Zealots and Tisha B'Av

In the middle of the Talmud tractate Gittin there is a long stretch of stories about the destruction of the Second Temple and the fall of Jerusalem on the 9th day of Av in 70 CE.

 One of those stories begins with these words:

...הֲווֹ בְּהוּ הָנְהוּ בִּרְיוֹנֵי

There were Zealots among the people of Jerusalem… (Gittin 56a)

Who were these Zealots? In the context of the stories in the Talmud, they were extremists who were so fanatical in their opposition to the Romans and to any Jew who disagreed with them that they would resort to violence and even murder. More on them in a moment.

In the meantime, what can we say about this word בִּרְיוֹנֵי / biryonei / “zealot”? The Klein Dictionary of Rabbinic Hebrew (1987) is blunt in its translation: “terrorist, bully, hooligan.” It says that the etymology of this word is obscure; it may be related to the Akkadian root barānū, meaning “violent, impertinent, rebellious.” (The old-school Jastrow dictionary of the Talmud suggests “rebel” or “castle guard”, losing the intimation of violence that the author is surely suggesting.)

Whatever the origin of the word, there is no mitigating that the Talmud holds these villainous, murderous Jews accountable for the desperation and ultimately the destruction of the city.

Yes, the Talmud speaks of fellow Jews in precisely this language, when necessary.

After introducing the Zealots, the story unfolds. The war with the Romans had been building since the year 66 CE. The people of Jerusalem—as well as Jews who had fled from outlying villages—sequestered themselves behind the city walls. The Roman onslaught was temporarily held at bay. And, the Talmud tells us, there were enough storehouses of food and cisterns filled with water to sustain the Jerusalemites for at least twenty-one years to come!

That is, until the biryonim / Zealots assert themselves.

We learn that there were a variety of political opinions among the refugees in Jerusalem at that time. Some wanted to fight; others wanted to appease the Romans; others thought it might be possible to work out terms of a compromise. The Zealots, being zealots, demanded adherence to their armed revolt—and would not tolerate dissent. The Rabbis counseled patience (so we see where the editors of the Talmud come out in this debate), and Zealots revolted:

.קָמוּ קְלֹנְהוּ לְהָנְהוּ אַמְבָּרֵי דְּחִיטֵּי וּשְׂעָרֵי, וַהֲוָה כַּפְנָא 

[In order to force the residents of the city to engage in battle],
the Zealots rose up and burned down the storehouses of wheat and barley,
and a famine ensued. (Gittin 56a)

They burn the 21-year supply of food that had been secured for the people’s survival! Because that, too, is what Zealots do: They are so certain of the righteousness of their cause, it doesn’t matter if there are brutal shortcuts that need to be taken to strong-arm or threaten people to their side. It doesn’t matter if there is death and destruction in the short term; all that matters the ultimate adherence to the cause. Violence for them is a necessary tool towards the ultimate ends—and it doesn’t matter who suffers.

The Talmud makes its anti-Zealot position perfectly clear. Immediately after the Zealots burn down the storehouses, we’re told a series of tragic stories about individuals who suffer horribly and die as a result of the desperate situation the Zealots have triggered. One thing leads to another—a tragic chain of events—that ultimately leads to the destruction of the Temple, the devastation of Jerusalem, and the Exile of the Shekhinah, G-d’s Intimate Presence.

This is what we mourn annually on Tisha B’Av.

Here's one more warning from the Talmud. As Jerusalem was in flames, the great Rabbinic leader, Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai, sought to save the city. He approached Abba Sikkara, the leader of the band of “dagger men” among the Zealots, asking Abba Sikkara to stop the madness:

.שְׁלַח לֵיהּ: תָּא בְּצִינְעָא לְגַבַּאי. אֲתָא.
?אֲמַר לֵיהּ: עַד אֵימַת עָבְדִיתוּ הָכִי, וְקָטְלִיתוּ לֵיהּ לְעָלְמָא בְּכַפְנָא
!אֲמַר לֵיהּ: מַאי אֶיעֱבֵיד, דְּאִי אָמֵינָא לְהוּ מִידֵּי קָטְלוּ לִי
.אֲמַר לֵיהּ: חֲזִי לִי תַּקַּנְתָּא לְדִידִי דְּאֶיפּוֹק, אֶפְשָׁר דְּהָוֵי הַצָּלָה פּוּרְתָּא

Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai sent a message to Abba Sikkara: Come to me in secret.

He came, and Rabban Yochanan said to him, “How long will you keep doing this, killing everyone through starvation?”

Abba Sikkara replied, “What can I do? If I say something to them [my Zealot followers], they’ll kill me.”

Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai said to him, “Find a way for me to get out of the city. Maybe there can still be some small salvation…” (Gittin 56a)

This is astonishing, if not surprising. The leader of the Zealots in Jerusalem knows things are out of control and that his followers have gone too far. But he’s passed the point of no return: by empowering his violent followers, he’s placed himself at risk. If he steps back from the brink, he knows they will turn their violence back on him.

Yes, I’m thinking about the political situation in Israel. (How could I not be thinking of it?) Today we’re seeing the devastation of what happens when Zealots—ultra-nationalist extremists coupled with the ultra-religious political parties—are permitted to dictate their terms to the majority of the nation. Such is the nature of coalition politics: the radical fringe is allowed to set the agenda—and they are willing to sacrifice the well-being of the rest of the country that dares to oppose their agenda.

In the days of the Talmud, they burned the storehouses of food—to force the people’s hand. The result led to the maw of the Roman legions and the destruction of Jerusalem.

Today, they will undermine the very foundations of Israel’s democracy, placing the economy, civil liberties, and the very promise of the “Start-Up Nation” at risk. I do not believe Jerusalem will be destroyed, but there are plenty of people this Tisha B’Av who are entertaining that very thought.

Tisha B’Av will have a profound and shocking resonance this year. Clearly, there are Zealots unleashed in Jerusalem. The extent of their destruction is yet to be known—a forceful, fully awake citizenry is determined not to allow them to burn down the country. The importance of our voices can’t be overstated.

There will be much to mourn this year on Tisha B’Av, and many lessons for our own time. May the reflections of this season help us to turn back from the brink of disaster, and may we save ourselves from the Zealots in our midst.

Tisha B’Av begins on Wednesday evening, July 26.
All are welcome to join me of an online study session on its themes on Thursday, July 27,
at 12:00 noon Eastern time. Register here to receive the Zoom link and Passcode.

Jerusalem's Past and Present (A Fast Day in the Eternal City)

Shalom from Jerusalem.

 Today (Thursday) is the minor fast day of 17 Tammuz, a date which has a special resonance in this place and time. 17 Tammuz ushers in the three-week period leading up to the Fast of Tisha B’Av, which commemorates the Exile—from Jerusalem, from G-d, and from one another.

In truth, a great many Jews don’t observe the so-called “minor fasts” that are sprinkled throughout the Hebrew calendar. These days mark ancient calamities and, frankly, Jewish history has enough other tragedies to fill the entire year. Personally, when I’m in the U.S., I don’t typically fast on this day.

But Jerusalem does twisty things to my soul. When I’m in Jerusalem in the summer, these Three Weeks pack a lot of spiritual resonance for me. That’s what I’d like to share with you here.

According to the Mishnah, five calamities befell the Jewish people on this date in antiquity—events which serve as an overture to the dark dirge of Tisha B’Av:

חֲמִשָּׁה דְבָרִים אֵרְעוּ אֶת אֲבוֹתֵינוּ בְּשִׁבְעָה עָשָׂר בְּתַמּוּז וַחֲמִשָּׁה בְּתִשְׁעָה בְאָב
,בְּשִׁבְעָה עָשָׂר בְּתַמּוּז נִשְׁתַּבְּרוּ הַלּוּחוֹת
,וּבָטַל הַתָּמִיד
,וְהֻבְקְעָה הָעִיר
,וְשָׂרַף אַפּוֹסְטֹמוֹס אֶת הַתּוֹרָה
.הֶעֱמִיד צֶלֶם בַּהֵיכָל

 On the 17th Day of Tammuz:
1.     The Tablets were shattered by Moses [when he saw the Israelites had made the Golden Calf];
2.     The daily offering in the Temple was cancelled [by the Romans in the buildup to the Temple’s destruction];
3.     Jerusalem’s walls were breached [by the Roman legions];
4.     The Roman general Apostomos publicly burned a Torah scroll;
5.     An idol was place in the Sanctuary.

—Mishnah, Ta’anit 4:6

Each of these events is noteworthy as the launch-pad for deeper tragedies for the Jews, several of which took place three weeks later on the 9th of Av.

But here I’d like to focus on #1: The Rabbis consider this to be the date that Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the tablets in his arms, saw the Golden Calf and the Israelites dancing around it, and smashed the stones with the Ten Commandments to pieces.

Of the five items listed in the Mishnah, this one is an anomaly. Most of the events in this list occur later in history, at the end of the Second Temple period when Rabbinic Judaism was emerging. But #1, strangely, is a throwback to the era of Moses and the Torah.

Why would the Rabbis of the Mishnah link their recent tragedies—from which they were still reeling—to Moses’s story from the distant past?

The Torah relates that when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the Tablets of the Law in his arms, he was stunned to see the Israelites cavorting with the idol that they had compelled Aaron to make:

וַֽיְהִ֗י כַּאֲשֶׁ֤ר קָרַב֙ אֶל־הַֽמַּחֲנֶ֔ה וַיַּ֥רְא אֶת־הָעֵ֖גֶל וּמְחֹלֹ֑ת וַיִּֽחַר־אַ֣ף מֹשֶׁ֗ה
וַיַּשְׁלֵ֤ךְ מִיָּדָו֙ אֶת־הַלֻּחֹ֔ת וַיְשַׁבֵּ֥ר אֹתָ֖ם תַּ֥חַת הָהָֽר׃  

As soon as Moses came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing,
he became enraged; and he hurled the tablets from his hands and
shattered them at the foot of the mountain. (Exodus 32:19)

 
This cries out for interpretation. Even though we can understand Moses’s anguish, we must ask: How could Moses smash the Tablets? These were the words of G-d, inscribed by the finger of G-d and infused with holiness! It’s hard to imagine that, even in a fit of rage, Moses would treat the Tablets with disgust. (Think of our own internal reflexes, if a Torah scroll totters in our presence, to leap and make sure it doesn’t fall to the ground.) How could Moses do such a thing?

There are many commentaries on this, but here is my favorite: Moses didn’t carry the Tablets—the Tablets carried him. After all, Moses was an eighty-year-old man at this point in the story. Are we to imagine that he lugged weighty stone tablets  from the mountain peak down to the base camp all by himself?!

No, says the Midrash: the letters—the writing of G-d—made the stones light as a feather. Their inherent holiness carried Moses along with the Tablets.

When those very letters saw the people cavorting with their idol, the letters peeled off the tablets and fled back to their divine Source. They had to: Holiness and the worship of gold don’t mix.

And with the letters gone from the tablets, suddenly Moses was holding the full weight of the stones. He didn’t exactly smash the tablets; it’s more like he lunged forward due to their new-found enormous weight and he couldn’t hold them anymore. They fell to the earth and shattered. (This midrash is found in Pirkei d’Rabbi Eliezer Chapter 45.)

It’s a good story, but there’s a deeper lesson going on here.

This midrash maintains that when people behave obscenely, then the Shekhinah, G-d’s intimate Presence, flees. So do her accoutrements, such as the letters on the tablets. Holiness can only blossom in the fertile soil of ethical living.

And that brings us right back to Jerusalem. The Second Temple, the Talmud teaches, was destroyed because even though the people followed the letter of the law, they treated one another with senseless hatred (sinnat chinam), and because no one—not the political leaders, nor the Rabbis, nor the Jews of the community—would stand up and counteract the hate. So the spirit flew back to G-d, and the Temple imploded. Because holiness can’t abide in the idolatrous atmosphere of hate.

The Rabbis saw the idolatry of the Golden Calf as the prelude to later apostasies in history: namely, when human hatred was so ever-present that people couldn’t see the Image of G-d in their neighbor. And they treated one another accordingly, leading to tragedy and Exile.

Jerusalem 2023. The city is as sublime as ever—it’s my favorite city in the world. The history, grandeur, and spiritual power of this place touch me as much as ever. But there is a weight that is evident in Jerusalem, too. Not far from the surface—the ancient explosiveness is still there.

There are deep tensions permeating Israeli society right now. Monstrous zealots and their enablers are running the government and given unprecedented power and authority. The West Bank is seething with violence—including the violence of Jewish radicals running amok, in tit-for-tat retribution with Palestinian extremists, burning vehicles and property. The very ideals of democracy are under attack.

Fortunately, there is also a huge swath of Israeli society that is determined not to allow the Zealots to bring down all that we’ve built. And so on Saturday night—as they have for the past six months—tens of thousands of demonstrators will take to the Israeli streets again, carrying Israeli flags and singing “Hatikvah.” This is no extremist gathering; it’s a patriotic display against zealotry and assaults on Israel’s democratic institutions, a demand to return to the ethical first principles of Zionism and Judaism.

As I’ve written before, the most pro-Israel stance that we can take today is to support these pro-democracy protests around Israel and America.

Today I’ll be fasting, in remembrance of how Jerusalem was lost 2,000 years ago, and how hatred, violence, and cruelty drive the Shekhinah into Exile. And then on Saturday I’ll be with the demonstrators, to show that we’ve learned the lessons of our living past. For the sake of Jerusalem: because G-d help us all if the Shekhinah is forced to flee from this place once again.

Photo: Arch of Titus, Rome; depicting the plundering of the Jerusalem Temple by the Roman army in 70 CE (NG)

Against Zealots: The Meaning of Tisha B'Av in 2022

Last month, a young man from Las Vegas celebrated a Jewish rite of passage that countless others have performed over the years: After months of preparation, he traveled to Israel to become a Bar Mitzvah. Like so many other Jewish 13 year-olds, his family arranged a ceremony that culminated with chanting from the Torah at the Kotel Ha-Ma’aravi, the Western Wall.

Ultimately, Tisha B’Av is about hope. But it’s hope born from shared experience and loss, from realizing the danger of violent zealotry left unchecked. It’s hope that comes from a recognition that a society does have the ability to change its direction, and share responsibility for its destructive patterns.

The celebration took place at the space that was created by the Israeli government after years of tireless efforts by the non-Orthodox Jewish movements. Set alongside the traditional Western Wall plaza, the space beneath Robinson’s Arch was carved out for egalitarian Jewish worship.

But this seemingly innocuous event was a flashpoint for radical Jewish elements of the far right. Dozens of Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) zealots converged on Seth Mann’s bar mitzvah ceremony, blaring airhorns and screaming vulgar epithets to disrupt the service. They howled that Sam and his guests were “animals,” “Christians,” and—wait for it—“Nazis.” They violently seized the siddurim from which Sam’s family were praying—the Jewish prayerbooks containing the sacred name of G-d—and ripped them to shreds.

And the ineffectual Israeli police stood by, silently and uselessly and refusing to intervene.

Tragically, this scene was predictable. It happened again last week. A teen from Seattle, Lucia da Silva, went to the women’s section of the Wall to celebrate becoming a bat mitzvah. She and her family and guests were met by 100 Haredi thugs who shrieked, blew whistles, and screamed obscenities. Again, the police, as well as the security hired by the Western Wall Heritage Foundation which controls the site, did nothing.

The mindset of the Zealots allows for no alternative expressions of Judaism. Women are forbidden from leading ritual; men and women praying together are heretics. And for those who are threatened by egalitarian expressions of Judaism (which the large majority of American Jews embrace), no expression of opposition, it seems, is beyond the pale. After all, their rabbis condone it.

The time and place of these disasters couldn’t be more painfully ironic: At the remains of the Beit HaMikdash, on the cusp of our most solemn season.

The 9th of Av is the saddest day in the Jewish calendar. The Rabbis maintained that that on this very date both Temples in Jerusalem were destroyed, six hundred years apart: the First by the Babylonians in 586 BCE and the Second by the Romans in 70 CE. Each time the Temple was destroyed, it marked Exile from Jerusalem and a period of political powerlessness, when Jewish communities were forced to live under the authority of others.The Kotel and the contemporary excavations around it are all that remain.

The Rabbis sought to give these historical calamities a spiritual dimension. How could it be, they pondered, that a people who has a covenant with G-d could find themselves in a such a dire and shattered space?

Their answer was not a cosmic one, but an utterly human one. שִׂנְאַת חִנָּם / sinnat chinam they explained: senseless hatred for one another:

לְלַמֶּדְךָ שֶׁשְּׁקוּלָה שִׂנְאַת חִנָּם כְּנֶגֶד שָׁלֹשׁ עֲבֵירוֹת
עֲבוֹדָה זָרָה, גִּלּוּי עֲרָיוֹת, וּשְׁפִיכוּת דָּמִים

This should teach you that sinnat chinam is equal in weight to three other sins:
idol worship, illicit sexual acts, and shedding blood. (Talmud, Yoma 9b)

How burning the irony, how painful the awareness, that today, more than ever, the Western Wall has become the focal point of the hate that percolates within the Jewish world. The snarling faces of the opponents at Lucia’s bat mitzvah and Seth’s bar mitzvah—and the hands that shredded the words of the siddurim—couldn’t be more visceral examples of this.

All this in the days leading up to Tisha B’Av.

I have no doubt in my mind that if the authorities refuse to take a stand, there is a disaster in the making. It is clear to me that the hatred exposed by the most extremist elements of Israeli society is as vicious as it was in the days leading up to the destruction of the Second Temple, when the moral and communal leaders of the community also failed to take a stand against Zealots.

Have we not learned any of the lessons of any of the Tisha B’Avs of our lifetime? The essential message of Tisha B’Av is: Hate kills; unchecked, it inevitably wreaks destruction and forces the Shekhinah into exile.

Ultimately, Tisha B’Av is about hope. But it’s hope born from shared experience and loss, from realizing the danger of violent zealotry left unchecked. It’s hope that comes from a recognition that a society does have the ability to change its direction, and share responsibility for its destructive patterns.

How should we respond this Tisha B’Av? In four ways:

(1) Fast and pray with special intensity, for the religious imperative of the day is more important than ever.

(2) Support those who are in the trenches of the work for religious freedom in Israel, including Hiddush—For Religious Freedom and Equality, the Israel Religious Action Center, ARZA, Women of the Wall, and the local communities and congregations of the Israel Movement for Reform and Progressive Judaism and the Masorti movement.

(3) Demand that the Jewish Federations (CJP here in Massachusetts), AIPAC, and other organizations that purport to be big-tent Jewish or Zionist organizations take a firm stand on this issue, which threatens Jewish unity and Israeli security.

(4) Rav Kook taught that the only true antidote for sinnat chinam/senseless hatred is ahavat chinam/senseless love. Not really “senseless,” of course; but loving other people precisely because of every person’s inherent value, having been made in the Image of G-d. Be part of the solution; live the opposite of hate.

We’ll need to have Tisha B’Av again this year. Let’s pray that one of these years we can get it right.

The Tisha B’Av fast in 2022 is Sunday, August 7, delayed one day (to the 10th of Av) because the fast cannot fall on Shabbat.

A Tree with Roots will be hosting a special online Tisha B’Av study at 11:00 am on Sunday. All are welcome: Register here to receive the Zoom link.

An Antidote to Cynicism

Book Review: Dreams Never Dreamed, by Kalman Samuels (Toby Press, 2020)

We live in strange and cynical times. It’s an era of discord and polarization, on the precipice of what will be the nastiest, most divisive political season in American history, exacerbated by the centrifuge that is social media. It’s difficult to escape, but we should do our best to protect ourselves: Cynicism, after all, is spiritual poison.

The antidote to cynicism arrived in my mailbox in the form of Dreams Never Dreamed, a memoir by Kalman Samuels, the founder of Shalva, the Israel Association for the Care and Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities. It looks like a generic feel-good memoir, and to be honest, I was unprepared for how deeply and profoundly I was moved by the story of the Samuels family.

The book works on a variety of levels. It is an Erin Brockovich-style saga of perseverance against entrenched and moneyed bureaucracies. It is also the story of a husband and wife, and a father and son. And it is the diary of one man’s spiritual journey and faith.

Kalman Samuels was born Kerry Samuels, raised in Vancouver in a normative suburban Jewish lifestyle. He was a jock, an inquisitive pupil, and a student leader. In young adulthood, he traveled to Israel, where his intellectual curiosity and openness brought him into the orbit of baal teshuvah-Jewish outreach. Incrementally he left the promise of university life behind for the life of a full-time Talmud student. No doubt that some members of his former circles were dismayed. But part of the sweetness of this book is that, unlike other memoirs of people who embrace haredi (ultra-Orthodox) Judaism, Kalman’s writing is open and affectionate about his youth. He doesn’t seem to have any regret or resentment about his upbringing; in fact, his teenage skills as a golfer, for instance, will help build important bridges much later in his life. Like I said, there is no cynicism to be found here.

Given the remarkable experiences that befall Kalman throughout the years, it’s hard not to be drawn into his faith, and to sense that something behind the scenes is pointing the way for him. Time and time again, as he becomes one of Israel’s leading advocates for disabled children and their families, an angel seems to lift him over yet another insurmountable obstacle. I kept thinking of the biblical Joseph, who constantly reminds others that his successes are not his own, but attributable to G-d whose hand is hidden behind the scenes.

It is also to Kalman’s great credit as a writer that he never sermonizes and these religious details are never heavy-handed. Nothing about the book is conversionary. He simply shares the elements of his deep faith that are germane to the astounding story he has to tell. That is refreshing, too.

Kalman and his wife Malki began to build their family in Israel in the mid-1970s. In autumn 1977, their one year-old son Yossi received a routine DPT (diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus) vaccination that all babies receive. And that is the moment the family’s life changed. Later they would discover that the pertussis element of that batch of vaccinations was corrupted. Soon their sweet and alert boy would begin having seizures, and he was becoming blind. By the time he was three years old, they realized he had become deaf as well.

Yossi Samuels eventually would become known as the “Helen Keller of Israel.”

For Kalman and Malki, Yossi’s disabilities  launched a years-long battle in the courts against those who negligently—and ruthlessly—permitted the faulty vaccines to be distributed to Israeli families. Entrenched corporate forces and the Kafkaesque Israeli health system denied culpability at every turn. Kalman tells the story of his family’s pursuit of accountability in direct and compelling terms. The setbacks are excruciating. The denouement, when it comes, is exhilarating. 

Yossi Samuels and Shoshana Weinstock, in an image from the book.

The emotional center of the book is Yossi’s emergence into the world. Just as Helen Keller had a teacher, Annie Sullivan, whose painstaking efforts finally broke into her world, Yossi had a teacher named Shoshana Weinstock. Shoshana does the work of teaching Yossi by fingerspelling letters into the palm of his hand. Here is the moment of breakthrough:

In the course of one such lesson, Shoshana suddenly appeared at our house with Yossi, knocking loudly at our door, breathless with excitement. “He got it! He got it!” she cried. “His life has changed forever!”

Malki and I had no idea what she was talking about. We looked at his hands to see what he had “got.” “No! No!” Shoshana shouted. “He got it! He understands that I’m signing letters in his palm. His entire world has just opened.”
…
“We were sitting at the table in my house and I was fingerspelling the five symbols that spell the word ‘table’ [shulchan in Hebrew] into the palm of his hand, while his other hand rested on the table.” She continued excitedly, “I have done this for the past few lessons but Yossi didn’t respond. Today,” she said, “a smile suddenly lit up his face and he began to touch the table deliberately, and we both knew that he’d understood I was spelling shulchan. We did it over and over and he smiled again and again, touching the table every time. He has a new life. I can teach him all twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet and give him language.”

We were all sobbing as Shoshana began to demonstrate on the palms of Yossi’s sister and brothers how to spell shulchan and how to sign the other letters. She told them: “You, too, are going to learn the letters, and you’ll at last be able to speak to your brother.” (p.94-95)

Excuse me for a moment, I have something in my eye.

Yossi’s widening horizons and development into a passionate, active young man is thrilling, to say the least. Just as inspiring, however, is Malki Samuels’s relentless vision. She is the catalyst behind Shalva. She knows firsthand how caring for a disabled child can be physically and spiritually exhausting for an entire family. The original vision was to create a center for children with disabilities that would provide love, care, and growth—and which would give parents a much needed respite, to focus attention on the rest of their families, or to reenergize themselves. These are lessons that could only come from parents who have experienced the challenges of raising disabled children themselves.

Shalva opens in the apartment building next door to the Samuels’ home. But this book is really about Shalva’s exponential growth, thanks to two factors: (1) Malki’s crystal-clear vision for what disabled children and their families need—which is not always in sync with what “the experts” believe; and (2) Kalman’s indefatigable, serendipitous, and often comic ability to make things happen or to raise the necessary funds. You root for them, even as you are certain that their efforts will be successful. (As Joseph would remind us, “Not me! But G-d…”)

The final battle is to find Shalva’s permanent home in central Jerusalem, on a vast campus with an amphitheater, public café, and an enormous array of amenities for the development or simple of joy of the children and their families. Shalva is even more than that: It’s a portal that welcomes visitors to Jerusalem as they enter the city from the west. For Jerusalem is not meant to (merely) be a place of politics and business. It is also supposed to be a gateway to more supernal dimensions, and that gateway is channeled through chesed / compassion and love. Do go visit the Shalva campus, it’s an essential part of understanding what Jerusalem is about.

And if you’re still not convinced, spend a little time with the astonishing Shalva Band. You’ll come around.

I got to know Kalman back in the 1990s, during my summers in Israel with Danny Siegel. Indeed, a chapter about Yossi and Shoshana is included in Radiance, the new anthology of Danny’s writing that I edited. Kalman’s book fills in lots of the gaps that I didn’t know and brings his story to a remarkable and heady fulfillment.

If you’re looking for a little inspiration—never maudlin nor cliched, but honest, touching and often very funny—read Kalman’s joyful, uplifting book. 

Quite simply, it’s the antidote to cynicism.

Borrowed Dresses: A Thought about Tu B'Av, the Festival of Love

Tu B’Av is a return to normalcy: Just six days after the Tisha B’Av fast that marks the destruction that senseless hate can wreak, Tu B’Av (the fifteenth of the month of Av) is a day devoted to love.

According to the Mishnah, Israel in antiquity had a minor summer festival when young women would dance in the fields, inviting young men to court them:

Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel said:

There were no festivals more joyful for Israel than the 15th of Av and the Day of Atonement, for on [Tu B’Av] the maidens of Jerusalem would go out in borrowed white garments – borrowed, so not to shame anyone who didn’t have a garment of her own. Each of the garments required previous ritual immersion. And the maidens of Jerusalem would go out and dance in the vineyards.

 This is what they would say: “Young man! Pay close attention and see whom you are about to choose. Don’t be seduced by beauty, but pay heed to a virtuous family.” After all, “Grace is deceptive and beauty is illusory, but a woman who fears God is to be praised” (Prov. 31:30)…  
                         Mishnah Ta’anit 4:8

אָמַר רַבָּן שִׁמְעוֹן בֶּן גַּמְלִיאֵל, לֹא הָיוּ יָמִים טוֹבִים לְיִשְׂרָאֵל כַּחֲמִשָּׁה עָשָׂר בְּאָב וּכְיוֹם הַכִּפּוּרִים, שֶׁבָּהֶן בְּנוֹת יְרוּשָׁלַיִם יוֹצְאוֹת בִּכְלֵי לָבָן שְׁאוּלִין, שֶׁלֹּא לְבַיֵּשׁ אֶת מִי שֶׁאֵין לוֹ. כָּל הַכֵּלִים טְעוּנִין טְבִילָה. וּבְנוֹת יְרוּשָׁלַיִם יוֹצְאוֹת וְחוֹלוֹת בַּכְּרָמִים. וּמֶה הָיוּ אוֹמְרוֹת, בָּחוּר, שָׂא נָא עֵינֶיךָ וּרְאֵה, מָה אַתָּה בוֹרֵר לָךְ. אַל תִּתֵּן עֵינֶיךָ בַנּוֹי, תֵּן עֵינֶיךָ בַמִּשְׁפָּחָה. שֶׁקֶר הַחֵן וְהֶבֶל הַיֹּפִי, אִשָּׁה יִרְאַת ה' הִיא תִתְהַלָּל

There’s so much here in this passage—it seems so against-the-grain of what we might imagine ancient Israel was like, including the young women, in this case, controlling their own romantic destinies. I’ve written about Tu B’Av and love in Judaism, and Rabbi Tzvi Sinensky has posted this excellent essay about the festival’s possible biblical roots.

It’s easy to skip over that passage about the “borrowed white garments.” What an astonishing custom that is: on a day of frivolity and frolicking, the young women of Jerusalem were determined that none of their peers would be hurt or humiliated while the celebrations were happening. So none would wear her own dress; instead, they would share with each other, including those from poor families who couldn’t afford a dress at all. This was how Jews celebrated.

I wonder how this principle might apply today. Our celebrations have become disasters of consumption. The more money you have, the more elaborate the celebration seems to have become. Somehow, brisses turned into bar/bat mitzvahs, bar/bat mitzvahs turned into weddings, and weddings turned into… what? Papal ordinations?

Each May in Boston, it seems that every Jewish organization has its “Annual Dinner,” where much-needed funds are raised to finance the crucial work that these non-profits, day schools, and synagogues perform year-round. And yet… I know many Jewish professionals dread that time of the year, when night after night they have to experience this season of conspicuous consumption, when many of the values of modesty, equality, and integrity go out the window in pursuit of the big donors’ money. One (important) organization, for instance, is known for charging substantial dollars for a seat at its annual dinner—and for those who pay less, but are committed to the cause, there are tables in an entirely different room from the rest of the donors and speakers! They get to watch the event videostreamed to them in their "annex."

But enough grumpiness. I’m thinking about the daughters of Jerusalem, and what we might learn from them. They teach us, for instance, why Tzedakah organizations that feed hungry people need to serve dinner on china, and use real utensils, even though plastic utensils are so much easier to clean up. It’s why food programs need fresh baked pies and chocolate chip cookies, not just soup and a green vegetable.

It’s why it’s not enough to donate your old clothes—by definition, clothes that you wouldn’t wear any more—or your old furniture, or old video games, or anything else. Laudable as those gifts may be (they certainly shouldn't be thrown out), we're supposed to reach for a higher standard. Maimonides had this nailed 900 years ago. He said that the definition of “Love your neighbor as yourself” was this: “What I want for myself, I want for other people. And what I don’t want for myself, I don’t want [to happen to] them.” (Sefer HaMitzvot, Positive Mitzvah #206)

Can you imagine a high school prom—where all the students, boys and girls alike, wear “borrowed clothes” from one another, so that no one is trying to outdo their neighbor? No one would show up in a fancier car than anyone else—not only because it’s in extremely bad taste, but also because they wouldn’t want to humiliate anyone whose family couldn’t afford otherwise.

Can you imagine how different synagogue life would be—especially in the notorious “Bar Mitzvah Year”? Rich families would no longer say, “If I’ve got it, why shouldn’t I flaunt it?” Because they would understand that exorbitant spending puts pressure on all the other families in a community, making others think, “I suppose that’s the community standard that is expected of us.”

Of course, every child in the class would be invited to everyone else’s birthday party—because no one would ever want to have someone else be hurt on the occasion of their celebration.

I'd be curious to know other ways in which readers would apply this principle. Can you imagine how different, how sensitive, how empathetic our communities could be?

I can imagine it. Call it a hippie-socialist-Bernie-kibbutz fantasy if you want, but I'll take the Sages and the young women of Jerusalem from long ago, and their definition of what a "Festival of Love" really should be. 

Broken Clocks (on the U.S. Embassy Opening in Jerusalem)

Gen. Edmond Allenby dismounts from his horse and enters Jerusalem on foot, December, 1917.

I was wrong.

I was wrong in December when I wrote ambivalently about moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. At that time, I wrote that while of course Jerusalem is Israel’s capital, “sometimes it is better to be smart than to be right.”  It’s hard to admit being wrong, but I was.

And it’s even harder when the messenger is someone like President Donald Trump, who it seems is determined to wrap even the moments when he’s right with so much narcissism, abuse, and seventh-grade-bully smarminess that you just want to say, “what he’s for, I’m against.”

But you know the saying about broken clocks, and it is foolish to conclude that, just because another’s motives are suspect, they are actually wrong.

I was ambivalent about moving the embassy because I thought it was bad for Israel’s security, because I thought it would launch tirades of anti-Israel violence, and because I thought it would isolate American foreign policy as a broker in the Middle East.

I realize now that each of these premises was faulty. American isolation is following apace due to the Administration’s other “America First” policies and obnoxious diplomacy, not because of the embassy. But regarding Israel, in fact, a trickle of countries are tentatively indicating that they will follow the American lead and move their embassies as well (Guatemala, and possibly Honduras and Romania, although the Czechs seem to have changed their minds). This is a very good thing, and I hope we quickly reach a tipping-point of other countries following suit.

Further, the expected waves of violence in Arab countries did not follow. (The Hamas-inspired violence on Gaza’s border is not because of the embassy move. If anything, it is connected to the 70th anniversary of the Independence/Nakba, and the delusions that terrorism will reset the world’s clocks to a time when there was no Israel.) 

And I argued that moving the embassy was symbolic; no one’s life (except for the ambassador's) would be enhanced by moving it, so the risk of disaster outweighed the benefits of symbolism.

But symbols are important. Our religious and civic lives are full of symbolism. For instance, at the Brandeis graduation yesterday, I was struck again by how full of  “ancient” symbolism our academic exercises are (from caps and gowns—make sure your hood is the right color!—to the regalia that the university president wears, to the solemn intonation of an alma mater). Israelis understandably feel delegitimized by the refusal, even of allies, to acknowledge that Jerusalem is the authentic capital of the State—the place where, de facto, everyone knows the political and legal seats of government are.

The move really has nothing to do with Palestinians, and nothing to do with peace processes, or two states, or even preventing a future Palestinian state from having its capital in East Jerusalem.

So the administration was right—I daresay, even courageous in moving the embassy.

And I was wrong.  I just hope and pray that six months from now, I won’t be writing a blog that says, “I was wrong about being wrong.”

Because these people sure know how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Instead of approaching Jerusalem with modesty and humility, as when Gen. Edmond Allenby dismounted his horse and entered the City of Cities on foot in 1917, the embassy opened with triumphalism and backslapping. Instead of celebrating Jerusalem, they celebrate themselves.

“Modesty and humility” are incoherent to these people. (“When President Trump makes a promise, he keeps it,” said son-in-law Jared Kushner, the sort of sycophantic and self-serving comment we’ve come to expect in lieu of what could have been a moment of oratorical inspiration.) The presence of uber-racist pastors, the voices of the evangelical hard right, is obscene. So, too, was the presence of the pro-Israel but anti-Jewish millenialist reactionaries (hello, Michele Bachmann? Are these people really interested in reviving this lunatic’s career?).

Supporters of the Administration love quoting the Bible. Some of them even compare Donald Trump to a modern day Cyrus of Persia! (As if Zionist history never happened! As if we hadn’t already returned to the Land!)

They might consider other parts of the Bible, such as the words of Jeremiah. Over twenty-six hundred years ago, Jeremiah (7:1-15) warned about the hypocrisy of those who spend too much time mouthing praises of Jerusalem (“The Temple of the Lord, the Temple of the Lord, The Temple of the Lord are these!!”, v.4) while simultaneously promoting injustice, moral perversion, and arrogance. Jerusalem demands morality, both personal and social. To behave otherwise is to mock its religious premise.

Moving the embassy is a very good thing. It should be accompanied by a set of moral values that represent city’s ancient heritage: a place for God to dwell among human beings, a place of seeking moral repair, and a place of yearning for real peace.

Of Course Jerusalem is Israel's Capital...

…but sometimes it’s better to be smart than right.

The Trump administration’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital is a cynical political maneuver—but there are plenty of good, historical reasons why Jews may feel torn. Here’s my attempt to sort through the issues and to explain why something that should seem obvious on one hand is so profoundly disturbing on the other.

Plenty of people may find themselves saying, “Isn’t Jerusalem already Israel’s capital?”  And of course it is. All of Israel’s government offices are in Jerusalem, Israel’s largest city. So, too, are the Knesset and the Supreme Court. So is Hebrew University, the national university of Israel, founded in 1918. The office of the Chief Rabbinate, a reprehensible institution but a significant national one nonetheless, is likewise in Jerusalem.

Furthermore, spiritually speaking, there has never been any doubt in the Jewish mind about Jerusalem's status. Since the days of King David some 3,000 years ago, Jerusalem has been the earthly capital of Jewish worship. Of no other city did the Psalmist cry:

If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither
Let my tongue cleave to my palate if I cease to think of you,
If I do not keep Jerusalem in mind even at my happiest hour. (Ps. 137:5-6)

For the Jewish soul, Jerusalem is home.

In a perfect world—of course the U.S. embassy should be in Jerusalem, the only capital of Israel.

So what’s the controversy?

When the United Nations in November 1947 voted to partition British Mandate Palestine into two states, a Jewish one and an Arab one, Jerusalem was considered too contested; it was to be internationalized. After the 33-13 U.N. vote passed, the Zionists accepted the plan and the Arab nations rejected it. (There were some enraged voices, especially from far-right nationalist corners of the Zionist movement, to reject the U.N. plan on the grounds that there could be no Jewish state without Jerusalem as its capital. David Ben Gurion sagely chose otherwise.)

When Ben Gurion and the Zionist leaders signed Israel’s Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948, it was an endorsement of the U.N. plan—the Declaration was signed in Tel Aviv, and the understanding was that Jerusalem would, indeed, be internationalized.

But the U.N.’s proposed boundaries never came to fruition. Within hours of Israel’s independence, she was attacked simultaneously by the surrounding Arab nations. When an armistice was reached the following year, Israel’s precipitous borders were somewhat expanded—and a foothold was established in Jerusalem, a lifeline to the thousands of Jews who lived there (and who were isolated, endangered, and on a few occasions, massacred during the War of Independence). Jerusalem was a divided city: the Old City and eastern neighborhoods of Jerusalem were under Jordanian rule; the western part of the city was Israeli. Into those western neighborhoods, the apparatus of the government moved.

After Israel’s stunning victory in the Six Day War in 1967, all of Jerusalem came under Israeli control. While the Muslim holy sites were handed over to the waqf—the Jordanian-controlled Islamic religious authority—both East and West Jerusalem became one Israeli municipality. Everywhere in the Jewish world, souls were stirred. The new anthem of the Jewish people became Naomi Shemer's Yerushalayim shel Zahav / "Jerusalem of Gold." 

But for most of the nations of the world, including the U.S., Jerusalem never gained its status as Israel’s capital, because they continued to cling to the 1947 U.N. Resolution 181 rather than comprehending that the status quo had irrevocably changed. 70 years later, that’s still the case.

The problem is precisely this: everything about Jerusalem causes passions to be inflamed. Even though many Jewish residents of the city have never stepped foot in the Palestinian neighborhoods such as Beit Safafa, Silwan, or Shuafat, there is a strong sense that Jerusalem can “never be divided again.”  And for Palestinians, Jerusalem is the inevitable capital of their state-in-waiting.

So there are threats. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has indicated that if the Trump Administration makes this move, it will pull the plug from the barely-on-life-support peace process. Worse, the implied threat is that the Palestinian street will go ballistic, launching, G-d forbid, a Third Intifada and new wave of violence and terror. That violence could easily spread beyond Israel.

On one hand, some supporters of Israel will understandably say—why should we allow the threat of terror to stop us from pursuing a goal that is ultimately right? Why would we cave in to that sort of blackmail?

But on the other hand—often it is better to be smart than to be right. What, really, is to be gained by this move, besides a sense of historic injustice corrected?

The danger of this spiraling out of control is real. No one’s life would be changed or improved by this symbolic U.S. recognition—but a lot of people’s lives could be devastated by the eruption of tensions. That is why one pro-Israel U.S. administration after another—Republican and Democrat alike—has put off making such a move as this. (I suspect that behind the scenes, the Israelis were nodding in assent. You really don’t hear about the Israelis making a big deal that U.S. embassy is not in Jerusalem—and for good reason.)

As scholar Micah Goodman has written in his important book Catch-67, the United States could be using its power to ease tension between Israelis and Palestinians, taking short-term incremental steps to build trust (rather than trying to force final stages of a peace process at this time). His book—a bestseller in Israel—offers concrete examples steps about how to do just that.

We should question the timing of this move:  Does it have anything to do with distracting attention from Donald Trump’s growing panic over the Justice Department investigation of possible collusion with Russia? Or with the increasing momentum in Israel of corruption charges against Prime Minister Netanyahu? And in a time of great tension between Israel and American Jews, over the Western Wall and pluralism issues in general, doesn’t the timing seem just a little self-serving for these politicians?

Whether or not the announcement is self-serving for the embattled politicos, all of us should pause to think about whether we want to be smart or right at this particular juncture.

The Talmud (Sanhedrin 93b) maintains that one aspect of King David’s leadership was that he was mavin davar mitoch davar: that he could anticipate how one thing causally leads to another. Thoughtful leaders should know that their actions have consequences, both intended and unintended.

That is what this moment calls for. Sadly, tragically, we are not currently blessed with leaders who have this sense of foresight.

Jerusalem, A Fractured Unity

Yom Yerushalayim 5777

As Jerusalem recovers from President Trump’s whirlwind visit, the city moves on to its next milestone. As evening falls, we celebrate the fiftieth Yom Yerushalayim / Jerusalem Day.

In fact, the Trump team’s quick departure is timely, because its visit inadvertently raised doubts about the very meaning of Yom Yerushalayim. 

In the days leading up to the President’s arrival, controversy was stirred as one of his advisors reportedly told the Israelis, “The Western Wall is not your territory. It’s part of the West Bank.” Subsequently, members of the administration both refuted and tacitly affirmed the remark. And while the President indeed made history by visiting the Kotel, his rebuff of Prime Minister Netanyahu who wanted to join him at the Wall only made his actual position more inscrutable.

Apparently, even though the state is 69 years old and Jerusalem has been united under Israeli sovereignty for 50 years, there remain those who doubt the city’s status as the legitimate capital of Israel.

Under the U.N. partition plan of 1947, Jerusalem was supposed to be an internationalized city. After the War of Independence, the city was bifurcated; Jordan ruled its eastern half and all of the Old City, and the western part of the city was controlled by Israel. The national institutions of Israel—including the Knesset, Supreme Court, and residences of the Prime Minister and President—all became rooted in western Jerusalem. And it has flourished: Jerusalem is Israel’s largest city.

Yom Yerushalayim marks the anniversary of the unexpected and dramatic unification of Jerusalem under Israeli rule in the Six Day War. On the 28th day of Iyar—corresponding to June 7, 1967 and May 24, 2017—Israel pushed back the attacking Jordanian forces and conquered the Old City and East Jerusalem. On that day, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan proclaimed:

This morning, the Israel Defense Forces liberated Jerusalem. We have united Jerusalem, the divided capital of Israel. We have returned to the holiest of our holy places, never to part from it again. To our Arab neighbors we extend, also at this hour—and with added emphasis at this hour—our hand in peace. And to our Christian and Muslim fellow citizens, we solemnly promise full religious freedom and rights. We did not come to Jerusalem for the sake of other peoples' holy places, and not to interfere with the adherents of other faiths, but in order to safeguard its entirety, and to live there together with others, in unity.

But there have always been two Jerusalems. Literally: Hebrew speakers know that the –ayim suffix means “a pair,” so its very name Yerushalayim implies not one but two.

The first appearance of Jerusalem in the Bible is in the Book of Joshua, where Joshua battles an alliance led by King Adoni-zedek of Jerusalem (Joshua 10).  By the end of the saga, most of the land has surrendered—except for Jerusalem, of which it says: “The men of Judah could not dispossess the Jebusites, the inhabitants of Jerusalem; so the people of Judah dwell with the Jebusites in Jerusalem to this day” (Josh. 15:63).  Already in Joshua’s time, the city was multicultural.

David was the first to “unite” Jerusalem; he made the city his kingdom’s capital. His son Solomon built the Temple there, making Jerusalem the dual religious and political capital of the people of Israel. With palace and temple, Jerusalem came to represent both the body and soul of the Jewish people.

Fractiousness amidst unity has remained part of the city’s identity ever since. In the Talmud (Ta’anit 5a), Rabbi Yitzhak imagines two Jerusalems, a heavenly city above that matches its earthly counterpart below:

Rabbi Yitzhak said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan:  “The Holy One says, ‘I will not come into the Jerusalem that is above until I come into the city of Jerusalem that is below.’”
Is there really a “Jerusalem that is above”?
Yes, for the verse says, “Jerusalem built up, a city with its companion” (Psalm 122:3).

In other words, Rabbi Yitzhak knows Jerusalem as both a spiritual ideal and as an earthly reality. Unifying the ideal with reality remains a messianic aspiration.

Today, we know that Jerusalem still bears these contradictions. On one hand, we have no doubts about Jerusalem’s centrality to modern Israel. We rejoice that for 50 years it has been united under Israeli rule. The streets of the Jewish Quarter—which had been demolished under the Jordanians—are flourishing. An American President just caressed the stones of the Western Wall. And the religious sites of all the city’s religious faiths are protected. Jerusalem is a thriving city of culture, spirit, and politics.

And yet: how unified is Jerusalem really? The Arab and Jewish neighborhoods certainly feel like two different cities. Do Israelis frequent Silwan or Beit Safafa or Shuafat? Even Jewish Jerusalem feels divided. Do secular residents visit haredi outposts like Sanhedriya or Kiryat Tzanz?

The Western Wall itself is a symbol of the schisms among Jews. The dispossession of non-Orthodox Jews at the Kotel is a pungent reminder that Jerusalem undivided is still a heavenly ideal that is far from reality. The Chief Rabbinate and its supporters distribute ugly posters around the city that slander non-Orthodox Jews and spew hatred at the Women of the Wall. President Trump is welcome at the Kotel, but Jewish women in tallit and tefillin, or men and women together in egalitarian prayer, are derided and scorned.

The ideal is that every Jew in the world has a stake in Jerusalem. But the reality is that its internal divisions reflect the discord that exists among our people.

Still, there remains a vision of heavenly Jerusalem floats above it all, reminding us that this is not the way it is meant to be.  Jerusalem also carries a whiff of peace—as ‘ir shalom, the city of wholeness.  The reality may be painful and fractured, but the ideal is that we should learn how to pray and live side by side with one another.

This Yom Yerushalayim and its celebrations should be a reminder of a future unification, when ideals and reality can be brought together. Celebrate it in joy and hope!