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July 29, 2023
Author(s): Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz,
Parshat Va’etchanan—Shabbat Nachamu
Is There Hope?
July 29, 2023 — 11 Av 5783
Temple Emanuel, Newton, MA
Why was this Tisha B’av different from all other Tisha B’avs?
On all other Tisha B’avs, we read about how once there was a Jewish homeland in the land of Israel, and that homeland was destroyed not by external enemies, but by internal Jewish hatred, what the Talmud calls sinat chinam, hatred of Jew for Jew.
In previous years, we got to read about it. We had a luxury. It was history.
What’s different this year is that we are not reading about it. We are living it. It is not history. It is our reality.
On the day the Knesset passed the legislation, Danny Gordis wrote a column. As you know, Danny Gordis has been interpreting Israel for American Jews for almost 30 years. He has been the speaker at 1,000 AIPAC dinners. He entitled his column “The Day the Music Died.”
Today was much worse than [the day Yitzchak Rabin was murdered]. Yes, Israel
was bitterly split then, but the immediate damage was caused by a lone, morally corrupt gunman.
Not today. Today, dozens of people did this.
It no longer matters what side any of us were or are on. Israel as we once knew
it no longer exists. It may heal, it may not. The army may survive, or it may not…
Yes, we needed judicial reform. Almost everyone knows that. But we needed unity
more than that. And we could have had both.
And today, any semblance of unity, or even the possibility of restoring unity, died.
More precisely, Israeli society as we knew it was murdered.
What do we do with this grim assessment? The question Israelis on both sides want to know, the question American Jews on all sides want to know, the question American political leadership wants to know is, is this traumatic week really the end of Israel as we knew it, or is there hope? Is there hope for repair? Hope for healing? Hope for renewal? Is hope reasonable or unreasonable? Is hope essential or an exercise in futile denialism?
Tisha B’av is about destruction and renewal, the end of hope and the beginning of the glimmering of hope. These two voices—there is no hope, we must hope, there is no consolation, we must find consolation—are constantly in dialogue.
The first chapter of Eichah, of lamentations, which we read on Tisha B’av, says, and I quote: eyn lah menachem, there is none to comfort to Jerusalem, ayn menachem lah, there is none to comfort Jerusalem, ayn menachem li, there is nobody to comfort me, the broken-hearted author of Lamentations. This destruction is real. Sober up. Do not succumb to illusion or denial.
But today, just two days later, is Shabbat Nachamu, the Sabbath of consolation, and we read Isaiah’s stirring words: nachamu, nachamu ami, yomar eloheichem, comfort, oh comfort My people, says your God.
So who is right?
There is certainly a strong case to be made against hope. Danny Gordis was in dialogue with Marc Baker on Tisha B’av morning. What he had to say was very sobering. He shared that recently, while he and his wife were driving to Tel Aviv, to be with their grandson who was having his tonsils out, his wife, who had inspired their move to Israel, said: “We’ve had a good run.” He said that at Shabbat lunch tables, people are asking questions that he had never before heard. Are our children going to stay in Israel? His friends’ kids are making plans to leave Israel. If we want to see our children and grandchildren, will we have to leave Israel? He pointed out that there is a real question about whether Israel has a functioning army given how many reservists have said they will not serve in what they see as an emerging Israeli Hungary or Turkey. He pointed out that 70% of Israel’s high-tech industry has talked about leaving Israel. That never happened before. Doctors are on strike. All of these signs point to ominous weather. The first commonwealth lasted 73 years. The second commonwealth lasted 74 years. In Israel’s 75th year, no Israeli knows how this will turn out.
The case against hope is strong. What about the case for hope? The story line, and photo, for hope that went viral this week showed a moment that happened at Jerusalem’s Train Station where there were two escalators, one going down, one going up. Each escalator was filled with protesters, one that supported the legislation, one that opposed the legislation, escalators taking the passengers in different directions. The note of hope was that some of the folks high-fived each other as they passed one another, a gesture of solidarity and shared citizenship even amidst the profound differences that still exist.
How much can we make of this lovely moment? Is this a harbinger of decency and sanity to come, where both sides will work together to forge a compromise that a solid majority of Israel can get behind? Or is this the exception that proves the rule that Israel is a divided land among divided tribes, hopelessly so, and increasingly so?
Many people sent me the viral video of this moment of the high five on the escalators, and it called to mind an iconic moment in American history having to do with George Washington’s chair at the Constitutional Convention. His chair famously had an engraving of the sun, which was perfectly ambiguous: Was it a rising sun, the sun of a new nation? Or was it a setting sun, the sun of a nation too divided to thrive? At the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention, after the delegates had come together and worked out their differences, Benjamin Franklin famously observed:
I have often looked at that picture behind the president without being
able to tell whether it was rising or setting. But now at length I have
the happiness to know that it s a rising and not a setting sun.
Benjamin Franklin could be optimistic because he saw the delegates working together. It is too early to tell whether we can be similarly optimistic. Nobody knows. Only Israelis can answer this question. We cannot answer this question for them. That said, on this Shabbat of consolation, there is a legitimate reason to be hopeful. In the podcast Micah Goodman did from Jerusalem this week, which I sent out yesterday, he observes that recent polling shows that somewhere between 60 to 70% of Israelis want the same thing. They do want judicial reform that represents necessary and sensible tweaks of the current system that a strong majority of Israelis throughout the political spectrum support. They do not want to neuter the Court, thereby eliminating the only check and balance in Israeli democracy. Micah is optimistic that if 60 to 70% of Israelis do not want what got passed this week but do want a better version broadly supported by the Israeli public, we will get that in time. This moment will not stand.
What do we do in the meantime? This is gut check time for our relationship with Israel. When Marc Baker asked Danny Gordis what can American Jews do for Israel now–since only Israelis can solve this crisis for themselves–Danny pointed to three things which I will call the three Ls.
The first L, and here Danny was especially forceful, is to not lie about Israel. Tell the truth. Danny observed that when some American Jewish organizations write that the Knesset’s vote on Monday was a great day for Israeli democracy, they obviously do not know what they are talking about. They have not read the bill. They are not seeing the pilots and reservist who are not serving. They are not seeing the doctors who are on strike. They are not seeing the rising generation of Israeli children and Israeli hi tech who are giving serious consideration to leaving Israel. This is not a great moment for Israeli democracy. This is the greatest crisis in Israel’s 75-year history. When a child is struggling, no good parent would deny the struggle. No good parent would lie about the struggle. No good parent would say this is my child’s finest day. A good parent helps their child face the real deal, and that is what Israel needs to do for itself now.
The second L is to continue learning. This learning means staying current on all the developments however you get your news. This learning means deep study that can help us place the day’s headlines in the longer history of our people, as the Israeli teacher of Israeli poetry Rachel Korazim did for us on Tisha B’av. This learning means actually reading legal analysis of the judicial reform bill that got passed and why it is so very problematic for Israel.
The third L is to continue to love Israel. Danny pointed out that to be a parent is to have a child who at some point has a serious struggle: emotionally, psychologically, physically, they are lost or confused or not thriving. That is not the time to say parenthood is too much of a drag, I am checking out. I only like being a parent when things are going well. That’s not a parent. I only love Israel when things are going well. That’s not a Zionist. A good parent leans in, figuring out the doctor, the therapist, the team, the counselor, the activity, that can nurture our loved one back to health. Israel is not thriving. How do we lean in? Do we call our friends and family in Israel just to check in? Do we make it a point to go to Israel especially this year? Our homework is to love Israel by showing up for Israel, so our question is, how will we show up?
Israel’s national anthem is the hope, Hatikvah. Only Israelis can make their national anthem their realty.
Meanwhile, our job is to live up to our own name. We are named for a preposition, the word “with.” God is with us. That is what Emanuel means. God is with us in our best of times and in our worst of times. Can we be with Israel in this hard season, telling the truth about Israel, not lying about Israel, learning deeply about Israel, loving Israel, showing up for Israel, as Israel emerges from this dark night into a better day. Shabbat shalom.