Rabbis (This Rabbi) And Politics

 This was written in, I think, mid-2022, something like that. I'm posting it here as Great Britain enters a General Election cycle.

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We lost some long-standing members this week. The problem, it seems, was me and my politics. Under my leadership, New London stands accused of being “increasingly politicised” when it came to “domestic issues around identity politics,” “national issues such as immigration” and “issues concerning Israel’s democratic government.” The couple left in search of a synagogue “that does not engage in such agendas and where we can both come and go as members without feeling that our personal views are constantly being questioned and challenged.”

 

Putting aside the question of the value of a religious approach that disdains constant question and challenge, I do have some sympathy. I understand – and deeply value – my faith as a refuge from the febrile world ‘out there.’ I deeply value the range of positions and views that will be taken by any collection of thinking human beings – and we have a lot of thinking human beings at New London. In my mind, I’ve never attempted to muzzle or limit debate on these important issues, if you feel otherwise, please accept my apology. But, but, but, but …

 

It’s another one of those weeks where the news ‘here’ is of the Illegal Immigration Bill and the news ‘there’ is of proposed judicial reforms. I find this week’s Torah portion (containing as it does the tale of the Golden Calf) fascinating, and for what it’s worth deeply political, but I can’t sit down to express a thought for this coming Shabbat without engaging with issues that, while definitely, ‘of the polis’ – political, are profoundly religious.

 

I want to share here how I – as your Rabbi – approach this tightrope walk. I also want to share a brief word about the relationship, as I understand it, of Judaism and matters of the democratic polis.

 

I allow this space, my weekly written messages, to be political than my sermons. If you want to experience New London-style Judaism experientially, as an escape from the pressures of the world, come to Shul; log on to our daily Shacharit services, enjoy our phenomenal new cantorial leadership and prepare to enjoy a newly redecorated and much beautified sanctuary. If you don’t like the message of my weekly-mailing, feel free to delete or scroll down. I don’t mind, really I don’t. If you come to Shul there’s less politics from Bimah – I think that’s correct.

 

I police my own language with great care. In fifteen years as Rabbi of New London, I have used the name of a specific British political party to make a religious point on one occasion only, and only as the result of deep reflection and (for what it’s worth) extensive consultation with the lay leadership. I am deeply committed to keeping my political-party-specific opinions to myself. I have never and can’t see how I would ever, tell anyone who to vote for. I am committed to treating any elected official with the respect due their mandate and their position. “Pray for the government,” taught Rabbi Chanina, “without its due respect a person would eat their fellow alive.” Amen to that. I have never and would never condone use of inflammatory epithets directed against anyone, member, stranger or political leader alike. I’m particularly opposed to epithets of precise historical meaning being used to tar contemporary political positions. If we disagree with a person or their position, I believe we should say so and explain why. But I am wary in the extreme of calling any person or position racist / sexist / homophobic / Apartheid / Nazi / fascist. Certainly, I am far more restrained in how I speak about political leadership today than Chazal – the Rabbis of Talmudic fame – were in the language used in the great tomes of our faith to attack political leaders of eras past.

 

But Judaism can never, in the words of our founder rabbi, Rabbi Louis Jacobs of blessed memory, be allowed to be “insipid” or “remote from the day-to-day concerns” of Jews. Judaism is not wholly or even primarily a spiritual/theological commitment. Judaism is a commitment to be part of a covenant of action. Its real-world commitment is evinced in verse after verse of the Torah and Sugya after Sugya of the Talmud. As I reflect on my own interest in matters of the polis, it’s to the Torah and the Talmud that I go, and from the Torah and the Talmud that I draw the inspiration that drives my teaching. If I’m interested in gender politics, it’s that verse in Genesis that insists the image of divinity is expressed through both male and female forms that underlies my interest. If I advocate for the dispossessed and unvoiced in society, it’s the repeated Biblical insistence to love, care for and not oppress the stranger that inspire me. If I have the temerity to speak against the political leadership of Israel – insignificant as I am - I have Samuel, Isaiah and an entire prophetic tradition to serve as models. That was the piece in the resignation note of our, now, former-members that, forgive me, annoyed me. It was suggested I function like a “see-saw,” “dashing to take up the mantle of causes that are transitory.” That’s certainly not how I experience my 25 years of rabbinic study and commitment. Ho-hum.

 

The point about democracy is this. Democracy is NOT the government by will of the majority. The majority don’t need a constitution to impose their will on the minority. Technically, the name for rule by the masses is ‘ochlocracy.’ And it’s not something I, as a Jew, have ever been excited about.  Democracy IS the CONTROL of the will of the majority. A good democrat reflects not on their own dictatorial power, but on the edges, the limits, the term-times, the checks and balances. Democracies always annoy those who think a mandate should be equated with their ability to do whatever they want. And that’s where religion comes in. Religion is and has always been a voice outside of a human-coming-together to do ‘what is right in their own eyes’ (a phrase used repeatedly in the Bible to demonstrate error is being made). Religion will, of course, make mistakes, and I, when I have the temerity to speak on behalf of our faith and how-much-the-more-so the Divine must model temerity and humility in looking to intervene in the public sphere. But the notion that religion doesn’t insist on an engagement in the political realm is absurd. I’ve shared more about this idea in a sermon here https://rabbionanarrowbridge.blogspot.com/2022/12/why-be-religious-archbishop-rowan.html. And the great lesson of the last century, and indeed the entirety of Rabbinic Jewish history, is that we should be deeply grateful to live in carefully checked and balanced democracy. ‘Ad Kan,’ as the Rabbis of the Talmud were won’t to say, ‘That will have to do for now.’

 

Shabbat Shalom

 

 

Don't Say It's Over, I'm Here

It's getting close to the twentieth anniversary of my ordination - amazingly.

I thoughts I might post this to the blog, written for the Shabbat on which I was interviewing at New London - I've been here 16 years.

In part it's about my very particular relationship with New London Synagogue and it's founding Rabbi - the extraordinarily brilliant Louis Jacobs of blessed memory.

But it's also, in part, about what it means to consider oneself worthy of being a Rabbi at all, for anyone, anywhere.

At the heart of the sermon is a Sugya from Sotah, I first heard from the great Dean of the Rabbinincal School, for most of my time at JTS, Rabbi Bill Lebau. It struck me as I heard it as just the most remarkable text. I've never forgotten it.

I started this blog when I started at New London, so this sermon have never been posted here. It is in Spiritual Vagabondry (available from that one utterly massive bookshop). 

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This is, I think, the sixth time I have had the honour of addressing this community from this pulpit.

And it always feels a bit strange.

 

I still think of myself sitting over there somewhere, with my father.

I still think of myself, as a small child, hiding in the velvet curtains and pretending I had understood the sermon so I could join in the conversation between my parents as we walked home from shul.

 

And it feels particularly strange today.

For me,

To be applying to become the next Rabbi at Louis’ Shul.

 

I’m reminded of a previous American Presidential campaign where Dan Quayle, a man who couldn’t spell the word ‘tomato,’ tried to pass himself off as an inheritor of the legacy of JFK.

‘Senator Quayle,’ responded Lloyd Benson, ‘I knew Jack Kennedy, I worked with Jack Kennedy. Senator Quayle, you are no Jack Kennedy.’

 

Other faith traditions have tales about the glory of having an occasionally errant child of a community wander away and look to return.

Other faith traditions have tales of welcoming back the returning child with extraordinary delight.

But I don’t think those stories reflect us, you and I, today.

I’ve spent almost five hours in interviews this past week facing questions and concerns.

And there’s been a lot of fear, a lot of anxiety. I am too much this, not enough that, what about the legacy of Louis?

 

I want, today, to explore what I understand by inheriting a fearsome and glorious spiritual inheritance and what I understand by the command to carry a fearsome and glorious inheritance forward.

 

It is a perfect parasha to explore these ideas.

Ve’eleh toledot.

And these are the generations.

This week’s parasha is the story of Isaac, an inheritor of a fearsome and glorious spiritual inheritance.

A man who

dug again the wells of water, which they had dug in the days of Abraham his father; and he called their names after the names by which his father had called them.

 

Ve’eleh toledot

And these are the generations

This week’s parasha is also the story of Isaac the ancestor

A man who bequeathed a legacy to the generation to come – to Jacob, Israel, to all of us sitting here today, some four thousand years later.

 

The unfolding of generations.

From one to another.

 

A story, about the unfolding of generations.

It comes from Rabbi Jacob’s charming autobiography.

Rabbi Jacobs has just been appointed to the flagship congregation, the New West End, and he is, in his own words, indulging in some namedropping.

He’s telling of all the Lords and Ladies, the dignitaries and captains of industry and he recalls a moment, just before the first Kol Nidrei service at the synagogue.

And he’s standing in the vestry with the Third Lord SoandSo whom he had only recently met.

 

These are Rabbi Jacobs’ words.

Time was pressing and I suggested that we go into the synagogue for Kol Nidre.

The Lord replied that he did not want to enter the synagogue for a while and that he would explain why after the service.

His explanation was that his grandfather, the first Lord, although a very observant Jew, did not hold with the Kol Nidre formula and used to wait patiently in the foyer until this part of the service was over.

His son, the second Lord, less observant and a little indifferent to the whole question would still wait outside because his father had done so.

The third Lord explained he personally didn’t understand what it was all about, but felt obliged to carry on the family tradition.

 

I find it a sad tale.

A tale of an emptying, a tale about the survival of the husk at the expense of the kernel.

A meaningless ritual followed for no particular reason other than the fact that his father had done is that way.

It’s the kind of story that makes me fear for the future of our glorious spiritual inheritance.

It’s a story that makes me fear, just a little, about this glorious synagogue.

 

I’m sure that as Rabbi Jacobs was writing this tale of his Lordship, he had in mind the famous story that closes Gershon Scholem’s magisterial Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, Scholem, of course, was much admired by Rabbi Joacobs who chaired one of Scholem’s lectures in London.

The story of their Lordships certainly reminded me of this tale.

 

When the [founder of Chasidism] the Baal Shem had a difficult task before him, he would go to a certain place in the woods, light a fire and meditate in prayer and what he had set out to perform was done.

When,  a generation later [his student] the Maggid was faced with the same task he would go to the same place in the woods and say, ‘We can no longer light the fire, but we can still speak the prayer – and what he wanted done became reality.

Again a generation later Rabbi Moshe Leib of Sassov had to perform this task. And he too went into the woods and said, ‘We can no longer light a fire, nor do we know the secret meditation belonging the prayer, but we do know the place in the woods to which it all belongs and that must be sufficient’ and sufficient it was.

But when another generation had passed and Rabbi Israel of Rishin was called upon to perform the task, he say down on his golden chair in his castle and said, ‘We cannot light the fire, we cannot speak the prayer, we do not know the place, but we can tell the story of how it was done.’”

 

Rabbi Israel died some 150 years ago, and most of us have forgotten even the story.

 

It’s very easy to become maudlin at the passing of one generation.

We mourn those we love.

We mourn those who lit a beacon for us.

Even if we think, in theory, that we have ‘got over’ the mourning for a lost loved one, our losses pray upon us,

Most particularly when we face the all too concrete question of moving on - opening our homes and our heart to someone else – that’s when our losses can haunt us most fiercely.

And in the face of this ferocity it is all too possible to cast any potential next partner as a fraud, as a failure, as not really ‘my type.’

It’s all too possible to subject any incomer to a test that will break anyone.

I’m sure we have all done it.

And it’s a good thing to be scared about, if you are in the business of vele toledot.

And I am scared.

 

I was thinking about this, particularly last week, in the context of Eliezer’s attempt to find a partner for his master’s son Isaac.

I couldn’t help but read this story from the perspective of a Rabbinical Search process.

Abraham sets out the brief;

no-one from the daughters of Canaan, Gd forbid,

And off Eliezer goes, loaded up with trinkets and baubles to attract some bright young thing for Isaac.

I wonder how Eliezer felt on the return journey, coming back with this stranger, someone to lead into the future. Leading a search committee is a daunting task, Milton, I suspect you know this better than I.

A lot of nerves and a good slice of fear.

 

I wonder how Rebecca would have felt, shifting a little uncomfortably on her camel at the prospect of spending the rest of her life with a man she had never met.

I wonder how Isaac would have felt, at the prospect of some new woman in his life.

Actually while we know nothing about Eliezer and virtually nothing about Rebecca’s feelings, we do know about Isaac – the suitor.

 

v¼¨­¦t‰k IËk›h¦v§T³u vÁ¨e‰c¦r›,¤t jÍ©E°H³u IºN¦t vɨr¨G ¿vŠk¡v«Ît¨v e½¨j‰m°h ¨vɤtˆc±h³u 

IœN¦t hË¥r£jœ©t e¼¨j‰m°h oË¥j²B°H³u ¨v·†c¨v¡tœ®H³u

 

And Isaac brought Rebecca to the tent of Sarah his mother

And he took Rebecca and she was for him a wife

And he loved her

And he was comforted after the death of his mother.

 

We know it works.

 

Oddly there is virtually no Rabbinic commentary on this verse.

There’s a charming Midrash[1] that tells us that once Rebecca was installed as Isaac’s wife a cooling wind – a ruach, a spirit, that had been lacking since Sarah passed away – returned.

We know it worked, but we don’t know how.

There are no stories about Isaac and Rebecca going on dates in the foyers of the King David Hotel.

No clues as to what I could do, now, to help find a way to have you accept me as the next Rabbi of this special community.

 

The verse is so stark in its simplicity –

He took her as a wife, and then he loved and then he was comforted.

Maybe there is wisdom in the order of the verbs.

You have to commit before you can love.

You have to love before you can be comforted.

Courting seems so much more complex these days.

But I’m not sure it is possible to feel comforted until you fall in love again,

And I’m not sure it is possible to fall in love without commitment.

 

It’s easy to feel maudlin at the passing of a generation.

 

This is the very last Mishnah in Tractate Sotah. It is describing the end of a generation some 1800 years ago.

 

When Rebbi Meir passed away, there were no more great tellers of tales.

When Ben Azzai passed away, there were no more keen scholars.

When Ben Zoma passed away, there were no more great sermons.

When Rabbi Akiva passed away, there was no more honour for the Torah.

It goes on.

When Rebbe died, there was no more humility and there was no more fear of sin.

 

It’s a maudlin, almost terminally despairing view of Jewish life.

And admittedly it was a hard time to believe in a Jewish future.

But we, Jews, are forbidden from yeush – despair, and by the time of the completion of the Gemorah this Mishnah has a different ending.

 

Rabbi Yoseph turned to the teacher of the text and he told him,

Don’t include the piece about there being no more humility – d’ika ana.

For here I am.

Rabbi Nahman turned to the teacher of the text and he told him,

Don’t include the piece about there being no more fear of sin – d’ika ana.

Here I am.[2]

 

Who did these fools think they were?

Rabbi Yoseph, I knew Jack Kennedy, I worked with Jack Kennedy...

 

Actually I suspect they knew exactly what they were doing.

I love the idea that Rabbi Yoseph waits, while this whole litany of what is no more unfolds, until someone says there is no more humility. And this is the point he challenges – what holy chutzpah does that take!

The Mishnah can’t be allowed to stand because it’s too maudlin, and we are forbidden to despair.

 

I love the idea that the only possible response to what has passed, as one generation unfolds into another, is to say

Ika ana

Here I am.

 

And so,

Ika ana

Here I am.

And I don’t know how to light the fire, I don’t know the words of the Baal Shem’s magical prayer, I don’t know where to go in the forest.

But I do know the story.

I know Scholem’s story, the story as it appears in Major Trends.

I know a whole bunch of Talmud and philosophy and theology and all that good stuff.

And I know the story of this place, of New London Synagogue.

 

But more important even than all that, I know something else that the Baal Shem and the Maggid and the rest of them knew.

I know that there is something that needs to be done.

A task which summons our attention and our best efforts.

And what is that task?

The same as it has always been.

 

We live in a world where the unfettered call of materialism spreads misery and threatens to rip the soul out of human beings, turning us into productive units, overpaid hamsters spinning our way round and round and not really getting anywhere.

We live in a world where religious idolatry – fundamentalism – has succeeded in destroying the World Trade Centres and threatens so much more horror.

Ve’ele toldot some things change and some just stay the same.

We are still the inheritors of Avraham avinu who broke the false idols of faux religious piety and struck out on a journey towards a life with decency, integrity and kindness.

The task is still not done.

The story is not at an end.

 

D’ika anna

I know this story.

I know its past and I think I know its future.

A future I want to share with you all.

If you will do me that honour.

Shabbat shalom,

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[1] Bereishit Rabba 60:16

[2] Sotah 49b