This Pesach

We have grown up in freedom.  We can say what we want to say, act within the boundaries of propriety (sometimes going a bit too far) because we are free.  It is very difficult to imagine what it would be like to live without that gift.  It is hard to imagine what it must be like to live in a totalitarian regime where every move is monitored and for the slightest infraction you can be thrown into prison.  There are dozens of modern-day examples.

Anywhere between 20 and 30 million people are slaves TODAY.  26% of that number involves children.   This number does not take into account more than 200,000,000 children working full time, for pennies.  It is entirely possible that children in Indonesia made the shoes you are wearing.  Children as young as five, are sent down into dank mines because they are able to squeeze into small places.  Some girls are sold or kidnapped as wives.  Remember the 200 captured in Nigeria?

It is stated by our sages, of blessed memory, that the idea of exploitation begins with a disparity in how people are viewed:

“That the master should not eat white bread and the slave eat course bread; that the master should not drink old wine and the slave drink new wine; that the master should not sleep on a feather mattress and the slave on straw….”  -Talmud, Kiddushin 20

Wherever there is inequality – when some deserve better than others - there follows forms of slavery. 

This is the essence of Pesach.  We remember what it means to have been a slave.  We are reminded that God hates slavery.  It is the Holy One who redeems the Children of Israel, our ancestors, from the torment of bondage.  It is He who wreaked havoc on a civilization because the Egyptians behaved uncivilly.

When we feel the power of freedom on Pesach and weep for the cruelly tormented in our time we have performed half the task that Passover demands.  The other half in found in the passage we sing on Yom Kippur from Isaiah:

Is such the fast I desire,
A day for men to starve their bodies???….
⁶ No, this is the fast I desire:
To unlock the fetters of wickedness,
And untie the cords of the yoke
To let the oppressed go free;
To break off every yoke.
⁷ It is to share your bread with the hungry,
And to take the wretched poor into your home;
When you see the naked, to clothe him,
And not to ignore your own kin.

⁸ Then shall your light burst through like the dawn
And your healing spring up quickly;
….⁹ Then, when you call, the Lord will answer;
When you cry, He will say: Here I am.  –JPS trans.

What is the prophet telling us?  The question most often asked is “Where is God when good people suffer?”  Remarkably, Isaiah teaches that the Holy Presence is among us when we continue the mission that He began.  God says, “heneni” when we bring freedom to the oppressed.

The Synagogue

When God gave His holy Torah to the people there was thunder shattering the air already thick with smoke.  The earth convulsed, as it was about to give birth to a new universe of order and justice and hesed.

And yet as we come to the next book of the Torah we are perplexed.  God speaks to the people through the Ohel Mo’ed, the Tent of Meeting.  In there, God spoke directly to His servant, Moshe.  When the Divine Voice spoke Moshe heard clearly, the ancient ones tell us.  Those outside the Ohel Mo’ed heard God’s Voice indistinctly.  They had to try to listen to hear the words being spoken.

Many of the sages wonder why the change.  Why was God’s Voice so thunderous at one time and barely discernable the next?

An answer: God was preparing us for a time when His diminished Voice would have to be sought.  That is why we come to the sanctuaries of today; it is where the Voice is most keenly felt.

That is why synagogue has been the central hub of all things Jewish for millennia.  From that place we feed the hungry; it is where we learn Torah.  Synagogues are places where children are educated; babies are named, brises are conducted, weddings performed and mourners encouraged.  From this cornerstone of Judaism cemeteries were purchased, news about Israel was gathered, and Federations were born.

When something goes wrong where do we gather for mutual support and strength?  Where can we pour out our heart without fear of ridicule or judgment?  It has always been the same whether in France, Poland, Russia or Yemen.

That is why support for the Synagogue remains the first and most critical arena for our ongoing care.  Without this what would remain?  Most of us know from our personal experience growing up in small hamlets around the south that when a synagogue closes in town there is no Jewish life left.  It is dead.

I am not a fundraiser.  I do not possess those creative talents.   I ask you to consider either a gift to the synagogue of whatever amount you can afford….or even better….think of leaving a legacy grant to the synagogue in your will.  Imagine the great good that can be done in preserving and enhancing Jewish life in Columbia for years to come!  The power of extending the gift to the next generation – as it was gifted to us – lies within our hands.

Remember all Jewish events and program are extensions of what we teach and promulgate right here.  

Yet. Don’t wait to be asked.

The Way

I often use the word halakha.  Taken non-literally, halakha means Law.  We speak of the Laws of Judaism (traditionally numbered at 613) as the binding concept of the Jewish people.  The halakhot govern the way in which courts function, how we daven; they cover rules of relations and discourse.  In effect, halakha dictates not just the way our society functions but how we relate to God, as well.

Halakha is the practical application of the Written Word, i.e. the Torah.  That which makes the Torah more than an interesting narrative, more than just good fireside stories, is the way that it leaps into the realm of living.  As a matter of fact, one of the primary functions of a rabbi is to breathe life into the Divine text, to make it available for usage.  That is why the Torah is more than a book of ideas or theology.  It is a handbook for life. 

And yet, if you have ever read the Torah for more than three minutes, it is clear that the Bible is not a completely useable document.  Example:  What does the episode of Noah teach us about life?  Sure, it’s a neat story and has fascinating insights and morals but how can it be used as a yardstick for living?  That is where human reason comes in.   Toward the end of the tale of the flood God tells the survivors, “…but flesh with its soul, do not eat its blood.” (Genesis 9:4).

Peering intensely at this passage the Rabbis deciphered several messages.

1). We are allowed to eat meat.

2). We are prohibited from eating living flesh.  That is, implicit in the words ‘flesh with its soul” is the idea that God does not want us to tear a limb from a living animal.  That is cruel.  As an extension of this interpretation comes the law that any part of an animal that is severed while it is still alive negates the whole beast.

3).  As blood is also mentioned in the same verse, that too, is equated with the soul of the animal.  So we have the halakha that any hint of blood in an animal renders it unfit for consumption. 

Our religion is a fusion of both God’s will and human insight.

The literal meaning of the word halakha is way.  For us halakha is the path to the living, organic faith that was born millennia ago.