Many Waze to Join the Story

I got back from a week in Israel a few days ago and I’m going to reflect on that but first I want to share something that happened to me a few weeks before I went.

Platform for Egalitarian Prayer at the Kotel

I had finished officiating at a funeral and got in my car to drive from the chapel to the cemetery ahead of the funeral procession.  While in the HOV lane of the Long Island Expressway, I saw the tire air pressure light go on and heard noises.  For no great reason I decided to ignore both indications until the noises grew significantly louder.  I then pulled all the way over to the shoulder, got out and realized one of my tires was completely shredded almost down to the rim. 

After I called the hearse driver, after the entire funeral procession pulled over so he could pick me up, after the sad burial, after I called AAA, after a very nice AAA guy came to replace the tire with the donut, after I called an auto shop in Great Neck, I plugged the address of the auto shop into Waze, the awesome GPS app pioneered by Israelis that tracks traffic, police activity and stalled vehicles and could probably also order you a felafel on the way.

As I prepared to leave the shoulder, the automated narrator on Waze said, in her characteristically measured tone, “stalled vehicle on the side of the road.”

I know this may sound strange to you, but I got a little nachas when I heard that.  I was like, “wow, that’s me!  I’m the stalled vehicle!”   I mean, I’ve always heard about other stalled vehicles but I’ve never actually BEEN the stalled vehicle.  She was talking about me, by golly.  I was a part of the story.

I hope you’ll forgive the somewhat unconventional introduction to my topic. 

Inflated or deflated, streamlined or sidelined, we want to feel like we’re part of the story.

        Minha with colleagues in a park opposite the Shalom Hartman Institute

For a Jewish person, the need to feel part of the Jewish story is larger than we tend to imagine and we often rush to critique people's motivations before we try to understand them.  

I’d like to share a few examples from my recent, brief time in Israel that illustrate the intense, creative approaches that Jews of a variety of backgrounds, with a variety of ideological perspectives, are using to help them feel authentically a part of the Jewish story.

First example.  I spent my time as part of a cohort of rabbis studying, praying, discussion, schmoozing at the Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, a creative, pluralistic organization seeking to transform Jewish life. 

We Don't Need Pied Pipers

When schools or houses of worship are looking for someone to work with their children – teachers or principals, for example  - you’ll hear people say, “We want to find a pied piper.”  

What they usually mean by that is, someone charismatic who will inspire children.   When we think of the “pied piper,” we imagine someone playing a flute and all the children are mesmerized and following behind.

The actual story is quite a bit darker.  There are several versions of it that originate in medieval Germany but the gist of the story is that a man is hired by a village that is overrun by rats to get rid of the rats.  He starts to play the flute, all the rats are attracted and mesmerized by the sound of the music, they follow behind the man.  He leads them to a river where they all drown.

The mayor of the village doesn’t "pay the piper."  He reneges on the original agreement.  So the piper seeks revenge.  He plays a different tune on his flute which attracts all of the children, who line up behind him and skip along.  In one version he leads them to a cave, in another into a river, but they are never heard from again.

Charisma is a quality that we often associate with leadership and a quality that we like to see in our leaders whether they are working with adults or children – who wants a shleppy leader?   Appropriately channeled, it can be a positive part of successful leadership.  But charisma can be dangerous.  And I would argue that it should not be the primary quality we look for when we consider leadership.

Online and print media have been abuzz with discussion about Marc Gafni, a spiritual leader who first received Orthodox ordination and subsequently was ordained by the Renewal movement. 

Changing Unhealthy Patterns

I imagine you have heard the joke I’m about to share, but please bear with me since I’m sharing it for a higher purpose...

Joan lives at home and has been looking for the right man to marry, but time after time it doesn’t work out because her parents don’t approve of whomever she brings home.  She goes to her friend for advice, the friend says – “Joan, find someone just like your father and bring him home for dinner.”  Which Joan does.

The next day, Joan’s friend asks how it went and Joan says,  “It was terrible.”  “What happened?”  “Well,” Joan says, “My father loved him.”  “So what was the problem?” her friend wonders.  And Joan says, “Unfortunately, my mother couldn’t stand him.”

In case you were wondering what happens when you Google “marrying someone like you father,” now you know...

To a large extent, for a host of reasons, we tend to maintain the same patterns of behavior, generation after generation.  Even when we want to act differently, even when we are convinced that we should make changes, we tend to replicate certain patterns. 

Suppose we truly want to make progress?  Suppose we recognize that we absolutely must address areas that are problematic?

The extended narrative we’ve been reading in the Book of Genesis about several generations in the life of a family may be instructive.  This is a family has had its share of tsorres, its share of aggravation.  

Murillo, "Joseph and his Brethren," c. 1670

And it also has an array of interesting personality traits and patterns.

This is a family that keeps secrets, where people aren’t always truthful to one another, where people keep animosity inside until it ruptures and causes them to act in treacherous ways, where siblings compete with one another with results that are often tragic.

That’s certainly true of the generation of Jacob.  And what about the children, Joseph and company?  Perhaps not surprisingly, you see some of the same traits.

But the book of Genesis offers the possibility that the current generation can break free of some of the negative patterns of the previous generation and also maintain the positive.  

An Important and (Sadly) Controversial Visit

Naftali Bennett’s recent visit to the Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan was eagerly anticipated by the entire school community.  After considerable planning, Bennett, who serves as Israel’s Minister of Education and Minister of Diaspora Affairs, spent several hours at the Schechter School on December 1. 

Minister Bennett visiting the Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan on December 1, 2015

I received a full description of the planning and the actual event from my wife Deanna, who is the school's coordinator of learning support and serves on its Educational Leadership Team.  Among other things, Bennett had conversations with middle school students and adults and shared stories and songs with the entire school.  A video showed him sitting on the floor with the children and singing along to some popular Israeli tunes.

That same day, along with the video, Bennett tweeted the following message, in Hebrew, to his approximately forty thousand followers:  “Meeting with the students of the wonderful Conservative Solomon Schechter School in New York.  Such love of Israel.  Such love of Judaism.”

Naftali Bennett, who personally identifies as Modern Orthodox, had unabashedly revealed the school’s affiliation and indicated how impressed he was.  Deanna informed me that the students and parents were likewise impressed by Bennett’s down to earth manner and ability to engage.  So far, so good.

Subsequently, however, several people castigated Bennett for having visited the school.  Among his critics was Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi David Lau.  According to Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Rabbi Lau said in a radio interview,  “you should not go to a place that explicitly belongs to groups that you know don’t respect klal yisrael (the Community of Israel).” 

In response, Naftali Bennett’s office issued the following statement: “Minister Bennett believes that public leaders in Israel need to bring Jews closer and not alienate them, and he views comments that alienate rather than bringing people closer with major concern.”

I especially appreciated a letter written to Rabbi Lau by Daniel Labovitz, former president of the school, in which he wrote, “You insulted me directly and personally, Rabbi, when you said that this school, of which I was president for four years, and which has educated both of my sons to love Israel, explicitly belongs to groups that you know don’t respect klal yisrael.  You insulted me directly and personally, Rabbi, when you said that my son, who sat next to Minister Bennett on the floor and sang, "yachad, lev el lev niftach b'tikva,” (“together, we will open each other’s hearts with hope”) doesn't respect klal yisrael.  You insult me personally because two of the graduates of Schechter Manhattan are currently serving in the IDF, defending klal yisrael, something that most of the Haredi men their age aren't doing.”

On Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we sing the prayer, hayom t’gadleinu.  Today, make us larger.  On Hanukkah, we follow the opinion of Hillel by increasing the number of candles we light each night so that we can increase holiness in the world.  How sad that Rabbi Lau chooses to reduce rather than enlarge, to be incapable of seeing an abundance of holiness even when it is coursing through the hearts and souls of children and the adults who love and guide them.

Fortunately Naftali Bennett knows better, and so do we.  At the Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan, at Temple Israel of Great Neck and at numerous other places across the globe, we understand that there are multiple paths toward embracing the beauty of our heritage and enhancing the glory of klal yisrael. 

Originally written for the Temple Israel Voice, December 18, 2015 edition

Where Everyone is Really Welcome: a Vision for Temple Israel of Great Neck

Thousands of years ago, our ancestors told a story about a man who was afraid to reunite with his brother after a rift that had occurred several decades prior.  He took a variety of precautions, sent his family along ahead of himself, and was left all alone.  Another man appeared and struggled with him until dawn. 

 Jacob Wrestling with the Angel by Marc Chagall

These moments in the life of our patriarch Jacob, moments of isolation and struggle, are not hidden from us.  They were described and recorded and, not only that, they became essential to his identity and to his new name, Israel, ישראל Yisra’el.

Which became the name for the nation, ישראל yisra’el, who are known as בני ישראל b’nei yisra’el, the children of Israel.

I have some questions for all of us on this beautiful Shabbat morning of Thanksgiving weekend. 

Given that our ancestor was Yisrael – who struggled, prevailed, complained and prevailed again.  And that our people bear his name.  And that our synagogue bears his name.  

Why do we exert so much energy pretending that everything is just fine when it’s not?  

Why are our synagogues, this one included, places where by and large people feel uncomfortable sharing anything beyond, “I’m fine, thank you”?

Why is it that in 2015, people whose life circumstances are other than happily married with high-achieving children sometimes wonder if they are fully welcomed here and in other synagogues?

How did the children of Israel – tormented dreamer and struggler, Israel who has good days and lousy days, Israel who sometimes supports his children and sometimes messes up spectacularly with regard to his children, Israel whose roller-coaster of a life is captured in unflinching detail in our Torah, Israel who is asked at the end of his life how he’s doing and says, “badly, thank you for asking” – how did the children of Israel come to believe that they are being measured, explicitly or implicitly, against certain narrow expectations and that they have to come into God’s house appearing to have it all together even when they don’t?

It’s exhausting.  It’s debilitating.  And the craziest part of it is that it isn’t even authentic to our tradition.

The Power of Expectation

Ellen Langer was a young psychology professor at Harvard in 1981 when she conducted an experiment that would become highly influential in her field.

Professor Ellen Langer, Harvard University

She took two groups of men in their 70’s and 80’s to a rustic hotel.  The first group was told that they were going to spend a few days reminiscing about the 1950’s, which they did – they talked, they laughed, they remembered.

The second group, which came a week later, was told to spend a few days inhabiting the 1950’s – in other words, to actually relive life as their younger selves.  This was accomplished in concrete ways.  For example, the second group, unlike the first, was told to bring their own luggage to their rooms rather than have porters take it. 

Both groups were measured for physical and cognitive function before and after their stay at the hotel.

There was a noticeable difference between the two groups at the end of their respective stays.  The group that inhabited their earlier lives were significantly more energetic and capable than the other group.  They were more boisterous and more lively.  

While waiting for the bus following their stay, they broke out into a game of touch football which they said they hadn’t played in years.

Ellen Langer’s experiment, shared recently with a group of clergy by Dr. David Pelcovitz of Yeshiva University, demonstrated, more dramatically than she even imagined, the power of expectation.  The men who were expected to act youthfully quickly came to expect that of themselves.  They didn’t fully regain the dynamism of their youth but they were far more agile than they had been and more agile than those in the other group.

In our concern for not overwhelming people, for allowing people latitude and freedom, for not imposing on people, we may be going overboard by failing to hold, and to convey, sufficiently high expectations.

I'd like to unpack the dynamics of expectations, starting with the Torah and then encouraging us to consider how high expectations, appropriately conveyed, can have a positive impact on others, as well as on ourselves.

Walking Together: The Challenge and Joy of Parenting Adult Children

Recently I was chatting with someone.  He told me what his children were up to.  He asked what my children were up to.  

I started by telling him what our oldest was up to – that he’s been working in a vineyard in Vermont, involved in the growing of the grapes and the making of the wine.  I didn’t get to our other children.

He said, “So you’re letting him do that?”

I wasn’t sure what he meant exactly, so I asked for clarification.

He said, “I guess you figure your son is still young, he needs to get this out of his system, so you’re letting him explore it before he settles down.”

I thought his comments were curious and I tried to unpack what might have been some of the assumptions behind what was said.  Here are three that I came up with:

An assumption that certain types of work are more worthy of support than others.

An assumption that I as the parent would not approve of the type of work my son is doing.

An assumption that even if I didn’t approve of it, I would or could stop him from doing it.

I’ll get back to my son - the vibrant Vermont vintner - eventually.

I want to reflect this morning on the extent to which parents impose their visions and aspirations onto their children.