Moses the
Whiner
As you may know, I have little patience for whining. I don’t like to hear it from children. But I especially don’t like to hear it from
adults. There are few things as discouraging
as a whining adult. And I know that I’m
not alone. People who agree with me,
avoid whining adults. But even whining
adults, avoid other whining adults.
And that tells us two things.
One, that most people don’t like to listen to whining adults. And two, that whining adults often don’t really
hear themselves. So I’m going to ask you
this morning: have you noticed that
others avoid you? Ask yourself, am I
a whiner? Be honest and take
inventory. Examine the conversations you
have had recently with others. And if
there’s evidence that you are a whiner, then perhaps take my message to
heart.
So what’s so terrible
about whining by adults? Apart from that
it’s annoying? Well, it’s fundamentally
unproductive. The difference between a
child and an adult is supposed to be that an adult takes his or her destiny
into his own hands. Adulthood is
supposed to be about thoughts and action. Not about woe to me! It is unseemly for an adult to not take
responsibility for their condition. To
not set about trying to making it what they want it to be. And this is in direct opposition to a whining
personality. Now, does the former
describe the personality of all adults?
Of course it doesn’t…if it did, I wouldn’t be, er, complaining to you
right now…
If whining among
adults is difficult to tolerate generally, it is especially difficult to tolerate
from those who position themselves as leaders.
Look, if you know me well, you know that I’m not a great fan of the
current occupant of the White House…that is, President Obama. I didn’t vote for him, because I am loyal to
a political ideology that is very much in contrast to his. But I have little patience for him, not
because my own political philosophy is different, but because…well, because he’s
a whiner. He whines incessantly about
anybody who opposes his political program.
He complains about any opposition to his legislative agenda. If you know anything about American politics,
you know that our system is unlike your Australian parliamentary system. The American system has three distinct and
independent branches of government which are precisely intended to serve
as checks against one another. America’s
Founding Fathers planned for a president’s power to be limited. For the sitting president to complain about
the very system by which he governs, is quite breathtaking. It’s not his job to whine about it. It’s his job to work positively with the other
branches of government, and the other parties, to create win-win policies that
will fly and result in good things for the country. I’m also not a big fan of Bill Clinton
because he was another president of the ideological Left. But Clinton was an effective president
unlike President Obama, because he accepted and embraced the system under which
he governed. Instead of whining about
it.
So, my political
rantings aside, I read this morning’s Torah reading with a bit of the rolling
eyeball. Moses opens the Book of Devarim
with a rather whiney recounting of the behaviour of the People Israel in
the wilderness. He complains about how
their behaviour caused a 40-year delay in their arrival at the moment of the
present harangue. This is the first of a
series of sermons that serve as Moses’ valedictory address to the people. His ‘swan song.’ Because the generation of Egypt is just about
gone, and the people will enter the Promised Land imminently. With Joshua bin Nun at their head, as Moses
must die on the far side of the River Jordan.
We’ll talk more about it next week, when we read from the sidra Ve’etchanan
where Moses cries out to God in protest of his fate. Suffice it to say that, as this week’s
reading opens, we hear a Moses who sounds more like a contemporary politician
then, well…a Moses.
Now before you chide
me for being hyper-critical of Moses, let me tell you that I have a lot of
tolerance for his whining. As I have for
any adult whose whining can be put in the perspective of a life of greatness…and
goodness. I’m not saying that Moses was
not, as the Torah put it, the greatest of all the Prophets. As we read in the closing verse of the Torah, Ve
lo kam Navi od beYisrael keMosheh. We
aren’t to take these words lightly. And
yet, the Moses we see in the Book of Deuteronomy is a Moses who is disheartened
and whiney.
And this is at the
heart of why Moses cannot be the leader to take the people across the Jordan to
the Land of Israel. It isn’t that God is
angry at Moses. It’s that Moses is not
up to the task. Because a leader must
believe in himself, as well as in the ones he is leading. That’s why Joshua bin Nun will be the one to
carry the mantle. Joshua proved that he
possessed the power of the positive in the Incident of the Spies. He and Caleb alone, took in the whining of
the other ten spies who saw the conquest of the Land as an impossible
challenge. They said, sure it will be
difficult. But God will give us the
strength to do it. No general has
ever won a battle without believing that the battle could be won. How else would he convince the troops it
could be won? And no army ever won a
battle when its troops lost heart. The
People Israel must not lose heart in the coming challenge. They therefore need a leader who is positive
and believes in his troops’ ability to carry out the campaign. And Moses is no longer that leader. We can – and should – have a lot of respect
and affection for Moses for what he has done for the people up until now. But we should also recognise that he is no
longer fit for leadership. And we should
take to heart the lesson about the nature of the challenge of leadership. And about the fitness of leaders.
Perhaps that’s a
good lesson on the day before Temple Shalom’s Annual General Meeting. Not that there’s a choice in whom to vote for
tomorrow. All candidates for office are
standing unopposed. Your vote will be
more an affirmation than a choice. But
it doesn’t make the election of a new President and Board of Management
irrelevant. It does, however, place more
of the responsibility upon those who are standing for office. Let me ask you: do you stand for office with positive
thoughts about the temple and its future?
Are you positive about what the temple stands for, about the fitness of
its members? If not, I pray that you will
have the integrity to stand down.
Because leadership positions should not be the result of a popularity
contest. Nor should they be by default.
In this week’s
reading we see a Moses who has achieved greatness. And that greatness can never be taken away
from him. But it’s time for the mantle
of leadership to pass to someone else.
And so he begins his valedictory to the People Israel. Who listen to him respectfully and hopefully,
take to heart his words. Listening ‘around’
his whining, as it were. Because while
his time for leadership is clearly past, he still has many important things to
say. Even to us, so many generations
removed from the events. Shabbat shalom.
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