A Muse: Shemini 2008

In this week’s portion of Shemini, chapter 11 lists those animals prohibited to eat and those which are permissible. Harav Kook, based upon his understanding of Torah was a vegetarian, and believed that optimally, the Israelites should be vegetarian. However, based upon certain considerations this goal was put on hold. Harav Kook position is based on several considerations:

• In the creation story man is told to eat from the land; but not from the meat of animals.
• In the verse (Deuteronomy 12:20) where man is permitted to eat meat, it is based on compromise, considering the word usage in the verse “ta’avah nafshecha”; as if to say that man is allowed to eat meat so long as he doesn’t treat animals as recklessly and callously as he treats man.
• Harav Kook views the laws in Shemini as a means by which to limit the consumption of meat. For example, the idea that only domestic livestock are allowed to be eaten is for Harav Kook, a way to discourage eating meat. It may be emotionally more difficult to eat domestic livestock rather than wild animals.
• The obligation to cover the blood after the slaughter (chapter 17:13) is indicative of “sheficat damim”, approximating manslaughter, something to be ashamed of.
• He also believes that the biblical injunction against cooking “meat in the mother’s milk” was intended to create a visual image of something so abhorrent that it would deter one from killing animals.
• Harav Kook also suggests that we aren’t allowed to eat from the ‘neveila’ (road kill) because we shouldn’t benefit from an accident whereby an animal was killed.

When considering the scandal surrounding the Rubashkin meat packing company it would do us well to consider the words of Harav Kook. Perhaps we have reached the point where we need to limit or perhaps eliminate the consumption of meat.

A Muse: Tzav 2008

Last week I mused on the purpose of sacrificial worship and sited the Ramabam’s understanding and the place of the korbanot in our spiritual history. This week’s parsha, provides an alternative to the Rambam.

Rabbi Levi ben Gershon (1288-1344), better known as the Ralbag, aside from being a great Jewish scholar was also well versed in Aristotelian philosophy. He was a scientist of note, excelling in mathematics, and astronomy. His invention of the Baculus Jacobi, a navigational tool was in use until the 16th century.

The Ralbag is diametrically opposed to the Rambam regarding the value and meaning of sacrificial worship. In his opinion, by virtue of the fact that our text goes into such minute detail regarding the korbanot is an indicator that there is intrinsic meaning and purpose; not just a compromise for the Hebrews coming out of Egypt as the Rambam suggests. Illustrating this point he sites Vayikra chapter 2 verse 13: “you shall salt your every meal-offering with salt”. Adding salt enhances the value and taste of the product, rendering the product savory and flavorful. Salting the korban teaches us that the ritual of the korban wasn’t irrelevant by virtue of the fact that salt was added as an enhancement.

An example of this is his interpretation of the korban “oleh” in chapter 6 verses 1-2. The Ralbag in Aristotelian fashion comments on the necessity for the Torah to direct the kohanim to use kindling wood as the combustible agent. The korban itself represents the spirit (soul) of man (tzura), whereas the kindling wood symbolizes the physical dimension of man (chomer). Man lives by virtue of his essential spiritl (tzura), God gracing the spirit; and dies as a result of his body (chomer) breaking down.

With this in mind then, focusing on the method by which the korban Oleh is brought before God ought to direct our attention to the process of becoming (tzura) and dying (chomer); to be attentive to the duality of tzura and chomer, spirit and form, and recognize that it is God who is the spirit which gracesthe tzura.

An Unacceptable Response

Many years ago, having had to relocate to a small Midwestern town, we chose to buy a house in a particular area because it had an established orthodox shul which we would be able to walk to on Shabbat. Within nine months of living there we decided to sell the house and move to a neighboring community where the orthodox shul was more to our liking. It really didn’t take nine months to come to that conclusion. In truth I had arrived at that decision with in a few months of having attending services. The rabbi’s speeches were offensive, filled with anger and violated my understanding of Judaism.

The rabbi wasn’t tolerant of life styles that didn’t meet his standards. Homosexuals were freaks and sinners, who because of them caused Los Angeles to suffer an earthquake. According to the rabbi, due to the liberal attitudes exhibited towards the gay community in Los Angeles, it had become the epicenter of “tumah”; thus not surprising that God had visited upon them an earthquake. Speaking with veteran members of the shul it was apparent that this was the kind of rabbi they wanted and appreciated. Realizing that we didn’t identify with this kind of intolerance and hateful speech, we decided that we couldn’t remain in this community, so we did the only thing we could. We moved.

I recall this chapter of my life to point out how hollow Obama’s response is to his pastors tirades against whites, Jews and America. For Obama to say that he had never heard those particular speeches may be true, but he can’t deny that he had heard about them at one time or another. If he is part of a community, no doubt the parishioners must have talked about the pastor’s sermons, and undoubtedly they must have trickled down to Obama. Unless he was an absentee church member, one who rarely attends services, and is marginally associated with the community. But this we know isn’t the case. Obama has said on various occasions that the pastor is very close to him, his spiritual advisor, married him and Michelle and baptized their daughters, and that Trinity Church is his second home. If he is that close to the pastor and so involved in the life of the church, then he surely must have been privy to his feelings on the subjects of 9-11, Israel, whites, Jews and his endorsement of Louis Farakhan.

I would think that alone would have caused Obama to distant himself from Trinity Church and that bitter, hateful minister, as I had found necessary to do many years ago. Not only hasn’t Obama done that, but in realty he hasn’t even fully repudiated his minister now even after being “caught”. All he has said is that he repudiates certain comments and remarks that the minister has made.

That isn’t good enough. For Obama to show his sincerity in his repudiation he will have to renounce his minister, not the remarks he made. Louis Farakhan, not his remarks have been repudiated universally. He, not his remarks, has been renounced as a racist, a black supremacist and an anti-semite. For Obama to do less than that regarding Wright falls very short of the mark. One can excuse an isolated remark. When hateful speech, however, becomes a pattern, such in the case of Rev. Wright, than one has to believe that it is the man, and not an unfortunate thought, slip of the tongue or error in judgment that is in need of total repudiation.

On a side bar, Obama has referred to Wright as an outstanding theologian. How would Obama know that, and what is his standard for assessment? For Wright to have said that Jesus was a black man is about as ignorant as one can get. After all, Jesus came from Judea, and as far as I know the Judeans weren’t Black. For Wright to say that Rome was “European” at the time of Jesus (repressing a black man) hardly deserves comment. I hope that Obama’s understanding of history isn’t understood through the lense of a bitter revisionist.

No, Obama, I expect more from you because you may be the president of this great country and we deserve the best. I wouldn’t want my president seeking spiritual counseling from a bitter, hateful man, who sees the world as divided along the fault line of color and who would revise history to serve his own twisted purpose, so much so that he could say from the pulpit that it was America, who was responsible for that perfidious act of terror on 9-11.

Liberation of the Liberal American Jew

There is strange and new wind that is subtly but ever vigorously blowing across the American Jewish community which I find terribly vexing. I first felt its chilling wind about four years ago around the time of the general election in 2004. At the time, good friends of mine asked me how I voted. Even though I knew that these people were liberal democrats I unabashedly answered that I voted for George Bush. Upon further questioning as to why I voted for him after pointing out how poorly he performed during his first administration, I explained that my first concern and consideration was the welfare of Israel. I made it clear that all other issues such as abortion, stem cell research appointments to the Supreme Court took a backseat to Israel’s welfare. Bush, in my estimation, was infinitely better for Israel than the alternative. Their reaction was bitter and I shall never forget it or forgive them for it. “If Israel is so important to you why don’t you move back there”?

Their remark was ridiculous because it would be the same thing as telling Jessie Jackson or Al Sharpton that if you don’t like the policies of the United States, go back to Africa. Somehow I don’t think that my liberal democratic friends understood what I was saying, nor would they have been willing to entertain the idea that in essence the two propositions were similar.

I filed that inauspicious discussion away, hoping that there remark had been out of context, not reflecting a trend within the American Jewish community. Was I ever wrong! Speaking to the same couple a few weeks ago we once again talked politics. This time they were voting for Obama. I expressed once again my concern for Israel’s future and this time the answer I receive was a bit more tactful. The gist of it was that it was time for Israel to grow up, stand on its own two feet and not be a burden on America. Reading between the lines what they were really saying to me was it was time that Israel stood on its own two feet and stopped embarrassing liberal American Jews who are in disagreement with Israel’s approach to the Palestinians.

Once again I was hoping that their opinion wasn’t typical of most liberal American Jews, but I was terribly wrong. What bothered me wasn’t the analysis of the pollsters indicating the support of many liberal Jews for Obama, but a piece in the recent issue of Sh’ma (January 2008 / Shvat 5768) entitled Affinities and Israel: A Roundtable.

The roundtable consisted of an intellectual group of Jewish adults whom I assume were all under the age of forty, ranging from a reform rabbinical student to a professor of Jewish studies and a professor of American studies as well as a few others working in Jewish organizational life. One of the questions with which they dealt was whether or not American Jews needed Israel. One of them unreservedly said, no. Others took a softer position, redefining the role of Israel within global Jewish life-in short intellectualizing the hell out of the issue. One of the participants had the audacity to comment that American Jews under the age of forty only know Israel as an occupying power. He went on to say that American Jews are so well integrated into American life that they don’t need Israel as much as before. He continued by saying “this is even more complicated because we live in a post-ethnic world where being a Jew for many people under the age of thirty, is only part of their identity”.

Let me remind these “yifey nefesh” that before Daniel Pearl died all that mattered to his Islamo- fascist murderers was that he was Jewish. I don’t know where these liberal Jews are living, but I don’t think it is in a post-ethnic world. Anti-Zionism around the world and here in America is just another buzzword, for being anti Jewish, or anti-Semitic. It may not be politically correct to be anti Semitic, but perfectly acceptable amongst our liberal friends to be anti-Zionist, because, after all, the wretched Palestinians are the underdog. If we are living in this post-ethnic world, then why didn’t the UN issue a statement condemning the murder of eight defenseless yeshiva students at Yeshivat Mercaz Harav Kook, not to mention countless other atrocities against Israelis? I have no reason to believe that there has been even a minute reorientation of the world to the Jewish people. All that has changed has been terminology and some nomenclature, but if I read between the lines regarding some statements made at enlightened universities such as Berkley, anti-Semitism is alive and well.

Hey, yefeh nefesh, read the press. When was the last time you saw a complimentary picture of an Israeli in the press. They are always depicted as angry and aggressive, while the pitiful Palestinians are depicted as suffering, living under the boot of the Israeli. Israeli soldiers are shown with an assault rifle pointed in the direction of a defenseless Palestinian indicating that he’s been victimized, once again. And what about Jewish depiction in the press; whenever they want to depict a real, authentic Jew, they pull out of the archives a picture of a black hat and bearded Jew. That’s tantamount to posting a picture of a Native American in full head dress with nothing more than a loin clothe and moccasins. Do you think that would ever happen?

So there it is. American Jews under the age of forty are no longer in need of Israel because we are living in a post-ethnic world. I hope they “grow up” post haste, otherwise they may do us irreversible harm. Who knows, maybe they’ll reach their fiftieth birthday and God willing, Israel will still be a beacon of light to all of us who need her.

A Muse: Va'yikra 2008

This week we begin reading a rather confounding book, much of it devoted to sacrificial worship and the rites and ritual associated with it. To say the least, sacrifice was a primitive form of worship in expressing one’s devotion to God. We aren’t the only culture to have instituted this form of worship. There were many other ancient civilizations that employed animal worship (as well as produce), to demonstrate their fealty to God or to the god of their choice.

There was a certain logic to the practice of sacrifice. It meant that you were willing to take something important, of value, and dedicate it to God, at great cost or sacrifice to yourself, with the hope that in so doing you were forging and sustaining a relationship with God. In our Temple an entire social class and economy grew up around sacrificial worship; from the purchasing of the animal to bringing it to the altar and having its remains left to the priestly class.

The Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim is concerned with the rite of sacrificial worship in that it was primitive. He comments that in essence, sacrificial worship was initially a compromise made with the Hebrews. In as much as they were part of the near eastern culture where animal sacrifice was normative, it would have been too radical to expect any other kind of expression of devotion. The Rambam was suggesting that sacrificial worship would be standard practice until the Hebrews would, through a natural spiritual and intellectual growth take devotion to a new level.

Tefillah, he suggests was exactly that. The disparity between the Tzedukim and the Perushim, while pivoting on numerous points also included this. Tefillah, prayer, became the approach by which the priesthood was no longer necessary as an intermediary or arbiter in reaching God. Every Hebrew would be able to reach out to God by reaching into the depths of his heart and praying to his creator. Prayer, as the Perushim intended democratized the people as far as having access to God was concerned. At first prayer was extemporaneous, later it became formatted and standardized.

The Rambam comments, however, that Tefilah won’t be the final form of devotion. As man becomes more sophisticated in his intellectual capacity and as his spirituality grows man will be able to meditate on God, and in so doing forge the bridge linking him to his creator in a much more powerful way than Tefillah is able to accomplish.

Meditation has become for many the method by which spirituality has become enhanced. Some of our great first and second generation Hasidic masters achieved great spiritual heights through this medium. Something to consider as we begin to read Va’yikra.

A Muse: Pekudei 2008

Pikudei, where the building of the Mishkan is completed is oftentimes read back to back with Va’yakhel. As you recall in last weeks musings, it was suggested that the Mishkan is man’s delineation of temporal, sacred/mundane space as a cap to his creation of culture, be it spiritual or mundane. I assume this to be the case because of the very unusual language in our text beginning in chapter 35 verse 30-35 where language such as “chochmat lev” and “tevunah v’daat” are used, to the beginning of verses of chapter 36 where this same type of language is applied again. It is the language of a society in formation; a society that it is at the cusp of developing its cultural norms and values.

It is no coincidence that in chapter 40 verse 33 the text reads, upon the completion of the Mishkan “vayichal Moshe et hamlacha”, “Moses completed the work”. Sound familiar? Similar language was used at the conclusion of the creation story. In Bereshit, chapter 2 verse 2, at the conclusion of creation God said: “vayichal elohim bayom hashvii melachto asher asa”, “by the seventh day God completed His work which He had done”. Whereas the Shabbat is our non-temporal sacred space, given to us by God as the cap to His creation; the Mishkan is man’s delineation of temporal, sacred/mundane space as a cap to his creation of culture, be it spiritual or mundane. With the work of completing the building of the Mishkan, Moshe has also brought to closure the exodus from Egypt.

The exodus from Egypt wasn’t only a physical deliverance, but also a spiritual and intellectual journey. Otherwise why employ the language of “chochmat lev” and “tevunah v’daat”. The construction of the Mishkan, although physical had to symbolize not only the physical freedom, but the freedom from spiritual repression.

As the Hebrews turned their back on Egypt they looked to the future. If Egypt represented a physically, intellectually and spiritually repressive society, then the new one they were building would be an open society. As the Mishkan was built by those who exhibited “chochmat lev” so too, would their culture be one of “chochma” and “tevunah”. The Mishkan wasn’t a fixed structured embedded in place, becoming cumbersome and difficult to maneuver, but was light, airy and very portable. In a sense, flexible so that it could accommodate the climate and circumstances of a nomadic existence. It carried the message of its builders, men who were infused with “chochma” to be open and accommodating, exploring new ideas and concepts adapting to a changing environment, keeping the Word relevant for all time.

Comfort ye, Comfort ye…

During the past six months I underwent a very intense program in pastoral care called Clinical Pastoral Education. If there is one word that can best describe the impact that this program has had of my understanding and application to the ministry, it is “transformational”. Clinical Pastoral Education, better known as CPE has contributed prodigiously to my understanding of the word “comfort” within the context of Isaiah chapter 40 verse 1 when Isaiah says to Israel in their suffering: “comfort ye, comfort ye, my people saith your God…”: The vision I have is that a spiritual, loving and intensely sensitive prophet comes down from the hills of Jerusalem into the villages of his suffering people in an attempt to comfort and assuage them in their suffering. I understand the task of the rabbi, the chaplain in this light. To enter the room of the sick and to offer a measure of comfort. The tradition from which I grew and evolved was an intellectual environment, the emphasis more on the written word and less on the spiritual. If there was any need in relating to the spiritual side it was perfunctory and as the sages would say “latzeit midei chovato”, to fulfill one’s obligation, not necessarily out of love and genuine devotion, but out of obligation. To visit the sick, to empathize with those who are suffering and in need, to participate in humanity on the sensitive, spiritual and delicate level was a default duty, unavoidable in the scheme of things, but not necessarily a priority.

It wasn’t always this way, but somehow and through the course of history it devolved as such. This CPE course has taught me above all else that the teaching of our sages extolling the virtues of of ministering to the sick needs to be venerated and restored to it’s position of sacredness. CPE training has caused me to rethink and reconceptualize so many of our teachings, to read more into the text, more of the spiritual and less of the intellectual. The Midrash elating the following story could be seen as an intellectual exercise or as a spiritual challenge: R. Huna says: One who visits the sick lessens one sixtieth of the illness. It was asked of r. Huna: If so let sixty people visit and the sick will be healed. Said to them: Sixty! But only if the visitors love the patient as their own soul. But even without this the visit helps him. One could be tempted to intellectualize this ( Midrash Leviticus Rabbah 34:1) reference as the rabbi did, but one could understand the text on a spiritual level: The rabbis are saying that one’s compassionate presence can bring a small, but real measure of comfort. We can’t heal him, no amount of love and compassion can, but we can make as small difference: we can comfort him.

CPE has presented to me a new dimension within the theological concept of “tikkun olam”, roughly translated as making the world a better place, improving it. Tikkin olam, however is more profound than that. It is the Jewish approach by which we can become co-creators with God in making the world more complete. There are indeed many ways in which we can do this. Many of my coreligionists have fulfilled this theological precept by becoming “greener”; for others more philanthropic. For me CPE has offered another portal by which I can become a co-creator with God. Having been called to the O.R. to offer final prayers (vidui) was one of those sacred moments; it was there that I was totally confronted with the creative power of medicine and it’s limits. I believe that those in the operating room doctors, nurses and technicians were all in need of pastoral care at that very moment when their efforts at co-creation were discovered to be sorely limited. Frozen by the reality of the moment I ministered to the patient, but neglected those servants of God who in spite of their skills came up short. It showed on their faces.

My encounters and limited experience with pastoral care have given em new understanding of what prayer means within my tradition. In our faith there are fundamentally two forms of prayer: Tefillah- a sreructured well articulated formulary tha is the basis of our prayer book and Zaaka- extemporaneous unstructured crying out to God in our time of trouble and need. The hospital rooms, the ER, and the family rooms have all become sacred spaces because it is there where God can particularly be felt. These sacred areas are places where I have felt the Zaaka, prayer articulated by the sick and their families, not from formularies that have been sanitized by its redactors, but genuine heartfelt out pouring of the soul. It is this experience that has given credence and deeper understanding to the Talmud Nedarim40: a, which relates the following: “R. Helbo took ill. R. Kahana proclaimed ‘R. Helbo is sick but no one came to visit.’ He rebuked the others as follows, ‘did it not happen that one of R. Akiba’s students took sick and none of the sages came to visit?’ But R. Akiba entered to visit and because he swept and sprinkled the room before him, he recovered. ‘My master you have made me live’. Following this R. Akiba went and lectured ‘whosoever does not visit the sick is like a shedder of blood.’”

A Muse: Va'yakhel 2008

Va’yakhel is a unique grouping of chapters in that it describes two classic conflicts concerning man’s relationship to God: How does man reconcile his duel need for spirituality and the mundane. In other words, how does man seamlessly move from the holy into the secular and then back into the sacred spaces where life is most precious, and how does man express his creative powers within, while recognizing his dilemma.

This first conflict can be viewed if we take notice of the juxtaposition of the mitzvah of Shabbat to the building of the Mishkan (Tabernacle). “Ein melachet hamishkan docheh et hashabat”, that is to say that the building of the Mishkan doesn’t trump the Shabbat. Whereas the Shabbat is our non-temporal sacred space, given to us by God as the cap to His creation; the Mishkan is man’s delineation of temporal, sacred/mundane space as a cap to his creation of culture, be it spiritual or mundane. I assume this to be the case because of the very unusual language in our text beginning in chapter 35 verse 30-35 where language such as “chochmat lev” and “tevunah v’daat” are used, to the beginning of verses of chapter 36 where this same type of language is applied again. It is the language of a society in formation; a society that it is at the cusp of developing it’s cultural norms and values.

The creation of the world is God’s creation and His gift of Shabbat provided us with spirituality. The building of the Mishkan was man’s creation of culture and society. God created the world out of tohu vavohu, out of the void, without borders other than those he super imposed upon the universe; man’s creation was made within given borders and confined to those proscribed by God and the natural order.

In a sense design and placement of the Menorah symbolizes this conflict between man and his frenetic attempt at finding a comfort level between the holy and the mundane. Of all the holy vessels enumerated in the text for use in the Mishkan, the Menorah is the only one without a specific purpose stated within the text. In Va’yakhel, verse 3, the command of not kindling fire on the Shabbat precedes the command to build and design the temple. The fire calls to mind the Greek myth of Prometheus, when fire is stolen from Zeus and given to man. For man, fire is the essential for not only existence and independence, but the expression of his creative ability. In our text man is being proscribed the use of this creative power in building the Mishkan on Shabbat. Man’s recognition of this is symbolized by his design and placement of the Menorah in the Temple.

The building of the Mishkan is God’s compromise with man in assisting him in navigating between the sacred space of the non-temporal and the mundane while at the same time granting man his desire for expessing his creative abilities. V’asu lee mishkan vshacanti betocham (build me a Mishkan in order that I may dwell amongst you) is God’s solution to man’s dilemma. Shabbat trumps the Mishkan, but it and the Menorah allows for the beginning of a new order, within man’s domain. God created man and his physical world, establishing the borders between the sacred and the mundane; man created the culture in which to live and develop, understanding and appreciating the borders between the sacred and the mundane.