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| US Air Force Academy Chapel |
Tear Down Their Altars?
When
I was the Jewish chaplain at the US Air Force Academy, I conducted services in
the iconic chapel building. Chances are,
if you saw an image of this building you’d recognise it. It’s a very famous building, an example of
modern, soaring, religious architecture.
Inside the building there are three permanent single-use
sanctuaries. Upstairs, in the vaulted
space is the Protestant chapel.
Downstairs, of somewhat more modest dimensions are the Catholic and
Jewish chapels. There are several
additional rooms that sometimes serve as an Eastern Orthodox chapel, a Muslim
prayer space, and a Buddhist meditation space.
All this under one roof!
The chapel building is a major tourist
attraction. Visitors to Colorado Springs
usually tour the Air Force Academy, and most take the tour of the chapel. Sometimes, while I was stationed there I felt
more like a museum curator than a rabbi.
Although there was a staff of dedicated tour guides, I would often find
a group coming through when I was in the chapel to set the Torah or change
books, or play with the sound system.
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| Baha'i Temple, Haifa |
On a few occasions, Jews who were part
of these groups would introduce themselves and chat me up while they had me
cornered. Often they would ask: Don’t
you feel like a Second-class Citizen, being given the smallest of the three
chapels and downstairs? And I would
always respond, honestly, that virtually all my Protestant colleagues were
jealous of my lovely little chapel on the ground floor, underneath their
soaring cathedral with its draughty heights and poor acoustics.
So people would come from all over the
world and visit our chapel. But there
was one resident of Colorado Springs who would not set foot in the
building. And that was our local Chabad
rabbi. He would occasionally come up to
the Academy to do a program. And when he
did, the price of his attendance would be my holding the program in the Cadet
Chapel Lounge which was in a dormitory building. He would not enter the chapel at all.
One time he explained: it was because of what we have just read this
morning, Deuteronomy chapter 12, verses two and three.
Do
away with all the places where the nations whom you are driving out, worship
their gods, [whether they are] on the high mountains, on the hills, or under
any luxuriant tree. You must tear down
their altars, break up their sacred pillars, burn their Asherah trees, and chop
down the statues of their gods, obliterating their names from that place.
Clearly this specific instruction does not
apply in the diaspora. The instruction
is specifically given for the people Israel as they are preparing to enter the
Land of Israel and seize it from the Canaanites. But my colleague understood its import to
him, to be that at least he should not enter a place where idolaters worship
their gods.
But there is dispute among Jews, as to
whether our neighbours’ worship represents idolatry. Many Jewish authorities, at the very least,
do not think that Christianity and Islam constitute idol-worship. Even the Rambam harboured some ambiguity on
the subject. He did not want to dismiss
all Christians and Muslims as idol-worshippers.
But he did not want to endorse their religions. This especially, because he was fighting a breakaway
religion coming out of Judaism, the breakaway known as Karaism. It would have been difficult for the Rambam
to condemn the Karaites, who had gained many followers from among the Jews,
whilst proclaiming Christianity and Islam to be valid. So the Rambam was not entirely clear. But later authorities were clearer. And today, many Jewish authorities do not
consider Christianity and Islam to be idol-worship. And that’s not just political correctness or
politeness. Rather, it’s a recognition
that adherents of these two religious systems, in their various iterations, often
recognise and assimilate the essential wisdom in the Torah. Oh, they don’t teach the keeping of the
Sabbath, for example. But Jewish
authorities have never considered such ‘ritual’ mitzvot as the Sabbath to be
incumbent upon non-Jews. In fact, some
Orthodox rabbis today will tell non-Jews that they are forbidden to keep the Sabbath.
Even if they’re on a path to convert to Judaism but haven’t yet.
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| Done of the Rock over the Western Wall, Jerusalem |
So it’s not a mitzvah in this day and age, to tear down the altars of other
religions. Not even in the Land of
Israel. Which is a good thing, because
the modern state of Israel is a religiously pluralistic state where anybody is
free to worship according to their own beliefs.
The country is full of mosques and churches. The Baha’i temple in Haifa is as recognisable
as is the Dome of the Rock. So it is not
necessary to think the gentiles’ religious buildings unworthy of standing: not in Israel, and not in the Diaspora.
But what about visiting the gentiles’
religious buildings? Just to see them
or, God forbid, to attend a service there?
Many Jews feel reluctant to set foot in the holy places of other
religions. Does this passage of Torah,
or any other passage, inform us that we should not enter others’ religious
shrines?
Obviously, my Chabad colleague in
Colorado Springs thought so. But I don’t
agree. I have been invited to attend
many a non-Jewish service, and I have even occasionally spoken from a Christian
pulpit as a guest ‘preacher.’ Some of
you have been in churches or mosques.
Either while on tour, to see important landmarks. Or to attend weddings. Or even just because you’d been invited to a
service and were curious.
Most Jews wouldn’t go as far as the
last. We’re happy to have guests in our
shule of other religions, as we have at many services here. But we don’t feel comfortable going into
someone else’s worship space. There is
too much baggage – too much history forced or coerced conversion of Jews. We even find their symbols distasteful. To our Christian neighbours, the Cross is a
symbol of life and redemption. But when
Jews see a cross, we’re more likely to see it as a symbol of death. As a symbol under which Christian armies and
mobs attacked and killed Jews.
If you don’t feel comfortable
attending a Christian, or other, service, then I’m not here to criticise
you. But I’m also not here to criticise
you if you do feel comfortable, and
attend someone else’s service either because you were invited or simply go
anonymously, out of curiosity. My
experience tells me that you won’t end up ‘infected.’ And you won’t likely be so impressed that you’ll
defect from Judaism. I’ve attended many
services of other religions, and I’m still a Jew. And this, despite that I often felt there was
something good, something memorable
to take away from the others’ service.
Our ancient forebears, as they entered
the land of the Canaanites, were likely to be attracted to the colourful ritual
of the Canaanite temples. Look, there’s
something to be said for vestal virgins…especially in contrast to the austere
worship of the unseen God. For former is
fun and exciting. The latter is demanding. But today, since our neighbours have given up
vestal virgins, we’re not likely to be too
strongly attracted to their religions!
Seriously. Do not read verses such as today’s reading
and think that we must tear down our neighbours’ altars. Or that, at a minimum, we must distance
ourselves from our neighbours and their religious practices. We shouldn’t imitate them. Rather, we should see the beauty and deep
spirituality in our own. But we should
not fear our neighbours’ practices. And
we should not think of them as idolaters.
At least not automatically. To be
sure, some gentiles are idolaters. As
are some Jews. But all of our traditions
have something of wisdom to share with their followers. And each of us can see beauty in the
practices of our neighbours. Even when
we don’t agree with them. Or feel
inclined to adopt them as our own.
Shabbat shalom.
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