Chances are you heard about the recent college scandal involving 50 people, orchestrated by a college prep company that involved getting students into elite college through cheating on standardized tests and presenting false athletic credentials.
What messages does all this send to the students? First of all, that honesty is optional. If it works, be honest; if not, don’t. But another problematic message that is sent to these students is, you’re not ok as you are. "As you are" isn’t good enough. In order to satisfy other people’s expectations, you have to pretend to be what you’re not.
Two weeks before Passover, I want to challenge us to think about the following. To what degree are we sending the message to people we love that they are not really welcome as they are. That “as they are” isn’t enough or isn’t ok. “As they are” can be, their actual abilities; their actual appearance; their actual sexuality; their actual personality; their actual degree of conformity or noncomfority.
Rabbi Schweber and I recently attended a fascinating presentation by the creators of a new Haggadah, a graphic Haggadah. Graphic as in “graphic novel,” telling the story of the Haggadah through comics.
It’s an amazing Haggadah. I’ve used it in my youth house class and will continue to use it and I suggest you go on line and check it out. It was created by Jordan B. Gorfinkel and Erez Zadok, with Rabbi Burt Visotzky serving as consultant.
There’s so much here. So many details that would take many, many hours to unpack. One fascinating element is how the Haggada depicts the four children and specifically the rasha, the so-called wicked or rebellious child.
The Haggadah describes a conversation between the rebellious child and his mom. The rebellious child asks, what does all of this mean to you? The mom says, since you exclude yourself, I’m here to tell you that had you been in Egypt, you would not have been redeemed.
The depiction of this is absolutely terrifying. The Israelites are almost done walking through the pathway through the sea. The water is about to close in. Two Egyptian soldiers are holding onto the boy, preventing him from walking through with his family and with the community, and as he is about to be drowned, he looks absolutely terrified.
But that’s not the end. The artists continue to include this boy in the rest of the Haggadah. In some pictures he’s making faces; in others, he’s listening to what’s going on or participating in what’s going on. In one picture, the mother has her arm around him and is explaining something to him.
And then you get to the page that’s one of the essential passages in the Haggadah. In every generation, each person needs to see him or herself as having left Egypt.
The artists decided to draw this as follows. A whole line of people crossing through the sea, ancient and modern, some well-known figures, many not well-known, all ages, all races. If you look carefully you see that surrounding the picture is an iPhone case. And you realize that someone is actually taking a selfie of himself and the entire group leaving Egypt.
Who is taking the selfie? Who is at the front of the long line of people being redeemed, on their way to the promised land? That same boy. The one who asked the uncomfortable question at the seder. Not only is he being redeemed, he’s leading the pack.
The illustrators are doing midrash through art. They are showing the redemption of the rasha. He does get redeemed. In some respects he leads the redemption. And he joyfully, playfully depicts himself as part of the community, party of that redemption.
Thankfully the mother kept him around. Despite her frustration, she didn’t throw him out of the house. She allowed him to show up, and to hang around, “As he is” with the understanding that he is a work in progress.
She gave him the structure and the support to find his own way and he did find his own way, not apart from, but very much a part of, the community.
Can we take these moments, can we take these weeks, leading up to the festival of freedom, to think about the ways we do and do not allow one another to show up “as we are?” The ways that we do and do not allow one another to feel blessed with our inconsistencies, our nonconformities and our imperfections.
Is the Seder table, and everything it represents, only for Harvard grads who look like models and color in the lines?
Do we say and do enough, explicitly, to show the people we love that they are welcome at our table, in our hearts, in our lives - as they are?
I’ve mentioned before that Deanna and I are watching a powerful TV series entitled “Call the Midwife" about a group of midwives serving a working class community in London in the 50’s and 60’s.
Some of them are Anglican nuns. There is a beautiful scene that occurs between two of the older nuns.
One of them - very outspoken and gruff - is quite angry at herself because she made a terrible mistake with lasting consequences. She keeps demeaning herself, saying she can’t believe how stupid she is. The other - a refined woman whose memory is failing but who retains her insight and her humanity - is in the kitchen with her gruff friend, whom she spars with occasionally, watching her wash the dishes.
The gruff nun breaks a dish and starts to cry and yells out, “I am useless!! Absolutely useless!!”
And her friend says to her, "You know, I never liked these dishes very much. In fact I wouldn’t care if you broke every last one of them. Whereas you are infinitely precious to me.”
If, intentionally or inadvertently, we are telling the people we love that we don’t value them as they are, we should rethink the message we are sending.
To our loved ones of all shapes and sizes and capacities and inclinations and phases in their journeys, how we can convey that they, we, all of us, are infinitely precious as we are?
Originally shared with the Temple Israel of Great Neck community on April 6, 2019.
Passover Haggadah Graphic Novel, Gorfinkel and Zadok, 2019
What messages does all this send to the students? First of all, that honesty is optional. If it works, be honest; if not, don’t. But another problematic message that is sent to these students is, you’re not ok as you are. "As you are" isn’t good enough. In order to satisfy other people’s expectations, you have to pretend to be what you’re not.
Two weeks before Passover, I want to challenge us to think about the following. To what degree are we sending the message to people we love that they are not really welcome as they are. That “as they are” isn’t enough or isn’t ok. “As they are” can be, their actual abilities; their actual appearance; their actual sexuality; their actual personality; their actual degree of conformity or noncomfority.
Rabbi Schweber and I recently attended a fascinating presentation by the creators of a new Haggadah, a graphic Haggadah. Graphic as in “graphic novel,” telling the story of the Haggadah through comics.
It’s an amazing Haggadah. I’ve used it in my youth house class and will continue to use it and I suggest you go on line and check it out. It was created by Jordan B. Gorfinkel and Erez Zadok, with Rabbi Burt Visotzky serving as consultant.
There’s so much here. So many details that would take many, many hours to unpack. One fascinating element is how the Haggada depicts the four children and specifically the rasha, the so-called wicked or rebellious child.
The Haggadah describes a conversation between the rebellious child and his mom. The rebellious child asks, what does all of this mean to you? The mom says, since you exclude yourself, I’m here to tell you that had you been in Egypt, you would not have been redeemed.
The depiction of this is absolutely terrifying. The Israelites are almost done walking through the pathway through the sea. The water is about to close in. Two Egyptian soldiers are holding onto the boy, preventing him from walking through with his family and with the community, and as he is about to be drowned, he looks absolutely terrified.
But that’s not the end. The artists continue to include this boy in the rest of the Haggadah. In some pictures he’s making faces; in others, he’s listening to what’s going on or participating in what’s going on. In one picture, the mother has her arm around him and is explaining something to him.
And then you get to the page that’s one of the essential passages in the Haggadah. In every generation, each person needs to see him or herself as having left Egypt.
The artists decided to draw this as follows. A whole line of people crossing through the sea, ancient and modern, some well-known figures, many not well-known, all ages, all races. If you look carefully you see that surrounding the picture is an iPhone case. And you realize that someone is actually taking a selfie of himself and the entire group leaving Egypt.
Who is taking the selfie? Who is at the front of the long line of people being redeemed, on their way to the promised land? That same boy. The one who asked the uncomfortable question at the seder. Not only is he being redeemed, he’s leading the pack.
The illustrators are doing midrash through art. They are showing the redemption of the rasha. He does get redeemed. In some respects he leads the redemption. And he joyfully, playfully depicts himself as part of the community, party of that redemption.
Thankfully the mother kept him around. Despite her frustration, she didn’t throw him out of the house. She allowed him to show up, and to hang around, “As he is” with the understanding that he is a work in progress.
She gave him the structure and the support to find his own way and he did find his own way, not apart from, but very much a part of, the community.
Can we take these moments, can we take these weeks, leading up to the festival of freedom, to think about the ways we do and do not allow one another to show up “as we are?” The ways that we do and do not allow one another to feel blessed with our inconsistencies, our nonconformities and our imperfections.
Is the Seder table, and everything it represents, only for Harvard grads who look like models and color in the lines?
Do we say and do enough, explicitly, to show the people we love that they are welcome at our table, in our hearts, in our lives - as they are?
I’ve mentioned before that Deanna and I are watching a powerful TV series entitled “Call the Midwife" about a group of midwives serving a working class community in London in the 50’s and 60’s.
Some of them are Anglican nuns. There is a beautiful scene that occurs between two of the older nuns.
One of them - very outspoken and gruff - is quite angry at herself because she made a terrible mistake with lasting consequences. She keeps demeaning herself, saying she can’t believe how stupid she is. The other - a refined woman whose memory is failing but who retains her insight and her humanity - is in the kitchen with her gruff friend, whom she spars with occasionally, watching her wash the dishes.
The gruff nun breaks a dish and starts to cry and yells out, “I am useless!! Absolutely useless!!”
And her friend says to her, "You know, I never liked these dishes very much. In fact I wouldn’t care if you broke every last one of them. Whereas you are infinitely precious to me.”
If, intentionally or inadvertently, we are telling the people we love that we don’t value them as they are, we should rethink the message we are sending.
To our loved ones of all shapes and sizes and capacities and inclinations and phases in their journeys, how we can convey that they, we, all of us, are infinitely precious as we are?
Originally shared with the Temple Israel of Great Neck community on April 6, 2019.
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