Passover Reflections 2010

As I sit at this old Olivetti, its motor humming, its keys clickety clacking, its ribbon newly dipped in ink, perhaps the last of its breed still in service, Passover looms. But as you read this, the Seders are memories; the labor of preparations rewarded with the twin joys of hearty fellowship and over abundance of food. The theme of the events was freedom (or if you prefer, of God’s deliverance of His people from slavery). At our Seders for the past few years we mix contemporary song with ancient tradition as we sing the non-Christian parts of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” and, to the same tune, “Solidarity Forever.” We sing Negro spirituals (“Let My People Go”) we sing “We Shall Overcome” and Hatikvah. We talk of Civil Rights struggles of the past and debate (for our guests are usually of mixed political views) gay marriage and universal health care. And we do all this in the comfort of our home, in the warmth of friendship, in the security of knowing that in America we are free and safe.

But it wasn’t always this way, we know. In 1943 the Jews of Warsaw, the few who had managed to survive the deportations to Treblinka, knowing that the end was near, gathered what arms they could to make a last ditch effort to… to what, I’m not sure. Not to survive, they knew that was no longer a possibility, and they were not attempting to follow the example of the Jews of Masada or of York, committing suicide to prevent being captured/murdered/humiliated by oppressors. No, the Jewish leadership of Warsaw meant to die with the dignity of resistance to those who were trying to transform them into sheep led calmly to their deaths. If during the fighting a few could escape, so much the better. The sewers were a way out for some, going over the wall for others, but not for many. For the majority of the Jewish survivors of the past four years of systematic starvation and forced deportation to death camps, the goal was to go down fighting. For Jürgen Stroop, the SS commander assigned to crush the rebellion, the challenge was almost too much. Facing unacceptable losses of his men he resorted to burning buildings, one by one, forcing the surviving Jews to flee into adjacent buildings ready to be set alight or into the sewers or onto the streets where they could more easily be rounded up or picked off. In the end, he entitled his report on the successful destruction of the Jews “The Jewish Quarter of Warsaw is no more!” though my English language copy is simply called the “The Stroop Report.”

It was on Passover that the Jews of Warsaw chose to time their rebellion, doomed though it was. Liberation was not gained; there were no miracles, no plagues descending from the finger of God striking the evil ones. We do commemorate the event, however with Yom HaShoah, timed to coincide with the rebellion in Warsaw. In my shul (Temple Emanu-El), each year a diminishing number of survivors rises to recite the names of family and friends who were killed by the Nazis. At Roger Williams University this year Hillel’s third annual Holocaust Memorial Lecture will take place a few days early, on April 8 at 5:00 when we host Deborah Slier and Ian Shine, co-editors of the recently discovered letters of Philip (“Flip”) Slier, a young Dutch Jew who while in a Nazi work camp before his deportation to Sobibor, was able to send out 86 letters and postcards and one telegram, materials serendipitously found only in 1997. The lecture is free and open to the public. (Full disclosure notice: I am the faculty advisor of the RWU Hillel.)

On another subject entirely, Jerusalem was never intended to be the capital of Palestine. In the UN partition plan the city, which had a majority Jewish population, was designated an international zone. Only with the attempt by Jordan to crush the new Jewish state was East Jerusalem, including the entire old city, seized. Israel conquered it in 1967 not from the Palestinians who never controlled it but from King Hussein of Jordan. The newly announced settlements may not be wise, but they certainly are not illegal.

J Street town meeting

The Chair recognizes the gentleman in the rear, waving the American flag.

Mr. Chairman I rise to propose that as there is no J Street in Washington, that we create one.

(The Chair): Why in God’s name would we do that?

So that at the end of the day we can say we’ve accomplished something, useless though it might be.

(General hubbub, hands flying, the sound of harrumphing is heard throughout the hall.)

Order, come to order! The chair recognizes the woman in the babushka.

It is to laugh. We have already accomplished many things. We have identified our enemies. And it is us.

(General hubbub, hands flying, the sound of harrumphing is heard throughout the hall.)

Chair: Us or Arabs?

Lady in the babushka: Us of course. It’s Jews who stand in the way of being pro-Israel and pro-peace. Anyway, that’s what that nice Mr. Ben-Ami seemed to be saying in his opening remarks. Never once did he talk about suicide bombers, or Hamas or Hezbollah. It’s Jews who are the impediment.

(General hubbub, hands flying, the sound of harrumphing is heard throughout the hall.)

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman (this from a man in a keffiyeh). May I speak? Thank you. On behalf of Jstreet’s Islamic Heroes Arab Department I’d like to point out that we have no problem with J Street’s goals of withdrawing Jews from our ancestral lands which stretch westward from the Jordan to the Sea. Is that too much to ask for a people which has shown remarkable patience, relying on rocket fire, airplane hijackings and suicide bombers only on occasion, such as when peace was getting uncomfortably close. The Israelis have deprived us of our nationhood. Thank Allah for J Street! The peace process hasn’t had such good friends since Chamberlain and Deladier were running the show.

The Chair recognizes the historian who is pulling his hair out of his head.
Balding Historian: Mr. Chairman. Israel has not deprived Palestinian Arabs of a state; it’s been other Arabs who’ve done that. I…

(General hubbub, hands flying, the sound of harrumphing is heard throughout the hall.)

Balding Historian continues: I, surely, am not the only person in the room who knows that in 1947 the United Nations created two states, a Jewish one and an Arab one. And what happened? Jordan and Egypt (and Lebanon and Syria and Iraq) invaded the nascent Jewish State; they were repulsed; the Jews expanded the land allotted to them and Egypt satisfied itself with Gaza, Jordan with the West Bank. Did it ever occur to these titans of tolerance that they could have a two state solution by combining the two halves of the remnant of Palestine? No? And why not? Either because they used the suffering of the displaced persons as a propaganda tool or because (this is the more generous explanation) they knew that a bifurcated Arab state, with its parts separated by Israel could never work. And it still can’t.

(General hubbub, hands flying, the sound of harrumphing is heard throughout the hall.)

The Chair recognizes the lady with the tears in her eyes.

Mr. Chairman, I have wonderful news. Moments ago, Middle East Peace Envoy George Mitchell announced new Israeli-Palestinian “proximity talks” - indirect talks between the Israelis and Palestinians with the United States serving as interlocutor. Oh, to have lived so long that I can witness from the safety of America Israel and the Palestinians talking from separate rooms, close by each other. Messiah, he must be on the way.

The Chair (staring, amazed): And that’s the wonderful news? that the two sides will be talking in close proximity to each other?

Lady with tears in her eyes: Well, in proximity. But it’s the long awaited turn of events.

Skeptic: Oy, the gullibility quotient rises exponentially. In 2000, my dear lady, Arafat and Barak met in the same room with President Clinton and what did we get? Intifada II. Surely this is not the coming of the Messianic age when the straws we grab are so flimsy.

(General hubbub, hands flying, the sound of harrumphing is heard throughout the hall.)
The Chair recognizes the Messiah.

Messiah: Nu, am I late? What can I do for you?

Lady with tears in her eyes: Bring peace between Israel and the long-suffering Palestinians.

Messiah: Sure. Easy. Right after Josh Stein wins the Powerball.

Balding Historian: ’Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished.

Danger out of Texas

Have you seen the article in the New York Times Magazine of February 14? It’s about the Texas State Board of Education, members of which try to have text books reflect the notion that America is a Christian nation as promulgated by the Founding Fathers. (You can find the article at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/magazine/14texbooks-t.html) Should this make us in New England nervous? Yes it should. Texas’s curriculum and text books chosen by the board are used in every public school in that state, and publishers, desirous of capturing that huge market will re-write their textbooks to pacify the Texans and then try to sell their books nationally. One estimate is that Texas’s decisions are reflected in 46 or 47 states.

The idea is to capture the minds of children. As Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition put it, “I would rather have a thousand school-board members than one president and no school-board members.” And why? As Cynthia Dunbar, a Christian activist on the Texas Board puts it, “The philosophy of the classroom in one generation will be the philosophy of the government in the next.” I thought about where I’d heard that sentiment before, and then it came back to me. “He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future.” It’s a coda from George Orwell’s classic novel of totalitarian mind control, 1984 much of which deals with re-writing history so that the current rulers can be proven always to have been right.

The Christian conservatives argue that separation of church and state is a myth perpetrated by the secular liberal establishment (whatever that is). All they are trying to do is uncover the long hidden truth that the founders were Christian men of God who established America as a Christian nation. Therefore there is no legal justification for disallowing crucifixes in government buildings or prayer in public schools. George Washington, the Conservatives say. called for a national day of thanksgiving after the British defeat at Saratoga in 1777. This is proof that the founders wanted religion in public life. But the Constitution (which does not mention God at all and which forbids any religious test for the holding of public office and the first amendment of which bars the establishment of a national religion) had not been written in 1777. Ah, the conservatives counter, but the Declaration of Independence had been and it refers to our creator and to Nature’s God. And by the legal principle of “incorporation by reference” you can connect the two documents, not read them as separate entities. It’s almost Talmudic. What this argument ignores is that Nature’s God is not another way of saying Jesus Christ; it’s a way that the politicians who wrote the Declaration of Independence could put some God into the document without actually referring to any specific deity. What, after all is Nature’s God, anyway?

The founders had an overtly biblical view of the world, the Christian Conservatives say. “In the new guidelines, students…are asked to identify traditions that informed America’s founding, ‘including Judeo-Christian (especially biblical law)’ and to ‘identify the individuals whose principles of law and government…informed the American founding documents,’ among whom they include Moses.” Yeah, we made it! Shabbat on Saturday! I wonder if the Texans know that Mosaic Law forbids pig roasts?

To Christian Conservatives the separation of powers is based on the Founders’ “clear understanding of the sinfulness of man,” not, apparently on Montesquieu’s “Spirit of the Laws” or Cicero’s “On the Republic,” or Locke’s “Treatises on Government” (which specifically condemn the idea of a state religion). When told by a professor of history that “The Supreme Court has forbidden public schools from ‘seeking to impress upon students the importance of particular religious values through the curriculum,’ and in the process said that the founders ‘did not draw on Mosaic law, as is mentioned in the [Texas] standards,’ several of the board members seemed dumbstruck.” But they insisted it was true anyway.

Be very worried, Jews. The Wise Men of Chelm are in charge of what your children and grandchildren may be learning in school. Already, according to the Times’ article, 65% of Americans agree with the statement that “the nation’s founders intended the United States to be a Christian nation,” and 55% said they believed the constitution actually established the country as a Christian nation.” Welcome to second class citizenship if the Texas conservatives get their way.

Church and State in England: Who is a Jew?

Oy; you think we have problems keeping church and state separate? What with the annual December dilemma, with crèche scenes on public property declared constitutionally protected if part of an exhibit featuring Santa and reindeer, what with rabbis lighting Chanukah menorahs in the State House? In Britain, takah, they have problems beyond your wildest fears. The government in the guise of its newly established Supreme Court, has taken onto itself the responsibility of defining who is a Jew. Yes, I’m talking about Gentile judges in England, not Haredi rabbis in Israel.

The case, which was decided a couple of months ago in mid-December (your columnist is sometimes a bit slow on the uptake) concerned a boy called “M” in court papers who was denied admission to a Jewish school. “M” comes from an observant family where the father is Jewish and the mother a convert to Judaism through the Reform movement. (In Britain Reform roughly equates to Conservative, while Liberal means Reform as in America.) He applied to the state-supported Jews’ Free School founded in 1732 but was rejected on the grounds that he was not Jewish according to Orthodox halachah, since his mother had been converted by a non-Orthodox rabbi.

So the boy’s parents sued, arguing that the school had discriminated against him. The family lost, but the ruling was overturned by the Court of Appeals. Ultimately the case reached Britain’s Supreme Court, which ratified the Appeals Court decision in a 5-4 ruling, saying that basing school admission on whether one’s mother is Jewish is by definition discriminatory and in violation of the 1976 Race Relations Act.

Hurrah for the Liberals, eh? Well, not quite. The Modern Orthodox establishment (it’s called the United Synagogue) and a great many liberals are deeply concerned. It’s bad enough that the school, a Jewish institution had defined “M” as not being Jewish, but now the government was deciding who was and who wasn’t. There’s a very dangerous precedent for this. Actually there are several dangerous precedents. I’m thinking of Nazi Germany and Communist Russia, both of which were in the business of defining who was a Jew—but not for any particular Jew’s advantage as in this case, I might add.

The decision has left British Jewry divided. Not only did the decision open up the possibility that non-Jews could qualify for admission, but that the government, rather than Jewish religious authorities, can determine who is Jewish in Britain.

Another problem: Jewish groups in Britain remain concerned that the ruling, might stigmatize Judaism as a discriminatory religion anytime schools give preference to those who are Jewish according to Jewish law. However, the president of the court, Nicholas Phillips, said in announcing the verdict that it did not mean that those responsible for the school’s admissions policy had acted in a way that was “racist as that word is generally understood.” Very comforting. Jews could now be called racists of a different stripe.

So now the Orthodox want to fight the ruling, the liberals like what the ruling says, but not the fact that there was a ruling. The Jews’ Free School and other state-funded Jewish schools have made some major adjustments to their admissions criteria. The criteria now focus on requiring applicants to demonstrate participation in faith-based activities, such as synagogue attendance -- something the Chief Rabbi characterized as “a Christian solution for a Jewish school.”

And why do British Jews face the problem of the government defining who and what they are? Because in Britain there is no separation between religion and the state. The Anglican Church is official but so as not to be discriminatory, others are also allowed state funding. But the piper has to be paid, or, to mix my clichés he who holds the purse strings calls the tune. In the case of “M” the Orthodox establishment which takes state money disenfranchised a boy whose family is religiously observant. Foolish school; had it not, the state would not have had the opportunity to declare who is a Jew. The Haredi don’t have this problem. No governmental court is going to define who can attend their schools because they don’t accept funding from the government. Smart Haredi; they didn’t go for the bait which has snared the others. Now if only they’d stop lighting Chanukah menorahs at the State House.

Anti-Semitism flares in Greece

The worst-kept secret in literature is that Homer the Greek depicted the Trojans as innocent victims of circumstance in general and of Greek blood lust in particular. The invading Greeks are described as barbarians while Troy is seen as a utopia. It has broad streets, wise rulers, industrious women, and of course Hector and Andromache, the noblest of the noble.

Yet we think of the Greeks positively. We admire the Parthenon and other architectural treasures; we are impressed with its sculpture, we live longer because it was a Greek who opened the world’s eyes to the fact that disease is the result of natural, not supernatural causes. Ours is a government based on the writings of Plato (not “The Republic” which manages to blend the worst elements of fascism and communism, but his “Laws” and his “Statesman”). Our geometry is Euclidian of Pythagorean elements thrown in. And yet. And yet even the greatest of Greek cities Athens built the Parthenon with money stolen from its reluctant allies. Athens thought nothing of destroying a neutral city because it refused to become its ally (read “slave”) and Athens couldn’t take the critiques of Socrates and so had him executed. The glory that was Greece is a bit tarnished, both in literature and in history.

And now again.

For a long time there was little anti-Semitism in Greece. Yes, there were crazy right-wingers there, but Nazism has a bad name in most countries the Germans occupied. However, with the coming of the Gaza war last year politicians and pundits on both the left and right of the political spectrum have been spewing anti-Semitic remarks. And then the arsons and desecrations started.

On the island of Crete the Etz Hayim synagogue was torched, saved, for a while, by two Albanians and a Palestinian immigrant who lived across the street and alerted the fire brigade. But the building was saved only for a while. A second fire was more successful, and while the first did not evoke condemnation by the Greek government, the second one did. “The attack on the Etz Hayyim Synagogue not only constitutes an attack on one of the remaining Jewish monuments in the island of Crete, but also an attack against the history and the cultural heritage of our homeland, Greece,” Prime Minister George Papandreou wrote to the Anti-Defamation-League. “The Government, I personally as well as the entire Greek nation, condemn this abominable act in the strongest possible terms.” Well, maybe he does, but the entire Greek nation seems to be of two minds. A well know anti-Semite, Kostas Plevris wrote a 1,400 page book condemning Jews. He was brought to trial by the Greek chapter of the Helsinki Human Rights Monitor and the Anti-Nazi initiative. And after a long trial was found innocent of incitement to violence against Jews. Even the prosecutor referred to his screed “Jews: The Whole Truth.” as “a scientific work.”

In 2009 the Jewish cemetery of Ioannina was vandalized four times. Greaves and a Holocaust memorial were destroyed and body parts were unearthed. A high-ranking police officer caught in the cemetery immediately after one of the incidents was not questioned by authorities. Neither the mayor, the governor nor the highest-ranking priest in the city condemned the outrage.

George Karatzaferis, the leader of the far-right political party LAOS wrote an article in his weekly newspaper calling the Jews “Christ killers” and saying that the “blood of the Jews stinks.” Left-wing leaders refused to condemn the anti-Semitic incidents or even join Greece’s commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day in late January. “There are no good Jews,” Jimmy Panousis, a well-known liberal radio personality said on his show. “Jews are pigs and murderers, but fortunately their days are numbered.”

The newspaper Avriani, blames American Jews for causing the global economic crisis, warning that American Jews were plotting to set off World War III. Piraeus Serafim of the Greek Orthodox Church warned of “Zionist monsters with sharp claws.” Salonica Anthimos, another church official known for his anti-Jewish statements said Jews were being punished for killing Christ.

A whole nation cannot be condemned for the rantings of a few. But let’s keep an eye on Greece, whose glory days are long gone, but whose ancestors even then were not above a massacre of innocents.

Reflections on a final Kaddish

Nearly 14 years ago I rose in schul and said a final Kaddish, ending my official period of mourning for my mother. On January 9, I did it again, this time for my father. People asked me why I go. I don’t pray; I think, I read, I write in my mind. Hardly anyone else since I started saying Kaddish in February has stayed with the program at my synagogue, so what do these other people know that I don’t? I doubt if they loved their parents less than I loved mine, so that’s not it. Maybe my academic schedule makes it easier. But ease is not the answer. The hours of services are not so difficult to plan around.

Friends to whom I confided these thoughts either tried to convince me that merely by going I would get into the swing of things, or asked the same question I posed to myself, “Why bother?” This was a tough one. I wasn't sure. When I had these same thoughts about why I was saying Kaddish for my mother, I wrote to friends:

“In the end I concluded that as my mother was always there for me when she was alive (sometimes too much so) I would be there for her, fulfilling the obligation imposed on me centuries before either of us was born. And so, for her, and not for me, I went to shul and said Kaddish and prayed, if at all, that I could pray. There was another reason I went, even less rational than the first. Maybe, just maybe, if I continued this charade and did the coming and going, the standing and sitting, the bowing and swaying, maybe, just maybe when it was all over, she would be back, not dead, laughing with me, talking to me, scolding me for some faux pas I didn't know I'd committed. This was obviously a thought verging on idiocy and I was not blasphemous enough to pray for her to be alive again—but somewhere in the innermost, most primitive recesses of my mind, the thought (if it can be so dignified) lingered. Stupid, I know, but unshakable, nevertheless.”

I no longer held that idea this time, but the other day, a fellow sat in my accustomed seat, the one to which I went every service. He asked why that seat was so special to me. “How else will my father know that I’m here, unless I’m in my seat?” I replied, and then felt myself blushing at the absurdities that spew forth my unguarded mouth.

So, there I sat as the sun set on January 9 ending both Shabbat and my period of mourning, wondering. Wondering why I could not pray, wondering why I was going to miss this twice daily ritual—and I knew that I would. I’d miss the companionship of the others and their bonhomie; I'd miss the special feeling of standing to say Kaddish; I’d miss the forlorn hope; I’d miss the structure it created for my day; I’d miss my father and wouldn’t be doing anything for him again, twice a day as I had for those eleven months. The official period of mourning would be over, but not my personal sense of loss. The eleven months were obsessively too long, but emotionally they were much too short.

When the last time I rose to say that final Kaddish, then for my mother, I found that I couldn’t. My throat choked, tears streamed from my eyes, my knees suddenly felt unable to sustain my weight. I sat, sobbing, trying desperately to utter the magic words which would bring her back to life as she had been before her final illness, though I knew that that could not be. What really hurt was the realization that I could do no more for her. She was now officially completely beyond my futilely outstretched helping hand. That was embarrassing. My hope was that such histrionics would not be repeated, no tears, just a simple stand up, say the prayer and sit down. Over. And so it was. Done.

The Haredi menace

I think of two Rosas—Luxemburg and Parks, and of the Grimké sisters—Angelina and Sarah. I think of Emily Pankhurst and of Susan B. Anthony. I think of Emilia Shrayer standing up to the Communist authorities in the old Soviet Union. I think of Nofrat Frenkel in Israel. All were women who knew something was wrong and risked everything to correct it. Some were killed, others were imprisoned, each was the object of ridicule. What do these women know about how things are or should be? Things are as they are because of divine ordinance. Read the bible. Slavery is divinely sanctioned; women must know their place because they are a pernicious, though necessary gender. “Now, I find woman more bitter than death; she is all traps, her hands are fetters and her heart is snares.” (Ecclesiastes 7:26) Enough said, right? Wrong. We also find “She is clothed with strength and splendor; she looks to the future cheerfully. Her mouth is full of wisdom, her tongue with kindly teaching.” (Proverbs 31: 25-26)

I think of the Women of the Wall and the arrogance of the authorities who arrested a woman for wearing a tallit at the Western Wall, still rankles. Granted, Nofrat Frenkel wasn’t stoned to death—for all their puritanical fussbudgetness the Haredim of Israel are not the Taliban. But they insist that they know the truth and that the truth shall deny others freedom. Just like the Taliban, just like the Puritans from whom Roger Williams fled. And we who are not ultra-Orthodox are asked to bend our wills to theirs, since they are the authentic Jews. Women must sit in the back of the bus, they insist; a 13 year old child converted by a Conservative rabbi has to be buried in a non-Jewish section of a cemetery in Spain by decree of rabbi Shlomo Amar, not a Spanish rabbi, but the chief Sephardic rabbi of Israel. So, not only do the Ayatollahs of the extreme right in Israel try to dominate in that country, they seek to extend their purview to the world. Recently mixed-group singing at the Wall was declared Vorboten so singing Hatikvah there to celebrate the return of the Old City to Israel is now a criminal offense. If I were a conspiracy theorist I’d suspect that the ultra-Orthodox who opposed the creation of the State of Israel have found a new way to destroy it—by alienating the vast majority of us who have entered the current century. It’s like supporting Hamid Karzai. Americans look at his corrupt regime and ask, for this we have to pledge our soldiers and our cash? For the Haredi we have to fight in Congress and the White House?

Avi Shafran, spokesman for the Orthodox Agudath Israel of America, has a strange argument. On the one hand “Israel is a country that has functioned with a certain understanding among its religious and not religious Jews. If the activists don’t want to alienate Jews, they shouldn’t thumb their noses at the traditional Jews in Israel.” The fault is all on the side of the progressives. On the other hand, it’s only a handful of the Haredi who protest the women and others who violate traditional standards. Most are in favor of a reasonable compromise, but there are always holdouts, he says. So, which is it—the fault is with the activists, or the fault is with the Haredi hot heads? Pick one. Oh, he also argues that the problem is with foreign Jews who are trying to impose their views on the traditional ways of Israel. Rather like Ross Barnett or George Wallace complaining about outside agitators coming to their states. The defenders of the benighted old ways always blame outsiders.

Modern Orthodox in America also feel the sting of their Haredi brethren who, not content to deny Reform and Conservative conversions, now challange the validity even of theirs.

Oh, lest it be thought that my ire is directed against the Haredi, it’s not. They are what they are. It’s Israel’s government which kowtows to them, allowing a minority within a minority to dictate public policy. That’s the shanda.