Thoughts
about High Holiday sermon topics probably start to creep into my mind
right around the time the Pesach dishes are being stowed away for
another year. By the beginning of summer I know what my subject will
be for at least one or two sermons, and I have a strong sense about
the rest. In part, this is due to a pattern I try and follow every
year. The sermon, I believe, has to reflect the tone of the day. So
on Rosh Hashanah – when the year and the holidays are new – I try
and give a sermon with a purpose to it – an exhortation either to
some form of action or conviction. This is the sermon to which the
verb “preach” - a word that I find a bit creepy – best applies.
Yom Kippur, on the other hand, is a time of deep introspection and
so, on that day, I try to give what I now call the “thinky”
sermon – the one more conducive to rumination and reflection.
This
year, the sermons came together later than in previous years. Part
of that is no doubt due to the relative lateness of the holidays. In
time, though, I figured out what I wanted to say on both days of Rosh
Hashanah, as well as the two sermonizing services of Yom Kippur.
What has stumped me has been this service.
I think
of this evening's sermon as the one that sets the tone for the
spiritual work that we each must individually do over these ten days.
It is also, with the exception of the mincha/ne'ilah service on Yom
Kippur, the most intimate. Many of you here tonight will be here for
every service, and so I feel a kind of kinship with you. It makes me
want to put something of myself into this sermon – to open up to
you the emotions I am feeling on this day of remembrance and at this
season of repentance. For me, these emotions tend to be pretty
similar from year to year, and so I was somewhat disappointed, though
not at all surprised, when I realized - after the fact - that the
sermon I gave on this night last year was remarkably similar to one I
had given just a few years earlier. In both I spoke about the
emotions of size and significance that are stirred up in me on our
annual family trips to North Carolina's Outer Banks. I have spent a
fair amount of time in New York City this summer – including a trip
to the top of the Empire State Building – and for a while I thought
about offering my reflections on visiting that remarkable place. But
as I thought about what those reflections were, I realized I would
just wind up giving the Outer Banks sermon yet again, this time with
an urban twist to it.
I have
started and stopped on this sermon numerous times – including one
version that I decided was more appropriate for Purim then the High
Holidays. I kept thinking to myself, when the other sermons are
written and your mind is clear, it will come to you. It didn't. As
late as yesterday I decided to scrap the whole plan and lead a
discussion group tonight – an idea I have been toying with for some
time now. Yet what would not leave me was the feeling that I had
something to say to you – something that I needed to say to you,
tonight. I just could not figure out what that thing was.
It hit
me this morning. I was looking at the front page of The Jewish
Week, which is New York City's equivalent of our Jewish
Ledger. The lead headline read “Gaza War Pushes Israel,
Reluctantly, Onto Holiday Bima.” In the article, more than a dozen
rabbis were confessing that this summer's Gaza war was forcing them
to to talk about Israel and they were nervous about doing so.
Whatever they said, they well knew, was likely to anger – even
outrage – a large portion of their congregation. So they were
trying to frame their words to both express what they felt they
needed to say, but also to keep the dialogue open with those who will
disagree.
How
astonishing! I finished my Israel sermon – the sermon I will give
tomorrow morning – nearly three weeks ago. And ever since, I have
been tinkering with it not to tone it down, but to try to make it
stronger. I have no fear of angering you with what I will say
tomorrow. For the most part, I have no such fear because the
majority of you agree with me – which is a good thing because my
opinions about Israel are right. But there is also something very
upsetting about being a rabbi who can't make his congregation mad at
him. Even last year when I told you that you all stink at praying
and you had better learn how to do it right, no one came up to me and
said “Mind your own damn business, rabbi, I can pray better than
you!” What kind of Jews are that polite?
There
is an irony to this shul – an irony that plays out on both a
superficial and a more profound level. In the Jewish Week
article, one rabbi said of his holiday sermons “I plan to speak
about the inability to speak to each other about things we disagree
on.” The superficial irony is that I don't have to speak about our
inability to speak when we disagree because we don't disagree – at
least not to my face. The deeper irony is that if we did disagree,
I would not have to sermonize to you about that either. We could
just talk. That's why we have lunch together after services on Rosh
Hashanah – so we can talk. That's why I encourage you all to visit
me here in the hours after morning services on Yom Kippur – so we
can talk. I like to talk to you about important things. To me, its
the best part of being your rabbi.
The
realization that I am not the kind of rabbi who ever has to worry
that his congregation will hate him is what finally shook from my
brain as to what I want to say to you. The last couple of months
here have been hard: resignations, people moving away, people moving
on. These changes are leaving real voids. We are filling those
voids, but so far, incompletely and at a terrible strain to our
president. Part of me sees opportunity in all this. Perhaps we are
going through that darkest hour that leads to the brightest dawn.
And in truth, I have been inspired by many of you these past few
weeks. I have been inspired by those of you who have who have taken
on the work of filling those voids. And I have been inspired by
those of you who have, through your actions, shown a determination
never to give in.
But I
keep hearing in my head the words of the poet Anthony Hecht, whose
poem Words for the Day of Atonement are quoted in the Reform
movement's mahzor: “Merely to have
survived is not an index of excellence.” Assuming the voids do get
filled, what do we hope to accomplish beyond survival?
Tomorrow
in my sermon, I will tell you the history of how I became so
passionate about Israel. Left unsaid will be the story of how that
passion awakened another: a passion for this ancient faith of ours.
For I have come to believe that, lurking under a surface of rote
observance and mechanical action, hiding behind the ignorance in
which we have been raised and the prejudices we have inherited, lurks
the most astonishing, powerful, life affirming and meaning creating
system of living and thinking and acting. It will take but a little
work to get us there. But it will take such work from a lot of us,
working together with the sense of purpose that breeds passion. If
we could, in this throw-back of a building, in the middle of a city
that is indifferent to our survival, create a model of Jewish
thought, and purpose and vibrancy, we will have done something of
enduring worth. We will have done something worthy of more than just
survival. Indeed, we will have done something worthy of blessing.
Somehow on this night, the accomplishment seems at the same time
farther away and closer than ever.
This is
the message that I wanted to deliver especially to you who are here
tonight because you are the ones who can hear it understand. My
prayer for all of us is that the trials through which this shul is
now passing will awaken a sense of purpose to our work that goes
beyond the need to survive. May that purpose be a fuel to our
passion and may our passion lead us to the days when we yell and
scream and argue with each other because we care so much. The
Mishnah teaches us not to fear such arguments because they are for
the sake of heaven. And everything we do for the sake of heaven is
in fact for the strength of our souls.
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