Kol Nidre 5771 – September 17, 2010
Rabbi Gary S. Creditor
Richmond, Virginia 23221
On November 6th, 1860 Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the soon to be divided United States. On April 12th, 1861 the Civil War erupted with the firing upon Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor, South Carolina. The sesquicentennial, one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of these events is soon upon us. The wounds from the War Between the States are not healed. They can be seen in the dispute whether or not VCU should pave the parking lot near Main Street Station because there might be graves of slaves in that location; in the bus lines that don't run to the counties; the fight over the location of the Diamond; the separation of school systems; of responsibility for crime, poverty and the homeless. It is political agenda to which religion must also speak. I was invited to co-develop a special seminar for the Osher Institute at the University of Richmond. My task was to glean from the wisdom of Judaism and our history to reflect on the issues of retribution, revenge and forgiveness. We have a compelling and unique message to our immediate community of Richmond, to the larger society and to ourselves on these subjects. They are present in both the macro and microcosms of existence. We cannot undo the most terrible conflict ever fought on this soil. We do have to deal with its consequences. On the personal level, we have all been in the position of causing hurt or being hurt. The human heart in its basest level can simply want revenge. The message of Judaism leads to forgiveness and reconciliation. This is the heart of our observances of Yom Kippur, our purpose for being here tonight. Perhaps this sharing will be helpful to our individual lives, perhaps for our wider community.
In redacting my material for tonight, I focus only on the following questions:
1. What are the core Jewish values that undergird society, both community and family?
2. What is the mechanism of Teshuva?
3. What is the relationship between forgiving and forgetting?
Who has the obligation to ask for forgiveness? Is there an obligation to forgive?
Who can forgive whom, especially when it spans 150 years?
4. I want to talk about Alex Lebenstein, zichrono livracha.
Our Core Values:
When asked for the most important verses in the Torah, the Rabbis picked two, one from Leviticus, the famous "Love thy neighbor as thyself' and one from Genesis (5:1) "This is the record of humanity when God created humanity in the image of God, He made them." The Rabbinical tradition stresses these because they elevate the humanity, the dignity, the honor, the holiness of the human being, as primary in God's sight, and thus in ours. In Hebrew: K'vot Haberiyot. How beautiful is the Torah. It commands us to be proactive on behalf of those with disabilities and not to capitalize on them. The Rabbis strongly expressed the idea that no one's blood is redder than someone else's, that the honor of the other person should be as precious to us as our own. For God, from the Genesis quote, humanity is undifferentiated. Being white, black, or any color of the rainbow, being young or old, firm or infirm, of one gender or another does not elevate nor subordinate us before each other or before God. Judaism teaches the equality of humanity as its core value. Each human being is holy. Our holiness comes from God. No one else can give it. No one else can take it away. Judaism could not have countenanced slavery. Our Torah and Prophets are clear. The Rabbinical literature is unequivocal. On the personal level, whether it is abuse of ourselves through substances, spousal abuse, abuse of the elderly, ignoring poverty and homelessness, lying and cheating, these diminish God's image in us. We have no right to diminish others. We must not diminish ourselves.
Woven through the Machzor and Siddur are the core values of rachamim, chemlah and gemilut chasadim, mercy, compassion and deeds of loving-kindness. Judaism presents these as Godly values for they describe His attitude towards us. In return, we are commanded to imitate God in our daily life, in our relationships between each other, in our families, at work, in the extended society. Judaism teaches that all life is precious and should be handled with care. Through the enactment of these values in our lives we preserve and enhance the dignity of all people. I think of this, and then I think of the movie Roots. How disparate?! How demanding, how humane are the dictates of our tradition!
God's covenant with Israel, our gift to the world, is enunciated in the verse in Genesis explaining why God chose Abraham to proclaim His message to the world. (18:19) "I know Abraham, for he will command his children and household after him, that they may keep the way of the Lord, to do righteousness and justice – tzedakah v'mishpat." In Leviticus we are commanded to pursue justice. One of the core pieces of this season's liturgy is to balance the two values together and to base society on both of them. In that way we observe and protect each one's honor and holiness.
In the famous story in the Talmud (Shabbat 31a), Hillel summed up the entire Torah by saying that you should not do unto others what is hateful to you. Sinah – hatred and sinat chinam, baseless hatred, are the most destructive dynamics of the human heart. Despite the harshness of Egyptian bondage, there is no echo of hatred towards them in our tradition. Instead, at Seder we remove a drop of wine from the cup at the mention of the ten plagues and their abbreviations. The true Jewish hero is the one who can turn his enemy into a friend (Avot DeRabbi Natan 23). Whether in society or in our families, the Jewish way is not to hate another. There is no fixing, no mending, and no repairing through hatred.
When composing this sermon and reaching this point my mind wandered away from Richmond and the Civil War, away from our families and wondered if any of this is shared across the borders of Middle East. I wondered if someone might create parallel texts from the different traditions that echo the same teachings and preach it from every mosque and synagogue. I wonder if anyone is listening. Maybe. Just maybe. I hope. I pray.
Teshuvah:
To deal with the world and our wounds, our pain and anger, to repair the world and ourselves, Judaism proclaims the process of teshuvah. Uusually it is translated as repentance but I would like to translate it as either turning or returning to our pristine, pure innocent childlike origin. There are five steps: (1)hakarat ha-cheit – recognition of sin, (2)charatah – remorse for having done it, (3)azivat ha-cheit – stop doing it, (4) peirar'on –restitution when possible, and( 5) viduiy – confession. The list is simple. The process is not. It takes guts to admit what we have done and turn to another, to confess and ask forgiveness. I watch Menachem instructing Ariel, Moshe and Raya to ask each other when they have hurt the other when playing or taking the toy from the other. Even children for simple things realize its difficulty. The highest form of teshuvah is that done from ahavah – from love and not from yirah, from fear. We should fix things and mend relationships because we love each other not because we are afraid of each other. We should heal broken hearts because we are motivated by love. We need to fix our society by turning to each other, sincerely and openly, in love. According to Jewish law, the person to whom one has turned is obliged to forgive, to give mechilah and selichah, renounce the debt owed and forgive from the heart.
Judaism teaches that the process of teshuvah needs to be done face to face. Only the person wronged can forgive the person who wronged him. That works between us here in this room or in our families for those alive. But how do we ask the dead for forgiveness? I have stood by my father's grave and asked him. How does he forgive me? The answer lies in the faith that even from olam habah, the world to come, there is a metaphysical bridge and if my sentiments cross it in purity and sincerity, completeness of heart and soul, then forgiveness crosses back to me. This is a leap of faith but it is worthy of making.
A cardinal Jewish belief and law is that we cannot forgive on behalf of others. Only the person hurt can forgive. There are many eloquent statements made about the Holocaust that we do not have the right on behalf of the dead to forgive all those who killed Jews. Only the dead can forgive. We can't. I know that we will never forget the Holocaust nor forgive Hitler and all the accomplices. We haven't forgotten the destruction of Solomon's Temple in 586 B.C.E. by the Babylonians, nor the Second Temple by the Romans. Yet I don't hate the Iraqis, descendants of the former, or the Italians, for the latter. They have no true connection to the events of 2500 and 2000 years ago, respectively. Time and generations have intervened. Maybe that is the way it will be with Germany and the Jews, and generations far after us. Not forgiving. Not our right. Not forgetting. History is our inner fabric. Each society receives the consequence for the sins of earlier generations, even if they are not guilty for sin perpetrated. But we can change the relationship. We can turning to each other.
To transition, who asks, who is asked, who can forgive those involved in the slave trade and slavery in this country? How can teshuvah be done? What did you and I have to do with slavery? My family came long afterwards. What can I be guilty of? Of what do I need atone? My answer to the seminar was that there is no one alive who can ask to be forgiven and there is no one alive who can forgive. Time has removed them all. Yet we are here, all citizens of Richmond, of this country, of the world, indelibly intertwined with each other. That chord cannot be severed. We have received the consequences of what earlier generations have done. We have to deal with it. We can turn with the values I enumerated with open ears and hearts and work to change our city and region, work to understand the historical record that each community carries on its back. We can work to change our world. The sesquicentennial must be a time of turning of communities and people in reconciliation with each other.
Alex Lebenstein:
I knew Alex when we both lived on Long Island. I was his Rabbi. We were both surprised to find each other here in Richmond. I hope that all of you know his life story. He survived the Holocaust and came to America, the only survivor of 19 Jewish families in Haltern am See, Germany. He throbbed with pain and anger. He ceased speaking and reading German. In 1994 two girls from the middle school in Haltern contacted Alex to come and speak to them about the Holocaust because they knew that their parents were not telling them the whole story. Alex was bitterly torn. He had fantasies of bombing the place. He decided to go. In the last days of his life when I was sitting with him in the hospital, he needed to speak of these events. He said to me: "How could I hate these innocent children? They hadn't done anything to me!" His trip there was transformational. While he would struggle to his dying day, the joy that animated him, the reconciliation that occurred in his heart was miraculous. It was more than that they named the school after him. It was the relationship with the new generation, the openness and honesty, the sharing, the physical contact with a generation twice removed, that created a metamorphosis with him.
Not everyone can be an Alex Lebenstein, but all that I have said above came true in him. I think that Alex and his life is a great paradigm for our society and individually. He didn't forgive those that murdered his family. They were dead and didn't ask for it. He didn't forget. The Holocaust defined his existence. He relinquished he desire for revenge. In seeing Haltern face to face Alex and they were transformed, elevated to a higher, holier plane of existence. They saw his humanity and he saw theirs. They turned to each other with respect and dignity, and were reconciled. That knowledge accompanied Alex to heaven. I have faith that there he knows true peace. That is the goal for us all, a true and complete peace.
Conclusion:
This is the paradigm that Judaism and our history offer Richmond 150 years after the onset of the Civil War whose consequences still afflict us. This the paradigm that Judaism offers our individual lives on how to heal broken hearts and bind up wounds that otherwise would fester and destroy us. The process of change is difficult. Everyone arrives at their own place. It takes time, courage, patience and sincerity. Yet Judaism holds before us the promise of kapparah, a true cleansing and atonement from God for our souls and peace in our hearts.
L'shanah tovah tekatayvu and vtaychataymu.
So may we be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life for life. Amen.
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