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Shof’tim: Justice is impartial

Shof’tim: Justice is impartial – Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah (PJ E-Bulletin, 08.25)

As a child, I used to love visiting the almost deserted City of London on a Sunday morning with my family. I recall looking up at the statue of Justice that adorns the dome of the Old Bailey, and marvelling at the image of a powerful-looking woman, her arms outstretched, bearing the Scales of Justice in one hand, and a sword in the other. A middle child, between an older brother and a younger sister, justice and fairness were always major preoccupations. As I gazed at that statue, I felt affirmed in my convictions: Justice meant that my brother shouldn’t get preferential treatment because he was the eldest and a boy, and that my younger sister shouldn’t get away with things that I couldn’t get away with.

Drawing on their personal experience of justice and injustice – in the family, at school, at play – children understand the essence of justice: Equity and impartiality. This week’s Torah portion, the parashah, Shof’tim, opens with the clear and unequivocal statement that judges ‘shall judge the people with just judgement – mishpat-tzedek’ (Deuteronomy 16:18). The passage goes on (16:19-20):

You shall not pervert justice [tzedek]; you shall not respect persons; neither shall you take a gift; for a gift blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous [tzadikim]. / Justice, justice you shall pursue [Tzedek, tzedek tirdof] so that you may live and inherit the land which the Eternal your God is giving to you.

The message in these verses is very clear. Justice is impartial. Further, justice is so important that those responsible for administering justice, must actively pursue it, run after it. The command to pursue justice is underlined by the repetition of the word justice. Further, those who are familiar with Biblical Hebrew grammar will know that since the verb usually comes first in a sentence, the reversal of the order is significant and is intended to emphasise the word ‘justice’. The classical mediaeval biblical commentators noted the repetition. For Abraham ibn Ezra (b. 1092, Spain), the exhortation is directed to the litigants, rather than to the judges; and the repetition of ‘justice’ is intended to convey that they should speak truthfully whether it is to their advantage or their disadvantage. For RaShI – Rabbi Sh’lomoh Yitzchaki (b. 1040, France) – who also sees the verse as directed to the litigants, the command implies that they should go in search of a reliable tribunal to decide their case. For the RaMbaN – Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman (b. 1194, Spain), the word ‘justice’ is repeated because it is addressed both to the judge and to the litigant.

So, what do we make of this powerful injunction: ‘Justice, justice you shall pursue’? The mediaeval biblical commentators spoke out of their personal ‘situatedness’; the circumstances, the times and the societies in which they lived. When we read those words, we read them in the context of our own lives today. Of course, the laws of the Torah are directed to a very particular audience: the people formed through the covenant with God at Sinai, and their descendants. As Jews today, we can read the verse in a double-way; from our situatedness within Britain, and from our sense of connection with the modern State of Israel. Like many of us, since the horrific massacres and abductions of October 7, 2023, and as Israel’s retaliatory war against Hamas in Gaza continues to have a devastating impact on the civilian population, I have been preoccupied with Israel-Palestine. I am using that hyphenated designation deliberately: ‘Justice, justice, you shall pursue’; justice for Israel and justice for Palestine; justice for two peoples whose lives and fates are inextricably bound up with one another. One of the most problematic impacts of the past two years has been the way that it has reinforced binary thinking: If I am pro-Israel, I must be anti-Palestine; if I am pro-Palestine, I must be anti-Israel. I must choose between justice for Israel and justice for Palestine; I cannot pursue justice for both peoples.

As it happens, my ‘justice-for-both-peoples’ commitment has an important historical precedent. In the 1920s, 30s and 40s, before the establishment of the modern State of Israel on 14 May 1948, there were passionate Zionists whose allegiance to the land, and whose hopes for the renewal of the Jewish people in the land, encompassed a commitment to honour the claims to the land of its Arab inhabitants. They called themselves ‘bi-national’ Zionists because in their understanding of Zionism the land could only be the home of the Jewish people if it continued to be a home of the Arabs who lived there. During the quiet period which followed the 1920 to 1921 Arab riots, Arthur Ruppin, a member of the Executive of the Zionist movement wrote in his diary on 31 December 1924 (Bein, Alex. Ed. 1971. Arthur Ruppin: Memoirs, Diaries, Letters. London: Wiedenfeld and Nicholson, pp.215-6. Translated from the German by Karen Gershon):

What continually worries me is the relationship between the Jews and Arabs in Palestine. Superficially, it has improved, in as much as there is no danger of pogroms, but the two peoples have become more estranged in their thinking. Neither has any understanding of the other, and yet I have no doubt that Zionism will end in catastrophe if we do not succeed in finding a common platform.

In 1925, Ruppin initiated Brit Shalom, a bi-nationalist Zionist organisation. After publishing its Statutes of Association, he made the objectives of Brit Shalom clear when he addressed the 14th Zionist Congress in Vienna in August (18th-31st) 1925. Ruppin declared (Mendes-Flohr, Paul R. Ed. 1983. A Land of Two Peoples, Martin Buber on Jews and Arabs. New York: Oxford University, p.73):

Palestine will be a state of two nations. Gentlemen, this is a fact, a fact which many of you have not yet sufficiently realised.

The bi-national Zionists of the 1920s, 30s and 40s did not win the argument. Perhaps, bearing in mind the Torah’s teachings on Justice and the current ongoing catastrophe, the time has come to embrace their vision?

WHAT IS ‘PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM’? – ‘Thought’ on T’tzavveh, PJ E-Bulletin

This week’s parashah, T’tzavveh opens with a significant phrase: ‘You, you shall command [Attah t’tzavveh] the Israelites’ (Exodus 27:20a). While the Torah relates many engaging stories, it is also the repository of the mitzvot, ‘commandments’, that define the relationship between the Jewish people and God. The grand narrative of the Exodus from Egypt may be understood, simply, as a tale of liberation from oppression. However, the message, continually repeated, as Moses tries to persuade Pharaoh to free the Israelite slaves, is more challenging: ‘Thus says YHWH, the God of the Hebrews, “Let my people go that they may serve Me – Shalach et-ammi v’ya’avduni”’ (Exodus 9:1). The Israelites were liberated from the tyranny of Pharaoh in order to serve a more powerful Master.

While the teachings of the Torah concern every aspect of domestic, social, economic and political life, their foundation is the service of God. After the destruction of the last Temple in Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE, the centrality of Divine service continued through Rabbinic Judaism, which established the framework for Jewish life in the form of the halachah, the system of law articulated first in the Mishnah, edited around the year 200 CE. Whether or not one is a student of Rabbinic literature, every Jew who participates in Jewish rites is reminded of the obligation to serve God each time we recite a blessing which includes the words, ‘… asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivvanu l…’ – ‘… who makes us holy with His commandments and commands us to …’ (literal translation).

We are at a crucial moment in the history of Liberal Judaism and Reform Judaism in Britain, as the two organisations negotiate a merger with the goal of becoming a single entity, ‘Progressive Judaism’, a name that directly reflects the global movement to which both LJ and MRJ are affiliated: the World Union of Progressive Judaism, founded in 1926 at the Liberal Jewish Synagogue in London (https://wupj.org/about-us/history/).

What is Progressive Judaism? There is no single answer. However, there is a clue in the word ‘Progressive’. Progressive Judaism is not only, like Orthodox Judaism, a response to Modernity, to the consequences of intellectual Enlightenment and political Emancipation. Progressive Judaism provides a framework for working out how to live Jewishly in a rapidly changing modern/post-modern world; an attempt to re-interpret and re-engage with our Jewish inheritance in the context of the needs of the present. In the past fifty years since Rabbi Jacqueline Tabick became the first woman to be ordained as a rabbi at Leo Baeck College, Progressive Judaism has been in the forefront of change in the British Jewish community, to the extent that, today, 50% of the progressive rabbinate is female, and 20%, LGBTQ+. Just as important, from its inception in Germany at the beginning of the 19th century, Progressive Judaism has acknowledged that individuals – and not just communities – have a role in defining and perpetuating Jewish life. As a consequence, ‘informed choice’, rather than the notion of being simply ‘commanded’ has been the hallmark of Progressive Judaism.

But, of course, Jewish life depends on individuals choosing to contribute to building and maintaining community. More than twenty years ago, I first set out what I call the compelling commitments that frame the choices we make (‘Bridging Choice and Command’, MANNA Essay, MANNA, No. 78, Winter 2003). At this critical juncture in the history of the two progressive movements in Britain, when we are trying to work out what it means to be ‘progressive’, I offer these ‘compelling commitments’ as a contribution to our reflections. Emerging out of our on-going experience they are not set in stone, but at their heart, we find these three – each one with a particularist and a universalist dimension:

Compelling Commitment One: Embracing Jewish Teaching and engaging with knowledge in the wider world

The commitment to nurture and cultivate our own Jewish lives and the life of the Jewish people as a whole, by continuing to learn and engage with the Torah, with our Jewish stories, teachings and traditions, and by participating in the various ritual acts, which celebrate Life with Jewish flavours, colours and tones.

And: The commitment to engage with the accumulating wisdom of the world, to study and to learn about the major developments in human knowledge, and to find ways of ensuring that the developing wisdom of humanity in all its dimensions connects with and informs Jewish teaching.

Compelling Commitment Two: Sustaining the Jewish Community and repairing the world

The commitment to honour both those that have gone before us and those who are yet to be born, by becoming links in the chain of the generations of our people, and by maintaining, restoring and re-creating Jewish communal life in Britain, in Israel, and throughout the world.

And: The commitment to love not only our neighbours, but also the stranger in our midst; to liberate the oppressed, protect the vulnerable, and support the fallen; to pursue justice and to seek peace; to participate in the great task of Tikkun Olam, the repair of the world.

Compelling Commitment Three: The Eternal is our God and The Eternal is One

The commitment to explore the meaning of existence, to journey, to search, and to listen out for the voice of the Eternal, who calls each Jew to become part of Am Yisrael, the people who ‘struggle with God’, and to strive to sanctify Life each day through our actions and our relationships.

And: The commitment to acknowledge that the Eternal is One, and to work together with all the peoples of the world to recognise the essential unity of existence in all its diversity.

Unlike the traditional understanding of the ‘commandments’, these ‘compelling commitments’ offer a framework for our lives, without spelling out exactly what each and every Progressive Jew should be doing each and every moment of the day. It is the responsibility of each one of us to decide for ourselves, and in relation to those around us, how to put our sense of commitment into practice. [999 words]

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

This week’s parashah, T’tzavveh opens with a significant phrase: ‘You, you shall command [Attah t’tzavveh] the Israelites’ (Exodus 27:20a). While the Torah relates many engaging stories, it is also the repository of the mitzvot, ‘commandments’, that define the relationship between the Jewish people and God. The grand narrative of the Exodus from Egypt may be understood, simply, as a tale of liberation from oppression. However, the message, continually repeated, as Moses tries to persuade Pharaoh to free the Israelite slaves, is more challenging: ‘Thus says YHWH, the God of the Hebrews, “Let my people go that they may serve Me – Shalach et-ammi v’ya’avduni”’ (Exodus 9:1). The Israelites were liberated from the tyranny of Pharaoh in order to serve a more powerful Master.

While the teachings of the Torah concern every aspect of domestic, social, economic and political life, their foundation is the service of God. After the destruction of the last Temple in Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE, the centrality of Divine service continued through Rabbinic Judaism, which established the framework for Jewish life in the form of the halachah, the system of law articulated first in the Mishnah, edited around the year 200 CE. Whether or not one is a student of Rabbinic literature, every Jew who participates in Jewish rites is reminded of the obligation to serve God each time we recite a blessing which includes the words, ‘… asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivvanu l…’ – ‘… who makes us holy with His commandments and commands us to …’ (literal translation).

We are at a crucial moment in the history of Liberal Judaism and Reform Judaism in Britain, as the two organisations negotiate a merger with the goal of becoming a single entity, ‘Progressive Judaism’, a name that directly reflects the global movement to which both LJ and MRJ are affiliated: the World Union of Progressive Judaism, founded in 1926 at the Liberal Jewish Synagogue in London (https://wupj.org/about-us/history/).

What is Progressive Judaism? There is no single answer. However, there is a clue in the word ‘Progressive’. Progressive Judaism is not only, like Orthodox Judaism, a response to Modernity, to the consequences of intellectual Enlightenment and political Emancipation. Progressive Judaism provides a framework for working out how to live Jewishly in a rapidly changing modern/post-modern world; an attempt to re-interpret and re-engage with our Jewish inheritance in the context of the needs of the present. In the past fifty years since Rabbi Jacqueline Tabick became the first woman to be ordained as a rabbi at Leo Baeck College, Progressive Judaism has been in the forefront of change in the British Jewish community, to the extent that, today, 50% of the progressive rabbinate is female, and 20%, LGBTQ+. Just as important, from its inception in Germany at the beginning of the 19th century, Progressive Judaism has acknowledged that individuals – and not just communities – have a role in defining and perpetuating Jewish life. As a consequence, ‘informed choice’, rather than the notion of being simply ‘commanded’ has been the hallmark of Progressive Judaism.

But, of course, Jewish life depends on individuals choosing to contribute to building and maintaining community. More than twenty years ago, I first set out what I call the compelling commitments that frame the choices we make (‘Bridging Choice and Command’, MANNA Essay, MANNA, No. 78, Winter 2003). At this critical juncture in the history of the two progressive movements in Britain, when we are trying to work out what it means to be ‘progressive’, I offer these ‘compelling commitments’ as a contribution to our reflections. Emerging out of our on-going experience they are not set in stone, but at their heart, we find these three – each one with a particularist and a universalist dimension:

Compelling Commitment One: Embracing Jewish Teaching and engaging with knowledge in the wider world

The commitment to nurture and cultivate our own Jewish lives and the life of the Jewish people as a whole, by continuing to learn and engage with the Torah, with our Jewish stories, teachings and traditions, and by participating in the various ritual acts, which celebrate Life with Jewish flavours, colours and tones.

And: The commitment to engage with the accumulating wisdom of the world, to study and to learn about the major developments in human knowledge, and to find ways of ensuring that the developing wisdom of humanity in all its dimensions connects with and informs Jewish teaching.

Compelling Commitment Two: Sustaining the Jewish Community and repairing the world

The commitment to honour both those that have gone before us and those who are yet to be born, by becoming links in the chain of the generations of our people, and by maintaining, restoring and re-creating Jewish communal life in Britain, in Israel, and throughout the world.

And: The commitment to love not only our neighbours, but also the stranger in our midst; to liberate the oppressed, protect the vulnerable, and support the fallen; to pursue justice and to seek peace; to participate in the great task of Tikkun Olam, the repair of the world.

Compelling Commitment Three: The Eternal is our God and The Eternal is One

The commitment to explore the meaning of existence, to journey, to search, and to listen out for the voice of the Eternal, who calls each Jew to become part of Am Yisrael, the people who ‘struggle with God’, and to strive to sanctify Life each day through our actions and our relationships.

And: The commitment to acknowledge that the Eternal is One, and to work together with all the peoples of the world to recognise the essential unity of existence in all its diversity.

Unlike the traditional understanding of the ‘commandments’, these ‘compelling commitments’ offer a framework for our lives, without spelling out exactly what each and every Progressive Jew should be doing each and every moment of the day. It is the responsibility of each one of us to decide for ourselves, and in relation to those around us, how to put our sense of commitment into practice.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Teasing out the Shabbat verses in K’doshim

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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

 

Climate catastrophe and planning for the next seven years

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‘Thought’ on Mikkeitz – Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

LJ E-Bulletin, 12.23

COP28, which brought together 50,370 delegates (including 2,456 fossil-fuel lobbyists), 15,063 registered NGOs, and 1,293 Media organisations, concluded on 13 December after two weeks of intense deliberations in a compromise: an agreement to transition away from fossil fuels, but no commitment to phase them out https://unfccc.int/cop28 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/dec/05/record-number-of-fossil-fuel-lobbyists-get-access-to-cop28-climate-talks https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/dec/13/cop28-second-draft-text-of-climate-deal-calls-for-transitioning-away-from-fossil-fuels

Twenty-eight years of UN climate conferences, so far. The target for avoiding the permanent breach of the 1.5°C increase in global warming, is in just seven years’ time. What are the plans for those seven years?

Interestingly, ‘sevens’ are an important feature of the Torah, from the seventh day set apart for ceasing from work (Genesis 2:1-3), through the seven-year agricultural cycle, and the seven cycles of seven culminating in Yoveil, ‘Jubilee’ in the 50th year, a year of D’ror, ‘Liberty’, proclaimed on Yom Kippur with the blasting of the shofar (Leviticus 25).

In this week’s parashah, Mikkeitz (Genesis 41:1-44:17), we encounter the number seven in the context of the ongoing Joseph story. Pharaoh has dreamt two dreams: First, seven fat healthy-looking cows are eaten by seven lean ones, and then seven abundant ears of corn are swallowed up by seven feeble ones. On waking, Pharaoh is keen for an interpretation. His Chief Butler remembers that when he was in prison, a certain Hebrew slave interpreted his dream, as well as the dream of the Baker, who was imprisoned with them, and that the interpretations had come to pass. Fetched out of prison, Pharaoh reiterates his dreams to Joseph, who promptly explains them: ‘The dream of Pharaoh is one… / The seven good cows are seven years; and the seven good ears are seven years: the dream is one. / And the seven ill-favoured cows and the seven empty ears blasted with the east wind; they shall be seven years of famine’ (41:25-27). Going on to inform Pharaoh that he should designate someone to oversee the taking up of the produce of a fifth of the land during the seven years of plenty to provide food for the seven years of famine, Pharaoh decides to appoint Joseph to the task. The plan goes so well that there is more than enough to feed the people when crops fail, which is why the famine having extended to Canaan, Jacob decides to send his ten eldest sons down to Egypt to buy corn (Genesis 41: 1-3).

With those seven years before the 2030 deadline at the forefront of our minds, we are all too aware that not only is there no plan in place to ensure that the 1.5° Celsius limit is not breached, but that the UK government is in the process of generating policies that will mean the deadline for UK compliance is extended for another five years to 2035 https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/sep/20/uk-net-zero-policies-scrapped-what-do-changes-mean https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/government-delays-ban-on-new-petrol-and-diesel-cars-aS7HJ8O5JC3q

There is a particularly pressing issue in connection with the failure to meet the 2030 deadline, which our Torah portion highlights. As the climate continues to heat, the planet is increasingly beset by extreme weather events year after year, both droughts and floods. What happens to life-giving crops, like corn, maise, wheat and barley in these conditions? They are utterly destroyed; unable to thrive, either, in the baked cracked soil, or when the ground is submerged in water. The global refugee crisis is not only driven by war and persecution, it is also a product of famine, flood and destitution. The famine having extended to Canaan, Jacob’s sons went down to Egypt to buy corn from the store houses. As we contemplate impending climate catastrophe, we may well ask: Where are the store houses? Where are the plans to feed and house millions of destitute people? Closing with the death of Joseph, the focus of the last portion of the Book of Genesis, Va-y’chi (Genesis 47:28-50:26), is on Joseph’s reunion with Jacob and the whole family moving to Egypt, and settling there. Refugees from famine made welcome. But then, the Book of Exodus opens with a tale of a new Pharsaoh ‘who did not know Joseph’ (Exodus 1:8), and the fate of the ‘children of Israel’, the descendants of Jacob, changes dramatically from peaceful coexistence to slavery and genocide (Ex. 19-16). It’s a familiar story, retold at Pesach. So well-known that sometimes we forget that before they became a persecuted people, the ‘children of Israel’ lived and thrived in the land of Goshen by the Nile in Egypt for many generations in peace, prosperity and security (Genesis 47:5-6; Exodus 1:1-7). Of course, minority peoples, especially, migrants and refugees, dependent on the goodwill of the host nation, are always vulnerable to persecution. As Jews, we know this only too well. It is for this reason that as we call on the governments of the world to keep to the 2030 deadline, we must also continue to demand that climate refugees and those in flight from war and persecution are given sanctuary amongst us.

Sukkot LJ E Bulletin

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Sukkot, chag ha-asif, ‘the feast of ingathering’, is the concluding autumn festival of the ‘three feet’ festivals (shalosh r’galim), when our ancestors would go on pilgrimage to Jerusalem with their offerings (Exodus 23:14-17, Deuteronomy 16:16). The first is Pesach, chag ha-matzot, ‘the feast of unleavened bread’, in the spring. The second is Shavuot/Weeks, yom ha-bikkurim, ‘the day of first fruits’, also known as chag ha-katzir, ‘the feast of the harvest’, in the early summer

In the Torah‘s accounts of the festivals, there is also another cycle of three: the sacred days of the seventh month (Leviticus 23 and Numbers 28 and 29). The cycle consists of the first day, Yom T’ru’ah, a ‘Day of Blasting’ (Num. 29.1), which later became the New Year for years (Mishnah Rosh Ha-Shanah 1.1), the tenth day, Yom Kippur, referred to in the Torah as Yom Ha-Kippurim (Lev. 23.27), and the seven-day festival of Sukkot (followed by Sh’mini Atzeret, the ‘Eighth day of Closure’), beginning on the fifteenth day of the month (Lev. 23.23-36; 39-43; Num. 29.12-39).

Sukkot is the connecting link between the two cycles. Both cycles inaugurate a time of renewal: the renewal of the Israelites at Pesach, in the first month of the year, originally known as Aviv, ‘Spring’ (Exodus 13.4); the call to renewal, individual and collective, with the ‘blasting’ of the shofar, the ram’s horn on the first day of the seventh month in the autumn (Lev. 23.24). But the two cycles resonate differently. While the ‘three feet festivals’ are rooted in the earth, in the seasons and the cycles of nature, and in the history of journeying, the sacred days of the seventh month inhabit the realm of eternity. 

The particular orientations of the two cycles are reflected in the festival that links them. Sukkot both concludes the agricultural cycle, and draws on and expands the themes of the first ten days of the seventh month. One of the ways it does this is through the reading on Sukkot of the biblical Book of Kohelet, Ecclesiastes, a work of wisdom literature that teaches about the fleeting nature of Life. The message is also conveyed more directly by the principal mitzvot of Sukkot: the sukkah and the lulav.

The two mitzvot connected with the sukkah concern ‘building’ and ‘dwelling’ in the fragile ‘hut’ that is open to the sky and to the elements (Mishnah Sukkah, chapters 1-2). Although a practical ritual, the meaning of the sukkah is complex. On the one hand, the sukkah represents the shelters used during agricultural labour in the fields once the people settled in the land beyond the Jordan, demonstrating a connection between the sukkah, and Sukkot as the late harvest festival. On the other hand, the passage in Leviticus 23 places the sukkah in the wilderness narrative: The people shall ‘dwell in sukkot so that your generations know that I made the Israelites dwell in sukkot, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt’ (Lev. 23.43). At first sight, this statement is straightforward. However, according to the Exodus narrative, the people dwelt in ‘tents’ (ohalim), not in ‘huts’ (sukkot) in the wilderness (Exodus 33.8). This suggests that the phrase in Leviticus 23.43 is a metaphorical reference to the refuge provided by God during the wilderness wandering years, a reading supported by a phrase in Isaiah concerning the future time when the presence of YHWH in cloud smoke and fire over Mount Zion will be accompanied by ‘a sukkah for a shadow in the day-time from the parching heat’ (Isaiah 4.6).

Alongside remembrance of the autumn harvest, the sukkah also signals the fragility of life, our vulnerability and dependence, which is why offering hospitality is a special obligation at Sukkot. Hospitality, especially to strangers and those in need remains a vital issue today. Traditionally, hospitality includes the invitation to seven special ‘guests’ – ushpizin (masculine) – from the Jewish past, a practice with its origins in the sixteenth-century kabbalistic mystical commentary on the Torah, the Zohar, ‘Book of Splendour’. In recent years the practice has extended to inviting seven significant ushpizot (feminine: see https://ritualwell.org/ritual/ushpizot/). Inviting people into the sukkah is both an opportunity to share the fruits of our labour with them, and a way of acknowledging the precariousness of existence, and our responsibility to offer refuge to others.

Turning to the lulav. The lulav has its origins in the reference in Leviticus to ‘taking’ on the first day of Sukkot, ‘the fruit of a tree of splendour, branches of palm trees, and boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook’ and ‘rejoicing’ (Lev. 23.40). No reason is given in the passage in Leviticus for the particular selection of these four species. Nor are there any details of how the ‘rejoicing’ is to be conducted. The careful selection of the items, and the guidelines for shaking the lulav, made up of a palm branch, two willow and three myrtle branches, together with a citrus fruit, known as the etrog, is outlined in tractate Sukkah in the Mishnah and Talmud and in later codes (Mishnah Sukkah 3.1ff., Babylonian Talmud, Sukkah 37b-38a; Shulkhan Aruch, Orach Chayyim 651).

Although the emphasis is on practical details, it is clear from the instructions that, like the sukkah, the lulav is freighted with symbolic meaning. For example, the requirement to shake the lulav in the directions of the compass, East, South, North and West, and towards the heavens and towards the earth, is in recognition of ‘the One to Whom everything belongs’ (Babylonian Talmud Sukkah 37b). Holding the lulav and etrog together with our hands, and shaking it in the prescribed manner, provides a tangible reminder to give thanks for our material blessings and the bounty of the Earth. At the same time, shaking the lulav reinforces our awareness that we live our finite material lives in the context of the infinite and eternal, in which context everything passes, however hard we grasp

Embodying Judaism: 

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A commentary on the Torah portion, Tazri’a-M’tzora 

LJ E-Bulletin, 04.23

Jewish practice, rooted in Jewish teaching, is visceral. It concerns what Jews do with our bodies from the kitchen to the bedroom, how we mark our homes, what we wear, and how we celebrate Shabbat and the festivals with food, rituals and song.

The Book of Leviticus opens with lists of sacrifices of animals and grains cooked or burnt on the Temple altar that was at the centre of Jewish life for a thousand years. It then turns to rituals surrounding the consecration of the officiating priesthood, creatures that can and cannot be eaten, and a ban on the eating of wild animals and those that die naturally. This week’s double parashah, Tazri’a-M’tzora, begins with women in childbirth, and proceeds to skin eruptions and house-wall eruptions, both described as tza’ra’at, which is usually translated as ‘leprosy’. The double portion concludes with seminal emissions and menstrual blood. The disruptive impact of each of these – childbirth, eruptions and secretions – is resolved with ritual, including immersion in water.

The first five portions of Leviticus bring the reader into an ancient realm of life and worship that may feel quite alien, especially to a Liberal Jew. It is for this reason that Liberal Judaism tends to focus on those parts of Leviticus that feel more relatable to contemporary society: the ethical and social justice rules of K’doshim (Leviticus 19) and B’har (Leviticus 25), and the biblical festival calendar set out in Emor (Leviticus 23). Nevertheless, I think a case can be made for Liberal Jews finding ways of making meaning for our Jewish lives out of the apparently less spiritually edifying parts of Leviticus, not least, the messy areas of human experience that constitute the content of Tazri’a-M’tzora.

We start with the acknowledgement that we humans, with our wonderful intellectual capacities that separate us from the other creatures, nevertheless, like the other creatures, inhabit bodies that encompass bodily functions and experience ailments and dysfunctions. Tazri’a-M’tzora reminds us to include our bodies in our religious lives.

This does not entail adopting the patriarchal worldview of the Torah. As soon as we start reading Tazri’a, which opens at Leviticus chapter 12, we are confronted with the gender binary (12.1-5):

The Eternal spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Speak to the Israelites saying: when a woman in childbirth bears a male, she shall be unclean seven days; shall be unclean as at the time of her menstruation. / On the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised. / She shall remain in a state of blood purification for 33 days: she shall not touch any consecrated being, nor enter the sanctuary until her period of purification is completed. / If she bears a female, she shall be unclean two weeks as during her menstruation, and shall remain in a state of blood purification for 66 days.

The differences between the strictures concerning the births of males and females are striking. The mother’s state of ritual impurity following the birth of her baby was double when she bore a daughter: 7 days/33 days for a male; 14 days/66 days for a female. In giving birth to a male, a woman brought a child into the world, who did not share her gender. Hence, following seven days of ritual impurity, on the eighth day he was circumcised and so initiated into the society of males, whose destiny he would share once he reached adulthood. Circumcision itself may be seen as a form of cultural mimicry: the removal of the foreskin, causing the male generative organ to bleed, just as the female bleeds naturally, both when menstruating and in childbirth. With circumcision, the binary opposition of male as bearer of culture versus female as embodiment of nature is reinforced. By contrast, when a mother gave birth to a female, she brought into the world a potential menstruating and child-bearing woman like herself, hence, the double indemnity.

Significantly, the practice of circumcision has been a feature of Liberal Judaism since its inception. Just as significant, in the past forty years, Jewish feminism has led the way in reconstructing the ancient practice of ritual immersion in water in the context of the lives of Jews today (see: https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/mikveh and https://ritualwell.org/ritual/mikveh/). In fact, influenced by Jewish Feminism, a progressive mikveh initiative called ‘The Wellspring Project’, launched in 2018, ‘aims to build a centre for wellbeing in Barnet’ that is ‘a welcoming, inclusive and non-judgemental space for people of all ages, genders, faiths or non-religious beliefs’ that ‘will promote the use of Jewish ritual such as immersion as part of our well-being, good mental health, recovery, and for moments of celebration.’ In addition to ‘immersion pools’, the centre ‘will include rooms for talking and complimentary therapies and groups’ (see: https://www.liberaljudaism.org/2022/03/find-out-more-about-the-wellspring-project/ and https://www.wellspringuk.org/).

During the early days of the Women’s Liberation Movement, the Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, produced Our Bodies Ourselves. A Book By and For Women (New England Free Press). I still have a copy of the original 1970 edition. A self-help manual, it has been republished many times in the past 53 years. I think the moment has arrived for Liberal Jews to embrace the deep wisdom underlying Tazri’a-M’tzora: that living our lives as Jews, entails engaging our bodies, and acknowledging every aspect of our embodied humanity in our Jewish practice.

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Joseph and their life of many genders: LJ Thought on Va-yeishev – Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Joseph and their life of many genders: LJ Thought on Va-yeishev – Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

Parental favouritism is a central theme of the Torah narratives about our ancestors and comes to the fore with the birth of the twins, Esau and Jacob, to Rebecca and Isaac (Genesis 19:22-26). Isaac favoured Esau and Rebecca favoured Jacob. (25:28). Unfortunately, once a father and blessed with twelve sons and a daughter, Jacob also had his favourite: Joseph. But as we see when the Joseph story opens, Joseph was not just the favourite child; Joseph was utterly different from Jacob’s other sons. Further: Joseph’s difference centred on a characteristic that takes the story beyond the theme of parental favouritism into the realm of the beyond: gender nonconformity – or, to use more contemporary language: non-binary gender fluidity.

As we read at Genesis chapter 37, which is where parashat Va-yeishev opens, the beautiful coat Joseph received as a gift from Jacob, k’tonet passim, a ‘coat’ that reached to the ‘palms’ (37:3), signalled more than Joseph’s special status in Jacob’s affections. K’tonet passim was also the garment of a princess. In the Second Book of Samuel, when Tamar, the daughter of King David was assaulted by her half-brother, Amnon, we read that: ‘She was wearing a k’tonet passim, for virgin princesses were dressed thus in olden times’ (II Sam. 13:18-19). Significantly in the biblical narratives, Tamar and Joseph alone are dressed in a k’tonnet passim.

So, Joseph was dressed like a royal virgin princess. And his ‘princesses’ garment’ also provided a visual representation of Joseph’s unique qualities. Joseph wasn’t a shepherd like their brothers; Joseph was a dreamer, whose dreams revealed an exceptional calling. Joseph dreamt that the family were all binding sheaves in the field, when suddenly Joseph’s sheaf stood up and remained upright, and then their sheaves gathered round and bowed down to it. Joseph dreamt that the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to them (Gen. 37:5-9). Jacob was angry and bewildered by Joseph’s dreams (37:10). He was also oblivious of the feelings of his older sons towards his favourite child – which is why Jacob sent Joseph on an errand to go and see how they were, as they tended the flocks (37:12-14).

It is hardly surprising that Joseph’s older brothers took the opportunity to wreak their revenge on the princesses’-garment-wearing-dreamer-favourite of their father. If it hadn’t been for the actions of the eldest brother, Reuben, they would have killed Joseph. As it was, the fourth eldest, Judah came up with a plan of selling Joseph to a travelling caravan of merchants, who took Joseph down to Egypt and sold him to Potiphar, a courtier and chief steward of Pharaoh (37:18-36).

What happened in Egypt reinforces the message about the dreamer’s unique capacities. Indeed, we read that God brought blessing and prosperity to Potiphar’s household ‘for Joseph’s sake’ (39:5). However, it was Joseph’s ability to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams that got Joseph out of prison (41:39 ff.) after being wrongfully arrested for attempting to sexually assault Potiphar’s wife (39:13-20), and resulted in Joseph becoming Pharaoh’s chief vizier, overseeing the collection of grain during the seven years of plenty in readiness for the seven years of famine to follow (41:46 ff.).

Joseph was special. But it was the incident with Potiphar’s wife that provides another way of understanding Joseph’s specialness (39:7ff.). On the one hand, the tale at this point simply conveys the vulnerability of Joseph the ‘Hebrew slave’ in the house of his Egyptian master – and mistress. And so, the reader understands why Joseph ran away, leaving their simple garment (beged) in her hand, when she kept pleading with Joseph on successive occasions to ‘lie’ with her (39:7-12). On the other hand, this story within a story, opens by saying how ‘beautiful’ Joseph was – literally, ‘beautiful’ (39:6): Va-y’hi Yosef y’feih to’ar vifeih mareh – ‘Joseph was beautiful of form and beautiful in appearance’.

At first glance, the reference to Joseph’s ‘beauty’ simply acts as a preamble, explaining why ‘his master’s wife cast her eyes upon Joseph’ (39:7). But this phrase is more than a statement about Joseph’s attractiveness; it links Joseph directly with their mother, Rachel, whom Jacob had fallen in love with at first-sight because she was so beautiful (Gen. 29:17): v’rachel hay’tah y’fat to’ar vifat mareh – ‘Rachel was beautiful of form and beautiful in appearance’.

Hebrew is an entirely gendered language. The only difference between this phrase about Rachel and the later one about Joseph is that the verbs, nouns and adjectives associated with Rachel are in the ‘feminine’ gender and those associated with Joseph are in the ‘masculine’ gender. But the difference in gender only serves to underline the similarity between the two phrases: Joseph was ‘beautiful’ as Rachel was ‘beautiful’.

So, what do we make of Joseph? After a spell in prison, the exceptional dreamer who wore a princesses’ garment and was utterly beautiful, was elevated by Pharaoh to be his second-in-command, dressed as an Egyptian overlord, given a new name – Tzaph’nat Panei’ach – married to As’nat, the daughter of Poti-phera, Priest of On (41:39-45), and became the father of Ephraim and Manasseh (41:50-52). Joseph wore a variety of different garments and many guises, transcending a simplistic understanding of who ‘Joseph’ was. Joseph: an exception that proves the rule – and yet, also a model and exemplar of another gender-fluid way of being human; which brings me to Joseph’s name: Yoseph – based on the Hebrew root, Yud Sameich Pei, to ‘add’. As we try to make sense of Joseph, binary gender categories of ‘male’ and ‘female’ just don’t work. Perhaps, what we need to do in order to encompass the complexity of Joseph and acknowledge fully Joseph’s qualities is add a dimension of humanity between male and female. And so, may we learn from the story of the one who was Yoseph to recognise that life transcends our attempts to impose binary gender definitions – and may we also acknowledge all the Yosephs in our midst.

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‘We need a Sabbath for the Earth’: A commentary on B’har (Leviticus 25:1-26:2).

LJ Thought for the Week: B’har

Life is full of paradoxes. One particular paradox is highlighted in this week’s Torah portion, parashat B’har (Leviticus 25:1-26:2). There we learn that we live in cycles of seven years, and that in the seventh year, there should be a Sabbath for the land (25:2-7). We also learn that following seven cycles of seven years, that is, after 49 years, the 50th year should be set apart (25:8-12):

You shall count for yourselves seven Sabbaths of years, seven times seven years; 49 years. / Then you shall make the shofar blast in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, the Day of Atonement; you shall sound the shofar throughout your land. / And you shall set apart [v’kiddashtem] the 50th year and proclaim d’ror throughout the land for all of its inhabitants. It shall be a yoveil for you: each person shall return to their holding and each person shall return to their family. / The 50th year shall be a yoveil for you: you shall not sow, neither shall you reap the after-growth or harvest the untrimmed vines. / For it shall be a yoveil. It shall be set apart [kodesh] for you. You may only eat produce directly from the field.

I haven’t translated three words in this passage: shofar; d’ror; and yoveil. Of these three, shofar is probably the most familiar: ‘horn’; usually understood as the horn of a ram. D’ror, is translated in different ways: ‘release’; ‘liberty’. It actually means that which is ’flowing’ or ‘runs freely’. In a passage in Exodus chapter 30, dealing with the spices to be used in connection with the offerings in the oheil mo’eid, Tent of Meeting, there is a reference to ‘500 weight of flowing myrrh – mor d’ror (30:22).

Yoveil is always translated as ‘Jubilee’. But what exactly does ‘Jubilee’ mean? In fact, yoveil is another word for ‘horn’: a ‘cornet’. But to get to the heart of its meaning, we need to check out its root: Yud Beit Lameid. Found, verbally, in causative constructions [Hiphil and Hophal], Yud Beit Lameid means to ‘conduct’ or ‘bear along’. Nouns related to yoveil reflect this meaning: yuval, is a ‘stream’ in Jeremiah 17:8; and y’vul, means ‘produce [of soil]’ at the beginning of next week’s parashah, B’chukkotai: ‘I will give you your rains in their season, so that the land shall yield its produce [y’vulah] and the trees of the field their fruit’ (Leviticus 26:4).

So, we can see an intimate connection between yoveil and d’ror: both words suggest dynamic movement, flow, growth. Just as streams flow, and crops that started life as seeds spring out of the soil, so the 50th year is a time of ‘release’. The shared underlying meanings of yoveil and d’ror remind us that although it appears that Life is lived in nature’s endless cycles, forever repeating themselves, week after week, season after season, Life is also about inexorable movement forwards – from birth to death.

But of course, the message of d’ror-yoveil does not just concern the paradoxical realities of Life. We learn that we are called to actively break out of the cycles of seven and proclaim d’ror and a 50th year that is a yoveil. ‘Release’ is only possible if we make it happen. Although the Sabbatical year was observed historically and continues to be observed in Israel today, there is no evidence that there has ever been a year of ‘release’ after seven cycles of seven. The reality is, then and now, that caught up as we are in the repeating rhythms of life, despite the fact that as time passes the final inevitable destination of our lives gets closer, the possibility of breaking free eludes us.

And it’s no good arguing that d’ror-yoveil is not possible because we have lost count of the seven cycles of seven. As the millennium approached, picking up on the biblical concept of yoveil in Leviticus chapter 25, ‘Jubilee 2000’ a campaign aimed at cancelling the debt of poorer counties gained momentum. As it happens, the campaign is relaunching this year (2022) as ‘Debt Justice’ (https://www.advocacyinternational.co.uk/featured-project/jubilee-2000

https://jubileedebt.org.uk/). In the USA, a similar ‘Freedom’ Jubilee was planned by radical Jews to mark the 200th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence in 1976 (see God-Wrestling by Arthur Waskow, chapter 11, ‘Beyond Marx and Buddha: The Jubilee’, Schocken Books, NY, 1978) and there is, currently, another Jubilee campaign in the US (https://jubileecampaign.org/ ).

We don’t need to know where we are in the seven cycles of seven to launch a year of ‘release’ campaign linked to a significant forthcoming anniversary – or deadline. As it happens, the current year (2021-22) is a Sabbatical year. Perhaps, the 2030 tipping point in the climate crisis – the year after this new cycle of seven – might focus minds. And perhaps, Liberal Judaism, could lead the way over the next seven years in framing that tipping point as an opportunity to break out of the cycle of continuing ecological and climate devastation and proclaim a year of release for the Earth and all its inhabitants.

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Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah

May 2022 – Iyyar 5782

Bo and a Theology of Intervention – Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah – LJ Thought for the Week

This year, January 27th will be a complex moment: both, International Holocaust Memorial Day and Tu Bishvat, the New Year for trees – so, a day for commemorating the horrors of the Sho’ah and a day for celebrating new life.

On the surface, the contradiction could not be greater. But when we turn to the Torah readings that precede January 27th, we find clues that bridge the chasm between death and life in the tale of the Exodus from Egypt.

More of this in a moment. Why was January 27th chosen as the date for the nations of the world to commemorate the Sho’ah? After all, Kristallnacht, the ‘night of the broken glass’, 9th-10th

November 1938, when the Nazi persecution of the Jews of Europe turned to violence in Germany and Austria, seems a more immediate choice? Alternatively, one might argue that once the Nazi top brass agreed on ‘the final solution’ at the Wannsee conference in January 1942[1], each and every day during the next four years until the Nazis were defeated in April 1945 was a day of unimaginable torment.

What made January 27, 1945 distinctive was that it was the day that the Red Army entered Auschwitz and liberated the camp. In other words, it was the day that marked the beginning of the end. So, perhaps, compared to all the other possible days of commemoration, from 9th November 1938 onwards, 27th January might be seen as the day when the flame of hope was rekindled. Just as – blossoming almond blossom trees in Israel apart – Tu Bishvat marks not the spring, but the hope that spring is on the way, January 27, 1945, might be understood as a sign that liberation was on the way.

If we turn to the Exodus narrative: Long before the plagues finally overwhelmed Egypt, reaching a crescendo of destruction in this week’s parashah, Bo (Exodus 10:1-13:16) which recounts the last three plagues – locusts, darkness, and the death of the first-born – the seeds of the challenge to the oppression of the Hebrews were sown in acts of human courage and defiance; the impulse to intervene and challenge injustice. Hence, the courage and defiance of the midwives, Shifrah and Pu’ah, who refused to obey Phaorah’s command to kill the new-born Hebrew baby boys (1:15-21); hence, the sense of outrage that propelled Moses to kill a taskmaster that was beating a slave (2:11-12).

Nevertheless, the focus of the Exodus narrative in the Torah, amplified later in the Haggadah, is on the role of God in liberating the slaves. When Moses encountered the Eternal One at the burning bush that was not consumed by the flames, the Eternal said to him: ‘I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their pains; / and I shall come down to deliver them out of the hand of Egypt …’ (Sh’mot, Ex. 3:7-8a). At the beginning of the next parashah, the encounter continues with a declaration that includes four promises of redemption: ‘I am the Eternal and I will bring you out from under the burdens of Egypt, and I will deliver you from there bondage, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgements, and I will take you me as a people and I will be your God’ (Va-eira, Ex. 6:6-7a). And then, when the Israelites were unable to hear the promises of freedom that Moses brought to them because the ‘harsh bondage’ had caused kotzer ru’ach, a ‘shortness of spirit’ (6:9), the ten plagues that followed conveyed a more potent message. Finally, when the ex-slaves arrived at Mount Sinai at the beginning of the third month following their departure from Egypt, another dramatic declaration expresses the accomplishments of the all-powerful God in poetic language: ‘You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on Eagle’s wings and brought you to Myself’ (Yitro, Ex. 19:4).

But what about the human actors in the story? God is not a ‘Superman’ with ‘a mighty hand and an outstretched arm’ – or an Eagle. God works through people: ‘But the midwives feared God and did not do as a king of Egypt had spoken’ (1:17) Another way of putting it is that being created b’tzelem Elohim, ‘in the image of God’ (B’reishit, Genesis 1:27), means that each human being is tasked to ensure that all human beings are treated as images of God. We are meant to intervene to challenge oppression and injustice, just as Shifrah and Pu’ah intervened, just as Moses intervened. While at the beginning of B’reishit, the Book of Genesis, we encounter a theology of Guardianship expressed in the responsibility of the first human to ‘tend’ and ‘keep’ the garden (Gen. 2:15), Sh’mot, the Book of Exodus confronts us with a theology of Intervention. When we look at the world today, there are so many sites of injustice and oppression. Thinking of the horrors of the Sho’ah, the plight of the Uighur Muslims, in particular, held as slaves in concentration camps, tortured and compelled to submit to re-education[2], demands our concern and our intervention. A cultural genocide – and a full-blown genocide in-the-making if the horrific treatment of the Uighurs is allowed to continue unchecked. Fortunately, campaigns have got off the ground, so we have an opportunity to participate and make a contribution[3]. As we read parashat Bo this Shabbat and mark Holocaust Memorial Day and Tu Bishvat on the 27th, let’s embrace a theology of intervention as Liberal Jews and make a commitment to act.

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  1. https://www.hmd.org.uk/resource/20-january-1942-wannsee-conference/ ↑

  2. https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/china-uighur-muslim-detention-camp-unhrc-xi-jinping-a8983971.html

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/24/china-has-built-380-internment-camps-in-xinjiang-study-finds ↑

  3. https://campaignforuyghurs.org/ https://www.saveuighur.org/ https://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/19-rabbis-among-uk-faith-leaders-calling-for-justice-for-uyghurs/ ↑

Our Foremothers: A Commentary of parashat Chayyei Sarah

Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah – LJ E-Bulletin, November 2020 /Cheshvan 5781

25 years ago, the publication of Siddur Lev Chadash was a huge milestone. After two decades of Jewish feminism, the new prayer book of Liberal Judaism put gender equality at the top of the agenda. The main difference in this respect between the new siddur and Service of the Heart published in 1967 was the use of an inclusive translation of the Hebrew throughout. When it came to the language of God, for example, gone were the words ‘Lord’, ‘King’ and ‘Father’; replaced by ‘Eternal One’, ‘Sovereign’ and ‘Parent’.

The changes in the Hebrew were minimal by contrast, but one change was extremely significant. In the Avot, ‘Fathers’, the first paragraph of the T’fillah, the Central Prayer, in came the ‘Immahot’, the ‘Mothers’. So, after the traditional recitation of Elohei Avraham, elohei Yitzchak veilohei Ya’akov, ‘God of Abraham, God of Isaac and God of Jacob’: Elohei Sarah, elohei Rivkah, elohei Racheil veilohei Leah, ‘God of Sarah, God of Rebekah, God of Rachel and God of Leah’ (Siddur Lev Chadash, LJ, 1995, p.97).

We should note the decision to add the Foremothers after the Forefathers, rather than list them by generation. The translation in the American Reconstructionist prayerbook published in 1994 also puts the Patriarchs first, but the Foremothers appear alongside the Forefathers, and with the omission of the word ‘and’, they stand in their own right (Kol Haneshamah. The Reconstructionist Press, 1994, pp. 90-91):

God of Abraham God of Sarah

God of Isaac         God of Rebekah

God of Jacob         God of Rachel

God of Leah

Significantly, in both versions Leah is mentioned after Rachel, although she was the elder sister and the first to bear a child (Va-yeitzei, Gen. 29:31-32).

Gender equality is a contemporary value. The Genesis narratives of our ancestors reflect a patriarchal culture, in which males and females were not treated equally, and married women’s lives were limited to their roles as wives and mothers. When Sarah couldn’t conceive, her maidservant, Hagar became her surrogate (Lech L’cha, Gen. 16:1-4). Similarly, when Jacob’s favourite wife Rachel was unable to conceive, her maidservant, Bilhah became her surrogate. Two of Jacob’s sons, Dan and Naphtali were the sons of Bilhah (Va-yeitzei, Gen. 30:1-8). Rachel’s older sister Leah, on the other hand, was fertile. However, when she stopped conceiving temporarily after bearing Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah, Leah made a similar arrangement with her maidservant, Zilpah, who mothered Jacob’s sons, Gad and Asher (30:9-13).

Since Bilhah and Zilpah mothered between them four of Jacob’s twelve sons, perhaps, we should also include them in the blessing of the Avot v’Immahot? The argument against would be that the blessing refers in each generation to the ‘God of … ‘ and there is no evidence that Bilhah and Zilpah had a relationship with God. But then, there is no evidence that Sarah, Rachel or Leah had a relationship with God, either. Indeed, we learn that Rachel hid her father Laban’s idols when Jacob’s household was leaving to go back home after his twenty-year exile (Gen. 31:19 and 30-35). Rebekah was the exception. We read that when she was pregnant and felt a struggle within her womb, ‘she went to enquire of the Eternal One – Va-teilech lidrosh Adonai – and the Eternal One responded explaining that ‘Two nations are in your womb … and the elder shall serve the younger’ (Tol’dot, Gen. 25:22-23). Armed with this knowledge, Rebekah took action to ensure that second-born twin, Jacob, would be heir to the blessing due to the firstborn son (Gen. 27:1ff.)

So, what about our first Matriarch, Sarah? This week’s parashah, Chayyei Sarah opens with her death (Gen. 23:1). Of course, Sarah’s role in ensuring the succession from Abraham to Isaac was crucial. Once she became pregnant and gave birth to Isaac, she persuaded Abraham against his wishes to expel Hagar and Ishmael, the son Hagar had borne with Abraham (Va-yeira, Gen. 21:9-11). But reading of Sarah’s death, we are reminded that her life was focused around the imperative to bear a male heir. In everything else, she either followed Avram’s lead as her husband, or disappeared from the narrative altogether. And so, when Avram responded to God’s call and decided to leave his home, the text says simply, ‘Then Avram took Sarai his wife’ (Lech L’cha, Gen. 12:5). When their journey brought them into Egypt and Avram sensed danger, he told Sarai to pretend to be his sister (12:13). Even when the mysterious messengers came to the door of the tent and announced that Sarah would bear a son, it was Abraham who organised the hospitality, while Sarah listened in the background and laughed to herself at the prospect of becoming a mother at her great age (Va-yeira, Gen. 18:10-15).

Chayyei Sarah opens with the words ‘The life of Sarah was 127 years… And Sarah died in Kiryat Arba, that is Hebron’ (Gen. 24:1-2). Towards the end of the parashah, having secured a wife for Isaac and after marrying again, we read of Abraham’s death at the age of 175 (25:7-8). There is nothing remarkable about the passing of our first Matriarch and Patriarch – except for two things; one implicit and one explicit. Sarah’s death is recorded immediately after the binding of Isaac (Va-yeira, Gen. 22). This juxtaposition should make us wonder about the connection between the two events. Was Sarah consulted, when Abraham went off to sacrifice Isaac? And then, when Abraham died, we read that ‘Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him in the cave of Machpelah’ (25:9). Sarah’s sole act of volition was to force the two brothers apart, but nevertheless, they remained brothers and shared the sacred duty of burying their father.

So, should the first blessing of the T’fillah reflect more closely what the Torah narratives tell us about our Foremothers and Forefathers? No. While our liturgy connects us to our inheritance, it is also an expression of our values as Liberal Jews today of all genders, committed to equality and inclusion.

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