Tag: liberation

judaism · theology

A Theological Platform for a Judaism that Does Not Yet Exist

levtaylor

1. We are living in apocalyptic times. War, climate disaster, and neoliberal capitalism are plunging us into ongoing and worsening crisis. Apocalyptic times call for apocalyptic theologies.

2. When we survey how Jewish people rebuilt their communities in the face of devastation, we see that Jews have stubbornly held onto hope. From the destructions of the Temples, through Crusades and Expulsions, to colonialism and genocide, our greatest leaders have never wallowed in despair. They always reaffirmed their faith in God and humanity.

3. The task of building the Messianic age is more pressing than ever. Like our forebears, we affirm that the Messiah will not be a man, but a time, in which all will understand the Oneness that lies beneath all superficial differences. The Messianic Age will be defined by equality between people, peace between nations, and harmony with nature. Our task is to build it.

4. Because of faith in God, we understand that our desire for a transformed world is sacred and just. With an outstretched arm and wondrous deeds, God liberated the slaves from Egypt. God hears the cries of all who suffer and shares their pain. God continues to defend the dignity of all who are subjugated.

5. In every age, our people have sought to understand the will of God. In their hardship, they communed with their Creator. Out of their struggles, they developed theologies. These are our inheritance: Torah; Prophets; Writings; rabbinic literature; Jewish philosophies. We claim them for our own time.

6. Our texts are central to our worldview. They are incomplete and polyvocal. We will never make idols of them by treating them as unquestionable authorities. Rather, they are our dialogue partners to understand our God, our world, and ourselves. We uphold the tradition of questioning, reconsidering, and retelling. Every answer is open to interrogation.

7. We affirm belief in the pure monotheism to which our ancestors aspired. We seek to connect with God, who is singular and infinite; immaterial and transcendent; eminent and imminent. Our God is nevertheless directly part of our lives. As the source of ultimate truth, God seeks to impart to us truth as we can understand it.

8. Life has meaning. Its meaning is intrinsic. Everything that lives on this earth was placed here deliberately by a loving Creator to serve a purpose. All that affirms life affirms God.

9. Jews are called upon specifically and by name. We feel that the task of healing the world has been entrusted to us, personally and collectively. This is what it means to be chosen. The task of Jews is to speak God’s truth and to fulfill God’s dominion on earth. A world ruled by God will be one in which no human being can subjugate another.

10. God created all people, replete with diversity, deliberately. We do not wish to make others like us. We reject any uniformity. We accept that people inhabit multiple, contradictory, and overlapping spiritual realities.

11. We bring our spiritual reality to life through our rituals. Our laws, practices and customs are all articulations of our moral purpose. Even where they carry no obvious moral instruction, they instill within us discipline, wonder at creation, and hold us together in community.

12. Our ancestors call to us from history. As refugees and outcasts, they knew what it was to live on the margins. Their memories demand vindication.

13. We have witnessed the progress of humanity. Scientists have developed incredible medicines. Engineers have shown how to harness natural resources to power the entire planet. Activists have shown how collective strength can transform history. We believe that it is our duty to sustain that progress.

14. In the hands of oppressors, progress is a dangerous force. Warmongers have found ever more efficient ways to kill. Capitalists have found increasingly profitable ways to exploit. We have seen how human ingenuity can be employed for systemic violence. We must wrest the tools of progress from those who worship the false god of wealth.

15. Nationalism is a sickness that is plaguing the world. We repudiate all xenophobia and chauvinism. We will not worship the false idols of states and their symbols. We reject all efforts to politically divide humanity.

16. Until all of humanity is fully redeemed, we remain in exile. Only when everyone has achieved full political, economic and spiritual freedom can we say we have reached our Jerusalem. The earthly Jerusalem is as much a part of exile as any other city, until the day when it becomes the heartland for peace and brings all humanity into unity with God. As such, we align ourselves with all those who seek to bring about an earthly Jerusalem based on the prophets’ visions of dignity, human rights, and liberation.

17. Individualism is killing us. Human beings have survived by being social creatures. The ideas of autonomy and personal choice do not serve us in this age. We need to resist the atomisation of people and create community, which necessitates sharing norms, ideals, and practices.

18. We see the Jewish family as expansive and interconnected. We are all responsible for one another, and want to live as if we are one family. This includes a commitment to loving rebuke where necessary.

19. We return to halachah. We see it not as the binding decisions of previous generations but as the creative forum of the present, in which we find new ways to live by our shared values.

20. We commit to Jewish time, which is shaped like a snail shell: always progressing, and always returning to the same points. We return constantly to our shabbats, our fasts, and our festivals. Every time we return to them, we learn more of what God requires of us, and we urge ourselves on to the next stage of our development.

21. The end of time is coming. It does not have to be disastrous. It could be wondrous. Our telos is a perfected world. We will never reach it. We will always fight for it.

Rabbi Lev Saul

festivals · theology

We are still leaving Egypt

levtaylor

We are still leaving Egypt.

There was a time when we lived at the whim of tyrants; when we worked without a break and only rested so we could work more; when we owned nothing but debts. 

There was a time when we lived in mitzrayim. Today, we translate that word as ‘Egypt,’ fixing it to a specific time and place. 

Our Torah does not permit us to read the story as if from a history textbook. Which Egypt were we living in? What were its borders? In which century did it take place? Who was the Pharaoh?

In Torah, all Pharaohs are simply called Pharaoh. To the migrant labourers and the chattel slaves of the ancient world, it made no difference whether the emperor was Ramses, Amenhotep or Cleopatra. As far as their lives were concerned, each century was broadly the same.

We want to imagine that this place is miles away from here and centuries apart from now. We want to draw a line to divide ourselves from the past.

The word for Egypt – mitzrayim – means ‘narrow, oppressive straits.’ It means places of anguish and control. That place does not have fixed borders between Sudan and the Mediterranean sea. It is a place we have all inhabited. It is a place we all still inhabit.

At Pesach, we are commanded to tell the story of the Exodus as if we ourselves had lived it. The haggadah instructs us to recall the events as if they are part of our collective experience. 

It is not just so that we can remember the bitterness of slavery in the taste of maror, or the tears of persecution in our salt water. This is far more than bringing a story to life. 

It is so that we will understand that Egypt was not simply one place and time. It is any place and time in which people are not free. And because it is any place and time, it is every place and time.

We must understand that we really were slaves in Egypt. We must believe, deep within the sinews of our bodies, that we are still there.

Because if we can remember how we were oppressed, we will remember that we were able to free ourselves. 

We will feel the strength and joy that comes from rising up and leaving constricting spaces. It is so that we will feel empowered to do it again. We must still leave Egypt.

The seder is a process of embodied retelling to help us understand that message.

Yes, in the first half of the seder, we read that we were slaves in the land of Egypt. But, in the second, we invoke Messianic redemption. 

When our plates are cleared and the afikoman has been retrieved and the dinner is done, we turn back to our haggadahs and complete our seder. 

We pour out a fifth glass of wine, open the door, and implore the prophet Elijah to return and finally bring us to freedom. We acknowledge that the struggle is not yet complete. We still have to leave the Egypts of our era.

As the seder concludes, we lift our glasses and promise: “next year in Jerusalem!”

Please do not mistake this toast for a tourism brochure. We are not praying for cheap easyJet tickets to Tel Aviv. The Jerusalem we hope to reach next year is miles away from the one in Israel today. 

Our fellow Reform Jews in Israel are still very much in exile, and crying out to leave their own narrow straits. If the Jerusalem in the contemporary Levant were the one we were reaching for, Judaism would be over. History would be complete, and so would the sacred purpose of the Jews.

If that were Jerusalem, the ultimate Jerusalem, we would have to say that we are satisfied with segregation, militarism, and fanaticism. 

But we are not. 

We are not in Jerusalem until the whole world knows unending freedom. Until there is no more oppression, we are all in Egypt.

We British Jews are still in Egypt too. We have made many advancements. We are citizens in our country with full civic rights. When this was granted to European Jews, many felt it was so miraculous that they considered the exile to be over.

Moses Mendelssohn, the founder of the Jewish Enlightenment, proposed that the social and moral progress encapsulated by Jewish emancipation would bring about a new society. A utopia of tolerance and conclusion based on the values Judaism had imparted to humanity. What would such a place be called? Jerusalem. 

He titled his book as such, anticipating that, when we reached such an age, Berlin would be Zion.

For all our greatest aspirations, Europe has not become the Promised Land. Not yet. Nor is Israel. Not yet. 

If we limit ourselves to imagining emancipation as a geographical phenomenon, we will keep chasing after new countries, hoping they will be our final destination, only to find that, in every location, we remain in exile.

That is because exile is not simply a place. It is a state of being isolated from the true and complete justice of God. 

That promised land is yet to be found.

As long as there is progress to be made, we will keep journeying.

As long as there are slopes to freedom, we will continue to climb that mountain. 

Until the day when we are all free, every year, we will pray that, next year, we will live in a world redeemed. 

Now, we are still leaving Egypt.

Next year in Jerusalem. 

social justice · talmud

Support our Queer Yeshiva

levtaylor

I am so excited to share this.

For years, I have harboured a dream of setting up a queer yeshiva. Now, we are launching a crowdfunder to get it started.

https://chuffed.org/project/queer-yeshiva

The Talmud is the most beautiful work of Jewish thought. It was what inspired me to train as a rabbi and got me through some of my most challenging times. It has so much to offer queers. Can you help fund it?

Since launching less than a week ago, we have raised over £4,000. We need your help to bring us up to our total goal of £5,000. Whatever you can give will be immensely welcome.

I hope you will join me in supporting this cause and sharing it with anyone you know who might be interested.

https://chuffed.org/project/queer-yeshiva

Our mission

We want to bring queer, radical Talmud learning to the UK. We are asking for your help to fund us. 

The Talmud is a beautiful and subversive text at the heart of traditional Judaism. 

Created by radicals who wanted to reinvent their religion, it teaches people how to think outside of binaries and assumptions. 

But for years, this sacred knowledge has been kept locked up by elite straight men. We want to break it open.

Our goal is to learn Talmud in a way that centres marginalised people. 

We are upending hierarchy and empowering queers with the tools and knowledge to bring these texts to life. We are here, we are queer, and we are ready for shiur.

https://chuffed.org/project/queer-yeshiva

The project

In the summer of 2022, we hope to launch a ‘Queer Yeshiva’: Four days of intensive rigorous learning. 

Based in East London, this will be an empowering experience of accessing traditional Jewish wisdom.

We need to be in a fully accessible venue, meeting the learning needs of everyone. We need this space to be open to single parents, unemployed people, and Jews who have never studied before.

This is a big undertaking, and it costs money. That is why we are asking for your help.

Within a year, we hope to be fully self-funding and sustainable, but first we need a cash injection to get this project off the ground. 

Can you help?

https://chuffed.org/project/queer-yeshiva

Who we are

For seven years, Babel’s Blessing has been London’s leading grassroots language school. We teach Yiddish, Arabic, Hebrew, Spanish and Sylheti so that Londoners can communicate with each other. We run a bnei mitzvah programme so that Jews can connect with their traditions on their own terms. We provide ESOL classes for migrants to the UK, including working as the only teachers of English as a foreign language in arrival centres.

Svara is a traditionally radical yeshiva in the United States. It teaches queer-centred Talmud pedagogy with methods designed to help oppressed people feel empowered within their tradition. Our educators have learnt from them and in their methods. 

Please donate and share now. We can’t do this without you.

https://chuffed.org/project/queer-yeshiva

sermon · social justice · torah

A charter of Disabled people’s rights

levtaylor

Do not curse the deaf. 

Do not put a stumbling block in front of the blind.

Revere your God.

This week’s parashah is Kedoshim, the centre of the whole Torah. It is the centre in two senses: we are slap bang in the middle of our scroll. When the warden performs the hagbahh tomorrow, the Torah will look almost completely even on both sides.

It is also, I feel, the spiritual centre of our Scripture. This is the part of the Torah that tells us what the rest of it was for. All the stories and speeches that surround the rest of the text can be summarised in this portion. 

Many of the verses from elsewhere in Torah are repeated. Some of it might seem superfluous. Kedoshim reads a little bit like the Torah’s greatest hits, reminding us of some its most popular laws and aphorisms.

But the collection is not random. The smattering of commandments I recited at the beginning all have something important in common. They are about what rights and obligations people have in relation to each other.

This year has brought home to many of us that we cannot take our health for granted. Our bodies are fragile and the time on earth we have is precious.

If you were to become blind, or deaf, or sick, or old, what could you expect from society? What are the minimum standards that others owe you? And, if you are blessed with youth and good health, what must you do to honour others?

Do not place a stumbling block before the blind. You might think: of course! Who would do such a thing? Who would want to trip up the disabled? But cities are structured and buildings managed in ways that are full of stumbling blocks. Every staircase to access public transport; every meeting held miles away from places people can reach; every building without a wheelchair ramp; every space without accessible toilets; every show without subtitles; and every badly laid-out street. These are all stumbling blocks.

Do not curse the deaf. And again, you would say: who would do such a thing? Surely nobody would be so cruel as to insult people who cannot hear them! But this happens all the time. Every headline that calls disabled people scroungers; every job that refuses to make adjustments; every effort to make welfare harder to access; every time the price of medication is jacked up; every time a comedian makes fun of a disability… aren’t all these insults to the deaf?

These are all ways that disabled people are kicked while they’re down.

Instead, the Torah tells us we need to lift each other up.

May we be the ones to remove every stumbling block and replace every curse with a blessing.

Shabbat shalom.

This sermon is for Edgware and Hendon Reform Synagogue, Parashat Kedoshim, on 23rd April 2021