September 1, 2010
The High Holidays are even closer than they were last Wednesday, when I shared a reading about prayer and community taken from the new High Holiday Machzor which will be introduced at a workshop tonight (7:30PM) and inaugurated on Rosh Hashanah.
On Yom Kippur we recite the Al Chet prayer many times. “For the sin which we have sinned against You willingly and unwillingly,” “ For the sin which we have sinned against You through foul speech,” etc. And then we sing together the V’al Kulam refrain: “for all these sins, O God of forgiveness, forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement.” Max Routtenberg, a leading Conservative rabbi who lived to 90, provided an introduction to this section which now takes its place in the new Machzor and helps us get some clarity on what these holidays are about.
“If I had to reduce the essential meaning of the vast religious panorama of the High Holy Days to just one word, I would select the word 'responsibility.'…The prayers, the sounding of the shofar, the fasting and the confession – all of it is based on the belief that we are responsible for our actions, accountable for our deeds, and judged for the things we do or fail to do.
This is one of the central, basic teachings of Judaism. You are a responsible human being. First and always, you are responsible for yourself… what you do with your life, with your body and soul, your mind, your intelligence, your creative talents, all these are charged to your account. It is the height of irresponsibility – a sin – to neglect one’s health and physical well-being; to disregard the nurture and cultivation of one’s mind and spirit; to be indifferent to the needs of the soul and to deprive it of the nourishment which the religious life can provide. V’al Kulam – for all these things a person is judged.
Judaism further teaches us that a person does not live alone in the world. You are a part of a group, a people; you are party of humanity. You are therefore responsible for the welfare of your neighbor, whether the person is next door or a continent away. You are responsible for the well-being of your fellow Jews, wherever they may be… and charged to your account is your treatment of all human beings … the advantaged and the disadvantaged. V’al Kulam – for all these things a person is judged. “
Ponder these thoughts and have a good Wednesday. Bill Rudolph
P.S. We begin the season with a synagogue Shabbat dinner this Friday night, preceded by a Kol Haneshama instrumental service as well as a traditional one. If you want to come to dinner, call the office this morning. I hope you can join us, for the services or dinner or both.
August 25, 2010
Last week I tried to continue the discussion of Thomas Paine’s bumper sticker (“The world is my country/ To do good is my religion”) and the trend towards universalism. The original piece was a bit controversial, a few people really hated it. I wrote a brilliant column in response, but storm related problems and who knows what else kept it from going to the list. My frustration was replaced soon by an understanding that the snafu must have been a divine omen, a message that I shouldn’t ruffle any more feathers on this issue. So I will include one of the many responses on the original piece and then move to the next topic.
I was meaning to write Wednesday as soon as I read your email but time got away from me. I appreciate your grappling with this contrast between the particular and the global. I had "this" conversation many times, in different forms, with my kids. What is so difficult about this conversation is that the "words" sound noble ("imagine" a world with universal rather than parochial values). What I tried to explain to the kids (that may have gotten through) is that the road to valuing others and doing good is through our personal experiences. We learn how to do "good" and about what is "good" through our family, religion-- in other words, our personal experiences. Parents cannot bond with all the children on earth as with their own but it is through one's intense commitment to one's own family that one learns to understand how others feel. A true global perspective comes from grappling with the particulars of our own experience and through that coming to understand what is common and what is individualistic in those experiences (and the different ways that one can be good).
Now let me share a first thought about the High Holidays, which are remarkably close upon us. Not the earliest on record by a few days, but close to it. Let me share one piece from our new High Holiday Machzor, the just published and just purchased prayerbook that we will introduce at a workshop on September 1 and then inaugurate on Rosh Hashanah.
In the introduction to the Kol Nidre service, we read this commentary about prayer and community and why we come together at times like this:
Prayer recited in community has a special dimension. Individuals may pray alone and keenly experience God. But Judaism is wary lest such aloneness become the norm and the permanent condition of the human being. Religion is not simply what we do with our aloneness, but what we do with others. Prayer should not isolate us, it should not lead us to believe that we need only God and ourselves, but prayer should lead us outward toward the love and care of the world we meet. Through prayer we discover how important the community is for sustaining our own salvation. Rabbi Reuven Hammer
I look forward to praying with you and feeling the love and care as so many of us do, beginning two weeks from tonight. In the meantime, enjoy this last Wednesday of August. The summer was too good, but it would be under-appreciated without the rhythm of regular life. Bill Rudolph
P.S. We begin the season with a synagogue Shabbat dinner on September 3rd, preceded by a Kol Haneshama instrumental service as well as a traditional one. I hope you can join us.
August 11, 2010
With appreciation for your nice notes upon the return of It’s Wednesday, especially from other lovers of the very spiritual Bryce and Zion National Parks, I return to the bumper sticker that was (and is) causing me angst. I saw it on my street, on one of those hip boxy Scion xB’s that nobody over 30 would look appropriate in. It read as follows:
“The World is my country
To do good is my religion”
I liked the quote for a few seconds. It nicely reflects the steady litany that I kept seeing in almost everything I read over the summer, that we need to realize that we live in a new age where particularism and parochialism - eg. loyalty to a particular country or religion - are all destined for the trash heap. Universalism is the way it is going. There is an attractiveness to that idea, that the world is one big family, that we all share the same values and interests and many of our problems and conflicts will disappear when we accept this and work together to make good prevail.
On the other hand, I am one who feels that being an American or a Jew is a special privilege, so I shrink from a full embrace of this thinking. With it, the value that I place on Jews marrying other Jews becomes arcane and racist and old thinking. With it, there can be only unmitigated joy that the daughter of a U.S. President is so comfortable marrying a nice Jewish boy, or that the nomination of the newest Supreme Court Justice passed with scarcely a negative word about her origins. To even hint that I have concerns about the family that Chelsea and Mark will be raising, or that I was the slightest bit upset that Elena Kagan couldn’t wait a day or two past Shabbat to be sworn in, is just more old thinking. I must be a Neanderthal. Much of what I believe and teach – about the value of maintaining our particular traditions, the security and support and joy that our little Jewish community can offer, the value of a shared heritage in building a home – all that seems to be old thinking.
Fortunately, I ventured closer to the Scion and read the fine print on the bumper sticker. This was a quote, from none other than Thomas Paine, who made it ca. 1791. In real ways, there is nothing new under the sun. While nations and especially particular religions have admittedly produced some bad things over the ages, they endure. They endure because they offer thousands of years of experience and practice and so much more. Without them, we would be slaves to the next fad or pleasant demagogue, without much of a compass or sense of belonging. With them, we find roots and we can sprout wings.
So, I am not giving up on my particularist belief that we Jews have a mission, and Israel and America have a purpose, and the world is enriched by diversity. Write if you see it otherwise, I strive to always know how out of touch I am.
I wish you a good Wednesday, the first day of Elul. One month from tonight begins Rosh Hashanah. I will be sweating for reasons mostly different from those we face on a day like today.
August 4, 2010
Boker Tov.
I am back, my extra vacation and regular vacation now history. They were very good. June was mostly at the beach and was for getting back control of my life, July was for some travel including biking/hiking in the very glorious Bryce and Zion National Parks in Utah. Spending time before the parks in nearby Las Vegas, I couldn’t help but notice a contrast between the things that God creates (see below) and those that we do.
Anyway, like a well oiled machine, here I am once again in your Inbox, on the first Wednesday of August, by 7:30AM, and then (hopefully) I show up each Wednesday thereafter. I wish my knees were as well oiled, but they did exceed the doc’s recommended maximum of 20-30 minutes of biking at one time by no small margin on no small number of occasions. Let’s keep that between us.I always agonize for weeks over this first column of the new season. Not for lack of something to say. Not to worry, I did read a lot and think about the macro and the micro of Judaism and shul life at this juncture in history. You will hear more as the Wednesdays and Shabbatot go by and on the High Holidays. But to pick out THE most important issue or idea to inaugurate this new season of It’s Wednesday? That is way too daunting.
Originally I was going to respond to the bumper sticker I saw recently - “The World is My Country, To Do Good is My Religion.” The response got too lengthy and angst-filled, so it will wait. Instead, let me share a little quote from Blaise Pascal in a little book I read in July called Running – The Sacred Art (by Warren A. Kay). I don’t run anymore, but the title intrigued me. In the chapter called “Seeing God While Running” is this quote:
“He [God] so arranges the knowledge of Himself that He has given signs of Himself, visible to those who seek Him, and not to those who do not seek Him. There is enough light for those who only desire to see, and enough obscurity for those who have a contrary disposition.”
Bryce and Zion were, for me, the most spiritual of places. God’s handiwork was on display in multitudinous amazing ways. Visible and divine because I was seeking it, or just neat geology? I am a seeker so I have no doubt what it is. In such places, God’s signs are much less subtle than usual. But we don’t need a national park or a trip of a few thousand miles to see them. Just ask Pascal.
I look forward to talking with you each Wednesday, and hope that this Wednesday will provide you with some spiritual moments and other good things.