Elizabeth Tikvah Sarah

About Elizabeth Tikvah Sarah

Posts by Elizabeth Tikvah Sarah:

PRO-ISRAEL AND PRO-PALESTINE by Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah, Rosh Ha-Shanah Shacharit 5785, 3rd October 2024

Edinburgh Liberal Jewish Congregation

We have gathered here this Rosh Ha-Shanah morning to mark the New Year for years. What will the New Year bring? We are concerned about the future for so many reasons – not least, because of the ongoing catastrophe of October 7 and its aftermath. But before we can look forward, we must look back, reflect on the past year, and consider the legacy of past years. Engaging in this process also includes interrogating the most precious and sacred legacy bequeathed to us, the Torah. I will turn to our Rosh Ha-Shanah portion in a moment. But first, let me begin with an experience I had ten years ago now.

In 2014, after a SodaStream Store opened in Brighton – SodaStream being an Israeli eco-company with its factory in the West Bank – the local branch of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign staged a picket.[1] Inevitably, a section of the local Jewish community decided to undertake a counter-protest. One Shabbat afternoon, after finishing my teaching, I went into the store to find out how the staff were dealing with the protesters. Doing so, involved walking through the two camps; the one waving Palestinian flags, the other waving Israeli flags. After I left, I decided on a strategy: to step between the binary. And so, I ordered both flags. I also created a placard for wearing front and back, with the words Anti-Israel, Anti-Palestine, crossed out in favour of Pro-Israel, Pro-Palestine. The following Shabbat, I returned to the EcoStream store, where I attempted to speak to both sets of protesters. I’m sure you can guess the reaction of both sides. Those bearing Israeli flags, could only see that I was holding a Palestinian flag. Those holding Palestinian flags, could only see that I was holding an Israeli flag.

I love Israel, which I first visited as a 23-year-old in 1978, and I’m also deeply committed to the Jewish values of justice and peace. So, for me, there is no contradiction between being pro-Israel and pro-Palestine. On the contrary. From my perspective as a Jew who has dedicated their life to the Jewish people, taken Jewish ethical teachings to heart, and does what I can to practice what I preach, being pro-Israel involves being pro-Palestine. We read in the book of Deuteronomy: Tzedek, Tzedek tirdof, ‘Justice, Justice you shall pursue’ (16:20). Justice for Israel and Justice for Palestine. Pursuing Justice, demands acknowledging the right of both sibling peoples to be treated justly.

Sibling peoples. The tragic irony of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is that there are so many similarities in the historical experiences of the Jewish and Palestinian peoples; both marginalised and persecuted, both exiled and dispersed. Of course, the establishment of the modern State of Israel empowered the Jewish people, while the Palestinians’ longing for self-determination continues to be thwarted by an Israeli government that is determined to crush their aspirations. The as yet unresolved conflict between sibling peoples goes back to Abraham. In the Torah portion we read this morning from Genesis 21, the two sons of Abraham, Ishmael and Isaac are separated from one another because Abraham’s wife, Sarah, is determined that Ishmael, the product of the union of Abraham with her Egyptian servant, Hagar, ‘shall not inherit with my son, with Isaac’ (21:10b). Abraham’s sons divided because inheritance cannot be shared.

But this is not the whole story. When God told Abraham, to listen to Sarah’s voice, ‘because in Isaac seed shall be called to you’ (21:12b), God added: ‘and also the son of the slave woman I will place as a nation because he is your seed’ (21:13). Two sons of Abraham. Two inheritances. And Ishmael’s mother, Hagar also received this Divine message. We first meet Hagar in Genesis 16, when unable to bear children, Sarah – at that time called Sarai – implored Abraham – at that time called Abram – ‘go, I pray you, to my servant; it may be that I am builded up through her’ (16:2b). The first recorded surrogacy arrangement went disastrously wrong. Once Hagar was pregnant, Sarai was jealous of her and treated her harshly. Hagar’s response was to flee to the wilderness. There a messenger of God found her by a fountain of water, and spoke with her. Enquiring why she was there, Hagar told the Divine messenger that she was in flight from her mistress. The Divine messenger then urged her to return, telling her that her seed would be greatly multiplied, and that she would bear a son and call him Ishmael, ‘because the Eternal has heard your affliction’ (16:11). Ishmael in Hebrew, Yishma-Eil, means ‘God shall hear’. These promises are repeated in an abbreviated form in our Rosh Ha-Shanah Torah portion Genesis 21, where we read that when banished with her son to the wilderness, a Divine Messenger called to Hagar from heaven, and told her that God ‘has heard the voice of the lad where he is’ (21:17b), and ‘will make him a great nation’ (21:18b).

So, two brothers divided in order to ensure that the inheritance due to Isaac as the son of Abraham and Sarah was not shared. But Ishmael was also due an inheritance. Given that the Torah relates the account of our beginnings as a people, it is remarkable that Hagar is given a voice, and that the text makes it clear that, as Abraham’s son, Ishmael was also the heir of a Divine inheritance. But this is indeed what the text says. And it’s not only a story in the Torah that is read as part of the annual Torah-reading cycle. Genesis 21 is the traditional portion for the first day of Rosh Ha-Shanah. Liberal Jews only mark one day, so Genesis 22, traditionally the portion for the second day, is often the Liberal portion of choice, although nowadays, many congregations read the two chapters in alternate years. Liberal practice apart, Genesis 21 is read today in orthodox congregations the world over, including by fundamentalist Jewish settlers on the West Bank. Determined to keep what they understand to be ‘Biblical’ Israel for themselves, and seeing themselves as ‘Torah-true Jews’, fundamentalist settlers ignore not only the ethical teachings of the Torah, they also ignore those parts of the story of our ancestors that don’t reinforce their supremacist narrative. Of course, this has been the situation since Israel’s victory in the 1967 ‘Six Day War’, and the occupation of East Jerusalem and the West Bank of the Jordan fifty-seven years ago. But now we are in the midst of the crisis precipitated by the Hamas massacres in southern Israel on October 7. That horrifying assault which included the murder of 1200 people and 250 more being taken into captivity into Gaza, has left Israelis deeply traumatised, and the retaliatory war that followed, continues to have devastating consequences for the people of Gaza. And not only for Palestinians in Gaza. The tightening of the IDF grip in the West Bank combined with an escalation in settler violence has made the lives of all Palestinians unbearable.

We all know this, of course. But where will it lead? Separated as children, the Torah relates that Isaac and Ishmael did meet again. We read in Genesis 25 (8-10):

Abraham expired, and died in a good old age, full of years; and was gathered to his people / Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him in the cave of a Machpelah, in the field of Ephron, the son of Zohar the Hittite, which is before Mamre. / The field which Abraham purchased from the children of Heit; there was Abraham buried, and Sarah his wife.[2]

Sarah died first, then Abraham. Do we have to wait for the passing of another generation before steps are taken back from the brink and towards a just and peaceful resolution? How many more people have to die?

One of the ways I try to remain positive in the face of the ongoing catastrophe is by looking beyond the abyss of the present to a possible future in which a confederation of states, Israel, Palestine and Jordan, work together for their mutual benefit. A few years ago, I attended a New Israel Fund breakfast meeting with representatives from Friends of the Earth Middle East, an organisation that encompasses Israel, Palestine and Jordan, and is based in Tel Aviv, Bethlehem, and Amman, respectively.[3] One of the major initiatives of Friends of the Earth Middle East is around water, and indeed, the organisation regards climate change with its attendant water shortages as a major contributor to regional insecurity.[4] Water knows no national boundaries. With the river Jordan reduced to a trickle, all three nations face the threat of drought with apocalyptic consequences, if they don’t cooperate together to conserve and share water.

The philosopher Martin Buber, best known for his book, I and Thou,[5] was passionately committed to a version of Zionism in which both peoples thrived on the land.[6] Buber articulated the essential equality between the Israeli and Palestinian claims to the land in an open letter that he wrote to Mahatma Gandhi in 1939 before the outbreak of the Second World War. Buber wrote to Gandhi in response to Gandhi’s position that ‘Palestine belongs to the Arabs.’ Let me quote from Buber’s letter:[7]

I belong to a group of people who from the time Britain conquered Palestine have not ceased to strive for the concluding of a genuine peace between Jew and Arab.

By a genuine peace we inferred and still infer that both peoples together should develop the land without the one imposing its will on the other…. We considered it a fundamental point that in this case two vital claims are opposed to each other, two claims of a different nature and a different origin which cannot objectively be pitted against one another and between which no objective decision can be made as to which is just, which unjust…

… We considered and still consider it our duty to understand and to honor the claim which is opposed to ours and to endeavor to reconcile both claims.

Eighty-five years have passed since Buber wrote that letter. Despair, generated by the horrors of October 7, and the devastation wrought on Gaza and its people by Israel’s ongoing war against Hamas, may make us feel that it could take another eighty-five years, at least, for the Israeli and Palestinian peoples to commit to a plan that is capable of reconciling their mutual claims to the land ‘between the river and the sea’. But today is Rosh Ha-Shanah. A new year has begun, and we are challenged to revive the spirit of Hope within us. The early rabbis regarded Rosh Ha-shanah as harat olam, the ‘birthday of the world’.[8] Indeed, the new year date, 5785, takes us back to the birth of the world on the basis of the chronologies in the Book of Genesis. Of course, the world did not come into being 5785 years ago, but the fact that we begin our calendar, not with our first ancestors, Abraham and Sarah, but rather with Creation, reminds us that our God is, as the traditional blessing formula puts it, Melech ha-olam, ‘Sovereign of the universe’; the One God of all peoples. May the universalist message of Rosh Ha-Shanah inspire us with a vision of a future of justice and peace, so that we may continue the work of tikkun olam, repair of the world, in the year that lies ahead. And let us say: Amen.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

  1. https://palestinecampaign.org/case-sodastream/

    https://brightonpsc.org/campaigns-2/brighton-says-no-to-israeli-settlement-business-in-our-town-the-ecostream-campaign/ ↑

  2. See Genesis 23: 1-20 for Sarah’s death and Abraham’s purchase of the cave. ↑

  3. https://www.ecohubmap.com/company/NGO/friends-of-the-earth-middle-east/ktvmz1co ↑

  4. https://www.globalnature.org/bausteine.net/f/6036/crossingthejordan.pdf?fd=2

    https://ecopeaceme.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/climate-change-a-new-threat-to-middle-east-security-same-title-as-above-but-above-is-just-a-word-document-this-one-is-a-publication.pdf ↑

  5. Buber, Martin, I and Thou. First published in 1923. First translated from German into English in 1937. A centennial edition, with a translation by Ronald Gregor Smith, was published in 2023 by Simon and Schuster. https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/I-and-Thou/Martin-Buber/9780743201339 ↑

  6. Together with Judah Magnes, the Chancellor of the Hebrew University and others, in 1921 Martin Buber founded an organisation called B’rit Shalom, which argued for a bi-national homeland See: A Land of Two Peoples, Martin Buber on Jews and Arabs, ed., Paul R. Mendes-Flohr (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983). ↑

  7. From: Martin Buber’s ‘Open Letter’ to Gandhi Regarding Palestine (February 24, 1939) in Arthur Hertzberg, Ed., The Zionist Idea. (Philadelphia: Jewish Publications Society, 1997, pp. 463-464).

    ↑

  8. ‘This day is the birthday of the world’, ha-yom harat olam, is the first phrase of a passage recited during the blowing of the shofar (‘ram’s horn’) in the Musaf ‘additional’ service on Rosh Ha-Shanah. The passage first appears in Seder Rav Amram (II, 114), the first prayer book, which was published in the 9th century. The Babylonian Talmud, tractate Rosh Ha-Shanah 10b-11a, includes a discussion of the New Year as the anniversary of Creation.

    ↑

THE CHALLENGE TO CHANGE by Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah, Erev Rosh Ha-Shanah 5785, 2nd October 2024

Edinburgh Liberal Jewish Congregation

The sun has set on the old year. Do we feel that a New Year has begun? Almost twelve months have passed since October 7. That devastating year continues for another few days. And what of October 8? We are longing for the horror of war to end, but we know that even the advent of a ceasefire, even the return of the remaining hostages, will not mean an end to the pain and suffering, grief and loss. The twelve hundred massacred on October 7. The 250 hostages torn away. The captives violated. The survivors bearing their losses, unable to return to homes ravaged by fire. The families of the hostages waiting month after month for the return of their loved ones. The tens of thousands killed and severely injured in Gaza during Israel’s retaliatory war against Hamas, their bodies, minds and spirits broken. The bereaved, whose homes lie in ruins. An entire people living in daily terror, for almost 365 days now, subject to displacement again and again, with no hope of safe refuge. And then, there is the conflict across the northern border between Israel and Hezbollah. More than sixty thousand Israelis have been displaced from their homes for almost a year, and over a million Lebanese citizens have now taken flight, with at least one thousand killed and injured so far in the bombardments. And now, just yesterday, a terrifying escalation, with a large-scale ballistic missile attack launched by Iran against Israel.

Those who have lived through the torment of the past twelve months will continue to live in torment whatever happens in the coming weeks and months. And what of us? Although we are thousands of miles away, the continuous news coverage means that we have been and continue to be witnesses. And of course, as Jews, we are more than witnesses. Some of us have family and friends in Israel. And even without that kind of tangible connection, we our part of the people Israel, which includes the Jewish citizens of the State of Israel. We are also Progressive Jews, committed to the values of justice and peace. Our hearts break for both Israelis and Palestinians. And so, we, too, feel the torment, as we continue to struggle with feelings of helplessness, and ask ourselves: What can we do?

The question itself is tormenting. The sky is dark. The New Year has barely begun. Before we consider setting ourselves the task of doing anything, we have to address ourselves; we have to examine our lives over the past year. As we struggle with our feelings of helplessness alongside our desperate need to discern the possibilities for renewal in the New Year, we have to ask ourselves more immediate questions: Are we, ourselves, prepared and ready to change? Do we feel able, as individuals, to change? Hebrew is a very concise language. Unlike English, which proliferates words that basically share the same meanings, Hebrew proliferates meanings out of single words. And so, it is with the word ‘change’ in Hebrew. Rosh Ha-Shanah, means, literally, ‘head of the year’, and many of us will utter the greeting, shanah tovah, and wish one another a ‘good year’. Interestingly, the root meaning of shanah, ‘year’ – means ‘change’, and also, paradoxically, ‘repeat’. When we consider what is entailed in a year, the paradox makes sense. A New Year signals change, and also continuity: every year we repeat the cycle of the sacred days; and as a new cycle begins, we also face the as yet unknown future that lies ahead, and the challenge to change.

Repetition and change. As we look back on the past year, do we long for change? Or do we long for certainty and stability? As I ask myself these questions, the words of Black American lesbian singer-songwriter, Tracy Chapman, come to mind. In her song, ‘Change’, which is the first item on her 2005 album, Where You Live, Tracy Chapman interrogates the listener in an effort to explore the circumstances that make us change. She does this by challenging us with a series of questions around one repeated question: ‘Would you change?’ It’s a wonderful song, and if you don’t know it, you can find it online. It’s also very insistent. Tracy Chapman throws out challenge after challenge. The penultimate challenge hits hard:

If everything you think you know

Makes your life unbearable

Would you change?

Would you change?

This challenge gets to me because it seems that the response is obvious. If everything that I think I know makes my life unbearable, then, of course, I would change. But would I? Do we change when our lives become unbearable? Or do we feel that bearing the unbearable is more bearable than finding the courage we need to change? Which begs the question: Why is the prospect of changing ourselves so unbearable? Is it that, having tried to change on many previous occasions – not least at the New Year – and failed, we feel that we are incapable of changing? But if we do feel that we are basically incapable of change, how can we expect anything to change in the world around us? I’m sure many of us are familiar with the stock-phrase, ‘Be the change that you want to see’, which has become part of the self-help tool-kit in recent years. Like many of the other soundbite products of the market that has developed in response to our urge for instant self-improvement solutions, the call to ‘be the change you want to see’, does not address the difficulties many of us may feel in effecting change in ourselves and in our lives. One of the problems with it is that it doesn’t address a major obstacle to personal change: fear. How can I be the change I want to see if I’m afraid of what might happen if I change? Will I be able to hold myself together? Will I be able to keep my family together? Will I be able to maintain my friendships and my relationships with colleagues at work? If I change, will they whole edifice of my life crumble around me? Fear, can be overwhelming. It can certainly hold us back from stepping out along new pathways. But let us not forget: Fear is not a pathological feeling. Feeling fear is essential to our survival. Without fear of real danger holding us back, we might run headlong into it: fall off the edge of a cliff, be hit by a speeding car. Fear helps us to navigate as we go about our lives. On the other hand, those who become overcome with fear as a habitual response, may end up not leaving their homes. The last song on Tracy Chapman’s Where You Live album speaks to this dilemma: ‘Be and be not afraid’. We have to be appropriately fearful, and also find ways of containing our fear, so that we are not immobilised by it. Our capacity to change hinges on this balancing act.

We find a lesson about what it means to be and not be afraid in the portion from the Torah that we will read tomorrow morning from Genesis 21 (:1-21). The portion tells the story of what happened when Ishmael, Abraham’s first-born son, and his mother Hagar were banished from the household because Sarah wanted to ensure, as she put it, that ‘the son of this slave-woman shall not be heir with my son, with Isaac’ (21:10b). The narrative relates that Abraham gave Hagar bread and a skin of water, but as she wandered in the wilderness of B’eir Sheva, the water soon ran out. In desperation, Hagar cast her son under one of the shrubs, and went and sat down some distance away, saying to herself, ‘let me not look upon the death of the child’. Feeling completely desolate in such a desolate place, Hagar then ‘lifted up her voice and wept’ (21:15-16).

Hagar was alone with her child in the wilderness, fearing the worst. But the worst did not happen. The story continues with the intervention of a messenger of God, who ‘called to her from heaven and said to her: “What is with you Hagar; do not be afraid, for God has heard the voice of the lad where he is. Get up, lift the lad and grasp your hand in his, I will place him as a great nation”’ (21:18). We read further that ‘God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water; and she went, and she filled the skin with water, and she made the lad drink’ (21:19). God came to Hagar’s aid – and what is more, the story concludes by saying that ‘God was with the lad, and he grew’ (21:20a).

As we reread this poignant story, we are reminded that God of our people is the God of all peoples. The God of Abraham, Sarah and Isaac, is also the God of Hagar and Ishmael. The message about humanity is equally clear. When we reread the tale of the expulsion of an Egyptian slave-woman and her son, it is easy for us to identify Hagar and Ishmael in one-dimensional terms as victims of persecution. But the narrative teaches us not to be so simplistic. Finding herself in victimising and desperate circumstances that left her feeling completely defeated and helpless, Hagar nevertheless summoned up the courage to look around her, see the well that in her despair she had not noticed before, pick herself up, draw water and save the life of her son. Reclaiming her volition, Hagar not only drew water from the well, she drew on her personal resources, and found the will to survive within herself. Abandoned to the desert, ultimately, Hagar did not abandon herself, or the son she had left under a bush because she couldn’t bear to witness his death.

In the past twelve months, the screens of our TVs and devices have been filled with images of desperate people, the innocent victims of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza. The story of Hagar reminds us not to reduce the victims of war and persecution to victimhood. Despite their anguish and suffering, and the depth of their unbearable losses, the people of Gaza remain determined to rebuild their lives, just as Israelis traumatised by the depraved acts of terror of October 7, are determined to rebuild their lives. At our Pesach family seder this year, I invited everyone to bring pieces of writing to share. My niece, Judith, my late brother’s middle daughter, brought a poem by Dr Refaat Alareer, a Palestinian writer, poet, translator and university professor from Gaza, who was killed in an Israeli air strike along with his brother, sister and their children on December 6. Aware that it was highly probable that he would die, Refaat Alareer delivered a call to others to live and to hold on to Hope. The poem has the title, ‘If I must die’:[1]

If I must die

you must live

to tell my story

to sell my things

to buy a piece of cloth

and some strings,

(make it white with a long tail)

so that a child, somewhere in Gaza

while looking heaven in the eye

awaiting his dad who left in a blaze –

and bid no one farewell

not even to his flesh

not even to himself –

sees the kite, my kite you made, flying up above

and thinks for a moment an angel is there

bringing back love

If I must die

let it bring hope

Hope. We are obligated to hope. Despite our sufferings as a people over millennia, we have always been, in the words of the prophet Zechariah, ‘captives of hope’ – asirey ha-tikvah.[2] A few minutes ago, I articulated a question that so many of us have been carrying in our hearts as we witness the ongoing catastrophe in Gaza: What can I do? So, what can we do? As it happens, there is a lot we can do. We can support those Israelis and Palestinians who are continuing to work together in more than thirty different organisations, driven by the vision of a different future in which both peoples live side-by-side in peace and mutual respect.[3] Feeling hopeless, we can find reasons to hope again in their example of courage and determination. We can do this. We must do this. As Jews in the diaspora, in particular, as Progressive Jews in the diaspora, we are obligated to stand up for Jewish values, and to support the efforts of those Israelis, both Jewish and Palestinian, who refuse to give in to nihilism and despair. As we enter a New Year, with the old year still holding us in its deadly thrall, let us resolve to grasp Hope for our own sakes, for the sake of our people, for the sake of both Israelis and Palestinians, and for the sake of the world.

May this be our will. And let us say: Amen.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

  1. https://ifimustdie.net/ ↑

  2. Zechariah 9:12. ↑

  3. These organisations include: Standing Together/Omdim Beyachad https://www.standing-together.org/en Women Wage Peace https://www.womenwagepeace.org.il/en/about/ Combatants for Peace https://cfpeace.org/about-en/ Parents Circle Bereaved Families Forum https://www.theparentscircle.org/en/about_eng-2/ Roots/Shorashim/Jadur https://b8ofhope.org/roots/

    Wahat al-Salam – Neve Shalom, ‘Oasis of Peace’ (Jewish-Christian-Muslim village)HelloHelloHello https://wasns.org/ Zazim – Community Action https://www.zazim.org.il/en/about ↑

Rosh Ha-Shanah 5785

Rosh Ha-Shanah 5785

The calendar
Proclaims
‘_Rosh Ha-Shanah_’
But how can that be?
The old year
Has not ended
Hijacked by
Horror
The new year
Suspended
On the far side of
The abyss.

Wordless
My mind
Searches for
Sounds
The voices of
The _shofar_
The sharp blast of
_T’ki’ah_
The bellowing
Boom-boom-boom of
_Sh’varim_
The rapid-nine-fire of
_T’ru’ah._

But
As my heartbeat quickens
And I try to
Listen to each
Particular inflection
All I can
Hear is a
Deafening
Tumult
The thunderous
Clamour of
War.


When will it cease?
The relentless
Tormenting
Question
We all share.

Hope
Almost abandoned
Let us take
Refuge in
The relentless
Turn of the year
With its
Promise of
Renewal.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

 

Waiting for Ethical and Effective Leadership

On June 9, I attended on Zoom a webinar organised by Rabbis for Human Rights. Founded in Israel in 1988, and comprising Israeli rabbis from across the denominational spectrum, Rabbis for Human Rights ‘is dedicated to promoting and protecting human rights in Israel and the Palestinian Territories.[1] Its activities include: providing a ‘protective presence’ during the olive season by ‘accompanying Palestinian farmers’ in order to ‘help to prevent violence and harassment, ensuring they can safely access and work their lands’; and ‘distributing food and other essential supplies to those affected by settler violence and living under occupation.’ Rabbis for Human Rights also engages in social justice work in general, including advocating for asylum seekers, creating educational programmes that teach human rights through a Jewish lens, and promoting dialogue and corporation among different religious and ethnic groups.

The theme of the webinar was the recent ‘Interfaith March for Human Rights and Peace’, held in Jerusalem that included Jews, Christians, and Muslims, and had been organised under the auspices of thirty organisations, including Rabbis for Human Rights. One of the webinar speakers, who had also spoken at the March, was Ghadir Hani, a Muslim woman, born and raised in the dual Jewish-Arab city of Akko, who is a Palestinian citizen of Israel and is active in a range of peace and coexistence organisations, including, ‘Women Wage Peace’.

On screen at the webinar, Ghadir Hani was standing in front of a photograph of the 74-year-old Jewish Israeli peace activist, Vivian Silver, who was murdered by Hamas in her home on Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel near the border with Gaza on October 7 (2023). Zichronah livrachah – may her memory be for blessing. Vivian Silver had been a member of Women Wage Peace since it was founded in the aftermath of ‘Operation Protective Edge’, Israel’s war against Hamas that began on July 8, 2014 in response to rocket attacks from Gaza.[2] Indeed, she was among those who greeted hundreds of women from all over the country when they travelled to Sderot, the town nearest to Gaza most frequently subjected to rocket attacks, to launch Women Wage Peace.[3] Meanwhile, Ghadir Hani joined Women Wage Peace, when she came to the ‘Fasting Tent’ outside the home of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which had been set up by members of the movement, and continued for fifty-two days to symbolise the number of days of ‘Operation Protective Edge’.[4]

Muslim Ghadir Hani and Jewish Vivian Silver: two women peace ‘comrades’ in each other’s ‘arms’ – as opposed to ‘comrades in arms.’ One, thankfully, still very much alive and active, the other a victim of the depraved violence perpetrated by Hamas on October 7 that generated a devastating war in Gaza that continues to this day: 260 days so far. Women continue to wage peace but their brave work is largely overshadowed by the men who continue to wage war. As has been overwhelmingly apparent over the past eight months, guns, rockets and bombs with their destructive force speak louder than words and acts of peace.

There was another woman speaker at the webinar, Rabbi Leah Shakdiel, a dedicated peace activist and scholar, who is both orthodox and a feminist and known for her contributions to interfaith and social justice work. Listening to her and to Ghadi Hani, made me reflect on the marginalisation of women’s leadership, particularly, in conflict zones, where it is needed most.

In this weeks’ parashah, B’ha’alot’cha Numbers chapter 12, we find a story that is all about the marginalisation of women’s leadership, specifically, the leadership of one woman: Miriam, the elder sister of Aaron and Moses.

There are just thirty-one verses in all about Miriam in the whole of the Torah[5] – and sixteen of them are in Numbers chapter 12.

Most of us are probably familiar with the story related in Exodus chapter 2, about how the unnamed mother and sister of the baby, who came to be called Moses, saved him from Pharaoh’s genocidal decree against new-born Israelite baby boys.

Miriam is not mentioned again until Exodus chapter 15, when having taken flight from Egypt, the Israelites crossed the divided Sea of Reeds on dry land. Just two verses are devoted to Miriam, but they are very telling (15:20-21). In addition to being named ‘Miriam’, she is designated as ‘ha-n’vi’ah, achot Aharon, ‘the prophet, the sister of Aaron.’ Miriam is also described as a leader in motion: ‘[she] took a timbrel in her hand; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances.’ Further, Miriam called on all the people to ‘sing to the Eternal’.[6]

That is the Torah’s last word about Miriam until Numbers chapter 12. The chapter which closes this week’s parashah, B’ha’a lot’cha, opens with Miriam speaking against Moses. We read (12:1):

Va-t’dabbeir Miryam – ‘Miriam spoke’ – V’Aharon – ‘and Aaron’ – b’Moshe – ‘against Moses.’

Crucially, the verb is in the feminine singular: Va-t’dabbeir, ‘She spoke’. Most translations do not reflect this. We read in the Plaut Chumash, for example: ‘Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses’.[7] But if the writer of the story had intended to say this, the verb would be in the masculine plural: Va-yom’ru Miryam v’Aharon b’Moshe. As it is, the Hebrew is clear: Even if Aaron went along with his elder sister’s challenge to their younger brother, Miriam was the chief instigator. She had good reason. After all, unlike Aaron, who was destined to be the High Priest, like the prophet Moses, she was also designated as a prophet.

The way the story proceeds supports the plain meaning of Va-t’dabbeir, ‘She spoke’: Miriam alone is punished by God with the plague of leprosy for her impudence in objecting to Moses’ unique relationship with God. Dismayed by Miriam’s punishment, Aaron acknowledges that he shares responsibility for the challenge against Moses (12:11-12), and Moses in his turn, as the singular interlocuter with the Eternal, prays to God for his sister’s healing (12:13). Nevertheless, Miriam’s punishment, which includes being excluded from the camp for seven days, stands.

It is a shocking story. Aaron is not on par with Moses, but as High Priest he later assumes an important leadership role. Miriam’s punishment reflects her marginality in the Torah and exclusion from the two-man leadership team. And yet, despite this, an important detail towards the end of the narrative suggests that although Miriam did not hold a specific leadership position, the people regarded her as a leader. We read (12:15-16):

Miriam was shut up outside the camp seven days; and the people did not journey on until Miriam was brought in again. / Then afterwards, the people journeyed from Chazeirot, and pitched in the wilderness of Paran.

‘The people did not journey on until Miriam was brought in again’. The people waited for Miriam.

They waited for her to lead them forward, as she had led the women with song and timbrels through the Sea of Reeds.

We are also waiting. We are waiting, as people everywhere are waiting during this global year of elections, for leadership that is ethical and effective. We are waiting: for the violence in Gaza to cease; for the hostages to return; for the people of Gaza to be free of the tyranny of Hamas and the siege imposed by Israel; for the occupation to end and for a new government in Israel and in the Palestinian territories that is committed to peace, security, justice and freedom for both Israelis and Palestinians.

We are also waiting, here in Britain, for polling day on July 4. We are waiting for the opportunity to elect a new government that will put country before party, the needs of the poor before the greed of the rich, that will repair our broken NHS and properly fund social care, that will untangle public transport chaos, and, rather than continue to pander to the economic interests of the fossil fuel industry, prioritise tackling the threat of climate catastrophe through investment in home insulation and green energy.

I mentioned earlier that Ghadir Hani is active in a range of peace and coexistence organisations. These include, omdim beyachad, ‘Standing Together’, ‘a progressive grassroots movement’, established, like Women Wage Peace, after the last Gaza war of 2014. Standing Together ‘mobilises Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel against the occupation and for peace, equality, and social justice.’[8] To achieve ‘a future of peace and independence for Israelis and Palestinians’, Standing Together operates on the basis that ‘we must stand together as a united front: Jewish and Palestinian, secular and religious, Mizrahi and Ashkenazi, rural and urban, and people of all genders and sexual orientations.’ Standing Together has tripled in size since October 7, and now encompasses twelve local chapters and eleven student chapters. In addition to daily demonstrations, since the beginning of March, Standing Together has been organising a ‘Humanitarian Guard’ to ensure that aid trucks get into Gaza in the face of settler violence.[9]

Standing Together is looking for ‘friends’ across the world, and the UK Friends of Standing Together has been set up to galvanise support here in Britain.[10] As we wait and wait, we can also act. We can raise our voices. We can offer moral and financial assistance. We can also join Progressive Jews for Justice in Israel/Palestine, a network initiated by Liberal Jews, that now includes members of both Liberal and Reform congregations.[11] As we continue to feel traumatised and horrified by October 7 and its aftermath, may each one of us find strength and hope in the efforts being taken by Rabbis for Human Rights, Women Wage Peace, Standing Together, and others, to create ‘an alternative to our existing reality’, and build a future of peace, equality, and justice for all.[12] And let us say: Amen.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Brighton and Hove Progressive Synagogue

22nd June 2024 – 16th Sivan 5784

  1. https://www.rhr.org.il/eng ↑

  2. https://www.womenwagepeace.org.il/en/about/ ↑

  3. https://www.womenwagepeace.org.il/en/vivian-silver/ ↑

  4.  https://www.womenwagepeace.org.il/en/ghadir-hani-woman-waging-peace/ ↑

  5. The narrative verses in the Torah that mention Miriam: Exodus 2:1-10 (not by name); Ex. 15:20-21; Numbers 12:1-16; Num. 20:1 (Miriam’s death). The non-narrative verses: Deuteronomy 24:9 (concerning the plague of leprosy); Numbers 26:59 (in the context of the members of the family Amram). ↑

  6. We read: Va-ta’an la-hem Miryam: Shiru ladonai, ‘Miriam responded to them: “Sing to the Eternal.”’ If she had addressed the women alone, the Hebrew would say la-hen, ‘to them’ (feminine), not la-hem, to them (masculine). ↑

  7. The Torah. A Modern Commentary. General Editor, W. Gunther Plaut. General Editor, Revised Edition, David E.S. Stern. Union of Reform Judaism, New York, 2005, p. 965. Chumash, meaning, ‘Fived’ is the traditional way of referring to the book version of the ‘Five Books of Moses’, that is divided into weekly portions, and which is used by congregants to follow the reading of the Torah during Shabbat morning services. The Chumash includes the haftarah, the reading from the Prophetic books of the Bible that forms the ‘conclusion’ of the reading from Scripture. ↑

  8. https://www.standing-together.org/en ↑

  9. https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-03-08/ty-article-magazine/.premium/i-couldnt-just-sit-at-home-the-arab-jewish-gaza-aid-convoy-carrying-food-and-hope/0000018e-1e72-df0d-adaf-9efee0d50000 https://www.ukfost.co.uk/standing-togethers-humanitarian-guard-defeats-far-right-settlers ↑

  10. https://www.ukfost.co.uk/ ↑

  11. For further information about Progressive Jews for Justice in Israel/Palestine, email: info@ljjip.org ↑

  12. https://www.standing-together.org/en ↑

Teasing out the Shabbat verses in K’doshim

This week, we are reading the parashah that is at the heart of the Torah: K’doshim (Leviticus chapters 19 and 20). Known in English as ‘the Holiness code’, the majority of the commandments outlined in Leviticus 19 concern ethical behaviour and our relationships with others. Progressive Jews are particularly enamoured of Leviticus 19 for this reason. Indeed, on Yom Kippur, both Liberal and Reform congregations read Leviticus 19, rather than the traditional text assigned to the day, Leviticus 18, from the previous portion, Acharei Mot, which is preoccupied with prohibited sexual acts. As it happens, K’doshim concludes in Leviticus 20, with a reprise of these prohibitions.

 

Rather than re-examine K’doshim’s ethical teachings, my reflections here concern two verses about Shabbat in Leviticus 19. We read (verse 3):

You shall revere, each person, their mother and their father; and keep My Sabbaths. I am the Eternal your God.

And (verse 30):

You shall keep My Sabbaths and revere my Sanctuary [mikdashi]. I am the Eternal.

 

My focus is on teasing out of these verses the significance of Shabbat, beginning with the comments of four of the most influential mediaeval commentators.

 

Abraham Ibn Ezra (b. Tudela, Spain, 1092) points out that verse 3 ‘corresponds to the fourth and fifth Commandments’ – the fourth being about Shabbat (Exodus 20:8-11; Deuteronomy 5:12-15), and the fifth about honouring parents (Ex. 20:12; Deut. 5:16).

 

The comment of Rashi (Rabbi Sh’lomoh Yitzchaki, b. Troyes, France, 1040) draws out the implications of the juxtaposition between revering parents and keeping Shabbat: ‘The law [to keep Shabbat] follows immediately to indicate that if a child is ordered by their father to desecrate the Sabbath, he is not to be obeyed, and similarly with the other commands.’

 

Turning to the second verse about Shabbat in Leviticus 19, Obadiah ben Ya’akov Sforno (b. Cesena, Italy, c. 1475) draws attention to the plural form: ‘My Sabbaths’, suggesting that this implies that the festivals are included. Sforno’s comment is underlined in the festival calendar in Emor (Leviticus 23), where Shabbat provides the model.

 

Meanwhile, Ramban (Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman, b. Gerona, Spain, 1194) comments on the conjunction of the two statements – keeping Shabbat and revering the Sanctuary: ‘The law of Shabbat is equal to all the commandments of the Torah, its desecration implying a denial that God created the universe.’

 

All of these interpretations emphasise the primacy of ‘keeping’ Shabbat. Ramban’s observation reminds us that the significance of Shabbat lies first and foremost in its sacred origins. The concept of the sacred is introduced in the Torah in connection with Shabbat, which is mentioned for the first time in the account of the completion of the work of Creation. We read at Genesis 2:3:

Then God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it [va-yikaddeish oto], because on it, He ceased [shavat] from all His work which God had created to do.

 

To ‘sanctify’ is to ‘set apart’; that is what the Hebrew root, Kuf Dalet Shin essentially means. God’s ceasing from the work of Creation on the seventh day as a rationale for the observance of Shabbat is stated explicitly in the Exodus version of the Shabbat Commandment (20:10a; 11):

The seventh day is a Sabbath to the Eternal your God, in it you should do any work … For in six days the Eternal heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore, the Eternal blessed the Sabbath day, and sanctified it [va-y’kad’sheihu]

 

The Exodus version of the Shabbat commandment begins with the exhortation, Zachor, ‘Remember’, while the opening word of the Deuteronomy version is Shamor, ‘Keep’. To appreciate the full resonance of the obligation involved in ‘keeping’ Shabbat, let us turn from sacred time to sacred space; from the Sabbath to the Sanctuary, bearing in mind the second statement about Shabbat in K’doshim: ‘You shall keep My Sabbaths and revere my Sanctuary. I am the Eternal’ (Lev. 19:30).

 

The Hebrew root Shin Mem Reish, to ‘keep’, also means to ‘guard’. In the Book of Numbers, the imperative of ‘guarding’ is mentioned innumerable times in the context of the Levites’ responsibilities in connection with the Sanctuary. This is the first reference, translated literally (Num.1.53b):

V’sham’ru ha-l’viyyim et mishmeret mishkan ha-eidut.

The Levites shall keep [verb: v’sham’ru] guard [noun: mishmeret] of the Tabernacle of the Testimony.

 

When we read this verse, we hear echoes of a similar formulation in connection with the Israelites’ responsibility for keeping Shabbat. As he read in Exodus 31:16a:

V’sham’ru v’nei Yisraeil et-ha-Shabbat …

The Israelites shall keep the Sabbath …

 

The Israelites/Jewish people are exhorted in the Torah to ‘keep’ / ‘guard’ the sacred time that is the Sabbath in the same way as the Levites were appointed to ‘guard’ the sacred space that was the mikdash/mishkan. It is for this reason that it is traditional to speak of an individual being shomeir (masculine)/shomeret (feminine) Shabbat; a ‘guard of the Sabbath’, an expression that appears in two verses in the Book of Isaiah 56.2; 6 (plural), and in the Shabbat piyyut, ‘poem’, Barukh El Elyon (attributed to Barukh ben Samuel of Mainz, c.1150-1221). Interestingly, it is not found in the Mishnah or the Talmud.

The Torah teaches that the Israelites are guardians of the seventh day that is set apart from the six working days. By setting apart the seventh day, the Jewish people, simultaneously, fulfils its purpose as a people set apart for God. As we read at the beginning of K’doshim (Lev.19.2):

You shall be holy [k’doshim], for I, YHWH, your God, I am holy [kadosh].

 

Having explored the two ‘Shabbat’ verses in K’doshim, we are left with questions as Progressive Jews that go deeper than how we understand ‘keeping’ Shabbat today: Do we subscribe to the vision of our task as a people expressed in this famous injunction? Is being ‘holy’ as God is ‘holy’ the rationale for our Shabbat observance as Progressive Jews? Do we still regard the Jewish people as ‘set apart’?

 

996 words

 

COUNTING THE DAYS IN ISRAEL & GAZA

Counting the Days

Counting the Days

Counting the days
In Israel
For the safe return of
The hostages
In Gaza
For the bombs
To stop falling
For sufficient aid
To get through
So many days
Since October 7
How many more?

The counting
Of the days of the Omer
Forty-nine days
From the second day of Pesach
Festival of
Freedom
To the eve of Shavuot
The Feast of  
‘Weeks’
The ‘Day of First Fruits’
The first harvest
After the long months of
Winter
Seven anxious weeks
In ancient times
Lest the harvest
Failed

And then
Centuries later
After the Roman overlords
Defeated rebellion
Destroyed Jerusalem
And the Temple
The land
Laid waste
Those seven weeks
Consumed with
Anxiety
For the future
And the anguish of
Continuing occupation
Emperor Hadrian
Crushing the rabbis’ revolt
Lashing persecutions
Subjugation
Exile

And now
After
The depraved
Killings
Violations
Abductions
Of October 7
The relentless
Bombardment
Of Gaza
Its people
Displaced
Trapped
Starved
Lives destroyed
That strip of land
Laid waste
As if it is possible
To defeat
Murderous extremism
With extreme
Indiscriminate
Violence

The commencement of
The Omer counting
Marked
One hundred and ninety-nine days
Of destruction
How much longer?

We continue
To count
The days
Will we still be counting
When the seven weeks are
Complete?
When will the horror end?
Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Additional Symbols on the Seder Plate PESACH/PASSOVER 2024/5784

PRAYER FOR REFUGEES AT PESACH

Eternal God, our Creator and Liberator, as we celebrate together at our seder and rejoice in our many blessings, we pause to remember those across the world whose lives are blighted by the curses of poverty and persecution. We think of the many millions in flight from tyranny, violence and destitution, risking their lives as they make their escape in the hope of finding refuge and security elsewhere.

Eternal Teacher of Your people Israel, as the children and grandchildren and descendants of refugees, aware of Your teachings of justice and our sacred obligations towards the stranger, we express our commitment before You now to open our hearts and our hands and our communities to welcome those in need of refuge, and to do what we can to contribute to the alleviation of their suffering. And let us say: Amen.            

SHOELACES

The shoelaces on the seder plate remind us of all those in flight from persecution and destitution, tyranny and war across the world today.

Let us take a moment now to think of them.

BEETROOT

The beetroot on the seder plate is a reminder of Putin’s brutal war against Ukraine and Ukrainian sovereignty. Ukraine’s most famous national food is borscht, for which the main ingredient is beetroot. Rabbi Igor Zinkov of the Liberal Jewish Synagogue, who is Co-Chair of the World Union/European Union of Progressive Judaism Ukraine Emergency Support Fund, writes:

“The story of Pesach is the story of freedom – and we will all be praying for those in Ukraine to be free this Passover. Many of us feel helpless in the face of what is happening, but all of us placing a beetroot on the sederplate is a powerful symbol of solidarity.

The Hebrew for beetroot is selek (סלק), which resembles the word for retreat, yistalku (יסתלקו).

At our seder, we will eat the beetroot after the bitter herbs are consumed and say the following prayer: May it be Your will, Eternal God, that all the enemies who might beat us will retreat (yistalku), and we will beat a path to freedom.”

SUNFLOWER SEEDS

The sunflower seeds on the seder plate are another way of expressing our solidarity with the Ukrainian people. Ukraine is a major grower of sunflowers, exporting sunflower oil around the world. Russia’s war against Ukraine has had a devastating impact on people and homes, on cities, towns and villages, on utilities and the economy, including, agriculture.

 

A RED CHILLI

The red chilli on the seder plate is a reminder of the burning world and of the catastrophic effects of climate change. As we pause to reflect on our impact as human beings on the planet, and to think of melting ice caps and the destruction caused by fires and floods over the past year, let us resolve to take responsibility for doing what we can to repair the earth, our only home.

AN ONION

The onion on the seder plate is a reminder of all those who are enslaved across the globe today.

Nicky Lachs writes: “It is not enough that the symbols on the seder plate just remind us that we were once slaves. We should also have something symbolising the fact that people are enslaved around the world today. I chose the onion for several reasons – but the main one is just that the onion is a basic but non-noticed ingredient of many food-stuffs, just as those who are exploited/ abused/enslaved are the ones who hold up the economy, but remain unseen…”                                         

AN ORANGE

The orange on the seder plate is a reminder of all those who feel excluded from Jewish life.

Dr Susannah Heschel tells the story of the genesis of this ritual in the 2003 book, The Women’s Passover Companion (JPL). It began with a story about a young girl who asks a Rebbe what room there is in Judaism for a lesbian. The Rebbe rises in anger and shouts: “There’s as much room for a lesbian in Judaism as there is for a crust of bread on the seder plate.” 

Besides the fact that a piece of bread would make everything un-kosher for Pesach, a piece of bread on the sederplate would carry a message that lesbians were a violation of Judaism itself, that they were infecting the community with something impure. So, the next year, Heschel put an orange on the seder plate “because it suggests the fruitfulness for all Jews when lesbians and gay men are contributing and active members of Jewish life.” The symbolism grew to include people who feel marginalised from the Jewish community, in particular LGBTQ+ people. The orange is a beacon of justice, equality and human rights.

OLIVES

The olives on the seder plate remind us that we cannot celebrate our ancestors’ liberation from slavery in Egypt without acknowledging that today the Palestinian people are not yet free.

The Torah narrates that when Noah sent out a dove from the Ark in search of dry land, she returned with a freshly plucked olive leaf in her mouth (Genesis 8:10-11). Since that time, the olive tree has been a symbol of hope and peace.

Sadly, in recent years, the destruction of Palestinian olive trees by Israeli settlers has been destroying the hope of a just peace between two peoples whose roots in the land that divides them are deeper even than those of the most ancient olive tree.

As we eat the olives tonight at our sacred seder, let us commit ourselves to supporting those courageous individuals and groups amongst the Israelis and the Palestinians who are working for peace and justice, dignity and security for both peoples. Thinking in particular of the people of Gaza, whose lives have been devastated by the war between Israel and Hamas following the depraved Hamas atrocities of October 7 2023, let us also recommit ourselves to a nonviolent resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

 

SPACE ON THE SEDER PLATE

Tonight, as we reflect on the meaning of all these symbols on the seder plate, we also leave a space to acknowledge other injustices that blight our world (an invitation to share).

Passover in the wake of October 7 and its aftermath PESACH/PASSOVER 2024/5784

Anyone
in southern Israel
who found themselves
in the pathway
of the depraved
assailants
on October 7
a target
to be pursued
trapped
killed
mutilated
captured
assaulted
raped

Citizens
migrant workers
overseas visitors
young people
waking up
at a music festival
to a deadly dawn
families
their homes
invaded
as they slept in their beds
or sat at their breakfast tables
and then set ablaze
as in the pogroms
visited on their grandparents
and great grandparents
twelve hundred murdered
in a single day
two hundred and fifty stolen away
a nation traumatised

And then
another nation
caught
in the retaliatory backlash
day after relentless day
bombs raining down
on Gaza
destroying
lives
homes
neighbourhoods
hospitals
schools
utilities
hundreds of thousands
displaced
trapped
in a war zone
with all escape-routes
barred
denied
sufficient medical aid
food
water
punished
for the sins of leaders
who do nothing
to protect them

Sh’mini Atzeret Chanukkah
Christmas Tu Bishvat Purim
Ramadan Eid aI-Iftar Easter Pesach
Friday after Friday
Shabbat after Shabbat
Sunday after Sunday
sacred days
desecrated

What questions will we ask
this Passover
around our seder tables?
how will we respond?
feeling overwhelmed
muted
let us leave
an empty space
on the seder plate
for our pain
our anguish
and fill it
only
with our tears

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Knowing the ‘inner-being’ of the stranger PESACH/PASSOVER 2024/5784

Telling the tale
of the Exodus
around the seder table
and making it personal:
‘In every generation,
each person
is obliged
to regard themselves
as if they had
personally
gone out of Egypt’ (Haggadah)

Each person is
obliged
to remember
to feel
the blood rush of
liberation
to savour
freedom
on our tongues
our teeth crunching
on the brittle bread
baked in haste
as the slaves took flight

And also
to taste the maror
imbibe the bitterness
of generations of
back-breaking
servitude
that made our ancestors’ bones
ache with anguish
that crushed their
shrunken spirits

And further
another obligation
after we rejoice
with psalms and song
and complete the seder rites
a take-away
challenge:
‘A stranger you shall
not oppress
for you know
the nefesh
‘inner-being’
of the stranger
since you were strangers
in the land of Egypt’
(Exodus 23:9)

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Tu Bishvat

Bare winter trees
branches etched
into the sky
frost crunching
underfoot
then deluges
of wind-driven rain
drenching every step.

And yet
signs
of rebirth
snowdrops
poking through
the weathered detritus
of long-gone autumn
and at the full moon
Tu Bishvat
the 15th day of Sh’vat
Rosh Ha-Shanah La-Ilanot
New Year for The Trees
reminding me – us
that in every buried root
the sap is rising
new life is stirring
in a few short weeks
Winter
will give way
to Spring.

Elli Tikvah Sarah

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