Teaching is Leading: A Drash for Parashat Bamidbar, Friday 1 August 2014

Years ago, ‘in a previous life,’ I had a wonderful job as training officer of my naval unit.  After a year in that position, I had pretty much set up my systems exactly as I wanted, and my day-to-day work was really a piece of cake.  But I lacked leadership experience, in the purest sense of leadership:  regularly directing the actions of a group of subordinates.  So I asked for a change of position to that of section supervisor, where I was in charge of about a dozen signals warfare specialists.

          As supervisor, I found that my new position involved more teaching than anything else.  My subordinates were all less experienced than me – both in the military service and on the job.  What they needed most from me was constant teaching, constant explanation of unfamiliar concepts, constant mentoring regarding setting priorities and organizing their own work.  I found that leading, is really all about teaching.  Leading isn’t simply about telling people what to do, and expecting them to do it.

This Shabbat, we start reading the fifth and final book of the Torah:  Devarim, or as it’s called in the larger world, Deuteronomy.  The name comes from the Greek deutero (pronounced ‘deftero’), meaning the ordinal number ‘second.’ When we reach Parashat Devarim, the rabbi’s stress level usually starts going through the roof, because it means that the High Holy Days are only two months in the distance.  But I can tell you with great certainty, that it isn’t the High Holy Days that are elevating my stress level this year…

          If you follow my writing on the weekly parashah, or perhaps the parashah itself, then you know that the book of Numbers which we finished last week, is all about leadership.  Moses and Aaron find their leadership constantly tested.  The way they respond to those challenges, teaches us important lessons about leadership, teamwork, and responsibility.

          In the book of Deuteronomy, Moses takes on an entirely different role:  that of teacher.  The entire book consists of a series of sermons, or as we call them here in the Land of Oz, ‘drashes.’  The book seems repetitive, because it is; Moses is repeating to the people the lessons of what they’ve experienced to this point.  Hence the name Deuteronomy, meaning ‘the second recitation.’  It is a prelude to Moses’ death, the passing of the mantle of leadership to Joshua, and the start of the conquest of the Holy Land.

          Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks points out in his drash this week, that with the arrival of the start of the book of Deuteronomy Moses has apparently switched roles.  He has gone from leader, to teacher.  But the truth is that there’s no switching inherent.  A leader, is a teacher…and ideally, vice versa.

          In our generation, respect for teachers comes with difficulty.  We’ve been conditioned to think:  He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.  The teaching profession is no longer held in high esteem.  I remember how I briefly considered, when I was in high school, a future as a teacher.  And I remember how nobody particularly encouraged that choice.  It didn’t pay well.  So why wouldn’t I want to do something else?  Unfortunately, many teachers as a result of this lack of regard for what they do, experience ‘burn out’ and lose their sense of calling.

          Funny how things work out:  I ultimately did become a teacher, since that is definitely what a rabbi is.  And recently, I had to read where someone wrote of my calling:  Who needs rabbis??!  They’ve just read a few more books than the rest of us!!!  So it apparently isn’t just classroom teachers who carry the stigma of he who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.  At least in some people’s minds, it extends to those whose calling is to teach in whatever setting.

          But those of us who have been in supervisory positions, especially when the job description made it clear that we were responsible for the development of our subordinates, know the truth.  That leading is teaching.  It’s easy enough, at least in a military setting, to simply order a subordinate to do something.  It’s more challenging to mentor that subordinate, to pull them along, to teach them what needs to be done, and when, and how.  That’s the kind of leading-is-teaching that we see Moses doing in the fifth book of the Torah.  The narrative seems to have ‘changed gears.’  But truly, it has not.  It’s still all about leadership, period.

          Leadership opportunities are all around us.  We see a lot of leadership.  And a lot of it is poor leadership.  Good leadership is precious, because it is relatively rare.  This past Sunday, some of you in this room attended a certain congregational AGM and witnessed just about the worst possible leadership.  And that is a tragedy.  Especially in the Jewish world, where our holiest book, the Torah, gives us so many examples of outstanding leadership.  But unfortunately, this is one of the results when Jews don’t read, and heed, their own Torah.  We call Moses, Mosheh Rabbeinu – Moses, our teacher.  From his life we learn so much.  Lessons that we can, and should, apply to our own lives.  Shabbat shalom.

Enjoy the Journey: A Drash for Parashat Masa’ei Friday, 25 July 2014

The travel industry is one sector of the economy that is booming.  And it has boomed consistently over recent years.  This, despite the general meltdown that the global economy has experienced.  And it’s not hard to figure out why this has been so.  Travel, especially mass travel is simply a good value compared to many other things, on which we spend our money.  And travel gives us a way to ‘escape’ so to speak, to get a needed time-out from our busy lives.

          Contempt for mass travel comes easily to many critics.  It’s impersonal.  It’s hit-or-miss regarding quality of accommodation.  And food.  And just about every other aspect.  It causes people to travel in a ‘bubble’ where they end up experiencing little of the places they’ve visited.  The criticism certainly rings true.  To an extent, it makes mass travel sound a lot like, well, a lot like life!

          Despite the very real criticisms of mass travel, many of us like to travel that way.  It’s a way to enjoy a higher standard of accommodation, and food, and overall experience, for the same price or cheaper than going on our own.  And it’s much more carefree; others get to worry about the driving, and the guiding, and the decisions as to where to stop and where to stay and eat.  So as with anything else in life, there are advantages and disadvantages.

          If mass travel in general is booming, the most booming sector may be the cruise industry.  Many of you have been on cruises.  Many of you have taken a cruise and, finding it a most pleasurable way to travel, took another cruise…and perhaps another, and another!  Those who have been on cruises, especially cruises on particularly good ships and destinations, have told me in sometime-gushing terms about what a great time you had.  My brother and his wife just came back from a Mediterranean cruise, and believe me I’ve gotten an earful…as well as seen some of the pictures posted on Facebook!

          Clara and I have never been on a cruise ourselves.  It’s not that we don’t think we would enjoy such a trip.  We’ve simply had other economic priorities in recent years, with children attending private school and now university.  Our dollars are going in other directions. Someday we’ll go on a cruise.  And then we just might get hooked on the concept…as you have.

          This week’s Torah portion is Masa’ei, meaning ‘journeys.’  It’s the final weekly portion from the book of Numbers, or Bamidbar.  Next week, as usually happens, the month of Av begins with our opening of the book of Deuteronomy, Devarim.  The first words of this week’s portion are:  These are the journeys of the Israelites, who had left Egypt betzivotam under the leadership of Moses of Aaron.  The word, betzivotam is usually translated, ‘according to their hosts.’  But this week, I found the word translated, ‘in organized groups.’  So perhaps the ancient Israelites were the first to enjoy the benefits of mass tourism?  Can you imagine Moses and Aaron as cruise directors??!

          Of course not.  And it would be difficult to draw an analogy between the 40 years’ wandering, and a cruise.  So I’m not going to try!  Except to say, that just as a cruise passenger today doesn’t have to worry about navigating strange lands and foraging for what to eat…neither did our ancient forebears.  They had Moses and Aaron to guide them, and their basic needs were taken care of.  Yes, the nation gave up its autonomy to decide where to spend the night, and where to eat, and when to rest.  Just like a motor coach tour or cruise passenger does.  The loss of autonomy, for the gain of safety and ease, was a valid trade-off.

          We’ve all heard the analogy of life to a journey.  You’ve heard it from me, although I cannot claim to have coined the phrase.  But I repeat it because it’s a great metaphor.  If we think of our lives only in terms of destinations, then we’re in danger of missing the pleasures of the journey.  Like spending our vacations worrying about where we’re going, how we’re going to get there and how we’re going to experience the destination.  Approach travel like that, and the danger is of missing out on the experience.  Of not enjoying the journey.

          Enjoying the journey should be the goal.  In terms of a holiday, or in terms of life.  When we worry overly about whether we’re doing it right, about whether we’re following expectations, about whether we’ve maximized everything we wanted to get out of it…then we’re in danger of missing out on the joy that the journey brings.  And that’s a significant danger, in the sense that we only have one chance at life…unless you believe in re-incarnation.  Why squander our lives worrying about the details and pre-expectations?  Why squander our lives, worrying about reaching our goals, to the point where we don’t allow ourselves to experience, and enjoy the journey?

          Going on an organized holiday, in particular a cruise, is a way to enjoy our time off without having to worry overly about the details.  This is why cruises are so popular.  I fail to see how I can give my life overall the carefree quality of a cruise.  But I can cruise through life much easier if I don’t sweat the details so much.  If I don’t worry as much about the destination, the goal, as I worry about simply experiencing it as if comes.

          As many of you know, Clara and I have recently experienced a big shock regarding our expectations as to the course and destination of our life’s cruise, at least in the short term.  I won’t kid you by saying that it hasn’t mattered…of course it has!  And it has caused us no small amount of worry and concern.  But now, some weeks down the line, we have a much clearer view of the specific possibilities and how each will come about…or not.  And we’ve learned an important lesson about not worrying so much about the precise destination, rather in experiencing the highs and even the lows along the way.

          Many of you have also learned these lessons along the way.  Maybe your destination has changed, perhaps more than once, along the way.  But that happens on cruises, too.  Sometimes that weather causes a change in course.  A friend of mine is booked for a Mediterranean cruise next month.  Thanks to the fighting in Gaza and the missiles falling all over Israel, the port visit in Ashdod has been cancelled.  Of course my friend is disappointed.  But it isn’t the end of the world.  And if he accepts that, then I’m guessing he’ll enjoy his cruise.  Likewise, when we experience a change in itinerary, a change of destination in our life’s cruises, it may be the source of disappointment.  But it need not spoil the experience.  The key is to not let it be so.

          Enjoy the journey.  Sometimes, enjoying the journey requires being open to changes in the destination, changes in the itinerary.  If so, the challenge is to enjoy even the changed journey.  And any journey in life – whether it is a holiday cruise or our life’s cruise – is subject to change.  So be open.  And enjoy the journey.  Shabbat shalom.

Taking Precedence: A Drash for Parashat Matot Saturday, 19 July 2014

The evening service on Yom Kippur is frequently called, ‘the Kol Nidrei Service.’ This is, of course because of the centrality of the Kol Nidrei declaration, often mis-identified as a prayer.  It is unique to that one occasion of the year.  Kol Nidrei, or ‘All vows,’ is a statement that is difficult to understand, and not just because it is in Aramaic.  It expresses a desire to be absolved of responsibility for upholding any vows we may make in the coming year, should we find them just too difficult to fulfill.

          Kol Nidrei is often thought to have its origins in the medieval Spain of the Disputations and Inquisition.  In truth, it is much earlier than that, having been composed during the Gaonic period:  the second half of the first millennium of the Common Era.  And the original version was in retrospect; it spoke of the vows and promises that we made in the past year that we were unable to fulfill – may we be absolved of them.  The version we say today, in prospect, represents a change instituted by Rabbi Meir ben Shmuel, the son-in-law of Rashi in the twelfth century.

          Apart from being changed in tense some eight centuries ago, Kol Nidrei has an interesting and mixed history.  For a time it was taken out of the liturgy.  After all, do we want Jews to think that they can be absolved of all vows they might make in the coming year, just because they find them too hard to keep?  If so, then we’ll likely come to make vows lightly, never really thinking we have to keep them.  Or alternatively, others might be reluctant to take a Jew’s vow seriously.  This, knowing that the Jew would think he can be absolved of all his vows just because he uttered this statement on Yom Kippur.

          These thoughts come to mind this week, not because the Days of Awe are that close, but because this week’s Torah reading offers us a glimpse into the Divine wisdom regarding the responsibility for one’s vows.  Today we’ve read that a man is expected to fulfill his vows.  But a girl in her father’s house, or a married woman, is automatically absolved if the man in her life – father or husband – objects.  On the surface, this of course smacks of what today we call ‘sexism.’  After all, the implication is that the female sex is unable to handle the responsibility for their vows, right?  Maybe, and perhaps if so it gibes with the traditional Halachah that women cannot serve as witnesses in a court proceeding.  But I’m going to leave that aside this morning.  And not because it is too hard to explain in any coherent way.  Rather, because we tend to react emotionally to that notion.  And it thus gets in the way, and prevents us from finding wisdom in this and other passages in the Torah.

          Instead, I want to focus on the aspect of fulfillment of vows in general.  We are expected to carry out what we’ve promised to do.  This, especially if we have vowed in G-d’s Name.  Remember the Third Commandment, of the ‘Top Ten’?  Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy G-d in vain.  The Rabbis explained that it means, don’t swear in G-d’s name whilst not really intending to fulfill that oath.  And here, in the 30^th chapter of Numbers, we find the principle repeated more explicitly.

          But…here, with regard to competence to enter seriously into a vow, or perhaps when one does so without consulting other interested parties, we find that there’s ‘wiggle room.’  A priori, in prospect, one should not make a vow except with the utmost of seriousness, especially if one makes it in G-d’s Name.  But a posteriori, in retrospect, if one finds some serious impediment to fulfilling it, one is not considered culpable.  At least, not Divinely culpable.  So we should avoid making vows in G-d’s Name unless we do so in complete seriousness and expectation that we will be able to fulfill them.  But on the other hand, we should not avoid making vows altogether just because we fear that some circumstance might make fulfillment of that vow so difficult as to be impossible.  Perhaps the message here is that there is a natural precedence of interests, a hierarchy where one voice trumps another.  Maybe the point of this verse is that we’re supposed to fulfill our vows…but.

          An example from contemporary life.  Many young people today, seeing that marriages often break down and end in divorce, are reluctant to get married at all.  And this may seem like a reasonable response to a reality where one has a reasonable expectation that one’s marriage vow may be impossible to fulfill.  But the divorce rate is not an indictment of marriage.  At least, not from the Jewish standpoint.  Even in antiquity, we had divorce as a safety valve for marriages that would bring unavoidable unhappiness.  Hillel said a man could divorce his wife even if she spoiled the soup.  Nobody thinks that a bad pot of soup is reasonable grounds for divorce.  Rather, we read Hillel’s words as informing us that, despite the desirability of enduring marriages, sometimes it just doesn’t ‘work out.’  And when it doesn’t, we shouldn’t think we’re stuck for life.  We enter into a vow in all seriousness.  But if it is just too burdensome, we let it drop and hope to achieve wholeness.  I think that the Kol Nidrei statement is not akin to making a promise whilst crossing one’s fingers behind one’s back.  Rather, it expresses the desire to ultimately be able to achieve wholeness…even when unable to fulfill one’s vows.

          Vows are important.  We should enter into them only with the utmost seriousness of purpose.  Especially when invoking G-d’s name in the process of making them.  But we should not feel that, just because there might be a possibility that we won’t be able to fulfill them, we should avoid promising.  We can never foresee all the possibilities of outcome from the start.  Without making promises, we would find it difficult to live, to transact with other people.  We should therefore feel free to vow, promise, and make contracts.  This, knowing that even the Torah teaches some flexibility in this area.  We are to fulfill our vows…but.  And the but is:  unless it becomes unreasonably difficult to do so.  In that case, we understand that even Divine Law provides for an ‘out.’  Shabbat shalom.

Impure from War? A Drash for Parashat Matot, Friday 18 July 2014

 Tommy – Rudyard Kipling

I went into a public-'ouse to get a pint o' beer / The publican 'e up an' sez, "We serve no red-coats here." / The girls be'ind the bar they laughed an' giggled fit to die, / I outs into the street again an' to myself sez I:

O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, go away"; / But it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play, / The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play, / O it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play.

I went into a theatre as sober as could be, / They gave a drunk civilian room, but 'adn't none for me; / They sent me to the gallery or round the music-'alls, / But when it comes to fightin', Lord! they'll shove me in the stalls!

For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, wait outside"; / But it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide, / The troopship's on the tide, my boys, the troopship's on the tide, / O it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide.

Yes, makin' mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep / Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap; / An' hustlin' drunken soldiers when they're goin' large a bit / Is five times better business than paradin' in full kit.

Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, 'ow's yer soul?" / But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll, / The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll, / O it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll.

We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too, / But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you; / An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints, / Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints;

While it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, fall be'ind", / But it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind, / There's trouble in the wind, my boys, there's trouble in the wind, / O it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind.

You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an' fires, an' all: / We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational. / Don't mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face / The Widow's Uniform is not the soldier-man's disgrace. /     For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!" / But it's "Saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot; / An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please; / An' Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool -- you bet that Tommy sees!

The first time I saw this poem was typed out on a single sheet of paper and posted on the wall of the coffee pot in the office where I worked when I was stationed at the NSA.  Tommy Atkins is a universal nickname for British soldiers, and I was in the US Navy, but the premise of Rudyard Kipling’s famous poem is a universal experience of those in the military service.  Their service is sought, but most citizens would prefer they remain invisible.

          As I said, a universal experience.  During Operation Cast Lead, a previous Gaza War in December 2008, a colleague in the Reform Rabbinate who was in Israel posted to our rabbis’ discussion group.  She was riding a train near Haifa.  She heard several soldiers sitting near her, who had just come from the war, speaking disparagingly about the Hamas-affiliated Arabs they’d fought.  She was appalled that Israeli soldiers would speak in such terms of their enemy.

          I was not a frequent poster on this and other list-serves, just as I’m more a lurker than a poster on Facebook these days.  But I felt compelled to respond to my colleague’s comments with a couple of verses from Kipling’s poem.  Israel in the time of war is a country that looks like an armed camp as thousands of reservists are activated and seen moving about the country since it’s a small country and no place is ever far from the battlefield.  And yet even in Israel, where civilians are as likely to be in the line of fire as on a train with relaxing soldiers, one occasionally finds someone who just doesn’t ‘get it.’

The soldier’s job is not to die in battle.  As General Patton so aptly put it, his job is to make the other side’s soldiers die in battle.  (Okay, he said it a little more colourfully than that!)  That’s how wars are won, and Israel of all countries cannot afford to lose a war.  There’s nothing dishonourable about that.  But there is something about it that wounds the soul.  And that’s why we read in this week’s Torah portion the dictum that the 12,000 special operations troops who were assigned to fight in the war against Midian, when they finished their fighting, were to purify themselves.  You yourselves must…immerse your [bodies and] your garments on the seventh day, and you will then be clean so that you can enter the camp.  Even though they had fought in a war that was Divinely ordained, and fought according to orders and the ethics of war, they still had to be purified after their participation.

This is surely recognition of how fighting in war brutalises even the one who fights a just cause, and according to established constraints.  In Iraq, soldiers going ‘over the wire’ on patrol or convoy duty would frequently huddle for a group prayer before ‘locking and loading.’  I led those prayers more than once as a chaplain.  And then, upon their safe return which was never taken for granted, they would pop open cold cans of ‘American champagne,’ or Coca Cola since alcohol was not permitted them.  And they would light up cigars.  And they would talk the way that soldiers talk, cursing and speaking disparagingly – to understate it – about The Enemy.  It was how the troops would decompress once out of danger.  And it was certainly what those Israeli soldiers on the train near Haifa were doing on that December day in 2008.

The Israeli Army is unique in the world.  It’s the only army where soldiers’ mothers present themselves at the gates of the garrison and demand to see their child’s commanding officer to berate him or her for something their child complained about in a phone call home.  It’s the only army where there is almost no line between battle front and home front.  But the Israeli soldier is still very much like soldiers elsewhere.  In order to reconcile his role as a trained killer, he tends to think of his enemy in less than human terms.  And that’s embarrassing for some civilians.

But thank G-d, not for all.  Thanks to that contiguity of the battlefield to the rear ground, soldiers on duty in the IDF get frequent visits from religious organisations such as Chabad, who bring encouragement and cheer to the beleaguered warriors.  And there are a number of charities that exist specifically to take tasty treats to soldiers on the battlefield or on duty in remote parts of the country.  Paul [Corias] will tell you about www.tzahal-pizza.com, his particular favourite, and there are other, similar organisations which enable you to easily send various kinds of treats to soldiers to let them know they are appreciated.

When I was in Iraq I received such largesse from Americans back home, and it made a big difference for me.  One Rabbi wrote and asked if there were any Jewish supplies I needed.  I didn’t need very much at the moment, but I lacked a Havdallah set and supplies.  Three weeks later I got a lovely set with enough Havdallah candles to last years.  The colleague couldn’t send wine, so I had to use grape juice…aw shucks!  But I thought of the colleague’s kindness every Saturday evening for the rest of my tour.

Israel is under attack from Gaza, whose missiles can now reach almost the entire country.  It increases our zechut, our merit in the world-to-come when we stand up for Israel against the criticism she takes for defending herself.  It would increase our zechut also to be tolerant of her soldiers’ need to vent, and not criticise.  It would increase our zechut even a little more if we would send pizzas, or burgers, or letters to the soldiers defending the Jewish homeland.  Think about it.  Shabbat shalom.

Law and Flexibility: A Drash for Parashat Pinchas, Friday, 11 July 2014

I’ve been learning a lot about Australian law lately – perhaps more than I ever wanted to know!  It’s not radically different from American Law in most states of the US.  After all, it shares the roots of English Common Law.  As such, it is based partly on statute and partly on precedent as to the interpretation of the statute.  And perhaps, partly on one’s ability to make a compelling argument for a judgment outside the precedent.  But on the surface it seems fixed, rigid.  And government functionaries are always reluctant to go outside established precedent in discharging their duties.   After all, they’re not paid to be creative, right?  Please don’t hear in this a criticism of government functionaries in general.  Since I once was one once, I still have a soft spot in my heart for those who toil day in and day out to make the government work.  But the way that government departments work, does not foster creativity in interpreting the law.

          Jewish law, Halachah, is also flexible.  Those who have not studied it, seldom think that.  After all, Halachah is all about telling you exactly what you’re not supposed to do, right?  Actually, of the 613 Commandments that the Rabbis identified, ‘only’ 365 are negative – one for each day of the civil year.  248 are positive commandments – thou shalt’s.  That’s one for every major component of the human body, according to the prevailing medical view at the time of Maimonides.  But in any case, we do tend to see Jewish religious law as being rigid.  After all, prawns are forbidden and there’s just no wiggle room, right?  (Actually, there is; if you are in danger of fainting from hunger and prawns are all that there is to eat, you can eat as many prawns as you like.  But I’m guessing you’d prefer a little more ‘wiggle room’ than that!)

          Okay, I know you think I’m kidding around…because I am!  But I’m going to make my case with an area of law that is extremely important, that being inheritance law.  This is near and dear to many of us.  I have seen fights over inheritances literally tear families asunder.  Few areas of family life are so strife-ridden as the question of what we will pass on when we die, and to whom.  Almost everybody I know has a story about a family rift that never healed, caused by greed over an inheritance.  Many of you have a funny – or perhaps not so funny – story about heirs dividing up a relative’s estate amongst themselves long before that relative was dead or even in a moribund state!

          And in the Torah, we see the laws and customs concerning inheritances being repeatedly overridden.  For example, way back in the book of Genesis.  As you remember, Isaac and Rebecca had twin sons:  Esau and Jacob.  Esau was the firstborn, and as such he was entitled to the special inheritance rights of the firstborn.  Not to mention, a special blessing.  We saw how Jacob, with the urging and assistance of his mother, tricked Isaac into giving that blessing to him.  Whether you are a firstborn or not, you probably heard a voice inside you crying, Not Fair!  When you first read the 27^th chapter of Genesis, you may have wondered why Jacob became the heir to the promise of Abraham.

          But he did.  And the reason he did, was that he was judged the heir who would  successfully carry out, through his own actions and those of his progeny, the Berit of Abraham.  So it’s not that the deception and shenanigans didn’t matter.  There were serious consequences arising from that.  As there are from all our own actions.  But at the end of the day, the Divine Will stood with Jacob’s inheriting his grandfather’s promise.  For all his flaws, he was the Man of the Hour.  Although it flaunted accepted law, the inheritance went to him, and Isaac his father understood that it had to.

          And now, generations later, another example of how the law of inheritance does not serve valid interests, has come up.  The five daughters of Tzelaf’chad, a man who has passed away, have petitioned for their father’s inheritance.  Their father had no sons.  Therefore, accepted custom was for the man’s estate to pass to his brothers.  But the daughters argue that that would result in their father’s name being blotted out.  And his daughters argue that there is no reason for this, since their father was not part of Korach’s rebellion.  (The presumption being that their father passed away at about the same time.)

          The very fact that Moses himself was hearing this case, speaks volumes.  Earlier, in the eighteenth chapter of Exodus, we saw Moses set up a hierarchy of courts.  This on the advice of Jethro, his father-in-law, who saw Moses wearing himself out trying to solve every little issue by himself.  So now, the fact that this has been brought to Moses’ attention and in the sight of all the assembly, tells us that the problem, whilst seemingly intractable, is being taken most seriously.  And then, even Moses cannot solve it himself; he consults G-d!

          And the solution?  The daughters get the inheritance.  And not only that, but the fact that a daughter should get her dead father’s inheritance before her uncles, is now written into the law code for all time.  Of course, some will see this as an insufficient change, since the daughters are still behind any sons in order of precedence.  So we’re not talking egalitarianism here.  But we are talking about a major change in the law, to address a situation that probably had not been thought of before.

          And my point?  Only one that I’ve made many times before.  We can see our Tradition, and the law-code that it spawned, as dated and onerous.  But if we realize that it is not so inflexible as it seems on the surface, then perhaps it is neither:  not dated, but dynamic; not inflexible but able to change to meet new contingencies.  Yes, there’s nowadays a tendency in the Traditional Jewish world, to be ever more machmir, more stringent, in interpreting Halachah.  And perhaps some of that tendency is understandable, given that religious tradition is so much under siege by contemporary sensibilities.  But if we look at the history of the Halachic process, even as reflected in the earliest of the Jewish sources, the Written Torah, we can see an essential flexibility.  Before we throw it out as irrelevant or ‘onerous,’ let’s learn more about how flexible it has been in the past, and perhaps try to reclaim it with that flexibility intact.  Shabbat shalom.  

Truth Can Be Hard to Swallow: a Drash for Parashat Balak, Friday/Saturday 4/5 July 2014

This week’s Parashah is very dear to my heart, being my son Eyal’s Bar Mitzvah Parashah.  Although it seems only yesterday it was seven years ago that we were busy studying the text’s lessons whilst I prepared him for his Big Day.  We were living in Germany at the time and now it’s two countries later – USA and Australia.  Where do the years go??!

Remember the Dan Hill hit song of 1977, Sometimes When We Touch?  Hill, a Canadian songwriter and performer, was still recording in 2010 but has only had two international hit songs, of which Sometimes When We Touch was his first and his biggest.  Perhaps you remember the opening lines of the song:

You ask me if I love you

And I choke on my reply

I’d rather hurt you honestly

Than deceive you with a lie.

The premise of the song is a dilemma that each one of us has faced at times.  We can tell the truth and hurt someone.  Or we can tell a lie and spare someone’s feelings.  But if we do tell a lie, then in the long run we risk causing more damage.  I’ll give you an example.

Say Clara cooks some dish that I don’t like.  I know, I know…that’s hard to imagine.  But say she does.  I can tell her the truth, and ask her not to cook it again.  But that, at the very real risk of hurting her feelings.

There’s nothing in the Torah that says we must always tell the truth.  Only when giving witness in a trial.  But for certain pragmatic reasons, there’s no sin in telling a lie.  At least, a little ‘white’ lie.  Such as:  Honey, that dish was very tasty!  What a successful trial cook!  So maybe it wasn’t true.  But I avoided hurting my wife’s feelings, and maintained shalom bayit.  That’s a good thing, right?

And then?  The next week, she cooks it again.  After all, I told her how much I liked it the first time.  And then not too far in the future again.  And again.  And then finally, sometime in the future, she sees me picking at the dish and asks, exasperated:  “But I thought you liked this dish??!”  And that’s when I finally have to tell her the truth:  “No, honey…actually, to tell you the truth, I don’t like it at all.”

So, sooner or later the truth does come out.  And when it does, it causes more hurt than if I had just trusted Clara to be able to handle that I wasn’t crazy about the dish the first time.  Because of my denial of the truth, I’ve caused unnecessary tension and made a situation far worse than it had to be.

Now the above is, obviously, a relatively ‘light’ matter.  But what about in ‘heavy’ matters?  It’s the same principle.  And it points to the choice that Bilaam had to make.

Bilaam was a pagan prophet.  He gets a mixed review in our tradition.  On one hand, he ends up blessing the people Israel.  This, on the instructions of God.  And in contravention to the commission he was given by Balak, the King of Moab.

Balak hires Bilaam to curse Israel, for Balak fears this people.  Bilaam agrees, but on the way to do so, he is repeatedly told not to even think about carrying out his commission.  He is only to bless Israel.  Bilaam hears God’s instruction loud and clear, and tries to waffle, but God knows the heart of the prophet.  He knows that Bilaam is going to curse Israel.  And how could it be otherwise?  Balak has offered Bilaam untold riches and prestige if he will carry out the commission.  Although Bilaam is clearly in touch with God, he clearly sees himself as a free agent.  Instead of telling Balak unequivocally from the start that he won’t be accepting the commission, he begins travelling to the designated place to do so.  This, whilst telling God that in fact he doesn’t plan to carry it out.  But in the end, God takes away Bilaam’s free will and takes control of the situation.  Bilaam blesses Israel with the words that we repeat in the morning service when we sing Mah tovu ohalecha Ya’akov/Mishkinotecha Yisrael:  How goodly are your tents of Jacob/Your habitations, O Israel.  Bilaam carries out God’s will, but because he is forced, there is no merit in it for him.

So what does this have to do with the song Sometimes When We Touch?  Or with the notion of lying to your wife about her cooking?  Only this:  when we are dishonest, there is always some price to pay.  Whether that dishonesty is in a trivial matter, or in one that speaks to someone’s deepest emotions, or in an ethical principle.  Whether it is in a matter that could be called ‘trivial,’ or one of obvious great import.  Dishonesty will ultimately come to no good.

Diplomats and generals all grasp this.  Clausewitz saw war as just an extension of statecraft, a step beyond diplomacy.  Most practitioners of both disciplines would disagree.  But either way, in the realms of both diplomacy and war, deception can only be used most sparingly.  As in one time.  After that, your adversary will not trust your words or your actions.

As in the great realms of war and peace, so too in the smaller realms where the rest of us operate.  If we expect our words and deeds to carry any credibility, if we expect to be taken seriously, then we must operate in a framework of clarity.  The truth can be hard to swallow.  But a lie will likely cause greater damage.  Shabbat shalom.