Staying off the Rocks: A Reflection for Parashat Shemot, Saturday 2 January 2016

A recurring theme in Jewish life and history is the question:  What is the balance between assimilation and distinctiveness?  That we assimilate, is simply a given.  Wherever we live in freedom, we grab the opportunities to enjoy the best of what society has to offer.  We make no apologies for this, and we shouldn’t.  To be sure, there are Jews who go to great lengths to avoid participating in the culture of the place where they live.  Whether they live in Antwerp, Brooklyn, or Melbourne.  They seem aloof and untouched by the place where they live.  They live in a self-imposed ghetto.  You could go between certain Jewish enclaves in Antwerp, Brooklyn, and Melbourne…and not realise you had moved to a different country or continent!

          Just as there are Jews who avoid assimilation, there are those who avoid distinctiveness.  There are Jews whom you might meet and get to know, and never know that they’re Jews.  Until some life event brings the hidden Jew to the surface.  Until then, they do not participate in any way in Jewish life.  Thus, they avoid contributing to its vitality and viability.

          Between both extremes are the rest of us.  Wanting to find ways to positively express our Jewish identity.  Seeing no conflict between that, and enjoying the best of the world around us.  We’re like a ship, navigating narrow straits.  Our task is to stay in the channel, in the centre, avoiding the rocks and shoals on both sides. 

I can prove to you that this is the Jewish ‘norm.’  When the Nazis singled out the Jews for persecution, there first acts were to ‘out’ a people – the German Jews – who until then were largely invisible to the average German.  Even if the Christian neighbour knew that a particular family was Jewish, it seldom resulted in that family isolating themselves in a distinctly Jewish world.  In fact, this was one of the Nazis’ chief complaints about the Jews.  That they sought to ‘hide’ among the Germans.  The very pseudo-science of Anti-Semitism was, more than anything else, aimed at enabling Germans to identify the hidden ‘Jewish Menace.’

          Okay, so the Nazi era was relatively recent in the sweep of Jewish history.  Let’s go back to the Maccabean revolt against Assyria.  Assyrian King Antiochus Epiphanes tried to force the Jews to assimilate, because so many Jews were eager to do so.  The king thought that was a good thing and wanted the rest to join in.

          Going further back, you may remember Queen Esther, the heroine of the book of the Tanach named after her.  Her very name – Esther – means ‘Hidden’ in Hebrew, and you may remember that her Cousin Mordechai advised her most strongly to hide her Jewish identity whilst in the palace of Kind Achashverosh.

          Even farther back was Moses:  Mosheh in Hebrew.  But wait, Mosheh isn’t even a Hebrew name…it’s an Egyptian name!  And as you remember – and we start to read the narrative in this week’s Torah portion – Moses was always aware of his identity as a Jew but it only became a motivating force for him at age 40.

          All I’m trying to say, is that this tension between maintaining our distinctiveness as Jews, and our full participation in the surrounding culture, has been a constant theme in Jewish history.  And through most of that history, the majority of Jews dwelt somewhere in the middle of the continuum between assimilation and remaining distinctive.  That is, when we were given the choice.  We avoided disappearing into society on one hand, and remaining aloof and apart on the other.  But at various points in our history we would swing what would turn out to be an excessive distance towards one or the other extreme.  And then, events and their consequences would influence us to chart a more centrist course going forward.  Over the centuries, we worked hard to find a balance.

          Early in this week’s Torah reading we are informed that the Egyptian Pharaoh thought the Jews a threat to his rule.  And we are informed of the Jews’ response:  The more the Pharaoh afflicted them, the more they grew and filled the land.  The midrashic interpreters suggested what this meant:  They filled the theaters and circuses.  This rings true to me.  The other night we went out to the Gold Coast Art Centre to see Suffragette.  Despite our tiny presence on the Gold Coast, we are always conspicuous in our patronage of the ‘serious’ arts.  And sure enough, in the sparse crowd in the theatre the night before New Year’s Eve I recognised several other Jews.

This interpretation, they filled the theatres and circuses, is meant pejoratively.  The more they assimilated, the more the Egyptians thought them a threat.  The sages are implying a circular progression of case and effect.  We responded to our affliction by trying to shed our Jewishness.  And we were punished for our eagerness to do so.

          And yet we know that we are called to be a Nation of Priests, a Holy People, a Light unto the Nations.  Here’s the heart of the matter:  We cannot fulfil this calling if we remain so distinctive and aloof from those around us that we are untouched by them.  Nor can we, if we lose our distinctiveness and disappear.  The very quest of the Jewish people requires that we find a balance.  That, like ships navigating narrow straits, we stay in the channel.  And avoid the rocks and shoals close to both shores.  Because a ship on the rocks is of no use.  And a Jew who cannot serve as a witness to G-d’s presence, is effectively not a Jew.  There are always Jews who are more or less traditional in their outlook.  But as an entirely separate phenomenon, there are Jews who try to be more or less distinctive.  

          Let’s support one another as each one of us tried to find the channel between the rocks of aloofness on one hand, and of invisibility on the other.  Some days it seems that either extreme would be easier.  Either can be tempting at times.  But by taking either extreme, we fail to fulfil the prophecy:  By you shall humanity be blessed.  Shabbat shalom. 

Boycotts and Gastronomic Choices: A Reflection for Friday, 1 January 2016

As anybody who knows me knows, before I came to live in Australia I lived in Colorado Springs, a lovely city of perhaps half a million souls nestled against the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains with Pikes Peak looming above the city at just over 14,000 feet elevation.  Geographically and climactically, Colorado Springs has little in common with the Gold Coast, where Clara and I have made our home for the past three-and-a-half years.  But the Jewish community is of a similar size:  maybe 400 affiliated families plus the legions of others whom all the local experts believe are present in the community.  But perhaps 400 families, and a few more on the fringes, are all that one can document as being there.

          There is a restaurant in Colorado Springs, that the Levy family used to like to frequent.  It is called ‘Jerusalem Café.’  I know, I know, it’s a no-brainer that the Levy family would prefer to eat in such an establishment.  But before you get carried away, let me tell you that the owners of the Jerusalem Café are a Palestinian Arab family.  Muslims.  I suppose they named their business ‘Jerusalem’ and not ‘Al Quds’ because ‘Jerusalem’ is more instantly recognizable.  Not many Americans would make the connection between ‘Al Quds’ – meaning ‘The Holy’ – and the city sacred to all three of the ‘Abrahamic faiths.’

          So the Jerusalem Café serves up the sort of food that the Levy family enjoys eating.  And we saw no contradiction to our Zionism and eating where the owner wears hijab.  Where murals of the Dome of the Rock and Al Aksa adorn the walls.

          One day I was eating lunch there with a non-Jewish friend, introducing him to their delicious shawarma.  And my friend, quietly asked if my loyalties towards Israel made me feel at all conflicted about patronising the Jerusalem Café.  Without even thinking, I told him, “Absolutely not.”  And then I looked up and scanned the room.  It’s not a large place:  maybe a dozen tables.  And this being the height of the lunch hour, everyone was occupied.  I pointed out to my friend:  Half the people here are Jews…and the other half are military personnel, in uniform.  Colorado Springs hosts five military bases, none of them close to the Jerusalem Café.  Despite that, the tables not occupied by local Jews on that weekday, were taken by military personnel.  Many of them had undoubtedly served tours in Iraq.  And were ‘supposed’ to be Islamaphobic.  Of all the places they could have been eating lunch, they chose to drive some distance to a place that was conspicuously owned and run by a Muslim family.  And the half-dozen or so lunch parties representing the city’s tiny Jewish community has also sought out, of all the places where they could patronise, a Palestinian-owned business.

          One time, there was a rally by local Colorado Springs Christians in support of Israel.  Some of the local Jewish community attended.  There was a pathetic little demonstration across the street from the venue, with a handful of enemies of Israel holding up signs with such slogans as ‘Zionism Equals Racism.’  A Jewish friend and I walked over to their table to engage in a quiet and respectful dialogue with them before the rally began.  As a result of this, Clara and I invited a couple who had been a part of the demonstration to our home for coffee and conversation.  The dialogue produced nothing earth-shattering, but it was interesting.  But probably the most interesting part of the evening was when we welcomed the couple into our home and they presented us with a gift:  a bottle of Palestinian olive oil.  In doing so, they expressed the hope that they hadn’t insulted us by bringing such a thing into our home.  Clara and I looked at one another, dumbfounded by the suggestion that our guests bringing a Palestinian product into our home would be offensive to us.  Rather, we thanked our guests profusely for the gift.  Over the following weeks we certainly enjoyed using the high-quality olive oil, the product of Palestinian villagers.  We saw no contradiction between that, and our sometimes-strident advocacy of Israel’s cause.  But later, when I had time to reflect, I realised that this represented the same essential mindset that caused the tiny local Jewish community to support a conspicuously Palestinian restaurant.  We don’t wish them ill.  We want them to succeed, and we’re willing to make our economic – and gastronomic – choices to support them when we can.

          This is in contrast to the way that the Palestinian leadership, its population both indigenous and expat, and their political allies behave vis-à-vis Israel and Jews, whom they see as one and the same.  They hate us and wish us the worst.  They expend great energies, influencing the world to isolate and boycott Israel and its products as an expression of that hatred.  Now, these others frequently accuse Israel and her supporters of likewise carrying a deep hatred of the Palestinians.  They will point to the “heavy hand” with which the Israelis respond to Palestinians who out of their frustration and continued disappointment with a dormant peace process, pathetically attack Israelis with kitchen knives and household scissors, and are shot deat by the Israeli Army and Police.  But the Israelis are not responding out of hatred.  They are simply responding decisively as a way of saying:  We will not let you terrorise us.  A pair of scissors is a deadly weapon, and when you use them, we respond as someone whose life you’re threatenting…because that’s what you are doing.  Come at me with scissors, and I’ll stop you with deadly force if necessary.  But bring me a bottle of your fine olive oil and I will be happy to purchase and enjoy it.  And under the right circumstances, I would love to sit down with you and dip our bread in it together.  And enjoy it together.  And get to know one another and enjoy one another’s company.

          The other day I read that the Palestinian Street is complaining.  Since the beginning of the latest wave of violence directed at Israelis, in October, their economy has collapsed.  This, because Jews are afraid to step into Palestinian towns and neighbourhoods in order to patronise their businesses.  They would be very happy to give such custom to their Arab neighbours.  This, in contrast to their neighbours and their supporters who want to bankrupt Israel for lack of customers.  Because the hatred is, by and large, one way.  When Clara and I were in Israel recently, not a single conversation where the latest wave of violence came up devolved into expressions of hatred for Palestinians – except, perhaps their so-called leaders.  On the rare occasions where we even had such conversations, the focus was more likely to turn to steps that we could take to prevent our becoming victims to the violence.  Because Jews have been victims too many times in history and it is time for a phase shift.  The Israelis have been working to make that shift for many years.  And the more they do, the more the world scorns them.

          This week’s Torah reading is Shemot, the opening chapters of the book by the same name or as it is more popularly known, Exodus.  It begins with the change in fortunes of the Jews of ancient Egypt.  The Pharaoh who knew not Joseph feared the Jews as a potential fifth column.  And he oppressed them.  But as the Torah informs us:  The more the Pharaoh afflicted them, the more they grew and filled the land.  So a positive response to persecution and affliction, is hardly a new phenomenon.  Rather, it is the classical Jewish response.  The ancient Israelites responded to Pharaoh’s afflictions with a positive approach to life.  Not with hatred of Egypt.  The contemporary Israelis likewise respond to Palestinian hatred and violence, and their supporters who would seem to want them to just go away, similar with a positive approach to life.  Not with hatred.  But with a positive witness of a self-confident national life that defied the hatred by saying:  We’re not going to succumb to this and respond in kind.  We’re going to transcend your hatred.  Come at us with a blade, or a gun, or a vehicle wielded as a weapon, and we’ll stop you decisively.  Come to us with olive oil, and we’ll buy and enjoy it.

          This is our way.  This is the way of peace.  Shabbat shalom.    

Happy (Civil) New Year!

Of course, we celebrated the JEWISH New Year some weeks back with contemplation, soul-searching, spiritual renewal and yes...food!

Tonight, many will be celebrating the CIVIL New Year, perhaps in a more exuberant fashion...

So tomorrow night, after you've enjoyed a late sleep, you can come to the Levy home and share in an occasion for spiritual renewal and food.  6.30PM, service to welcome Shabbat followed by dinner (meat this week).

Then, Saturday morning, we invite you to join us at the QCWA Hall in Southport for the morning service.  We will celebrate the beginning of the Civil Year by transitioning to a new book of the Torah when we read from the book of Shemot (Exodus).  10.00AM, service followed by lunch out for those who wish to join.

Would love to see you!

Rabbi Don

To Complement One Another: A Reflection for Parashat Vayechi, Saturday 26 December 2015

Almost every Jew has seen representations of the Chagall Windows.  And every Jew who has managed to travel to Israel, has probably made the mandatory stop at Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital in Jerusalem, to see the actual windows.  Chagall’s stained glass creations, grace the perimeter of the raised ceiling of the hospital’s chapel.  When tourists visit, they usually wait for and listen to the docent’s explanation of the history of the windows, and the imagery thereon.  Chagall, in carrying out the commission from the hospital, illustrated in stained glass the blessings that Jacob imparts to all his sons in this week’s Torah reading.

          Last night, I talked about the blessings Jacob conferred upon his two grandsons, the sons of Joseph.  I talked about how we can take that he deliberately blessed them in contravention of the law and custom concerning birth order.  But those were not the only blessings Jacob confers in this week’s portion.  That was in the 48^th chapter of Genesis.  Immediately afterward in the narrative, in Chapter 49, Jacob blesses all twelve of his sons.

          This is important business, this blessing of our children.  When our group in Southport gathers for Shabbat at the Levy home, we seldom have multiple generations of one family present.  We therefore just bless one another as friends.  We do it light-heartedly, evoking smiles and laughter.  Nothing wrong with that.  But when parents bless their own children publicly, it is powerful.  It is definitely not just a rote ritual.  In the synagogue in Clara’s moshav in Israel, it is a very moving moment.  At the end of the Friday evening service, all the men whose children are present, gather them around and bless them.  It’s according to the same script we use.  But there is a deeper dimension in the ritual that is easily discernable.

          The ritual is repeated after walking home from the synagogue.  The father of the house – in this case Clara’s father Vito may he rest in peace – would individually bless each member of the household.  This repetition wasn’t public but it was moving nonetheless.

          In this context, we see that the blessing of children is serious business.

          And the blessings that Jacob imparts to his sons in this chapter, are nothing if not serious.  In fact, several of them seem more like curses!  For example, Reuben:  Water-like impetuousity – you cannot be foremost, because you mounted your father’s bed; then you desecrated him who ascended my couch.  And then, Simeon and Levi.  Accursed is their rage, for it is intense, and their wrath for it is harsh.  And so on.  A number of the sons’ blessings, hardly sound like blessings.  They sound more like Jacob is dumping a pail of cold water known as reality, over the sons’ heads.

But remember the drash about the meaning of the Four Species?  You know, the four species that we carry and wave during the festival of Sukkot?  (Come on, it wasn’t that long ago…)  I’ll refresh your memory.  The lulav has taste but no smell, symbolizing those who study Torah but do not possess good deeds.  The hadass has good smell but no taste, symbolizing those who possess good deeds but do not study Torah.  The aravah has neither taste nor smell, symbolizing those who lack both Torah and good deeds.  The Etrog has good taste and good smell, symbolizing those who have both Torah and good deeds.  When we take them up together, we symbolize that the people Israel is made up of individuals who possess different qualities and who all, each in his own way, bless one another.

This drash doesn’t really tell the whole story.  Of course it is best to possess both Torah and good deeds, and it is not desirable that one lack both Torah and good deeds.  But even the one who is like the aravah, the willow, has a function and is able to bless their fellow Jew.  Even when a member of the family does not live up to the aspirations we hold for them, they are not to be discounted.  As Mishnah Avot reminds us:  Who is wise?  The one who learns from every one.  Each one of us has something important to share with others.  For some, it’s in the realm of Torah knowledge.  For some, it’s good deeds.  For some, it’s both.  And for some, outwardly lacking both, there is a lesson on the importance of the two.

Each one of us has something unique that we bring to the table.  The stereotyped Jewish parent aspires for each of his children to obtain a profession that will give the child a generous income and elevate their status.  Therefore, a doctor is likely the parent’s first choice.  A lawyer probably the second.  An accountant, third.  And so on.  But not every Jewish child is capable of, or wants to obtain one of the professions from this narrow list.  Most Jewish parents probably don’t aspire for their children to grow up to be tradies.  But…as soon as the parent has an electrical malfunction in the house, they will appreciate the child who became an electrician!  Et cetera.  Even when our aspirations are not met, each one of our children – whatever their life choices – will ultimately be in the position to bless the parent in partial recompense to the blessing which flowed the other way.

In this context, we can see Jacob’s blessings to his 12 sons, as something other than curses.  Each one of them, and the tribe that springs from his loins, will in the end bless the other siblings and their progeny as they gel into the people Israel, a people with a mission among the peoples of the world that transcends their meager numbers and meager possession of the usual measures of greatness.  And yet, Israel does become a great nation.  We see proof of this even today, as our significance is way out of the proportion that our numbers and power would imply.

With this in mind, we can read these blessings differently.  Not every child is destined for leadership.  But each has a unique potential that can be identified and unleashed.  Each member of the people Israel has a blessing to impart to the rest.  Let it be our lifelong quest to identify, and unleash it.  Shabbat shalom.     

Out of Order? A Reflection for Parashat Vayechi, 25 December 2015

What are we supposed to think?

          In the Torah, as in ancient Near Eastern law and customs generally, there is a preference for the first born son.  We have seen in the Torah’s narrative that inheritance rights favour the firstborn.  This includes the inheritance of property, but also the intangible elements of legacy.

          This is a powerful social force, which survives even today.  Many grown children who weren’t first in their family’s birth order, can tell of growing up with lower expectations from their parents.  Or some other manifestation of preference for the first born.  In the counseling world, intake forms for treatment ask the patient’s place in the birth order in their family of origin.  It is important information for the counselor when trying to understand family system issues.  Parents of multiple children of the same gender seldom are aware that they are perpetuating this preference.  (I’m not even going to touch the phenomenon of gender preference, usually for the masculine!  Another drash, for another day.)

          So when the Torah, which the devout amongst us consider an expression of G-d’s will expresses this preference, it clearly means something. 

Yet as the Torah’s narrative unfolds, we see instance after instance where the second or subsequent son in the birth order gets the preference.  And when that happens, there is no clue that G-d does not approve.  We saw it in the Esau-Jacob competition, where the twins’ mother, Rebecca, was seen conspiring against her husband Isaac to ensure the primacy of the younger one.  We saw it in the next generation, where Jacob showed preference for not even son number two, but number eleven in birth order!  Of 12 sons, Joseph was older only than Benjamin.

And now, in the 48^th chapter of Genesis, we see it again.

In this week’s Torah reading we see the hand of Jacob changing the custom again for the next generation.  His son Yosef has brought his two sons, Menasseh and Ephraim, to be blessed by their grandfather.  Jacob crosses his arms, blessing the younger, Ephraim with his right hand whilst he blesses the firstborn, Menasseh with his left.  This may seem like a minor variance, but it is powerfully loaded in a way that is not immediately apparent to the casual reader today.  The right hand is the hand of spiritual primacy, the one preferred for the performance of mitzvoth.  Joseph presents his sons to his father with Menasseh on his left so that the older boy will be on Jacob’s right.  His intention is clearly that Jacob will place his right hand on the older boy’s head.  But Jacob does the opposite.  And the text makes it clear that Jacob is making change deliberately.  When Joseph points out his father’s ‘error,’ Jacob gently rebukes his son and predicts that the younger son, Ephraim, is destined for primacy.

This might seem, again to today’s casual reader, not such a big deal.  Jacob blesses both grandsons and tells their father, Joseph:  [Menasseh] too will become a people, and he too will become great; yet his younger brother shall become greater than his offspring[‘s fame] will fill the nations.  So if both boys’ progeny will become great nations, what is the offence if their grandfather has predicted – some would say ordained – that the younger one will be greater?  Speaking as a second son myself, I would say…big deal!

And it is a big deal.  Since these aberrations of the expected order are preserved in the Torah, we do well to look for a lesson in them, to not think them random.  If the Torah as a script of G-d’s will, there is a sacred lesson in all this.

Writing these words, reminds me of something that happened to me about a year and a half ago.  I thought I was at the end of the line in Australia; my visa would expire the next day despite all logic that the Department of Immigration should have allowed me to stay:  in order to attend my Fair Work hearing scheduled for several weeks later, and in order for Jewish Journeys to complete the application and be considered as my new sponsor.  A few days before, I had written one final e-mail to the agent in Hobart that was handling my case, requesting the extension, and got no response.  After a talk the previous day with the immigration phone enquiry people, I had gone up to the office in Brisbane. 

Conceding that we were leaving Australia very soon, we were going to get a bridging visa to give us a little more time to get our things packed and shipped, and to book flights.  There was a line waiting at the reception counter in the office.  We were almost at the front of the line, when my mobile rang.  It was the agent in Hobart, calling to let me know that they’d reconsidered my case.  I could stay in the country long enough to attend my hearing, and for Jewish Journeys’ application to come in and be considered.  Had the phone call come five minutes later, I would have already cancelled my visa by getting the bridging visa.

Talking about it a while later with my good friend Gordon, I intoned the well-known expression:  G-d works in strange ways.  Gordon’s response was:  Rabbi, G-d works in G-d’s ways!  In other words, there’s nothing ‘strange’ about how G-d works.  It only seems strange, measured against our own sensibilities.

And I think that this preference, on one hand, for the firstborn and the repeated abrogating of the principle on the other hand, represents an example of this principle at work.  ‘The Rules’ are set, and followed, except when they’re not.  Because The Rules make sense…except when they don’t.  In the case of Esau and Jacob, it was not clear at the time – except to their mother – that Jacob was the one who would successfully carry the promise of Abraham to the next generation.  At the time, we can only see that Rebecca favours Yaakov because he seems to fit her image of how a son should act.  But as the Torah’s narrative unfolds, we see why this is true.  And then Jacob in turn chooses his eleventh son, Joseph, as the favoured one.  In doing so, he seems only to be expressing his preference for his wife Rachel over Leah.  His decision causes conflict among his sons.  But subsequent events show that Rebecca’s choice is nothing less than divinely-inspired as Joseph ends up saving the entire family from famine, as well as modelling the important principle of forgiving the truly repentant.  And now Jacob is once more ‘out of order’ in prophesying that the second of Joseph’s sons, Ephraim, will outshine his older brother.  As the narrative continues to unfold, we will see how it comes to light that Jacob, in showing this favour, was again inspired in the act. 

One more important thing that we learn from this week’s reading.  The blessing that we impart when we bless one another on Shabbat evenings, alludes to Jacob’s blessing of his two grandsons.  ישימך אלקים כאפריים וכי מנשה – yesim’cha Elokim ke-Efrayim vechi-Menasheh ­ - May G-d make you as Ephraim and Menasseh.  When we invoke this blessing, we invoke Jacob’s aspirations regarding his two son’s two sons.  He saw different futures for them, and that vision made him bless the two out of order – in the placement of his hands and in the invoking of their names – but he saw each one of them as a gift from G-d and as an important link in what would become the chain of tradition.  Shabbat shalom.  

Finding Transformation: A Reflection for Parashat Vayiggash, 19 December 2015

Joseph Reconciles with His Brothers

In his drash this week on Vayiggash, Rabbi Lord Sacks points out that almost all the pioneers and important figures in the development of the field of psychology were – and still are – Jews.  This fact is very familiar to me, because I spent the year before I came to Australia, studying psychology full-time in graduate school.  When interviewed by a faculty member to see if the program would be suitable for me, I only jokingly told the teacher that I’d been struggling with the art of counseling during the 15 years of my rabbinate, and I wanted to take some time out to ‘finally learn to do it right.’  I was actually only half-joking.  When one is entrusted with souls, one should feel in awe of the sacred responsibility.  If one is serious about fulfilling one’s calling, one cannot be glib about it and think that it’s simple – that it’s all just ‘common sense.’  So I wanted to learn the theories about therapy, in order to better care for the souls that come to me for help.

          None of the teachers in my program was Jewish, and only one other student was.  But I found that almost every one of the great thinkers of the field was a Jew.  Thinkers whose contributions developed our understanding of how and why people feel, think and behave the ways they do.  One of my fellow students also noticed it.  One night, chatting on our way to the car park, he asked me if I’d notice that many of the names and personal stories behind the theories and techniques we’d been studying in our survey course, were Jews. “Actually, they’re virtually all Jews,” I pointed out.  Of the figures whom we studied that semester, only one was not.

          It was therefore not surprising, as Rabbi Sacks points out, that the Nazis had a particular contempt for psychology.  They called it ‘Jewish Science’ and refuted its premises with a particular vigour.  But the question that arises from the fact that it was almost exclusively Jews who ‘invented’ psychology is, Why?

          The question can surely be answered, in part, by the Jews’ non-acceptance in established fields.  From the late 19^th century, the modern pseudo-science known as Anti-Semitism replaced the more traditional religion-based contempt for Judaism and Jews.  Jews found themselves unwelcome in various traditional and established academic fields.  They therefore ‘invented’ psychology as an outlet for their talents and their desire to grasp at new theories and knowledge.  In the same way, the entertainment industry was driven by Jews who sought new fields, not closed to them, for an outlet for their creative energies.  Jews, shunned in opera, ballet, and other traditional art forms, in effect ‘invented’ Tin pan Alley, Broadway, and Hollywood.

          But this need to find, and even invent outlets to guide their original thinking does not fully explain the Jewish embrace of psychology.  I think it reflects in a deeper way the Jewish sense of a higher purpose to our very being.  That even when we wallow in misery, that too has meaning apart from the misery we might feel at the moment.  Other religious systems also teach that there is more to life than what we might be feeling at any given moment.  But none seems to frame the issues quite like the sages who wrestle with the Torah generation after generation.

          Sacks points to Victor Frankl, a name that may be familiar.  Frankl, as an inmate in Auschwitz, conceived Logotherapy.  At its heart, Logotherapy posits that, no matter what some force outside yourself has taken from you, they cannot take from you the essence of your humanity.  You retain the latter – and allow it to give you victory over your circumstances – by identifying and understanding what it is that gives your life its essential meaning.  This is going to be different for each individual.  One person’s meaning might be to raise their child.  One person’s meaning might be to write a book that nobody else can write.  And so on.  Almost anybody who has studied Frankl’s theory, find that it resonates deeply.  Rick Warren, a prominent Evangelical pastor in California, re-framed Frankl’s ideas into Christian terms when he wrote The Purpose-driven Life:  What on Earth am I Here for?  His book has sold tens of millions of copies and so propelled Warren into superstardom that, in 2008, he famously interviewed, separately, both candidates for President of the USA:  John McCain and Barak Obama.  In those interviews, he pointedly asked each candidate when they thought life begins.  Senator McCain responded unambiguously, “Life begins at Conception.”  And if you know anything about McCain’s life, you know he wasn’t just parroting some church’s doctrine.  Then-Senator Obama answered the question quite differently.  Maybe you remember it. “To answer that question with specificity, is above my pay grade.” It’s no wonder that Evangelicals voted heavily for McCain.  In retrospect, I wish there had been a few thousand more Evangelicals, concentrated in different states.  But I digress…

So Victor Frankl, Rick Warren and others who have advocated the psychology of meaning, tapped into a very basic human need and therefore made a huge contribution to our knowledge of how to overcome adversity.  Perhaps the gist of this form of psychology is, I think, therefore I feel, and therefore I behave.  After all, its goal is to help us find within us the means to overcome adversity.

When we look at this week’s Torah reading, we can fully understand why all of this – the quest to understand the human mind and guide human behavior – is such a quintessentially Jewish enterprise.  Joseph, the protagonist of the narrative at this point, could have been a lifelong patient of psychotherapy.  He had tsurres like nobody hearing or reading my words today could imagine.  His brothers were so jealous of their father’s favouring of Joseph, and of Joseph’s resulting sense of superiority, that they came to hate him with a passion.  So much so, that they almost murdered him in cold blood – and then ‘relented’ when instead they sold him to slavers.  In Egypt, Joseph endured incredible adversity until his talents come to the attention of the Pharaoh.  Then he was propelled into stardom, specifically as the Pharaoh’s chief counselor.  He saved Egypt from disaster and was therefore positioned to save his family when the same disaster – a regional drought and famine – threatened to wipe them out.

And now, in today’s reading, he faces his brothers.  The narrative is laconic as Torah tends to be, but through the lacunae one sees glimpses of the swirling emotions as Joseph toys with his brothers, making them pay for the way they treated him years back.  But he experiences a change of heart.  And that change of heart comes only when he realises the purpose, for his success in Egypt.  Joseph comes to understand that the very purpose for his suffering, is to ensure that his family will live and prosper.  This lesson in the Psychology of Meaning, changes Joseph’s behavior.  He relents from his quest to make his brothers suffer.  And he welcomes them into his home, into his adopted country.

Joseph found transformation when he realised the purpose of his life.  When it became clear to him, what on earth he was here for.  That clarity, that realisation gave him a new perspective.  And from that perspective, he was able to forgive, and embrace his brothers.

There are certainly other forms of psychotherapy that work.  Ask me some day about Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, another Jewish invention, which is helping people with PTSD right and left.  But it is clear that the Psychology of Meaning, Logotherapy, resonates deeply with the human mind and with basic human needs.  As Joseph modelled for us so long ago, as Frankl learned in a different kind of adversity so many centuries later.  When we can see the meaning of our lives, we can overcome.  Shabbat shalom.    

The Centrality of Israel: A Reflection for Friday, 18 December 2015

Some years back, I was in line to check in for a flight from Ben Gurion to London Gatwick.  I had been in Israel for a week and a half:  a week for a little study at a yeshiva, and a few extra days to attend the wedding of one of Clara’s nieces.  Clara didn’t travel to Israel for the wedding because our kids were young and it was too much trouble.  But as I happened to be there anyway, I extended my stay to attend.

          Having stayed at Clara’s parents’ home for a few days for the wedding, I of course found myself loaded down with care packages to take home.  If you’ve got a mother-in-law, you probably understand this.  There was no way I was leaving that house without a mountain of foodstuffs thrust upon me.  Good thing I wasn’t coming to Australia!  I tried the I Don’t Have Room in My Suitcase ruse, but it didn’t work.  There was an extra suitcase in the house; I was welcome to use it.

          So I set off to the airport.  If you’ve flown in or out of Israel, you know of the extra security.  Before reaching the check-in counter, you and all your luggage face a security agent, who questions you at length about what you’re carrying, who packed it, and how you controlled it.  Maybe I’m a pathological truth-teller; I found myself unable to lie and say that I’d packed the bags myself.

          Did anybody give you anything to carry on the flight?

          Yes.

          Who gave you something?

          My wife’s mother.

          Do you know what it is?

          Food for my children.

          Ah, that’s a savta’s job.  And she affixed the security tape to my bag and passed me through.

          Backward a bunch of years.  I was in Israel to study, and I had travelled to Ashkelon to spend Shabbat with Clara and her family.  I took the Thursday evening bus.  On Friday morning, looking for something to do, I borrowed Clara’s car and drove to Beersheva to see the old Beduin Market.  Returning to Ashkelon, I did what people did in those days; I filled the car with hitch hikers.  One was an older woman.  Once she realised my Hebrew carried a foreign accent, she began giving me the Third Degree.

Where are you from?

The United States.

Why are you here?

I’m studying.

Whose car is this?

My fiance’s.

Why haven’t you become a citizen?

I’m going back to the US to finish my studies.

Oh, that’s okay.  The State of Israel isn’t running away. (Meaning:  You’ve got the rest of your life to immigrate.)  

I can tell you a dozen more, cute stories, from a dozen different visits, but the aforementioned encounters well illustrate the joy of being in Israel.  It’s not that it’s the world’s most beautiful country.  There is not more to do in Israel than anywhere else.  And it’s not that the people are more, or less, kind than the people anywhere else.  It’s just that the Israeli people you encounter are likely to be almost exclusively Jewish.  Except for the staff at hotels where you might stay.  There you’ll encounter Israeli Arabs, but otherwise you don’t meet them in casual encounters along the way.  But Jews are not shy as a group.  In chance encounters, they will talk to you, advise you, interrogate you.  It’s just so quintessentially Jewish.  And because of that, each and every encounter with them brings a delight – or an exasperation – that turns the encounter into far more than its script conveys.

In short, every conversation feels like you’re talking to your distant cousin Shmeulik, son of Uncle Yankef whom you’ve only seen at your bar mitzvah and your father’s funeral.  The last time you saw your mother, she mentioned Shmuelik so you know he’s out there.  But if you should chance to visit the city where he lives, and ring him up, and go over for dinner or meet him for drinks at your hotel, each of you takes a proprietary interest in his cousin immediately.  That’s Israel.

If you have a proprietary interest in the Israelis, then even more so the land where they live.  Even if you haven’t studied the Tanach diligently over a lifetime, you will recognise place names that you encounter along the way from the Bible stories.  For example, if you drive to Jerusalem after arriving at Ben Gurion Airport.  You turn to the east on Highway One and one of the first turnoffs you’ll pass is Modi’in.  It’s a modern town in the Judaean Hills, but of course its name is important in the story of Hanukkah.  It was there where the elderly priest Mattathias resisted the Assyrians.  His sons rallied the populace to join in the resistance.  When Jews across the land heard of this wondrous event, some left their homes and went out into the countryside to seek out this band of rebels and join in the small army to take the fight to the entire country.  It’s like that nothing more than a glimpse of a roadside, will bring all these thoughts to the forefront.  

Not everybody hearing or reading my words today can appreciate Jewish humour.   Perhaps you’ve only encountered Jewish nosiness, or Jewish chutzpah, to a limited extent so that it isn’t a trope for you yet.  But chances that you’ve read some Tanach.  So when you see a road sign for, or actually set foot in, a place like Modi’in…or Beth El…or Beersheva…or the Sea of Galilee, that experience will engender for you a sense of being in a place connected to important people and events.  And if you’ve read the history of how we Jews reestablished ourselves in the land beginning in the nineteenth century, you will similarly react to such place names as Rosh Pinna, Rishon Letziyon, Yad Mordechai, and Zichron Yaakov.

Many Jews, be they Jewish from birth or Jewish via conversion, resist travelling to Israel.  This is more than understandable.  If you live in Australia, it’s very far, and since there are no direct flights from this country, travelling there is a long and arduous trip.  Not to mention expensive.  Additionally, many resist going to Israel because of the negative image drawn up by a bad press.  A press that only seems to report the crisis aspect of Israeli life.  The image one gets is highly distorted.  For example, one hears the word ‘Apartheid’ thrown around regarding Israel:  Israel shoves its Arab citizens, and the Palestinians living into the territories, into tribal ‘bantustans’ in order to keep them away from Jews.  I’ll respond to that with two images from my recent trip.  In Tiberias, a small city on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, one sees Arabs in their traditional mode of dress all over.  In the shops, on the streets…in the health clinic where we took Eyal for his physiotherapy.  Nobody assaults, or insults, or runs from them.  They’re just part of the landscape, the same as Jews are.  The other image:  Ashkelon is a city on the south coast, just north of the Gaza Strip.  You surely have this image of Gaza being under siege, nothing more than a huge concentration camp where the people are bottled up in a pressure cooker.  But on Highway 4 outside Ashkelon, the main coast road that leads to Tel Aviv, one sees cars, trucks, and mini-busses with Gaza number plates day and night.  And by the way, if you look at the Gaza Strip on Google Earth, you’ll see as much open land as populated.  It’s still a very densely populated piece of land.  But then, Israel is one of the most densely populated countries on earth.  If it weren’t for mini-states like Singapore, Lichtenstein, Monaco, and the Vatican City, it would be closer to the top of the list.  And yet in the entire country, as in Gaza, it is possible to find wide-open spaces.  Just don’t expect the Australian Outback.

Another falsehood about Israel is that they Jews have systematically perpetrated ‘genocide’ or ‘ethnic cleansing’ against the Arabs.  That lie is easily dispelled by a simple drive, say from Ashkelon to Beit Shean.  To get there, one first drives on Highway 6, which at times skirts the Green Line, the border between Israel proper and the Palestinian territories of the West Bank.  Along the way, you see six large Palestinian towns that are situated just over the border.  South to north, they are:  Qafr Qassem, Qalqiliya, Taibe, Tulkarm, Jat, and Baka el Garbiya.  You’ve probably heard at least some of these names before.  They are all large, thriving towns, each with a profusion of construction cranes towering over the cityscape.  When you come to where you have to turn east on Highway 65 to get to your destination, you are in the Lower Galilee, in the area of Israel proper that’s known as ‘The Arab Triangle.’  There, before you see a single Jewish town, the highway passes between four Israeli Arab towns:  Qafr Qani’a, Ar’ara, Basma and Umm al Fahm.  These are also all large, thriving towns.  They fill the valley, through which the highway passes…not to mention the hillsides on either side.  The only Hebrew you see when passing through is on the road signs which, like in the rest of the country, are in Hebrew, Arabic and English.  All of the signs on businesses, and all the roadside billboards, are in Arabic exclusively.  Looming over the towns in great profusion are…construction cranes.  These towns,and their sister towns in the West Bank, are all experiencing the explosive expansion that Jewish Israel is going through.  In short, there’s definitely no ‘ethnic cleansing’ going on.  The only ‘ethnic cleansing’ is of Jews, who dare not live in these places.

I know I’ve gone on more than long enough for a Friday night.  But indulge me a moment longer to make a point.  In Australia as elsewhere in the Diaspora, one encounters Jews as individuals or in rather small groups who make very little difference in the land as a whole.  Despite this, people you encounter seem to have strong opinions about the Jews.  But it is difficult to see the Jewish collective as really mattering in the life of the country.  So everything that you read about in the Tanach, every one of the rabbi’s assertions that what we’re taught in the Torah matters for all humanity, seems very remote and theoretical.  And Israel, distant and encountered mainly through bad press, seems to indicate that we Jews have no particularly positive contribution to make to the world.  For that, it is really necessary to go to Israel.  To walk the streets and shop in the malls and markets, to sit in the parks, to drive on the highways.  To have endearing encounters with Israelis.  And frustrating encounters.  It’s like any other country…and not like any other country.  But as a Jew, you have a stake in it.  To be Jewish in the fullness that the identity offers, it is necessary for the State and Land of Israel to take a central role.  A close encounter with Israel will enrich your Jewish identity beyond your wildest dreams.  You don’t have to live there.  But, after visiting, yu may just want to live there.  Of all the risks you take when visiting Israel, that’s probably the biggest one!  Shabbat shalom. 

To Listen and Solve

We live in an ever-more violent world.  I think we can all agree on that, and together we look with trepidation on the world around us and wonder who will be the next victims of seemingly-random violence.  And yet, when we talk about the roots of the violence we see an ever-widening gap between two distinct worldviews as to how we might address and rein in this violence.  The gap is so wide that when we representatives of the two worldviews talk to one another, they sometimes seem to be speaking entirely different languages.  Nay, what really seems to be the case is that they are situated in two parallel universes, from which the denizens of one universe can see and hear those of the other but cannot penetrate the transparent-yet-impermeable boundary between the two.  That is, when they bother to acknowledge the voices of the other worldview at all.

I was reminded of this the other day, driving home after dropping my daughter at the airport for a flight to Denver to return her to school after the Thanksgiving holiday.  While driving, I listened to a program on a public radio station.  It was a replay of a forum on gun violence that had taken place, and been broadcast live, from San Francisco some weeks back.  It was just the thoughtful kind of forum that I like; a multi-disciplinary panel consisting of prominent individuals from various professions and therefore viewpoints, discussing the various ramifications of apparently-increasing gun violence in America and ideas for ‘common sense’ measures to address it.  But as I listened, I realized that this panel, whilst representing a variety of specific viewpoints into the issue, was at one in the basic premise:  the solution for gun violence is to decrease – for some, drastically – the number of legal guns in the hands of certifiably law-abiding people.  Now that is an entirely valid viewpoint, albeit problematic from the standpoint of the Second Amendment to the US Constitution, and would certainly be legitimately represented on any panel whose purpose is to problem-solve for gun violence.  But it is not the only viewpoint, and the limiting of the panel in question to advocates for that viewpoint condemned what might have been a valuable discussion, to irrelevance.

 The interesting point in the program was when, in wrapping up the discussion, the panelists actually addressed this one-dimensional aspect to the session and more-or-less celebrated it!  Several of the participants talked about how wonderful it was to discuss the issue rationally, without the interference of the contrarian view that fewer guns is not the answer. “We know they’re wrong,” declared one panelist, an activist representing a public interest NGO. “If we’d included them, they would have come with the same tired old arguments based on lies and inaccurate statistics.”  And several other panelists expressed assent!

 Various debates that are raging in society today – not just that on how to address gun violence – are stymied by one side’s mania for silencing the other side as an illegitimate voice.  The idea of freedom of speech, enshrined in the First Amendment of the US Constitution, has been under attack for a long time.  The term ‘Political Correctness,’ coined sometime in the 1980’s but which came into common usage in the 1990’s, describes the tendency to make us curb our speech whenever it may offend someone else.  To those who decry the tendency, it represents a good idea – that we should guard our tongues (and quills) to avoid inadvertently offending someone whose context we cannot grasp – that went awry as people stammer and stutter to express themselves forthrightly in a society where almost anybody can be offended about anything.  And lately, the term Political Correctness is itself under attack in the wake of the campus demonstrations at the University of Missouri, where it has been asserted that to invoke the term Political Correctness out of exasperation with the stifling of Free Speech is patently offensive.

Social media – and I’m referring specifically to Facebook – could be a wonderful tool for enabling people of diverse viewpoints to converse with one another.  But increasingly, it has become a medium for people to sound off, usually in barrages of links to articles and online videos that support the poster’s viewpoint.  When scanning my newsfeed of posts by my Facebook ‘friends,’ I’ll sometimes read one of the articles in question or view one of the videos.  But this phenomenon of ‘dueling links’ is hardly a constructive way to conduct a discussion.  I’ll give an example.  On a Facebook group for Rabbis who are members of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, someone posted a discussion question about gun control in the wake of the gun violence event on the Oregon small-town community college campus several weeks back.  Now this particular poster and I seldom agree on much of anything, but I respect him as a reasonable person wanting to grasp solutions to big problems, so I responded to his post with a contrarian viewpoint, presented as reasonably as I could.  Immediately, a new party to the discussion countered with a raft of links to articles that allegedly refuted what I was saying.  Now, wanting to have a true discussion where all parties try to take in all legitimate discussion points, I clicked on the first link and started to read the article.  And it turned out that the article didn’t refute my viewpoint at all, but its headline did not hint accurately to the writer’s conclusions.  In other words, the person entering the conversation and offer a counterpoint to my position, instead of thoughtfully entering the conversation, chose to fire what he thought were shots over my bow with some big guns instead of reading the article in question, citing it and digesting it for the forum.  But that’s not all.  After a couple of days of back-and-forth discussion in the thread, the original poster expressed frustration over the discussion not resulting in a coming together of the participants over one – presumably his – viewpoint.  I responded to his frustration by pointing back to his original post, asking for a measured response by others who might disagree with him so that he might begin to understand the other side of the issue.  On that he backtracked, but to me it was clear:  the aim of this person whom I still see as generally reasonable, was not understanding but convincing, as in convincing parties holding the view opposite his that they were simply wrong.

So last Friday afternoon, whilst driving from place to place, I heard the news report from Colorado Springs; a ‘gunman’ (I really don’t like that term, terrorist is far more accurate for most usages) had shot several people at the city’s Planned Parenthood clinic and was in a protracted standoff with police.  If you follow my writings, you know that I have a connection to Colorado Springs, where Clara and I created a domicile after I retired from the US Air Force; this event unfolding in Colorado then was, for me, personal.

The standoff ended after some five hours after it began.  The perpetrator was identified as a sort of Ted Kaczynski type, a wild-eyed hermit with a tendency for incoherent ravings that don’t seem to identify him with a particular political position, just with a generalised rage at society.  The only connection between anything he’d said, to an opposition to abortion, rational or otherwise, was his alleged muttering to one of the police officers taking him into custody: “no more baby parts.”  And even that was unattributed, the lack of attribution explained by the reporter’s stating that the source had no permission to speak for the police department.  That alleged comment aside, nothing was reported from a search of Robert Louis Dear’s three residences, or his online presence – if any existed – to indicate a political orientation and affiliation with the Pro-life Movement.

And yet, already on Saturday morning we began to hear – first from the CEO of Colorado’s Planned Parenthood organisation – that the killer was firmly in the camp of the anti-abortion crowd and was acting out of the ‘hate’ of members of that group for Planned Parenthood, and that this sort of thing is the natural result when groups try to limit women’s access to abortion-on-demand.  I read this article in Saturday’s Washington Post, meaning that the article had already been written Friday night.  The article went on to state that the candidates for the Republican nomination for the Presidency have been silent on the issue.

Well, duh!  Why respond, except perhaps a brief tribute to the three individuals – only one of which, a police officer from the nearby university campus who had joined the city police in responding, had been identified at that point – who had died in the gunfire.  Since little was known about Mr. Dear, and even less about his motivation for the attack, wouldn’t it make sense that a rational person would withhold judgement?  But again, that’s far too rational for many of the voices in the ongoing kulturkampf in American life, where some participants are entirely intent on illegitimising, and therefore stifling, any voice that expresses a viewpoint counter to their own.

In Jewish life generally, when discussing the need to discuss issues at length rationally, we point to the opposing schools in antiquity of Hillel and Shammai.  The two sages, and their respective followers, had very different approaches to the application of law passed on the Torah’s prescriptions and proscriptions.  A sage of a later generation proclaimed that ‘both represent the voice of the Living God, but the law holds with Hillel.’  And why was that?  The answer was given:  because the sages of the School of Hillel were more humble, and respectful of the other side, listening to their arguments before presenting their own.  We find this enshrined in the Babylonian Talmud, Eruvin 13b.

The principle we learn from the passage is that a healthy and respectful debate is a good thing.  And that one side’s tendency to shut down the other side results in, their own arguments ultimately being over-ridden.  And I think the reason is clear; those whose debating tactic is to shut down the other side, clearly recognise that they haven’t got a winning argument to present.  My hope is that society will not be fooled by this tactic of delegitimising the other side.  That instead they will look at the delegitimisers with skepticism.  Perhaps that is far too optimistic on my part.  Time will tell.  A good week, all!