Forgiving those who have wronged us is one of the most difficult things we ever do. It is also one of the most healing.

The Reform Judaism blog excerpted a letter from my book “Why Judaism Matters – Letters of a Liberal Rabbi to His Children and the Millennial Generation” (Publ. Turner-Jewish Lights, 2017)  on forgiveness – see https://reformjudaism.org/blog/2018/08/23/5-truths-about-forgiveness?utm_source=WU&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20180824&utm_campaign=Feature

 

Soren Kierkegaard said: “It is perfectly true, as philosophers say, that life must be understood backwards. But they forget the other proposition, that it must be lived forwards.”

Though we’re always living forward, the life lessons we learn help to shape our future. Since this is the season of self-examination leading to the High Holidays, I offer a list of 32 life lessons I’ve learned – there are others, but the number 32 is a significant one in Jewish mystical tradition. It equals the 22 letters of the Hebrew aleph bet plus the 10 “words” of the covenant, and it’s the number equivalent for the Hebrew word lev (lamed – bet), heart, which the mystics teach are the number of pathways to God.

I offer the following as a hedge against the toxicity in the political environment in this country in these days leading to the High Holidays. Some of these I’ve borrowed gratefully from a journalist named Regina Brett and published in the Plain Dealer from Cleveland, Ohio (hers are in italics).

They’re not necessarily a way to God, but a means to a healthier, wiser, and more sacred way of living, at least as I’ve come to believe in them.

1. God gave us life and our natural abilities only – everything else is either up to us or a result of dumb luck.
2. Life isn’t always fair, but it’s still good.
3. Life is short, so cut your losses early.
4. Begin planning for retirement as a teen by developing your passions and interests, for they’ll sustain you when you get old.
5. Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up your present.
6. You don’t have to win every argument, so at a certain point stop arguing.
7. Love your spouse/partner above all other people and things. If you aren’t married, then nurture the special friendships in your life.
8. Don’t compare your life to anyone else’s as you have no idea what their journey has been all about.
9. If you can’t publish what you want to say or do on the front page of The NY Times, don’t say or do it.
10. Try not to speak ill of anyone, but if you must, do so only with trusted friends and then only so as to understand better how to cope better with people like that.
11. Don’t procrastinate to see doctors. It may save your life.
12. Carpe diem. Take pleasure in this day and do what inspires you for we don’t know what tomorrow will bring.
13. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
14. Breathe deeply as it calms the body, mind, heart, and soul.
15. Take your shoes off whenever possible as studies indicate that doing so will prolong your life.
16. Too much alcohol and drugs dull the mind and loosen the lips compelling us to say things we may mean but don’t want said and to say things we may not mean at all.
17. Get a dog or a cat for the love for and from such a creature is unlike anything else we’ll ever know.
18. Over prepare, and then go with the flow.
19. It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.
20. Speak the truth but only when you know you can be effective and only if it doesn’t cause another person unnecessary harm or hurt. Otherwise, be quiet.
21. Stand up to bullies wherever they are and whenever you encounter them.
22. Time does heal almost everything.
23. Don’t fear or resist change for it is natural, necessary, and an opportunity for growth.
24. Don’t envy other people’s talent, circumstances or life – you already have everything you require.
25. Love isn’t just a matter of the heart – it comes from God.
26. Learn Torah as often as you can – it will enrich, change, and enhance your life and it will inspire you to do what you might never choose to do otherwise.
27. Support the State of Israel as the democracy and Jewish State that it is regardless of its imperfections, for Israel remains the best hope for the Jewish people to create a utopia worthy of the ethics of the Biblical prophets.
28. Be modest.
29. Be forgiving.
30. Be kind.
31. Be generous.
32. Be grateful.

Now, let’s live our lives forward.

 

 

I first met Rabbi Leonard I. Beerman when I was eleven years old when my mother, brother and I joined Leo Baeck Temple in Los Angeles in 1961. My father had died two years earlier and we needed a synagogue and a rabbi. Meeting Leonard had an impact on me that I could not have anticipated. As a young boy I looked at him from afar with a sense of awe. His resonant voice and gentle manner comforted me, and his message stirred and lifted me to think about life and the world in a way that no one else did or has since. There was no Rabbi on the American scene like him. No one had as much moral courage and insight. No one was as principled. The only other Rabbi who compared to Leonard as a moral leader was Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. Leonard Beerman became a father-figure for me but I didn’t realize it until I spoke with my wife after I had finished reading this volume “The Eternal Dissident – Rabbi Leonard I. Beerman and the Radical Imperative to Think and Act” edited by Professor David N. Myers, Professor of Jewish History at UCLA (2018). The book includes forty sermons and essays accompanied by commentaries by forty of Leonard’s friends, colleagues, congregants, and students from across the religious and political spectrum – I am one of them. Barbara said: “You know, John, Leonard was a father figure to you! You’ve always spoken of him that way since I’ve known you.” She was, of course, right. I suspect I’m not alone. In the last three years of Leonard’s life (he died in 2014), he and I had become close. We regularly met for lunch at his favorite Beverly Hills Tennis Club where he played tennis into his 90s. He had been reading my blog and liked the way I thought and wrote, so one day he wrote to me and I jumped at the chance to connect with him. Our friendship began and grew. He always said as we parted, “John – I’m an old man but you make me feel young again!” Leonard was like that. People felt seen by him, and they loved and revered him as a great moral rabbinic leader. He was as eloquent a writer and speaker as there was in the American rabbinate. Strangely, Leonard didn’t think he was a very good writer. He was so wrong. He was among the most thoughtful and moving writers and thinkers that there was on the American Jewish scene. Leonard drew liberally from the visions of the Biblical prophets and classic Jewish text while weaving poetry and other literary sources together as he reflected about what it means to be human, moral and accountable. He was tortured by the suffering of the innocent. He loved Israel but didn’t spared his moral critique of Israeli oppression of the Palestinians under occupation. Leonard served as a US Marine during World War II and he fought while studying at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem before and during Israel’s Independence War. I asked him about the impact of his military service in those two wars. He explained that he served twice to test himself, and he came away a confirmed pacifist. Reading “The Eternal Dissident,” especially at this time of year in the Hebrew month of Elul before the High Holidays, prepared me spiritually and morally to lead my congregation for the last time before I retire next year. Leonard’s soft yet powerful and resonant moral voice rings in my ears. Even in his death he has given me a precious gift. The last time we shared lunch together was only a month after the end of the fighting in the 2014 Israeli-Hamas War in Gaza. He and I both were preparing to speak about the war (we did so very differently). His sermon was highly critical of Israel even as he acknowledged the brutality of Hamas. For me, his pacifism was a conundrum of conflict. But he did not budge from his moral convictions. I wrote to David Myers (the editor of the volume and Leonard’s dear friend) and Leonard’s widow, Joan, when I finished reading the book this week to thank them for producing this extraordinary volume. A better model of a man, a more courageous religious leader, and a kinder, more sensitive and provocative rabbi there has not been in the American rabbinate in my memory. This book ought to be read by every religious leader in every faith tradition, and by atheists and skeptics too. Few works are as important as this one, and I recommend it without hesitation. You can find it on beermanfoundation.org. I mourn still the loss of Rabbi Leonard Beerman. His life, however, is impressed on my heart and in my mind and soul and always will be. In this I know I am not alone.

 

Last week (August 9) an article appeared in the opinion section of the Forward under the title – “Stop Trying to Bring Reform and Conservative Judaism to Israel – We Already have too much Religion” by Einat Wilf and Ram Vromen.

The article set up a straw dog paradigm that is faulty on so many levels it is difficult to respond. But Rabbi Gilad Kariv did effectively as a follow-up letter to the editor. Rabbi Kariv is President and CEO of the Israel Reform Movement.

Rabbi Kariv shows that Reform Progressive and Liberal Judaism is an authentic Israeli movement and that progressive Judaism is a necessity for Israel’s future both as a Jewish and democratic society.

I am including links to both the original article and Rabbi Kariv’s response which offers links to surveys completed fairly recently that show both the growth and potential of Reform Judaism in Israel.

I urge you to read both items.

https://forward.com/opinion/407701/stop-trying-to-bring-conservative-and-reform-judaism-to-israel-we-already/?attribution=home-top-story-5-headline

https://forward.com/opinion/letters/407949/yes-israel-needs-reform-and-conservative-jews/?attribution=home-article-listing-5-headline

Note: I serve as the national chair of the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA), the American Zionist arm of the Union for Reform Judaism and a partner with the Israeli Movement for Reform and Progressive Judaism.

August 13, 2018, The Jewish Forward

This article ought to upset any American Jew who loves Israel and believes in Israeli democracy but is starting to get worried that, as Peter Beinart notes, Trump has emboldened PM Netanyahu and anti-democratic forces in the State of Israel.

Peter reminds us, and I agree wholeheartedly, that we in America need to support those Israelis and Israeli organizations that support democracy and human rights in the Jewish State.

Read more: https://forward.com/opinion/408066/peter-beinart-i-was-detained-at-ben-gurion-airport-because-of-my-beliefs/

The following link leads to a statement made by Rabbi Josh Weinberg, President of Israel, on behalf of the American Reform Movement  concerning the fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

<http://cirrus.mail-list.com/ravkav/88839342.html>

Heather Heyer – z’l

Note: I print with permission a commentary by my colleague, Rabbi Joel Schwartzman, on the tragic events of a year ago in Charlottesville, Va. when Heather Heyer, a protester of the white supremacy rally in that city, was mowed down deliberately a Neo-Nazi thug thus murdering her. See Heather’s obituary in the New York Times from a year ago.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/13/us/heather-heyer-charlottesville-victim.html

Rabbi Schwartzman, a retired chaplain in the United States Armed Forces, comments on a column published in Friday’s Union for Reform Judaism’s Ten Minutes of Torah by Dahlia Lithwick. She wrote:

“One continues to hope that Charlottesville – with its grieving town, its brave citizens, and its bone-deep efforts to contend with racism and rage – will never happen again, anywhere. But I continue to believe that what Charlottesville revealed, what it refracted and allowed, plays out daily under the surface of American life, and that it no longer shocks us as it ought to.”

Rabbi Schwartzman responds:

“These words that Dahlia has written quantify and characterize what Charlottesville has come to mean for me as well as the nation. I who have a working knowledge of the origins and outcomes of the Holocaust see and hear echoes of that unspeakable, unfathomable epoch in Jewish history. This is not the case for the generations of Americans and American Jews that have followed mine. They aren’t haunted by visions of death camps and crematoria. I who live part of each year in Charlottesville walk its streets, know where and what happened on which avenue and at which park, and know that the spirit of what tormented and murdered European Jewry is alive and well in America. It has the tacit approval of the leader of this country. This anniversary weekend, it will raise its ugly, bigoted and all too potentially violent head once again, although, one hopes, not necessarily in Charlottesville itself.

The name of Charlottesville has taken on an instant and symbolic meaning which is so terribly unfair and tragic because the people who live there were stigmatized and terrorized by an invasion of thugs for whom they didn’t bargain and for which violent chaos they were unprepared. Now they wear a national label, a label that associates this bucolic town with the worst that humanity has to offer.

The populace, which includes students and faculty at the University of Virginia, the townspeople themselves, and the town’s government have all committed to “taking back their town.” If there is anything positive which has arisen from the past year’s experience, it is this unifying commitment, in the face of what the name “Charlottesville” nationally and internationally has come to signify. It is, at least, to purify and sanctify what was besmirched in the city’s streets last year at this time.”

On this first anniversary of Heather’s death, we say zichrona livracha – May she be remembered for a blessing.

The following are selections from Jewish literature about תשובה – Teshuvah (lit. return, turning, response, and repentance), the primary occupation of the Jew in the month of Elul through to Yom Kippur (though teshuvah ought to be what one does throughout the year). Elul is the Hebrew month preceding the High Holidays and the month of Tishri and the High Holydays. There are 40 days from Elul 1 to Tishri 10 (Yom Kippur) the same amount of time that Moses spent on Mount Sinai receiving Torah.

“Teshuvah is a manifestation of the divine in each human being… Teshuvah means “turning about,” “turning to,” “response” [based on the Hebrew root – שוב – shin-vav-bet], “return” to God, to Judaism, to community, to family, to “self”… Teshuvah reaches beyond personal configurations – it is possible for someone to return who “was never there” – with no memories of a Jewish way of life…Judaism isn’t personal but a historical heritage… Teshuvah is a return to one’s own paradigm, to the prototype of the Jewish person…The act of teshuvah is a severance of the chain of cause and effect in which one wrong follows inevitably upon another…The thrust of teshuvah is to break through the ordinary limits of the self…The significance of the past can only be changed at a higher level of teshuvah – called תיקון (tikun) – תיקון הנפש (tikun hanefesh) – תיקון עולם (tikun olam)…The highest level of teshuvah is reached when the change and correction penetrate the very essence of the sins once committed and create the condition in which a person’s transgressions become his/her merits.” (Gleaned from “Repentance” by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz)

“Repentance must be preceded by the recognition of seven things: (1) The penitent must clearly recognize the heinousness of what one has done… (2) The penitent must be aware that one’s specific act was legally evil and ignominious… (3) The penitent must realize that retribution for one’s misdeed is inevitable… (4) The penitent must realize that one’s sin is noted and recorded in the book of a person’s iniquities… (5) The penitent must be fully convinced that repentance is the remedy for sickness and the road to recovery from evil deeds… (6) The penitent must conscientiously reflect upon the bounties the Creator had already bestowed, and how the penitent had rebelled against God instead of being grateful to the Eternal… (7) The penitent must strenuously persevere in keeping away from the evil to which s/he had been addicted and firmly resolve in her/his heart and mind to renounce it.” (Bachya ibn Pakuda, Duties of the Heart 7:3)

“One of the foundations of penitence, in human thought, is a person’s recognition of responsibility for one’s actions, which derives from a belief in humankind’s free will. This is also the substance of the confession that is part of the commandment of penitence, in which the person acknowledges that no other cause is to be blamed for one’s misdeed and its consequences but s/he the person alone.” (Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook)

“For transgressions between one person and another, such as injury, cursing, stealing, and similar offenses, a person is never forgiven until that person gives the other what is owed, and pacifies him/her.” (Maimonides, Mishnah Torah, Laws of Repentance 2:2)

“What is complete teshuvah? When one comes upon a situation in which one once transgressed, and it is possible to do so again, but the person refrains and doesn’t transgress on account of one’s repentance.” (Maimonides, Ibid 2:1)

“Rabbi Eliezer said, “Repent one day before your death.” His disciples asked him, “Does then one know on what day s/he will die?” “All the more reason s/he should repent today, lest s/he die tomorrow.” (Talmud, Shabbat 53a)

“One’s perspective is enlarged through penitence…All that seemed deficient, all that seemed ugly in the past, turns out to be full of majesty and grandeur as a phase of the greatness achieved through the progress of penitence… Moreover, it is necessary to identity the good that is embodied in the depth of evil and to strengthen it – with the very force wherewith one recoils from evil. Thus will penitence served as a force for good that literally transforms all the wrongdoings into virtues.” (Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook)

“Rabbi Abbahu said, “In the place where penitents stand, even the wholly righteous cannot stand.” (Talmud, B’rachot 34b)

[Note: The following is printed as an op-ed in this week’s edition of the Los Angeles Jewish Journal.]

The new “Nation-State” basic law is neither overtly racist nor suggesting of apartheid. Yet, it is a bad and unnecessary law and ought to be repealed. Israel already has the Declaration of Independence that sets the principles of the State of Israel as the Jewish and democratic nation-state of the Jewish people.

There is much in the bill that is operative making it redundant. The principal language of Israel is Hebrew. The Israeli flag and national anthem are Israel’s national symbols. Independence Day, Memorial Day, and Holocaust Remembrance Day are recognized holidays. Jerusalem is the eternal capital of the Jewish people.

The bill is worrisome for several reasons. It formally demotes the Arabic language from an official language to one with “special status,” a slap in the face to the 20% minority of Arab-Israeli citizens and the Israeli-Druze community. The message of the bill to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza is that the State of Israel is the exclusive homeland of the Jewish people despite Palestinian claims for a nation-state of their own alongside Israel. The message to Palestinian Israeli citizens is that they are second class citizens.

In 1992, a Basic Law was passed that emphasized fundamental human rights and equality under the law for all Israeli citizens. The nation-state law fails to mention equality thus posing a veiled assault on Israel’s democratic tradition and the 1992 law. Future courts and legislatures can use this new bill to deemphasize Israeli democratic traditions.

The bill originally sought to preserve the bond of unity between world Jewry and Israel, but at the last minute ultra-Orthodox parties rejected the unity principle as it applies in Israel. The Israeli Conservative and Reform movements objected strenuously because they regard the bill as an attempt by the ultra-Orthodox parties to solidify their hegemony over religious affairs in Israel rejecting religious pluralism.

One wonders why this bill was brought forward now. Is it a political attempt by PM Netanyahu, who advocated strongly for its adoption, to shore up his right-wing political base before the next election?

There is a bill currently making its way through the Knesset that would raise the number of orthodox yeshiva students required to serve in the army, a move bitterly opposed by the ultra-Orthodox parties that threatened to quit the coalition and force new elections should it become law. Netanyahu needs them in his coalition. Current polls show that Netanyahu’s Likud would gain no more seats should an election be held today.

The bill has driven a deeper wedge between Israel and Diaspora Jewry. Tensions exist between the Prime Minister and the Reform and Conservative movements in North America due to Netanyahu’s reneging on his own Kotel Agreement, allowing his ultra-Orthodox coalition partners to introduce a conversion law in the Knesset excluding non-Orthodox conversions, and his alliance with Trump and American Christian evangelical extremists.

Many from Netanyahu’s own party oppose this law including the President of the State, Reuven Rivlin, Benny Begin, Moshe Arens, and Dan Meridor.

The vast majority of Israelis don’t want a medieval model imposed on their modern country. The most pressing question for Israelis besides security is the relationship between democracy and Judaism. As long as Jews remain in the majority by significant percentages (i.e. 70-80%), the conflict between democracy and Judaism appears manageable.

Section #7 of the bill enshrines the settlements as an important goal of the country, at the top of the right-wing agenda for decades. To most objective observers, Israel’s identity as a Jewish and democratic state will be assured only by containing settlements to the large settlement blocks that will remain in Israel in an eventual peace agreement and stopping the spread of settlements beyond the security fence that would make partition impossible. Only a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can preserve a strong Jewish majority thereby preserving democracy and the Jewish character of the state.

This bill serves a world view that’s damaging to Israel, a move towards ethnic religious nationalism dominating Israeli political affairs and the separation of Israel from millions of its supporters in the Diaspora. That is not what the nation’s founders envisioned for Israel.

 

The Nation-State Law that passed through the Knesset raises important questions about Israeli democracy and the march by the right-wing government of Prime Minister Netanyahu to redefine Israel and change essential elements in Israel’s Declaration of Independence. The founding document of the State of Israel promotes equality, a democratic form of government, and establishes Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

This law was unnecessary and, I believe, a political effort by the Prime Minister to shore up his religious right before calling for new elections.

Benard Avishai has written an important piece in the New Yorker (July 20) that is worth reading.

see – https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/israel-passes-a-law-stating-whats-jewish-about-a-jewish-and-democratic-state