Welcome to Elul - A time for reflection

The text below was written by Rabbi David Young. Thank you David for the creativity, time, and effort you put into this project each year. It adds meaning as we approach the Days of Awe.

The Hebrew month of Elul is the last month of the Jewish year. As such, it is considered a month of spiritual preparation for the High Holy Days. Special meditations are added to the daily service for some, known as S’lichot, or penitential prayers. (*The Saturday before Rosh Hashanah is also known as S’lichot, and it is used as a night of contemplation and study.) For several years, a group of Reform clergy and educators has collaborated on a series of Elul Thoughts, shared with our congregations in a daily email. 

It is with great honor and wonderful blessing that we once again bring Elul Thoughts to our congregations across the United States and Canada this year. We have been sending Elul Thoughts to our congregations since 2008 when I worked with Rabbi Alan Litwak at Temple Sinai in North Miami Beach, FL. This project was his brainchild then, and it has taken on a renewed life again and again as we connect with colleagues and friends who want to contribute. Every year we invite cantors, rabbis, and educators. Some years we invite congregants or teachers from other areas of expertise. This year a wide swath of invitations were sent, but only rabbis responded. So for the first time in many years we are able to present an all-rabbi Elul Thoughts for you.

This year’s Elul Thoughts include contributions from:

Rabbi Michael Birnholz, Temple Beth Shalom, Vero Beach, FL

Rabbi Erin Boxt, Temple Beth El, Knoxville, TN

Rabbi Alan Cook, Sinai Temple, Champaign, IL

Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker, Congregation Beth Israel, Colleyville, TX

Rabbi Ben David, Adath Emanu-El, Mt. Laurel, NJ

Rabbi Daniel Fink, Congregation Ahavath Beth Israel, Boise, ID

Rabbi Cassi Kail, Temple Beth El, San Pedro, CA

Rabbi Neal Katz, Congregation Beth El, Tyler, TX

Rabbi Brad Levenberg, Temple Sinai, Atlanta, GA

Rabbi Eric Linder, Congregation Children of Israel, Athens, GA

Rabbi Alan E. Litwak, Temple Sinai, North Miami Beach, FL

Rabbi Laurence Malinger, Temple Shalom, Aberdeen, NJ

Rabbi Harry Rosenfeld, Congregation Albert, Albuquerque, NM (ret)

Rabbi Andrew Rosenkranz, Temple Beth Torah, Wellington, FL

Rabbi Benjamin Sharff, The Reform Temple of Rockland, Upper Nyack, NY

Rabbi Simone Schicker, Temple B'nai Israel, Kalamazoo, MI

Rabbi Stephen Wise, Shaarei-Beth El Congregation, Oakville, ON, Canada

Rabbi David N. Young, Congregation B’nai Tzedek, Fountain Valley, CA

You can follow any of us on Facebook or Twitter.

If you have missed any of these daily emails or want to go back and remember something from earlier in Elul, feel free to read them all at https://tinyurl.com/elulthoughts.

Reflections On Tisha B'Av: A Moving Day Or A Day Of Moving Forward

For decades, I have had mixed feelings about Tisha B'Av. At camp it was a day we marked but not with fasting. At home it was a day ignored. In class it was a day to learn about and parse out what horrific events actually occurred that day and which were "assigned" to it. As a teen in Ramla, Israel it was one of the most moving Jewish experiences of my life.

My mixed feelings swarm around the destruction of the First Temple in 586 B.C.E, and the Second Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. While I certainly mourn the deaths of so many and lament the exile and yoke of slavery that fell upon so many others, a large part of me sees the upside. If we had not been exiled to Babylonia, we would not have redacted the Torah or created the synagogue as an alternative to the destroyed Temple in Jerusalem. These two consequences of the Babylonian's destruction of the First Temple and the Exile, set up our ability to survive and even thrive in the wake of the Roman destruction of the Temple centuries later.

The Roman destruction and exile created two realities that sustained us as a people and continue to do so now and into the future. First, the exile brought the fulfillment of the promise to Jacob that his descendants will burst forth over the face of the earth. There is no place on earth that Jewish feet have not trod. The exile, so far and wide, brought into Judaism a rich cultural diversity that could not have been achieved else wise. Yes, exile often brought suffering. But, as I learned from Leonard Fein z"l, the exile brought into Judaism a richness that we would otherwise never have known.

Second, the Roman destruction of the Second Temple brought an end to sacrificial service. As I have often put it: no longer do have to bring our cute, cuddly, lambs to slaughter. Prayer replaced sacrifice just as the synagogue replaced the Temple.

Maimonides expounded on this by pointing out that in essence, Judaism was forced to mature from killing animals to expressing our communal and personal thoughts and prayers directly to God. We did not disappear into the annals of history, as did so many other peoples. We evolved into a new iteration. We were stateless but with a closer connection to God and each other.

In a class through the Shalom Hartman Institute, my teacher, Rabbi Gordon Tucker, showed me a new way of looking at the existence and final destruction of the Temple.

The final construction of the Biblical Tabernacle included many, many curtains which divided it into various areas blocked off from each other and ultimately the outside world. Both Temples in Jerusalem followed a similar construction only substituting unhewn stones for the majority of curtains. But some of the curtains remained, especially between the inner and outer sanctum and between the inner sanctum and the Holy of Holies which represented, as it were, God's home on earth just as it had in the Tabernacle in the desert. Through the use of various texts, Rabbi Tucker shows that, regardless of intent, all these curtains and walls effectively separated the people from God. By destroying the Temple, the Romans allowed for the reestablishment of the people's direct connection with God, just as they had at Sinai. The difference being that unlike at Sinai, the people were no longer afraid of the intimacy of the connection.

Rabbi Tucker showed us how beautifully Leonard Cohen's "Lover, Lover, Lover" expresses this thought, especially in the fourth verse:

"I never never turned aside," he said, "I never walked away.
It was you who built the temple,
it was you who covered up my face."

(Click HERE to hear the whole song.)

As we come out of the Pandemic and begin to return to our synagogues, it is time to ask ourselves if our synagogues have replaced the ancient Temple as the curtain, the barrier, between us and God. If so, how do we remove the barrier and maintain our sense of community and peoplehood.

The Shabbat After The Insurrection - January 8, 2021

In Pirkei Avot 1:2 we read: Al shlosha d’varim haolam omeid. Al haTorah, al ha’avodah, v’al gemilut chasadim. The world stands on three things. Upon Torah, and upon worship and and upon acts of loving kindness. This Mishnah, this passage, has become an overused trope. It is used in the mission statements of hundreds of synagogues across America, including our own. We sing it to a simplistic melody without thinking about the import of the words. The overuse of this trope has stripped its meaning of any depth.

What we never or rarely read is just a few mishnayot later in 1:18. Al shlosha d’varim haolam omeid. Al hadin, v’al ha’emet, v’al hashalom. The world stands on three things. Upon justice, and upon the truth and upon peace. This Mishnah, in America, has been forgotten just at the moment when we need it most.

The insurrection, the rebellion, the seditious, traitorous invasion of our Capitol, called for and supported by our political leaders, whom we allow to be there, they are our political leaders, weighs heavily on me, many of you, and as it should, on every American. Seeing these traitors who adorned their bodies and clothing with Nazi symbols, anti-Semitic and racist slogans, carrying the battle flag of the Confederacy, the ultimate symbol of treason against America, still tears at my soul. How could any of this have happened? Because, I have allowed, you have allowed, we all have allowed the pillars of justice, truth and peace to be shattered. It feels as if our world is tumbling out of control.

The time has arrived for us to rebuild and shore up these most important pillars.

Justice: We need to move beyond just doing gemilut chasadim, acts of lovingkindness and build a society that is just. A just society is built to ensure that all have equal opportunity, that wrongdoers are punished to the same standard across the board, and the good have the opportunity to benefit from what is good for all. We need to challenge ourselves to work toward that world, and to hold our leaders, formal and informal, to the same standard to which we would hold ourselves, if not higher.

Truth: Parsing what is true and what is fiction has become harder. We lie easily. We believe lies even more easily. When the surest truths of science are called lies, how much easier it is to discount and disbelieve historic and current truths. We need to find the truth by using that most ancient, and often annoying, Jewish practice, questioning. We question and when we find the truth based on fact, test it again, then hold on to it, promote it, cherish it.

Peace: How many times have you heard me define peace as inner wholeness. When we are whole within ourselves, we can be at peace with ourselves. When we are at peace with ourselves we can be at peace with others. But, as we are taught by Maslow, unless our basic needs are met, we cannot find peace within ourselves. To ensure peace in the world, we have the obligation to ensure every human being has their most basic needs met and has the opportunity to strive for more. In other words, we need to create a world held up by the other two pillars, justice and truth.

This week, our American peace, our inner individual peace sustained blows that threaten to shatter us. Tonight’s service is designed to help us begin to heal, to rebuild our inner peace. There are no slides tonight. Just one video of our children lighting candles. I want us to see each other as we pray. So please turn on your cameras. I want us to feel the connection with each other letting the words and melodies calm our souls so we can find that Shalom on this Shabbat. Why then have the one video? Simple, what is more healing than seeing our young people carrying on our most positive traditions.

I want us to find rest and peace this Shabbat, rebuilding our inner strength to be able to heal our country and our world, for there is no harder work than to establish justice, truth and peace.

Yom Kippur Morning 5781 - Cancel Culture vs. Teshuvah

 I would like to personally thank the Albuquerque Journal and Dan Piraro, the author of the Bizarro comic, for giving me in yesterday’s paper the perfect opening to this morning’s sermon .

Joell, can you please share the comic please.

Thank you Joell. You can take it down now.

This is how I know I’m getting old. About two months ago, something popped up in my Facebook feed about Cancel Culture and I had to Google it to find out what it means (actually I use Duck Duck Go) . For those of you who still do not know, here is the definition from the Urban Dictionary: “A modern internet phenomenon where a person is ejected from influence or fame by questionable actions.”

In other words, someone does something, or says something, that crosses a line that is considered to be offensive and others call for a boycott of that person. Even if the person recognizes what s/he did was offensive and sincerely apologizes, they remain “cancelled” to many. I am not speaking here of acts that violate the law, but rather, legal acts that are deemed to be offensive. It is the most un-Jewish phenomenon, especially at this time of year.

Let me be clear. I am not saying Cancel Culture is anti-Semitic. I am saying that it violates the Jewish value of תשובה – repentance - as it does not allow for any consideration of sincerely repenting and change in behavior.

This is not a new phenomenon, although with the growth of technology, it has become more pervasive. In the past, Cancel Culture has involved, censorship, not tolerating flip-flopping, and dozens of other supposed sins.

Some examples. Growing up in the sixties and seventies, there were, and still are today, calls to remove various pieces of classical literature because in our times they are culturally insensitive. Often, these works accurately represent the values of their times. Back in the day, as it were, there were calls to remove the works of Mark Twain from my high school’s English curriculum. I remember my friends and I, then seniors in high school, working to keep the books in the curriculum. We believed, and I still do, that learning the values of the past, with an eye on the values of today, can teach us about how far we have come, how far we have yet to go.

Cancel Culture in its multiple forms has been a part of our politics throughout my life. Politicians whose positions have changed with time are vilified and cancelled. In presidential politics, both President Bush’s, Presidents Clinton and Obama, and innumerable candidates, most memorably John Kerry and John McCain, were labeled flip-flopper. I yearn for politicians who are open enough to the thinking of others, that they regularly reevaluate, and even change their positions. Today it is worse. Any politician perceived as being less than ideologically pure, is ostracized, cut off, Culture Cancelled.

If we were to do a true self-reflection during these Days of Awe, could any of us honestly say that we have not said or done anything that could get us cancelled? Of course not.

Cancel Culture eliminates the possibility of Teshuvah, personal or communal, and thus eliminates the need for this Day of Atonement.

The Rabbis recognized that emotional wounds run as deep, if not deeper than physical ones. The Talmud, as well as later Midrash and commentaries are replete with reinterpretations of stories about our Patriarchs and Matriarchs explaining how, contrary to the Biblical text, they did not emotional harm each other. From Sarah laughing at the possibility that Abraham could father a child at age 100, to trying to explain how Joseph really did not tattle on his brothers, the textual acrobatics boggle the mind.

In each of these reinterpretations, one finds the Rabbis leading us on a path to see that Teshuvah is possible, even if, as in the case of Jacob and Esau or Joseph and his brothers, it takes decades.

If, instead of quickly cancelling someone whose words or deeds offend us, we engage with the person and explain the emotional impact upon us, we open the possibility for repentance. We open the possibility of personal and societal growth for all.

Wrapped in our personal pain, we forget that emotions help set societal norms.  As soon as we share them, our emotions have a communal impact. Social media allows us to spread our emotional pain around the globe, raising awareness, and increasing the possibility for positive change and growth.

Imagine the society we could build if, instead of using our pain to cancel, we engage with each other, take the time to actually hear each other, and allow room for repentance, change and growth.

That is the message of this Day of Atonement, the call of these Days of Awe. Let us commit to using our pain not to cancel but to recognize the power of repentance and engage to bring positive growth and change to our world.

G’mar Chatimah Tovah

Yom Kippur Evening 5781 - Who Can Be A Member of Our Community

Some of you have wondered, and the bravest among you have asked; what am I going to talk about during my last High Holy Day sermons. As one person said to me: “It’s your last High Holy Days here. You can say whatever you want!” What are they going to do, fire you?  I smile at that because, as many of you have chastised me over the years, I always speak about whatever I want. This Yom Kippur, I would like to leave you with a part of my vision of the inclusiveness a Jewish community should embody.

Tomorrow, as we do every year, we will read: You stand this day, all of you, before the ETERNAL your God—your tribal heads, your elders and your officials, all the men of Israel, your children, your women, even the stranger within your camp, from woodchopper to water drawer.

One of the many reasons the early leaders of the Reform Movement chose  to read this passage on Yom Kippur morning is the inclusive definition of who is a part of the Jewish community. But, in the 19th Century, they could not envision how to include “the stranger within your camp” into the Jewish community. For them, it was a community made up solely of Jews who looked like them. But, this Torah text and others are clear, not only Jews are a part of the Jewish community, non-Jews are as well.

Our portion is crystal clear in its definition. Everyone, from the highest officials to those who have the least, regardless of gender or age, race or ethnicity who stand with the Jewish community, constitute the Jewish community.

Today, we are comfortable welcoming, the LGBTQ+ community and every racial, every ethnic group as members of Congregation Albert. We welcome into membership non-Jewish spouses and partners regardless of their religion. They can even choose to remain members of Congregation Albert after they, and their Jewish spouse/partner separate, or the Jewish partner dies. But, what of the non-Jew exploring Judaism with the potential of conversion? What of the non-Jew who comes to study with us, pray with us, congregate with us, who wants to be a part of our community but does not want to convert, who wants to be a part of our community. If you are on Zoom, look at the participant list, I guarantee that there are a significant number of non-Jews participating with us on this Erev Yom Kippur.

The question is not, who is a Jew, but who can be a part of our Jewish community and our congregation.

There are three definitions of membership in a community. 1) Memory, 2) Covenant, and 3) Holiness.

1)  Memory. We are united by a common meta-story, the Exodus from Egypt and revelation at Sinai. Every year we recount the tale of our transformation from slaves to free people and the forging of our community. We ignore that we were not alone. Others joined us as we crossed the Red Sea and chose to transform ourselves at Sinai. Exodus 12:48 specifically commands to include the stranger who lives among us: “as a citizen of the country.” A non-Jew, who lives as a part of the Jewish community is not Jewish, but, is a full part of the community.

This inclusiveness is reinforced in the first piece of Jewish liturgy found in Deuteronomy 26:11 and recited each year in the Passover Seder: “You shall rejoice in all the good that the ETERNAL your God has given to you and to your house, you the Levite and the stranger who lives with you.”

Logging into, and downloading the memory, is a conscious choice. There are Jews who choose to forget and separate themselves from the Jewish community, and non-Jews who choose to remember and cleave to us.

2)  Covenant. Torah also teaches that membership in the Covenant with God is porous. In each generation we have to choose to be a part of the covenant. Ritually we have four ceremonies for Jews to express that choice: Brit, entering the covenant at birth; Bar/Bat Mitzvah upon at age 13; Confirmation at the beginning of young adulthood; Conversion to Judaism for adults. The ritual of Conversion is for the non-Jew who wants to be Jewish. There is not now, nor has there ever been, a ritual or ceremony to admit a non-Jew to the Jewish community without converting. They were just welcomed.

3)  Holiness. Tomorrow afternoon we will read Leviticus 19, the holiness code from our Svihov scroll which survived the Shoah. Upon my arrival at Congregation Albert, I chose to have us read this passage from this scroll as a reminder to each of us that being holy means acting Godly, even when the rest of the world does not. The Holiness Code commands us to act in ways that are kind and benefit Jew and non-Jew alike. In this way we become holy as God is holy. Holiness is feeding the hungry, clothing the stranger, paying workers their earned wages, caring for those in our community, Jews or non-Jews, who cannot provide for themselves. We are called upon to love our fellow Jews, not always easy, and to love the non-Jews who choose to live among us.

Teens, and adults, love to point out to me that these laws are basic moral, ethical principles of living. They are not exclusively Jewish behaviors, non-Jews value them and do them too. Yes. That is the point.

Membership in the Jewish community is multidimensional. One can claim membership through Memory and/or Covenant and/or Holiness. One can be Jewish and be a part of the community. One can be non-Jewish and a part of the community.

Yet, even in this open, pluralistic vision of the Jewish community, there are boundaries in which every member of the Jewish community, Jew or non-Jew must fall within.

One cannot be a part of the Jewish community if s/he believes is a believer in another religion, believes in more than one God and/or believes the Messiah has come. These people can be our closest friends, yet, cannot be a part of our Jewish community. Our partnerships with the multitude of religious groups in Albuquerque attests to this. But they cannot be counted among those who dwell among us. But, many non-Jews fall within these boundaries and should be counted as members of our Jewish community, if they so desire.

Our By-laws state: “Any person of the Jewish faith or such person’s non-Jewish partner, eighteen years of age or older, who wishes to associate with the Congregation and accepts the responsibilities of membership will become a member on approval of such person’s membership by the Board of Trustees. In the event of the death or divorce of a Jewish member, the non-Jewish partner may continue his or her membership.”

We already allow non-Jews who have Jewish partners, even if they are members of another religion to become members and remain so as long as they want. We count among our members practicing Christians, Hindus, Buddhists and Muslims.

Even so, there are many non-Jews who fall within these boundaries, they do not believe in more than one God and that the Messiah has not yet come. are not married to Jews but want to be a part of our Congregation Albert. Why do we exclude them?

In the Galilee you can see the ruins of synagogues that date from the 1st Century BCE through the 2nd Century CE. On the surviving walls and columns you can see the names of the donors who contributed to sustaining those synagogues. Yes, the tradition of donor plaques dates to antiquity. Among those names, you will find a plethora of non-Jewish names. In those days, non-Jews who did not want to formally convert to Judaism were members of those shuls. When the Romans made associating with Jews and studying Judaism punishable by death, the practice stopped. Today, that threat no longer exists.

What if we were to begin a conversation about changing our membership criteria to read: “Any person of the Jewish faith, or who is not a practicing member of another faith, or is the spouse or partner of a Jewish member of the Congregation, who wishes to associate with the Congregation and accepts the responsibilities of membership will become a member on approval of such person’s membership by the Board of Trustees.”? I believe these non-Jews who, through memory, covenant, or holiness, belong to the Jewish community, would enhance our congregational family with their energy and talent. We currently have appropriate policies that certain lay positions can only be filled by Jews, for example President or the chair of the Religious Practices or School committees.

On page 328 of our Yom Kippur prayerbook, there is a quote from Isaiah 2:2-3, which has been in every Reform prayerbook since 1898.

וְהָיָ֣ה ׀ בְּאַחֲרִ֣ית הַיָּמִ֗ים נָכ֨וֹן יִֽהְיֶ֜ה הַ֤ר בֵּית־יְהוָה֙ בְּרֹ֣אשׁ הֶהָרִ֔ים וְנִשָּׂ֖א מִגְּבָע֑וֹת וְנָהֲר֥וּ אֵלָ֖יו כָּל־הַגּוֹיִֽם׃ וְֽהָלְכ֞וּ עַמִּ֣ים רַבִּ֗ים וְאָמְרוּ֙ לְכ֣וּ ׀ וְנַעֲלֶ֣ה אֶל־הַר־יְהוָ֗ה אֶל־בֵּית֙ אֱלֹהֵ֣י יַעֲקֹ֔ב וְיֹרֵ֙נוּ֙ מִדְּרָכָ֔יו וְנֵלְכָ֖ה בְּאֹרְחֹתָ֑יו...׃

“It shall come to pass, in the fullness of time, that the mountain of the House of God shall be established as the highest mountain, and raised above the hills; and all nations shall flow to it. Then many peoples shall say: Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Eternal, to the House of the God of Jacob. And they shall say: Teach us Your ways, that we may walk in Your paths.”

It is time for us to open our doors to anyone who is not a practicing member of another faith who wishes to join us.

Only then do we fulfill the words of tomorrow morning’s Torah Portion, the challenge at Sinai, and the prophecy of Isaiah.

G’mar Chatimah Tovah