The Boy and The Pearl

October 20th, 2006 
Rabbi Gary S Creditor

On February 21,2002, in Karachi, Pakistan, the thirty-eight year old Wall Street Journal Reporter Daniel Pearl was murdered. On the gruesome video taken by his abductors, Pearls says: "My father is Jewish. My mother is Jewish. I am Jewish." He then adds to this utterly simple declaration something his murderers could not have known: "Back in the town of Bnei Brak there is a street named after my great-grandfather, Chayyim Pearl, who was one of the founders of the town." He was then beheaded.

There have been two distinctively different means employed to memorialize Daniel Pearl. On the second anniversary of his death, Daniel's parents, Ruth and Judea Pearl, invited 147 well-known Jews to reflect on Daniel's last words by thinking about the meaning of Jewishness. The title is taken directly from his recorded last words, "I Am Jewish." It is a fascinating book. The contributors represent a very wide spectrum of Jewish thinkers, leaders and writers. As you can imagine, they all respond from their own "place" and thus provide a vast continuum of answers. We have no way of being inside Daniel Pearl's mind, heart and soul in the last moments of his life to know why his last words were a declaration of his Jewish identity. But his parents organized the responses in the following very Jewish categories:

• Identity
• Heritage
• Covenant, Chosenness, and Faith
• Humanity and Ethnicity
• Tikkun Olam (Repairing the World) and Justice

Since my sermons are distributed on the listserv and archived on the Web site, you can refer to these categories there or buy the book. We are challenged to compose our own response to these categories.

• How would we define ourselves?
• What are we?
• Who are we?
• What are our relationships?
• To ourselves?
• To others?
• To God?
• No God?
• How narrow the circle?
• How wide the circle?
• What stands at the very center of our circle, our being?
• How do we see others?
• Alien?
• Foreign?
• Inclusive?
• Exclusive?
• Do we care about the world around us?
• As long as we are on top, who cares?
• NIMBY - Not In My Back Yard - for anything?
• Or "Love thy neighbor as thyself?" with a very wide definition of "neighbor. "
• Coupled with "Tzedek, Tzedek Tirdof' - "Justice, Justice Shalt Thou Pursue. "

Whether or not we verbally articulate our answers to these existential questions, our lives give our answers. How we act, how we do business, how we behave is our answer.

I do have one additional question:

How, if at all, does being Jewish infuse and influence our responses?

Does it matter?

Does it add something qualitative to our being and behavior?

If yes, why and how?

If not, why not?

What should you, can you, want to do about it?

The second means to commemorate Daniel Pearl's life is a network of concerts organized worldwide in which dedications are made to the ideals for which he stood and against the hatred that took his life. This was done to celebrate his birthday which was October 10th. This sermon is juxtaposed to that date and the Torah portion of Bereshit of this Shabbat.

To me Daniel Pearl is an enigma. He did not lead a particularly Jewish life. He was not connected to the Jewish community or to organized Judaism. He married a Christian woman who converted to Buddhism. I don't know the status of his son. While his great-grandfather celebrated in the quotation was connected to the very religious town of Bnei Brak, his father left that town and did not follow in the religiosity of his family. That is how Daniel was raised. And yet his journalism and personal values clearly reflected and gave evidence to the eternal vision for humanity which we find in this Shabbat's Torah portion.

While the stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel are our sacred literature, they are not Jews! Our foundational story, that there is a purposeful Creator who cares about us, whose creation was 'very good', is not told about Jews, Hebrews or Israelites. Bereshit is the Jewish view of humanity to humanity and humanity towards the physical world. The Jewish view of ecology is based on God's command to tend to the Garden. The Garden is pristine, thus our obligation to preserve the world. Adam and Eve faced the question to obey or disobey, thus the human quality of making a moral choice and being responsible for its consequence. Cain and Abel reveal to us the human passions of jealousy and anger, the distinctly Jewish view that all human beings are brothers (and sisters) regardless of any difference of color, gender, race, and religion, and thus commanded to love each other, and not murder each other. Through the story of Noah, the Book of Genesis reveals the Jewish view of humanity:

Standing in relationship and accountable to God,

Responsible for each and to each other,

That should love and not hate each other,

That is obligated to make moral choices,

That is compelled to take care of this fragile planet, our lifeboat in the galaxy.

While couched in a universal framework, it enunciates the Jewish values that are the core of our being and juxtapose us in relationship to ourselves, to others and to God.

Maybe Daniel Pearl's citation of B'nei Brak was no mystery. It was the clue to his life's work through journalism, to bring forth these cardinal and foundational beliefs and tenets of Judaism. Perhaps Daniel Pearl was murdered because his beliefs, our beliefs, are an anathema to his murderers. Our active, dedicated and passionate Jewishness raises his fallen banner, proud and high.

In celebration of his birthday, his work and his life, many literary and musical pieces were created. I close these remarks by reading one, entitled The Boy and the Pearl. For the text and its pictures, follow the links from www.DanielPearl.org.

THE BOY AND THE PEARL

Once upon a time, there was a pearl. It was a pearl with special luster, beauty and brilliance.It nestled happily in the mouth of a protective oyster.

One warm summer afternoon, a little boy climbed among the rocks that were sitting on the shore where the pearl lived in its shell. The boy nearly tripped over the oyster, tickling its lips with his toes. "Aaaah-chooo!" The oyster sneezed, spitting out the pearl, which bounced off the little boy's shin. "Mom, look," cried the little boy. "What is it?" he asked. "That is a pearl," replied his mother, "and it looks like a special pearl.

What luster! What beauty! What brilliance!"

"Can I keep it?" asked the little boy. "Well," said his mother, "usually pearls like to stay safely in their oyster houses, but since it is now out in the world, it will be your job to protect it." "I won't let anything happen to it," he promised. His mother gave him a handkerchief from her beach bag, and he carefully wrapped the pearl and placed it tenderly in his pocket. When they got home, the boy put the pearl in a small wooden box, still wrapped lovingly in the handkerchief.

As the summer wore on, the little boy kept the beautiful pearl safe and secure, only occasionally taking it out to admire its special luster and brilliance. The little boy began to feel sad that the pearl remained hidden away. Shouldn't it be shared and allowed to bring a smile to everyone who saw it? After all, it WAS an especially beautiful pearl.

The boy explained his thoughts to his mother. Shouldn't he share such an amazing pearl? Although his mother knew that the pearl was valuable, she agreed. How could she tell the boy that sharing was bad? She told him to be careful with it and to remember that not everyone would appreciate the beautiful pearl in the way that he did.

The boy put the wrapped pearl back in his pocket and began to take it with him wherever he went. Indeed, whenever the boy showed the pearl, it brought a smile to the face of everyone who saw it. "What luster! What beauty! What brilliance," everyone exclaimed. They took their smiles home with them and shared them with their families. Wherever the boy and the pearl went, they brought a little extra sunshine.

Then one day, the boy stopped to show the pearl to a little girl standing outside a jewelry store. When he unwrapped the pearl, a bright smile appeared on the little girl's face. The owner of the store came outside to see what made his daughter smile so. "Look at the pearl, Daddy," she said, "see how beautiful it is?" "Yes," the man agreed, "but now it's time for you to go inside and do your homework." With that, the little girl skipped into the store and the man turned to the boy. "That is a very valuable pearl for such a small boy," said the man, "where did you get it?" "An oyster gave it to me when he sneezed," replied the boy.

The man, who had long ago lost his sense of wonder, ignored the boy's answer and only saw that he could make a lot of money if he sold the beautiful pearl. "That pearl should be kept safe in my store," said the man, "I will give you five dollars for it." The boy knew that five dollars was a lot of money, but he told the man, "No, I think the pearl will spread more smiles if it travels with me." The man became angry and yelled, "that pearl is too valuable for you! It belongs in my store!" The boy, who still clutched the pearl in his hand, became frightened and he dropped the pearl. The pearl landed on the sidewalk and rolled to a stop at the feet of the angry man.

The boy reached for the pearl, when…

STOMP!

The man stepped on the pearl and crushed it into tiny pieces.

"A pearl is not for little boys," the man raged, "and now you have learned your lesson."

The boy stooped to look at what was left of the beautiful pearl and he began to cry.

Just then, the wind began to blow. It picked up the pieces of the shattered pearl and they rose into the sky. Some of the tiny pieces blew past the boy and he smiled when he remembered the beauty of the pearl. Although the pearl was gone, the smiles and happiness it brought with it remained in his heart. The wind lifted the sparkling fragments of the pearl higher and higher into the sky. In time, the pieces floated in the air all over the world.

Every time some of the bits floated past someone, that person couldn't help but smile.

Everywhere the fragments of the pearl went, it brought smiles with it. It was just as the boy had hoped.

May his memory be for a blessing.

Amen.