Israel Sermon for Erev Rosh Hashanah – 5767 – Sept 22, 2006
As soon as you go through El Al security at the airport, you feel that you are on your way home. High above the ocean and the European continent, observant men -- Ultra-Orthodox, Modern Orthodox and miscellaneous other -- davven together in the back of the plane. People are speaking Hebrew and Yiddish all around you. Then, there is that unique, inexplicable tug on the heart as the Tel Aviv coastline appears through the airplane window -- a stirring of something undeniable, deep inside.
In Israel I feel no separation between my body, the air I breathe and the earth I walk on.
The hills, the trees and the stones seem to know me intimately – even in places that these legs have never walked before.
Whenever I am in Israel I feel I am awake to a degree that I am not awake anywhere else.
This land is my home, and these people are my people.
The Russian bank teller is my sister.
The Ethiopian security guard posted at the café is my brother.
The woman with the sheitel speaking Yiddish to her 8 children is my sister.
The Palestinian cab driver is my cousin, as are the Palestinians in the Arab villages and neighborhoods throughout the Jewish State, and those living on the other side of the separation barrier, just a few kilometers away.
When I ride on a bus in Israel, I feel connected to all the other passengers, regardless of differences in our life experience, our political views, our accents, our theologies.
I love the fact that even though malls have sprung up all over the country over the past 15 years, there are still corner groceries and produce stands within walking distance of every home, where the shopkeepers knows all the locals.
I love that every one anticipated the beginning of Shabbat.
Mellow, nostalgic Israeli music from the early years
floats across the airwaves every Friday afternoon.
We have all schlepped our groceries back from the market, put the flowers in a voz on the table, and are mopping our stone floors and cooking for Shabbat.
As we do this, we know that the entire country is doing this,
the religious and the secular alike.
There is an intensity and integrity of Jewish life that simply cannot exist anywhere else.
David Horovitz writes in his book, A Little Too Close to God: The Thrills and Panic of Life in Israel:
“I love the fact that my children are living in a Jewish environment, where it is the Hebrew date that gets written on the chalkboard in their classroom in the morning, where they learn about Jewish holidays in their regular curriculum, not at Sunday school, and where they can experience those holidays with their entire nation. We can buy sufganiot (Chanukah doughnuts) at every bakery in town. We see menorahs lighting tens of thousands of apartment windows. We shop in supermarkets bursting with Matzoh every Passover. We put up a sukkah each year, just like our ancient forbears, and hear the same hammering all along our street.”
The wail of air raid sirens penetrates all ears and all hearts on Yom HaShoah, and again six days later on Yom HaZikaron (Memorial Day for fallen soldiers and victims of terrorism). For two full minutes on each of these days, the entire country comes to a standstill. Traffic stops. People get out of their cars on crowded highways and stand at attention.
Tragically, every one who has lived in Israel for a few years knows some one who has lost a family member in a war or a terrorist attack.
We mourn together. We remember together.
We are One.
In Israel, people are passionate. They care passionately about the country and about each other. They also disagree passionately with each other.
Apathy is a very rare phenomenon.
I believe that the depth of love that a Jew can feel for the Land of Israel is unlike the love that a Jew can feel for any other place.
Because it’s not just a piece of land.
It’s the place where our People and our religion originated.
It’s the place where our souls were once all together.
Israel is ingrained in the Jewish neshamah.
I appreciate the rugged beauty of Maine – her mountains and her extraordinary coastline.
I love the land and people of Western Massachusetts, where I enjoyed living for 21 years and where I have a mother, many friends and many good memories. I visit that area as often as possible.
I am blessed to have spent time in many beautiful places and to have encountered many wonderful people in this country and in other parts of the world.
But my attachment to Israel is a matter of the soul…primal…
truly a thing apart.
I freely admit that I am very romantic about Israel, but I am also realistic.
Fifty, thirty, even twenty years ago, Israeli shlichim -- emissaries --were still coming to North America to call upon us to make aliyah, to move to the Jewish State, “livnot u’l’hibanot ba,” to build it and to be built by it. They tried their best to inspire us to come to Israel where we could live normal lives as Jews.
The idea of living a “normal” Jewish life, as I have described in broad strokes above, does not motivate people to pick up and move across the ocean today –
not when we are so comfortable here in the United States, both economically and socially.
Although we know anti-Semitism exists, and is in fact on the rise throughout the world, it does not affect our daily lives. As Jews, we are not in danger here. And most of us do not feel that we are missing out on anything. In fact, here in America we can live much more “normal” lives than we could in Israel, where a million citizens had to evacuate their homes or descend into bomb shelters for a good part of this past summer.
Israel is the most natural place for a Jew to live as a Jew, but it is not an easy place in which to live as a human being.
If one’s primary concerns are convenience, material comforts, and safety for oneself, one’s children & grandchildren – concerns not to be dismissed lightly – Israel is not a very attractive place to live today.
*But I am strongly encouraging you to visit that complex, intense, miracle of a country -- to take at least 10 days out of your full, busy lives, and give yourself the incomparable gift of breathing that air, walking on that land, seeing those pink stones and that golden light, and being among those people – your people. It will be a transformative experience.
I want to acknowledge the dozens of you sitting here tonight who are not Jews, but who are married to Jews and who have raised or are raising Jewish children.
Thank you for supporting your partners and your children in learning about and staying connected to their Jewish heritage and to this Jewish community.
Thank you for being an important -- an essential -- part of our community.
Israel is not the country of your heritage, but I hope that you too will visit Israel.
It will deepen your understanding of the People and the history that you have welcomed into your lives, and I guarantee that it will enrich your lives as well.
Whether or not you believe that God actually promised Eretz Yisrael to our forbears, there is now a Jewish State on that soil.
Given that we are such a tiny minority on this planet, and given our history of persecution, it is incredible when you stop to think about it that Jews are not an extinct people.
It is even more amazing that we actually have a sovereign state in the land that the Torah tells us was promised to our ancestors almost 4000 years ago.
After almost 2000 years of exile and longing, Jews are miraculously able to live in that land. By a wondrous fluke, you and I are living at a time when we can freely visit there.
If you have children between the ages of 18 and 26, they can go to Israel free of charge, with other young adults, on a Birthright program.
Please encourage them to take advantage of this extraordinary opportunity.
Meyer and Caryn’s daughter Anna did it this past December, and spoke about it here in the synagogue shortly after she got back. She was deeply affected, and it was very moving to hear her share her feelings and observations.
Like one’s relationship with one’s family, our relationship to Israel is complex.
There’s deep love and loyalty, but I want to acknowledge that for some of us there is also a lot of angst, confusion, and disappointment.
Many Jews feel guilty and even angry about what has happened to the Palestinians, at least in part as a result of Israel’s existence and especially as a result of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and, until recently, Gaza.
Many Jews feel uncomfortable with the social and economic disparities between Israeli Jews and the Arab citizens of Israel.
Many Jews feel a distaste for the power of the Orthodox parties within the Israeli government, and the ways that Orthodoxy is imposed on people at life cycle events such as marriage and divorce.
Israel is not paradise.
It is a nation state with very real and pressing problems.
Israel has its share of corruption, pollution, violence, and injustice, just like every other country.
Let the issues that trouble you, motivate you to look for the good in Israel – and there is a LOT of good.
Let your upset motivate you to find out about and support organizations and projects in Israel that you believe in.
There are many people in Israel, many organized groups, working hard to build a more compassionate, equitable, sustainable society.
There are many Israeli Jews building bridges of understanding, working for peace and justice.
On the table in the foyer, there is a yellow handout with a list of several organizations in Israel that you may want to support. I included a variety of organizations, as I imagine that there are a wide variety of interests and a wide variety of views on Israel amongst those of you who are here tonight.
If there are organizations that you want people to know about which I did not include, please email me and I will assemble an additional list and email it to the congregation.
Many of you give generously to local and national organizations, both with your money and your time.
Tonight I am asking you, in addition to what you do and give locally and nationally, to go home and – between RH and YK -- contribute generously to at least one organization in Israel that does work that you believe in.
It might be $1000, it might be $100, it might be $18 -- whatever you can afford.
Not-for-profits in Israel still rely heavily on North American Jewry for financial support.
This is the season for Teshuvah (repentance), Tefillah (prayer), and Tzedakah (direct acts of justice and lovingkindness, and financial contributions to just causes).
Last year my Erev RH sermon was about teshuvah.
Tom’w morning my sermon will focus on tefillah.
On Sunday morning we will do a text study with a discussion of Tzedakah.
In addition to studying and discussing Tzedakah, we are called upon to actually do it – to give from our hearts.
Each time I sing Lecha Dodi on Friday night, or recite the Kiddush, I draw strength from my years of Shabbatot in Yerushalayim. Had I not spent 6 years in Israel, I would not have felt called to devote my life to building Jewish community and imparting Jewish teachings and traditions to other Jews and their family members and friends. This is true of many other rabbis I know, whether Reconstuctionist, Reform, or Conservative.
Most Jewish professionals have been deeply nourished and inspired by our experiences of Jewish life in the Jewish State, and we all hope to pass that experience of Jewish community on to our congregants and students.
The best way for me to pass this on to you, is to
bring you there so you can experience it for yourself.
Israel pulsates with beauty, spirit, fascinating history and LIFE.
If you have not been there yet, YA’LA! (Israeli slang, from the Arabic, for LET’S GO!)
If you have not been there in a few years, LET’S GO AGAIN, TOGETHER!
The war with Hezbollah this summer, on top of the ongoing violence in and near Gaza (which did not end with the “disengagement”), may discourage some of you from traveling to Israel.
It’s very frightening to see Israel’s existence being threatened.
It would be foolhardy to fly into a war zone.
But there is a ceasefire with Hezbollah and the North is safe.
Also, Israel never feels as scary when you are there as it does when you view it from here (unless you are literally in an area where the katyushas are falling).
As I see it, the threat to Israel is all the more reason to go there soon, especially if you have never been there before.
I have many ideas for programs that I am excited about sharing with you and hope to implement here in the coming year. But more than any of them,
I hope to bring a good-sized group -- at least 18 (18 = chai = life) -- of you to Israel sometime between February and July of 2007.
A trip to Israel will transform the consciousnesses of those of you who have not yet been there,
and it will revive the souls of those of you who have not been there in a while.
A congregational trip to Israel will be an intense bonding experience for those who participate in it, and when that group returns, it will inject a huge dose of Jewish vitality into this congregation.
Tonight I say to you,
L’Shana Tova Tikateivu –
May you and those whom you love be inscribed for a good year,
AND
“B’Shana HaZot B’Yerushalayim”
(THIS YEAR – 5767 -- IN JERUSALEM!