On Language

Rabbi Michael Feshbach

Temple Anshe Hesed

Erie, Pennsylvania

William Safire was in Erie last month. I didn't go to hear him. I would have, for despite disagreeing with him politically, I admire his wit, his words and his weekly column in the New York Times. I would have gone to see him, except that he was speaking on a Friday night. What's the Yiddish phrase? It's tough to be a Jew.
Despite not hearing him, however, just knowing that he was here opened my ear. If I were William Safire, what would I write about. Aha! Just the other day, in his own paper, I found one! One use of language so unconsciously inappropriate as to spark a column.

The article was in the Financial Section of the Times. Not the first place I turn to, to be honest. Let's just say that I read the comics in the New York Times sooner and more frequently than the financial news in any paper. (Hamayvin yavin; those who understand will understand.) But this time, an article caught my eye.

Seven years of plenty, the headline read. It was referring to the stock market. But it was obviously a Biblical reference. To the story of Joseph in Egypt, who interprets Pharoah's dreams of plump and emaciated livestock, and of tall and withered crops, as referring to seven years of plenty, followed by seven years of famine. Sure enough, underneath the headline was the quote from Genesis. The subject was speculation that the years of booming growth on Wall Street might be followed by years of bust. But the article began with a most interesting sentence. It read something like this: "Surely using the Bible to make economic forecasts is a most unorthodox approach."

Is it now? Is it really? Orthodox Keynsians, maybe. But I have met a number of the "original" "Orthodox." And it seems to me that using the Torah to make predictions about the future is, for some of them, precisely an Orthodox thing to do. And the tradition is open, at least metaphorically, to all Jews. My favorite Talmudic sage, selected for my affection simply because of his name, Rabbi Ben Bag Bag, said: "Hafoch bah, v'hafoch bah, v'kulah bah; turn it and turn it (the Torah), for everything is in it." Everything. References to tyrants and triumphs of past and future. The cycle of history. Even tomorrow's stock prices? Yes, some would say (although I am suspicious of such specifics, myself). Even tomorrow's stock prices. If you know how to read it right. Take that, Early Edition!

The subject of the use of the Torah, its scope, its aim, and its prophetic power is a fine topic for another time. This week, however, I want to remain with the irony of language. Thus randomly alerted to an interesting twist on the word "orthodox," from that bastion of secular Jewish reading material, the New York Times, I then turned to an intentionally Jewish publication, Moment magazine. There to find two more examples in the careful, and careless (or, if not careless, then offensive) use of words.

In a dialoge (debate?) between the Orthodox Dr. Stephen Bayme, and the Reform movement's Rabbi Eric Yoffie, both participants were so careful, so attuned to the nuances of what they were saying, that they wound up actually being respectful in disagreement, an accomplishment worth savoring in this overheated war of words between the denominations of late. Both men, because they were concentrating on what they were saying, while tackling a difficult subject (intermarriage and outreach) managed to sound respectful of one another, and looked towards all movements as having the potential to be serious Judaism. Where respect can come through despite differences, hope can find a harbor from the storms of hate. Interesting, then, that in an article about a difficult subject, careful words paved the path for a dialoge that could at least take place.

What, then, are we to say about another article in the same issue. The writer was not trying to be offensive; in fact, he was trying to do a mitzvah. It was an article about matchmakers in the Jewish community. It was an interesting article. But the writer, as have so many others, made clear that there were just two perspectives on Judaism. There was the Orthodox world. And everything else was secular. No possible conception of a non-secular, non Orthodox Jew. Then the icing on the cake, referring to the Orthodox as "religious" couples, in clear contrast with all other Jews.

In Israel, the Orthodox have usurped the word "religious" unto themselves. "Dati" ("religous") simply means Orthodox. But it is precisely that kind of subconscious use of languague that must be brought to light, to reveal the assumptions it conveys, because of all those who do not share those assumptions.

Language creates reality. The world we know is shaped by the words we use. It is precisely why there is so much discussion of languague in our society today, and so much heat (and so little light) surrounding the label of "political correctness." I am the first to agree that some usages of language can go too far for my own personal taste. Until I lost weight, and now, still fighting the battle, I have been a little heavy. I don't need someone to call me circumferentially challenged. Still, for all its potential for parody, the movement of political correctness is, first and foremost, an excercise in the sensitive use of language. It is about the fact that words have implications.

Resistance to the fact that words have implications is resistance to precision, communication, education. It is when people come out and admit that the implications of "insensitive" language are things that they agree with... then we are down to really talking tachlis. Then we are dealing with real issues. And it is at that level we can begin to tell if real respect is possible. If dialog in the face of disagreement is possible. Ultimately, if democracy itself is possible.

From one religious, non-secular, non-Orthodox Jew, to all of you, my best wishes. Happy listening.

Making Change

Rabbi Michael Feshbach

Temple Anshe Hesed

Erie, PA

I remember as if it were yesterday the strangest string of statements I had ever heard. It was eight years ago, on a sunny July morning in South Florida. And it is a series of statements that I have heard many, many times since, without ever giving them a second thought. But that time it was something different.

I was in a meeting. A woman came in. She said the following words to me: "Rabbi Feshbach, your wife is on the phone on line two in your office. Your secretary is getting the number."

That's it. The strangest string of statements. Not much, really. But on that day eight years ago, I was simply stunned by these two sentences.

You see, I had only been ordained for slightly over a month. Married for two weeks. Moved to Florida for less than one week. And I remember my reaction to these words. It was this: Who is Rabbi Feshbach? Who is my wife? Where is my office? I have a secretary?

There had been so much change in our lives, so fast, that I guess I just hadn't really absorbed it all. I was stunned.

I have heard that there are books and magazine articles out there that give people advice on how to run there lives. The experts who write these articles seem to agree on something called "common wisdom." Common wisdom says, I have been told, that there are many sources of stress in life, and that we should all carefully plan to avoid having more than one of these stresses in the same decade or so. These life experiences that are to be savored all on their own, without the imposition of one too close to the other, are: getting married, moving, starting a new job. Oh, and one should also have one's children exactly the right distance apart.

Well, most of us have learned by now that if Life and the Franklin Planner were interchangeable terms, we would not need different words for them. Some changes we seek, others we are open to, and others come out of the blue. To paraphrase the motto of a well known support group -- Change Happens. (Or: Life is What Happens When You Are Trying to Make Plans.)

This past year Julie and I became parents, and are still learning what that means. This summer we are moving from Erie, (although not that far). I am going to become the Rabbi at Temple Beth Am of Williamsville, New York, a suburb of Buffalo. This late fall/early winter we are expecting another child -- and hoping and praying that everything goes well with that.

Each of these changes is something that could be contemplated on its own. Each one involves transition, which is always educational, and always an inducement to growth -- but rarely easy. Each one involves excitement, anticipation... and some sadness for the passing of what once was. Each one would leave us busier than I could have imagined being.

I know people who claim that they are "spiritual," but not religious. They like alternative states of awareness and consciousness. They do not like rituals.

I have two problems with this claim. The first is that it is often sometimes disingenuous. Because, frankly, almost all human beings have rituals. Rituals are the way we pattern our lives, the routines I wrote about last week, the habits we form from which, scientists tell us now, we really are Wired -- for the things we do with regularity leave trace marks on our minds, physical imprints in our brains. Everyone has rituals of some sort, which are seldom fully rational, and which leave us flummoxed at best if something happens to interfere with them.

But the second problem I have with the claim that one can be spiritual and not religious is that I know how very, very important "ritual" is in life. In changes. In transitions.

There is a reason why there are so many rituals associated with "life-cycle" events. Celebrations of birth and commemorations of death. B'nai Mitzvah, and Graduation. Weddings -- and, hopefully rarely -- divorces. Farewell dinners, and installations. There is a reason why people develop private rituals for other transitions -- and why I believe Jewish creativity is now responding for new rituals for new changes -- on getting a driver's license, on leaving for college, on being an Empty Nester, and for events in womens' lives that once went unmarked. All of these rituals surrounding change, the old ones and the new ones, they too, come from a level beneath the surface, beyond the rational. They come from a subconscious awareness that when we change, we are, in a sense, coming apart.

We do come apart. A part of us ends. A part of us is new. Only a part of us remains the same.

This part-ing is hard. It separates us from others, and segregates different parts of ourselves. Which is why transition is hard for everyone. And why it is dangerous for the self. When we change anything in our lives, we are unravelling our lives. The danger is: we might not re-ravel right.

This is what the rituals that mark the changes in our lives do: they provide a place, and a presence, to witness the change, and support us through it. The old family structure ends, and reravels into this: two individuals become a couple, a couple become parents; a family of three welcomes a fourth. A young person becomes an adult. A child is given a name, and joins a people.

These are private moments, but they are not private alone. They affect the community. And the community can be there, to help, to be the audience as the change is played out on the ritual stage... to reassure the changed individuals that there place in the community is secure. And to hold and comfort and support when someone is so overwhelmed... that they don't know, for a moment, who they are, or how to find their office.

There are changes coming in our life. There are changes that have already happened. How glad I have been to be part of a community that cared so much about my family as to help us through some of these changes. There is sadness in leaving that community, and pain. And hope that we can remain a part of each others lives. And there is excitement at learning about, and being part of a new place, of new faces and future friends and the things we will go through together.

We are making changes in our lives again. But all that means, really, is that we are alive. And for that, I am nervous, I am anxious, I am excited. I am grateful. And I am glad.

Double Jeopardy

Double Jeopardy

Rabbi Michael L . Feshbach

"Wherever you go," says a song I know, "there’s always someone Jewish .You’re never alone, when you say you’re a Jew. “Well, we may never be completely alone as Jews. But it sometimes feels lonely nonetheless. Sometimes we are lonely as Jews. And sometimes we are lonely because of the kinds of Jews we are.

It is a blessing and a curse to be, always and everywhere, a minority.     But I am a minority, as an American Reform Jew. I am minority because of my religion in this country, and, most especially, in the community in which I live (there are only approximately 800 Jews in the surrounding 300,000 area population of Erie County, Pennsylvania).And I am a minority because of my denomination in Israel. And this particular December, because of’ ‘church-state" issues, that minority status is confronting me in both places at once.

i .My Home: Church-State Issues

At the request of several families in our congregation, I attended and spoke at the most recent meeting of a local Board of Education. The meeting itself was an educational experience for me; I urge all of us, even those with children in private schools (since you still can vote in these elections) to periodically carve out the time to attend the open meetings of local government, so we can get to know the people in public life - and see how they behave in those positions.

It was ... well, shocking .People was shouting at each other. Members were grandstanding in ways that were just; well, ignorant of the issues and the law. Members had no clue what they were voting on part of the time. They followed no recognizable parliamentary procedure. It put any doubts I ever might have had about the functioning of synagogue boards into a proper (and positive!) perspective.

The specific issue which prompted my attendance was a recent controversy surrounding the school system’s Holiday Card Contest. An internal memo, leaked to the press, stated that the cards should have "no nativity scenes." What was meant as "no religious symbols, for example, no nativity scenes," was seen by some of our Christian neighbors as "the only religious symbols you cannot use are Christian ones????”What was meant to be sensitive and inclusive of all came across(or, perhaps - and let 's face it, this is a possibility - was deliberately misconstrued) as being discriminatory against the majority faith.

The issue is complex . Students should not be censored . Yet a card picked to represent the entire district should reflect the officially neutral stance of the government towards religion) . But I think that if we get past the emotions surrounding church-state issues, especially in our schools, we may find that we have more common ground than we thought .

I believe that both sides sometimes react to what they think the other side is saying, or what their fears are, not what is actually being said (although some groups , it is true, really do want Christian prayer said out loud by all students in public schools) .

In an attempt to find that common ground , I have developed five criteria to help my own thinking about issues of religion and public schools .Not everyone would agree with these criteria .But I believe that many people would , even if their policy conclusions might differ .The criteria are :

1.       We all want quality education for our children .

2.       We all believe that our children should be allowed to express themselves . Non-intrusive, non-coercive , student initiated religious expression is legal in public schools, with slightly greater leeway given the older students get , since coercive power is lessened as we become more mature .(Thus public universities fund activities not allowed elementary schools .And this is also why the argument, "well , Congress does it," does 't apply .)

3.      We all believe that a public school classroom is not a place to exclude anyone . Any activities which make some children feel less than "normal " should be avoided .

4.      We believe that schools can teach about but not actively celebrate religious holidays .

5.      We believe in the rule of law .We might not agree with the law .The Supreme Court, for example , has ruled the menorahs and Christmas trees are seasonal, rather than religious symbols .The very idea of the Supreme Court ruling on whether something in my religion is "religious" or not is repugnant to me . But that is the law of the land . And we want our schools to abide by the law. If we don 't like the law, the schools are not the right address for our grievances .

After many frustrating discussions on this topic, I have come to believe that if only we can convey how excluded we feel when Christianity is endorsed as a public norm, and if only our opponents can communicate their real fear than an important component of their children 's lives will be demeaned , dismissed or undermined , then we can make progress and move from common ground to the common good .But those are a lot of ifs.

ii .My Homeland : Church-State Issues

"Reform is goyim of the highest order ."So wrote one of Israel 's most prominent Orthodox rabbis in recent months .Another went so far as to suggest that the zealot Pinchas , who in the Torah stuck a spear through the bellies oaf couple of whose actions he disapproved , was (we he saying justifiably?? ) eliminating the very first Reform Jews .

If I am a minority as a Jews in my home country, I am a minority as a Reform Jew in our homeland .And now, in the coming days, one of the very few gains we have ever made in the Israeli courts is about to come under fierce attack .

In November 1995 the Israeli Supreme Court upheld the validity of Reform and Conservative conversions performed in Israel .Those performed in the Diaspora are supposedly already valid for purposes of immigration to Israel under the Law of Return .)The problem remains that with Orthodox political control over the Ministry of Religious Affairs , which oversees birth , marriage and death records , one could be registered as a Jew for immigration purposes , but not be allowed to marry as a Jew, have "Jewish " children , or be buried in a Jewish cemetery .

Even the small gains of recent days, however , are now on the chopping block of political expediency .A law requiring all conversions to be re-certified by the Orthodox Chief Rabbinate is coming before the Knesset ; it was one of the promises Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu             (himself a secular Jew) made to his "partners " in order to form a coalition .Since the prime minister depends on the Orthodox parties for the bulk of his political support, this bill is almost sure to pass .

And so Israel remains, and looks likely to remain, the only otherwise democratic country in the world in which Jews are not given full religious freedom , to not only practice our religion, but to do so through whichever denomination we choose .The answer is not to cut ourselves off from our homeland .The answer is not to claim that we are fully at home here , that Israel is not part of our lives (an anti-Zionist position thoroughly and tragically discredited by the horror of history); the answer is not to slash our donations to the UJA in protest (which ultimately hurts our own communities the most) .The answer is to react .... and act .

In a bit of partisan fervor which you will not often find in this column, I want to tell you a little bit about one organization that is fighting for equal rights for all Jews in Israel .It is called ARZA , the American Reform Zionist Association .In my mind , this is our best hope, and the most effective voice , fighting for civil rights, for social justice , and, yes, for our own self-interest as Liberal Jews in the land of Israel .

It is ARZA (and its Israeli counterpart , the Israel Religious Action Center) that brings the cases and pleads the cause of Reform and Conservative rights before the courts of Israeli justice and in the court of Israeli opinion .

Every single committed , non-Orthodox Jew who cares about liberal Judaism and who cares about the land and people and state of Israel should be a member of ARZA .It is easy .It is inexpensive($36).It is effective .                      It is in our own interest.(More information about ARZA and its activities are available at ARZA, 838 Fifth Avenue , New York, New York, 10021-7064 ; 1-212-650-2480, fax 212-517-7968... OR via the World Wide Web , at, I believe :http ://shamash.org/reform/uahc .You can find ARZA listed on the home page of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations .)

Along with joining ARZA, now is the time to make our voices heard more directly .I can fax or e-mail to anyone who is interested the addresses of all the relevant political leaders, and a sample letter to them. For convenience , I am including Prime Minister Netanyahu 's address now :Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu , Office of the Prime Minister , P .O . Box 187, Jerusalem , ISRAEL, 91919.

Fax 011-972-2-566-4838 .

Please take the time , and find the air-mail postage(or the small cost of an international fax) to let Israel 's leaders know your feelings on this issue .

It is true that unless we are citizens, we do not get a vote in Israel .But remember that much of the impetus for these changes is coming from American Orthodox leaders . And while we don 't get a vote ... it is our homeland , and our faith being called into question .Not a vote ... but we do get a voice . Let us use our voices now .I urge you to do so.

From Redemption to Redeemers

FROM REDEMPTION TO REDEEMERS: THE MESSAGE OF PASSOVER

Rabbi Michael Feshbach

More than a thousand generations ago, a certain group of Hebrew slaves in ancient Egypt escaped from their bondage and left behind the land of their captivity. The events turned a loose rag-tag association of tribes into a nation, which left its mark on the religious consciousness of humankind.

This year, Passover begins on Friday night. The holiday begins with a festive meal and special observances, and it lasts for eight days (seven in some circles - especially in Reform Judaism).

Passover is most characterized by two particular observances. The first is the "Seder", the ritual meal held on the first two nights at which the story of the Exodus is told and retold in great detail. The second is that, in memory of the hasty departure from Egypt (in which even the bread that the Israelites were preparing did not have time to rise), most Jews refrain throughout this holiday from eating bread or any kind of food that "rises" in a similar way. Thus, only "unleavened" , or flat, crispy bread called Matzah, is eaten, and the only flour used in cooking is made from this Matzah.

The name Passover comes from the last of the ten plagues against the Egyptians, when the angel of death came at night and killed all the firstborn in Egypt, but "passed over" the houses of the Jews that had been specially marked.

A story is told in the Haggadah, the special book used at the ritual meal, about certain rabbis who lived in the second century. These rabbis spent the entire evening after this meal discussing the "redemption" involved in the Exodus from Egypt. They continued with their discussions all through the night, until their students came to them and said: "Masters, the time has come to recite the morning blessings.”

On the surface, this is a cute little story. It says that each year Jews should spend time thinking about the Exodus, the real beginning of the Jewish people .But this story also tells much more about the deeper significance of Passover.

These rabbis lived under the Roman Empire, at a time during which both Jews and Christians were persecuted. Simply observing Passover at all was a crime punishable by death - and some of the rabbis in this story were eventually martyred.

There is a theory that what they were doing that night was both talking about the past redemption, the Exodus from Egypt, and actively trying 1 'bring about a future redemption - by plotting a revolution (ill-fated though it was) against the Roman oppressors. Their students came to tell them not, "It is time to pray now," but to warn them: It is morning; it is time to begin less subversive activities.

In the annual celebration of Passover, past and present - and future - meet and interact. Every year a Jew is told: In every generation, each person must think that he or she came out of Egypt. The redemption was not just in the past, but is experienced every year as a present event.

This is the key to understanding Passover. Redemption is an ongoing experience and a need in the present. Every year, as long as there is hunger, oppression or poverty in the world, while someone, somewhere, cries out for freedom, the Jew is commanded to feel the experience of being freed himself , and to help others wherever needed. "This year", the very end of the Haggadah reads, if there is discrimination or degrading, slave-like conditions anywhere, "we are all slaves". The closing words of the Haggadah express the eternal Jewish hope; physically and spiritually, "Next year may we all be free. Next year in Jerusalem.”

I Am Not A Number

"I am not a number!"

Rabbi Michael L. Feshbach,

Temple Anshe Hesed, Erie, Pennsylvania

During my junior year in Israel, studying at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, I took a course on the Holocaust taught by a professor named Ze 'ev Mankiewitz .It was a strange thing, indeed, to take a course on the Holocaust, to take exams and be graded on our knowledge of the mechanisms of death, to write academic papers on the inner workings of hate .It was strange, but it was important. And there is at least one session from that class that will stay with me forever.

We were talking about the guards in the camps. One student raised her hand. "How?" she asked. "How could they have done that?"  There was a very brief silence. And then Dr. Mankiewitz, who is a native of South Africa, told of a trip he had taken to the land of his birth several years after having made Aliyah (moved to Israel).

It was a snowy July night, and he was with friends, after a night at the theater.        Standing near their car in the parking lot was a shivering black child of about seven or eight, in a torn coat. As his friends walked past the boy without even breaking their stride or focusing their eyes, Mankiewitz turned to his friends ... and he realized ... that they simply did not see a human being standing there. They did not even notice, because this boy was not a person to them.

As a classroom is a limited setting, so too is a film. How can a film, a play, a novel, any work of art at all capture the horror of the Shoah, the Holocaust? In scope of course, no matter how many piles of bodies or shoes are shown, it cannot. As any work of art, even in retelling a fact-based story, Schindler’s List, (which is now to be shown without commercial interruption on national television) falls short of that mark. In this film, a high percentage of the characters with whom we become involved survive. This, alone, makes its portrayal of the Holocaust too sugar coated.

But it also probably enables the film to reach and touch such a large audience. Besides, the point of art cannot be to show the full scope and scale of the most sordid story of history. What art can do is show a glimpse of the story, and the most basic building block that allowed this horror to happen.

It can show ... how human beings turn each other into something less than human .It can show the act and the outcome of people treating other people as objects. And this Schindler’s List does as powerfully as any other film I have ever seen in my life.

The balance between human touches and the process of dehumanization is brilliant. A young girl waves: "Good -bye, Jews." Some people reduced to papers, others to ashes. Suitcases carefully packed, then flung aside .A jeweler working on separating out precious metals ... presented with a pile of human teeth. Condos into ghettoes, gravestones into footpaths. The randomness of murder. The futility of hope. A single camera shot into the dark and open eyes of a child, clutching his mother’s skirt. People struggling to figure out the rules ... but in the kingdom of the night, where people are not people, there are no rules to figure out.

But this can only be a Steven Spielberg film ... because the reverse process is shown a well : how, for one man , statistics that are numbers on paper , that are merely cheap labor, true objects in the line of production ... become , to him, real people. Slowly .Gradually But completely.

And in the midst of it all, in an ocean of black and white, are the burning yellow flames of the candles ... and a mysterious red dress.

Never again, we say. But never again what?

It should be never again -- not just to the height of the horror -- but the mundane evil that we can not only see in this film, but also relate to. For there is an evil here that is not just Nazi in nature. It is something we see in our everyday lives.

Never again should we allow any people to treat any other human beings as objects.           Never again should a skater skate that saw her rival as only an object to be clubbed out of the way.

Never again should we Jews, of all people, speak derisively of any other people as a whole group, we who have been the objects of such groupthink. ("Goyim, this" or "shvartzes that", for instance -- how many times have we heard it ... or even said it?) The frustration of our history may make this hard, at times. But we must try.

Not too many years ago, there was a short-lived and extremely popular television series in which everyone was referred to by a number. The show was called "The Prisoner," and the ex-spy was number six. But in the opening sequence of every show, he stood on a beach and waved his hands in frustration and shouted at the sky ... "I am not a number. I am a free man!"

As are we all ... not numbers ... but free men and women. Each one of us ... is a human being ... b 'tzelem elohim, made in the image of the Most High, endowed with divinity, touched by God ... and worthy of respect in life ... and in death. Each one of us a story, each one of us a universe, a whole precious world onto ourselves. It is something that we must not -- that we dare not ever forget. About anyone!

It is not the lesson of the Holocaust. That is too large for a class or a work of art, ungraspable, unfathomable .There is more to the Shoah that just that. It stands out, burning in our minds and our hearts and the face of pure evil itself. But to treat other people as people ... it is, to me, the message of this film, and one of the most important lessons of life.