Are We Trying Hard Enough? The Essential Yom Kippur Question

The morning back in high school that I took the SAT’s, I packed my number 2 pencils and was about to leave the house when my mother said to me, “Remember.  All you can do is the best you can do.”

She said that to me numerous times as I was growing up.  Before tests.  Before I went onstage to act in a show.  On my wedding day…

All you can do is the best you can do.

Sometimes the comment made me more nervous.  Though overall it was a helpful thing to hear and I think my mother said it because she wanted me to understand that the most important measure of my success was the knowledge that I’d done my best.

However, with enormous respect for my mother, may she rest in peace, I’m going to begin my comments by modifying hers a bit and encouraging us to evaluate ourselves using what I believe is a more effective measure.

Truth is, not every situation calls for “the best we can do.” 

When our kids were growing up and we would get dinner ready, we realized it didn’t have to be our best.  It just had to be reasonably nutritious and something they would eat. We knew we could do “better,” but with all of the other competing priorities we chose not to.  We didn’t aspire to be Wolfgang Puck while we were making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for their school lunches. 

When we cleaned up at the end of the day we realized we didn’t have to do our best.  We just had to make sure it was neat enough and we determined what neat enough was.

On arguably the holiest day of the year, when we’re supposed to take a look at ourselves, and a look at the world, and ask appropriate self-reflective questions about how we relate to the world, I propose the following question that we can ask today, and all year long, about different situations.

Are we trying hard enough? 

In each realm of our lives, the mundane and the unusual, the individual and the societal, are we trying hard enough?

Open Our Hearts - A Plea for the New Year

At the end of the Amidah, which is part of our daily prayer, we each say the words:

פתח לבי P’tah libi.

Dear God – Open my heart.

Why do we have to pray for this?

Why don’t we just do it?  

A 6 year old boy named Alex who lives in Westchester sent a letter to the president of the United States.  He had seen the picture of a 5-year old boy sitting in an ambulance in Aleppo, wiping blood off of his face, a picture many of us have seen.  Alex wrote to the president that he wants the boy to come live with his family.  Alex wrote that he is prepared to share his toys with the boy.  He ended the letter by saying, “We will give him a family and he will be our brother.”

It’s very inspiring to hear about the pure open-heartedness of a 6-year old boy.  A boy who is ready to open his home, his toy box, and his heart to someone roughly his age.

But our view of things gets more complicated as we grow into adolescence and adulthood.   We experience fear again and again.  We experience disappointment again and again. 

We understand how complicated situations are socially and politically.

Our expectations lie unfulfilled.   Our hearts get broken.

And little by little, in different situations, over time, our hearts harden – they close up. 

So maybe that’s why we each pray to God ptah libi – open my heart – because we wish our hearts could remain open despite all of the internal and external forces that can keep our hearts rigid and closed.  And because it’s not so easy to keep our hearts open.

It is truly understandable for us to harden our hearts in so many situations.  We are often perfectly justified in being suspicious, or wary, or fed up. 

At the beginning of this New Year, I want to explore some of the political and personal reasons why we harden our hearts.  And I also want to explore why and how and in what situations we should strive to keep our hearts open.  Long past the relative innocence of childhood, can we face the world as it is, can we face life as it is, with hearts that remain appropriately open?  I hope so. 

Beware the Online Megaphone: in Defense of Research and Conversation Before Hitting Send

By mid-July of this year a colleague and friend of mine found himself in the midst of considerable controversy.  His name is Rabbi Neil Blumofe and you may have read about him in the Jewish Week and elsewhere on-line.

He is the rabbi of a thriving Conservative synagogue in Austin.  He was planning an Israel trip to include a local interfaith group he’s involved with as well as interested members of his congregantion. 

To plan the trip he turned to an organization called Mejdi, which was founded by an Israeli and a Palestinian with the objective of providing a dual narrative approach to travel.  Mejdi has planned trips for organizations that include the Hartman Institute and AIPAC.

The organization forwarded a tentative itinerary to Rabbi Blumofe for his consideration and Rabbi Blumofe held a meeting with congregants who expressed interest in the trip. 

The proposed itinerary included an overnight stay at a settlement and a meeting with the rosh yeshiva there, a discussion with a women's rights advocacy group in Haifa and numerous other items.  The proposed itinerary item that became quite controversial was a stop at the grave of Yasser Arafat.  The idea of it, as explained to Rabbi Blumofe, was to use that stop as a context for presenting various Palestinian narratives about Arafat and the PLO.

Rabbi Blumofe found that the guide that the Palestinian guide from MEJDI that he spoke with, and was hoping would help lead the trip, actually was very critical of Arafat and the PLO.   Rabbi Blumofe did not respond to any of the proposed items, wanting the entire itinerary to be discussed by those who were interested in the trip.

Rabbi Blumofe told a reporter for the Times of Israel that when he met with interested congregants on June 30 no one mentioned anything about the visit to Arafat’s grave.

A congregant of Rabbi Blumofe’s wrote a letter to him questioning his judgment and calling for his resignation.“To me, it’s no different than were you to travel to Germany to pay your respects at Adolf Hitler’s tomb, if one existed,” he wrote in his letter to Blumofe, adding that it was “time for you to resign. Depart and let us be done with you. In name of G-d, go!”

Rabbi Blumofe offered to meet with this congregant and the congregant refused.  The congregant wrote letters to major Austin philanthropists, including one who donated the property on which the synagogue and other Jewish institutions are located.  Statements were circulated on the internet including an open letter to Rabbi Blumofe calling for his termination, accusing him of helping to promote modern blood libels against Israel and world Jewry, and calling for termination of his rights to visit Israel.

Over the past 4 years I’ve gotten to know Rabbi Blumofe well.  He is a creative, compassionate, intelligent rabbi and an ardent supporter of Israel.  Within and beyond his congregation, he has succeeded masterfully in deepening and elevating the way people approach Judaism and Israel.

I personally think that a trip to Arafat’s grave is so loaded, so problematic, that whatever intentions you might have can easily be undercut by your symbolic presence there.  And Rabbi Blumofe himself has identified the problems involved with such a visit.

However.  What troubles me is that people assume intention before they ascertain intention.  What troubles me is that people mount campaigns before they do research.  What troubles me is that given the amplifying capacity of social media – people in the public eye but anyone, frankly – any one of us – can be tried and convicted without being given the opportunity to say a word.

That’s not the way it’s supposed to be, certainly not according to Jewish tradition going back to its Biblical roots.  

No More Sarcasm - Just Like That

In the scene from “The Frisco Kid” that has been frequently circulated on social media since the death of Gene Wilder a few weeks ago, the Polish rabbi, played by Wilder, is asked by a Native American chief if his god can make it rain. 

Gene Wilder and Val Bisoglio, "The Frisco Kid"

“He can do ANYTHING!”  Exclaims the rabbi.

“Then why can’t he make rain?” Asks the chief.

“Because He doesn’t make rain.  He gives us strength when we’re suffering.  He gives us compassion when all that we feel is hatred.

“He gives us courage when we’re searching around blindly like little mice in the darkness.   BUT HE DOESN’T MAKE RAIN.”

All of a sudden a clap of thunder is heard and it starts to pour. 

“Of course,” says the rabbi, “sometimes - just like that - He’ll change his mind.”

Today is Rosh Hodesh Elul.  During this month we are supposed to make a very special effort at heshbon hanefesh – looking at ourselves, wondering what we’re doing right, what we’re doing wrong, what changes we might like to make.

It’s interesting that we’re not asked during this month to try to understand God better.   But I do think that there’s a marvelous teaching that helps us to understand what God’s role might be in helping us to look within and do what’s right.

It’s expressed in the very first verse of Parashat Re'eh – ראה אנכי נותן לפניכם היום ברכה וקללה re’ei anokhi noten lif’nekhhem hayom brakha uk’lala – today I set before you a blessing and a curse. 

The verse establishes a framework for honoring and challenging our capacity to choose how we live our lives.  So here we are, beginning the month that leads right into Rosh Hashanah, and I want us to get off on the right foot.  I'm going to get philosophical and practical.  

I want us to think about what needs to go on inside of us in order for us to make positive changes.  In a moment I will use an issue I personally have started to work on as an example.

Pray for My Father

On Monday, August 22, I joined with a group of rabbis for a condolence call.  It was the first condolence call I'd paid to a Muslim family. 

On August 13, Maulama Akonjee, an imam in the Bangladeshi community in Ozone Park, was shot and killed, along with his associate, Thara Uddin, while walking home from religious services dressed in religious garb.

The New York Board of Rabbis (NYBR), which I serve as an officer, contacted the family and asked if they could bring a group of clergy – rabbis and Christian clergy as well – to offer condolences, and the family agreed.

So I drove to the family’s house and stood outside with the other clergy until we were ushered in.  We sat in the living room.  Two of the imam’s sons came out to sit with us, accompanied by other family members, one of whom helped with translation.  (The imam’s sons came to New York from Bangladesh just a few years ago and their English is not yet fully fluent.)

The sons sat quietly as several of the clergy, including NYBR Executive Director Rabbi Joe Potasnik, spoke.   When asked, the sons told a bit about their father – that he was a peaceful man, that he wanted his community to commit themselves to regular prayer and good deeds.

Rabbi Joe Potasnik with a group of clergy at the Akonjee home

A representative from the NYPD, a Muslim, chanted verses in Arabic that are traditionally recited in a house of mourning.  Rabbi Angela Warnick Buchdahl, senior rabbi of Central Synagogue in Manhattan and also a cantor, led us in the singing of the 23^rd psalm.  Rabbi Avi Weiss of the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale offered a blessing to the imam’s sons.   The oldest son said it was the first time he had spoken with a group of Jews. 

As we were about to leave, we each had the opportunity to offer personal condolences to the sons.  I said a few words to the oldest son.  He offered me a hug and he said quietly, “pray for my father.”

Justice Includes Jews: Thoughts About Black Lives Matter, Jews and Justice

I want to talk about the recent Black Lives Matter statements about Israel for two reasons:  First, this is an issue many of us have been reading about, and are likely passionate about.  Second, it challenges us to navigate a complex political dynamic, to oppose injustice toward others while also insuring justice for ourselves.

Here are some relevant facts and some context:

Black Lives Matter  - an organization launched, according to its website, in 2012 - has sought to advocate in multiple realms for just treatment of people of color.  

At the beginning of August 2016, the organization refined and presented a platform that includes several sections, including:  End the war on black people, Reparations, Invest/Divest, Economic justice, Community control and Political power.

Individual elements within these sections include advocacy for universal health care, fighting climate change and a reallocation of funds from policing and incarcation to education, justice services and employment programs. 

In the Invest/divest section is included the topic of cutting military expenditures, in which the United State is criticized for using excessive funds on its military in order to expand territory and power.  

In that topic, under that section, are several statements pertaining to United States support of Israel.   Here’s the one that was deemed most offensive by a wide political spectrum within the Jewish community:

“ The US justifies and advances the global war on terror via its alliance with Israel and is complicit in the genocide taking place against the Palestinian people.” 

Some more context.  Numerous Jewish leaders have worked with the Black Lives Matter movement to protest unfair treatment of African Americans in this country.

Most Jewish organizations, right-wing to left, including those who have collaborated with the Black Lives Matter movement, were angered by these statements and for very good reason.  The statements are distorted, false and incendiary.  Several Jews of color have criticized the platform for being anti-Semitic.  Rabbis across the political spectrum have denounced the statements.

I saw some attempts to defend the statement about genocide on the basis that the authors were using the word differently, to indicate extreme discrimination rather than wholesale murder, but neither that nor any other interpretations were satisfactory to most Jewish leaders, and for good reason. 

Along with the vast majority of Jewish leaders, I say unequivocally that to call the treatment of Palestinians by Israelis a genocide is libelous and anti-Semitic. 

I want to identify two pitfalls that the Jewish community can fall into, neither of which are acceptable, and a possible third approach.

The Past Won't Shut Up: A Brief Tale of Two European Cities

Toward the end of the fourth book of the Torah, we read once again the long list of places that our ancestors stopped through on their way from Egypt to the promised land.  It’s a part of the Torah that gets us thinking about passing through different places, and a nice backdrop for me to reflect on a few of the places that Deanna and I passed through this summer.

But I’d like this to be more than a travel-log.  What emerged for me, especially in visiting some of the places in Europe that we saw recently, is a sense of the strong pull that the past exerts on the present.  Europe has strong resonance with the past.  You walk the streets of its cities and towns and you get pulled in, and pulled back, and it makes you wonder about how these places will continue to respond to current challenges.

So passing through inevitably leads to looking back as much as it leads to looking around.

And with no further intro, here’s my “tale of two cities."  I will in the future reflect on my time in Israel this summer, but today I’m going to take us to two of several cities that we visited in northern Europe - Copenhagen, Denmark and Berlin, Germany.

We spent a full day in Copenhagen on my birthday, actually.  Beautiful city, resonant with history but also in many ways future-oriented.  A city focused on reducing its collective carbon footprint – far more bicycles than cars in the city center, for example.  A city focused on broadening economic opportunity – universal health care coverage, fully subsidized university tuition. 

Inside the courtyard of Amalienborg Palace in Copenhagen 

We decided to take a walking tour.  The tour-guide was a young Danish man named Magnus who spoke excellent English and was very well-informed.