Re'eh: "There Shall be No Needy Among You?"

Parashat Re’eh 5768 – August 30, 2008

There Shall Be No Needy Among You?

To address the problem of poverty we must abandon our cynicism, awaken our empathy, and have faith that a better future is possible.

The story goes that the Hassidic master, Rebbe Levi Yitzhak of Berdichev once went into the center of town and stood in the middle of the marketplace and started preaching. After a while one of the businessmen approached him and said, “rebbe Yitzhak, we’re always pleased to see you, but we’re trying to make money here.” Rebbe Yitzhak responded, “well, you all come to shul every week and talk business… I figured I’d come to the marketplace and talk Torah.” In fact, Torah has a lot to say about how we operate in the economic realm.

This week’s torah portion begins with a choice: “see, this day I set before you blessing and curse: blessing if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I enjoin upon you this day; and curse if you do not obey the commandments of the lord your God…”

It would seem that the choice is clear – really no choice at all: follow God and be blessed; don’t follow God and be cursed. And what are these blessings? Later in chapter 15 (v. 4) we read about one of these blessings:

“There shall be no needy among you – since the Lord your God will bless you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you as a hereditary portion – if only you heed the Lord your God and take care to keep all the commandments I enjoin upon you this day.” Again, a simple formula, right – if we follow in God’s ways, we will have abundance and no one shall want. But how are we to understand this statement? It seems more than a little simplistic. Is this how the world works? Is justice really that simple? And, what does it mean to follow God’s commandments? And how should we understand the reality that there have always been poor in our midst?

Perhaps the Torah is more subtle than we might think because in the very next paragraph we see a marked shift. First the Torah said there shall be no poor among us… now take a look at verse 7:

“If, however, there is a need person among you,…”

Wait a second! I thought you just said there would be no poor people… what gives? Is it because we sinned? Because we didn’t keep kosher strictly enough, because we didn’t check our clothing for mixtures of linen and wool? Is it because we didn’t pray correctly? What is the commandment that we failed to heed? Let’s look more closely:

“If, however, there is a need person among you, one of your fellows (Ahecha) in any of your settlements in the land that the Lord your God is giving you, do not harden your heart and shut your hand against your needy kinsman. Rather you must open your hand and lend him sufficient for whatever he needs.”

So, now we’re getting a fuller picture of this problem. Perhaps the first statement is not descriptive but rather prescriptive. It isn’t that there will not be any poor, but rather, there shouldn’t be any poor. And, the commandment we must head: to open our hands and provide that person with that which he or she needs to live a dignified life. At the same time, the Torah recognizes our greatest barrier to solving the problem. The Torah recognizes that scarcity is not the only source of poverty. When the Torah commands us not to harden our hearts, it is acknowledging that the greatest barrier is our own lack of empathy and foresight.

A year and a half ago, I traveled to a very poor region of El Salvador with a delegation of Rabbinical students. We went there to learn about the problems of global poverty and the work being done in places like El Salvador to support sustainable development. And, on that trip, one of my fellow rabbinical students asked a question that resonated with many of us: “What would it take for me to see my host family as my own family? His question brought into focus the issue of empathy and the barriers within our selves that keep us from caring and acting.

And poverty isn’t just a problem in far away places like El Salvador. Poverty is right here at home in the wealthiest country in the world. Poverty is problem in our very own neighborhood. And one of the most frightening developments of the last several years is that poverty has crept right up to our very own front door. Record numbers of college educated people are finding themselves out of work and homeless. People who work 40, or 60, or even 90 hours a week are not able to pay for housing, food, and fuel. The middle class is beginning to feel the pressure that so many working class people have known for a long time. How many of us… how many of our friends and neighbors, are just one tragedy – one catastrophic illness, one layoff, one injury, one accident – away from poverty?

Our Torah portion says (v. 10) “Give to [the poor person] readily and have no regrets when you do so, for in return the Lord your God will bless you in all your efforts and in all your undertakings.” Our failure has been a failure of imagination… is a failure to see the ways in which collectively our destiny is bound up with the condition of every person around us. It has been our failure to see that our entire society is brought down when we neglect the needs of the vulnerable.

We started with the promise just a few verses ago that there will be no poor…. But here is the rub, the fine print, the punch-line, if you will: Verse 11 starts “For there will NEVER cease to be needy ones in your land…”

There will never cease to be poor people. We can respond to this truism in one of two ways, we can become fatalist and believe that nothing we do can improve the lives of those who are most vulnerable, we can fall into cynicism and believe that the world is simply too cruel so we should each just grab as much as we can for ourselves and let others fend for themselves. Or we can make another choice. We can embrace the hopeful spirit of the Torah’s injunction and we can strive for a society ruled by justice and fairness.

The Torah concludes: “There shall never cease to be needy ones in your land, which is why I command you: open your hand to the poor and needy fellows in your land.”

I don’t have a simple prescription for the problem. If I’ve learned anything, it is that these issues are vastly complex. But I firmly believe that beginning to address these needs starts with our own ability to awaken our empathy and to abandon our cynicism. It starts with a hope for a better future and faith that it is possible.

“See, this day, I set before you the blessing and the curse…” The choice is yours to make.

Devarim: "Why should I want to live?"

Sermon: Parshat Devarim 5768 / 9 November 2008

“Why should I want to live?”

The Book of Deuteronomy is Moses’ ethical will to the Jewish people. Like Moses, we should all be asking ourselves: “What is the meaning of my life?”

Two years ago today, I received a phone call that I will never forget. I was working as a chaplain at UCLA medical center and the call was from the psychiatric wing of the hospital. A nurse called to request assistance with a Jewish patient who was being belligerent and was demanding to see a Rabbi. It turns out that the patient was a fourteen year-old boy (who I’ll call Razi) who was hospitalized for anorexia and severe depression. When I arrived, I was greeted by a very stern nurse who didn’t seem to care much for chaplains. “Rabbi,” she said, “Raz is very sick and will try anything to not eat, now I think he’s trying to trick us. He says there’s a Jewish holiday tonight when Jews have to fast; but I checked, and ‘Yaum Kepper’ isn’t until September.” I told her that I had better have a talk with the patient. You see Raz was from a very committed Conservative Jewish family that kept kosher and attended shul regularly. Raz himself had graduated from a Conservative day school and he was not, in fact, trying to trick the nurses… it was Erev Tisha b’Av and he wanted to observe the fast.

So the nurse brought Raz out from his room to meet with me. Raz, was about my height, but he weighed only about a 100 pounds. His cheeks were gaunt and his shirt hung on his shoulders as though on a coat hanger. He complained to me about his nurse and how she wouldn’t let him fast. I explained to Raz that his treatment – which included a strict eating regiment – was a matter of pikuah nefesh – a matter of life and death – and that he was not only exempt from fasting, but that it was imperative for him to follow his doctor’s orders to eat. Though he didn’t like my answer, he acknowledged that I was correct. We read a little bit of Eicha together from the Tanakh he had in his room: “Eicha yashva badad ha-ir – Alas, Lonely sits the city, Once great with people! She that was great among nations Is become like a widow; The princess among states is become subjugated. Bitterly she weeps in the night, Her cheek wet with tears. There is none to comfort her, Of all her friends.” I looked up at Raz and he was crying. “I feel like Jerusalem right now,” he wailed, “I’m so alone in this awful place.” And then he got very quiet and I waited… and when he looked up at me with his sunken eyes he said, “Rabbi… I have a question for you! No one around here has been able to answer it for me and I want to know what you think.” “Rabbi: why should I want to live?”

That question knocked the wind out of me! You see, what Raz didn’t know is that I had asked myself that very question when I was his age. Then I said to him, “Raz, only you can answer that question for yourself. You have to believe that there is something worth living for.” He cried even more and then he looked back up at me and said, “Well, Rabbi, you’re a grown-up… you’ve made it this far. From where you are in life right now, is it worth it?” In that moment I recalled my own struggles, but I realized that I did have clear answer to his question, “Yes, Raz… yes, I believe it’s worth it. I know that this is a very broken world, but I also believe that we have it in our power to fix the brokenness… I believe that healing is possible – for the world and for ourselves… I guess what I’m saying is: I believe there is hope… Right now you feel destroyed, like Jerusalem… but even in Eicha there is hope.” And we turned ahead in the book to chapter 3: “‘Zot ashiv el-libi, al-ken ohil… [Whenever I recalled my distress] this is what I call to mind and it gives me hope: The kindness of the Lord has not ended, God’s mercies are not spent. They are renewed every morning…’ (from Lam 3:19-23). So, I guess what I’m saying Razi is that change is possible, every day gives us a new opportunity… nearly 2000 years have gone by and Jerusalem is still not rebuilt, but little-by-little we’ll get there.”

After that first meeting, Razi and I met regularly over the next several weeks. And I’d like to think that he gained hope and some healing through our conversations. I know that my encounter with him changed my life. And to this day, his question echoes in my mind: “Why should I want to live?” I don’t take that question for granted. Razi was on an honest search for meaning in life. Razi asked that question in a moment of despair, but there are many other ways to ask that question. Instead of asking “why should I want to live?” we should all be asking ourselves, “what do I have that is worth living for?” Or “what is the meaning of my life?” But, our culture isn’t too open to asking that question out loud. Try going to a dinner party and asking your friends: “what is the meaning of your life?” or try it as a pick-up line the next time you’re at a singles bar, “hey, what’s your name… and what give your life meaning?”

In our culture, “the meaning of life” is joke or cliché. But those of us who have sat at the bedside of a loved one have asked that question. Those of us who have confronted our own mortality have asked that question. Those of us who have looked into the face of our newborn children and wondered what kind of world we’re bringing them into have asked that question. Those of us who have felt the brokenness of this world, who have felt the pain of suffering… all of us, at some point in our lives, have asked the question: “What is the meaning of my life?”

And the most tragic thing I can think of is if you can’t find the words to answer that question. But in a culture that doesn’t often ask the question out loud, where should we turn for answers? I want to suggest to you that a good place to look is in the Jewish tradition. I read the Torah through the lens of that question all the time. And this morning we beginning reading my favorite book of the humash – sefer devarim – the book of Deuteronomy. Even more so than the other 4 books, Devarim recognizes a world that is broken in need of healing, a world in chaos in need of justice. Sefer Devarim does not take for granted the question of meaning and it offers a clear a vision of the world as it ought to be. And Sefer Devarim puts the responsibility squarely on our shoulders. Repairing the world is our choice. Transformation is possible… healing is possible.

And our guide through sefer Devarim is himself an example of this. The Book of Deuteronomy is narrated by non-other than Moses. Moses himself was transformed by his encounters with God and his struggles as a leader. This man, Moses, who once protested to God “Lo ish devarim anochi” – “I am not a man of words” (Ex. 4:10) now has something profound to say. Deuteronomy opens, “Eleh ha-devarim asher diber Moshe el kol Yisrael.” - “These are the words – devarim – that Moses spoke to all of Israel.” This once timid man, who fled from his destiny, has discovered his voice, his message, and the meaning of his life’s struggle. And the book of Deuteronomy is his ethical will to the Jewish people.

In the weeks ahead, I encourage us to read Moses’ words together for their sublime wisdom. And I’m going to give you some homework. I want you to consider writing your own ethical will. It doesn’t have to be the book of Deuteronomy. It just has to be a sincere statement of the wisdom you want to leave to your children and grandchildren. What has life taught you? What have you learned from your own struggles, from growing up, from what you’ve read and what you’ve seen in life, from marriage (or divorce), from raising children, from making a living, from building a community, from love and from loss? What has life taught you?

It might take years to craft and you may revise it many times, but cherish that will. You deserve to know the wisdom and meaning of your own life, and your children deserve to know it too.

My prayer for us this morning is that like Moses, we learn to find those words and that we too should have the courage to share them.

Shabbat Shalom

Mas'ei: "These are the Journeys"

Shabbat Mas’ei / Rosh Hodesh Av 5768 / August 2, 2008

These are the Journeys

We must always remember where we came from and be grateful for the miracles that have brought us here.

I’m very pleased to announce that after a month of looking, my family and I have found the home we will be living in. Just yesterday, our offer on a house in this neighborhood was accepted by the current owners. If all goes well, we’ll be living in our new house in about a month. It is particularly exciting for us because we’ve never owned a home before. And, we’re also exciting because for the last several years, neither Melanie nor I have lived in one place for very long. As a matter of fact, since graduating high school and leaving my parent’s home in 1992, I have lived 14 different apartments in the last 16 years. And, I have not lived in any one of those places for more than 2 years. This is very exciting and new to us. I’m really looking forward to settling down… We’re finally going to live in a real house! No more furniture I found our on someone’s curb. No more noisy upstairs neighbors stomping around or playing their electric guitars at 2am. No more lazy landlords or crazy managers. No more unreturned security deposits. No more tiny kitchens or storing things under beds and sofas. We’re finally going to live in a house!

I imagine that the children of Israel might have felt similarly standing on the East bank of the Jordan river, poised to enter the promised land. Finally, they could put their long and difficult past behind them. This week’s Torah portion – parashat Mas’ei – is really the last chapter in the journey toward Eretz Yisrael. The book of Dvarim, which we begin reading next week, is a series of Moses’ sermons to the people, but this week we read about the end of the journey. You might thing there’s no looking back, but parashat Mas’ei opens with a long and rather prosaic list of all the places where we camped along our long trek through the wilderness.

Chapter 33 opens: “These are the marches of the Israelites who started out from the land of Egypt, troop by troop, in the charge of Moses and Aaron. Moses recorded the starting points of their various marches as directed by the Lord. Their marches, by starting points, were as follows.” In all, the Torah records 42 different encampments in 40 years… that certainly breaks my record. This long list includes the names of places that appear nowhere else in the Torah. Some are commented upon, while others are simply listed.

Why list all these names? Midrash Ba-Midbar Rabbah provides a number of reasons: The first reason is that the list serves as a reminder of all the miracles that God did for us along the way. It is an acknowledgement that during those 40 years, God was always with us serving as our “sukkat shalom” – our shelter of peace and tranquility. It wasn’t always an easy journey, but we survived in no small measure because of God.

The second reason the Midrash gives is that remembering all the places serves as a reminder of the mistakes we made along the way and our frequent rebellion against Moses and God. Recounting all of our journeys is a caution against our own hubris – the false belief that we are entirely in control of our destiny.

And, the third reason given by the midrash is that listing the campsites is meant to teach us two important virtues – the value of hachnasat orchim (welcoming guests into our homes) and the importance of gratitude. Just as God sheltered us and showed us hospitality in our long journey, so too we must be kind and welcoming to the stranger. And, we must always remember where we came from and be grateful for the journey that has brought us to the promised land.

Our own lives are not unlike the circuitous journey of the Israelites in the wilderness. And, when we fail to look back and reflect on the path we have taken, we risk forgetting the miracles we have experienced along the way. We risk becoming arrogant and absorbed in our successes and we easily forget the lessons we learned from our shortcomings. And if we forget all the people that helped us along the way, we can become selfish and ungrateful.

My prayer for us this morning is that we always remember where we came from, the journey that has brought us here and the values we’ve learned along the way.

Shabbat Shalom