Rosh Hashannah 5771: Renewal of Israel’s Covenant with Israel

In Seminary, they teach you not to share the more personal details. Not to let your guard down. Not to bear your soul. With you, my family and friends here at Beth El, I cannot do anything but share my soul. Open my heart. Share the personal details. And as Rosh Hashanah is about covenants, about renewal, about commitment, about challenging ourselves to become something new and something better than the previous year – a renewed covenant awaits us this year.

A short five years ago was my most recent time spent in Israel. Just after Sarah and I were married, we moved to Israel for the year. But with respect to those feelings and personal details I mentioned moments ago, allow me to be candid: I was petrified to go to Israel. It was not because of the terror. It was not because of the suicide bombers, or buses, or even living abroad for the first time. It was because I fell in love with Israel in 1998. And when Sarah and I were planning our year in Israel, the Israel of 1998 was long gone. I was not spending a year in the country that I preached about, that I fell in love with – I did not know where I was headed. I was scared.

[Ki Ein Shikhichah lifnei kisei kivodekha v’ein nistar mineged einekha – For you there is no forgetting, from You nothing is hidden] It was the end of our year. My wife and I were walking with close friends—a classmate of mine from the UJ, and his wife and son—on our way to a Yom HaZikaron Service, Memorial Day in Israel. We were reflecting on the past year and how wonderful it was to be in Israel. How we will miss the smells of wild rosemary and jasmine and lavender. How we will miss our community and the constant Jewishness free-flowing in the air. And then, a discordant interruption to our conversation, the siren went off.

For 60 grave seconds, on the evening of Memorial Day, a siren blares across the nation. Everyone stands in silence.

It’s an eerie scene. Smiles turn to pallid blank faces. People stop their cars mid-street, exit and stand at attention. Even babies stop crying. The bartering in the market stops. The bickering in the Yeshivas stop. The guns stop firing in the north. The Buses run later on their routes. And the police officer and the criminal both stand in silence to remember those many martyrs whom have fallen. 60 whole seconds.

Few times in my life have I felt such a chill. I looked on in amazement. Frozen in time set to the melodies of silence and Shrill. The siren stopped and I turned to Sarah, “That was really powerful: could you imagine if we did that in the States on Memorial Day?” And Sarah replied, “Yeah, that would be something, but you know, here in Israel, sadly, they need a siren like that in place, and it’s not only to memorialize their fallen – it’s to sound an alarm and to warn people.”

[V’atem Hadvekim BAdonai eloheykhem chayim kulkhem hayom – You who cleave to Adonai your God have been sustained to this day] It was Israeli Independence Day, but in downtown Jerusalem, albeit ironically, it could have been Mardi Gras. Fireworks from Sunset to Sunrise. Live concerts every three blocks. Falafel Stands frying.

We just had finished 24 hours of mourning for Memorial Day, but now it was Yom Haatzmaut. We got up from mourning to celebrate Israel’s Independence. About 30 or 40 of our friends gathered in San Simon park right behind our apartment. We barbecued, played guitars, sang, grilled, ate, told stories, and lived freely. No hate. No chaos. No worries. No anger. Just freedom. We celebrated a then still young, 58 year-old nation. We celebrated the right to be Jewish and be home. We celebrated the ability to pick ourselves up from mourning and raise up a bottle of beer, even if it was poor-tasting Israeli beer. And then we celebrated the fact that there was Israeli beer!

Fourth of July in America is also about fireworks and Independence, and perhaps in 200 plus years it will be different in Israel. But right now, for every Jew and Israeli, when Yom Haatzmaut comes around, their blood boils with the anticipation just to run outside and scream Todah Lashem! Thank you God – as we all should say Thank God for this day! Freedom and Salvation is here and near.

[Ki Khishemkha ken tehilatekha, kasheh likhos v’noach lirtzot. Ki lo tachpotz b’mot haMet ki im b’shuvo midarko v’chayah – Your glory is Your nature: slow to anger, ready to forgive. You desire not the sinner’s death, but that he turn from his path and live]

It was late on a Saturday night following Shabbat in Jerusalem. I knew that it was close to the start of the Spring College Semester for Americans because that week I was receiving calls daily on my cell phone from previous USYers and students of mine that had arrived in Jerusalem to study abroad for their Junior Year. Sarah went home and I was going with some friends for a slice of Kosher pizza after a birthday party that night. Sbarro of course.

It was 2:00am. My friends and I walked and schmoozed and caught up and found ourselves on a deserted street off of Yaffo. During the day, Yoel Salomon is known for its cafes and galleries, and its safety, as it is only a pedestrian walk. At 2am, the same could not be true. Three young thugs approached us, and barked at me in Hebrew. I told my former USYers to run, as I stepped forward, intercepting to chat with the trio. I was frank. I told them they were mistaken, they did not know us and to have a good night. With my friends at a far distance, we got into a bit of a scuffle, and then the first punch. I was hit smack in the eye. One of the thugs held me down, and as I wriggled free, fully prepared to defend myself, stood up, braced myself to swing, and met the brutes eye-to-eye. I saw it. All three of them had Jewish Star necklaces. All three of them were Jews. I went numb. I went blank. I got very close to the one that hit me, pressed my face against his, and told him to leave, glaring. His two friends began to pull him back. Ben Gurion’s Israel was here.

I’m a pacifist. But I was ready to swing. And then I saw their Judaism. And then I realized how special and bizarre and complicated a place Israel really is. I couldn’t swing. I was frozen. I wore a black eye for a month and it was some of the best Torah I learned that year.

[Adam Yisodo me’afar v’sofo l’afar. B’nafsho yavi lachmo. – Humanity’s origin is dust and its end is dust. Humankind spends their lives earning bread]

As many of us know, the shuk is the term for market in Israel. In Jerusalem, the main shuk is called Machaneh Yehudah, named after the surrounding neighborhood which spawned the market, set up well over 100 years prior. The Jewish Shuk is one of the Middle East’s oldest continuously existing markets. And it is the absolute epitome of daily life in Israel. It is a page right from antiquity. Bartering has always been the nature of the place. The smells of the fresh produce and fruit that are in season. Watching the fluctuation of prices. Spices and fish and meat and delicacies only found in Israel. And then the occasional exotic fruit around the holidays when it is time to try something new and make a shehechiyanu. Sure there are some supermarkets now, but they’ve only shown up in the past few years. And their prices just cannot compete with the negotiable amounts in the shuk. The warm, freshly baked chocolate rugelach. The snacking browsers, picking grapes and berries on every corner without paying a shekel, and with the seller not wincing even a bit.

Sarah and I did our “first prep for Shabbat” grocery shop at the shuk. I remember it so clearly. As insignificant as it may be to many, Sarah asked for two heads of lettuce. In Hebrew. And then negotiated the price. We were living in Israel. We were part of the fabric of society. We were shoppers in the shuk. We were breathing the ancient air, and tasting the fresh fruit. We were yoshvei yirushalayim, dwellers of Jerusalem.

I can go on and tell you stories about Hoshanah Rabbah at the Kotel, about building our first Sukkah, about burning our chametz with neighbors in the street, about the tastiest of restaurants and feeling like Indiana Jones, about kashering our burners for pesach at the local grocery store, about being several blocks from one of the bombings in Tel Aviv, and those stories come with time, but today is just a taste.

And now, the Israel that Sarah and I left just about four years ago, yet again, is no longer. One month after we left, the Second Lebanon War broke out and those infamous kidnappings took place—and though the fate of the others were tragic, Gilad Shalit’s life still treacherously finds itself frozen in the midst in captivity. We’re now facing a new Israel. An Israel different than 1973 during the Yom Kippur War. An Israel different than 1995 when one of my childhood heroes Yitzchak Rabin was murdered. An Israel different than 1998 when I fell in love with our homeland. And now an Israel different than the nation with which over that year my love affair was rekindled. An Israel of hotels once packed with tourists, then fleeing kibbutzniks, and now, God-willing tourists again. An Israel that pays a higher price for cropped and photoshopped images and media-based propaganda than for soaring rockets and bomb shelter childhoods.

A renewed covenant awaits us this year. Renewal of our selves. Renewal of our covenant. Yishuv Eretz Yisrael. Settling the land of Israel.

Nahmanides cites Numbers 33:53 as the proof text that living in Israel is a mitzvah, a commandment. “Inherit the land and live in it, since it is to you that I am giving the land to occupy.” He teaches that the first part, “inherit the land” is a commandment to the Jewish community as a whole to be in control, and the second part “and live in it” is explicitly a charge for each individual to live in the land of Israel, even if the land is under outside control. Nahmanides further adds that this mitzvah is “incumbent upon every individual in every generation.”

So it would seem that it is a mitzvah to make aliyah, to go up to Israel—to live there.

So why aren’t we all on the next flight to Israel, bags-packed and ready to experience the permanent tastes for ourselves? The same reason I am here now in Minnesota, in America. We are Americans, and maybe some Canadians and Russians, but we are Americans. We are residents of America, in America. But as Jews, we are bi-national. We have two homelands. America and Israel. When America needs us, we are there. But are we really there when Israel needs us?

Maimonides, the Rambam, does not quite agree with Nahmanides. He does not include conquering the land or living in Israel in his count of the 613 mitzvot. Some suggest that the Rambam considers living in Israel to be a Rabbinic mitzvah today. While not a commandment straight from the Torah, there is still a Rabbinic mandate.

On this Rosh Hashanah, we are each compelled to look deep within our souls and ask ourselves, what do we see? What do we have within? Is it a connection to the Holy Land?

Admittedly, this season of renewal is challenging practically. We may call these the High Holy Days, but renewal is not only up to God on High. It is our cooperative responsibility to seek personal renewal. And that is the message of Rosh Hashanah. B’Rosh Hashanah Y’katevun. On Rosh Hashanah it is written. But we can do the writing. Our plan for the year. Our plan for renewal.

Friends, we cannot renew ourselves without renewing our relationship with Israel. Israel is the place where Heaven and Earth touch. Now do not get me wrong – I’m certain that every single person here knows that I am passionately in love with America and I am an unwavering patriotic American, but as my father puts it, “sometimes my soul longs to breathe the air of Jerusalem.” It’s an oxygen that awakens the depths of my being and reminds me who I am. And I saw that place. I felt that place. I experienced Heaven and Earth as one.

Rabbi Neil Gillman reminds us that “not every Jew is a Zionist,” but I am a Zionist. That’s right—I am a Zionist. And I hope at the very least the majority of you are Zionists too. But Zionism all the world over is currently under threat. We are now witnessing the fruit of a multi-year and multi-generation campaign toward the de-legitimization of Israel. On many fronts, voices rise out with the strategy of slander and lies designed to isolate Israel—all in order to undermine our precious Israel’s claim to the first and most fundamental right of self-preservation: Israel’s very right to exist.

And though my generation has never lived in a time when Israel did not exist, I’m now seriously concerned, and that’s putting it lightly. In just the past few months, a number of statements and events have worried me greatly.

On one hand, there is an encouraging development. Peace talks were renewed last week and that should bring us some hope. From the lips of President Obama in the Rose Garden: “The purpose of these talks is clear. These will be direct negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians.” That hasn’t happened in a long, long time—and perhaps this could be the realization that both Israel and the Palestinians very well may need to give up something that they cherish.

But with the peace talks, of course, come parties on both sides trying to derail those talks—fatal ambushes and discordant offensive sound-bites. I’d like to believe in my heart of hearts that a fragile peace may potentially be in the balance, but there is no doubt in my mind: though the threat to Israel has always been multifaceted, now it is shockingly ever-present and the weapon of the day is the mouth and the pen.

Further, I could give you many examples of the power of the word that trouble me, but let me provide just a few.

This past May, the Rabbinical Assembly passed a resolution on civil discourse in our society. It calls for speaking out against demonizing rhetoric and calls upon leaders to “conduct themselves according to the highest standards of civility in all public discourse.” Sadly, one of our own – and perhaps I use the term “own” loosely – Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, the spiritual leader of the Shas Party in Israel, went on record last week calling for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to “perish from this world.” “Abu Mazen and all these evil people should perish from this world”; “God should strike them with a plague, them and these Palestinians.” There is no doubt that these recent comments of the Former Chief Sephardic Rabbi are deplorable. These comments are inexcusable and constitute irresponsible incitement to violence. And we cannot defend him or them, for such irresponsible and inciting comments harm these prospects at such a crucial time.

On the other side of the inciting of violence is a person of much greater power, the President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Let me be very clear (as my dear friends at AIPAC remind us so very often): “A nuclear armed-Iran would feel confident further intensifying its support for terrorist allies like Syria, Hamas and Hizballah, which are actively working to undermine US interests and peace efforts. Furthermore, [Ahmadinejad] has on numerous occasions vowed to destroy the state of Israel.”

Ahmadinejad said just this summer: “Israel has actually rung the final countdown for its existence. It shows that it has no room in the region and no one is ready to live alongside it. Actually, no country in the world recognizes it, and you know that the Zionist regime is the backbone of the dictatorial world order.”

And then there was the situation with Ambassador Michael Oren. Ambassador Oren was invited to give a university commencement speech, but for several months, the invitation was protested and criticized. It became a global media disaster, coinciding with the PR nightmare of the Flotilla incident. It took 5,000 plus signatures not to rescind Oren’s invitation. Now, the $25,000 question—which university was it that nearly rescinded its invitation to the Israeli Ambassador? Brandeis University. What day and age are we living if Brandeis – BRANDEIS! – has to question whether or not to bring Ambassador Oren to address the student body?

I am a fan of protest. I support civil disobedience. I am even prone to be personally critical of Israel, in seeking a common goal of a more perfect Israel. In fact, our covenant with Israel also demands that we use our words and not sit silent in the face of increasing religious extremism within the Land. As we seek renewal, Israel must remain a homeland for all Jews. It is intolerable for Jewish women to be arrested for wearing tallitot or dragged away from the kotel for carrying a Torah scroll. That is why we fought so hard against passage of the Rotem conversion bill, which threatened, and still threatens to drive wedges between diaspora and Israeli Jews as well as between some groups of Israelis and others.

We must ensure progress toward religious pluralism rather than religious extremism in Israel. We must ensure progress toward Israel’s legitimate existence. We must ensure progress toward Israel’s perpetual safety and security.

This Rosh Hashanah we must plan to forge ahead with our renewal. We live and support the existence of Israel. For my generation, there always has been an Israel. It has never been in question. It has always been a given. And while I have not made aliyah, I have helped settle the land. I agree with both Ramban and Rambam, we are required to settle the land of Israel, but I do not think that means changing our mailing address. Perhaps you do have to live there for an extended period of time in order to really experience Israel, but that starts with only a trip. But renewal of our covenant with the land begins here in America.

In renewing our relationship with Israel, we begin this long and arduous task of renewing ourselves. We begin to change our way of thinking. We do not engage, we defend. We support personal rights and democracy. We support a peoplehood and are united with our fellow Jews. And on this Rosh Hashanah, we must all come to open our hearts and share our souls.

Settling Israel means buying Israel bonds. It means investing in Real estate abroad. It means supporting the Masorti movement in Israel, and TALI schools, it means logging on to Haaretz for Israel news as opposed to CNN. It means reading your news using HonestReporting—and lobbying with AIPAC and our local politicians, joining us when we go to AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington. It means teaching your kids that Israel is Israel and not Palestine. Shalom means peace and Salaam means peace. Renewing our covenant means talking about Israel with all those around you—your friends and those people you don’t get along with so well. In this global war of words, we are the first and the last line of Israel’s defense.

Tonight over Shabbat dinner, ask your family and friends about their relationship with Israel. Next week, call up your parents, call up your children. Is there a connection? Are they willing to defend Israel in the face of dishonest reporting? Are they willing to provide context at university boycotts and rallies, disarming misattributed figures and statistics? If the radical Islamic terrorists can teach their kids to die for the land, can’t we teach our kids to love it so much that we simply must live for Israel?

I am a firm believer that the American Jewish community cannot exist without Israel and Israel cannot exist without America. It is my prayer for all of us this year that when we hear the word Israel, we begin to glow uncontrollably with delight. That we feel young again. May we all come to see and taste and hear and feel Israel. May She be under our constant guidance and protection, and may we be under God’s constant guidance and protection. May her defenders on the ground be safe and accurate. May they protect in the name of peace and not war. And may the Jerusalem of our dreams finally become a Jerusalem of reality. May we be renewed. May She be renewed. And together, may we both be blessed to walk influenced by the Sweetness and Mercy of the Divine for this New Year.