November 2, 2022

Today, we affirm Israel’s robust democracy, reflected in the more than 71% turnout for the fifth election in four years. We love Israel and are committed to the vision of Israel as a democratic, pluralistic Jewish state.   

Benjamin Netanyahu is likely to become prime minister, and we congratulate him on his unprecedented sixth term. Additionally, we commend current prime minister Yair Lapid for announcing that, should Netanyahu prevail, there will be a peaceful, democratic transition.    

As Netanyahu assembles his coalition, we are profoundly concerned about promises of cabinet positions he has made to Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir, the leaders of the ultra-nationalist Religious Zionism party. Their platforms and past actions indicate that they would curtail the authority of Israel’s Supreme Court and inhibit the rights of Israeli Arabs, Palestinians, members of the LGBTQ+ community and large segments of Jews who are non-Orthodox. Including Ben Gvir and Smotrich in the government will likely jeopardize Israel’s democracy and will force the country to reckon with its place on the world stage. It will almost certainly lead to challenging moments in U.S.-Israel relations and will be painful for Jews worldwide who will not see the Israel they love and believe in reflected in these leaders, nor in the policies they pursue.  

Our commitment to Zionism is unwavering and we take some comfort knowing that our partner and colleague, Reform Rabbi Gilad Kariv, will remain a strong voice for democracy and pluralism as a member of the Knesset. We look forward to working closely with those across the political spectrum who share a commitment to the fundamental ideals enshrined in the Israeli Declaration of Independence. Together with the Israeli Reform Movement, we will navigate the coming period with fortitude, rooted in our belief in Israel’s future as a peaceful, democratic homeland for the Jewish people, no matter how they choose to worship or believe, and a place in which all its citizens—Jewish and Arab alike —are respected and can thrive.   

Union for Reform Judaism
Jennifer Brodkey Kaufman (she/her), Chair
Rabbi Rick Jacobs (he/him), President

Central Conference of American Rabbis
Rabbi Lewis Kamrass (he/him), President
Rabbi Hara E. Person (she/her), Chief Executive

American Conference of Cantors
Cantor Seth Warner (he/him), President
Rachel Roth (she/her), Chief Operating Officer

Haaretz, November 2, 2022   

[Note: From time to time I post Rabbi Yoffie’s columns in Haaretz. He is an astute observer and commentator on all things Jewish and Israel, and his column today is no exception. Forward this blog to those who are concerned about the impact of the Israeli election on Israel and the American-Israel relationship.]

                       
“If Netanyahu welcomes the poisonous, Arab-hating far right into government, led by a Trump-like provocateur, it will be a catastrophe for Israel’s standing in America: In Congress, on campus and among American Jews.
                       
American Jews are in mourning.

While we don’t know for certain what the new Israeli government will look like, based on what we do know, the winners are Itamar Ben-Gvir and the far-right Kahanism that he represents.

Since it was the lunatic fringe of American Jewry that gave birth to this ideology, we know what Kahanism is. And we also know that Israel will pay a heavy price in its international standing for Ben-Gvir’s victory – especially in the United States.

Americans are already viewing Ben-Gvir as a Trump-like figure, who has done to the Israeli right what Donald Trump did to the Republican Party. Both are radical, belligerent nationalists, who travelled in a few short years from the outer reaches of the political system to its very center. Both give legitimacy to racist and extremist views, poisoning political discourse in a heretofore unimaginable way.

Both are cynical showmen, provocateurs and inciters who tolerate violence, that is, when they don’t outwardly encourage it. Both speak the language, sometimes coded and sometimes clear, of authoritarianism and quasi-fascism.

Thanks to Ben-Gvir, Arab-hating Israelis are much freer to express their views in Israel today than they once were, just as thanks to Trump, minority-hating Americans are much freer to express their views in America.

Ben-Gvir, of course, may welcome the comparison with Trump, which he undoubtedly takes as a compliment. But he, like Benjamin Netanyahu, misunderstands America and is misreading its politics.

Make no mistake: This is a vulnerable time for Israel. Ben-Gvir’s emergence as a significant political player in Israel will undermine the country’s public standing in America, strengthen Israel’s enemies and offend its friends.

The danger can perhaps be contained, but only if Ben-Gvir, along with Bezalel Smotrich, his extremist partner in the Religious Zionism party, remain outside of an Israeli government and coalition. After all, if approximately 10 percent of Israeli voters support a far-right extremist party, it is troubling, but no more than that. But if that party enters the government and its leaders serve as ministers who speak for the Jewish state and the Jewish people, it is a catastrophe.

Right-wing Israeli politicians love to pontificate about anti-Israel and pro-BDS activity on campus, seeing it as a left-wing effort. But the American Jewish community has fought against this; only a small number of pro-BDS student resolutions have passed, and not a single major university has voted to boycott or divest from Israel.

Yet the minute a narrow, right-wing government takes office in Israel, with Ben-Gvir and Smotrich sitting as senior ministers, the campus Israel haters will be dancing in the streets. They will organize demonstrations and renew the BDS campaign, and flyers with Ben-Gvir’s picture and past statements will be distributed on every elite campus in America. Those of us who have made the case for decades that Israel is not an apartheid state will find ourselves contending with quotes from two members of Israel’s cabinet that sound quite a bit like support for apartheid.

And those who say that apartheid-supporters sit at the highest levels of Israel’s government will be right, and we will have no compelling response.

Even worse is what may develop in Congress. According to recent polls, approximately one-third of the Americans who identify as Democrats support boycotting Israel. In the current Congress, though, backing for Israel is overwhelming; only a handful of members in the House and Senate have expressed encouragement for boycotting or cutting aid to the Jewish state. Congress Democrats, in other words, have stood up to the critical attitudes of their own constituents to maintain aid to Israel.

But what will happen when racists and extremists sit in the Israeli government? Keep in mind that for a decade, Benjamin Netanyahu has carried out an absurd vendetta against the Democratic Party, the most recent chapter of which is his newly-released autobiography. It is filled with vicious and utterly gratuitous attacks against Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, the latter of whom is the party’s most popular living leader.

The shift may not be immediate, but Israel cannot count on long-term Democratic support if its government is led by a prime minister hostile to the party and its ministers espouse positions that virtually all Democrats rightly find abhorrent.

If Netanyahu is counting on Donald Trump and a Republican victory in the midterms to solve his Ben-Gvir problem, he is misreading realities here as well. The Democrats will control the White House and American foreign policy for the next two years, no matter what happens in the midterms. And the Republican Party cannot be counted on for anything – even support for Israel.

It is true that the Trump administration delivered the Abraham Accords, and for this Trump deserves credit. There remains a core of pro-Israel support in the party that should be appreciated and acknowledged. But it is also true that the party is shifting beneath Trump’s feet.

Part sociopath and part id-driven clown, Trump knows nothing and believes in nothing. After spending his entire adult life in New York City without connecting to Israel in any way, he embraced Israel as president when it was convenient to do so and will abandon it the minute that the party or the MAGA base challenges him.

That is exactly what is happening now, as we see from the challengers to Trump who are beginning to emerge. While the former president is still essential for energizing the base, it is a base that he no longer controls.

As historian Nicole Hemmer has suggested in her brilliant book “Partisans,” the Republican Party is moving in the direction of populist nationalism, nativism, authoritarianism, and ethnic and class resentment. Despite the increasingly erratic pro-Israel bluster of Trump, the party is returning to its isolationist roots and to the “America First” themes that originated with Nazi sympathizers in the 1930s.

The Republicans today are the party of Tucker Carlson, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and the Proud Boys. It has resurrected Pat Buchanan’s strain of populist nationalism, and it has allowed his antisemitism to gain a strong foothold in its ranks.

Some elements of the party, of course, are fighting back, resisting white supremacy and supporting a robust foreign policy and real commitment to Israel. Such people still exist in the Republican ranks. But these elements, the sane and sensible ones, are just as appalled as the Democrats by the crude racism of Ben-Gvir and company.

They know, just as the Democrats know, that if Israel is to maintain American support in these dangerous and uncertain times, it must do so in the traditional way: as a fully democratic, proudly Jewish state – tied to Democrats and Republicans alike, committed to human rights and to the values that bind the countries and the peoples of America and Israel.

And they know that this can never happen if semi-fascists like Ben-Gvir and his crew sit in Israel’s cabinet and make the decisions that determine Israel’s fate. Netanyahu, are you listening?”

Note: This weekend, the twice-impeached disgraced former President Donald Trump put a target on the backs of American Jews. Twitter lit up with condemnation of Trump and his blatant antisemitic dog whistling. In response to Trump’s post, Senior Contributing Editor of The Forward, Rob Eshman, wrote yesterday (October 16, 2022) the following:

“Posting that Jews need to ‘get their act together’ paints a target on our backs

In two separate recent incidents, audience members have tried to shout down Jewish comedians mid-act.

In Omaha, a heckler yelled “Free Palestine!” during stand-up comedian Sam Morril’s set.

And in Point Pleasant Beach, New Jersey, comedian Ariel Elias faced a pro-Trump heckler who demanded to know who she voted for.

And then this morning, former President Donald Trump heckled all American Jews.

Jews in the United States must “get their act together,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, “before it’s too late!” He wrote that Evangelical Christians are “far more appreciative” of Israel and what Trump “has done for Israel” than “people of the Jewish faith.”

There are two problems with what Trump posted. One, it’s false. And two, it poses a threat to Jewish lives.

American Jews are overwhelmingly supportive of Israel. Eight in 10 American Jews say Israel is an essential or important part of what being Jewish means to them, according to a 2020 Pew Research Center survey. Just under half of American Jews have visited Israel, too. American Jews may oppose specific Israeli government policies, but only 15% say Israel is not important to their Jewish identity.

In his post, Trump wrote, “no president has done more for Israel” than he has. While the Trump administration recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and brokered the Abraham Accords among Israel and several Arab countries (with which it already had economic and other ties), historians have pointed out that other presidents have done more: President Harry Truman first recognized the Jewish state. President Jimmy Carter brokered a lasting peace between Israel and Egypt, at the time Israel’s biggest enemy. And President Barack Obama gave more money and arms to Israel than any president ever had.

Trump’s post ignored these facts and instead singled out American Jews as ingrates. He added a veiled threat, too, proclaiming that American Jews need to change “before it’s too late!”

Trump’s Jewish supporters tend to either agree with his messages or dismiss them as a harmless example of Trump being Trump — the guy in the back of the comedy club with the loudest mouth.

“I can just tell by your jokes you voted for Biden,” the heckler in New Jersey shouted at Elias. She wryly responded, “I can tell by the fact that you’re still talking when nobody wants you to that you voted for Trump.”

When a former president with millions of followers heckles American Jews, it’s not even remotely funny. A 2020 study of online antisemitism found that instances of hate spiked after the 2016 presidential election, when the Trump campaign pushed similar slurs against American Jewish loyalties, and after the “Unite the Right” march in Charlottesville.

“We find the frequency of antisemitic content greatly increases (in some cases more than doubling) after major political events,” the researchers wrote.

In other words, Trump speaks, the memes follow, and antisemitic acts increase.

Whether Trump himself is antisemitic or not is beside the point. One thing we know about antisemitism is it increases during times of economic downtown and political uncertainty, which pretty much sums up the last few years.

“When the society suffers, it needs someone to blame, someone upon whom to avenge itself for its disappointments; and those persons whom opinion already disfavors are naturally singled out for this role,” write the authors of a 2020 study on conspiracy theories and Jew-hatred.

By singling out American Jews because they don’t support him or a particular Israeli government, Trump painted a crude target on our backs.

“Culpability is a tricky thing,” wrote the journalist Julia Ioffe following the 2018 antisemitic massacre at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, “and politicians, especially of the demagogic variety, know this very well. Unless they go as far as organized, documented, state-implemented slaughter, they don’t give specific directions. They don’t have to. They simply set the tone.”

The tone is increasingly nasty — just check out the hecklers attacking Jewish comics. If only they would all just sit down and be quiet.”

Each year, for more years than I can recall, I offered a blessing to our oldest congregant at Temple Israel of Hollywood, Pearl Berg. Pearl is the oldest human being I have ever known. I met her 34 years ago when she was a spry 79 years old.

There are perhaps 1000 people in the world who reach 110 years of age.

Pearl is still sharp, though “slowing down a bit,” according to her son Bob Berg of Washington, D.C.. Either Bob (age 82) or his older brother, Dr. Allan Berg of Philadelphia (age 85), come to visit their mother regularly.

Pearl is a marvel not only because of her age, but because she remains a positive clear-thinking kind woman whose wit and sense of humor is a constant, who welcomes graciously all visitors, who reads every day,  and plays gin rummy remembering the cards her opponent picks up – most of the time.

My connection with Pearl and her family precedes my own birth. Pearl’s husband Mark (z’l) employed my mother in the early 1940s as an office worker in his Los Angeles scrap metal business when she was 25 years old. When Mark died 33 years ago and I prepared my eulogy, my mother told me that Mark was the kindest of bosses. When she departed from his business to volunteer at an army base in San Luis Obispo during World War II, Mark gave her a going-away office party. She never forgot it. My mother died 7 years ago at age of 98, and I thought that she was old – a youngster compared with Pearl.

Happy Birthday Pearl! We look forward to celebrating your 114^th birthday next October 1.

See article published in the LA Jewish Journal, “113 year-old Pearl Berg may be the oldest Jew in the world” – https://jewishjournal.com/cover_story/352205/cover-story-113-year-old-pearl-berg-may-be-the-oldest-jew-in-the-world/

Pearl is listed below as the 12th oldest American, but adjusted to her real birthday of October 1, 1909 (according to birth records), she is the 8th oldest person in the United States and the 2nd oldest in California. Pearl is likely the oldest Jewish person in the United States and possibly the world!

https://gerontology.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_oldest_living_people_in_the_United_States

The oldest Israeli on record was Yisrael Krystal, who died on August 11, 2017 at the age of 113 years, 330 days. Pearl is second only to Mr. Krystal (z’l).

The following statement articulates the raison d’etre of a courageous group of Israeli veteran soldiers who are part of a growing movement in Israel called “Breaking the Silence.” Few in American Jewish life know about them. I have hesitated to write about them until now because I fear that anti-Israel voices outside the Jewish state will use what I say to vilify Israel. That is not my intent. I love Israel. However, love ought not to blind us to the truth of what is happening in East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza Strip under the Israeli military administration.

“Soldiers who serve in the territories witness and participate in military actions that change them immensely. Cases of abuse toward Palestinians, looting and destruction of property have been the norm for years, but these incidents are still described officially as ‘extreme’ and ‘unique’ cases. Our testimonies portray a different – and much grimmer – picture, in which the deterioration of moral standards finds expression in the character of the military orders and rules of engagement that the state considers justified in the name of Israel’s security. While this reality is well-known to Israeli soldiers and commanders, Israeli society in general continues to turn a blind eye and deny what is being done in its name. Discharged soldiers returning to civilian life discover the gap between the reality they encountered in the territories, and the silence about this reality they find at home. In order to resume civilian life, soldiers have to ignore what they have seen and done. We strive to make heard the voices of these soldiers, pushing Israeli society to face the reality it has created.”

“Breaking the Silence” claims as members more than 1300 former Israeli soldiers who represent all strata of Israeli society and cover nearly all units that have operated in the occupied Palestinian territories. These soldiers confess now that they were participants in committing unnecessary violence against Palestinian civilians and humiliating Palestinians during their terms of service in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

“Breaking the Silence” was created in 2004 at the tail end of the Second Intifada (2000-2005) in order to give serving and discharged Israeli personnel and reservists a means to confidentially recount their experiences. For more details, see the movement’s website at https://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/ . There it is written:

“All the testimonies we publish are meticulously researched, and all facts are cross-checked with additional eyewitnesses and/or the archives of other human rights organizations that are active in the field. Every soldier who gives a testimony to Breaking the Silence is well-aware of the aims of the organization and the interview. Most soldiers choose to remain anonymous, due to various pressures from military officials and society at large. Our first priority is to safeguard the soldiers who choose to testify to the public about their military service.”

These soldiers decided to speak out with the hope that their voices will describe the harsh facts of the occupation and thereby help to bring an end to 55+-years of Israeli military control over Palestinians living in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip.

I have known about “Breaking the Silence” for years. I feel compelled to write about this honest morally-based movement of courageous Israelis for the first time because West Bank violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians has grown more frequent, destructive, and deadly, because the harsh character of the occupation is increasingly more systemic and entrenched, and because territory that would become part of a future Palestinian state is being aggressively taken and settled by right-wing Jewish settlers with the support of the Israeli government and military administration thereby making a two states for two peoples resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict more difficult to achieve.

These veteran soldiers in “Breaking the Silence” tell of the daily humiliation of Palestinians at the hands young 18, 19, and 20 year-old Israeli soldiers who do not speak Arabic well, cannot communicate easily with Palestinians or understand their needs, and whose military orders to control the Palestinian population are often arbitrary and not always based upon Israeli security concerns. As soldiers, they describe themselves as having been cogs in the complex administrative and military wheel of subjugation of the Palestinian people.

It all began after the 1967 Israel-Arab War when a victorious Israel fought against Egypt, Syria, and Jordan in their deliberate attempt to destroy the Jewish state. Israel won that war in a lightning victory that stunned the Jewish world and dramatically expanded its borders after six days of fighting taking East Jerusalem and the Old City, the West Bank, the Sinai Peninsula, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights, and a portion of Southern Lebanon, and absorbed under Israeli control millions of Palestinian Arabs. Time passed. Egypt made peace with Israel and Israel returned the Sinai. The Oslo Peace Process began in 1993 bringing Israel and the Palestinians to the peace table. Jordan followed with a peace agreement with Israel in 1994. Israel withdrew its citizens and security forces from Gaza in 2004, but maintained control of 3 borders (Egypt controlled the southern-most border).

The Oslo Accords created the Palestinian Authority (PA) and divided the West Bank into three areas: A, B, and C. Area A is controlled by the PA’s security and Civil Administration. Area B is controlled by the PA’s Civil Administration but security is maintained by the Israeli military and police. Area C is controlled wholly by Israel’s military administration. “Breaking the Silence” notes that:

“The Civil Administration is a military body tasked with managing the civilian aspects of ruling the occupied West Bank. Together with the Gaza district Coordination and Liaison office (DCL), it is subordinate to the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT). These governing bodies are responsible, among other things, for granting or denying permits to Palestinians to enter Israel for work, medical care, or travel abroad; controlling the import and export of goods, including food; allocating natural resources and planning and building civilian infrastructure. In other words, COGAT, the Civil Administration and the Gaza DCL shape and impact countless aspects of Palestinians’ daily lives. It is impossible to understand the Israeli occupation without putting these units under the spotlight, and yet, they receive very little public attention both within and outside of Israel, and their work has rarely been the subject of in-depth research and investigation.

As demonstrated in the testimonies given by soldiers and officers who served in COGAT, the Gaza DCL, and particularly the Civil Administration, the unit’s work operates on two axes that exemplify Israeli occupation policies as a whole: preserving and perfecting control and monitoring of the Palestinian people, on the one hand, and entrenching and expanding Israel’s hold on Palestinian territory, on the other.” (Breaking the Silence, Military Rule – Testimonies of Soldiers from the Civil Administration, Gaza DCL and COGAT, 2011-2021)

Through an elaborate administrative system that controls the movement and rights of the Palestinian population, Israel set up many check-points, conducts regular unannounced night-time searches of Palestinian homes, demolishes unapproved and un-licensed Palestinian home construction, and builds by-pass roads permitted only to Jewish settler travel. In recent years there has been a marked increase in settler violence with impunity against Palestinian farmers and their cash crops (some violence also is committed by Palestinians against Jewish settlers and IDF soldiers). Water rights are denied to Palestinians (especially in Area C).

One set of laws applies to Israeli Jewish settlers (the same laws that apply for all Israeli citizens inside Israel itself) and another set of laws applies to Palestinian Arabs living in the territories controlled by the Israeli military administration.

Taking all accumulated evidence together, the leadership of “Breaking the Silence” concluded:

“As the soldier’s testimonies show, the result on the ground is a clear, strategic joint effort by the Civil Administration, the settlement enterprise and successive Israeli governments, designed to push out Palestinians and limit their presence in Area C while simultaneously promoting Israeli construction and expansion in the area, thus pushing the possibility of Palestinian statehood ever further into the distance, while paving the way for future annexation of the occupied Palestinian territories.”

Israel, founded as a Jewish and democratic state, is the pride of the Jewish people world-wide. It is without question the greatest achievement of the Jewish people in the past 2000 years. Though forced to fight many wars of self-defense and against terrorism, Israel’s democratic, Jewish, and moral foundation (still alive and well within Israel itself) is compromised every day by its harsh occupation of another people.

Only in a two-state resolution of the conflict can justice be achieved for the Palestinian people, can Israel’s democracy and Jewish character be preserved, and can Israel’s young soldiers and future leaders be made whole.

We in Israel and the Diaspora ought to support fully “Breaking the Silence” and those courageous Israelis who are speaking the painful truth about their IDF service as a necessary part of bringing peace to our two peoples and resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in two states for two peoples living securely and peacefully side-by-side.

This blog also appears at the Times of Israel – https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/breaking-the-silence-courageous-israelis-speak-out/

Shanda: A Memoir of Shame and Secrecy is Letty Cottin Pogrebin’s twelfth book, and perhaps her most personal and intimate. It is not only reflective of her eight decades of life experience and that of her generation, but of all first, second, and third generation American Jews who struggle with secrets and shame, and are deathly afraid of public exposure and embarrassment.

The cover description of the book describes what Letty does in this very satisfying memoir:

“The word Shanda is defined as shame or disgrace in Yiddish. The book, Shanda, tells the story of three generations of complicated, intense 20^th century Jews for whom the desire to fit in and the fear of public humiliation either drove their aspirations or crushed their spirit.”

A disclaimer – Letty Cottin Pogrebin is a friend, so the memoir was of particular interest to me. However, it is worth reading for anyone who struggles with the fear of shame and public exposure in any of their manifestations in contemporary American, Jewish, and other-ethnic lives. It is of particular interest to anyone interested in how we American Jews identify with the Jewish religion, tradition, culture, people, and State of Israel.

Letty does not hold back about her own most intimate and, perhaps, most embarrassing experiences. As I was reading, I asked myself where the line is between full-disclosure and remaining private. As a public figure myself, this is an issue with which I struggled throughout my professional life as a congregational rabbi. What was appropriate to share and what wasn’t? I was therefore stunned by many of Letty’s self-disclosures. By the end of the book, however, I understand well why Letty shared so much – she simply had to do so based upon her experiences from childhood on into adulthood.

Letty’s writing is crisp and insightful, as are all of her books and many articles in leading American newspapers and journals. This book is filled with Jewish traditional and cultural references that played themselves out in her life, for better and ill. She presents Judaism with expertise and accuracy, and while she is respectful and learned, her critical voice (especially of the traditional role of women in Judaism) is ever-present.

Letty is a first generation American Jew, a Litvak, meaning that she values the life of the mind. Her greatest fear has always been “losing my mind.”

I will leave it to the reader to discover the secrets with which Letty’s parents lived and the very disturbing truths they denied her as a child that led her eventually to write this memoir that one of her twin daughters encouraged her to write. Those secrets, once revealed, led Letty to often mistrust what others say, to question everything, to probe ideas and assumptions, and to take a public stand on behalf of honesty, truth, justice, and basic human decency.

She is of the founding generation of American feminist thinkers and writers, a founding editor of Ms. Magazine, a strong and articulate liberal activist in American politics and American-Israeli politics, a born and bred New Yorker, and a voice always worth hearing.

I could not put down this 5½” by 8¼” 416-page volume that includes many photographs of Letty as a child through adulthood. I mention the size of the pages because they add to the intimate feel of the book.

Letty includes a list of discussion questions for book groups and a glossary of Yiddish and Hebrew terms.

I read the book quickly, in three sittings, and regretted when I came to the conclusion. I found myself wanting more. But, alas, Letty needs to write, and likely there will be another work to come down the road.

I loved this book and highly recommend it.

As we approach the American mid-term election, what most concerns so many of us are the ongoing threats to American democracy that the Trump-Republican Party poses and the lies and deception that Trump, Trump-Republicans, and the right-wing media bubble shamelessly promote. The virtue of “truth” is on the ballot on November 9.

Speaking the truth is a big deal in Judaism. In the Midrashic literature, truth is regarded as divinely inspired and a foundational value: “The seal of God is Truth –  חתמו של הקדוש ברוך הוא אמת – Chotmo shel HaKadosh Baruch Hu Emet” (Shir Hashirim Rabba 1:9 – 650 to 900 CE).

The following Midrash describes an imaginary conversation between God and the ministering angels. The angel of Truth advised God not to include truth when creating the human being because humankind is incapable of truth-telling:

“When the time came for the Holy Blessed One to make the first human being, the ministering angels made themselves into competing counsels. Some of them said: ‘Don’t create humans,’ and the others said: ‘Create them.’ The angel of kindness said: ‘Create them, for they will do acts of loving kindness.’ Then the angel of Truth said: ‘Do not create them, for they will be full of lies.’ The angel of righteousness said: ‘Create them, for they will establish justice.’ The angel of peace said: ‘Do not create them, for they will be in constant strife!’ What did the Holy Blessed One do, but grab up Truth and hurl it to the earth. Whereupon the ministering angels said before the Holy Blessed One, ‘Ruler of all worlds, what have You done? Why have You so chastised the chief of your court? Let truth arise again from the earth.’” (Bereishit Rabba, 8:8 – 400-600 CE)

“Let truth arise again from the earth.” What does this mean?

The mystic Rabbi Isaac Luria (1534-1572) offered an explanation:

“…the throwing of the truth [to earth] and its arising from the earth that pure truth is, in fact, contradictory to human nature. But when truth is thrown to the ground, it splits up into many shards which are dispersed throughout the world. These are ‘sparks’ of truth, embedded in each and every human being. [Our] role is to collect these sparks of truth and connect them, until the entire truth arises from the earth.” (Cited by Shmuel Rabinowitz, Jerusalem Post, January 10, 2020)

Truth-telling is a so important in Judaism that it is a pre-condition for the processes we are called to engage during this High Holiday season of תשובה – Teshuvah (repentance), סליחה – Selichah (forgiveness), אחריות – Achrayut (taking responsibility), and התחדשות – Hit’chad’shut (renewal).

In light of our tradition’s emphasis on truth-telling, how are Jews and Americans supposed to cope with the massive corruption of truth by the former president, by so many Members of Congress, and by candidates for election in the Trump-Republican Party? According to The Washington Post Fact Checker, Trump lied to and/or mislead the country 30,573 times in his four years as President, and when we add the number of lies and misleading statements spoken by Trump-Republican members of Congress, Trump-endorsed candidates for election, and the right-wing media bubble, the depth and breadth of the lies is overwhelming.  

Though it seems that Trump has Teflon skin protecting him from legal consequences for his lies and criminality, Congress and the justice system in DC, NY, Georgia, and Florida are doing their work to bring him to justice. Their task is not a simple one. They have their mandate, and so do we American citizens – to vote and to get everyone we know – Democrats, Independents, traditional Republicans, and those who have never voted before – to support candidates up and down the ballot in every jurisdiction, local, state, and federal in the nation against Trump-Republicans and for their Democratic challengers. This election is not about Democrats vs Republicans. It’s about democrats vs autocrats. It is for and against democracy itself.

I have faith that our legal authorities and we American voters will each fulfill our respective mandates and that in the end justice will be served, American democracy will be restored, and “truth will arise again from the earth.”

This blog is also posted at The Times of Israel – see
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/let-truth-arise-again-from-the-earth/

My friend, Rabbi Ammi Hirsch of the Stephen S. Wise Free Synagogue (SSW) on West 68th Street in Manhattan, addresses the growing antisemitism masked as “anti-Zionism” that 40% of Jewish college students nationwide say they either experienced personally or witnessed in the last year. Rabbi Hirsch’s Rosh Hashanah sermon is a powerful explication of a complex yet simple truth that antisemitism is spreading nationwide and that many of our young Jews are unprepared to cope with it, despite the 70-80% of American Jews who support Israel and feel that it is important to their Jewish identity.

As a life-long liberal Zionist and Israeli, Rabbi Hirsch takes on the Harvard Crimson’s support for BDS and lays bare the significance of the moral blindness to which many progressive Jewish students and others on the left at elite universities and colleges have succumbed.

His sermon is worth watching and listening to its end. If you have teen-age and young adult Jews in your families, I urge you to forward this blog to them and encourage them to listen – https://swfs.org/sermons/the-american-campus-and-the-jews/

Of all the virtues, humility – Heb. ענווה  anavah – is a foundation stone, for most other virtues grow from it including appreciation, gratitude, patience, respect, dignity, generosity, compassion, empathy, loving-kindness, doing justice, and pursuing peace.

The importance of humility is evoked in a Talmudic passage that is inscribed over many synagogue sanctuary arks around the world – “דע לפני מי אתה עומד – Da lifnei Mi atah omed – Know before Whom you stand” (1). This religious teaching reminds us of our finitude and limitations on the one hand and our capacity for spiritual and moral awareness and transcendence on the other, contrasting themes that frame what we are called by Jewish tradition to consider about our lives especially during the High Holiday season.

At one end of the spectrum upon which the virtue of humility appears are the extremes of pride, hubris, arrogance, conceit, vanity, egomania, self-aggrandizement, narcissism, hard-heartedness, and shamelessness. On the opposite end along the spectrum are the extremes of meekness, diffidence, submissiveness, subservience, victimization, humiliation, self-deprecation, self-denigration, self-denial, self-effacement, and a sense of unworthiness.

Where does the virtue of humility appear along this spectrum?

In thinking about this, I’m reminded of the short story called Bontshe Shvayg – Bontshe the Silent, first published in 1894 (2). This is a moving morality tale about a meek Jew who never spoke up for himself no matter what indignities he suffered at the hands of bullies, antisemites, and the chief prosecutor of the Holy Tribunal. In comparison, consider Moses who the Bible describes as “a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth” (3).

Moses’ humility was a key virtue that led to his becoming the most important and intimate Prophet of God, and the most powerful man on earth. A rabbinic legend (midrash) explains:

One day God observed the shepherd Moses retrieving a lamb that strayed from his flock. Taking the diminutive creature lovingly into his arms, Moses cradled it tenderly and returned it to its mother. God said: “Since you tend the sheep of human beings with such compassion, you shall be the shepherd of My sheep, Israel” (4). Moses’s assumption of responsibility for his flock’s welfare and his compassion for even the most vulnerable creature are the character traits that caught God’s attention.

The Bible notes that when Moses heard the Divine voice call to him from the Burning Bush (5), Moses’ heart and soul opened to the experience of awe and wonder; but when God commanded Moses “בא אל פרעה – Bo el Paraoh…– Come into Pharaoh…” (6) and demand freedom for the enslaved Israelites, Moses demurred and resisted because he believed that he did not feel the requisite self-confidence, courage, or agency to confront the most powerful human being in the world. God reassured Moses. As God’s Prophet, the Almighty promised to put words into his and his brother Aaron’s mouths (7) and to send plagues that would shock and awe Pharaoh into submission so that the enslaved Israelites could be taken out of Egypt into freedom on their way to Mount Sinai to forge a covenant with God.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel noted that the ‘I’ of the prophet is God, meaning that God and the prophet walked together as one. The prophet felt sympathy for both God and for humankind, and when the prophet spoke, it was not the prophet alone speaking – it was God as well. The prophet’s humility, compassion, and empathy, commitment to and responsibility for others were the necessary character traits and virtues God sought in choosing each prophet. (8)

Louis Jacobs explained that humility occupies the golden mean along the spectrum (described above) between two extremes in the human character, from self-denial and unworthiness at one end, to pride and conceit at the other:

“… humble people are … confident and competent in themselves so much that, as a result, they seek to self-actualize by helping others. Humble people are still self-efficacious; they just don’t feel the impetus to boast about themselves but instead, let their actions speak for their ideals. To be humble is not to think less of oneself, but to think of oneself less” (9).

Bontshe Shvayg was an extreme victim beaten into submission. His was NOT “humility” according to Jewish tradition. It was humiliation. Humble people are different. They understand well who they are because like all human beings they are nobly born by virtue of being created “בצלם אלהים – b’tzelem Elohim – in the Divine image” (10). They accept readily as well their individual self-worth, virtues, talent, skill, capacity, and ability, but do not need to prove anything to anyone else. They do not brag nor boast nor call attention to themselves because they are too busy putting the interests of others before their own.

What does a humble person today look like? Rabbi Jacobs listed a number of habits of humble people (11):

Humble people base their decision-making on a sense of shared purpose rather than self-interest.

Humble people know how to listen without feeling they have to express their own opinions and narratives. They do not interrupt, nor do they self-reference when another is speaking. They understand that what others say is more valuable than what they think and feel at that moment and in that situation.

Humble people make room for others, exercise self-restraint, demur, defer, and take up no more space than is necessary or appropriate. They emulate God by undergoing what the mystics call tzimtzum (צמצום, contraction within the self) (12), in order to make space available for others to rise, act, take leadership, thrive, and contribute to the community. They do not need to have the final word. They permit the wisdom of others to prevail, and they speak only when asked or when it is their role to do so as a teacher, leader, mentor, or guide.

Humble people are forever curious and seek knowledge everywhere and all the time. They are perpetual learners. They realize that they do not have all the answers. They glean knowledge from the experiences of others and crave more opportunities to learn. They embody the Mishnaic sage’s dictum: “Who is wise? The one who learns something from everyone” (13).

Humble people put others at the forefront of their thoughts. They brag about others, giving credit easily to others while the prideful brag and take the credit for themselves. They do not call attention to themselves as experts. They have mastered the art of remaining silent so as to learn more from others and to be able to hear more astutely the stirrings of their own soul. As it is written: “Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel remarked: ‘All my days, I grew up among the Sages, and I have found no better attribute than silence.’” (14)

Humble people are receptive to constructive criticism and actively seek it out because they know that feedback is a valuable means towards their own self-improvement and evolution.

I offer below a few additional thoughts of others about the virtue of humility that can be helpful for us all during these Days of Repentance and Awe:

“Why was the human being created on the last day? So that if such a person is overcome by pride, it might be said: ‘In the creation of the world, the mosquito came before you” (15).

“When a person comes into the world his hands are closed as if to say, ‘The whole world is mine, I want to possess it.’ When he leaves the world his hands are spread wide as if to say, ‘I possessed nothing of what is in the present world’” (16).

“Appear always what you are and a little less” (17).

“In order to rise you must first descend” (18).

“Teach your tongue to say ‘I don’t know’” (19).

“It is taught in a baraita (20) in the name of Rabbi Meir: For what reason was the Torah given to the Jewish people? It is because they are impudent [Heb. עזים – Azim, meaning coarse or arrogant], and Torah study will weaken and humble them” (21).

“Humility is a river fed by two streams – a sense of limitation and a sense of awe” (22).

“Life is a long lesson in humility” (23).

“[Humility is]…a soft answer to a harsh challenge; silence in the face of abuse; graciousness when receiving honor; dignity in response to humiliation; restraint in the presence of provocation; forbearance and quiet calm when confronted with calumny and carping criticism” (24).

“For all our conceits about being the center of the universe, we live in a routine planet of a humdrum star stuck away in an obscure corner … on an unexceptional galaxy which is one of about 100 billion galaxies. … That is the fundamental fact of the universe we inhabit, and it is very good for us to understand that” (25).

“It was said of Reb Simcha Bunem, a 18th century Hasidic rebbe, that he carried two slips of paper, one in each pocket. One was inscribed with the saying from the Talmud: בשבילי נברא העולם – Bish’vili niv’ra ha-olam, ‘for my sake the world was created’ (26). On the other he wrote a phrase from our father Avraham in the Torah: ואנכי עפר ואפר– V’anochi afar v’efer – I am but dust and ashes’ (27). He would take out and read each slip of paper as necessary for the moment” (28).

גמר חתימה טובה – G’mar chatimah tovah – May you and those you love and our people Israel be sealed in the Book of Life for a good, meaningful, purposeful, healthy, loving, generous, peaceful, and humble New Year.

Notes:

1. Babylonian Talmud, Berachot 28b (6^th century CE)
2. L. Peretz – Polish Yiddish writer (1852-1915)
3. Numbers 12:3
4. Exodus Rabba 2:2 (1200 CE)
5. Exodus 3:2
6. Exodus 10:1 – the Hebrew is curious as it uses the verb “לבוא – to come” instead of “ללכת – to go” to Pharaoh, which is the classic translation. Robert Alter, however, translates the verse literally: “And the Lord said to Moses, “בא אל פרעה – Come into Pharaoh, for I Myself have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants” suggesting the presence of God was even in Pharaoh’s hardened heart.
7. Exodus 5:1
8. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972). See The Prophets, (New York: Jewish Publication Society, 1955)
9. Louis Jacobs, a British rabbi and theologian (1920-2006)
10. Louis Jacobs, The Jewish Religion: A Companion (Oxford University Press, 1995)
11. Genesis 1:27
12. צמצום – Tzimtzum (contraction within the Divine Self) is the basis for a cosmology of the universe developed by the mystic genius Rabbi Isaac Luria of Safed (1534-1572) who imagined that in the beginning before creation, God occupied all space and time. In order to make room for the created world, God (Who was all light) had to withdraw some of that light and thereby placed it in huge vessels (כלים – keilim). But the power of the trapped light was so great that the vessels could not hold it and there was a great explosion (preceding the Big Bang Theory by 4 centuries) and the shards of the vessels (שבירת הכלים – shevirat ha-keilim – the breaking of the vessels) were flung to the four corners of the universe (ארבע כנפות הארץ – arba k’nafot ha-Aretz). Light was trapped in the shards. Luria believed that when Jews perform a מצוה – mitzvah (commandment) a small measure light is released from a shard and returns to God. When the entirety of the Jewish people perform mitzvot together, the Messiah will arrive announcing the restoration of the world (תיקון עולם – tikun olam) in which justice (צדק – tzedek), compassion (חסד – compassion) and peace (שלום – shalom) will prevail for all humankind and creation.
13. Avot 1:4 (200 CE)
14. Avot 1:17 (200 CE)
15. Midrash Bereishit Rabba 8:1 (400-600 CE)
16. Midrash Kohelet Rabba on Ecclesiastes 5:14 (650-900 CE)
17. Greek proverb
18. Chassidic wisdom (17^th-18^th century CE)
19. Babylonian Talmud, Berachot 4a (6^th century CE)
20. A בריתא – baraita (Aramaic) is an oral law not included in the 2^nd century legal code, the Mishnah.
21. Babylonian Talmud, Beitzah 25b (6^th century CE)
22. Rabbi Norman Hirsch (b. 1930)
23. James M. Barrie (1860-1937)
24. Rabbi Norman Lamm (1927-2020)
25. Carl Sagan (1934-1996)
26. Mishnah Sanhedrin 4:5 (2^nd century CE)
27. Genesis 18:27
28. Martin Buber (1878-1965), Tales of the Hasidim: Later Masters (New York: Schocken Books, 1961), 249-250.

This blog also appears at the Times of Israel https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/humility-first-among-the-virtues/

It is common political knowledge that Senator Mitch McConnell’s primary interest is and has always been power, getting it and holding onto it. Now, we have an inside look at what he was thinking in the days after Trump’s insurrection and attack on the nation’s Capitol as described in Rachael Bade’s and Karoun Demirjian’s new book “Unchecked: The Untold Story Behind Congress’s Botched Impeachments of Donald Trump.”

It is debatable, to be sure, to suggest (as the book’s title seems to do) that the Democrats botched the impeachment. I disagree. They made the case powerfully against Trump. It was the Republicans fear of Trump that ultimately gave him a pass. That said, Politico describes what McConnell was thinking:

“’Unchecked’ explores how the longtime Republican leader came much closer than originally reported to backing Trump’s conviction after the January 6 Capitol insurrection — and even got sandbagged by his own members into making a decision on the issue before he was ready. McConnell relished the opportunity to slam the door shut on the controversial former president’s political career, and inside his Capitol office suite, he intensively debated the question with his own staff…But while McConnell was ready to be done with Trump, his party, it seemed, was not. To his chagrin, a large chunk of his members were once again coalescing around the former president. And they were about to put him in a bind….That afternoon, fellow Kentucky Senator Rand Paul would force a vote on the constitutionality of convicting a former president — short-circuiting McConnell’s own deliberations. While Trump loyalists had seized on the suggestion that a former president simply could not be impeached and convicted, McConnell was not so sure. He argued with one of his most trusted aides about why the Founders would explicitly allow Congress to bar an impeached official from future office yet reserve that power only for current officials…McConnell had never led such a rebellion [against a fellow Republican]. And that day, he wasn’t sure he was up to the task.”

Is the fact that McConnell was troubled as he spoke on the Senate floor on February 13, 2021 enough? See – https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/13/politacs/mcconnell-remarks-trump-acquittal/index.html

Hardly. To the contrary. McConnell’s failure of leadership enabled Trump to continue to spread throughout his base a toxic undermining of American elections and our democratic institutions and to give Trump the right to run for President again in 2024. McConnell’s failure to lead Senate Republicans shines a light on what great leadership really means. Except for Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger  in the House and Mitt Romney in the first Impeachment trial, along with a small handful of Republican members who voted to convict Trump in the second Impeachment trial, the entire Republican Party failed in its duty to the Constitution and the American people.

Great leadership requires not just vision and high moral rectitude, but the love of truth and a sacred commitment to further the common good. There are times when all leaders must stand up against the crowd, take a political risk knowing that they can lose everything, power, position, and the respect of their followers. Great leaders, however, bear the responsibility to act on behalf of the best interests of the public and to set a high moral standard for themselves and their colleagues.

I understand and even sympathize that in the current environment of the Trump-Republican Party that it is very difficult for Members of Congress and the Senate to oppose the mob and risk being expelled from the “tribe/cult.” Anyone who did so was defeated in Republican primaries this year or decided not to stand for re-election knowing that they would be defeated if they spoke their minds. Those few who took public stands against Trump and election denial were condemned,  threatened, and excommunicated from a political community they cherished.

Effective leadership is not just about saying the right thing at the right time and then following up with consistent action. It is also about organizing others to follow you. Senator McConnell utterly failed to do this when he could have done so with enough colleagues to make a difference in the outcome of the Impeachment process.

Martin Luther King put it well when he said: “A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.”

Congressman John Lewis said: “You must be headlights and not tail-lights.”

Uri Avneri, a leader of the Israeli peace movement, said: “If you say something outside the consensus, you create enemies. The less you say, the less trouble. That is a basic political truism. But it is not the stuff great leaders are made of.”

President Gerald Ford said: “In the age-old contest between popularity and principle, only those willing to lose for their convictions are deserving of posterity`s approval.”

McConnell did none of that. Rather, he did as the 19^th Century French politician, Alexandre Auguste Ledru-Rollin, said: “There go the people. I must follow them, for I am their leader.”

Leaders lead. The pursuit of popularity and power does not a leader make. There will always come a time when leadership means standing up courageously against the crowd, without hesitation, knowing that one’s cause is right, moral, and just.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks characterized truly great leaders as those who “combine realism with idealism, subordinate politics to ethics, power to responsibility, and pragmatism to the demands of conscience…[Great leaders] are always exposed to prophetic critique to remind themselves of transcendent standards and ultimate aims.”

Consequently, it matters little that Mitch McConnell suffered pangs of conscience when deciding to vote against the conviction of Donald Trump. What matters is that he failed to do so when he knew and understood that Trump had engaged in treasonous behavior in his designing and leading the insurrection against American democracy.

Liz Cheney put it right as she addressed her Republican colleagues in the January 6 hearings: “I say this to my Republican colleagues who are defending the indefensible. There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain.”

McConnell, for all the power he wields, is no leader. His example is as bad as all Republicans in Congress who failed to do their duty to uphold the rule of law and the US Constitution.  

This blog also appears at the Times of Israel – https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/utter-failure-of-leadership-senator-mitch-mcconnell/