Curing the National Pain
Yom Kippur 2017
Those
of you who were here Rosh Hashanah the second day will recall that I spoke of
the power of stories.
Among
my favorite story tellers is Rebbe Nachman of Breslov. You see, my Hebrew name
is Nachman, too. He is Rebbe Nachman of Breslov and I am Rebbe Nachman of West
Hollywood. He is famous for his Kafkaesque stories.
Among
his stories is one called the Tale of the Princess. I am going to read
you only the opening few sentences:
“Once, there was a king. The king had six
sons and one daughter. The daughter was very dear to him, and he would
cherish her exceedingly and play with her very much.
One time, while he was together with her on a certain day he became
angry with her and the words, "Let the not-good one take you away!"
escaped from his mouth. At night she went to her room; in the morning no one
knew where she was. Her father was very afflicted and went here and there
looking for her.”
The story goes on
and on, a never ending story, of how the king’s trusted servant is sent out to
find and return the Princess to her father. But I will stop here, as I have
gotten to the point of the story that interests me.
The story is filled
with kabbalistic meanings.The is King is of course, the Ain Sof, the Infinite
One. The daughter is the Malkhut, the Kingdom, the Malkah, the Queen, the
Shekhinah, the divine presence. She is the vehicle whereby the infinite is
engaged in the finite world. She holds the spiritual and physical realms
together.
Now, we come to the
end line—the Princess is captured by the “ Not –Good One”. That is the “ Other Side”
in Kabbalah. The universe is in turmoil. Something has come between God and his
universe and he has become angry. In Rebbe Nachman’s twist on kabbalistic
philosophy, even the King, the Inifnite One, has an anger-management problem.
We, as Jews, as God’s servant, have to repair the terrible breach.
We
have a national breach here, as well, in which a mood of discord and anger seem
magnified beyond the norms.
I
am not going to get into politics. People have posted how much they appreciate
that we have managed to avoid it, and allowed them to feel the warmth of the
services.
So,
instead of politics, will talk of
"Unpolitics." I will talk about healing, what we call, in Jewish
parlance, tikun hanefesh, repairing the soul, of getting us down from our
national malaise. It will begin, here, today, in this sanctuary.
Almost
all of us use Facebook for posting. We share events, we share news, we share
images, and we share moods.
I
believe that you have noticed something happening with the posts in the past
year. The posts are becoming increasingly volatile.
It started with using all caps on key
words, then on entire posts. “All caps” is a stand in for “shouting”. I saw
more as time went on. Soon, “Caps” was not enough. The people at Facebook
clearly enjoyed this, so they allowed for more shouting--oversize fonts and
dark red backgrounds. No longer just screaming, but screaming bloody murder.
Families and friends have suddenly been “ unfriending” and “ unliking” each
other.
We get carried away. We become so sure of
our position that we block out any other position.
A handful of students at UC Irvine a few
years ago discovered that they could block the Israeli Ambassador from being
heard just by being obnoxious. Now, it has spread to many campuses, wherein a
core of students effectively barred speakers from appearing. The first targets
were Israeli speakers, and while far-right speakers have been the ostensible
targets, it has spread to the point that UC Berkeley spent $600,000 on police protection to enable a
columnist for the Jewish Journal to speak because someone had decided he was a
Nazi.
It happens on the right- it happens on
the left. We are living in some echo chamber. One person sends one message and
is echoed a million times over because of very effective and powerful social
networking. This is how, our sages taught us, the plague of frogs began. One
frog croaked, and then a second frog appeared, and another and another, until
the land was flooded with croaking frogs.
Even if we are mostly decent and
well-thought, what we see outside is a cacophony, magnified, until it
overwhelms us. A plague of croaking frogs.
It is time to turn things around. And it
will start with us. It will not come with demonstrations and
counter-demonstrations, it will not come with twitter –blasts of denunciation
and empty symbolic acts.
We all know that disease is contagious,
but now we also know that the contagion is not solely spread by microbes. There
is a famous case of the June bug epidemic, in which workers in a factory showed
signs of illness from an infestation of bugs. There were no bugs, but people
fell ill and were hospitalized. People infect each other in many ways.
It also means that health is contagious.
Social service agencies discovered that
when they brought people together in social networks that shared activities and
healthy living advice, these healthy behaviors spread from person to person all
around .” We call this process “contagious health.” ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-zoughbie/health-initiative_b_2821964.html)
Contagious health.
If it is true for physical health, then
it is even more so true that Emotional health and social health are
contagious.
I want to start a health contagion here,
at Hollywood Temple Beth El. We can undo the rancor and the divisiveness around
us. So we need to make our first steps.
We start with ourselves.
First step- we are commanded, as Jews, to
celebrate in “ Simcha”, in happiness. The same Rebbe Nachman of our story , taught”-
Mitzvah gedolah -“It is a great command to be happy always and fight away
sorrow and bitterness with all one’s might.” It’s a mitzvah, a command- Happiness is a big task. That’s why our Declaration
of Independence made it a basic right: “The pursuit of Happiness”
Our happiness requires also that we broadcast it:
One of our Sages, Shammai, himself very impatient and honestly
blunt, nevertheless insisted .” Greet every human being “besever
panim yafot” - with a pleasant face, with a smile. I assume the Dalai Lama studied Pirke Avoth,
because he too said: “My practice when I see someone, is to smile”
Take that inner happiness and broadcast
it out side. Do it on the street, do it your emails, do it on the phone, do it
on your posts. Even if you don’t feel like it, do it; it will be contagious. It
will come back to you. Instead of flaming and shouting, send good messages.
Report on good things you have seen or observed.
Next step-
We all know the phrase “ kina hora”- no evil eye, Ayin HaRa. It is
a look of jealousy, a look of meanness. There is its opposite, “The Good Eye”.
The Rabbis teach that one of our key goals to attain is ” Ayin
Hatov”, the Good Eye. ( Avoth 2:10)
What if we would look at each person we meet with a “Good Eye”.
That means to look for good aspects, good potentials. Suddenly, instead of
seeing people in silos, we begin to see individuals. Instead of splitting
ourselves up- left versus right, red versus blue, bi-coastal versus fly-over states,
race versus race, male versus female, and all the other tiny button-holes we
are pegged into, we suddenly see people, like ourselves.
The Torah tells of a very old Abraham, who sits in his tent in the
heat of the day, presumably after his circumcision, and God has appeared to him.
He sees three strangers walking in the desert sun and abruptly abandons God,
gets up and runs to greet these strangers. He did not ask what party do you
belong to, what is your position on x, what passport do you have. At that
moment he saw three people in trouble in the desert. Our commentaries teach us
from this that reaching out to our fellow human being is greater than being
with God because that is where God is to be found.
Looking at our fellow human being and seeing the presence of God.
That is the “Ayin Tov”- the Good eye.
The third step- cultivate a
circle of people who are positive, who can help you grow and whom you can help
grow.
That same verse of Pirke Avot that talks about the “ Good Eye” also
states, in the list of desirable attributes—A good neighbor—and chaver tov,a
good friend.
In truth getting a good neighbor sometimes is out of our
hands, but getting a good friend is in
our hands and is something we can do. In every bad neighborhood, there are good
friends, just as, in the best of neighborhoods, there are bad friends.
If we build a circle around us of positive friends, who build us
up, whom we can lean on, we begin the process of spreading our immunity. Eventually,
our circle will grow, and we will change those around us. You can start
building your healthy community with the people here today at Hollywood Temple
Beth El.
Finally, the last step, in our search to
cure what ails us:
Do we wish to live long and well? The
psalms tell us: “ Netzor leshoni mera.“ Keep my mouth from evil. “Sur me ra”.
It’s Google’s famous slogan, “ Don’t be evil.”
“V’aseh tov”. and do good. That’s the challenge. We move away from
attacks, pot-shots, innuendoes, slights and slurs-whether in person, or email,
twitter, Insta- this and that.
We move on to “Do good”. That’s the big
challenge.
Anger and hatred are contagious, they
spread when there is no group immunity. Good deeds and good words are vaccines.
As in all vaccines, they create a herd immunity, wherein even the dour and
morose are saved by the goodwill of the others.
There is even scientific support. You
see, if you don’t believe the rabbi because he quotes the Torah, or the sages,
or even the Dalai lama, surely you will believe a science report. This is from
a chemist who specialized in pharmaceutical chemistry. You want to live longer?
Here is his explanation:
“Genuine kindness creates feelings of
warmth and connection, as does love.” In short, it produces agents in the body
that lower blood pressure, stimulate anti-oxidents, and relieve inflammation,
among other benefits.
For this project to succeed, we need to
begin with the first step within the context of community. Remember that the internet,
ipads and smartphones were prophesied to solve our great problem of loneliness
and isolation. With so many friends and so many likes, we must all feel very,
very happy. But we are not. It tears us apart as much as it brings us together.
We need flesh and blood, people we actually
know. We need community to help us stay well.
I have seen it in my former congregations
and in this one. I have seen it when someone has died. It is the circle of
friends and companions coming to the home, bringing food, calling up, visiting,
that helps us all deal with our pain and move on. It is found in reaching out
to each other in times of trouble.
It is also in good events- in weddings
and Bnai mitzvah celebrated together. I just officiated at the wedding of a
young man at whose Bar Mitzvah I had officiated some 25 years before. People
have come to me with memories of something I said over 40 years ago. Memories
of good things.
We are an old establishment by Los
Angeles standards, going back nearly a century, to the early studio founders,
the Laemmle of Universal, the Warner Brothers, the Meyer of MGM
That is a glorious past and we have an
opportunity to create a glorious future.
We
are at a unique junction here at Hollywood Temple Beth El. We sit at the major
north-south and east-west thoroughfares of Los Angeles. We are in the heart of
a region of artists and musicians, entertainers and performers, young people
trying to find themselves and older people still trying to find themselves, and
just plain folk.
We will soon continue with our memorial
to the martyrs of our people. We are here because we are heirs to a stubborn
and stiff-necked people who have survived the worst that humanity could devise.
Yet we are here because we are the heirs to those who refused to give up, who
refused to lose hope in the ultimate redemption of humanity. By supporting this
community at Hollywood Temple Beth El, we give testimony to their dedication.
We will then continue with our Yizkor
service in memory of those whom you loved during their lifetimes. Among you
today are those whose parents and grandparents dedicated themselves to this
community. Again, as you involve yourselves in this community, you bear active
witness to the love and support they gave you.
With you, we can create a community of
support and friendship. Here is the first step in reversing the alienation, the
loneliness, and the anger. I will start with us and spread out, a good
contagion, to the rest of the country. We can instill in us all with words that
we use in the Jewish wedding ceremony:“ Ahavah v’ achvah, shalom v ‘reut—Love
and brotherhood and sisterhood, peace
and friendship” and then we will find “gilah-rina-ditza v Chedvah” -Joy – and
song- gladness and laughter.
May we see this happen, here, today, on
this Yom Kippur Day, this day of redemption and reconciliation. Amen.
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