Charity

Charity, I do not like. Not that I want to discourage people, mind you. It's just that I do not like the implications of the word. Charity to me, implies kind of hierarchy. We can give charity to the unfortunate needy. The word charity actually comes from the Latin root, Caritas. Caritas means affection or fondness.  Therefore, when we give “charity” we are doing so out of love. Nice idea.  I do not think so.

I would argue that if we give only out of a feeling for the poor will not give when our song remains on moved by their plight. It is easy to have a heart swayed by a waif with a wide out eyes who is resembles Oliver Twist and remain implacable in the face of a malformed body. Dennis Prager has challenged many high school teenagers with the following scenario: two men of equal worse see a beggar. One is moved to tears by the poor person’s situation. He commiserates and gives him one dollar. The next man sees the man takes $10 from his pocket and grudgingly gives it to the beggar. Prager then asks who has done the better thing. The overwhelming response is that the one who is overtly sympathetic, and give only a dollar, is better.  That is wrong.

Judaism does not demand pathos, although it is a nice addition to make us more human. Our faith states that we need to do acts of tzedaka, not charity. Tzedaka means righteousness. In the case of the two man who saw the beggar and reacted, Judaism would say that the one who aided the beggar so that he has enough to eat has performed the mitzvah. Beggars may benefit from charity but they live from tzedakah.

Tzedakah comes from the word tzedek.  Tzedek means righteousness or justice.  Tzedakah is the Jewish moral code by which we are commanded to live.

Reach Out Across the Aisle and Then Up

Back in 1984 in the small community of Eastvale Texas, things went awry.  Big time.  Potholes were so numerous that the police stopped giving tickets for drunken driving (everybody swerved).  Water was in extremely short supply to the extent that the fire department had to “borrow” water.  Even automobiles threw fenders, mufflers and tires randomly, indiscriminately. Car parts littered the streets.  They just fell apart all over the place.  To misuse biblical terminology, ‘the septic tanks runneth over.’

Leaders from the community got together and decided the best way to get some coveted financial relief from the government was to call themselves ‘blighted’.  Said then Mayor Bert Eubank, “All I need is just a couple of million.”

These modern-day Jobs figured they could attract a lot of attention by drawing the national media to view their open wounds (anticipating sympathy in the form of dollars).

The story reminds me of the beggar in Fiddler on the Roof.  With his hand extended, he begs for money from the usual characters.  Offered one kopec, the beggar complains, “Because you had a bad week I should suffer?”

As life progresses, good and bad come unexpectedly.  How we react to these occurrences defines us.  A large segment of the deepest meaning of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur is coming to terms with how we have responded to the ordinary events of life, the day-to-day stuff.

A prayer we recite on the Holy Days reads that we should be blessed by “never having to be dependent upon the charity of others.”  At the same time, we pray that God should be charitable to us in judging our lives. In other words, we ought to feel dependent upon God, not upon humanity. 

Who would disagree?  Of course we ought to be independent of people!  Closer to the truth is that we invert the Judaic notion: we form intricate webs of dependency and inter-dependency with people while distancing ourselves from God. 

One of the realizations of the global warming phenomenon is that we are swiftly understanding how much we are need of one another for survival.  We are dependent on people.   We cannot get along without them.  We need to galvanize one another and work on tandem to assure that the world will sustain us in the near future.  We need people in other ways too.  They are our employers; we wait for words of encouragement, paychecks and raises.  They are our customers; without them we are out of business.  We are connected to humanity at all levels.  Our lives are spent depending on people.

And yet.  It is not supposed to be this way.

At times of searing personal pain, our attention goes elsewhere.  Wisdom from the battlefield: “There are no atheists in a foxhole.”  Our tradition says the same thing using the metaphor of life.  Long ago, Eliezer ben Durdaya was a man who reached the height of personal achievement.  He was rich, successful… and hungry.  Eliezer had an insatiable desire for more and more.  His life slowly became twisted and his contorted by his want and the intolerable emptiness inside.

Nearing the end of his days Eliezer ben Durdaya screamed to the mountains, ”You are great  --Plead for me!” They remained silent.  Eliezer then turned to the sun and moon asking their help and intervention.  They too, remained unmoved.  Finally, Eliezer understood the blanket truth: he had to do the final reckoning.  No one, no thing would come to his defense.

Judaism does not believe in finger pointing, unless the finger is directed at the self.  Even if events or people have contributed to our present condition only we can make the ultimate difference; change.  The Talmud sums it up this way: When a person dies, nothing accompanies him before the Almighty, except his deeds.  

Be Charitable

Charities are doing lousy.  So writes the New York Times (7/30/02).

Population is gyrating up.  Donations are down.   Two necessary ingredients for disaster.

Judaism is compulsive about giving.  In fact, our tradition is so heavily dependent on the notion of giving, that tzedaka is absolute.  That is, we must do acts of tzedaka whether we feel like it or not.

Idea: Barbara Silver runs A Package From Home*.  Barbara sends toothbrushes, socks and hats to hayalim bodeddim, soliders in Israel with no family.  She also encloses a note of thanks for the job of defending the country.

Idea: Mazon** annually provides about $1,000,000 to charitable organizations around the country.  They support soup kitchens, work programs and our own Harvest Hope needs all our help locally.

A View from Israel::  “Today I visited terrorism survivors in hospital, bringing chocolate bars and balloons.  Some have been there already a month and have much longer to go.  One teenager was bombed in Café Moment and her entire leg had bolts sticking out of it to hold it together.  One young guy was shot by a terrorist in Neve Yaakov over a month ago, and he explained that his entire left side was riddled with bullets.  Another guy was with him and he too is still in the hospital, hardly able to move his leg.  Another young guy said he doesn’t ever sleep because he’s in so much pain.  He was also in the Café Moment bombing.  We talked to his mom too, who is having a hard time with the expense of getting to and from the hospital every single day.  She lives all the way across the city.  They all visit with each other, this young group of terrorism survivors and it was so nice to see how they keep each other company.  The entire visit had a strong emotional impact on me that I haven’t yet had time to process.

One of the most powerful moments came with our final visit, to an older woman who was in the Passover bombing in Netanya.  Her spirits were very low and she kept talking about wanting to have peace and for the attacks to stop.  We talked for several minutes before I noticed the tattoo on her arm from the Holocaust.

This personal narrative is from Person-to-Person Action Corps in Israel*.  They visit hospital, bring balloons, buy underwear…. whatever is needed by the survivors of acts of deadly terrorism.

Idea: Tuesdays with Friends offers opportunities to serve the older members in Columbia.  For information about TWF call the office. (Beth Shalom members cook and serve meals once a month).

Idea:  Numerous opportunities for tzedaka exist in our own shul.   We cook and serve the handicapped twice yearly.  We run a programs for people in homes and hospitals and shul members members cook and serve a meals once a  We run programs for the elderly now too. 

Charity giving may be down but in the Jewish faith we have learned some great lessons through the long epochs.  One of them is that we must always give; giving refines the soul and provides a genuine sense of worth.   May it be said of us when we pass from this physical universe that the world is a better place because we were here.

American Jewish World Service
45 West 36th Street
New York, NY 10018

T: 212-792.2900   ajws@ajws.org. 

 **             MAZON

                  1990 South Bundy Drive

                  Suite 260

                  Los Angeles, CA 90025-5232

                  E-Mail:  mazonmail@mazon.org

                  www.mazon.org

What Should You Support?

Hypothetically.  Just say you have one or two million dollars to give away.  It was a good year and now it is time to give back; time to do some “tikkun,” improvement.  The first decision you need to make is how to best use such a goodly amount. After all, being a good entrepreneur with solid business skills, you know that giving money must also be solidly researched and well-thought.  So you begin to think of all the worthwhile charities you can donate the money to with an awareness that the money must make a real and significant difference for your people.  You want to give it to Jews. 

The next decision is how best to allocate the money; there are many worthwhile causes.  Among them are programs and activities for the infirmed.  The money could go a long way toward giving meaning to the elderly.  Israel is a possibility.  With years at war and ongoing economic as well as frontal assaults, such an infusion of cash would give much needed money along with an unspoken statement of support.  Youth programs are certainly worthwhile.  Recreational and sports activities for children.  So many things to choose!

You could even decide to divide the money up among the many willing and noble causes.  Why not give a little to each?  The only problem with that is that the greatest effect of the donation will not be met.  A single lasting contribution by you cannot be achieved when the money is thinned out among different agencies.  What do you do?

The one area so often overlooked when philanthropists seek ways to contribute to the welfare of the Jewish people is through the synagogue.  Odd, isn’t it?  In the past twenty years memorials and museums have been constructed to the memory of the Six Million in metropolises throughout the world.  Relying on deep pockets these buildings rise on significant gifts and bequests.  Massive JCCs have been built in virtually every city through the nation costing many millions of dollars.   At the same time, most religious institutions continue to exist on a shoe-string budget.  They barely balance their meager balance sheets.  And yet synagogues are the most meaningful contributors to Jewish survival! 

The fact that there are philanthropists at all that still remember they are Jewish is because of the shuls they were brought up in.  They never forgot the lessons of cheder (religious school).  Their teachers were insistent that tzedaka is humanity’s redemption.   Ingrained in their memory are sitting at shul and crying to God.  They will never forget the serious learning the long impassioned discussions about tzedaka and justice.  Wrapped in a tallit, benching licht (candle lighting), full emotional outpouring of the soul are all memories which inform the present.

It is usual too see sprawling hospitals in large metropolitan areas named for Jewish contributors.  The same is true of our universities.  A few years back in 2002 a very rich billionaire philanthropist died.  Creator of the famous TV Guide and Seventeen magazines Walter Annenbery was also a powerful voice in politics.  He donated millions to museums and institutions of learning including the Annenberg Schools of Communication.  One of his many legacies is the Annenberg Foundation which gives away grants and affords opportunities for many people throughout our country.    Training programs, educational media, theatres, hospitals, communications and so much more were left by Walter Annenberg.  The name will be familiar if you watch PBS.  Little was given to Jewish causes.  Nothing at all that I am aware of was given to Synagogues.  Why?

The same question can be leveled at many Jewish do-gooders.  Why do they ignore the fountain which feeds all the tributaries  If it were to dry up, rest assured the balance of the Jewish landscape would wither in its wake.  The Day Schools are in a similar quandary.  While they nurture the youngest shoots of the flower they receive scant attention from big donors.  Millions are given to create a chair at a university which does nothing to foster Jewish identity while rabbis and principals go about with their hands out.

Another oddity: all the afore mentioned buildings and programs will eventually fall away.  As proven through the epochs the only remaining feature of Jewish life are shuls and their educational appendages.  Need proof?  Think of the last time you traveled.  What noteworthy Jewish sites remain for more than a century?  Almost without exception they are synagogues.  What happened to the rest of their communal activities and structures?  We do not know.  They did not survive.

So why do the moneyed forget the place where the future is to be written?  I do not know.  But if anyone has an answer I would love to hear it.