HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Rabbi Adler!

Lifnim Mishurat ha-Din: How Not To Be An Observant A-Hole

I’m currently working on transforming part of what I taught on Shavuot into a coherent blog post. But in the meantime, something happened that made me want to post a little shortie that seemed very relevant.

So, Julie and I are having a little issue with our landlords regarding the resolution of having our fridge die on us the last time we were out of town. The precise details aren’t important; what’s relevant is that I ran into a lot of frustration in trying to convey to them why they ought to do anything more for us than the strict letter of the law compels them to do.

What was frustrating for me is that I realized how much American society lacks the language available to us as Jews in these regards. What we were looking for from our landlords was not merely mishpat ve-din (the letter of the law) but going lifnim mishurat ha-din (“between the lines of the law”). This concept is an important one in halachah, because our Rabbis realized that sometimes, the strict letter of the law may be constructed in such a way as to still provide opportunities for a person to be (as Ramban so pithy puts it) a naval bi’reshut ha-Torah, which is usually translated as “a scoundrel inside Torah’s jurisdiction,” but more accurately could be rendered “an a-hole within the bounds of Torah.” That is to say, someone who will consistently follow the mishpat ve-din, but will do so without leavening of either chesed [lovingkindness] or rachmanut [compassion]: such an individual acts, as Rav Kook tells us, out of yir’at ha-chok [the fear of the law and the consequences of transgressing it] rather than from ahavat shamayim [the love of Heaven].

To act lifnim mishurat ha-din is to go over and above one’s minimum obligations, because of empathy for the circumstances of other people, and the desire for a better world to live in, and sometimes because one knows that exceeding the minimums of the law for reasons of compassion and thoughtfulness pleases God, who delights in people caring for each other. And such action is especially meritorious, because not only does it foster gratitude between people, and inspire the recipient of such behavior to emulate it with others (“paying it forward,” as we say these days in America), it causes people to bless God, who inspires His people to such actions.

A famous story is told in tractate Bava Metzia, in Talmud Yerushalmi (YT B. Metz. 2:5), of an incident involving R. Shimon ben Shetach, one of the Zugot (the original heads of the Pharisaic schools during the late Second Temple Period):

Rabbi Shimon ben Shetach earned his living by selling flax. His students once said to him:

“Rabbi! Rest a while, and we will buy you a donkey so that you will not have to work so hard.” They bought him a donkey from a certain Bedouin, and found that a very valuable pearl was attached to its harness. Then they came to him and said:

“From now on you will no longer need to labor!”

“Why not?” he asked. They replied:

“Because we have bought you a donkey from a certain Bedouin and it had a valuable pearl attached.” He said:

“Does the seller know about the pearl?”

“He does not,” they replied. Whereupon he ordered them to give the pearl back to the Bedouin.

The question was raised: But did not Rav Huna Bevai bar Gozlan say in the name of Rav: It was decided in the presence of Rebbi [Yehuda ha-Nasi] that even those authorities who rule that anything stolen from a non-Jew is forbidden for a Jew to own, agree that something a non-Jew loses is permitted for a Jew to own?

The answer was given: Do you think that Shimon ben Shetach was a barbarian?! Shimon ben Shetach would rather hear the non-Jew say: “Baruch Elohei Yisrael!” [“Blessed be the God of Israel!”] than have any material reward this world has to offer.

This is the model of behavior we are encouraged to emulate. R. Shimon would have been well within his rights to keep the pearl. The rules of the marketplace begin with caveat emptor. And R. Shimon was a great man, whose time surely was better spent teaching Torah than scraping a living: and if a man can sell a donkey without even noticing a valuable pearl on its saddle, he must surely be wealthy enough to afford its loss.

But that’s just not how we roll.

Better to profit less from a transaction than to have one’s extra profit come at the expense of another’s unexpected loss. Better for one’s “extra profit” to come from the joy of making another’s life a little unexpectedly easier.

This ideal is something conspicuously absent from modern Western culture-- certainly from American culture. And, to be fair, it’s something that we in the Jewish community don’t always live up to, either. We’ve produced an unfortunate number of nevalim bi’reshut ha-torah, all through our history, and in every movement and stream of Judaism.

Perhaps if we vigorously and visibly dedicate ourselves to this ideal, the non-Jewish world around us can pick it up from us by example.

-Ami

Tefilat Tal: How To Avoid Spiritual Dehydration

One of the seasonal shifts that came in with Pesach last week was that, having said Tefilat Tal (the Prayer for Dew) on the morning of the second day of the chag, we cease adding mashiv ha-ruach u-morid ha-geshem (“You make the wind blow and cause the rain to fall,”) to our Amidah every day, and (except in some Ashkenazi communities) replace it with the phrase morid ha-tal (“You cause the dew to fall,”) instead.

I have to say, I really love Tefilat Tal, much as I love Tefilat Geshem (where we introduce the reverse process of substitution in our Amidah), said on Shmini Atzeret. In part, I love them purely for reasons of liturgical geekery: they are arrays of piyyutim (liturgical poems) written in the highest medieval style of the genre, thick with allusive imagery wrought in incredibly elegant and concise, if sometimes abstruse, Hebrew. And I am a huge fan of that kind of work: it gives a happy to the poet in me, the liturgical scholar in me, the historian and the theologian in me.

And in part I love the way in which they keep our calendar tied to the rhythms of the agricultural year-- even if it’s just a little bit. I love that the concern for what kind of water and how much is being produced in Nature, which must have been so utterly central to the lives of our ancestors, remains as a reminder to us today; that even though we’re not farmers, we should be mindful about where our food comes from, and not just who we ought to thank for doing the hard work of growing it, but Who we ought to thank for it being possible for people to grow it at all.

I love them a lot, though, because they are prayers for water. And I love water. Water and earth are my elements, magically speaking; and I was born under a water sign, astrologically. I am only happy living near water, and, as Julie sometimes shakes her head over, I would rather see rain than shine any day.

And these tefilot for water seem to trigger something deep within me. Because I love water for its own sake, but the mystic in me responds equally potently to water imagery. In our tradition, Torah is often symbolized by water, as is prophecy and other positive forces. Moshe Rabbenu’s greatest miracle had to do with water (splitting the sea), Miriam his sister had her miraculous well. Avraham crossed rivers, Yakov wrestled the angel next to one. Yitzchak dug wells of water. Yishayahu prophesies, u-shav’tem mayim b’sason mi-mayanei ha-yeshua, “You shall draw water with rejoicing from the wellsprings of redemption.” The Psalmist reminds us that those who love Torah and speak words of Torah every day-- v’hayah k’eitz shatul al palgei mayim, “They are like a tree planted by pools of water.” The righteousness (which comes from learning Torah) that God craves, the prophet Amos likens to water: v’yigal ka’mayim mishpat, u’tzedakah k’nachal eitan, “Let justice crest like flooding waters, righteousness like a river in spate.” Even in the other direction, as it were, the Psalmist says, ka’ayal ta’arog ‘al afkidei mayim, ken nafshi ta’arog elecha Elohim, tzama nafshi l’Elohim, l’El Chai, “Like a stag longs for streams of water, even so my soul longs for You, O God: my soul thirsts for God, for the Living God.” Bava Kama 82a uses Yeshayahu 55:1 (hoy kol tzamei l’chu la’mayim, “Oh all you who are thirsty, go to the waters!”) as a prooftext for why Torah is like water. And in Brachot 61b, Rabbi Akiva likens the Jewish People and Torah to fish swimming in water: take Torah away from the Jews, and we die. The Kabbalists refer to the “outpouring” of divine energy from Ein Sof (God’s ultimate infinite and transcendent aspect) out into the created world as nehora, which is Aramaic for “river” (and also, paradoxically, for “flame”).

I cannot resist the feeling that, in our prayers for water, we pray for all these things as well. And as I prepare my kavanah (intention) for saying Tefilat Tal, inevitably, as I imagine the Winter rains subsiding into the dews of Spring and Summer over thirsty ground, I also imagine the thirst I have for devekut (“cleaving close” to God, i.e., increased spiritual awareness, an increased sense of connection to God), and how that thirst can be quenched: through learning Torah and talking about it with my fellow Jews, through tefillah (prayer) and hitbodedut (meditation), through the observance and performance of mitzvot.

My best friend, Sarah, is a great advocate of proper hydration. She has taught me that often, we mistake dehydration (of one degree or another) for other complaints, or do not realize that other complaints are symptomatic of dehydration. Often when we think we hunger, we are thirsty; when we are tired and don’t know why, when we have headaches, indigestion, even backaches-- those things and many others can be from not drinking enough water.

I think that spirituality works very similarly. When we have other complaints in our lives, we often do not realize that they arise from lack of  “drinking enough water,” which is to say, from not taking the time to learn Torah, to daven (pray), to meditate, to do mitzvot with any kind of real kavanah (focus, intention). These things are not extra avocations that we might work into our lives, schedule permitting. They are foundational necessities of life, which require our prioritization, lest we become spiritually dehydrated. Torah, mitzvot, and prayer-- the three things on which the world rests, according to Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel-- are our spiritual nourishment, our spiritual discipline: they help keep us alive and healthy. And just like any doctor worth his or her salt will tell you that you ought to drink two to three liters of water a day for optimum health, any rabbi worth his or her salt should tell you to learn a little Torah, try to daven, and do some mitzvot each and every day, for optimum spiritual health. And in some ways, these things are even more important to keep in mind than drinking water, since if your body gets dehydrated enough, it will send you clear and unpleasant signals that you have to drink more or risk injuring yourself. But your soul can become very spiritually parched indeed before you comprehend its signals that you need more spiritual hydration, and by the time you work it out-- and some folks never do-- it can already have caused you injury. Spiritual dehydration’s symptoms-- which we often mistake for other things, or attribute to other causes-- can include general unhappiness, mental restlessness, devaluation of self, relationship issues, lack of fulfillment, feelings of meaninglessness, materialism, and-- in advanced cases-- greed, egotism, and lack of compassion and empathy. The connections aren’t always obvious-- just like with water, who would think to connect dehydration to hunger or backache?-- which is why it is all the more important to daven, learn, and do mitzvot regularly-- because you can never tell what will make the difference.

And yet, one of the striking elements of both Tal and Geshem is that, having elaborately and eloquently begged God to send us water, both close with corollaries of cautious specificity: livrachah v’lo li’k’lalah. L’chayim v’lo la’mavet. L’sova v’lo l’razon. “Let it be for blessing, and not for a curse. Let it be for life and not for death. Let it be for plenty and not for famine.” Because rain and dew must come in proper measure. Not having any water come leads to drought, thirst, and no crops. But having too much water come leads to floods, drownings, and fields being washed out. And likewise, with the symbolic water of Torah, mitzvot, and prayer, those also must be in proper measure. Too little leads to spiritual dehydration, meaninglessness, and unhappiness. But too much leads to zealotry, religious compulsiveness, and fanaticism. A balance has to be met. One should learn and daven a little every day, do some mitzvot every day, and do them all with happiness and not anxiety, with a kavanah (intention) of seeking to “draw closer” to God, to improve one’s own life and the lives of those around one, not just meticulousness to get the forms perfect. Because Torah and mitzvot should never be for a curse and for death-- either literal, spiritual, emotional, or social; they should always be for blessing and life-- literally and spiritually, for each one of us, and collectively, for all the People Israel.

-Ami

A Very Meisner Pesach, or How To Live The Exodus

B’chol dor va-dor, chayav adam lir’ot et atzmo k’ilu hu yatza mi-Mitzrayim. “In every generation, a person is obligated to view themselves as if they personally went forth out of Egypt.”

We recite this every Pesach, of course. And with every passing year, this seems to resound more strongly for me. Pesach is our most performative holiday: we don’t just say a tefillah (prayer) about what happened, we re-create what happened. We get rid of our chametz (leavened stuff), both practically by cleaning and ritually by mechirat chametz (legally selling our chametz). We kasher everything. We sit at the seder table. We eat matzah. We eat maror. We drink the wine. We lean, we recline on cushions. We have the items on the seder plate in front of us. We open the door for Eliyahu ha-Navi. We go through the telling of the story, asking as many questions as we can about it, analyzing what it means to have once been enslaved and now to be free. In some communities, to fulfill (as best they can) the original commandment in Exodus, “You shall eat it in haste, with your loins girded up, with your sandals on your feet and your staves in your hands,” they actually bust out a walking stick and a sack of matzah, folks wear their sandals, and people take turns carrying the sack of matzah over their shoulders, around the table, staff in hand and sandalled up (presumably everyone’s loins are already girded these days) -- that’s serious ritual action.

This is not a holiday of abstractions. This is a very tachlis (real, pragmatic) holiday, grounded in concrete actions, rituals, deeds, as well as words.

And yet, even with all of this, can we really fulfill the demand that this verse in the Haggadah makes upon us? Can we actually view ourselves as formerly enslaved, newly tasting freedom?

The halachic answer, of course, is yes. Did you read the Pesach story and discuss it? Did you eat the matzah and the maror, drink the wine, stop at the afikoman? Yeah? Boom: you’re yotzei (fulfilled), you’ve successfully recreated the Exodus.

The midrashic answer is also generally yes. By playing games with the text of the Exodus story, and extending the ideas within it to other stories in Tanach, other stories in Rabbinic text, other stories in Jewish history, we can re-create the Exodus.

Homiletically, I might say that the answer lies in all our lives, past and future. As I mentioned in my very first post to this blog, the Exodus is dependant upon God’s command to Pharaoh, shlach et ‘ami ve-ya’avduni “Let My people go, so they can serve Me.” By reflecting upon what ways we have fulfilled that condition of our freedom, and what ways we can commit ourselves to better fulfilling it in the future, we make ourselves yotzei for this mitzvah.

But is that enough? Is there more?

I think there can be. Way before I became a rabbi, my initial training was as an actor. I got trained in a variation on Meisner Method (one of the offspring systems of the Stanislavski school of “method” acting), at UC Santa Cruz, by a truly astonishing master director named Greg Fritsch. He was (and, God willing, remains) an incredibly intense little guy, five foot bupkiss, with presence around fourteen foot nine. And he taught us that the seed of every experience and feeling that we would ever need as actors lay within us. The trick was knowing yourself and trusting yourself enough to find them and bring them out, even when they were scary or painful. That last clause is no joke: a good acting studio (and Greg’s was the epitome of such) is a little like group therapy. You get together with a small group of other people, and together, you bring out your inner demons, your inhibitions, your fears, your childhood traumas, your ego, your self-criticism, and you alternately bludgeon them into submission and force them to serve at your pleasure.

What does this have to do with Pesach? Everything. Just like the Haggadah says, you have to live it, not just read it. Who knew the Rabbis were all about Meisner Method, right? But the Haggadah tells us, B’chol dor va-dor, chayav adam lir’ot et atzmo k’ilu hu yatza mi-Mitzrayim, she-ne’emar: “ve-higadeta l’vinecha ba-yom ha-hu leimor ba-avur zeh asah Hashem li b’tzeti mi-Mitzrayim.” Lo et avotenu bil’vad ga’al Hakadosh Baruch Hu, ele af otanu ga’al imahem, she-ne’emar: “v’otanu hotzi mi-sham, l’ma’an havi otanu, la-tet lanu et ha-aretz asher nishba l’avotenu.”

“In every generation, a person is obligated to view himself as though he personally had gone forth from Egypt, as it says, ‘And you shall tell your children on that day, saying “This is because of what Hashem did for me when I came forth from Egypt.”’ For not only our ancestors did the Holy One Blessed Be He redeem, but rather even we ourselves were redeemed with them, as it says, ‘And He took us out from there, so as to take us and give to us the land which He swore to our ancestors.’”

You have to be able, as Greg taught us, to get to “that place:” the emotional and sensory moment of living that experience, of knowing it, being inside the truth of it; and you have to be able to “find your way back to it,” whenever you need to get there. That’s not just Meisner, that’s Pesach.

Within every Jew is the seed of this experience. When you are preparing for the seder this year, take a few moments to really prepare: not just the food, the dishes, the house, and so forth. Prepare yourself.

Think back, look within yourself-- deeply, unflinchingly within yourself. When were you a slave? When were you bound to something terrible: a secret, a trauma or neurosis, an addiction, a bad relationship, a horrible situation you found yourself mired in, family dysfunctionality...anything that brought you low, that made you feel less than worthwhile and valuable, that made you desperate and miserable? For a long time or a short time-- months or weeks or just one really messed-up day? Really remember that experience. How did it make you feel? Not just in the abstract, but physically? Butterflies in your stomach? Sinking feeling? Wretched? Self-loathing? Angry? Hateful toward someone else? So bitter you could taste it in your mouth?

Let yourself re-live that experience. Spoiler alert: this will probably be unpleasant, and it will definitely be difficult. But take it in. Keep it fresh in your mind.

Now think back, just as deeply. When did you get freedom? From the situation or thing you remembered before, or from some other bad situation. What’s the moment you remember most clearly feeling freed? The relief you felt when you were just sure you were never going to get out of a bad mess, and suddenly things started clearing up? When you got over the worst break-up ever? Began to live with a terrible loss? Came to terms with a health crisis? Managed to fix something in your life you thought might be unfixable? What was that moment when you suddenly got hope back into your life after feeling hopeless? What did it feel like? Did you feel lighter? Did you want to laugh or cry or both? What did your body feel like when you regained hope and resolve? Calmer? More excited?

Re-live that moment. It should be a lot more pleasant than the last time, but it might not be any easier. Memories and feelings are freaky that way. But take it in, too. Keep that joy, that excitement, that sudden sense of doors opening and horizons expanding, fresh in your mind.

When you read about how we were slaves-- avadim hayinu l’Faro b’Mitzrayim, “We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt!”-- bring up that first memory. Let that awful experience spill into those words: when you say it, link it up in your head-- this is what it feels like to be a slave. When you read about how God freed us-- v’yotzi’anu Hashem elohenu mi-sham b’yad chazakah u’vi’z’roa netuyah, “But Hashem our God took us out of there with a strong hand, an outstretched arm!”-- bring up that second memory. Let that wonder and delight and painfully happy return of hope where hopelessness was flood out of you, into those words: when you say it, link it up in your head-- this is what it feels like to be free!

Take the sum of those two feelings-- the joy after the pain-- shmoosh them up, and try to cram it into every brachah (blessing) you say at the seder.

Take the acknowledgement, the reality, the truthfulness of those sensations, and fire them right out and up to Hashem.

Because we were slaves, and He made us free.

-Ami

Thirteen Updated Principles

OK, so I was speaking a while ago with a colleague, and we were sort of joking about Yigdal (the liturgical restatement of Rambam's 13 Principles of Faith), that we hoped that it was graded on a curve, because otherwise, neither of us were sure we could get a passing grade on that test-- much less 100%.

It started out just as a joke, but it got me thinking: my supposition is that most non-Orthodox Jews probably couldn't get a score of over 60% on the "Do You Believe These 13 Principles?" quiz, and even the ones to which they're willing to answer "yes" probably have some unspoken reservations attached.

To some degree, I think that's inevitable. Two Jews, three opinions: we all know that, and that's probably a very lowball estimate when theology is involved.

Granted, I think Rambam never meant the 13 Principles to be an exact catechistic checklist, to be formalized as universal Jewish dogma (and indeed it never has been, nor do we have any such thing); and I wouldn't approve of there being such a thing anyhow.

But it would kind of be useful as a short-hand in theological conversations, I think, to have something like that as a reference point for discussion.

So with probably an earth-shaking lack of proper humility, I took it upon myself to try and update the Rambam's list. I fully admit that not only am I no Rambam, I am not even remotely close, and should anyone wish to accuse me of humongous chutzpah, I am cheerfully willing to accept such a judgment. I am also very aware that my update is predicated on the ideas both of a personal God and some form of halachic commandedness, which not all non-Orthodox Jews agree with; and I am (less cheerfully) willing to accept that as a fair criticism and leave it at that, because I actually don't see a way around God being personal, and I feel quite strongly about the need for halachah in some form or another.

To be honest, I have no idea whether it is even reasonable to expect that Jews could have as many as thirteen theological points on which they might roughly, in some way shape or form, agree with a majority. Hell, it might be a pipe dream to think we could expect more than three or four, tops. But since (chatzpan that I am) I thought it best to follow Rambam's list as well as I might, there remain 13, and some are even more or less the same.

I have to say, I have renewed respect for Rambam (if such a thing were even necessary) after engaging in this project: it's awfully hard to come up with concise statements of faith that are both specific enough to be meaningful and at the same time loose enough to permit them to be umbrellas for numerous shades of interpretation, some spaced rather far apart from each other. And, to be fair, in that interest I did change the format from "I believe with perfect faith" to just "I believe," because honestly, can anyone really claim perfect faith about anything? Never a single moment's doubt? No reservations, no exceptions, no wavering? If we're very, very lucky, maybe we could claim that about one thing. Maybe. But more than that, and either we're kidding ourselves or we're nuts, or so I would think.

In any case, here they are (though I have yet to translate them properly into Hebrew, so forgive me):

1. I believe that the Holy One Blessed Be He, is the Creator and Designer of everything that has been created; He alone is responsible for the conception and creation ex nihilo of this and any other universes, and the design and ultimate causation of everything within them, and anything besides Himself that might exist outside them.

2. I believe that the Holy One Blessed Be He, and blessed be His Name, is One, and that there is no other unity in any way like His, and that He alone is God, who was, and is, and will be.

3. I believe that the Holy One Blessed Be He, has no physical body or characteristics thereof, nor anything even remotely resembling such, and that there can be no physical comparison to Him whatsoever.

4. I believe that the Holy One Blessed Be He, is the first and the last: nothing preceded Him, and nothing shall outlast Him, for He alone is eternal and not created; and all else in existence was created by Him, and endures at His pleasure.

5. I believe that the Holy One Blessed Be He is capable of omniscience, omnipotence, and omnipresence, but contracts Himself for the sake of the existence of the universe, and for the sake of the gift of free will to human beings.

6. I believe that to the the Holy One Blessed Be He, and to Him alone, it is right to pray; and that it is not right to pray to any being or object besides Him.

7. I believe in the covenant of Torah, in the form of the Written Torah that we have passed down from time of our leaving Egypt and which was canonized by Ezra the Prophet, and the Oral Torah that we have received from Our Rabbis of Blessed Memory and which we continue to create. We are bound to the Holy One Blessed Be He through Torah: we receive it, in order to follow the mitzvot within it, as it is written, “And the People said to Moshe: everything that Hashem commands, we will do and we will hear;” (Ex. 24:7) and in order to create more Torah and more fully comprehend the mitzvot, as it is taught “Rabbi Yehudah rose to his feet and said: ‘It is not in Heaven!’ (Deut. 30:12) What did he mean by ‘It is not in Heaven?’ Rabbi Yirmiyah explained: That the Torah had already been given at Sinai, and we do not pay attention to further revelatory material, but rather, as it is written, ‘We rule according to the majority [of halachic scholars].’ (Ex. 23:2)” (BT Bava Metzia 59b)

8. I believe that the covenant of Torah is eternal and irreplaceable, and while interpretations may change and halachah may evolve, there is no addition to the Written Torah, nor are there new revelations that add to the revelations of our prophets, whose day ended at the time of the raising of the Second Temple, and whose like shall not be seen again until the time of the moshiach.

9. I believe that observance of the mitzvot is incumbent upon all the People Israel, according to our various interpretations of the halachah; and that it is the duty of all Jews to learn and study Torah, both Written and Oral, all their days, so that they may know our inheritance and understand their obligations and wrestle with the infinite meanings implicit in Torah, and thus both fulfill the commandment “You shall love Hashem your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your might...” (Deut. 6:5), and be worthy of the name of Yisra’el (the one who struggles with God).

10. I believe that Judaism alone is the religion for Jews, and is not to be replaced by or conflated with non-Jewish religions. Nor is it to be universalized and actively proselytized to non-Jews, who can and should have their own paths for relating to the the Holy One Blessed Be He and establishing justice on the earth.

11. I believe that the the Holy One Blessed Be He, knows perfectly who has done right and who has done wrong, and confronts all beings at some point with the accounting of their deeds, and that for evil there are some form of consequences, and for good there is some form of reward, and the one need not preclude the other, nor shall we know with certainty what either may be, so long as we live upon this earth.

12. I believe in the coming of the the time of the moshiach; that such a time shall come about after the achievement of tikkun olam: when the hungry shall be fed, and the poor shall be clothed and housed; when the helpless are helped and the downfallen upraised; when peace is made and war is no longer, as it is written, “Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, nor shall they practice war any more,” (Is. 2:4) and when the People Israel shall once again be able to live safely in all the land that was promised to our ancestors (regardless of whose flag may fly over parts of it); and when we can agree among ourselves and our neighbor brethren upon the building of a Third Temple, on the holy mountain of Hashem-- a Temple unlike the first two, as it is written, “My House shall be a House of Prayer for all nations;” (Is. 56:7) then shall it be the time of the moshiach.

13. I believe that the soul that the Holy One Blessed Be He places within each one of us is eternal, and survives beyond the confines of this world, even if we do not know for certain to what places it may travel afterward, as it is written “I shall not die, but rather, live, and speak of the deeds of Hashem.” (Ps. 118:17)

-Ami

Amish Torah

Having been out of blogging action for a couple of weeks due to the interference of life, this week brings two posts, right after one another.

Recently, Julie and I took a quick two-day getaway to Indiana (which we can’t recommend), to Amish country (which we can recommend highly).

We learned a lot about the Amish while we were there. I knew very little about them, prior to this trip: only that they were Anabaptists (a Christian belief wherein baptism of a child at birth or in early childhood is considered insufficient, and a second baptism at maturity is deemed necessary, because they believe acceptance of salvation requires kavanah [intent] to be a ma’aseh [effective deed]-- although they don’t put it quite like that). I knew that they lived separately, and (I thought) entirely rejected technology much past the level of around the seventeenth century.

But it turns out that while they do live comparatively separately, and there are indeed many aspects of technology they reject, they have a complex system of rules and guidelines for what kinds of technology are entirely forbidden, and what can be used but not owned, and what can they neither own nor use themselves but can derive hana’ah (“enjoyment” or profit) from in its use by an English person (in Amish parlance, all non-Amish people are called English, which suits me well, since I have always sort of wanted to be English anyhow). In short, they have a de facto system of halachah. And in many ways, as far as I have been able to tell, it has many parallels to hilchot Shabbat (the halachot of Shabbat observance) and hilchot aku”m (the halachot of dealing with non-Jews).

For example, our Amish host took us for a brief ride in his buggy (I felt a little sorry for the single horse pulling four of us in a wooden buggy, but she seemed to be fairly fatalistic about the experience): though the buggy itself is “handmade” wood, drawn by a horse, it has running lights for night-time driving which are electric, powered by batteries. Also, we noted that though there were no electronic devices in the spacious sitting-room/dining room that we were entertained in, our hosts did have a refrigerator, powered by natural gas (also a gas stove/range, and gas lamps, which were cool, like being in a 19th century parlor).

It turns out that they are prohibited from being connected to the electrical grid (part of their living “separate” lives), and so shun major electrical appliances or electronic devices. But they have no prohibition about natural gas power (though they are not connected to gas lines, but use large storage tanks instead), and they make exceptions to the electric appliance rule for some small things, especially those which can be powered by batteries and cranks (we didn’t get to ask about solar or wind, although those kind of seem like they should be permitted-- but then, what do I know from Amish halachah? There’s plenty of things in our halachah that seem like they ought to be permitted, but are not, or occasionally vice-versa).  And they will use even from-the-grid electricity if they are working for an English person, and it is done in their place of business. They will accept car rides from English people, and even charter buses for communal trips.

The atmosphere of the Amish dinner table (and they were lovely hosts, though Julie and I couldn’t really eat most of what they served-- they like their fleischigs, which of course are treyf) was convivial, warm, welcoming, friendly, familial, and full of storytelling and joking. In sum, much like a frum dinner table.

We learned that these very plain-living folks who were our hosts, unable to have children (in a prolific culture with significant stigma attached to infertility, much like the frum world), had adopted and raised seven kids. We had to learn from our mutual friend that they hadn’t mentioned the twenty kids whom they had fostered over the eyars.

And it got me thinking, how like and how unlike Haredi Jews the Amish are. The Haredi world has some really good qualities, some of the best being their willingness to open their homes and their hands to aid those around them (even when they themselves might have little), and the tight knit communitarianism that helps keep frum kids educated in frum schools, keeps frum shul memberships free or on sliding scales, keeps food on everyone’s plate for Shabbos. In that sense, they are much like the Amish. The only people I have known whom I would’ve bet would raise seven adopted kids have been frum.

But the big difference I noted was that the Amish understand and acknowledge that their lifestyle and their rules are chumrot that they take upon themselves. They acknowledge that one need not be Amish to be a good person, or even a good Christian. It is their way, and it is not for everyone. It is deeply ironic, I think, that this attitude, so similar to how we as Jews approach the idea of conversion and Judaism (in other words, we don’t proselytize, and we don’t necessarily rush to encourage converts, because we understand that one need not be Jewish to be a good person and please God), is so utterly at variance with how Haredim understand Haredi Judaism. Built upon a vast network of ever-denser chumrot, ascetic minhagim derived from mussar and mussar-influenced Kabbalistic teachings, and stultifyingly paralytic interpretations of halachah, Haredi Judaism nonetheless sees itself as entirely authentic and normative, the beau ideal from which all other forms of Judaism are deviant.

As devoted to interfaith dialogue as I am, it still sometimes shocks me when I come across a particularly blatant example of how Jews can need a lesson in Torah from non-Jews.

The Amish, without having any knowledge of the concept as we have it, have put into practice the idea from Eruvin 13b of elu v’elu divrei elohim chayim (“these and also those are the words of the Living God.” They have put into practice the belief that one should take upon oneself and one’s community a set of strictures for a purer, more ascetic life, while retaining the awareness that doing so is a choice, not a matter of universal requirement: and that, my friends, is tolerance. That is the knowledge-in-action that pluralism creates shalom bayit (internal peace) in the community at large.

You take a look at what’s going on with the Haredi world in Israel, between the Orthodox and non-Orthodox communities there and here in the US. And you tell me that Haredim don’t need what the Amish have to teach. It is a lesson that would lead us steps closer on the path to tikkun olam, and bringing the coming of the moshiach. 

-Ami

Jewish Education Comes From Home

I just started a new teaching gig: learning Megillat Ruth with a small class of high school girls every Sunday. And I was pleasantly surprised to find that my new students were extremely bright, had acute literary skills, and excellent Hebrew. They translated, they read, they discussed, all with speed, quality, and incisiveness...it was the kind of experience learning text with students that Jewish educators rarely get the chance to have.

Afterward, I was musing to myself about the class, wondering why this was so different. It’s not, of course, like I’ve never taught very bright, talented kids before. You can’t teach in Jewish day schools and Hebrew schools and not run into a lot of bright and talented kids. But these girls were remarkable, in my experience: I have seldom taught such a responsive and engaged class.

In the end, it was the engagement that struck me as being most different. They did so well not only because they were bright and talented, but because they were engaged, they were motivated. They wanted to be there, learning what they were learning. And to some degree, that might just be because all or some of them have a natural inclination for text study.

But to a very great degree, it became apparent to me, having met their parents, having seen those parents interacting with their children, that the girls were engaged and motivated because their parents were engaged, and were teaching by example that, in their homes, Jewish learning was important, and to be valued for its own sake; and that such learning was connected to life in that home, by virtue of observance. In whatever shape or form it might take, it was clear to me that these were homes that observed Shabbat and chagim (festivals) and perhaps had some kind of experience of kashrut. I’m not implying Orthodoxy or any kind of strict traditionalism; just that these were homes in which Judaism was readily participatory in some fashion. And I believe that has made all the difference.

I am a Jewish educator. My rabbinate is teaching. I’ve taught in day school, in Hebrew school, at informal learning gatherings, and one-on-one for tutoring of various kinds. I spend a lot of my time thinking about how to teach more effectively, what we as a community or as a people could be doing to improve Jewish educational facilities or train better Jewish educators. But things like teaching this wonderful class remind me that ultimately, even if we had the kind of funding that we need (and always lack) to make quality Jewish education readily available and affordable, even if we had consistently deeply informed and traditionally knowledgeable teachers, the better part of the onus for successful Jewish education rests upon the home.

I have taught classes, in the past, that were the reverse of this one that I recently began. Where the kids absolutely didn’t want to be there, they steadfastly refused to participate, their knowledge of both text and Hebrew was abysmal, and those that lacked utter apathy for the Jewish tradition only replaced apathy with vague contempt. And perhaps in part, we can write some of that off to modern teenagerhood: rebellious, apathetic, disconnected. But having met the parents of those students also, I know that they had homes in which Jewish observance played no real part: Shabbat was not kept, and such chagim as were kept were observed in the most casual and half-hearted manner; text was not discussed or learned in the home, and no form of kashrut was kept. In short, there was nothing in the home life of these students that might reinforce or support the notions that the study of Jewish text and tradition related in any way to real life, or was of any practical importance to their parents.

I once had such a student tell me with complete seriousness, when I asked her why she was in Hebrew school, that her mother had been quite clear that when she (her mother) had been a girl, she’d had to “waste her afternoons sitting through Hebrew school,” and if she’d had to do it, then her daughter would have to do it, too. It’s true that we talk a lot about passing things on l’dor va-dor (from generation to generation), but I’m pretty sure this is not what that’s supposed to be.

There seems to be a pretty clear understanding in secular American culture that if we want our kids to succeed in regular school, not only does the school need adequate funding, trained teachers, and decent materials, but parents have to be involved. They need to ensure that kids do homework, get tutoring if needed, and they need to be given encouragement, shown that education is valuable, and, ideally, come from a home where books and newspapers are read, current events are discussed, literature or history or science or mathematics are used and discussed and valued. In homes where none of these things are true, it is rare that the child will truly embrace learning and critical thinking.

It should be obvious that the same basic ideas are true for Jewish education.

It’s not enough that we send our kids to Hebrew school (which is seldom an adequate educational experience even in ideal circumstances), or even to day school. Judaism is passed on by Judaism being practiced. When kids see mitzvot being done by their parents, when they see Jewish ritual as a part of their daily (or at least weekly) lives, when they hear Torah being talked about-- even if it’s just a quick read of the weekly parashah-- that makes all the difference. When they get support and encouragement for their Jewish educational achievements equal or greater to that which they get for their secular educational achievement, that makes all the difference. In such situations, regardless of the level of home observance according to the stricture of the tradition, Judaism is a reality, a living thing, and it causes the student to engage in their Jewish studies. It makes Jewish education merely a Herculean effort, rather than a Sisyphean effort-- and sometimes, as with my newly begun class, it even makes it into a pleasure and an instant success.

We Jewish educators need to make a bargain with the rest of Am Yisrael: we will give 110%-- really bust our butts-- coming up with quality Jewish educational experiences for your kids. We will bring to bear all our excitement and passion for our texts and traditions, all our dedication to youth and education. We will try to make do on the shoestring budgets and limited resources that education in an economic crisis and an atmosphere of assimilation permit us. We will continue to teach for shockingly low pay, just like other teachers, all across America. But in return, zay dem yidn: live Jewish lives. Bring Jewish observance into your homes. Go to shul on Shabbat. Learn a little Torah. Maybe keep a little kosher. Say a brachah now and then. These things have limitless effect on your children. And they will give life to our tradition as nothing else will do so, strengthening the next generation and elevating us all just a little in holiness.

-Ami

Revelation-Ritual-Rules-Remembering

When I would teach high school Jewish Studies classes, I would usually give them an assignment around Pesach time: rent Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments and Dreamworks’ Prince of Egypt, and after watching them, tell me what they got wrong vis-à-vis the text of the Exodus narrative in the Torah.

It’s a fun little assignment, and the responses it generates are interesting, as a teacher. Prince of Egypt is the harder one for most students, because it’s a better movie, and incorporates much more directly from Torah and from traditional midrashim and commentaries. But what always surprised me is the thing that most students missed, which to me was the most egregious failing of the film. Maybe you’ll recall: the final plague, the “destroyer” moving through Egypt, striking down firstborn, the Israelites, protected, trembling in their dark houses.... Yeah, there’s the problem: where’s the matzah? During the tenth plague, we weren’t trembling in the dark in our protected houses: we were having the first Pesach seder.

Part of what I cherish about this section of the Exodus narrative-- which we see in this week’s parashah, Bo-- is that it does something quintessentially, paradigmatically Jewish. Right as the tenth plague is about to occur, at the dramatic climax of the first act of the Exodus story (the second act being the part about kri’at yam suf, the splitting of the Sea of Reeds, and the third act being the part about getting the Torah at Sinai), the narrative pauses so that God can have Moshe Rabbeinu (our teacher Moses) instruct the people in the basic laws of the Jewish calendar and proper Seder observance.

I love that. I love it because there is something so Jewish, so hamische (homey), about this attitude. That God would say to Moshe, “Listen, dude, I’m gonna send in the destroyer, this plague is gonna be a mind-blower, one for the ages. It’s gonna be so heavy duty.... BTW, make sure you know how to calculate the months, so that you know when all the chagim (holidays) are going to be. The first one’s going to be Pesach: let me give you the details of how to observe it.”

It’s that attitude that really exemplifies our tradition: Something cosmically momentous has occurred, something that should inspire us forever-- but since inspiration can’t be codified and demanded, here’s the tachlis (pragmatic forms) for creating a situation that, if done right, may cause inspiration by reminding you of what occurred and how to connect to it.

That presumption, that the minutiae of ritual and ethical observance are not distinct from revelation and miracle, they proceed directly from revelation and miracle-- and do so not after long separation from the fact, but davka right smack in the middle of the fact...that, my friends, is the heart of the Jewish tradition.

I like to imagine the first Seder, happening while the tenth plague was going on, as a bunch of us gathered around the fireplace, eating roast lamb, matzah, and maror, simultaneously stunned at the advent of our freedom after so long, and bemused at the detailed commandments we now have to keep. I presume that the original Seder involved just as many questions as modern Sedarim do-- maybe that was also the night that originated “Two Jews, three opinions.”

But all jokes aside, what I love about this instance is that it demonstrates the nature of our tradition as one really made to be used by people in their everyday lives. Yes, there are a lot of details in the mitzvot, but they’re there for good reason. And that reason is not, as some have said, “Because God said so,” (which, when I hear it, always sounds like “Because God said so, so shut up.”) but rather because the tradition-- and because God (with whom we author the tradition)-- understands that a person cannot live their life in a perpetual state of revelation, or high spiritual elevation. That’s just not how we function. Nobody exists in a perpetual I-Thou moment. So we need a framework of mitzvot to give us a system of spiritual discipline, to be a daily mnemonic aid, so that we are constantly reminding ourselves of who we are, who we were, and Who made us what we are; so that we can constantly renew, as Heschel put it, our “radical amazement” at life in the universe, at life with one another; so that we create situations, using ritual, that help us re-enact the revelations and miracles that shaped us, so that they continue to shape us.

The Haggadah reminds us of this very thing, midrashically riffing off verses from Parashat Bo:

בכל דור ודור חיב אדם לראות את עצמו, כאלו הוא יצא ממצרים, שנאמר: והגדת לבנך ביום ההוא לאמר: בעבור זה עשה ה' לי, בצאתי ממצרים. לא את אבותינו בלבד, גאל הקדוש ברוך הוא, אלא אף אותנו גאל עמהם, שנאמר: ואותנו הוציא משם, למען הביא אתנו, לתת לנו את הארץ אשר נשבע לאבתינו

In every generation, a person must view themselves as if they themselves came forth out of Egypt.   As it is said, “And you shall tell your child at that time, saying, ‘It is because of what Hashem did for me when I was brought forth out of Egypt.’” Not were our ancestors alone redeemed by the Holy One Blessed Be He, but we ourselves were redeemed along with them, as it is said, “And He brought us forth from there, so that he could bring us here, to give to us the land which He had sworn to our ancestors.”

Such an expectation could not reasonably be supported in a vacuum. Time creates distance. Stories evolve if left unfixed. Revelation cannot be passed on verbally. But with ritual-- both of action and of language-- we create guides to aid us in fixing stories and erasing the distance of passing time, and circumstances to pass on the experience of revelation as much as such a thing can be passed on. The mitzvot of our tradition are potent with understanding of how humanity really functions.

And I love them for it. I value it every day, and every time I read this parashah, and even every time I get annoyed with movie versions of the Exodus for their not getting it right. This understanding in our mitzvot is what gives our people vitality, the life of the millennia, and is a great part of what makes Torah so precious as a way of life: it knows us, sometimes even more than we know it.

-Ami

Parashat Bo

Barbara McClintock was a Nobel Prize winning genetic scientist who spent her life studying ears of corn. She was one of the most precise empirical observers and rigorously logical thinkers in American science. But, towards the end of her life, when she was asked “how do you do great science?” she answered, "about the only thing I can tell you about the doing of science is that you somehow have to have a feeling for the organism". In thinking about the ears of corn that she worked with all of her life, she added, "Really, all I can tell you about doing great science is that you somehow have to lean into the kernel."

I read about McClintock in a book called, The Heart of Learning: Spirituality in Education, in an article by a great educator and writer, Parker J. Palmer.   In his article, Palmer relates, "Barbara McClintock practiced the highest form of love – which is intimacy which does not annihilate difference".  It’s awesome to think about this idea of intimacy which does not annihilate difference as it relates to the art of being an effective teacher.  When we teach, we must often attend to the diverse needs of many individual students with distinct learning styles and personalities. 

In McClintock’s work, her focus was on the individual ears, or sometimes even kernels of corn.  What makes us effective is our ability to “lean into the kernels” in our own lives – or to “somehow have a feeling for” the individual student, or person, or task, we face?  In McClintock’s words, we must seek intimacy which does not annihilate difference.

A few years ago I taught a Bat Mitzvah student how to chant from the Torah.  Teaching Torah chanting to 12 and 13 year old kids is something I’ve done since I was in high school.  But this time was different: my student was severely hearing impaired.  My inclination was to allow her to read from the Torah without learning how to chant.  But the rabbi of the synagogue urged me to teach her to chant Torah – just to teach her differently than I’d taught the other kids. 

Our Torah portion this week teaches a similar lesson.  In Exodus 10:2, we read about the obligation of teaching the generations that follow about the Exodus from slavery in Egypt. We must, “tell it in the ears of your children and grandchildren”. 

      This description is of a very intimate, very personalized telling!  It is individualized – it requires really knowing the person you’re talking to.  Saying something “in the ears” of someone else is not simply saying to, “teach it to them” – rather, it’s a quiet telling: deeply personal, meaningful, and sacred.     
                In the Book of Exodus, the end goal of “telling it into the ears” (of our students) is not just so that they might gain knowledge of the event of the Exodus.  It’s much more profound and much more powerful than that.  The verse continues, saying that we must tell it into their ears, “and you will (both) know that I am God”.

What is the goal of education?  According to Barbara McClintock and the Book of Exodus, Education requires: relationship, intimacy, and the recognition of divinity in all things – both the ears of corn and the ears of children. 

-Julie

The Genesis of Infertility

So clearly Ami and I won't always be blogging about precisely the same topics.  This is what I've been working on in my corner of our house this afternoon.  It's for an upcoming anthology on topics related to sexuality for the CCAR Journal (Central Conference of American Rabbis).  I'm really curious to hear your responses/reactions/thoughts!

The Genesis of Infertility: A Contemporary Reading of Biblical Responses

Rabbi Julie Pelc Adler

            After the first humans’ expulsion from Eden, the twin values of conception and reproduction ceased to be as simple as would the commandment, “be fruitful and multiply” might suggest.   Sarah, Rebecca and Rachel[1] (three of the four matriarchs in the Torah); as well as Hannah[2] in N’vi-im face serious challenges trying to conceive[3].  Each woman is vocal about her struggle in a way that befits her circumstance and personality, creating echoes that span the generations, resounding for modern women who share their struggle.

Rachel lashes out with words of anger, Hannah cries out to God in desperation, Isaac pleads with God alongside Rebecca[4], and Sarah takes matters into her own hands in order to ensure offspring for her husband.  Biblical women and their partners confront and respond to a myriad of interconnected factors related to infertility, struggling with the fact of their barrenness, its theological and sociological implications, and an attempt to make meaning in their suffering.

THEOLOGIAL

The text attributes the power of opening and closing wombs to God[5].  As God is therefore an active player in the struggle of each of these women for fertility, their quest becomes one of theological import.  Hannah’s prayers are perhaps the most oft mentioned, as her pleas to God are credited as the invention of silent prayer (“Hannah was praying in her heart, and her lips were moving but her voice was not heard”) [6]. 

Whereas Hannah’s physical response to her suffering is to weep, Sarah’s is to laugh.  The absurdity of the promise and the possibility of hope so long denied must have hurt as deeply as had her years of barrenness.  Yet, Sarah is chastised for her laughter, as if to deny its acceptability as a legitimate emotional release to the decades of dreams deferred. 

The most readily answered prayer is that of Isaac, uttered on behalf of his wife, Rebecca[7].  She becomes pregnant seemingly right away: “And Isaac entreated YHVH for his wife because she was barren and YHVH was entreated of him and Rebecca his wife conceived”.  The Hebrew is almost playful, using words with a lyrical lilt and symmetry between the one requesting and the One answering the prayer[8].  Also, Rebecca is referenced twice in the same sentence as אִשְׁתּֽוֹ׃, “his wife”, thereby emphasizing the strong connection between the two and illustrating his active participation in entreating God.  He never abandons hope that Rebecca, herself, might conceive (taking another wife in her stead or chastising her for her barrenness).  God here is immediately responsive, and the couple moves from infertile in Genesis 25:21 to expectant parents of twins in the very next verse.   For Isaac and Rebecca, there never seems to be a loss of hope or faith in God’s ability to alleviate Rebecca’s barrenness.

Rachel, on the other hand, seems to suffer a crisis of faith in the face of her barrenness.  Rather than to God, Rachel cries out to her husband, Jacob, saying, “Give me children, else I die!” Jacob seems to hear in her plea a misdirected (in his opinion) source of the infertility and replies in anger, “Am I in God's stead, Who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?” [9]  Jacob chastises Rachel for lashing out in anger at him, making a demand that he sees to be completely inappropriate and outside the range of his power to fulfill.  Jacob, however, does not pray to God or make any pleas on Rachel’s behalf.  There seems to be antagonism and resentment between these two, perhaps rooted in their shared frustration at Rachel’s inability to conceive (especially in contrast with her extraordinarily fertile sister and co-wife).

Interestingly, Sarah is silent in response to her many years of barrenness, even in the face of the seemingly absurd promise (in the face of her infertility) made to her husband that he be the father of many descendents[10].  She, rather than pray to God, takes definitive action to make God’s promise true.  She seems to acknowledge and accept that the promise of procreativity is made to Abraham and not to her; she seems to see her role, instead, as the intermediary whose actions might make the promise fulfilled.  Without a word of complaint or resentment, she offers her husband an alternative route to fertility that includes another woman, her handmaid, in her stead as the bearer of offspring.

SOCIAL

For women in Biblical times, the social implications of infertility are great.  In two of the four cases, other women use their strong fertility as a tool to torment their infertile rivals.  Rachel is called, עֲקָרָֽה׃, or “barren”, in contrast with her sister, Leah, whose ease with fertility (and resulting fecundity) torments Rachel.  Likewise, Hannah’s infertility is mentioned specifically in counter-distinction with that of her co-wife, Peninah.  Hannah weeps in response to her suffering, so wholly at a loss and staggering with grief, she appears to the outside eye to be drunk.  This ancient form of bullying is suggested by the text to compensate for the fact that the infertile wives are more beloved by their husbands than their procreating counterparts.

 Sarah, too, is called barren by the text[11]; she opts to share her husband with another woman in an attempt to “give” him a son. Jealousy between women is an issue here, too, as Sarah ultimately expels the handmaid and her son because of an incident between her own child and the boy that she found too disturbing to tolerate[12].

MEANINGS: RABBINIC AND PERSONAL

Traditional readers of text imagine meaning in each and every corner; it is not surprising, then, that generations of rabbis noticed the abundance of infertility in the lives of the biblical matriarchs.  Some postulated that God intentionally created the situation of barrenness so as to make each of these women to despair her fertility, desiring the desperate pleas from these righteous servants.  In a midrash on Genesis, the rabbis imagine that “the efficacy of prayer and the value of suffering [is] that [it] leads to purification and brings people closer to God:” [13]

Why were the matriarchs barren? R. Levi said in R. Shila’s name and R. Helbo in R. Johanan’s names: Because the Holy One, blessed be He, yearns for their prayers and supplications. Thus it is written, “O my dove, in the cranny of the rocks,/Hidden by the cliff” (Song of Songs 2:14): Why did I make you barren? In order that, “Let Me see your face,/Let me hear your voice” (Song of Songs 2:14).[14]

Similarly, rabbis in the Talmud, suggest that the matriarchs and patriarchs were initially childless “because the Holy One, blessed be He, longs to hear the prayer of the righteous.”[15]

Perhaps the rabbinic mind was comforted by this explanation for infertility.  Perhaps an afflicted couple in the Rabbinic period would encounter this teaching, relax into their suffering, breathing a sigh of relief, “oh, so God just wants my prayers.  That explains it.”  But, somehow, I can’t imagine that this platitude worked for very long, especially if the pleas continued and prayers for children remained unanswered (or the divine answer was “no”).  In moments when hope wanes and doubt creeps in, I tend to prefer the company of Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Hannah. 

We do not like unanswered prayers any more than did our predecessors.  We crave meaningful answers to our questions.  We want someone to listen when we ask, “Why?” and not offer lovingly unhelpful suggestions like, “it’ll happen when the time is right” or “maybe you need to relax and stop thinking about it so much”.  In quiet moments, we answer our own wordless “Why?” with equally (if not more) unhelpful answers, “God hates me” or “I’m not meant to be a mother”.

Again, our matriarchs precede us with their own answers to try to explain that which seems inexplicable. Genesis Rabbah 45:2 recounts,

“And Sarai said to Abram, ‘Look, the Lord has kept me from bearing” (Gen. 16:2) as follows: “Said she, I know the source of my affliction: It is not as people say [of a barren woman], ‘She needs an amulet, she needs a charm,’ but ‘Look, the Lord has kept me from bearing.’”

Sarai attributes her infertility to God’s will. I can imagine a seemingly endless stream of well-meaning friends and acquaintances periodically stopping by Sarai’s tent, accustomed to her husband’s hospitality and welcoming generosity, confounded by the couple’s lack of offspring.  Each takes Sarai’s hand, offers a long look of disbelief, and suggests, “it’ll happen when the time is right” or “maybe you need to relax and stop thinking about it so much”. 

We are the inheritors of a Jewish tradition steeped in the art of inquiry (and the pursuit of questions), familiar with righteous indignation (even arguing with divine decrees), and probing for answers wherever they might be found; we are also the inheritors of a tradition that includes the reality of infertility.  As such, we include in our search the possibility of skepticism about the role (or existence of) God, medical interventions heretofore impossible, and a multiplicity of media through which conception are normative.

---

[1] Genesis 11:30; Genesis 25:21, 24-26; Genesis 29:31; Genesis 30:1-2, 9, 17, 22

[2] I Samuel 1:2, 5-6, 2:21

[3] Though less is written about them, Michal in II Samuel 6:23 and the wife of Manoach in Judges 13:2-3, 24 also struggle with infertility.  Michal’s infertility is never alleviated and is unique in that there seems to be no hope and no possible intervention for her; there is a sense of the inevitability of her childlessness, “Michal the daughter of Saul had no child unto the day of her death”

[4] Genesis 25:21

[5] Genesis 16:1-2; Genesis 20:17-18; Genesis 29:31; Genesis 30:22; 1 Samuel 1:5;

[6] 1 Samuel 1:10-16

[7] Genesis 25:21

[8] The verse uses parallel words like “vay·ye‘·tar and vay·yê·‘ā·ṯer (same verb used for that which Isaac does and that which God does in response to the inquiry) and with the repetition of sounds in words like Yitz·ḥāk and lə·nō·ḵach.

[9] Genesis 30:1-2

[10] Genesis 11:30,16:1-2, 21:1-3

[11] Genesis 11:30

[12] Generations of scholars have struggled to discern the precise nature of the boy’s misdeed, as the Hebrew verb, “metzahek” has multiple meanings

[13] “Infertile Wife in Rabbinic Judaism”.  Judith R. Baskin.  Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia.  Jewish Women’s Archive, 2005.

[14] Genesis Rabbah 45:4

[15] BT Yevamot 64a

- Julie

Un-Halachic Halachah

I swear this blog is not going to be one long anti-Haredi screed. That’s really not what we started it for. And I promise I will sing a new tune in the next posts I make. But I had to say this. Look at this article I saw in the Forward today:

http://blogs.forward.com/sisterhood-blog/146606/

For the tl:dr (too long: didn't read) crowd, the long and short of it is a Haredi rabbi who basically said that frum (Orthodox) guys-- he was talking to soldiers in Tzahal (the IDF), but the implication seems wider than that-- should leave anywhere a woman can be heard singing, even if they have to get shot and die for leaving. Better death than kol ishah (listening to a woman singing).

This is insane.

This is so crazy there are no good words for it. It’s nuttier than a Rosh Hashanah honeycake. It’s Chock Full o’ Nuts. You get my drift?

Halachah (Jewish Law) is quite clear on the subject of martyrdom. Basically, the rule of thumb in Jewish thought is “Choose life.” Living is good, and one should do whatever is necessary to stay alive, and keep others alive. That includes breaking any and all mitzvot (commandments) in order to do so. This principle is enumerated by the Rabbis of the Talmud as pikuach nefesh docheh et ha-kol (Saving a life trumps all other responsibilities). The only exceptions that they make to this principle are:

• that one is not permitted to murder an innocent person to save one’s own life, 
• or to publicly practice avodah zarah (idolatry) to save one’s own life, 
• or to commit incest to save one’s own life. 

And the Rishonim (the great halachic scholars of the middle ages and Renaissance) say that if a person in those three situations finds themselves unable to choose martyrdom at the critical moment, does what they have to do to survive, and then expresses remorse, and makes it clear that they did what they did only to save their life and not for any other reason...we accept their statements, and we do not consider them apostates, heretics, or sinners.

In other words, the tradition-- which originally made the most limited exceptions possible to the idea that one should save life at any cost, even breaking the mitzvot-- became even clearer with time that in fact, there is never a moment where martyrdom is truly preferable. Obviously, there have been some brave martyrs in our tradition who chose death over apostasy, or chose death in order to save many other lives, and we respect their courage and convictions. But for the most part, we are crystal clear that life is so valuable, there is nearly never anything extreme and unusual enough to justify throwing it away. That is the halachah of the matter. End of story. And I would have thought, until today, that every halachically educated Jew would have agreed on that matter.

But to find that not only is this not the case, but that some Mad Black Hatter rabbi has said that listening to a woman sing-- which is not halachically prohibited!-- is something a person should choose death to avoid...I am just sickened. The prohibition that the Haredim use concerning kol ishah is a chumra (legal stricture) based in aggadah (non-binding Rabbinic parable) and in mussar (ascetic homiletic philosophy). At best it can be taken on by individuals as a stricture over and above the law, but it cannot be applied as a halachah for all Jews. That's just not how halachah works.

What truly sickens me isn’t just the stupidity of the proximate issue (kol ishah, listening to a woman sing), it’s the gross and audacious abuse of the halachic process and paradigm that this pronouncement represents. And not just represents in and of itself, but as an exemplar of how Haredi Judaism is abusing, perverting, and twisting halachah while claiming their “observant” status as a mantle of authenticity.

I have said elsewhere, and will say it again, that much of the Haredi problem boils down to an increasing lack in Orthodoxy of the principle of machloket l’shem shamayim (“dispute for the sake of Heaven,” cf. BT Eruvin 13a and other places): we are supposed to tolerate viewpoints different from our own, so long as those views come from a place of legitimate struggle to embrace Judaism more effectively, to better develop our understanding of what God wishes from us. We don’t have to agree with the viewpoints of others; just tolerate them, even if we disagree with them. And this is simply not being done.

There have been several promising voices from the Orthodox world that have come out recently and noted that it is deeply un-Jewish to do some of these things-- to shame people publicly, for example, or to assault them or verbally abuse them, or to threaten their lives or health, based on a belief that their Jewish practice or their understanding of halachah or their theology is incorrect. But so far, no one that I have read has properly contextualized the issue as a lack of machloket l’shem shamayim-- although I have been pleased that some have raised the mitzvah v’ahavta l’rei’echa kamocha (“you must respect your fellow person as you do yourself”) which would certainly also preclude publicly shaming and abusing one’s fellow Jews.

But in any case, part of the issue here is that non-Haredim, and yes, non-Orthodox Jews also, have a right to their interpretations. Even if one believes those interpretations are incorrect. The tradition dictates that they have a place in the House of Jacob also. Instead of tolerance, the reaction of the Haredi world is to attack, and to delegitimize not only anything non-Haredi, but any shitah (Jewish practice) that doesn’t include the latest round of chumrot (legal strictures) to be followed. And that includes the increasing focus on halachic non-starters like kol ishah or much of the way that Orthodoxy currently interprets the idea of tzniut, as I mentioned last time.

These chumrot would be problematic in and of themselves for their divisiveness, and the way the Haredim are attempting to force their observance of said chumrot on everyone else; but most infuriating is that the chumrot in question are often beyond ridiculous.

Far too much is made in Orthodox halachah today of the principles minhag k’halachah he (“A custom can become like law”) and hilcheta k’vatrai (“one should reinterpret the law according to the latest interpretation”). These principles, if one studies the halachah, if one looks at its development from the time of the Gemara (first five centuries CE or so) through the time of the Rishonim (medieval period) to the early Acharonic times (post-Renaissance period, more or less), were always guidelines. They were never intended to be either universally applied or inflexibly applied. And they both come from times when it was infinitely more difficult to gather Jewish text and learn enough of it to make every halachist fully qualified. We tend to forget that for every Rabbenu Gershom (R. Gershom b. Yehudah, 11th c.) or Rambam (R. Moshe Maimonides, 12th c.), every Rosh (R. Asher b. Yechiel, 13th c.) or Meiri (R. Menachem Meiri, 13th c.), there were hundreds of guys running around the Jewish world being called rabbis who had very slim educations indeed, and hundreds more acting as dayanim (halachic judges) with even less knowledge than that. They needed interpretive guidelines that heavily influenced their decisions, because not only did they lack training, they had few facilities for research to make up for their lack of knowledge.

But today, even if some of our rabbis could stand extra training in halachah and its nature, uses, and history (and I count myself on that list, don’t worry), we at least have the benefits of having instantaneous communication with other, more erudite rabbis; of having searchable, electronic collections of texts like the amazing Bar Ilan Database; of having, for God’s sakes, printed books of Jewish text that are both readily available anywhere and (despite what Julie might say about our library) readily affordable to even working-class Jews interested in scholarship. It’s not only a different game, the playing field barely even looks the same. We don’t need the same interpretive guidelines anymore-- or at the very least, we don’t need them to be so strong.

And in the Haredi community, instead of loosening such guidelines, to allow their highly halachically educated scholars freer rein to use their training and talents, they are instead tightening them, setting them in stone. And what results is not only excessive stricture without any balance of leniency, it is bad halachah. A chumra imposed on a chumra is self-invalidating by halachic rules; one does not impose chumrot on the people that do not have their core bases in halachah, but instead in aggadah (parable) or kabbalah (mysticism) or mussar (ascetic homiletics), or anything else: these are basic precepts of halachic interpretation. And yet the vast majority of cases, including both issues surrounding relating to the non-Haredi world, and surrounding tzniut, kol ishah, the treatment of women in general-- these precepts are ignored, if not entirely flouted.

Halachah is an amazing system. It was designed to be innovative, evolutionary, flexible, realistic, fostering of justice and fairness, and creative of spiritual development. Haredi halachah is none of these things: it is rigid, completely unrealistic, creative of gross injustice and misery, and profoundly unspiritual, innovating and evolving only ever-increasing stricture and zealotry.

This is not what halachah is supposed to be. It is becoming closer and closer to the antithesis of what halachah is supposed to be.

And, to my mind, what is worst is that not only does Haredi halachah create insane chumrot like this “death before kol ishah” nonsense, and not only does it pervert the halachah in Orthodox communities, but it blackens the name of halachah in the non-Orthodox world. Liberal Jews, especially those with limited or nonexistent halachic education see these actions, these pronouncements, and they hear them called “halachah,” and they believe them to be authentic examples of halachic jurisprudence! And, we can hardly be shocked to see, they then come to believe that halachah is crazy, full of reprehensible injustices, utterly unsuited to either life in the modern world or to Liberal Jewish observance. And I cannot blame them for thinking so, because Haredim claim the mantle of halachic authenticity, and we do nothing to dispute it.

But it must be disputed. People must be told, this is not what kosher halachah is-- it's not even worthy of being called halachah. Whether in matters of life and death, or whether in matters of who sits where on public transportation, this is not Jewish Law. This is Haredi insanity. And the two are not the same.

-Ami