Brothers

27 Thursday Oct 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in Divrei Torah, Ethics, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry

After God created the heavens and the earth, tragedy struck in a catastrophe that has never been forgotten, a tragedy now ingrained in our DNA and repeated in every generation.

The tale of Cain and Abel is a story of envy, despair, and evil that has stained the human condition (Genesis 4:1-15).

As dramatic as this story is, in only fifteen verses does the episode unfold and resolve. The narrative gives only bare details of Cain’s and Abel’s lives and their fates. Abel (Havel) was a keeper of sheep. His Hebrew name means “vapor,” reflecting his short and purposeless life.

Cain was a farmer and tiller of the soil, the same ground that he polluted when he murdered his brother and his brother’s blood soaked the earth.

We learn that the brothers each had brought to God offerings. Cain was first – Abel followed. God rejected Cain’s gift and received Abel’s joyfully. Cain felt humiliated and shunned by the God he yearned to serve.

Why did God reject Cain’s gift? We don’t know. God, however, seemed surprised by Cain’s strong reaction and asked: “Why are you so upset? Why has your face fallen? Is it not thus: If you intend good, bear-it-aloft, but if you do not intend good, at the entrance is sin, a crouching-demon, toward you his lust–but you can rule over him.” (vs 6-7) [An enigmatic ancient poetic passage – see below]

A shame! Instead of sympathy God gave Cain a lecture. Yet, we can’t really blame Cain for his distress. He felt rejected and utterly alone. Even Cain’s parents were missing from the scene, so he struck out against the one closest to him – the only one there – his brother Abel.

Cain and Abel had spoken or argued, but we’re not told about what. The rabbis offer several explanations.

One said that the brothers had agreed to divide the world. Cain took all the land and Abel took everything that moved: but then they fought out of greed for more.

Cain said: “The land upon which you stand is mine. Get off – you may fly if you like, for I don’t own the air. But the land is mine and not for your use.”

Abel shot back: “The clothes you wear are made from the wool of my flock. Strip down. Walk naked. You’ve no right to the product of my sheep.”

A second sage said that each brother owned both land and movable property and that they fought about on whose land the Temple in Jerusalem would be built.

“The Temple should be built on my land,” said one.

“No. It must be built on mine,” said the other.

Their battle thus became a religious war each claiming that God was on his side.

A third rabbi said that Abel had a twin sister, a magnificently beautiful and alluring woman, and since there was no other woman on earth, each wanted her.

Cain argued: “I must have her because I am the first born.”

Abel too felt entitled: “She’s mine because she was born with me. Together we must stay.”

The rabbis regard Cain and Abel as symbols. Each explanation is an argument for what drives people to hate and kill each other; materialism, religious fanaticism, and sexual obsession.

“Cain rose up against Abel and slew him.” (v 8)

The Midrash claimed that Abel was the physically stronger man, and as he was about to kill Cain, Cain pleaded for his life: “We are the only two in the world. What will you tell our parents if you kill me?”

From fear or perhaps pity, Abel lowered his weapon, and at that moment Cain murdered him.

After the deed (as if God didn’t know), the Almighty asked: “Where is Abel your brother?”

Cain was cold and disengaged: “I know not; am I my brother’s keeper?” (v 9)

God expected moral accountability, but as he had turned on his brother, so too did Cain turn on God:

“You hold watch over all creatures, and yet You demand an accounting of me! True, I killed him, but You created the evil inclination within me. It’s Your fault! Why did You permit me to slay him? You slew him yourself, for had You looked favorably on my offering, I wouldn’t have had reason to envy and kill him.”

God emphasized to Cain the heinous significance of his murderous act, but Cain didn’t understand.

God said: “The voice of your brother’s blood(s) cry to Me from the ground.” (v 10)

The Hebrew for blood (dam) is written in the plural (damim) meaning that killing one human being is equivalent to the murder of every generation to come, of an entire world, genocide. And given that Cain killed his brother, murder is also fratricide.

As tragic as this tale is, the ending is abruptly positive. Adam and Eve chose life again and bore their third son, Seth, in the place of Abel. We are considered Seth’s descendants (v 25) and neither carry the legacy of victim or aggressor. That is for each of us to decide.

Note: The above is a creative compilation of the Biblical text and rabbinic commentary. The translation of the poem – vs 6-7 – is borrowed from Everett Fox’s translation of The Five Books of Moses – The Schocken Bible: Volume I.

“Theater of the absurd!” Another UNESCO assault on history and decency

26 Wednesday Oct 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish-Islamic Relations

≈ 1 Comment

The article below from The Times of Israel published today tells a story that every Jew should read and know.

The international organization that is designed to be a strong advocate for education, science and culture (UNESCO) around the world instead has succumbed to political pressure from anti-Israel and anti-Semitic forces that have made a virtue of ignorance, denial and cultural myopia.

This Times of Israel piece reports on a new resolution passed by UNESCO that yet again ignores the historic Jewish and Christian connections to the Temple Mount (known to Jews for 2000 years as Har Ha-Bayit) on which the ancient Jerusalem Temples once stood.

Prime Minister Netanyahu rightly observed that UNESCO is presiding over a “theater of the absurd!”

Despite this denial of history and of the Jewish people’s origins, I believe it is important that Israel and the United States stay engaged with UNESCO so as to act as an obstacle in the way of further efforts to delegitimize Jewish claims to the land of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people.

Some have argued that American refusal to pay dues to UNESCO since 2011 for similar aberrations of its raison d’etre as an international organization have enabled UNESCO to be unduly influenced by anti-Israel and anti-Semitic elements in the organization.

See –

http://www.timesofisrael.com/unesco-adopts-another-resolution-erasing-jewish-link-to-temple-mount/?utm_source=The+Times+of+Israel+Daily+Edition&utm_campaign=69fccd2321-2016_10_26&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_adb46cec92-69fccd2321-54740573

Is there really nothing new under the sun?

21 Friday Oct 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Holidays, Jewish Identity, Poetry

≈ 4 Comments

“Havel havalim amar Kohelet; havel havalim hakol havel – Utter futility! Said Kohelet – Utter futility! All is futile! What real value is there in all the gains a person makes beneath the sun? One generation goes, another comes, but the earth remains the same forever…only that shall happen which has happened, only that occur which has occurred; Ein chadash tachat hashamesh – there is nothing new beneath the sun!”
Ecclesiastes 1:2-9

Depressing, realistic, cynical – or all three?

In the mid-1990s, I taught a year-long weekly seminar at my synagogue on the book of Ecclesiastes and its rabbinic commentary in Kohelet Rabbah. I began with thirty-five students. After a year, five remained.

I was assured by a number of the students that the drop in enrollment wasn’t because I was a bad teacher, though I wondered.

The following year, I taught another year-long seminar on the thought and writings of Rabbi Abraham Heschel. We began with about fifty students and retained most everyone.

I confess that I was relieved and thank Heschel for saving me!

What was the difference between the two classes? Those who delved into the thought of Ecclesiastes wanted to kill themselves whereas Heschel inspired them! Ecclesiastes depressed the “Kohelet drop-outs” because they didn’t want to spend their Sundays engaged with cynicism/realism (depending how you read the book). They voted down Ecclesiastes with their feet. I have always, by the way, found the book fascinating – but that’s me!

The scroll of Ecclesiastes is the text, nevertheless, from the collection of Writings that we read every year during the festival of Sukkot. Given it’s depressing themes, why would we do that? Sukkot, after all, is called “Z’man sim’cha-tei-nu – a time of our joy.” We greet one another with these words during the holiday: “Moadim l’simchah – May you be joyful during this time.”

Some scholars suggest that Ecclesiastes was an argument against the ancient Greek pagan world when bacchanalian orgies and wild celebrations were taking place. The rabbis thought that reading Ecclesiastes would kick the Jew in the gut and slap his face, recalling Cher slapping the love-sick John Cusack in “Moonstruck” and shouting – “Snap out of it!”

The theme of the changing seasons, as described in the first chapter of the scroll, may be the real reason this text was matched with Sukkot, though Ecclesiastes is a philosophical oddity and counter to the rabbinic worldview. Its philosophy is Greek, not Jewish – though the Rabbinic Midrash attempts valiantly to spin the book as a reflection of rabbinic theology. One can imagine Kohelet taking the Aristotelian and modern scientific view that nothing has ever been created or destroyed, that God as Creator is a necessary truth for the masses of Jews who need not only to believe in a commanding God but also recognize that there must be a higher moral authority when ordering Jewish society, thus giving ultimate meaning to our lives.

The question is – was Ecclesiastes right when he proclaimed – “There is nothing new under the sun!” Did he mean to say that this is the world as it’s always been and ever will be and that nothing we think, feel and create as human beings is ever new?

The 1996 Nobel Prize acceptance speech for literature by the Polish writer Wislawa Szymborska is eloquent. She insisted that, yes, there is something new under the sun – each and every day. She addressed Kohelet directly in these words:

“I sometimes dream of situations that can’t possibly come true. I audaciously imagine, for example, that I get a chance to chat with Ecclesiastes, the author of that moving lament on the vanity of all human endeavors. I bow very deeply before him, because he is one of the greatest poets, for me at least. Then I grab his hand. ‘There’s nothing new under the sun’ That’s what you wrote, Ecclesiastes. But you yourself were born new under the sun. And the poem you created is also new under the sun, since no one wrote it down before you. And all your readers are also new under the sun, since those who lived before you couldn’t read your poem. And that cypress under which you’re sitting hasn’t been growing since the dawn of time. It came into being by the way of another cypress similar to yours, but not exactly the same. And Ecclesiastes, I’d also like to ask you what new thing under the sun you’re planning to work on now? A further supplement to thoughts you’ve already expressed? Or maybe you’re tempted to contradict some of them now? In your earlier work you mentioned joy – so what if it’s fleeting? So maybe your new-under-the-sun poem will be about joy? Have you taken notes yet, do you have drafts? I doubt that you’ll say, ‘I’ve written everything down, I’ve got nothing left to add.’ There’s no poet in the world who can say this, least of all a great poet like yourself.”

The Kotzker Rebbe was once asked if he had the power to revive the dead. He answered: “Reviving the dead isn’t the problem; reviving the living is far more difficult!”

Certainly, nature has set its course; but the human being is a thinking, creating and transcendent being, and we do indeed, I believe, have the capacity to create ourselves anew in every moment and thus improve ourselves (tikkun hanefesh) and the world (tikkun olam).

This series of Holidays from the beginning of Elul through the High Holidays, Sukkot and Simchat Torah is our season for the Jewish people to celebrate spiritual rebirth and renewal. Our world view is a challenge to Kohelet. Yes, there is something new under the sun! Everything!

Moadim l’simchah and Shabbat Shalom.

Reflections on Hate and the Trump for President Campaign

16 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Politics and Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Poetry, Quote of the Day

≈ 3 Comments

When Donald Trump turned on Hillary Clinton in the 2nd Presidential Debate and said “You have hate in your heart” his obvious projection revealed what is in Trump’s own heart. Not only is he consumed with himself, as classical narcissists are, but anyone who isn’t fawning all over him and those who criticize him, as far as he is concerned, are sorely deficient, bad, sad, a disaster, and worthy of being pummeled, slandered, and attacked mercilessly – the sign of a true playground bully.

I have considered the corrosive nature of hatred, and having just emerged from Yom Kippur when the Jewish people strives to self-critique, improve our lives and exorcise negativity and destructive impulses from our hearts, minds, and souls, I searched my book of quotations on the theme of hate, and I offer these pearls of wisdom.

I begin with a famous statement of German Pastor Martin Niemoller who criticized Hitler in the 1930s and suffered seven years in a concentration camp as a result:

“First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”
– Pastor Martin Niemoller, German Protestant thinker, teacher and activist

“Thou shalt not hate another in one’s heart!”
–Leviticus 19:18

“I feel fairly certain that my hatred harms me more than the people whom I hate.”
-Max Frisch, Swiss architect, playwright, and novelist

“One of the reasons people cling to their hate so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”
–James Baldwin, American novelist, writer

“If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is part of yourself. What isn’t part of ourselves doesn’t disturb us.”
–Hermann Hesse, German poet, novelist, painter

“Hatred like love feeds on the merest trifles. Everything adds to it. Just as the being we love can do no wrong, so the one we hate can do no right.”
–Honoré de Balzac, French novelist, playwright

“Never let yourself hate any person. It is the most devastating weapon of one’s enemies.”
-Katherine Hepburn’s father

“Love, friendship, respect, do not unite people as much as a common hatred for something.”
-Anton Chekhov, Russian short-story writer and dramatist

“I have decided to stick to love…Hate is too great a burden to bear.”
– The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.

“It is human nature to hate the person whom you have hurt.”
-Publius Cornelius Tacitus, Roman Senator and historian (c.55-c.120)

“In time we hate that which we often fear.”
-William Shakespeare

“People hate those to whom they have to lie.”
-Victor Hugo, French poet, novelist, and dramatist

“There is a revisionist theory, one of those depth-psychology distortions or half-truths that crop up like toadstools whenever the emotions get infected by the mind that says we hate worst those who have done the most for us. According to this belittling and demeaning theory, gratitude is a festering sore.”
-Wallace Stegner, American novelist and writer

“If you understand each other you will be kind to each other. Knowing a person well never leads to hate and almost always leads to love.”
-John Steinbeck, American novelist

“Hate, it has caused a lot of problems in the world, but has not solved one yet.”
-Maya Angelou, American poet

“Hatred is the coward’s revenge for being intimidated.”
-George Bernard Shaw, Irish playwright, critic and polemicist

“Never waste a minute thinking about people you don’t like.”
-President Dwight D. Eisenhower

“I can forgive the whites in America for hating the blacks; I cannot forgive them, however, for making the blacks believe that they are worthy of being hated.”
-James Baldwin, American writer

“Now hatred is by far the longest pleasure;
People love in haste, but they detest at leisure.”
–Lord Byron, British poet

“I used to think that people who regarded everyone benignly were a mite simple or oblivious or just plain lax — until I tried it myself. Then I realized that they made it only look easy. Even the Berditchever Rebbe, revered as a man who could strike a rock and bring forth a stream, was continually honing his intentions. ‘Until I remove the thread of hatred from my heart,’ he said of his daily meditations, ‘I am, in my own eyes, as if I did not exist.’”
-Marc Barasch, American author, editor, and activist

“I shall allow no man to belittle my soul by making me hate him.”
-Booker T. Washington, African-American educator, author, orator

“There is no fire like passion, there is no shark like hatred, there is no snare like folly, there is no torrent like greed.”
-Gautama Buddha

“No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to their human heart than its opposite.”
-Nelson Mandela, South African President

High Holiday Sermons 2016-5777 – Read and/or Watch

14 Friday Oct 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Holidays, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish Identity, Social Justice, Women's Rights

≈ Leave a comment

For those interested, Temple Israel has posted my sermons (below) on our Temple website (written texts and UTube) as well as those of my colleagues, Rabbi Michelle Missaghieh and Rabbi Jocee Hudson.

Hag Sukkot Sameach!

see http://www.tioh.org/worship/rabbis/clergystudy

Rabbi John Rosove’s High Holyday Sermons:

Celebrating Bob Dylan

13 Thursday Oct 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Politics and Life, Art, Poetry

≈ 2 Comments

Upon awakening this morning following a full, demanding, elevating, affirming, and purifying Yom Kippur, I learned of the Nobel Prize for Literature being awarded this year to Bob (Zimmerman) Dylan, and I couldn’t be more thrilled.

It is said that the music of one’s youth and teen years remains a person’s favorite and default music for the rest of their lives, even if we evolve our tastes. For me, I grew up in the early to late ’60s loving Bob Dylan. His music was at once personal to me and it was the voice of my generation in the midst of a cultural revolution in America.

I was told by a dear friend after delivering my high holiday sermons this year that I could not have spoken the way I did had I not grown up in the 1960s. Though I think my messages transcend my generation, in a way my friend is right. I have a certain orientation in the world reflecting values and politics that were forged in the 1960s after the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, the civil rights movement, and Vietnam War.

Those were painful and confusing times for Americans and for me and my generation in particular (I was born in the closing weeks of 1949). I’ve carried those ’60s memories into my liberal politics today.

I am not a scholar of poetry, but Dylan’s verse has always moved me. I walk in my neighborhood 3 to 4 times a week listening to my favorite podcasts. When I tire of the spoken word, I shift to the music I’ve downloaded, and prominent there is Dylan. His poetry, syntax, melody, and voice lift me, offer me insight and provoke my thinking as only a great poet can do.

I regret that Dylan left Judaism for Christianity, as the press has reported, but I recognize that as an artist, he is forever seeking and breaking from convention. I’m thrilled for the honor he has received.

Mazal tov Bob! Keep the music and poetry coming!

Sign Petition to Israeli Government to Build Egalitarian Prayer Space at Kotel in Jerusalem

07 Friday Oct 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Social Justice, Women's Rights

≈ 5 Comments

Shalom,

Allow us at the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA) to wish you a Shanah Tovah and a Chatima Tovah.

As many of you may be aware yesterday, Thursday, October 6, 2016, the Israel Movement for Progressive Reform Judaism, the Conservative Movement, Women of the Wall and other organizations filed a petition to the Israeli Supreme Court, following orders by Supreme Court justices from September 2016, as part of the petition against the Kotel Heritage Foundation. This petition was an amended version of the original petition appealing to the court to enforce the decision that already passed the Government to create an egalitarian prayer space in the South Kotel Plaza in Jerusalem this past January. Keep in mind, this agreement already passed and we’re just insisting that it be implemented.

“This petition is the most painful note we have had to place between the ancient stones of the Kotel until now,” explained Anat Hoffman, Executive Director of the Israel Religious Action Center and the Chair of Women of the Wall.

While the petition is making its impact in the courts, we want the powers that be in the Israeli government to hear from as many members of the Diaspora Jewish community as possible. That is why we are asking everyone for a simple and low-effort action: to send an email through this site: http://www.urj.org/join-campaign.

We have reason to believe that the more voices are heard, the greater the impact it will make upon the Prime Minister to fulfill the agreement that has already been made.

We appreciate your help and effort in doing all that we can to bring about progressive democratic and pluralist change to the State of Israel on a matter that affects all of world Jewry.

גמר חתימה טובה ושבת שלום,

Rabbi Joshua Weinberg – President of the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA)

Rabbi John Rosove – National Chair of of the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA)

10 Days-10 of Life’s Biggest Questions Answered by You

29 Thursday Sep 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

For the past several years I have participated in a project of “Reboot” in which on each of the days from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur I received a question in my email. I answered the questions each day, and the following year was sent my answers. I could see where I was, where I wished to go, and where I am now as the New Year begins.

I recommend this to everyone who wants to utilize the High Holidays for introspection and reflection.

Here is Reboot’s description of 10Q:

Answer one question per day in your own secret online 10Q space. Make your answers serious. Silly. Salacious. However you like. It’s your 10Q. When you’re finished, hit the magic button and your answers get sent to the secure online 10Q vault for safekeeping. One year later, the vault will open and your answers will land back in your email inbox for private reflection. Want to keep them secret? Perfect. Want to share them, either anonymously or with attribution, with the wider 10Q community? You can do that too.

Next year the whole process begins again. And the year after that, and the year after that. Do you 10Q? You should.

10Q begins October 2nd, 2016

10Q: Reflect. React. Renew.
Life’s Biggest Questions. Answered By You.

Get started by clicking onto this site – http://www.doyou10q.com/

ARZA mourns the loss of Shimon Peres

28 Wednesday Sep 2016

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Tributes

≈ 1 Comment

The following press release appeared this morning from the Association of Reform Zionists of America, the Zionist arm of the Reform movement comprising 1.5 million Jews. As the national chair of the ARZA Board, I share this with sadness over the passing of Shimon Peres, but also with the hope that his vision of a two states for two peoples peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will come about soon.

The Association of Reform Zionists of America joins the people of Israel and people of good faith around the world in mourning Shimon Peres, former Prime Minister and President of the State of Israel. President Peres suffered a debilitating stroke on September 13, the 23rd anniversary of the day when he signed the Oslo Peace Accords on the White House lawn alongside Yitzhak Rabin z”l and Yasser Arafat.

Shimon Peres was one of the last remaining leaders of the founding generation of the State of Israel. First elected in 1959, he served as a Member of Knesset for a nearly unbroken streak of 48 years before being elected President in June 2007.

As a political leader, he placed the good-being of Israel, the unity of the Jewish people, and hopeful prospects for future peace as his guiding lights. He was a committed disciple of David Ben-Gurion, of whom Peres said, “I knew him well, and I am bound to say that not only did I see him as the greatest Jew of our generation, but my admiration for him continued to grow throughout the years of our acquaintance.” Under Ben Gurion’s tutelage, Peres ascended the ranks of Mapai, a precursor to today’s Labor Party.

His political views evolved over the years. Early in his career, Peres was perceived as a military hawk. A protégée of Ben-Gurion and Moshe Dayan, and an alumnus of the Haganah, he developed crucial strategic alliances for Israel throughout the 1950s and 1960s. He served as the Deputy Defense Minister in 1965 and held various other ministerial posts throughout the 1960s and 1970s. In 1974 he became the Minister of Defense in Prime Minister Rabin’s government.

Peres’s and Rabin’s destinies were often linked together, and each was often perceived as the other’s nemesis. He succeeded Rabin as party leader in 1977, and when Likud won the subsequent election, Peres became the opposition leader.

Eventually, he developed into a political dove and one of the most eloquent proponents of peace with the Palestinians and the Arab world. In the 1980s, he served a rotating shift as Prime Minister with Yitzhak Shamir in the Labor-Likud unity government. By the 1990s, he was forcefully articulating his vision of peace in what he called “The New Middle East.”

In President Peres’s vision, economic development and partnerships were the keys to transcending longstanding territorial grievances between Jews and Arabs. With his disciple Yossi Beilin, he was one of the key architects of secret peace negotiations with the Palestinians, which culminated with the Oslo Accords in 1993. As Rabin’s Foreign Minister, he often urged the ambivalent Prime Minister to take risks for peace. On September 13, 1993, Rabin, Peres, and Arafat signed the accords at a White House ceremony with President Clinton. The three of them received the Nobel Prize for Peace for their willingness to embrace Peres’s vision of a New Middle East.

On that historic day, Shimon Peres said:

We live in an ancient land, and as our land is small, so must our reconciliation be great. As our wars have been long, so must our healing be swift… I want to tell the Palestinian delegation that we are sincere, that we mean business. We do not seek to shape your lives or determine your destiny. Let all of us turn from bullets to ballots, from guns to shovels… We shall offer you our help in making Gaza prosper and Jericho blossom again.

Tragically, we know that peace did not blossom in the 1990s. Violence and terrorism erupted as the peace process staggered. In November 1995, Yitzhak Rabin was killed by a Jewish assassin at a Tel Aviv peace rally, and Peres once more stepped in as Israel’s Prime Minister.

In subsequent years, he vigorously led those who would continue to envision peace, even during brutal days of terror. He founded and led the Peres Center for Peace, which works to build the infrastructures of peaceful coexistence between Jews and Arabs. When he retired from the presidency of Israel in 2014, he was the world’s oldest head of state.

Shimon Peres was an intimate and committed friend of the Reform Jewish movement. Throughout his life, he was an outspoken advocate for Klal Yisrael, the unity of the Jewish people. He was an ally who supported of the Israel Movement for Progressive and Reform Judaism, the Union for Reform Judaism here in North America, and Reform Jews around the globe.

In 2007, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion awarded him the Dr. Bernard Heller Prize for his lifelong leadership and pursuit of a peaceful future for the Middle East. At that time he said, “What I appreciate in Reform Judaism is its accommodation of the best of higher Jewish values with the modern world.”

That description could apply to Shimon Peres himself. Jewish history and destiny were in his DNA. Born into a secular family in Wisniew, Poland in 1923, he was tutored in Talmud by his grandfather, a scion of Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin. He developed a passionate love of Israel and Yiddishkeit. His family made aliyah in 1934 when Shimon was 11 years old; all his family members who did not leave Poland for Palestine were murdered in the Shoah. Once, when President Clinton asked him how Jews were able to survive over 2,000 years of exile and oppression, he replied, “Our Sabbath saved us.”

With the loss of Shimon Peres, the extraordinary generation of Israel’s founding leaders leaves the world stage. We join with our people and people of good faith around the world in sharing our condolences to his family and all of Israel.

And in our grieving, we pray for leaders everywhere who will inherit his mantle and have the courage to envision a new “New Middle East” for us all.

Zichrono Livracha – May his memory be a blessing.