I want to frame our discussion this morning first by acknowledging our collective pain. And yet, I want to be very careful, because I want you to see that we are not the only ones hurting. When people hurt, they make choices that are destructive in general, or self destructive. And it is with that in mind that I want you to open your hearts and your minds.
Brazilians, back in Brazil, have no idea how America's democracy works.We always assume that all democracies look like ours - you vote and each vote counts and that's it. I was deeply surprised when, once I arrived and began paying attention to how American politics work - I was surprised by how for politicians getting to power was basically a chess game. Get the states that are big numbers in the electoral votes and one becomes the president. Back then it struck me as unfair: who is taking care of the states that are small, if everyone is only looking at the big states? But, I was told, this is America and this is how it works, there are good reasons for this system. It works. Until, of course, those who cannot feel that they are being seen or heard or taken care of, those who end up in pain, cannot take it anymore and make a choice. A choice that for us is unthinkable. A choice that looks like putting Nero in charge of the Roman fire department.
But for those who have been fighting the good fight for decades, and loosing the fight for decades, loosing jobs, loosing their rural communities - some like Seneca, in Nebraska; if you haven't listened to the Radiolab podcast on it you should - loosing hope of a better life or of the same life that they had for their kids - it is a choice that makes sense. Don't call them names, don't say they are crazy, or evil.
Of course, the electoral college system helped those who wanted to get to power and could feel their chance just simmering underneath, and were good at playing the game. They knew where to go the days before the election, so people would feel seen and heard - and vote for them.
And I know some of you are already angry with me for acknowledging that people in pain make destructive choices. And here I want to remind ourselves that you and I are also in pain. And people in pain can make destructive choices. Hold that for a moment.
I also want to tell you that one of my loves in the secular studies is Linguistics, and inside Linguistics a small branch called semiotics - semeodiks. That branch studies signs, symbols, how we process them and how they effect communication. And it is a fascinating area because it marries the visual arts and language. We all know that "one picture is worth a thousand words" - but semeodiks affirms that one picture and a few words are more powerful than a million words. A good TV shot and a few words can tell you an enormous amount about the feelings and communication.
It was with that training that I watched the last few presidential campaigns in the US. And I want to point out that the last three have had an increasing messianic component, a focus on one figure who would change it all. This is true of both campaigns of the current president and of the newly elected one. I am not criticising it.I am not supporting it. I am just pointing it out.
We know that in a democracy there is no one person doing it all - but the expectation is still there. And when the promises of change and hope did not fully materialize for those outside of the financial and technological hubs, they voted for the next one who promised to do it. And yes, you can blame whoever is to be blamed. The sheer fact remains that people felt forgotten, and in pain. And people in pain can make destructive choices.We know that people feeling pain and feeling the anger that comes with feeling pan will look for someone to blame, and given a few choices, will take them, above and beyond logic or thought.
Messianism is a remarkably powerful force. For Jews and Judaism it has always been destructive - we have no time today to go into the destruction and chaos caused by Shabbatai Tzvi and Jacob Frank. The Lubavitcher rebbe is the one messianic Jewish figure that actually accomplished construction, but he did it because he did not affirm himself to be the messiah - others did, and many still hold by that assumption, that the Rebbe was the Messiah, in different degrees. BUT most liberal Jews - if we think about messianism at all, do not expect one person to come and redeem the world. But other do, and they voted for a messianic figure - not for a figure who was capable and a hard worker, but for a figure that promised to change it all for the best. Again, I am not supporting or condemning, I am point out what it looks like from my perch.
What is our part, you ask. What can we do? I have the same questions. I went to look where I always go when I am in pain, and when the world looks crazy. I went to Torah. Because, of course, I want to remind you of this: whenever things got rough for our people, whenever the unthinkable happened, we always looked for Torah to be our compass. Our moral compass. Our meaning compass. No matter what happened to us, Torah has always been our center. And it is with all this in mind that I want to share a few texts with you, not necessarily to give you comfort, but to give you perspective.
Why does God chose Abraham? That is a Torah mystery. Abraham shows up in the Torah completely neutral. Check our source number 1.
Completely unremarkable. The Torah then begins our portion, Lech Lecha, with God just turning to Avram and speaking. Why?We have no idea. plenty of midrashim have been written about it. Our second source is one of these, and it is probably my favorite among these midrashim that look for an explanation.
(א) "וַיֹּאמֶר ה' אֶל אַבְרָם לֶךְ לְךָ מֵאַרְצְךָ וְגוֹ'" ר' יצחק פתח (תהלים מה, יא ): "שִׁמְעִי בַת וּרְאִי וְהַטִּי אָזְנֵךְ וְשִׁכְחִי עַמֵּךְ וּבֵית אָבִיךָ" אמר רבי יצחק משל לאחד שהיה עובר ממקום למקום וראה בירה אחת דולקת אמר תאמר שהבירה זו בלא מנהיג הציץ עליו בעל הבירה אמר לו אני הוא בעל הבירה כך לפי שהיה אבינו אברהם אומר תאמר שהעולם הזה בלא מנהיג הציץ עליו הקב"ה ואמר לו אני הוא בעל העולם (יב): "וְיִתְאָו הַמֶּלֶךְ יָפְיֵךְ כִּי הוּא אֲדוֹנַיִךְ" "וְיִתְאָו הַמֶּלֶךְ יָפְיֵךְ" ליפותיך בעולם "וְהִשְׁתַּחֲוִי לוֹ" הוי "וַיֹּאמֶר ה' אֶל אַבְרָם לך לך וגו'":
(1) (1) Ad-nai said to Abram, "Go you forth from your land…" … Rabbi Yitzchak said: this may be compared to a man who was traveling from place to place when he saw a bira doleket/castle aglow/ castle lit up (can mean both full of light or in flames). He said, "Is it possible that this castle lacks a person to look after it? The owner of the building looked out and said, “I am the owner of the castle.” Similarly, because Abraham our father said, “Is it possible that this castle has no guide, no one to look after i?"The Holy Blessed One looked out and said to him, “I am the Master of the Universe.” … Hence, God said to Avraham, Lech Lecha.
Birah doleket – I left the two possible meanings of the words there for you. As a good semiotics student tells you, the entire midrash hangs on those two words. One definition: “a palace aglow, full of light” and someone is tending to it. In other words, Abram sees the beauty, the order, the coherence of the world and of life, and knew there was a HIgher Counciousness behind it all. God was taking care of the world. And that moment brings God's words.
The second possibility paints an enormously different picture: “a palace in flames”. The world is in chaos, catching fire, turmoil, and pain abound. Where is the caretaker?! asks Avram. The world will be destroyed! It is out of destruction that God's words come to Avram, as if to say: 'I am here even in the destruction.'
When I first encountered this midrash, my teacher opted by the second reading, and he said that all Jews are called to come and try to put out the flames. He was talking about Jews that make a choice of being Jewish, and his words were "if someone sees the world in fire, and comes with their bucket, are we turning them away?" It so happens that we see a world catching fire right in front of our eyes. Are we coming with our buckets OR are we pretending not to see the fire?
In that sense it is obvious why the Torah keeps the reason of Abram's being chosen secret: Abram can be any of us. Each of us is called to help change things. In that sense, this source is fully messianic - redemption is possible, and it is in yearning and activelly hastening redemption that we meet the Holy One. BUT there is no messiah - alone, a person does not accomplish anything. The only possible messiah is each and every one of us.
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, writes in God in Search of Man, that is your third source: “There are those who sense the ultimate question in moments of wonder, in moments of joy; there are those who sense the ultimate question in moments of horror, in moments of despair. It is both the grandeur and the misery of living that makes man sensitive to the ultimate question.”
“There are those who sense the ultimate question in moments of wonder, in moments of joy; there are those who sense the ultimate question in moments of horror, in moments of despair. It is both the grandeur and the misery of living that makes man sensitive to the ultimate question.” Abraham Joshua Heschel, God in Search of Man, p. 367
What we cannot do is to shrug and say - I have nothing to do with this. Because we live in a democracy, and I told you enough times that we need to make our voices heard. That we are obligated to do so, with respect for others who hold different views than we do. Because we all are made in the image of God, as we talked about before. Because indifference is the opposite of life, and silence helps those who would commit terrible things to just do it, as Elie Wiesel wrote so powerfully, sources number 4 and 5.
The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of beauty is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, but indifference between life and death. Indifference, to me, is the epitome of evil. Elie Wiesel, US News & World Report (27 October 1986)
And then I explain to him how naïve we were, that the world did know and remained silent. And that is why I swore never to be silent whenever wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must - at that moment - become the center of the universe.
Elie Wiesel, Nobel Prize acceptance speech, 1986
When the world is catching fire, this is the time to listen to the small, quiet voice that reminds us to have hope, to do what is just, to be extra moral and extra compassionate, to go out of our way to try to stand together with those that are harassed, oppressed and attacked.
Do not let your pain blind you and enable you to be destructive in your actions or your speech. Do not let despair take over and not act.
We can do small things: call your Muslim friend, if you have one; or an immigrant friend if you have one, or a homosexual one if you have one. If you don't, go out of your way to make such a friend. Protest when you see Hispanics or other minorities being singled out for bullying. Sign petitions.
Remember - a little light takes away a lot of darkness.
There is no messiah. No one will come to save us from ourselves. There is just you and I, there is just us - and we will be enough.
Dear God
Please give the current President and the next President the wisdom and courage to guide the United States of America with fairness and kindness, and to help keep all of us safe and secure.
Please give all of us the wisdom and courage to remember that while the President of the United States is an extremely powerful person, there is something even more powerful: our voice of moral conscience.
When we come in Your name, when we speak truth to power, then it is we who are the mighty and the powerful.
May we never forget or compromise on the core values that we hold dear.
And so may it be Your will!
by Rabbi Shmuel Hertzberg