winston Churchill and the Iran Sanctions Bill

09 Thursday Jan 2014

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Most Israelis, Americans and international observers recognize that Iran’s nuclear weapons program is an existential threat to Israel and the western world. The question is what to do and not do in the midst of current negotiations between Iran and P5 +1?

I believe we should NOT support S. 1881 – The Menendez-Kirk Iran Sanctions Bill which would impose new stringent sanctions on Iran and entities that do business with it if Iran fails to meet certain conditions in current negotiations over its nuclear program.

J Street, a pro-Israel and pro-peace American political organization, supports the Obama Administration’s current strategy in negotiations, as do I. What follows is J Street’s arguments explaining why S.1881 would either encourage a nuclear armed Iran, war or both.

The following is excerpted from a J Street memo.

“President Obama’s administration, the US intelligence community and numerous security experts believe that enactment of this bill would likely derail current negotiations, foreclosing the possibility of a diplomatic resolution to concerns over Iran’s nuclear program. The legislation of new sanctions would be seen by Iran and some of our P5+1 partners as a bad-faith act violating the spirit of the first –step understandings agreed in November, and empower Iranian hardliners seeking to undermine President Rouhani, restricting his ability to agree to necessary concessions.

If it led to the collapse of talks, enactment of the bill would also ensure that the international community placed the blame for such failure squarely on the United States, leading to the likely defection of several of Iran’s large trading partners (i.e. China, Russia, India) from the US-led multilateral sanctions regime. In other words, the bill could result in significantly REDUCED economic pressure on Iran.

The bill places an essentially impossible condition on any final agreement: that Iran abandon all uranium enrichment, even for verifiably civilian purposes at levels far below weapons-grade. Conditioning the avoidance of new sanctions— not to mention relief from existing sanctions– on this outcome would also cause the likely collapse of negotiations, as Iran is extremely unlikely to agree to such terms.

The failure of diplomacy makes a nuclear-armed Iran or military engagement with Iran (or both) much more likely, which would threaten US and Israeli security, and frustrate the United States’ ability to advance the critical Israeli-Palestinian talks now underway.

Thirty-four Senators need to vote “No” in order to ensure that there is override-proof support for President Obama on this. He has promised to veto any bill of this kind that passes through Congress because:

[1] It sets an essentially impossible condition for a final deal, namely that Iran renounce even a peaceful nuclear program with intrusive international inspection.

[2] Its passage would be very likely to immediately derail the current diplomatic process.

[3] Enacting a bill that all but ensures the collapse of talks would likely lead other countries to break from the US-lead multilateral sanctions effort, and significantly REDUCE economic pressure on Iran.

Legislating sanctions now is an unnecessary risk, especially given that there is no question that Congress would be ready to pass new sanctions immediately should Iran violate the “first step” agreement or fail to come to terms on a permanent agreement.

I ask you to contact your senators and express your opposition to S. 1881.

Senators who have not taken a position on the bill (39):

Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)

Max Baucus (D-MT)

Michael Bennett (D-CO)

Sherrod Brown (D-OH)

Richard Burr (R-NC)

Maria Cantwell (D-WA)

Thad Cochran (R-MS)

Michael Crapo (R-ID)

Dick Durbin (D-IL)

Jeff Flake (R-AZ)

Al Franken (D-MN)

Martin Heinrich (D-NM)

Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND)

Dean Heller (D-NV)

Mazie Hirono (D-HI)

Tim Kaine (D-VA)

Angus King (D-ME)

Amy Klobuchar (D-MN)

Ed Markey (D-MA)

Claire McCaskill (D-MO)

Mitch McConnell (R-KY)

Jeff Merkley (D-OR)

Chris Murphy (D-CT)

Patty Murray (D-WA)

Bill Nelson (D-FL)

Rand Paul (R-KY)

Jack Reed (D-RI)

Harry Reid (D-NV)

Bernie Sanders (D-VT)

Brian Schatz (D-HI)

Jeff Sessions (R-AL)

Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH)

Richard Shelby (R-AL)

Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)

Jon Tester (D-MT)

Mark Udall (D-CO)

Tom Udall (D-NM)

Elizabeth Warren (D-MA)

Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI)

 

Senators who wrote to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in opposition to moving such a bill (10):

Barbara Boxer (D-CA)

Tom Carper (D-DE)

Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)

Tom Harkin (D-IA)


Tim Johnson (D-SD)


Patrick Leahy (D-VT)


Carl Levin (D-MI)


Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)


John Rockefeller (D-WV)


Ron Wyden (D-OR)

 

Cosponsors of the Bill (51):

Lamar Alexander (R-TN)

Kelley Ayotte (R-NH)

John Barrasso (R-WY)

Mark Begich (D-AK)

Richard Blumenthal (D-CT)

Roy Blunt (R-MO)

Cory Booker (D-NJ)

John Boozman (R-AR)

Ben Cardin (D-MD)
Bob Casey (D-PA)

Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)

Dan Coats (R-IN)

Tom Coburn (R-OK)

Susan Collins (R-ME)

Chris Coons (D-DE)

Bob Corker (R-TN)

John Cornyn (R-TX)

Ted Cruz (R-TX)

Joe Donnelly (D-IN)

Michael Enzi (R-WY)

Deb Fischer (R-NE)

Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY)

Lindsey Graham (R-SC)

Charles Grassley (R-IA)

Kay Hagan (D-NC)

Orrin Hatch (R-UT)

John Hoeven (R-ND)

Jim Inhofe (R-OK)

Johnny Isakson (R-GA)

Mike Johanns (R-NE)

Ron Johnson (R-WI)

Mark Kirk (R-IL)

Mary Landrieu (D-LA)

Mike Lee (R-UT)

Joe Manchin (D-WV)

John McCain (R-AZ)

Robert Menendez (D-NJ)

Jerry Moran (R-KS)

Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)

Rob Portman (R-OH)

Mark Pryor (D-AR)

James Risch (R-ID)

Pat Roberts (R-KS)

Marco Rubio (R-FL)

Chuck Schumer (D-NY)

Tim Scott (R-SC)

John Thune (R-SD)

Pat Toomey (R-PA)

David Vitter (R-LA)

Mark Warner (D-VA)

Roger Wicker (R-MS)

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

The Ethics and Politics of Street Tzedakah – Part II

08 Wednesday Jan 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Social Justice, Uncategorized

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When I lived in Berkeley in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, walking along Telegraph Avenue could be expensive if you gave to every panhandler who asked for spare change. Not that much has changed in all these years. The number of people asking for hand-outs is at least as great as it was, and perhaps more so. Given the nagging high national unemployment rate of 7% and the large numbers of long-term unemployed who have been unable to find work, the high number of under-employed, the historically low minimum wage, the federal cuts to food stamps for the working poor, and the threat that Congress will not extend unemployment insurance, it is no surprise that people asking for help on the street is so ever-present.

What to do? Democrats in Congress who believe that the federal government should extend a helping hand, especially in difficult times, are slogging it out with a recalcitrant hard-hearted extremist Republican party that cares little for “the least among these” (Matthew 25:40) despite their own Christian faith claims.

What about us? Do we give to the people on the street? Something to everyone, nothing to anyone, sporadically when we feel like it?

I confess that over the years I have been alternately generous and tight-fisted. Sometimes I open my wallet, but more often I walk by without responding, always feeling guilty when I do.

A week ago, my friend Letty Cottin Pogrebin sent me a link to an Op-ed she had just written for Moment Magazine called “The Politics and Ethics of Street Tzedakah” (http://www.momentmag.com/opinion-politics-ethics-street-tzedakah/). After reading it I felt especially ashamed of myself.

I decided, both for the sake of the person asking for help and for myself, that henceforth I would give to everyone asking me for assistance. This week, so far, I have given to five individuals, a dollar per person, not very much in the grand scheme of things (perhaps $250-300 annually). The pay-off, however, is great in human terms. The opportunity to connect heart to heart and soul to soul with a stranger in need is a benefit for both him/her and me.

In each of the five cases this week, the recipient responded gratefully: “Thank you brother!” “God bless you!” “Have a great day!” They felt seen and respected. I felt I did the right thing. It was, in a limited way, a win-win though my dollar gift did little to solve the great socio-economic problems in our country.

None of those who panhandle wish to be doing so. One young man walking through traffic was holding a sign that read, “This is humiliating to me, but I am hungry. Please help!”

To those who say skeptically that these people are scamming us, that they can do better standing at a busy intersection than by actually getting a job, I ask only that you put yourselves in their place and reflect on what it would have taken for someone to do what they are doing.

Regarding giving when we legitimately suspect fraud, Rabbi Chayim of Sanz (1793-1876) said:

“The merit of tzedakah is so great that I am happy to give to 100 beggars even if only one might actually be needy. Some people, however, act as if they are exempt from giving charity to 100 beggars in the event that one might be a fraud.” (Darkai Chaim, publ. 1962, p. 137)

Maimonides reminds us that “One must never turn a poor person away empty-handed, even if you give him a dry fig.” (Mishneh Torah, “Gifts to the Poor” 7:7)

The obligation to give tzedakah includes everyone without exception, even the poor who receive from community funds and individual handouts (Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh Deah 248:1). When the poor gives, they realize that there are others worse off than themselves.

According to surveys, the American Jewish community is the most generous community in the country per capita. I am proud that our people give to all kinds of worthy causes, to alleviate suffering here and around the world, to the people and state of Israel, to local, national and international Jewish causes, to synagogues and food pantries, homeless programs, and refugee organizations, to universities, hospitals, art museums, and symphony orchestras. We write checks because we know that Judaism requires it, because we know the heart of the stranger, the poor and oppressed, and in the interest of tikun olam.

But how often do we give when we meet strangers on the street?

I have decided that I am no longer walking by without giving. My personal pledge is to carry one dollar bills at all times, and to give them whenever asked, not just for the sake of the other, but for my own sake as well.

Diplomacy – Quotes to Consider in Dangerous Times

05 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by in Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Quote of the Day, Uncategorized

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As Secretary of State John Kerry, along with able diplomats such as US Middle East negotiator Martin Indyk, wade into the waters of Middle East diplomacy, I thought the following quotes are enlightening.

“Negotiation in the classic diplomatic sense assumes parties are more anxious to agree than to disagree.” -Secretary of State Dean Acheson (1893-1971)

 “You cannot negotiate with people who say what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is negotiable.” -President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963)

 “Never hate your enemies. It affects your judgment.” Mario Puzo, The Godfather (1920-1999)

“Hating clouds the mind. It gets in the way of strategy. Leaders cannot afford to hate.” -Bill Keller, Journalist (b. 1949)

“To jaw-jaw is always better than to war–war.” -Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

“Diplomacy: the art of restraining power.”  -Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger (b. 1923)

“Diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.” -Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

“All war represents a failure of diplomacy.” -Anthony Neil Wedgwood “Tony” Benn, British MP and Cabinet Minister (b. 1925)

“Diplomacy is, perhaps, one element of the U.S. government that should not be subject to the demands of ‘open government’; whenever it works, it is usually because it is done behind closed doors. But this may be increasingly had to achieve in the age of Twittering bureaucrats.” -Evgeny Morozov, Russian-American writer (b. 1984)

“Force is all conquering, but its victories are short-lived.” -President Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)

“Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.” -President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963)

“Certainly the international community is putting a lot of pressure on Iran and making clear that its nuclear program must stop. If it stops with the sanctions, the combinations of sanctions, diplomacy, other pressures, I, as the prime minister of Israel, will be the happiest person in the world.” -Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (b. 1949)

Amen!

Netanyahu’s Moment of Truth

02 Thursday Jan 2014

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Ari Shavit is among the most intelligent, fair-minded, and visionary of Israeli political commentators, and his piece in Haaretz (“Netanyahu’s Moment of Truth” – January 1, 2014) articulates as well as anyone could the challenge before Israel, before Israel’s Prime Minister, and before the Israeli government as Secretary Kerry presents a document to the Israelis and Palestinians this week that will include the recognition of a “Jewish state” within the 1967 borders with adjustments.

Shavit says that if Netanyanu and Abbas accept the principles of this document, this would be a Zionist victory and it would begin a restoration process that leads hopefully to a final two-states for two peoples end-of-conflict agreement, but also to an unprecedented international acceptance of Israel among the family of nations thus ending its growing pariah status.

The Prime Minister can take enormous credit for making the Iranian nuclear issue, the most important existential challenge to the existence of the state of Israel since the 1973 Yom Kippur War, front and center on the international agenda. His clarity and dogged determination to pressure the United States and the European powers to make Iran’s nuclear weapons program the most important and consequential foreign policy issue in the Middle East (indeed the world) is to be commended. The Jewish people owes him a profound debt of gratitude even before a real deal is signed between the West and Iran.

But, Israel has two central foreign policy challenges – the first is without doubt Iran’s nuclear weapons program; the second is the achievement of a two-state solution – Both will determine the future security, viability and democracy of the Jewish state of Israel.

PM Netanyahu has wanted to be regarded as the Israeli Winston Churchill. This is his opportunity to be so regarded. I pray that he takes it and rises to be the world-class diplomat par excellence that Israel, the Jewish people and the western world badly need him to be.

Read Ari Shavit’s column – http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.566539