Emor

This week's parsha, Emor (Leviticus 21:1-24:23), continues to detail the requirements incumbent on the priests (the sons of Aaron). It begins with regulations for priests' families and continues with regulations for sacred food and some criteria for sacrificial animals. From there it moves on to regulations for the Sabbath and Festivals, followed by regulations concerning the bread display of the Tabernacle. This description of holiness requirements is interrupted, however, at the end of the portion, which veers off to a story of a blasphemer, retaliation laws, and the blasphemer's punishment (death). In reading the parsha I wondered how to connect the story of the blasphemer to the rest of the text. I found the answer in words.

Emor (אֱמֹר) the title of the parsha, means "speak", as in "go speak to so and so about such and such". Words and speech are central to this portion, and to Jewish tradition as a whole. This is clear later in the portion with the story of the blasphemer, with its numerous references to speech and words, not just in the sense of a blasphemer saying bad words, but in the descriptive details surrounding the blasphemer (Leviticus 24:11):

יא וַיִּקֹּב בֶּן-הָאִשָּׁה הַיִּשְׂרְאֵלִית אֶת-הַשֵּׁם, וַיְקַלֵּל, וַיָּבִיאוּ אֹתוֹ, אֶל-מֹשֶׁה; וְשֵׁם אִמּוֹ שְׁלֹמִית בַּת-דִּבְרִי, לְמַטֵּה-דָן".
11 And the son of the Israelitish woman blasphemed the Name, and cursed; and they brought him unto Moses. And his mother's name was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan. "

As noted in The Torah: A Women's Commentary, Shelomith the daughter of Dibri is the only named woman in all of Leviticus. In her name there is the root sh-l-m," שְׁלֹמִ", the root for peace (shalom), or wholeness (shalem). She is the daughter of Dibri, whose root d-v-r "דִּבְרִ ", can mean thing (davar), or word (dibur). Indeed, looking at the meanings behind the names suggests that the blasphemer, who is not named, is antithetical to his upbringing- for his mother, wholeness or peace, came from the word. By blaspheming he instead took the word and used it for destruction.

We grow up hearing the saying "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me." This parsha says the opposite- that words are at least as powerful as actions, and can cause as much damage.

Jewish tradition takes words very seriously. Another example of this is the blessing said over food that does not fall into the four categories that have specific blessings:
ברוך אתה ה' א‑לוהינו מלך העולם, שהכל נהיה בדברו
Transliteration: Barukh ata Adonai Eloheinu Melekh ha‑olam, she‑hakol nih'ye bidvaro.
Translation: "Blessed are you, LORD, our God, King of the universe, through whose word everything comes into being." [emphasis added]

So while much of this parsha deals with issues of holiness and proper priestly procedure, underlying the portion is a message and reminder that our reality is very much built on words, and we have a concomitant duty to value how we speak and use our words. May we use our gift of speech to bring about wholeness and peace (shlemut, shalom).

Shabbat shalom,
Dara ;-)

Getting back into it

Shalom, bonjour, hello. It has been a long while! Over the past few months I have made the transition back to Ottawa from Jerusalem (returning home after a wonderful Jerusalem celebration of Purim in mid-March). Home is where the heart is- my love, my family, my reality. I only wish I could bring some of the wonderful friends that I made in Jerusalem along! Alas, we will have to take advantage of technology and frequent flyer miles!

By day I am a policy analyst working for the Canadian government, but I look forward to continuing to study and train for the rabbinate. My path might be somewhat long and even convoluted, but it will be interesting. This blog will continue to track the journey, through a mix of analyses of parshot hashavua (weekly torah portions), observations, anecdotes, and more.

L'hitraot, à la prochaine, until next time,

d ;-)

January 16th- parasha Shmot

This Shabbat, as President-elect Barack Obama prepares to take office, and we hope for peace in Eretz Israel, we begin the central story of the Jewish people with sefer Shmot- Exodus. Shmot opens with the children of Jacob becoming the people Israel enslaved in Egypt. Yet as quickly as chapter 2 we are introduced to Israel's saviour in the character of Moses. Moses is often referred to as the epitome of a leader, even with his speech impediment and outbursts of passion and impatience (which arguably prevent him from ultimately entering Eretz Yisrael). For me, what makes Moses such a compelling leader is his humanity. The Torah chronicles Moses' growth into leadership, enabling us to both connect with and learn from him.

In this parsha I am most struck by a set of events demonstrating Moses' leadership capability before God taps Moses as official saviour of Israel via a burning bush. In the second chapter of Exodus, verses 11 through 19 chronicle three encounters. In the first encounter Moses comes across an Egyptian smiting (מַכֶּה - could be beating or killing) a fellow Hebrew. Moses looks to make sure no one is around and then kills the Egyptian, hiding him in the sand. In the second encounter, the very next day, Moses comes upon two Hebrews fighting together. This time, in lieu of responding physically (as with the Egyptian), he asks the one who had committed the wrong (לָרָשָׁע) why he was hurting his fellow Hebrew (רֵעֶךָ) . The wrongdoer responds snidily, chiding "Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? Are you going to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?" Moses does not know how to react to this, and fearing for his safety he flees to Midian. There he has his third encounter. Sitting by a well Moses sees the daughters of Midian's priest being harassed by shepherds. Unlike in the first encounter, there is no mention of violence, and unlike the second encounter, there is no indication of indecision on Moses' part when challenged. Rather, the Torah reports that Moses saved the women from the shepherds (in the women's words), drew water for them and watered their flock. Later he takes one of the daughters, Zipporah, as his wife.

Late Israeli Biblical scholar Nechama Leibowitz (quoted in Etz Hayim- Torah and Commentary at p. 325) writes of how the three encounters demonstrate Moses' universal sense of justice: "Three times Moses interevenes on behalf of a weak person oppressed by a stronger one: first an Israelite beaten by an Egyptian, then an Israelite beaten by another Israelite, and finally the Midianite women harassed by the shepherds. Had we been told only of the first clash, we might have doubted the unselfishness of his motives. Perhaps he had been motivated by the sense of solidarity with his own people... Had we been faced with the second example, we might still have had our doubts. Perhaps he was revolted by the disgrace of witnessing internal strife among his own folk. Came the third clash, where both parties were outsiders... his sense of justice and fair play was exclusively involved." [emphasis added]

Certainly a universal sense of justice and fair play are key leadership attributes, but I see even more here. The three encounters show Moses growing and learning how to act and react in challenging situations. Moses first responds to injustice with violence and cover-up. The next day, though, he uses his voice instead- he challenges the Israelite's actions with words. At this point, though, he is not able to complete the conversation with persuasive communication. He fears what he hears from the Israelite and flees. Finally, in Midian, Moses seems to address conflict with success- he is able to fend off the shepherds without any indication of violence, and takes the further steps of caring for the Midianite women and their flock.

Moses, at this early stage, has displayed his capacity to 'stay alive through the dangers of leading' (the challenge raised in the book Leadership on the Line). He has shown his sense of justice, and also his ability to learn and cope with conflict. These leadership qualities indicate his readiness to take the helm of the Israelite people (despite his protestations to the contrary) when called to do so by God in the very next chapter. As Barack Obama prepares to take the helm of the United States, and world leaders work to resolve the current conflict in the Gaza strip, perhaps it would be worthwhile for all to open up parsha Shmot (along with Leadership on the Line !) and reflect on the models of leadership described therein.

Shabbat shalom,
Dara Lithwick

Time...

More than a month has passed since I have last posted here (sorry), and it is amazing what can happen in such a span of time. The first semester of HUC is over, and in just over half an hour I will be heading on a sherut to Ben Gurion Airport for a 1:00am flight to Toronto, and then on to M and home in Ottawa.

Three weeks ago I was preparing for another trip, albeit a much shorter one. I was preparing for a trip to Bethlehem through the Encounter program. Encounter is an "educational organization dedicated to providing Jewish Diaspora leaders from across the religious and political spectrum with exposure to Palestinian life." About 40 of us participated in this trip, and spent two days meeting with various Palestinians working for peace. We visited a school dedicated to peace, we walked around the separation wall dividing Bethlehem from Jerusalem, met with a UN worker, the deputy mayor of Bethlehem, a businessman, and community workers. We met with families and ate and danced with them. Many participants slept over at the houses of Palestinian hosts.

On the first day of the program I was asked to give a short dvar Torah, and this is roughly what I said:

"In a couple of days we will be celebrating Hanukkah. As noted by David R. Blumenthal, "The word 'Hanukkah' comes from the Hebrew word 'chinuch', meaning 'education'.

This week's Torah portion, Vayeshev, is full of dreams and intrigue- light and darkness, shadows and clarity.

Truth takes time.

This week's parsha begins with Jacob favouring Joseph, and Joseph sharing his dreams with his brothers, leading to the the story of Joseph's brothers' hatred towards him, a hatred that he himself would fuel by reporting to them his dreams of kingship over the family. After dreaming his first dream he tells his brothers "please listen"... Midrash Lekach Tov tells that Joseph approached his brothers to tell them of the dream but they refused to listen- he therefore had to implore them. Maybe they didn't want to listen because they didn't want to hear what he had to say, maybe because they knew what he'd say and thus didn't want to hear it. As noted by Rav David Silberg, people often hear only what they want to hear. We have a hard time accepting ideas that oppose previous assumptions and convictions. The brothers had written Joseph off for leadership and did not want to entertain what he had to say, so they tried to avoid him. We know how they were later proven wrong. The challenge is keeping our minds open to other views, to criticism and rebuke, to accept that we aren't always right and that we have much room to improve.

Challenges, difficult conversations and revelations abound throughout the rest of the parsha (Joseph is sold into slavery, then later is imprisoned and interprets dreams with very different outcomes for Pharoah's cupbearer and baker; in the meantime there is the challenging tale of Judah and Tamar). Joseph, for all that he goes through, keeps his chin up and ultimately does well- God is with him. He is an honest broker, a source of light among all the darkness around him. He does not give up- he sees that truth takes time, and he focuses on what he's able to do.

The British Reform siddur has a prayer for international understanding that speaks to the themes of education, light, and the ongoing pursuit of truth and justice (at p. 249):

Mekor Hashalom, Source of peace, be with those who guide the destinies of the world so that an end may come to boasting and vainglory, and the reign of arrogance dwindle in our time. Give them the courage to speak the truth and the humility to listen. Help us all to put the good of our fellow human beings above our own ambitions, and the truth which does not profit us above the lie which does. So may we stand upright, freed from the burden of fear and the weight of suspicion, learning to trust each other.

Help each one of us bring our own offering of understanding, and our own sacrifice for peace, so that we are at peace with ourselves and live in peace with those around us. Then in tranquility may we all go forward to build Your realm in the world, until the earth shall be filled with Your knowledge as the waters cover the sea." Amen.

Three weeks later war is raging now in the Gaza strip, though today there were signs of hope for a possible ceasefire. I pray that all is more quiet when I return.

More on Derech Eretz...

I am by my computer, on the phone with M.S., while watching a live press conference being held by the leaders of Canada's three (left of centre) opposition political parties: Stephane Dion, leader of the Liberal Party, the Official Opposition; Jack Layton, leader of the New Democratic Party; and Gilles Duceppe, leader of the separatist Bloc Quebecois. These leaders represent parties with very different outlooks and platforms, yet together they are representing a common front to fight the current economic crisis by making Parliament work. As an example of the differences that they have put aside, in the 1990s, when Quebec was threatening to secede from Canada, Stephane Dion was effectively tasked with ensuring national unity, while Gilles Duceppe was a leader in the push for Quebec to secede.

These leaders have lost confidence in the governing Conservative party, who, in their recent economic update, failed to address the many problems facing Canada's (and the world's) economy. Instead of staying in their partisan silos, they have banded together to offer an alternative to the Conservative party. Over the past week leading figures in all of the opposition parties have put aside their differences to offer a viable alternative to the Conservative party. This offer of a coalition government is a bold, and almost unprecedented, move. The last coalition government in Canada briefly existed some 91 years ago.

This morning I spoke at our shacharit service about the need to combine learning of Torah with Derech Eretz- acting properly, acting with decency. Whether or not the Liberals, NDP and Bloc succeed in creating a coalition government, I believe that the efforts of the parties are an example of Derech Eretz, putting aside politics to try to do what they believe is best for Canadians.

Here is the open letter to Canadians written by the leaders of the Liberal, New Democrat, and Bloc Quebecois parties:

Monday, December 1, 2008


To our fellow citizens,

Canada is facing a global economic crisis. Since the recent federal election, it has become clear that the government headed by Stephen Harper has no plan, no competence and, no will to effectively address this crisis. Therefore, the majority of Parliament has lost confidence in Mr. Harper’s government, and believes that the formation of a new Government that will effectively, prudently, promptly and competently address these critical economic times is necessary.

The contrast between the inaction of Mr. Harper’s government and the common action taken by all other Western democracies is striking. We cannot accept this.

A majority of Canadians and Quebecers voted for our parties on October 14, 2008. Our Members of Parliament make up 55 percent of the House of Commons.

In light of the critical situation facing our citizens, and the Harper government’s unwillingness and inability to address the crisis, we are resolved to support a new government that will address the interests of the people.

Today we respectfully inform the Governor General that, as soon as the appropriate opportunity arises, she should call on the Leader of the Official Opposition to form a new government, supported as set out in the accompanying accords by all three of our parties.


Respectfully,


Hon. Stéphane Dion
Leader, the Liberal Party of Canada


Hon. Jack Layton
Leader, the New Democratic Party of Canada

Gilles Duceppe
Leader, the Bloc Québécois

Derekh Eretz and Jacob’s Ladder (my drash on parashat Vayetzei)

Let’s be honest- Jacob, now running away from home to meet his destiny, is a nothing, a spoiled brat even. He has a lot to learn before he becomes Israel- father of our nation.

After Jacob runs away from home he has his first dream, one which, as we will see, provides him with a model of what he must become in order to be Israel:
וַיַּחֲלֹם, וְהִנֵּה סֻלָּם מֻצָּב אַרְצָה, וְרֹאשׁוֹ, מַגִּיעַ הַשָּׁמָיְמָה; וְהִנֵּה מַלְאֲכֵי אֱלֹהִים, עֹלִים וְיֹרְדִים בּוֹ. (12)
וְהִנֵּה יְהוָה נִצָּב עָלָיו, וַיֹּאמַר, אֲנִי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵי אַבְרָהָם אָבִיךָ, וֵאלֹהֵי יִצְחָק; הָאָרֶץ, אֲשֶׁר אַתָּה שֹׁכֵב עָלֶיהָ--לְךָ אֶתְּנֶנָּה, וּלְזַרְעֶךָ (13) .

Jacob’s dream begins with a vision of a sulam, a ladder with malachim ascending and descending on it. Only after this vision does God appear to Jacob to say that the land will be for his descendants, and that God will be with Jacob.

Why did Jacob have to dream of the sulam? Why did he need such a brilliant visual aid to understand God’s words, when God was able to speak to Abraham without any props? God could have just started talking to Jacob!

The ladder imagery must contain important messages for Jacob to learn in the course of his relationship with God. As the Talmud observes (Berakhot 55b), "A dream uninterpreted is a letter unread." What does the image of the sulam and the malachim reveal to Jacob?

First, as noted in ancient Midrash[1]: “This [sulam], or “ladder” serves as a bridge between heaven and earth upon which angels ascend and descend- thus indicating the dialogic nature of communication between the two realms.”

Second, “Malach”, translated there as “angel”, also means messenger. Rabbi Lawrence Kushner[2] takes this interpretation one step further, writing, “The angels did not reside in heaven at all. They lived on earth. They were ordinary human beings. And, like ordinary human beings, they shuttled back and forth between heaven and earth. The trick is to remember, after you descend, what you understood when you were high on the ladder.”

Aha! So we are the messengers traveling on the ladder, in a literal sense, between heaven and earth. From another angle, we can put Torah study in the place of heaven, and have Earth representing actions/deeds/mitzvoth/prayers, with the ladder as the bridge between them. Starting from the ground, from where we are right now, we actively reach up to God. This understanding reinforces the relationship between the study of Torah and the expression of what we learn through the way we act and live. We can imagine ourselves continuously climbing and descending, or going back and forth on, the ladder, enriching our lives and our surroundings by reinforcing our actions with prayer/learning and reinforcing our learning with prayer/action.

As noted by Chasidic Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman HaLevi Epstein of Cracow (1751-1823) in his commentary on parsha VaYeitzei:
“ ...Just as (Mishna Avot 2:5) states “An ignorant person cannot become a Hasid”, so too Torah knowledge alone cannot complete a person’s soul as seen in our Sages’ teaching (Eruvin 109b)- “Whoever says ‘There is nothing in life but the story of Torah’, this person has not acquired Torah.”[3]

Action alone, or learning alone, are insufficient.

This concept- that a combination of learning and doing is necessary to bring God into our lives and world- is a fundamental precept in Jewish tradition. It’s called “Torah im derekh eretz”:

In Pirkei Avot (ch. 3, verse 21), Rabbi Elazar Ben Azaryah says,
"Where there is no Torah there are no manners/proper conduct (derekh eretz); Where there are no manners/proper conduct (derekh eretz) there is no Torah. Without wisdom, there is no fear of God; without the fear of God there is no wisdom. Without insight there is no knowledge; without knowledge there is no insight. Without food there is no Torah; without Torah there is no food.”

The malachim on the sulam begin from the ground, going up. It is only by engaging in our world, where we start from, that we can ascend the ladder to God. By living mitzvoth through doing them, living with our derekh eretz, we reach up to God. As we climb this ladder we bring godliness down into the world with us- we share God in the world. By being messengers shuttling back and forth, informing our actions/mitzvot with knowledge and intention, we benefit as well. As noted by Reb Nachman of Bratslav, “Let us learn that the more we give, the more we have. Giving changes a person’s impulse to cruelty into kindness of heart. This is the chief service of giving.”[4]

Jacob, at this point in his life, has had limited life experience and questionable moral judgment. This dream of the sulam shows him the way of living that he will have to adopt, as Jacob and as Israel (representing the people Israel), to live a life of godliness and fulfillment as a messenger of light to the nations. Through the metaphor of the ladder, Jacob can understand that the more we strive to grow and climb, the more God comes down to live among us.

Sometimes it can be easy to get caught up in the theory of living, instead of in the practice of it, and learning how to live, living with derekh eretz, is not something acquired overnight. Jacob is only at the beginning of his quest, en route to becoming a messenger, a malach, of God.

Going back to my lawyer days, I remember somebody asking why it is that we practice law. We practice law because we never perfect it- we are always works in progress, combining experience and learning in order to try to reach the essence and share it. As educators, cantors and rabbis we model the possibility that all Jews serve as malachim between heaven and Earth- all works in progress, yet all capable of bringing TORAH TO DERECH ERETZ , of bringing light into the world.

[1] Torah: A Women’s Commentary, p.159-160
[2] God Was in This Place and I, I Did Not Know, p. 13
[3] Sefer MeOr VaShemesh (Perusho shel harav Kalonymus HaLevi Epstein), Parshat VaYetze (translated by Rabbi Moshe Silberstein).
[4] Quoted in British Reform Siddur, p. 598.

"Marriage is a Jewish Issue" by Rabbi Laura Geller

The entirety of the article below is reproduced from the Jewish Journal:

"November 19, 2008

Marriage is a Jewish issue

Parshat Chayei Sarah (Genesis 23:1-25:18)

By Rabbi Laura Geller

This week's Torah portion, Chayei Sarah, is the biblical equivalent of JDate. After Sarah's death, Abraham gets busy trying to find the right wife for his son, Isaac. He sends his servant, Eliezer, to Abraham's hometown to make the match. Eliezer prays that the right girl will show up at the well and that she will make herself known to him through her generosity, gentleness and beauty. And sure enough, everything unfolds the way it was supposed to, and Eliezer brings Rebecca home to Isaac.

As they approach on their camels, Rebecca sees Isaac off in the distance. The translation says: "And she alighted from her camel." But the Hebrew word can also mean: "She fell off her camel." I've always loved Rebecca for that -- just at the moment when you want to make the best impression, you trip. I can identify with that. Still, Isaac loved Rebecca from the moment he saw her.

A lot has changed since the biblical period about how we find a marriage partner. And our ideas about who might be an appropriate partner have changed, as well. But as we saw from the recent passage of Proposition 8, not everyone agrees.

Why is Proposition 8 a Jewish issue? After all, doesn't the Bible say, "One who lies with a male as one lies with a female is an abomination" (Leviticus 18:22)? If we read the Torah as fundamentalists do, this and other verses would indeed present a problem. (Should we really execute people for working on Shabbat?)

That's not how most Jews read the Torah. We read it through the lens of commentary and with the understanding that certain laws, which might have made sense in biblical society, are no longer relevant now.

As Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson wrote in "Gay and Lesbian Jews: A Teshuvah," "We have reviewed a range of rabbinic reasons given for opposing same-sex acts. We have concluded that homosexuality is not intrinsically unnatural ... destructive of family life, devoid of the possibility of children, or hedonistic. We are dealing, therefore, not with a previously considered and previously outlawed phenomena, but with a situation never before encountered in Jewish law. Modern homosexual love and stable homosexual couples are different in significant respects from anything known in Torah or rabbinic Judaism."

In other words, what the Torah proscribes has nothing to do with contemporary gay or lesbian relationships and therefore is irrelevant to the current discussion. What does matter are core values that emerge out of Jewish tradition, including the fundamental notion that all human beings are created in the image of God and mishpat ehat yihe'eh lachem, that law should be applied equally to all.

Proposition 8 is a Jewish issue because we know what it is to be victimized because we are different. We need to stand up and defend the civil and human rights of other minorities. And it is a Jewish issue because it is also about us.

Gays and lesbians are part of our family. They are our brothers and sisters, our sons and daughters, our cousins and nieces and nephews. Gay and lesbian families are in our synagogues, their children are in our day schools, our religious schools and our early childhood centers. They are part of our community. "They" are "us."

Reform Judaism has taken the lead in the Jewish community in supporting the civil and human rights of gays and lesbians. The Reform movement welcomed the first synagogue for gay and lesbian Jews into what is now the Union for Reform Judaism in 1974. The Reform movement began to ordain openly gay and lesbian rabbis in 1990, and, in 1996, the Reform movement went on record to "support the right of gay and lesbian couples to share fully and equally in the rights of civil marriage."

Thirteen years ago, I stood under a chuppah with my friends Rabbi Lisa Edwards and Tracy Moore. It was a powerful ceremony -- without a marriage license. They were and still are such fitting partners for each other, still in love after all these years. Last month I stood with them again under their chuppah, this time with speaker of the state Assembly, Karen Bass. This time with a marriage license.

When Bass signed the license and declared them married according to the laws of the state of California, the congregation burst into applause. It was a historic moment.

Now the status of that marriage is unclear. This is a Jewish issue. The right to marry is a Jewish issue because we believe that all human beings, male and female, gay and straight, are created in the image of God. The right to marry is a matter of civil rights; each of us has the right to choose a fitting partner for ourself and enjoy the same protection that the law provides to any married couple and their children.

Few of us meet our marriage partners at the well anymore. Our world has changed. But some things never change. God is present when two people commit their lives to each other and become one family. We need to continue the struggle for marriage equality, because it is a Jewish issue.

Rabbi Laura Geller is senior rabbi of Temple Emanuel of Beverly Hills, a Reform congregation."