Parashat Tzav: Lobbying is a Jewish Thing
Raise your hand if, on Monday night, someone at your dinner table will be asking the “Four Questions.”
Ready for this? I’m about to blow your mind. The four questions aren’t actually questions. It just sounds good for us to call them four questions. They’re really more like one lead-in statement with four supporting clauses. It’s not “How is this night different from all other nights?” – but “How different is this night from all other nights!” – Mah Nishtanah Halaylah hazeh mikol haleylot!
These four questions are four opinions, four observations, four concerns about the dinner we sit down to eat during the beginning of Passover. And we’ve been stating these opinions since the Mishnah suggested to do so some 2000 years ago. But of course they’re opinions! We Jews are an incredibly opinionated people.
What is the purpose of sharing these opinions around our Seder table? We want to engage the listeners. We want to encourage our friends and our family to hear the story, to tell the story, to become a part of our story. We want people to agree and to disagree and so we state our opinions about the evening and how special and how different it is. Nevertheless, we know all too well that the stating of opinions sometimes amounts merely to complaint and grumbling.
We complained to Moses in the desert when we didn’t like the food and when we longed to return to Egypt. We complained to Moses about his leadership. It is our very nature to have opinions and to have strong opinions. Well, you know the old joke—two Jews, three opinions.
But there is a difference between complaining and stating one’s opinion. There’s a difference between being vocal and being a whiner. There is very little benefit, if any at all, to sitting and complaining and whining…but when we’re vocal, when we present our opinions and suggestions in a cogent manner before those whom have the capacity to help effect change, then, and only then, can we partner in making great changes in this world—and then our opinions matter!
We advocate and we lobby.
NPR surmises that the term “lobbying” actually originated at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., where it was used by Ulysses S. Grant to describe the political fast-movers frequenting the hotel’s lobby in order to access Grant, who was often found there, enjoying a cigar and a brandy. The lobbyists were the ones who used the lobby to access the president. And they presented their issues, their goals and their desires.
I didn’t stay at the Willard Hotel, but earlier this week, I was just down the street from it. I had the opportunity to meet with Congressman Ellison, Senator Klobuchar and with Senator Franken’s Staff. Then, when I returned home to Minnesota, I had the opportunity to meet with State Senator Latz as well as Representatives Winkler and Simon.
In Washington, D.C., I was joined by about 8000 others seeking change and a brighter future. And here in Minnesota I was joined by about 800 others seeking change and a brighter future.
This was my week of lobbying. This was my week of advocacy on the eve of Passover, a holiday that celebrates freedom and revolution. Many of you know that we sent a delegation to the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington, D.C., this past week. We lobbied our elected officials, sharing with them that we felt it was imperative to impose crippling sanctions on Iran, to pass the foreign aid package, ensuring that Israel would get its $3B allocation, and to reaffirm the strong ties between Israel and America.
I and my AIPAC compatriots sat in Senator Franken’s office, and were pleasantly surprised when we ran into our own Beth El family lobbying as part of the National Council of Jewish Women. We sat and watched the health care legislation get signed into reality together. And that morning I got to sit and listen to former Prime Minister Tony Blair with the 8th graders from HMJDS.
On Thursday, the Joint Religious Legislative Coalition staged its yearly Day on the Hill here at the Minnesota Capitol. We advocated to prevent further damage to the safety net of public assistance, to overhaul our goals of ending poverty by 2020, to seek an impartial judiciary, and of course, to figure out how to neutralize the state’s current budget deficit, not by cuts, but by increasing revenues.
It’s been a busy week to say the least. A busy week of dialogue. A busy week not of complaining, but of stating opinions. Opinions as a Jew and as a private citizen. Opinions as an informed American citizen and opinions as a human being compelled to seek justice in this world.
Okay, so what if our opinions are wrong? What if these opinions bring us down the wrong path? What if the advocating that that we do is ill-informed? That is the beauty of democracy—and that we’ve learned from our tradition as well. For the people, by the people.
When Moses didn’t come down off the mountain, the Israelites grew restless. Aaron hemmed and hawed, but eventually the people grew out of control. They approached Aaron, and they appealed to him and lobbied to him to bring them some faith and some comfort and out of that lobby emerged the Golden Calf. Certainly not the right solution in our eyes. Certainly not a good outcome from lobbying, per se.
However, on the other side, there was Moses, atop the mountain, lobbying on behalf of the people to the Holy Blessed One, to spare them and not to smite them for their actions.
For the people, by the people. The balance of the conversation. If we are wrong, then hopefully the right position is also presented. Or, even better, if we feel at present we are off-course, then we must right the ship.
I spoke just a couple weeks ago about making yourself count by taking part in the census, but advocacy is an altogether even more important way to make yourself heard and your voice count. The key is to whom we present our opinions and how we present them.
We’re reminded of Hillel’s great teaching in Pirkei Avot – Al tifrosh min hatzibor – don’t separate yourself from the community (Avot 2:4). That doesn’t mean “don’t disagree”; it means if you do disagree, if you have an opinion, make your voice heard and effect change. And share that not only with your brother or your wife or your cousin or your friend, but with persons of authority. And in truth, no one is stopping any of us here from running for office. We need either be leaders or work with our leaders. The people may have cried out in Egypt, but it wasn’t until Moses and Aaron went with Pharaoh, backed by God, that the Exodus really happened. We all need to find a vehicle and venue for our voices to be heard.
Our mission is not only about advocacy; it’s about embracing what it means to be change-agents in this world. But, reflecting back on the haggadah, over many centuries, we haven’t changed our Mah Nishtanah – nor have we changed the end of our Seder.
Mah Nishtanah is at the middle of our seder, but Next Year in Jerusalem – L’shanah Haba’ah B’yerushalayim is at the end. It would be nice to think that “next year in Jerusalem” is about the physical place—but then we’d be letting ourselves down each year when we sit time-and-again, here in America, repeating the same empty words.
Friends, Jerusalem is certainly our city of gold, capital of the modern state of Israel, but when we say l’shanah haba’ah b’yerushalim, we’re talking about Jerusalem the spiritual place, the emotional place. A place that allows us to transcend our very existence. This Jerusalem is a place where we are pleased with all that surrounds us. It’s a place where there is no war and there is no hate. There is no disease and there is no crime. The Yerushalayim we long and strive to reach is a place where all are free and all can be free. Essentially, it is the fusion of heaven and earth—yerushalayim shel mala v’lo shel mata—Jerusalem up above and not here down below. A place where there is no need for gripe, for complaint or even for lobbying.
Striving toward heaven on earth, this Yerushalayim with which we close our sedarim year-after- year…this is not about packing our bags and moving to Israel. This is about packing our bags and going to the Capitol. The Capitol in Saint Paul and the Capitol in Washington. If we are ever to reach yerushalayim, then we need to raise our voices and share our opinions—but we need to do it profoundly and we need to do it correctly.
When the time comes to sign up to travel to Washington for AIPAC next year, join us. When the time comes to travel to Saint Paul next year, join us. When the time comes to vote in November, do it. But you don’t have to wait until then—when you feel you are ready to embrace the mitzvah of making your voice heard, then send a letter, an email, make a phone call. Embrace facts and not fear, let your opinions be informed by policy preferences and not propaganda, influenced by information not innuendo. And don’t gripe to your neighbor, but lobby to your politician.
Because, whether or not you realize it, the reason you likely call the four questions the four questions is because that’s what someone told you to call them—and no one ever told you that you were allowed to question that. That you were allowed to present our yown opinion. Guess what, you can and you should—and more importantly, it’s a mitzvah to do so.
