Can I Kvell?

Eyal with us, moments after changing the position of his tassel!

Yes, Eyal has graduated from high school at American Hebrew Academy!  Now he's enjoying Senior Trip, while we prepare to fly to Australia!


Happy Mother's Day, Jewish Mothers!

It's been a busy week of packing and various set-backs in the process of getting ready to move; therefore I didn't have a chance to write and post a D'var Torah this past week.  Of course, there was also much fodder for thought with the interesting turns of US and Colorado politics; perhaps we'll get to it a bit this coming week, but don't count on it! :-)

In the meantime, I couldn't let Mother's Day get past without offering a bit of Jewish Mother humor; enjoy!

...The Jewish mother took her young son to the beach at Coney Island.  As they were standing at the water's edge, a wave came along and swept the boy out into the ocean.  The mother became hysterical, then she looked heavenward and began beseeching G-d to return her son.

"I'll be more religious!" she declared. "I'll light candles every Friday night and keep a kosher home!"

A second wave came along and deposited her soggy son at her feet on the sand.  She looked at him, then again turned her gaze heavenward.

"He had a hat!" she yelled.

...A Jewish mother in Brooklyn decided to prepare her will and make her final requests. She told her rabbi she had two final requests. First, she wanted to be cremated, and second, she wanted her ashes scattered all over the shopping mall.

"Why the shopping mall?" asked the rabbi.

"Then at least I'll be sure my daughters visit me twice a week." 

...A Jewish man is laying on the operating table, about to be operated on by his son, the surgeon. The father says, "Son, think of it this way... If anything happens to me, your mother is coming to live with you."

...Mrs. Goldberg, age 75, went to see a gynecologist for the first time in her life. She was asked to step behind a screen and remove her clothes so the doctor could examine her. At some point during the examination, Mrs. Goldberg said, "Excuse me, doctor, can I ask you a question?"

"Certainly," the doctor replied.
"Tell me," she said. "Your mother knows that from this you make a living?"

...A young Jewish Mother walks her son to the school bus corner on his first day of kindergarten.
" Behave, my bubaleh" she says. "Take good care of yourself and think about your Mother, tataleh!"

" And come right back home on the bus, schein kindaleh."

"Your Mommy loves you a lot, my ketsaleh!"

At the end of the school day the bus comes back and she runs to her son and hugs him.

"So what did my pupaleh learn on his first day of school?"

The boy answers, "I learned my name is David."

What if the following people had had Jewish mothers?

Mona Lisa:  "This you call a smile, after all the money your father and I spent on the orthodontist?"

Chistopher Columbus:  "I don't care what you've discovered, you still should have written!"

Michelangelo:  "Why can't you paint on walls like other children? Do you know how hard it is to get this junk off the ceiling?"

Napoleon:  "All right, if you're not hiding your report card inside your jacket, take your hand out of there and show me!"

Abraham Lincoln:  "Again with the hat! Why can't you wear a baseball cap like the other kids?"

George Washington:  "Next time I catch you throwing money across thePotomac, you can kiss your allowance good-bye!"

Thomas Edison:  "Of course I'm proud that you invented the electric light bulb. Now turn it off and go to sleep!"

Paul Revere:  "I don't care where you think you have to go, young man; midnight is long past your bedtime!"

And then these two, who really did have Jewish mothers:

Albert Einstein:  "But it's your senior photograph! Couldn't you have done something about your hair?"

Moses:  "That's a good story! Now tell me where you've really been for the last forty years."

Yes, there's something special about a Jewish mother; she expresses her love by being overly protective, and she teaches derech eretz through sometimes sarcastic, nagging questions.  We can laugh at them all day.  But at the end of the day, think about the amazing achievements of the Jewish people, and remember that each Jew who made a positive impact on history had a Jewish mother!  So...it's Mother's Day!  Stand up and be proud, Jewish Mothers! 

You Shall Surely Rebuke...

I know, I know...I already posted a d'var Torah for this week's Torah portion!  But after all, we did have a double portion, and Rabbi Mel Glazer at Temple Shalom (Colorado Springs) offered some interesting thoughts that resonated with me.  So, beshem omro, let me offer them here...

In Parashat Kedoshim, Leviticus 19.16-17, we're told not to be a gossipmonger among our people lest we stand aside while another's blood is shed. (The reference is that destroying a person's reputation by gossiping about them is akin to stealing their good name, which in turn is almost like murdering them.)  The Torah then tells us that we must rebuke our fellow.  The word rebuke is stated twice, hoche'ach toche'ach.  The traditional rabbinic answer as to why the word is repeated, and understand that traditionally every jot and tittle in Torah is considered to be pregnant with meaning, is to give the meaning "you will surely rebuke."  But Rabbi Glazer offered two alternative explainations.

The first possibility:  the first "rebuke" is private and the second, done only if the first fails, is in public.  In other words, when correcting your fellow, you should first do so without publicly shaming him or her.  Only if the behavior worthy of rebuke persists, should you issue a public rebuke.

But I liked the second possibility even better.  The first rebuke is for one's self, the second one for one's fellow.  In other words, before even thinking about challenging your fellow because of some behavior, one should "rebuke one's self by examining their motive and why the behavior in question is irritating them so.  If one pauses to do such a self-examination, perhaps you won't in the end rebuke your fellow at all, because they did not need to be rebuked.

Wise insights into the text of the Torah, and keen insights to help us to live in peace with one another!

A good week, everybody!

Weekly D'var Torah; Parashat Acharei Mot

Gay Pride Parade in Tel Aviv, 2010

We have a double portion this week:  Acharei Mot/Kedoshim,  Leviticus, chapters 16 through 20.  Double portions are used to make sure the lectionary begins and ends on Simchat Torah, since the number of weeks in a Jewish year varies.  They’re also used, as in this case, to get diaspora and Israeli communities in synch when an extra day of a festival outside Israel puts more traditionalist diaspora communities behind our Israeli cousins in the reading cycle.  In Acharei Mot we find the well-known passage detailing specifically forbidden sexual practices.  Prefacing the list, Leviticus, chapter 18 verse 3 admonishes: “Do not perform the practice of the land of Egypt in which you dwelled; and do not perform the practice of the land of Canaan to which I bring you, and do not follow their traditions.”  Continuing one’s reading of the chapter, one finds a litany of 14 unacceptable sexual unions. One is not permitted to “uncover the nakedness” of one’s mother, one’s father’s wife, one’s sister, and so on.

Then we reach verse 22, which states: “You shall not lie with a man as one lies with a woman, it is an abomination (Hebrew:  to’eva).”  The term to’eva/abomination does not appear earlier in the chapter, to describe all the other forbidden sexual unions.  So what is the distinct connotation of the word to’eva?  It is that this – male homosexual behavior or perhaps some specific behavior – is singled out for particular condemnation  The Torah sees this as worthy of singling out in a list of forbidden acts that many of us, at least up to verse 21, would think unnatural.  I don’t think many of you reading this would argue that it isn’t unnatural on some level to have sexual relations with one’s father, one’s mother or step-mother, one’s sister, etc.

Unnatural or not, the chapter in its outset clearly states that these were acts characteristic of the pagans among whom our people lived in Egypt and Canaan. Implied by their inclusion of the list is that they were acts that were, if not common then at least known among the Israelite people; had such acts not had an attraction so that the people engaged in them, it would not have been necessary to admonish against them! We don’t know how widespread these practices were among the Israelites. Does the attachment of the pejorative ‘abomination’ to male homosexual acts, imply that these were particularly attractive to the people?

I can’t answer this question with any degree of certainty, but in that the best, educated guess today is that less than two percent of the adult population in the USA define themselves as homosexual, the best guess is that homosexual proclivities were not significantly more widespread then.  What I do know is that the Torah is all about boundaries.  Evidence outside the Torah informs us that there were few, if any boundaries in pagan society.  Standards on any given issue were that which were proclaimed by the cultic and temporal leaders, by those who wielded power of various sorts.  We find an example of the last in the fifth chapter of Exodus, where the Pharaoh, peeved by Moses and his stubborn insistence that he “let my people go,” (imagine that!) demands that his taskmasters stop providing the Israelites with straw yet uphold the daily quota of bricks to be made.  In Pagan society, where there is no rule of law based on a higher power, people’s day-to-day lot depends on the capriciousness of whoever rules.

I want to be clear that, when I write disparagingly of ‘pagan’ society I’m not referring to a contemporary religious phenomenon known as ‘Neo-paganism’ as well as by various other names:  Wicca, Earth-centered Religion, and probably others.  In my experience, this phenomenon is more a liberal reaction against more-traditionalist forms of Christianity, than anything else.  But that’s another sermon for another day…

So the text repeatedly admonishes against the practices of the Egyptians and the Canaanites, this including some homosexual act that males engaged in, presumably sodomy.  Those who advocate strongly for removal of social liabilities from GLBTQ people – specifically of recent, the state’s refusal to sanction same sex unions on the same basis of male-female marriage – often assert that Leviticus 18.22 represents the beginning of discrimination against homosexual people.  Even Jewish religious leaders who would advocate strongly for the importance of a deeply spiritual practice of Judaism, often strongly reject this verse.  In a recent, generally thoughtful piece in CCAR Journal: The Reform Jewish Quarterly, Rabbi Jeffrey Brown (a 2005 ordinee of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion) stated that he was “…cognizant of…the tragic and painful history surrounding Leviticus 18.22 and its problematic and complicated impact on Western and Jewish sexuality.”  But Brown is not only of a mind to reject this one verse among the Torah’s many individual verses.  He advocates “preaching against the text,” that is, “actively asserting that the Torah is…wrong.”  My purpose here is not to register a strong complain against Rabbi Brown as an individual; I’m highlighting his words here because of their recent publication and because I believe he has articulated very clearly a philosophical attitude toward the Torah held by many, if not most of my Reform rabbinical colleagues today.

As the astute reader has no doubt already surmised, my own approach to Torah is somewhat different.  If one upholds the words of the Torah only where one agrees with them, and dismisses as “wrong” any verse with which one disagrees for whatever reason, then the Torah is practically meaningless.  If so, if we wish to subject the Torah in each instance to the test of what we already believe to be true according to whatever may be the current sensibility, then perhaps we should cease referring to our congregations as ‘temples’ or ‘synagogues,’ and acknowledge that they are primarily Jewish ‘social clubs.’

If it is true, as Tamar Cohn Eskenazi and Andrea L Weiss assert in The Torah:  A Women’s Commentary, that “in the early 21^st century, (Leviticus 18.22) is one of the most misinterpreted, abused, and decontextualized verses in the Torah,” then to me the antidote is to cease misinterpreting, abusing, and decontextualizing this verse, and any other verse about which it might be said; the antidote is not to reject the Torah's authority.

For the record, I agree that this verse, inasmuch as may be used in certain circles to marginalize GLBTQ people in this day and age, is being misinterpreted and decontextualized.  (“Abused” is too strong a word for me in this context.)  In order to understand any passage in the Torah, whether we might disagree with it or not, we have to first take into account the circumstances of the people to whom the passage was written.  Imagine, then, a people in transition:  a people leaving one pagan society and going through a phase of hardship in the desert as their leader attempts to forge them into a nation, a people ready to rule themselves in a new land, a land where other pagans will surround them, under the sovereignty of their God.  Although there was hardship enough in Egypt, there was also incredible wealth, an extremely vibrant society with many exciting attractions and diversions.  Don’t think of the ‘slavery’ of the Israelites in Egypt in terms of the slavery of black Africans in the American south through the second half of the 19^th century.  Think, rather of the lot of the Israelites in Egypt as more analogous to the condition of coal miners in West Virginia before an unionization (“St. Peter don’t you call me ‘cause I can’t go/I owe my soul to the company store.”)  In this context, the slavery in Egypt begins to look more like an extended servitude, like consignment to a permanent underclass.  If so, then it is easier for the contemporary reader to understand the Israelites’ periodic nostalgia for Egypt during their wanderings in the desert.  Feeling constricted in their very austere present circumstances, they are remembering the attractions that they enjoyed, even as “slaves,” in Egypt.  The Wisdom of the Ages seems to bear this up; in many Passover Haggadot, we find commentary defining Mitzrayim not only as Egypt, the physical place, but also as a place of narrowness where our potentials cannot be realized.

So where does this leave us with regard to Leviticus 18.22?  Think of the sexual boundaries prescribed through verse 21 as reflecting that there were no accepted boundaries in ancient Egypt.  For the good of a society where families would be strong and family relationships would be meaningful, it was necessary to draw certain boundaries around sexual behavior.  And where the Torah refers to specific behaviors, such as sodomy, with the pejorative to’eva/abomination, think of the proscription as having to do primarily with the cultic practices of the pagan sects which form the social norms of the place.  Expressed another way, Leviticus 18.22 is almost certainly not about sexual orientation, a concept that could not have been known or understood by the ancients.  It is not about loving relationships between those of the same sex.  In that sense, it has not much to do with the normalization of GLBTQ people within our communities that are being advocated in the early 21^st century of the Common Era.  Rather, it is about the specific cultic practices, about which we have ample knowledge, within the pagan temples of Egypt and Canaan.

Now there are other verses in the Torah which can be read as declaring the monogamous, male-female relationship as the ideal building block of a healthy family and society, but they don’t hit one with the same force as Leviticus 18.22 and should be dealt with as we encounter them in the text - lest we take them out of context.  For the time being, let’s try to understand and contextualize the verse in question, in an authentic way.  Let’s see it as arguing against attraction for the cultic practices of the pagans of the world surrounding the ancient Israelites.

If we read this passage of Torah in this way, then we can honestly ask ourselves to what extent we are attracted to the paganism of our own age, and how much that attraction dilutes our spiritual life in the context of Jewish Tradition.  When I say “paganism of our age,” don't think of the aforementioned Neo-paganism.  Rather, think of materialism and the enthroning of the self at the expense of the values of family, community and society.  Just as the ancient Israelites needed to be reminded that the pagan gods of Egypt and Canaan were powerless to save them and forge them into a people living in the Image of God, we sometimes need to be reminded that our ‘pagan’ gods cannot save us and enable us to live in God’s image.

US Penitentiary In Florence, Colorado

Last time in prison...

...hopefully!  Many folks know that I have been serving as part-time Jewish chaplain to the US Federal Correctional Complex in Florence, Colorado for a couple of years:  first as an adjunct to my regular congregational work, and in the past year as my only employment while I've been 'on sabbatical.'  I've actually doing correctional chaplaincy work on and off as a volunteer since 1996, in federal institutions as well as state institutions in Florida and Colorado.

It's an unusual vocational path for a rabbi - as is the military chaplaincy - but one I've felt led to go down.  Despite stereotypes, there are Jews in prison, and not only for white-collar crimes; there are six inmates whom I regularly visit in the maximum security US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum (also known informally as 'The Supermax' and 'The Alcatraz of the Rockies') at the Florence complex.

Visiting the prison is always an adventure and sometimes a bit unnerving:  for example, when that big steel door slides shut and you're inside, and when staff go running down the corridor in response to a general alarm.

So why do I work in the prison?  I do, because I really believe that religious faith is an important tool in taking these inmates and ultimately turning them into productive and law-abiding members of society.  I want Judaism to be an agent for change in the lives of Jews who have broken the law, gotten themselves incarcerated, and will eventually be released.  I don't want law-breakers to only be warehoused until they must be released back onto the streets.  And sometimes, in my one-on-one encounters with inmates, I actually do get to feeling that I am helping them.

But today was my last visit as I prepare to leave for Australia.  Will I find such opportunities Down Under?  I don't know, but I am happy I've had the opportunity up to now.

Boxes, boxes, and more boxes!

So waddaya do when the commitment to move is made, and you're no longer on active duty in the military where Uncle Sam sends a crew of friendly workers to your house to start packing you up?  You buy boxes, and you fill them with stuff...and buy more boxes, and fill them with more stuff!  Looks like we'll not lack what to do in our final days in Colorado Springs!

A Starting Place

Yes, playing ukulele is one of my hobbies/passions!  Here on the deck of my home in Colorado Springs.

A Starting Place...

The e-mail came Friday; our work visas for Australia had come through.  It had been such a long process, a long wait to arrive at this moment, I felt like saying shehecheyanu – the blessing for when momentous occasions arrive.  But let me back up and start from the beginning…
I am a retired USAF chaplain, having decided in 2008 to leave the service while I was still at an age where it was possible to have a second career as a congregational rabbi.  And I didn’t mean to have a part-time ‘retirement’ job with a sleepy little congregation, rather a dynamic career where I could shepherd a vibrant congregation where exciting things are happening.

I guess I took the ‘wrong’ position, with a small congregation in Colorado Springs that presented itself in the interview as having aspirations to become such a place but which, when it came to participating and funding, did not have the will.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying they aren't lovely people!  But I realized I would never fully realize my vocation while working with them.  Although Clara and I very much enjoy living in Colorado Springs, a place we had already known because I was stationed at the Air Force Academy from 2001-2004, the congregation simply didn’t have the collective will to provide me with the challenges I was seeking.  After completing my second year with them, I let them know I would be looking for new challenges and opportunities in the coming year, that they should begin the process of looking for a new rabbi.

Well, I guess I took a risky gamble – at least as some would say – because the economic recession which had collapsed the market for Jewish communal jobs including those for rabbis, had not yet begun to recover.  Okay, that’s not the only issue; Reform Judaism has a deserved reputation for being a liberal (actually, I would say ‘Leftist’) movement, and I am center-right in many ways.  I got down to the placement finish line with only one congregation, a small place in north-central Florida, and I feared it was a mirror image of my first congregation – not offering the kind of challenge and security to warrant moving my household clear across a continent to take.  I recommended they consider other candidates, and I enrolled in graduate school to take a needed ‘time-out’ from work, and give me a cushion of time to discern where I needed to go with my vocation.

A small congregation in Gold Coast, Australia had been on the placement list back the previous summer when I began my job search.  Their profile looked interesting, so I sent them a resumé; they acknowledged receiving it, but then I heard no more and the congregation disappeared from the list, so I guessed the position had been filled.

Then, just as I started school in the summer of 2011,   the congregation re-appeared.  Although I had committed to studying for two years, I went ahead and sent another resumé.  This time they responded with an immediate request for an interview, and we talked early in the morning Colorado time on July 4^th, 2011.

The interview went well; at its conclusion the committee wanted to know when my wife Clara and I thought we could travel to Australia to meet them in person.  I had already prepared an answer to this question; because I was in school, and my kids were home from school for summer holidays, I didn’t want to take off and travel until the end of the summer semester.  And because the August semester break was not really long enough for a trip to Australia, and the Jewish High Holydays were not far off, why not plan for me to come to Australia for the important holy days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur to support the congregation (since they were currently rabbi-less) and have a mutual look-see?

The committee liked the idea, but after the conversation there was some back-and-forth and it was the end of July before we agreed on the details.  I couldn’t know at the time, but the indecision reflected a big change in the congregation’s lay leadership and not any ambivalence over whether they wanted me to come.

Clara and I travelled to Australia in September and spent two wonderful weeks with the congregation and the Gold Coast.  It was a very busy time owing to the important festivals but we managed to get a good sense as to whether we would be a good ‘fit’ for this congregation and they for us, and the answer was in the affirmative.  We let them know that I would like to be considered a candidate for a long-term position with them.  I returned to Colorado let the department know of my intention to withdraw from the university at the end of the fall semester.  We busied ourselves with a few process steps and planned to move to Australia in early 2012.

I won’t bore you with the details and all the reasons why, but here it is May 2012 and we’re finally getting ready to leave in a few weeks.  This, months after we told everybody in the community here that we were going and having to endure months of “So, when are you going already??!”

So now the decision is made and the die is cast; we’re planning to travel to Australia on 21 May, immediately after our son Eyal’s high school graduation.

This new blog will document the experiences of an American couple living and working in Australia; it will also serve as a place to share my thoughts on various topics, of Jewish and general interest that may arise.  I will probably use it as a vehicle to share my weekly reflections on the Torah, as well as other religious issues.  Please enjoy, and if you’d like to offer feedback or any recommendations for a topic then feel free to communicate with me.