Tag: new year

high holy days · liturgy · sermon

Circumcise your heart

levtaylor



In passing, we read in liturgy recently that God asks us to circumcise our hearts. A member exclaimed: “You’re going to have to explain that one!”

I actually think it’s worth delving into, and we can learn a lot from it, but drilling into this metaphor requires some robust engagement with physicality and body gore. If you know that’s not for you this morning, feel free to check out of this sermon at any time without judgement. I’ve taken a punt by looking at an ugly expression in Torah, and if it brings up anything triggering for you, you can leave and we’ll let you know when the sermon is over.

Circumcise your heart.

Funnily, it had never occurred to me before that the expression was anything but ordinary. It appears at least twice in the Torah that I can find, and possibly more, as well as variously in the Prophets, the rabbinic writings, and the liturgy.

It’s just one of those sayings, isn’t it? It’s the reason for the season. That we pray and fast and atone and repent during these Days of Awe, in order that we might emerge on Yom Kippur with circumcised hearts.

But, confronted with the member’s incredulity, I was suddenly struck. Because I actually don’t know what it means. The term became defamiliarised and looked like a word I had never seen before.

After all, it’s funny, isn’t it? It’s an action that we can imagine on one body part, even if we’d prefer not to, but which is ludicrous if applied to another.

But more than ludicrous, it’s grotesque! Circumcising a heart sounds visceral, violent, bloody and gory. It sounds like macabre surgery.

Why do we have such an obscene metaphor placed so centrally in our Yom Kippur liturgy?

This has sent me on a journey through dictionaries, concordances, and the grammar commentaries of ibn Ezra. So, come with me, if you will, on an adventure to understand what a circumcised heart looks like, how to get one, and why we may need one, especially this week.

Well, firstly, we need a definition.

I always do a little chuckle when I go past the cafe in the park between the synagogue and Surbiton station, because it is called Orlah. I’m somebody’s language, I’m sure it’s a beautiful word, but in Hebrew it means foreskin. It can mean uncircumcised, but also unskilled, closed, and forbidden.

Lips can be uncircumcised, as Moses tells God that he has uncircumcised lips, and cannot do the work of talking to Pharaoh. This might mean literally that Moses had some kind of cleft palate or scarring around his mouth. It might be more metaphorical, suggesting that Moses had a stammer or speech impediment. But the image is of lips overlaid with layers of unwanted skin that prevent being understood.

Ears can be uncircumcised. The Prophet Jeremiah chastises the citizens of Jerusalem for having uncircumcised ears, adding that they are unable to hear God’s word. Here it is almost certainly metaphorical, and conjures an impression of ears cemented over by excess membranes.

Even trees can be uncircumcised. For the first three years, they bear fruit that shouldn’t be eaten. The early fruit is forbidden because, according to ibn Ezra, is dangerous and useless, like the foreskins of lips, ears, and hearts.

The word for circumcise is milah. This one is more exclusively used for male genitalia, but please do not only imagine the safe medical procedure practised by experts in the NHS. In our Torah, circumcision is something that can happen to adults, without anaesthetic, in the heat of the desert. That is how it is for Abraham, the men of Shechem, and Joshua’s soldiers.

This is probably the version of circumcision we are expected to picture when God tells us to remove the foreskins of our hearts.

Notice that all of these expressions are somewhat revolting. The imagery is gory. That’s probably deliberate.

We have been trained by the sanitised philosophy of the West to imagine the Bible as an intellectual text chanted gently by angels with harps. But no such creatures exist in our text and Scripture wasn’t written to be a gentle thought experiment.

One of my favourite biblical commentators, Roland Boer, wrote a book called The Earthy Nature of the Bible: Fleshly Readings of Sex, Masculinity, and Carnality, where he gets us to see how embodied and physical our holy texts are.

In every passage, Torah is blood and guts and sweat and excrement. It’s life as it is really lived: raw and without disinfectant.

When we understand that the Torah doesn’t blanche at corporeality the way we might, we can understand God’s call to circumcise our hearts.

The Prophet Jeremiah declares: “circumcise yourselves to God and remove the foreskins of your hearts, O people of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem.”

In Deuteronomy, Moses tells the Israelites: “circumcise the foreskins of your hearts, and stiffen your necks no more.”

This is a metaphor for repentance. We are to imagine something surgical, messy, full-bodied, and painful. And isn’t that what atonement really is?

There may well be moments of healing that are civil, calm, and muted. But the moments of real change, at least internally, don’t involve sitting comfortably and smiling. Change hurts.

It involves real inner turmoil and strife. It cuts deep in its own way, no less than a wound. It means breaking and healing and breaking again, like the stitches of a botched operation.

When I think of the moments of most intense atonement, I have undergone them because I had to.

Because I outgrew an older version of myself. Because I needed to quit an addiction that was hurting me. Because I had to find a better survival strategy than one that had served me when I was younger.

And I cried and I ached and I experienced pain. And that was just part of the circumcision of the heart.

Ibn Ezra says this kind of atonement cannot be done alone. You need to ask God to circumcise your heart with you. He says: God will rip away the foreskin of your heart, and remove the layers of insensitivity that obstruct your heart.

And knowing this I become aware of those layers of hard membrane that keep clogging up my spirit. And I know I want God’s help to strip them away.

My own arrogance and ego, which keeps me from seeing myself as I truly am.

My anxiety and fear, which keep me from doing the right thing now, by focusing only on a worrisome future.

My snappiness and my temper, which keep me from building more meaningful relationships with the people I love.

I wish to cut away them all.

All the many escape routes I have found to keep myself away from sitting still with God, whether it’s over-working, or over-eating, or over-exercising. Or running away into books and words.

All of these are layers that I once built up to protect myself. Slicing them off would leave my heart rawer, more vulnerable, and exposed. The process would be painful and it would require more recovery time than I allow myself. But I know I need it.

Bloody, gory, embodied, and fully physical, I know I need to change.

So, I ask God’s help, this Shabbat Shuva, to see the layers of dead skin on my spirit. May God be a surgeon of the soul, ready to tear away those defences that do not serve me. May I do all I can, this Yom Kippur, to circumcise my heart.

Amen.

Opening scene from The Killing of a Sacred Deer
high holy days · sermon

Look for the helpers

levtaylor

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

The pastor, Fred Rogers, said these words. He was speaking to nursery age children on American public TV. He was a gentle Christian minister, who gave people hope and comfort through trying times.

This year, I have returned to his words often. This has been a difficult year for the British Jewish community. We have seen previously unthinkable and frightening acts of antisemitism. 

And, yet, for every one person sowing hatred and fear, there have been hundreds of others bringing love and solidarity. 

On days when a disaster happened, I wished that every KLS member could be in this building. Then you could receive the cards, the flowers, the emails, the calls.

You could see all the neighbours checking in on us. All the faith leaders extending solidarity. All the politicians asking what we need. All the emergency services coming round to offer us reassurance.

I wish every member could receive all the love, because to look at the news, you would think there was nothing but hate. But there are so many good people, who are happy that Jews are here in Britain, and who want to build with us a society based on tolerance, liberty, and compassion.

They are our helpers. And we have had so many.

While some may want to kill and destroy, without the helpers, there would be no such thing as civilisation. 

Indeed, there was a time when even knowing Rosh Hashanah’s date depended on a great community of helpers.

In this modern age, we can look at our phones and quickly find out when Rosh Hashanah begins. Some use paper calendars or have the information stuck up on their fridges. 

But there was a time before all that. Not just before phones and fridges. But before we even had a fixed calendar. 

Back then, if you wanted to know when Rosh Hashanah began, you had to stare up at the night sky. 

Rosh Hashanah always starts with the new moon of Tishri. The new moon is a slither in the sky, visible only for about fifteen minutes on a clear night, and requiring expert precision to identify.

So, Jews throughout the Diaspora would gaze patiently at the waning moon, perhaps as they tended flocks, or nursed children, or laid on their backs under a cloak of stars. They would wait for it.

And then they’d see it. The exact moment when the moon looked almost entirely black, save for a faint glow around the perimeter. Blink and you’ll miss it. But see it, and the new moon has come, and with it, the new year. 

Still, it wasn’t enough for one person to spot the moon from a field. Every Jew had to agree that this was indeed the start of their year. 

So, the witnesses walked to Jerusalem. They trekked from wherever they were in the countryside to the old Temple. They gave testimony there before learned teachers, holding up picture charts, who could confirm that what they saw was a true new moon.

On the walk to Jerusalem, you could find others walking the same path, all heading towards the Temple courtyard, because they had seen the same moon that you had seen. Hundreds would descend on the courtyards to bear witness to fifteen minutes of a blackened sky.

Rabban Gamliel, the head of the Jewish community in the early first century, wanted to make sure that all these helpful people felt valued. So, he threw a great feast in the courtyard for everyone who came to volunteer their sighting of the moon. 

Gamliel ensured that every witness was questioned thoroughly, and asked to describe the moon they saw. And he made a new law, saying that anyone who was giving this testimony could walk two thousand cubits in every direction, even in violation of Shabbat. He wanted to reward people; to make sure they continued helping.

When every witness had been interviewed, and the rabbis had confirmed that the new moon had been seen, they would light up a fire on the Mount of Olives to declare that the festival had begun. And everywhere across the Jewish Diaspora that they saw a burning pyre, they’d light their own bonfire, to let the whole community know that this was the beginning of the year.

The Rosh Hashanah of Antiquity was made by helpers.

Now, every year, for thousands of years, at exactly this time, we have gathered, just as they once did, to celebrate this day.

Yet, this Erev Rosh Hashanah is not only a celebration.

We meet here on the 25th anniversary of the World Trade Centre attacks. September 11th 2001, a quarter-century ago, forever changed the world. 

I remember coming home from school to see that now iconic footage of the Twin Towers falling live. My mum stood, ironing shirts, transfixed by rolling coverage on the BBC. She said: “there will be bombs dropping somewhere tomorrow morning.” She had a tone of detached fear. 

Terror, I suppose, is the word.

A few days later was Rosh Hashanah. Rabbi Alexandra Wright preached. In her sermon, she summarised the mood:

“The sickening fear that refused to dissipate, the disbelief and unutterable shock of seeing those elegantly poised silver towers, knifed by the steel of two airliners, buckle slowly, almost gracefully, crumbling, shattering into a million pieces amidst a plume of lethal dust and smoke, held back for a little while any contemplation of the global implications of this attack.

“But by the following morning, a voice of anger, outrage and retribution had been discovered. America would avenge the deaths of its thousands. Retaliation would be bitter-sweet comfort in its hour of loss.”

Rabbi Alex was sadly proven right. A month later, the attacks on Afghanistan began. That war lasted twenty years. Subsequent wars followed in Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Somalia, Lebanon, Pakistan and Syria. Some say we are still living through the same war.

Immediately following 9/11, there was a climate of fear.  If even New York were vulnerable, anywhere could be attacked. 

We in Britain feared for how we might be hurt, and we feared for the hurt that our own country might inflict on others.

In this climate of panic, there was another message that cut through, too. Televisions re-ran the message of Mr. Rogers. “”Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

The speakers directed us to think of the heroes that day in New York. The firefighters who rushed towards danger. The first responders who came to the scene. The nurses and paramedics who treated wounds.

These are the same people mentioned in the Mishnah of Rosh Hashanah where we learn about the team of volunteers that called the new moon. Because Rabban Gamliel didn’t just create legal exemptions and special protections for the new moon volunteers. 

He extended Shabbat privileges to midwives, firefighters, sentinels, and anyone who needed to take swift action to counteract a disaster. He made a halachah for the helpers, to say that their helping mattered more, even than Jewish law.

“Look for the helpers,” that was the message. Find strength and comfort in all the people who run towards disaster with the sole goal of helping others.

Realising that his voice was needed once more, Mr. Rogers came out of retirement to record a message for the post-9/11 world. Rogers, a Presbyterian minister, used a Jewish concept to anchor his message: “tikkun olam”; healing the world.

He said:

No matter what our particular job, especially in our world today, we all are called to be repairers of creation. Thank you for whatever you do, wherever you are, to bring joy and light and hope and faith and pardon and love to your neighbour and to yourself.”

This was a message to everyone. 

The work of being a helper did not just belong to those who did exceptional professions, but to anyone willing to do the right thing. Anyone who came forward with a volunteer spirit to address a problem was a helper. 

The message to look for helpers has recurred many more times since September 11th 2001. In 2018, a terrorist shot up the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, killing 11, and injuring 8. The neighbourhood where the attack took place, Squirrel Hill, had been home to Fred Rogers.

Tovia Jacobs came from the same neighbourhood, and was a student at Yeshiva University. He penned a profound reflection on coming as a Jew from this place, inspired by Fred Rogers, and wanting to find helpers. He acknowledged, in particular, the Muslim organizations who raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Synagogue within a few days of the attack. “The helpers were definitely there,” he said, “each acting as a small vigil candle in the darkness.”

This year, that message has reverberated in my brain once more. Look for the helpers.

Tonight, I want to retell the story of this last year, not as one of victimhood and fear, but one that has been profoundly shaped by helpers.

Last Yom Kippur, there was an attack on Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation in Manchester. The leadership of this synagogue carried out the necessary risk assessments and made the brave decision to stay open. The Synagogue Protection Group understood that we needed to change how we do shul security, and stepped up to the plate. So many members, through their volunteering, ensured our community flourished in proud defiance of hatred.

In the weeks after the attack, we were inundated by gifts of flowers and messages of support. We made a notice board purely to showcase all the words of solidarity we were receiving. Some people called the synagogue office, just to say they were thinking of us, and to let us know that we were their neighbours, and that they cared about us. A man came round and, to my surprise, handed me an anonymous cheque to help with our increased security costs.

On the first night of Chanukah, after the attack at Bondi Beach in Australia, we received so many messages of support. The local MP, Monica Harding; the Council leader, Andreas Kirsch; the mayor, Noel Hadjimichael, and several dignitaries immediately came round to support us. We received visits from all of the local police services. Some of the police then came in the evening to our Chanukah Party, danced with us, and ate doughnuts.

When there was an attempted arson attack at Finchley Reform Synagogue, all the faith communities of their area immediately came together to stand as one. Cantor Zoe Jacobs, FRS’s spiritual leader, said at the time: “We are extremely grateful for the solidarity of our neighbours, local police, and politicians. They help us remember that we are always a community who would choose to build bridges rather than walls.”

When there was a stabbing attack in Golders Green, the local vicar, Reverend Joe Moffatt, and the council’s faith worker, Marina Payen, called and asked what we needed. I said we needed a public show of support. They said: “then that’s what we’ll do.”

That weekend, all the faiths came to stand together against hate outside the Bentall Centre in Kingston. The mosque promoted the event at Jummah prayers on Friday. Some of the churches stopped their Sunday services to join us. We were surrounded by Kingston’s community representatives and faith leaders. I looked around and thought: “I am so glad the Jews are outnumbered here.”

In Kingston, we are blessed with exceptionally strong civil society, positive neighbourly relations, and a culture of collaboration between the faiths. 

So, yes, there have been stories this year that I need not repeat. But there are other stories that we should be telling again and again. Stories of the helpers.

We have seen them. And we need to keep looking out for them.

We look for the helpers because, when we feel scared, they give us security.

We look for the helpers because, when our faith in humanity is tested, they restore it sevenfold.

We look for the helpers because, when we’re not sure what to do, we know we can follow them.

All across this city, this country, this world, there are people who have decided that hatred will not win. They are determined to stamp out the scourge of bigotry and intolerance. They are building a world based on love and diversity. 

There are those, now, who are scared and confused, and looking for helpers. 

They are looking for you. So find that helper within yourself.

In Antiquity, when the Temple stood in Jerusalem, the New Year wasn’t declared until the helpers arrived. Then, when they had confirmed that they had seen the new moon, they lit a torch on the Mount of Olives to say that Rosh Hashanah had begun. 

And everywhere across the Jewish Diaspora that they saw a burning pyre, they’d light their own bonfire, to let the whole community know that this was the beginning of the year.

Today, let us each light the fire within ourselves that we will be numbered among the helpers.

Let us set up the beacon from this synagogue that says we will promote tolerance, liberty, and compassion.

Let us look out and see all the many other flames, shining bright in the darkness, coming from every place that believes in the vision of a shared society.

And, as we look out at the sea of lights in the darkness, let us say: a new year is here.

Shanah tovah.

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5787

high holy days · sermon

Why the world was made

levtaylor

There are some places in this world that fill me up with an awe of creation more than anywhere else can. Places so beautiful they make me wonder why they exist.

The Scottish Highlands are such a place. Those mountain landscapes are cragged rocks and stark hills stitched together by seas and tarns and smaller rock pools. They are peat bogs and waterfalls growing shrubs and trees, so full of life it feels as though they are themselves breathing. 

This year, I went to visit them. With my partner, we walked through the hills, saw old churches, visited a beloved rabbinic mentor, and witnessed the birds and wildlife. 

In between completing my dissertation and getting ordained as a rabbi, I decided to make a pilgrimage to mark the transition. It truly felt like a religious moment; a chance to draw closer to something sacred.

As we walked, we met with a land that was part of our country but felt decidedly foreign, and we met myths that, while part of our heritage, seemed alien. 

For the Gaelic-speaking peoples of Scotland and Ireland, these landscapes have their own origin story.

Those mountains are no accident. They were built intentionally, but a type of deity called Cailleach. Known also as Beira, or the Queen of Winter, she is an aged crone; one-eyed and completely white. 

She battles spring each year to reign her icy dominion over this hemisphere. She is a deer-herder, a lumberjack, and a warrior. She carries in her hand a great hammer as she strides across the Celtic Isles. She is the mother-goddess.

It was Cailleach who built the Highlands. She pulled rocks out of the sea and carved out stepping stones for her giant strides. She pushed through the space, breaking up new mountain faces with her hammer. She walked as winter through the new landscape she had made, and allowed waters to flow and overflow in every crevice.

I was enamoured by this story. Yes, that is what it looks like. It looks like an enormous witch has made it. It feels bursting with purpose.

My boyfriend prefers another version. He is a scientist, a doctor. We see the same world but through different lenses.

Millions of years ago, he read, the earth endured an ice age. Frozen water cut through the earth and wore down the ancient mineral rocks at a glacial pace. When the waters finally thawed, they left behind these precipices and pastures on the Scottish coastlines.

But isn’t that just the same story, told in a different way? Cailleach is simply an anthropomorphic ice current. The processes attributed to gods and fairies – that breaking and carving and flooding – are repackaged in scientific language. The scientists can give us approximate dates and name when the layers of sediment formed, but they are effectively telling the same story.

What difference does it make whether these wells were made by frozen currents or by the Wild Woman of Winter?

It is not fair to say that one is rational and the other is mythical. Both accounts are testament to humanity’s ability to understand its surroundings. The story of Cailleach is no less important a contribution, and we cannot just dismiss it. 

Equally, we cannot treat the national myth in the same way as we would our best scientific discoveries. They are not equally weighted as theories about how the earth was formed. Centuries of technological advancement and detailed research have given us this account of the Highland’s foundations.

The difference between these stories is not whether they tell us something true, but what kind of truth they point us to. The scientific explanation tells us the history of the world in context of great geological events. It teaches us how to identify, exploit or protect the natural surroundings we have inherited.

The story of Cailleach, by contrast, tells us about the unquantifiable truths of the Highlands: the awe they inspire; the magic they seem to hold. It teaches us about the shared national destiny of the Scottish, Irish, and Manx people who tell her story. 

These are not competing, but complementary, stories of creation. One tells us the truth of how a place was made, the other tells us why.

At this time of year, we turn to our own national myth and origin story. Our new year recalls the creation of the world. It is a day for us to delight in the fact that we are alive.

The biblical account of creation does not only explain the origins of one geological formation, but seeks to tell the genesis of the entire world.

5,783 years ago, the world was made in six days, from explosive dividing light, through land and seas and atmosphere, through to sea creatures, winged beasts, mammals, and human beings.

It is no good to compare this religious tradition with the theories of the Big Bang or evolution through natural selection. They are telling the story of the same thing, but from totally different perspectives. 

Science attempts to understand how the world was made; our myths ask us why.

The first chapter of Genesis suggests some reasons. The world was created with great purpose. Each day, with everything that God created, God saw that it was good.

When God created humanity, God gave us responsibility for the earth and what is in it. God gave us companions and promised us regular rest. God created the world for goodness, with humanity at heart.

The scientist and the theologian alike look at the world with a sense of wonder. We both feel awe as we track their stars in their orbit. We both marvel at the fact that a planet has produced the perfect conditions for life to form and grow entire ecosystems to sustain myriads of plants and creatures.

On this we agree.

The difference is that, for the believer, we do not just gaze in awe. Awe gazes back at us. 

You are not just amazed at the world, but the world is amazed by you. 

Not just the parts of you that you share in common with all other living beings, but those things that are unique to you. 

Not just the fact that you have functioning organs and limbs, but you. That transcendental, magical part of you. We might call it personality or soul or neshama.

It is not something mechanical or quantifiable. There is something about you that is wonderful and irreplaceable.

That is you. 

When we are confronted with the wonder and beauty of the world in which we live, we are tempted to ask what it is all here for. The answer of Judaism is that it is here for you.

To the religious imagination, your life is not an accident. It is a blessing. You were created for the sake of the world and the world was created for the sake of you. 

According to our Torah, at first creation, God wandered round to take in the Garden of Eden in the cool of day. And, there, God called out to the first human being: “Where are you?” God was looking for the human.

The great Jewish philosopher, Martin Buber, understood that this question is addressed to every human being in every age. We, too, are forever hiding, behind the stories we tell ourselves that our lives are meaningless and our actions matter little. We find ways to try and escape truth, even to hide from ourselves. 

And God, that great Source of amazement, nevertheless seeks us out, asking “where are you?”

So, Buber says, you have to answer that question. You have to seek deep inside your soul and answer who you really are. You have to try and give an account of what you are doing on this earth. You have to make yourself present, ready to face Truth, and, crucially, to change.

Where are you?

You are on this beautiful earth, crafted by a magnificent Creator. You are here and alive. You are a miracle.

God is amazed at how wonderful you are.

And now you have to show that God’s faith is rightly placed.

Shanah tovah.

Cailleach, Queen of Winter
climate change · high holy days

Another trip around our fragile planet

levtaylor

 

This year, Richard Branson saw the planet from a completely different angle. The owner of Virgin was on board a rocket and saw the Earth as it appears from space.

It must have been incredible. The globe with its big blue oceans and grey-green continents, set against the great dark expanse of our solar system. 

I have always associated that image with Rosh Hashanah. I remember being in cheder as a child, drawing out the world like this in crayon.

“This festival is the birthday of the world,” I learned. 

We celebrate the world’s creation and another trip around the sun. According to rabbinic tradition, the Earth is now approaching the ripe old age of 5782. Mazal tov!

Our ancestors may not have known that the world was, in fact, billions of years old. They probably did not even realise that it is, as Branson would have seen, spherical and rotating on its own axis. 

But they understood something deeply important. This planet is a gift from God. It is a sacred place, existing in an improbable balance that allows the perfect conditions for life. It is filled with more animals and plants than we will ever be able to name. As the Psalmist declared: “How manifold are your works, Eternal One!” 

At the Jewish New Year, we celebrate creation and our place within it. We thank God for the bees that made us honey and the trees that bore us apples. We count another year when God placed human beings in a perfect garden and charged us with caring for it.

What Richard Branson might not have seen from all the way up there was how delicate this planet really is. Once again, we experienced our hottest summer on record, where wildfires spread across the western coast of North America. Some congregants at my synagogue in Essex lost their homes to flooding, as sudden thunderstorms struck. 

Our climate is rapidly changing. We have witnessed snowstorms in Texas and flash floods in China and Germany. Whole swathes of the Amazon rainforest have been destroyed. Parts of the Great Barrier Reef in Australia have died from sun bleaching, leaving ocean graveyards behind.

Experts warn that melting polar ice caps and close contact with cattle will mean even more deadly pandemics.

The midrash on Genesis teaches that God took Adam and Eve around Eden, showing them every living thing . “Look after this world and care for it,” said the Holy One. “For if you destroy this world, there will be nobody after you to repair it.”

Now look at this world. Are we not in danger of ruining it? As it stands, the planet is being consumed by a few, while the many are exploited, in a way that could destroy us all.

We cannot separate Richard Branson’s trip into space from the unfolding ecological disaster. Every rocket launch emits one hundred times more greenhouse gases than a single flight on an aeroplane. 

Right now, Branson is engaged in a battle with other billionaires for who can most colonise the atmosphere. Other heads of corporations, including Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are engaged in a space race. They want to project themselves furthest away from this planet and create an entire industry charging others for the same privilege. 

I do not want to see the world from space if I cannot live in it. I certainly do not want only a covetous few to explore space if it means they leave a burning planet behind for the rest of us.

This earth cannot have been given by God only so that a wealthy few could enjoy seeing it, but that every one of us could live in it and marvel at its wonders.

It doesn’t have to be this way. The last year has shown us how fragile the planet is. But it has also shown us how adaptable human beings are. 

We know how caring and supportive people have been to each other throughout the last year’s difficulties. The Jewish community has shown the very best of itself in its mutual aid and compassion for our most vulnerable members. 

Incredibly, we have also seen a vaccine developed, approved, and distributed in record time. Everyone across the community has rallied to take up the offer of protecting themselves and others. 

We have the power to send people into space and cure diseases. Through hard work, cooperation, and creativity, humanity has already shown it can face off its greatest challenges.  

As Progressive Jews, we talk often about the importance of “tikkun olam”: healing the world. We have a sacred duty to preserve and perfect the planet. 

The energy and investment that has gone into space programmes could support the development of new green technologies and a just transition to a sustainable future. 

Across the country and the world, campaigners are pushing us to rethink our entire economy. They urge governments of the world to invest in jobs, resources and renewable energy. It is not too late to defeat climate change, even as it arrives on our own doorstep.

We can have clean air and clean waters; a flourishing planet for our children to grow up.

If it is possible to see the world from space, it must also be possible to save it.

This year, let us rise to the challenge.

Shanah tovah.

festivals · high holy days · judaism

A journey through time

levtaylor

Sermonettes for Rosh Hashanah

This year is unlike every other in so many ways. In order to keep people engaged with the services, I delivered sermonettes between prayers, as two-minute reflections on the meaning of the festival. The seven drashes for Rosh Hashanah 5781 follow.

  1. On breathing

How wonderful are Jacob’s dwelling places! How good it is for us here, where for the first time in living memory, we are not all gathered in one place but we are all in each other’s tents. This whole community has gathered together in dispersed places. And although we are distant, we are somehow together. We are with each other, in our living rooms.

This is, of course, not a normal New Year, and this is not the usual format. Rather than preach at you uninterrupted for twenty minutes, this morning I am simply going to guide you through the service. At each stage, I will offer little sermonettes explaining our purpose here today.[1] Welcome, and thank you so much for coming on this journey.

Jewish liturgy takes us on a journey through time. Each service is a journey from primordial history through the present towards the ultimate redemption of humanity. The Jewish High Holy Days take us on a journey from the creation of humanity towards the Messianic Age.

And today – today, right now – is where it all begins. On the seventh day of creation, at this precise time in history, the first human being was created. The Holy One breathed air into Adam’s nostrils and that wind became his soul.[2] So, too, was his wife called Chava. Chava – Eve – literally means breath. She is both breath and life. We are here with Adam and Eve at the dawning of humanity once more.

Rabbi Zahavit Shalev taught us that every night when you go to sleep, your soul disappears and returns to God. Then, when you wake up in the morning, God returns your soul to you so that you can breathe alive once again.[3] As we wake, we say to God: “thank you, Sacred Name everlasting, that you have returned my soul to me in compassion, unending is your faith.”[4] We are here at the beginning of a day at the beginning of time, grateful to be alive.

Right now, you are Adam. You are Eve. You are the first person rising up on the first day, breathing for the first time, saying to God: “this soul that you have placed inside of me is pure.”

[1] Everything about these sermonettes I owe to my teacher, Dr. Jeremy Schonfield

[2] Genesis 2:7

[3] From her rabbinic dissertation on sleep

[4] Modeh Ani, Forms of Prayer 2008, p. 18

* * *

2. On taking responsibility

Eight days after a baby is born, it becomes liable for its first commandment.

By ten days, it has been named, or washed, or circumcised. It ceases to be an embryo and takes on its first responsibilities of being Jewish. It realises that being human is a blessing and a privilege, and that it must honour the duties that come with that.

Ten days after we are created on Rosh Hashanah, we come into contact with Yom Kippur. We are forced to inspect our lives and accept that we are responsible. We take on the commandments laid down to us by God. We accept that we are not just flesh and bones, but living spirits with moral responsibilities.

Ten generations after Adam came Noah,[1] who learned that people could fail in their responsibilities. Ten generations after Noah came Abraham,[2] who realised how painful keeping promises could be. Abraham, we read today, was called upon by God to head up Mount Moriah and sacrifice his youngest son. Abraham encountered God and learned that this came with reward, but came with responsibility too.

Ten minutes after we wake up, we are faced with our obligations. Having thanked God for our souls, we return our debt of gratitude by doing the most important commandment that has been given to us. We study.[3]

You are here. A ten day old baby. Abraham receiving God’s call. A full human being, learning that you are responsible. Learning that you must learn.

[1] Genesis 5

[2] Genesis 10

[3] New Forms of Prayer Draft Liturgy, p. 32

* * *

3. On ancestors

The Amidah is a journey within a journey. It begins with Abraham and Sarah and ends with King David building Jerusalem. When we begin this voyage in time, we cast our minds back to our ancestors. We remember Sarah’s hospitality; Rebecca’s generosity; Rachel’s patience and Leah’s humility.

Amidah means standing. It is the standing prayer, and we are literally standing in their footsteps. We are here because of our ancestors. Generations of human beings from hunter-gatherers to the creators of our modern industrial cities have brought us to this moment.

And we, as Jews, are here as Jews, because of every other Jew. For thousands of years, people have put their feet together on this day at this time of year and recited these words. By showing up today, we have kept that tradition going. We are another link in the chain.

Over time, we have come to do things differently. Spontaneous prayer gave way to memorised blessings, which gave way to words written on scrolls, which became prayer books with the advent of the printing press, that we can now see on computer screens in front of us.

Although the medium has changed, the message has not. Ethical monotheism. Judaism’s mission of doing justice in the name of the One God. We stand in the footprints left by ancient prophets, affirming the faith they once held.

* * *

4. On being yourself

Stop. Breathe. Take a moment. Shut your eyes.

Feel your breath rising and falling. Don’t try to force it. Just notice how you inhale and exhale. Pay attention to your nose, chest, lungs, shoulders, mouth. Feel the breath coming in and out of it.

When we began this journey through time, you acknowledged that the soul within you was pure. That is your natural state. Good. Honest. Righteous. Beautiful. That is who you are.

When you looked back over your ancestors, you remembered their piety. Of course, they made mistakes, but it is their goodness that has endured. So will it be with you.

You not only have ancestors. You are an ancestor. You are leaving your own tracks in the sand. What you put into the world now will stay long after you are gone.

Breathe. Contemplate. What do you want to leave behind?

Breathe. Remember. Who are you, deep down?

Breathe. Know that you are loved and lovable and able to love. Make the conscious choice to fill the world with the best of who you are.

Open your eyes. Open your lips. Pray that you may become who you are.

* * *

5. On being vulnerable

The service is reaching its apex. When we started, it was summer. Suddenly, you look around and see that autumn is coming. We are at the turning point of the year, when green leaves turn brown and Elul’s rays give way to Tishrei’s rains. We will change our blessings. Soon we will stop asking God for dew and start requesting fertile rains. We have journeyed through the seasons.

You are older now than when this service began. Yes, an hour and a half  has passed, and with it you have learnt more about who you are and who you want to be.

You are spiritually older, too. You have been Adam, Eve, Abraham, Sarah, Rachel, David. And now, you have grown enough that you can finally be you. You can find yourself exactly as you are, vulnerable and exposed. You can be present in this mortal body.

Your body is mortal. This year has brought home for many of us how fragile health can be. We have asked God to make peace for us as it is in Heaven. We ask God now for healing. We accept that our bodies are frail. Souls need plenty of sustenance. As individuals, as Jews, as humanity, we pray for God’s sacred restitution.

* * *

6. On the messianic future

The future awaits us!

The shofar is a herald for many things, but above all it was once used as a siren to announce that a dignitary was coming. When kings and queens approached a town, the shofar would sound to announce their arrival. That sound alerted the villagers to prepare their banquets and make a welcome party.

This section of the shofar service is called malchuyot. It shares its root with melech – king; malkah – queen; malchut – sovereignty. It means royalties. This is the time of our acknowledgement of God’s supremacy over all.[1] It is a reminder that the day will eventually come when everyone will understand God’s unity.

We sound the shofar and announce that the Ultimate Sovereign is coming. God is on the way.

When compiling the liturgy in the 3rd Century, Rav ordained that within this section we would recite ‘aleinu’ – the prayer affirming God’s majesty and our messianic future. It speaks of the coming day when all humanity will be united by a single God.

As progressive Jews, we understand this not as Davidic kingship or nationalist aspirations for supremacy, but as the coming of an age of peace and justice. We look forward to a utopian future in which all struggles are brought to an end, replaced by enduring joy. And we accept that it is our responsibility to bring about that perfect society.

[1] Babylonian Talmud Rosh Hashanah 16a

* * *

7. On today

You have been young and old. You have been the first human being and witnessed humanity’s ultimate redemption. You have breathed so many cycles, taking advantage of the beautiful soul placed within you. And now, having been through all of this, having seen time from every angle, all you are left with is today.

Today.

Rabbi Joshua ben Levi once met Elijah. He asked him: when will the messiah come? Elijah said: “The Messiah is at the gates of Rome, sitting among the poor, the sick and wretched. Like them, he changes the bindings of his wounds, but does so one wound at the time, in order to be ready at a moment’s notice.”

Rabbi Joshua went out to the gates of Rome, and lo and behold, he found the Messiah sitting there, tending to his wounds. Rabbi Joshua said to the Messiah: “When will you be coming?” The Messiah looked up and joyously answered: “Today!”

The next day, Rabbi Joshua went back to Elijah and complained: “The Messiah lied to me. He said he was coming today and did not.” Elijah replied: “He said he would be coming today, if only you would hear his voice.”[1]

Olam haba zeh olam hazeh. The world to come is the world we are in.

We are here today with nothing but the present. Whatever the past and future might hold, this moment is sacred. And so we call on God – hayom teamtzeinu. Give us strength today. Give us blessing today. Remember us for life today. Amen.

[1] Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 98a

festivals · high holy days · judaism

Spiritual Dialectics

levtaylor

Sermonettes for Erev Rosh Hashanah

This year is unlike every other in so many ways. In order to keep people engaged with the services, I am delivering sermonettes between prayers, as two-minute reflections on the meaning of the festival. The four drashes for Erev Rosh Hashanah 5781 follow.

  1. On lighting candles

The world stands balanced between darkness and light. Just as the day comes, night will surely follow. And when night falls on a night like tonight, on a holy night, we light a candle.[1]

Adam was afraid of the dark. When the first human being witnessed the sun start to fall on his first evening on the planet, he cried out because he thought the sun would never return and the darkness marked his death. Throughout the night, he and Eve cried, until dawn came, and he realised that God had made day to follow night.[2]

As night falls, we too can feel fear. But we know something that Adam did not. We know that the day will come. We know that even in the midst of utmost darkness, light will surely come.

This year, celebrating Rosh Hashanah may inevitably feel bittersweet. We are dipping our apples in a honey that has tasted pandemic and economic collapse. Many of us are facing uncertainty about our health, finances and relationships. It is natural that we should wonder how much we can go on.

But by coming here tonight, we affirm that we will go on. We remember the thousands of years we endured since the first human being looked upon the first night sky. We acknowledge that we do not only pray that day will come, but that we can work to bring on the day.[3] And we know that no matter how dark it may seem, we can always light a candle.

[1] New Forms of Prayer Draft Liturgy, p. 19

[2] Babylonian Talmud Avodah Zarah 8a

[3] Yaakov Roblit, Shir laShalom

* * *

2. On the holiness of hope

“You’ve got to have hope. To some people the only thing they have to look forward to is hope.” These were the words of Harvey Milk, a gay Jewish immigrant in California; an activist who transformed politics in defence of minorities. As he sought election to office, he told his captive audience: “You have to give them hope.  Hope for a better world. Hope for a better tomorrow. Hope that all will be alright.”

And it wasn’t alright for Harvey Milk, who was assassinated 40 years ago. But it was alright for many others. Because of his fight, I grew up in a better world than I otherwise would have done. Because of the sacrifices he made, I live in a world that gay people of the past could only have imagined. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to give up hope now.

We are all here because of the optimism of previous generations. The immigrants who packed their bags, believing they could make a better life here. The survivors who made it through the camps because they had the strength of will. The feminists who insisted that women had a place in the synagogue, not just as spectators but as leaders. Every Jew who decided that showing up was  worthwhile and kept the faith of our people alive through the centuries. We owe it to them, and to the generations who will follow us, to keep hope alive.

The psalm that Howard and Fiona just read for us teaches: “When the wicked flourish, they are only like grass […] but the righteous shall flourish like a palm tree, growing tall like a cedar in Lebanon. Even in old age, they will bear new fruit and shine green in the courtyards of our God.”[1] Remember this. Remember that the wickedness we see in the world is only grass that will wither, but that righteousness plants firm roots in the soil and refuses to be moved.

Know that just as we live in the dialectic of night and day, so too do we live in an unending struggle between right and wrong. As Jews, we will hold on to our faith in what is right. And in pursuit of it, we will remind the world of the holiness of hope.

[1] Psalm 92, excerpted and adapted

* * *

3. On blessing the new moon

There was a time in King Solomon’s life when he was given over to nihilism. He wrote Qohelet, the book of Ecclesiastes, in which he declared: “Everything is vanity.” He said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?”[1]

His advisers tried to console him, but Solomon only retorted with a challenge: “tell me something that will always be true.” Many days and weeks passed, but no one could respond. One day, a jeweller came in holding up a ring. On it, she had engraved three words: גם זה יעבור – this too shall pass.

Yes, the only certainty is change. We recite hashkiveinu – cause us to lie down and let us rise up to life renewed.[2] We go to sleep only to wake up. We wake up, and we go to sleep. We live in this constant cycle.

In a moment, we will recite the blessing for the new moon. The moon, like us, like life, exists in a constant state of flux. It waxes only to wane and fills out only to diminish again. Note that is not the full moon we bless, when the night sky is brightest and the moon appears most whole. It is the new one, when only a slither hangs in the night sky, promising only potential.

When the rabbis blessed the moon, they used to gaze up at it and say: “David, king of Israel, long may he live.”[3] David was, of course, long dead. He, the father of Solomon, was for them the prototype of the messianic age. He represented an imaginary perfect society of the past. And he stood in as the harbinger of the future utopia. We do not live yet in a perfected world, but we can look up at the sky and see the moon as our model. Just as the moon starts out as a tiny crescent and expands to its fullest form, we too can live in the darkest of times and know that completeness will follow. Whatever this pandemic throws at us, we know that it will pass, and a brighter future awaits us.

[1] Ecclesiastes 2:1-2

[2] New Forms of Prayer Draft Liturgy, p. 53

[3] Babylonian Talmud Rosh Hashanah 25a

* * *

4. On sickness and health

We live in the balance between sweet and bitter; darkness and light; completion and absence; justice and iniquity. Above all, this year, we live in the balance between sickness and health.

Let us take time to reflect on sickness. On all those who have died of Covid. The 40,000 who died in the UK and over 900,000 who have died worldwide. We think of all those who have survived Covid but still live with its scars – those who still have trouble walking, breathing and carrying out daily activities. We think of all those suffering with sicknesses unrelated to the pandemic, often marginalised and ignored. We contemplate the mental health of everyone in our society, as we face anxiety, depression and trauma. We pray for everyone whose bodies, minds and spirits need healing.

But in the dialectic of health, we are also able to celebrate the vitality we still possess. We show joy at all those who are alive. We are grateful that we who sit here tonight are counted among them. We can think of the community we have built, the solidarity we have engendered and the strength we have found in each other. Let us pray, then, not only that we will be healed, but that we will be active in helping others to heal.