Passover in a Time of Captivity

  

Passover feels, this year, haunted. It’s one thing to celebrate freedom when we are full of the joys of freedom. It’s another when there are hostages and fresh memories of Iranian drones and Gazan terror.

There are many Seder supplements, additional readings and ideas that are filling my inbox; so many that a Cantorial colleague has collected them here. I encourage anyone struggling or looking for a way to hold this multi-valent time well to explore.

At the New London Communal Sedarim, and at my home Seder, we will take part in the Seder Seat For A Hostage campaign.   More information here https://bod.org.uk/sederseat-sajbd/

 

In my own thoughts about freedom and Passover this strange and bitter year, I’ve been reflecting on a basic truth of all Jewish rituals. It’s something I realised while staying in a farmhouse several years ago when the cockerel woke me up with its growing at 4am, despite it being pitch black outside. The cockerel continued to crow at ten-minute intervals through the pre-dawn and into the afternoon. The incident that prompted my realisation was the ancient blessing, instituted to be said every morning, where God is praised for giving the “cockerel the ability to understand the difference between day and night.” As I struggled to get back to sleep, and throughout the day, I realised that cockerels don’t have the slightest clue about the difference between day and night. I realised also that the ancient Rabbis would have known that and that, therefore, the blessing that suggested God endowed this annoying animal with a level of understanding it did not possess was not a statement about the world as it is, but a statement about the world as they wished it to be.

 

The same, I think, goes for every prayerful utterance in our faith, especially the prayers about peace and triumph of the decent and the punishment of the wicked.  We pray as an act of aspiration, not description.

 

The Seder itself came into existence just as the Temple was destroyed, with Roman oppression and murder all around. We’ve sung of our deliverance from slavery as we’ve been plunged into exile. We’ve sung of our emergence into freedom during the darkest of times. This isn’t the first time we’ve had to reach toward a hope for the world and our place in it, rather than reflect on a bitter reality. In fact, this state is our norm. In other Passover rituals, we blur how we have always sung of freedom against a backdrop of pain – “This is the bread of affliction,” we say in this Zman Cheroteinu – Time of our Liberation.

Freedom and slavery have always, for us Jews, been closely interwoven. Pain and hope have always been co-conspirators at Seder. And Od Lo Avda Tikvateinu –I have not yet lost hope. In fact, it’s the experience of sitting at a Seder table, with family, friends and strangers alike that most keep that spark of hope alive.

May it be that way for us all.

 

And may all of Israel – and the hostages most especially – come to know true freedom speedily in our days.

 

Rabbi Jeremy

 

The Donkey of Our Enemy

Been another hard week.

Marked by the pain, continued pain for Israel, continued pain at the levels of antisemitism in this country.

We had a Council meeting this week and I took the opportunity to gauge where our Council thought I should be speaking out. A couple wanted me to speak more about antisemitism.

I abhor antisemitism.

I don’t accept that London or this country is becoming a no-go area for Jews. The phrase sticks in my throat a little, I think it’s deliberately alarmist and I don’t like it. But it’s hard now, I know it is.

And I feel, in myself, a gentle increase in the sorts of protection I take for myself – the times I go out wearing a cap over a Kippah. Tiny increments which add up.

So what to do?

And what about that other thing that’s going on in my mind, and in my heart. This space exists for the other in all this.

The Muslims of this country, who are subject to disturbing attack, sometimes from high levels of political leadership, from which comes no apology and no accountability. It’s very disturbing. To my Muslim cousins, preparing for Ramadan, I wish Ramadan Mubarak – even at, particularly at these sensitive times. If you hate antisemitism, and I hate antisemitism – you have to hate anti-Muslim hatred. You can’t be in favour of selected hatred of one group of people by another group of people.

And so too, I feel this pull in both directions when it comes to Israel and Gaza. My heart breaks for the families of the hostages, for the families with sons and daughters serving in strange plains of battle, who never thought that their military service, or reserve duty would consist of having to go door to door through the rubble of booby trapped Gazan tunnels in search of terrorists and hostages. It’s inconceivably awful.

But my heart breaks too for the millions of people in Gaza facing intense deprivation and for the Gazans who are mourning a loss of life that is staggering – even as much as I distrust Hamas as a reliable source for how many have been killed – it’s staggering. And I can’t handle the maths.

I can’t handle having to work out how many Gazans on a scale of responsibility for the acts of 7^th October from none to considerable , how many of those Gazan lives is it acceptable for Israel to be responsible for killing based on the numbers of Israeli lives killed or taken or wounded or in pain. My heart doesn’t allow me to do that kind of maths.

 

And the verse that went through my mind as I was trying to think through how to respond to the appalling acts of antisemitism here and the deeply painful loss of life there is one we read a couple of weeks ago.

כִּֽי־תִרְאֶ֞ה חֲמ֣וֹר שֹׂנַאֲךָ֗ רֹבֵץ֙ תַּ֣חַת מַשָּׂא֔וֹ וְחָדַלְתָּ֖ מֵעֲזֹ֣ב ל֑וֹ עָזֹ֥ב תַּעֲזֹ֖ב עִמּֽוֹ׃ {ס}        

 

If you see the donkey of your enemy lying under its burden and you would be tempted to refrain from helping it, help it!

It’s a brilliant image – here I am making my own way along and I see this donkey struggling, and the Torah knows what goes through my heart – that this is not only not my problem, but it’s my enemies problem, and the Torah knows I will be tempted to refrain.

Taazov Imo – don’t walk by.

And I know, there’s a Talmudic dicta that in the name of Rabbi Shmuel Bar Rav Yitzhak in the name of Rav, that says this only applies to an Israelite enemy – it doesn’t mean the enemy on the other side of the border.  But that’s not the only voice in our tradition that shapes, I think, the way we need to – we still need to – treat the donkeys of our enemies regardless of who that enemy is.

Midrash Tanhuma Mishpatim 1:2

R. Alexandri explained it as follows: Two mules are being led along a road by men who despise each other. Suddenly, one of the mules falls to the ground. As the one who is leading the second mule passes by, he sees the mule of the other man stretched out beneath his load, and he says to himself: “Is it not written in the law that If thou seest the ass of him that hateth thee lying under its burden, thou shalt forbear to pass him by; thou shalt verily release it for him (Exod. 23:5)?” What did he do? He turned back to help the other man reload his mule, and then accompanied him on the way. In fact, while working with him he began to talk to the owner of the mule, saying: “Let us loosen it a little on this side, let us tighten it down on this side,” until he reloaded the animal with him. It came to pass that they had made peace between themselves. The driver of the mule (that had fallen) said to himself: “I cannot believe that he hates me; see how concerned he was when he saw that my mule and I were in distress.” As a result, they went into the inn, and ate and drank together. Finally they became extremely attached to each other.

 

The point is that taking care of the donkey of our enemy is how we build our way out of enmity towards something that is not just filled with violence in one direction begetting greater violence in the other, begetting greater violence back again and back again.

This is Rebeinu Bachya, the thirteenth century commentator of Zaragossa talking about a parallel verse – yes we get more or less the same instruction twice in the Torah

The promise contained in our verse is that if you assist your enemy with their falling donkey they will eventually appreciate you and become אחיך, “your brother.” When you assist them they will forget the “hatred” between you and only remember the bond of love that unites brothers. (on Deut 22.4)

 

I know, that Midrash and that commentary are a little twee. I know it’s harder, this awful millennia old conflict between Israel and those people over that border. But the dynamic of hate in one direction driving more hate in the opposite and on and on until tens of thousands lie dead cannot be the greatest calling of our time.

Here’s another verse, one with chilling, for me, implications for our time.

אִם־רָעֵ֣ב שֹׂ֭נַאֲךָ הַאֲכִלֵ֣הוּ לָ֑חֶם וְאִם־צָ֝מֵ֗א הַשְׁקֵ֥הוּ מָֽיִם

If your enemy is hungry, give them bread to eat;
If they are thirsty, give them water to drink.

(Prov 25:21)

And I know the dicta that reads the verse about study – if a person is hungry for Torah bring them to the study hall. But that’s not the only voice in our tradition that shapes, I think, the way we need to – we still need to – treat our enemies in their hunger and in their thirst.

Rebeinu Bachya again, in a comment on how Abraham sent Hagar away from their tent – with a container of water, shares this

) One may view the fact that Avraham provided Hagar with bread and water as an allusion to something that he foresaw concerning the future when his descendants would be oppressed by the Arabs. He foresaw that the Ishmaelites would hate the Jews more than any other nation on earth hated them. Avraham was careful not to deny Hagar and Ishmael the necessities to ensure their survival, something with which Jews provide even their enemies. He modelled himself after Proverbs 25,21 “If your enemy is hungry feed them bread; if they are thirsty, give them water to drink.” (Genesis 21:14)

 

Rabeinu Bachya didn’t understand this verse, from Proverbs, as only applying to Jews. He understood it to mean, if you are caught in a cycle of hatred and fear, even if you know that that hatred and fear is millenia old and even possibly hard baked into a sort of religio-ethno-something, you still give your hungry enemy bread and your thirsty enemy water.

Rav Moshe Amiel was born and educated in the great Yeshiva communities of Eastern Europe, before fleeing Nazism in 1936 to become Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv. In his essay,

Justice in the Jewish State According to the Torah, he remarkably cites a Christian scholar in total agreement, when discussing this verse, of ours, from Proverbs

"If your enemy is hungry, feed him bread, and if he is thirsty, give him water" (Proverbs 21:21). And the Christian scholar Kornaval comments beautifully on the verse "You shall not abhor an Egyptian because you have lived in his land" (Deuteronomy 23:8): "So, even for the kind of hospitality that the Jews received in Egypt after they tortured them with all kinds of hard and cruel labor and also shed their blood, the Torah commands them without hating the Egyptians and acknowledging them with gratitude because they lived in their country - if this commandment is not close to loving enemies, then I really don't understand the Hebrew language." And these things are ancient parts of who we are as Jews.

 

I’m not a military tactician. I don’t know the best way to bring the hostages out. I’m not on the front line, I know all these things, but I just failed to understand something on the radio yesterday morning. There was a discussion about a new port that the Americans are due to build on the coast of Gaza, and the plan is to check aid with Israelis in Cyrpus or something, and ship it into Gaza that way. And the speaker said, well, of course there’s a perfectly useable port, just 30 km north of Gaza in Ashdod, but … and well I understand the hatred and the anger and desire for revenge. But it’s not good. And, perhaps even more importantly, it won’t get us to a place where the sons of Abraham, the brothers who both have fallen donkeys at this point, get to re-find in one other our relative humanity.

We can’t keep going on this path, and the only other path – the one that leads out of this place, comes through being able, somehow, even in pain, feeling compelled to assist the donkey, even, of our enemy.

 

On the Public Stage - For the Release of Hostages and for Democracy in Israel

In September, and then again in October, I had the privilege of speaking to large crowds at two events in Central London.

The first, was a pro-Democracy rally where I shared this

And then, awfully,  just weeks later at a rally for the release of all the hostages, but particularly as a Shaliach for Noam Sagi whose mother (now released) was taken on the 7th October 2023.

Posting here for anyone interested

On Holocaust Memorial Day at New London Synagogue

This year Holocaust Memorial Day falls on Saturday 27^th January. 

I want to pay tribute to all those who have made this day such an important occasion in our national calendar. 

 

We are all invited to place a candle in our window at 8pm this Saturday evening. Iconic buildings will be lit up purple and there is a project to light 6 million ‘digital candles’ on billboards across the country. The iconic billboard at Piccadilly Circus will display portraits of Holocaust and genocide survivors in the lead up to this national moment. 

Registration to join streamed curated moments from the Holocaust Memorial Day 2024 Ceremony is open here https://www.hmd.org.uk/take-part-in-holocaust-memorial-day/ukhmd/ 

 

At New London, we will be reciting a Memorial Prayer in our services this Shabbat but deferring our major commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day to next Shabbat, 3^rd February. Next week marks the 75^th Anniversary of the arrival in this country of our member Hannah Lewis MBE. Having survived the Holocaust in the Adampol, in the Labour Camp and in hiding, Hannah came to London – in part owing the actions of another New Londoner, Basil (subsequently Lord) Feldman, or blessed memory. The theme of HMD this year is the Fragility of Freedom and Hannah’s story – which she will be sharing from the Bimah – is a hugely important reminder of this fragility. It is also a privilege and an honour to be able to hear Hannah's story - I encourage all to make every effort to attend. 

In terms of age-appropriate or related concerns, Hannah will be focussing on her journey to London, not her direct experiences of the Holocaust as it surrounded her. We will have some more information available at the Synagogue regarding her remarkable story of survival. 

 

I want to, also, share with the community two other opportunities for engaging with this important time. 

  

The Most Precious of Goods is a theatrical performance of the French novella, translated and directed by Nicholas Kent with music from friend of the community, Gemma Rosefield (who has played cello at our recent Slichot evenings). Marylebone Theatre until 3^rd February (I’ll be there on Thursday 1^st) https://www.marylebonetheatre.com/productions/the-most-precious-of-goods 

 

Revenge: Our Dad the Nazi Killer is an extraordinary new documentary about two Australian brothers who investigate their father and uncle, Holocaust survivors, and whether they might have been responsible for the mysterious deaths of Nazi war criminals who fled to their country after the war hoping to start a new life and avoid persecution. Available to stream https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001vn46/storyville-revenge-our-dad-the-nazi-killer 

 

Rabbi Jeremy 

The Chanukah Giraffe

 

Chanukah has always asked the question – are you, as a Jew, willing to raise your head above the parapet? Right back in the earliest days, the heart of the Maccabean revolt was the refusal to shrug and fall in line when the surrounding society said, “Don’t be Jewish.” The Maccabees found this intolerable. And so, here we are. 

 

Two hundred years later, the Rabbis articulated rules for the placement of the Chanukiyah. Candles, they taught, should be placed, "outside the house, or in the window overlooking the public space". People needed to see that we were here, proud of who we are and what we stand for, and proud to be different. They added, “In times of danger, it’s enough to light on your table.” Sometimes discretion is nobler than valour, but this extension of the neck has always been a Shikul, something to weigh up. As Jews, especially as Jews of the Diaspora we have long been used to marking carefully ways in which we fall in line with the expectations of our surrounding society, or raise our heads above the parapet and prove ourselves as different – at this Christmasy time of year most especially. And now, here we are, with horror along the southern border of Israel, destruction in Gaza and tension on the streets of London. 

 

There is something remarkable in the Chabad-led programme to put up public Chanukiyot … everywhere. I have cycled past three this morning. My Chabad colleagues lead the way in refusing to back down; wearing the same clothes, and the same outward commitments to our faith, come what may. 

 

This Chanukah is both something tragically new and something that has re-raised the very essence of this festival to the surface. The essence of Chanukah has never been a cute story about everlasting oil. It’s always been that it takes a certain kind of bravery – and in the language of Rabbi Steven Bayar – the neck of a giraffe to make a difference in the world. Not a foolhardy stupidity – “in times of danger, light your Chanukiyah on the table and that’s enough,” – but a refusal to back down. Rudyard Kipling, no great friend of Jews, had it right. “If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you … or being hated, don’t give way to hating.” 

 

And maybe, this is the real lesson of a flame. Candles, even ones powered by miraculous flasks of oil, need protection from the elements. They can’t be assumed to survive the wafts of societal pressure. A flame, and the heat, warmth, delight and inspiration we can derive from a flame, demands our effort. It has always been so. 

 

Happy Chanukah. 

 

On Abortion

 I was asked by a teen congregant for Judaism's approach to abortion. I responded with this.

Judaism's position on abortion falls into neither of two main camps on this difficult issue - neither 'pro-life' nor 'pro-choice.' 

My primary teacher on this issue is a fellow classmate in the Rabbinical School where we were both ordained. She, Rabbi Dalia Kronish, carries the genetic code for dwarfism and hearing someone standing tall at four-foot-nothing explain why they think there is a problem with people doing genetic tests and choosing to abort 'non-perfect' children is one of the most powerful things I have ever heard. You might also be interested in the writing of Rabbi Danya Rutenberg on this issue, for example here https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2022/06/judaism-abortion-rights-religious-freedom/661264/

Some sources.

There is a passage in Exodus (21:22-23) which compares the debt owed by a person who hits someone who then dies with the debt owed by a person who hits someone and causes them to miscarry a foetus. The former is liable, 'life for a life,' the latter pays financial damages. 

That is to say, the Bible considers the foetus as something significant and of legal standing, but not as a full life.

The major impact of this view is discussed in the central Rabbinic text, Mishnah Ohalot 7:6. Here the rabbis consider what to do when a woman is having "difficulty giving birth" (carrying a child and certainly giving birth were, and even today remain, occasionally dangerous). The rabbis are clear that such a foetus should be "cut up and brought out limb by limb." That is to say, it is obligatory to abort a dangerous foetus, even when its limbs are recognisable. The Mishnah goes on to say, once the majority of the body has come out, you can't get involved since "one soul can't be pushed aside for another soul." That suggests that a foetus only becomes a 'soul' when it emerges from the womb.

Differing Jewish perspectives on abortion range from those who hold that abortion is only permissible when the 'difficulty' referred to in the Mishnah is clearly and immediately life-threatening (at which point it is actually compulsory, even during labour) and those who hold that 'difficulty' can include a much broader range of even psychological reasons - if a mother feels she would be unable to love a child as much as a child deserves to be loved. For those who hold the latter position - including myself - I do think it makes sense to consider a sliding scale where the most life-threatening cases should be aborted even very late-stage, but less clear-cut cases of danger should be permitted only at an earlier stage. 

Is that helpful? 

And He Lifted Up His Voice and Wept - A Sermon on Shabbat Toledot

 Always a difficult Parasha

I get that we are supposed to favour Jacob over Esau and indeed find ourselves, the Children of Israel, in the narrative of our patriarch Jacob.

But … I never have.

Jacob comes across in this week’s Torah reading as a bit of a schemer, quick to do his brother out of his birthright at the beginning of the Parasha. And then quick to follow his mother’s – let it be said – desperately dishonest advice, at the end.

And I know the Rabbinic commentaries, that Rebecca knew that the covenant had to run through her favoured son, which is supposed to justify the deceit. But it doesn’t help much.

And I know Easau, the red-headed, the purchaser of red-lentil soup, is the ancestor of the Edomites who wreak such havoc later in our story and presage the terrible things done to our people by the Romans, called Edom. I know also the Rabbinic commentaries that associate every action of Easau with idolatrous wrongdoing. But it doesn’t shift me much.

I mean, I know he’s quick to sell off his birthright;

          וְיַעֲקֹ֞ב נָתַ֣ן לְעֵשָׂ֗ו לֶ֚חֶם וּנְזִ֣יד עֲדָשִׁ֔ים וַיֹּ֣אכַל וַיֵּ֔שְׁתְּ וַיָּ֖קׇם וַיֵּלַ֑ךְ וַיִּ֥בֶז עֵשָׂ֖ו אֶת־הַבְּכֹרָֽה׃

That verse is brutal in its stripped backparsimony.

He ate, he drank, he got up, he went and he spurned, did Esau, the birthright.

But Easau is not supposed to be the smart one, who dwells in the encampment studying. He’s the guy out hunting in the field and he’s, at the very least, tired and hungry.

He certainly regrets the action.

When Easau finds that Jacob has come in and taken the blessing from their father from under his nose – Bmirmah – as Isaac says it, in guile. Easau wails.

That’s another extraordinary passage,

[Esau] said, “Was he, then, named Jacob that he might supplant me these two times? First, he took away my birthright and now he has taken away my blessing!” And he added, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”

Isaac said to Esau, “But I have made him master over you: I have given him all his brothers for servants, and sustained him with grain and wine. What, then, can I still do for you, my son?”

And Esau said to his father, “Have you but one blessing, Father? Bless me too, Father!” And Esau wept aloud.

 

It breaks my heart every year.

I know people like Easau, a bit simpler than the very sharpest of men, but loyal and decent and, by the way – who wins the prize for Honouring your father in the context of this week’s Parasha?

And I do know I am one of the Children of Israel, one of the people of the God of Abraham, and for me to be in this place – this place I love, holding this heritage I adore -  I need that the Biblical story unfolds, not through Easau, but through Jacob – who is to become Israel in next week’s Torah reading, when he wrestles that angel.

But it doesn’t sit easy.

And every year, when I come to this parashah, and I read through the classic commentaries that justify the actions of Jacob and Rebekkah and Isaac, and the modern commentaries, particularly from within the Orthodox world, I’m left cold. To mix my metaphors, a little as if I’ve been given something beautiful to eat, but it’s got ashen, somehow in my mouth.

So, for those of you who have heard me preach on this Parasha before, you will have heard me preach about destabilising narratives which see me retreat behind the sense I have of what I know is right, or preaching about not falling for the assumptions of the evil of the other, or that sort of thing.

Actually, it’s not even the tale of Jacob and Easau that brings up this destabilized sense of my relationship with the Avot and Imahot of these stories – the founding parents, the archetypes and the bases of our faith.

Back a generation, as it were, there’s the story of the Hagar. Brought in to provide a child to an infertile couple and then kicked out when the couple manage their own child. Hagar is, of course, the mother of Ishmael – held to be the first Arab.

It’s almost a trop.

That we have a thread of connection that binds us to archetypes who shape everything we are, as Jews. But none of them is a paragon of perfection on the straight-forward reading of their lives. They  behave, at times, in ways that cause us and other characters in our sacred scripture distress.

The characters who suffer the behaviour of our great archetypes go down in our literary and religious history as our enemies, but when we read these tales with an open heart, they inspire empathy too. At least they do for me. Actually, it might be even more complex than that.

The great Tikvah Frymer Kensky in her book, reading the Women of the Bible, writes

Hagar is the prototype of Israel. Everything that happens to Hagar is paralleled by the story of Israel's sacred history. The liberation, the wandering in the desert, the promise from God. The unsettling nature of the story is that Sara is our mother, but Hagar is us. You sympathize with Hagar and feel uneasy about it. That is the technique of the storyteller. Hagar is the double of Israel, yet so is Sara.

We might be both sides of each of these stories; hero and antihero all bound into one.

I don’t really have an end to this sermon.

I don’t have a neat way to wrap it up and apply it to the awful bloody brokenness of the Middle East.

I certainly don’t excuse or feel anything less than utter contempt for the perpetrators of the horrors of 7^th October, or anything less than utter heartbreak for those suffering.

But I can’t retreat behind only feeling for one side of this story.

Maybe there is a lesson in a Midrash which tells us how Abraham felt about his two sons – the covenantal son, the one who goes on to bear the story from his own generation into the future, Isaac, and the other son – the one to be sent away – Ishmael.

When God tells Abraham, “Take your son, your only son, the one you love, Isaac,” the Rabbis assume the conversation between God and Abraham,

“take your son,” – I have two sons

“your only son,” – they are each the only son of their respective mothers

“the one you love,” – is there a limit on how much we can love? – Says Abraham, in the mind of the rabbis of Bereishit Rabba.

Why does there have to be a limit on the amount we can love.

Or, from this week’s reading, my heart is still snagging, and ripping on that verse Easau shares, when he realises that Isaac has blessed Jacob instead of himself.

Have you but one blessing father? Bless me also father -  הַֽבֲרָכָ֨ה אַחַ֤ת הִֽוא־לְךָ֙ אָבִ֔י בָּֽרֲכֵ֥נִי גַם־אָ֖נִי אָבִ֑י:

But mainly, my heart is just with the continuation of that verse.

וַיִּשָּׂ֥א עֵשָׂ֛ו קֹל֖וֹ וַיֵּֽבְךְּ

And he lifted up his voice and wept.

Shabbat Shalom