Jeremiah was a bullfrog, was a good friend of mine…singing Joy the world.” What does this song have to do with today’s Torah portion? Why is Jeremiah compared to a bullfrog? What is a prophet?

“Before I formed you in the belly I knew you; and before you came out of the womb I sanctified you and I ordained you a prophet to the nations.” Jeremiah 1:4

This sets up this week’s haftarah portion—if you are Sephardic and which we will read this week. It ties into this week’s Torah portion because they are both about call. What do we mean that Jeremiah and Moses were called? Who is called today?

While there is a lot written about Moses and Jeremiah, I want to compare this verse to another one from Psalms. Psalm 139: “O Lord, you have searched me and known me…For You have formed my reins; You have knit me together in my mother’s womb.” Psalm 139:1, 13

This is “Relational Judaism” as we have been studying at its best. This is that I-Thou relationship that Buber and then Wolfson have been discussing. While we talk about prophets and rabbis and priests and ministers being called or having a calling, this verse means that each of us is known by God, even before we are born, and set apart and make holy, consecrated, sanctified for something. What is that something?

The use of the word womb is common to both, as is the idea that the Lord has known someone before birth.  Is this a common metaphor in the Tanakh or is it unique to these two sources? Is there a connection between G-d’s mercy and compassion frequently linked to word rechem, meaning womb, and knowing someone before birth?  Is this knowledge a source of comfort or of fear? Because it is talking about womb, a uniquely feminine image, are there any feminist interpretations of this imagery?

Jack Lundbom explains that there is “an inclusio” of major importance we find by comparing verses 1:6: with verse 20:18 when Jeremiah laments, (and Jeremiah always laments!) “Why from the womb did I come forth to see trouble and sorrow and have my days end in shame?”  He believes that it is natural when contemplating one’s death to reflect on one’s birth as well. it can be read, “Why did I come forth from the womb? Answer: Because Yahweh called me before I came forth from the womb.”[1] (page 28-29). Despite the despair of this classic lament, it answers with “affirmation and hope.” Jeremiah was born because G-d called him forth to be born.

It would seem that the new Jewish Publication Society translation of verse 4 makes yet another point by arranging the spacing as it does, emphasizing the three verbs associated with Jeremiah’s call:

“Before I created you in the womb, I selected you
Before you were born, I consecrated you;
I appointed you a prophet concerning the nations.”[2]

There is the sense that G-d needed or required Jeremiah, that G-d knew him and that he was set aside and made holy.

Only Jeremiah is told that he will be a prophet to the nations. While many of the commentators point out that it is predestined that G-d will call Jeremiah, it is critical to note that Jeremiah, like Moses objects and says that he is too young and cannot speak. This makes both of them what we call “reluctant prophets” like Jonah who did not want to go to Nivevah and tried to run away, as far as he could, all the way to Tarshish. Not until God reassures Jeremiah that G-d will be present can Jeremiah accept what he must do. Only then could Jeremiah accept his appointment, his task to be a prophet to the nations.

Holladay points out that the verb y-tz-r is usually taken to mean formed or fashioned. However, it could be a ‘near miss’ with the verb tz-v-r, to summon as in Psalm 77:3. “It is striking that in Isa 49:1, 5 we have ‘from the womb he has called me and ‘shapes me from the womb,’ two phrases within Isa 49:1-6 which may reflect the expected verb and the actual verb in the present phrase.”[3] He believes that “I summoned you” makes more sense, “given the diction of Psalm 139:13..All five verbs then point to Jrm’s being called. In Jrm’s case his birth and his vocation are coterminous: there was never a time he was not summoned.”[4] Based on this work, it would seem that Holladay is correct that these calls of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Moses and Gideon follow a formula of commission, objection, reassurance and sign of G-d’s presence.

Ellen Davis Lewin She argues that Jeremiah has a dual role, both that of prophet—G-d’s messenger and of mediator.  But she pushes the point further. “His life is intolerable because he is G-d’s prophet to a faithless people and cannot himself forsake that commission. Jeremiah’s desperate question, ‘Why did I come out of the womb?’ points directly to the answer given before it was ever posed: ‘To be a prophet to the nations.’ (1.5).” It is Jeremiah’s use of his own personal struggles to inform his prophecy and to enhance his authority. “He submits the record of his own struggle as both a contrast to the easy lies spoken by the prophets of hope and an aid to the community’s interpretation. Jeremiah offers the prophetic process itself as the validation of his message…Like the people he addresses, Jeremiah has faced G-d as Enemy. Only that personal confrontation substantiates his claim that G-d is Deliverer, for Israel as for himself, and provides the basis on which the argument for authority must finally rest.”[5]

Yehoshua Gitay argues in his article in Prophecy and Prophets published by Scholars Press that there is a difference between the private vision of Jeremiah and his call with the fact that this experience has been published.  Publishing it makes it public and accessible to all. “The call of the prophet is apparently a dramatic moment in his life, and one could expect a vivid description of Jeremiah’s call in the book ascribed to him. However, the narrative uses a stereotyped stylistic structure (Habel); and one should question whether this formulaic approach concealed any expression of personal feeling that might reflect the prophet’s intimate religious experience. The act of publishing contradicts the intimate tone of a private affair; it indicates that the narrator seeks to turn the personal affair of Jeremiah’s call into a public event.”[6]

“The reference to beten, (belly) connotes not the physicality of formation. The belly is the place of emotions, thus conveying the intimate relationship between G-d and the chosen one..”[7] Not only was Jeremiah called before he was born, but G-d promises in verse 9 that he need not fear, for like Moses and Gideon, G-d’s presence will go with him. These are words that are meant to comfort Jeremiah.; the phrase ‘I will be with you’ appears in Exod. 3:12 in the call to Moses and in Judg 6:16 in the call to Gideon.”[8] Lawrence Boadt links the calls of Moses and Jeremiah together by pointing out that with both there is a divine meeting, a call, an objection, a reassurance and a sign.”[9]

But what about for the rest of us? Do we have to be selected and chosen, set apart and made holy by G-d before we receive that reassurance? I don’t think so. Psalm 139 has been much beloved throughout the centuries as a promise of G-d’s omnipresence and omniscience.

Psalm 139 begins with the idea that G-d searches us and knows us as individuals. Although the object “me” is not included in the Hebrew it is understood in most translations. The verb form kh-k-r has the dual sense of “to search” and “to examine.” The same verb khokair is repeated in Jeremiah 17:10, when it says, “I, the Lord search the heart” Both the Soncino edition of Psalms and Rabbi Freehof have linked these verses together. As we have said earlier, this kind of knowing denotes an intimate form of relationship. Freehof sees this as “One of the most intimate and spiritual of the psalms. The psalmist is so conscious of G-d’s nearness, that he feels that G-d knows his every thought. But G-d though intimate and near, is also omnipresent, filling the universe. There is no place where we can escape G-d’s presence. It is no wonder that G-d knows our every thought since He is our Creator…It is not strange that G-d knows man so well. He has created him and formed him even in the womb.”[10]

This explanation takes it out of the specific call of a specific person Jeremiah and makes idea that G-d knows each of us before our birth accessible to us all.  The psalm continues with the emphasis on the word You, that is repeated in the Hebrew, implying that only G-d can know us that well, that intimately—in our hearts, thoughts, feelings, our whole being.

The Soncino edition of Psalms quotes Maimonides as saying, ‘This is the noblest utterance in the Psalter of pure contemplative theism, animated and not crushed by the thought of G-d’s omniscience and omnipresence.’…The writer’s realization of G-d is most intimate and personal, the effect of religious experience rather than of rational meditation.” [11]  It cites Ibn  Ezra as declaring this psalm ‘the most glorious on the theme of the ways of G-d and is unequalled in the five Books of the Psalter..[12]

Weiser in his commentary on Psalms teaches that more important is the idea that this is not an impersonal account “in abstract theological definitions” but rather his personal experience of the reality of G-d. This view he shared with his readers and imparts “fresh, lively tones which even today still directly touch the heart of the reader.”[13] God did not stop speaking with the deaths of Ezra and Nehemiah. It is still possible to discern God’s presence and God’s call today! That fills us with hope.

The analogy between Psalm 139 and Jeremiah’s call “It also implies that G-d will take care of Jeremiah, that his special love for him runs deep, deeper than even that of the parents who conceived and gave birth to their son. This piety echoes the trust expressed by the psalmist in Ps 22:10-11 that G-d had watched over him and cared for him since his conception in the womb. In Hebrew, knowing carries the sense of experiencing intimate friendship and strong loyalty. Consecration comes from the same Hebrew word that expresses holiness. It will not just be a dedication, it will be a religious commitment of a special kind.”[14]

It is also important to understand the root of the word for womb. Like the G-d who is accessible even when hidden in the dark and can create even in darkness, the womb is a dark place but full of compassion and warmth. The mystery of creation of the world by G-d is likewise echoed by the personal creation of a person by G-d in his or her mother’s womb. G-d is not limited to any physical space nor is G-d limited in G-d’s ability to create.

So what is a call? How do we see this as modern Jews? How does it differ from what Christians use in terms of a minister being called or feeling called?

When I was applying to rabbinical school, I was told to avoid the phrase. Too Christian. People would look on you with skepticism, even fear. Maybe you are crazy. God is talking to you. If someone told me they saw a bush burning unconsumed, I might think they were crazy too. But I think something is going on—something deep. Something profound.

Perhaps Frederick Buechner, a Presbyterian Theologian, has it right: “The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.”

So how do we find out where that intersection is—a place where we are happy, joyful and we can do something to make the world a better place? There is one book that I routinely buy two at a time, because I loan someone a copy and it won’t come back. That book begins to help each of us answer that question, sort of a Jewish What Color is Your Parachute. Jeffrey Salkin who wrote Putting G-d on the Guest List about Bnei Mitzvah, wrote, Being G-d’s Partner and finding the spiritual connection to our work.

He begins by telling the story of his move from Pennsylvania to Long Island. He was impressed with the head of the moving crew, a big, burly, enthusiastic guy, as Salkin said, “a dead ringer for Willie Nelson,” but someone who saw the connection between is work and what God wants him to be doing. He was enthusiastic precisely because as he said, “Moving is hard for most people. It’s a very vulnerable time for them. People are nervous about going to a new community and about having strangers pack their most precious possessions. So, I think God wants me to treat my customers with love and to make them feel that I care about their things and their life. God wants me to help make their changes go smoothly. If I can be happy about it, maybe they can be, too.” Salkin suggests in his book, and I agree, that each person has a unique call, a unique role to play that will make the world a better place while being happy. For me, I have found that in the rabbinate.

Many people spend this quiet period, call it what you will, Winter Break, Christmas Vacation, the week between Christmas and New Year’s reflecting and setting goals for the new (secular) year. Some think about work and their connection to it. If that is the case for you, feel free to borrow the book. It will sit up here on the bimah. It will guide you through thinking about the connection between spirituality and work and help you find more meaning—either in what you are doing now—or in what you might like to be doing.

We see then, in the case of both Psalms and Jeremiah, we learn that G-d can know a person before birth and therefore is in intimate and personal relationship with him. I think perhaps what is most significant then is that while the call of Jeremiah represents a personal experience made public by its publishing, the fact that the psalmist is able to describe a similar sense means that it is possible for any of us, not only those called to be prophets. We, then, have a decision to make about whether to accept our call or our relationship to the Divine as did Jeremiah or whether we will turn a deaf ear and walk away. If we accept our call, and make the world a better place, then we will find joy. Joy to the World. May all our celebrations be merry and bright and may the new year dawn with a renewed ability to hear that still small voice of God so that we can find our place in the world and find our call.

I wrestled with what to say this weekend. As a congregation we were participating in Human Rights Shabbat together with 180 congregations around the globe. However, last week I had spoken about the topic because of the death of Nelson Mandela. As I discovered, there was still much to say…

“C.O.F.F.E.E. Coffee is not for me. It’s a drink that people wake up with, that it makes them nervous is no myth. Slaves to a coffee cup. They can’t give coffee up.”

.When I was a little girl and we lived in Evanston, we would go to the Old Town School of Folk Music periodically. There I was introduced to a wonderful singer/songwriter with a deep resonate voice, similar to Odetta who sang this song. I even have it on an LP. Remember LPs?

I never thought I would become a slave to a coffee cup. How did that happen? What does it mean to be a slave? People answered, being subservient to someone else, not having control, not having any choice, not being paid, not having any power, being oppressed.

Coffee is one of those things that we are enslaved to. And in the process of needing our daily cup of joe, we in turn enslave others. That’s what today’s Torah portion is about. It is a bridge between Genesis and Exodus, between Joseph enslaving Egyptians so that Egypt had enough food during a famine and then Pharaoh 400 years later enslaving Israelites. What happened here?

Pharaoh had slaves to build the pyramids. Southern plantation owners had slaves to pick cotton. Even John Adams, a northern states president had slaves. But that was long ago and far away. It doesn’t happen any more right? Think again.

Yes, there are modern day slaves, just like our portion is talking about. Does anyone know how many? (Guesses of 20 million, 26 million). About 27 million of them according to slaveryfootprint.org. When I took their survey, they estimate 49 work for me. They make my car, my running shoes, my body wash, my clothing, my gadgets. They make yours too. They even help make my chocolate and my coffee.

Children chained to looms in Bangladesh so we can have cheap t-shirts. CNN’s lead headline this week online that girls in one neighborhood of Cambodia are being sold into the sex trade. Most likely for people in the United States. Tomato workers in Florida who provide the tomatoes to many of our grocery stores and to Wendy’s who are not being treated fairly.

And then there is my beloved coffee—I work hard to find fair trade, organic, kosher coffee. These days you will find me drinking Green Mountain Columbian Fair Trade. Sometimes I drink Delicious Peace, a collective of Jews, Christians and Muslims in Uganda who grow fair traded, organic, kosher certified coffee. But what I buy is a drop in the bucket. When companies like Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts, McDonalds switch over to mostly Fair Trade as opposed to about 3% their buying power makes a difference in the life of farmers.

Why does all of this matter? What does this have to do with us as Jews, as Americans?  As one member pointed out, “Justice, justice shall you pursue.” (Deuteronomy 16:20). Every year at Passover we say that “We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt.” And because of that experience we are told that we have an obligation to treat the stranger, the widow and the orphan correctly. 36 times, double life, we are told to protect the stranger, the orphan and widow. That’s more than any commandment on kashrut, on Shabbat, on how to davven.

We are told that we have to work to free the captive wherever they are. We pray for their release in the G’vurot prayer and we work for it as we saw with Gilad Shalit and many others. The rabbis declared the redemption of captives to be a mitzvah of the highest order. Knowing that there are millions of people today who are enslaved, we cannot remain silent.

We have an obligation to treat workers correctly. We must pay them a living wage and pay them on time. We are commanded to not withhold the wages of a laborer overnight. We are taught that we are each created in the image of the Divine, b’tzelem elohim. This means that no person should ever be a slave to another.

We need to avoid buying goods that are produced unethically. The rabbis forbid buying goods that were known to be stolen, holding the buyers as responsible as the thieves. Today, we have an obligation to avoid buying those products that have documented human rights abuses in their supply chains and supporting independent monitoring of worker conditions.  This includes re-examining how we source kosher meat, where our Chanukah gelt comes from and what coffee, yes back to the coffee, we are drinking.

Jews were at the vanguard of organized labor. We started the labor movement. Names like Samuel Gompers, Emma Goldman, Sidney Hillman. They are ours. Bread and Roses, The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, actions that helped establish the 40 hour work week, 8 hour work day, child labor laws, safer working conditions. We are proud of the contributions we made. And we may take some of them for granted these days.

One of the founders to this congregation, Rabbi Emil Hirsch, whose photo was prominently displayed on the Elgin Jewish History exhibit, was famous for calling his own congregants to task for their treatment of workers. He helped negotiate the labor contract for Hart Schaffner and Marx after Hannah Shapiro, led a walkout in response to a wage cut. 40,000 others joined this strike. With Hirsch’s help—or nagging, Schaffner eventually settled, including a 10% wage increase, a 54 hour work week and an independent arbitration committee to resolve ongoing labor disputes.

I never thought that I would be married to a Teamster but for 11 years we answered the question that the UPS ad asked, “What can Brown do for you,” very differently than the ads suggested. Brown provided health insurance, like we will most likely never see again, with free premiums and a 0 deductible, it gave us an education credit, it gave us stability, it gave us a pension. And when Simon was being bullied early on because he was deemed too slow and later because he was Jewish, the union went to bat for him and protected his job.

We can’t solve the poverty question or the slavery question here today. We can talk about the Universal Declaration for Human Rights, the anniversary of its ratification we celebrate this weekend. You have a copy of the 30 articles with you. I have taken each one and linked them with Jewish values and halachot. When we talk about modern day slavery, worker’s wrights and poverty, we are talking about human rights. Article 23 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights clearly states: “Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.” Now there has been much written in recent years about trade unions and how they have been the downfall of the auto industry or how they mismanaged pensions. There have been attempts, starting with Reagan and air traffic controllers to break unions. Our neighbors to the north, in Wisconsin, thought they could do it at the state level. Perhaps some of you believe that in a free market economy unions have outlived their usefulness.

Has any one read the book, Nickeled and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich? My daughter read it as part of Sociology 101 in college and then made me read it. It was eye opening. The author, a journalist, went under cover to work in a restaurant in Florida, a Hotel maid in Maine and a Wal-Mart worker in Minnesota. She spent a year doing this. Could she make it financially without dipping into any of her own personal financial reserves. The answer was sometimes yes, sometimes no. Mostly no. When she was living in a hotel, it was because she didn’t have first and last month rent and a security deposit. She also didn’t have a can opener or a microwave or a refrigerator. She would go to the food pantry, get cans and then not be able to open them or heat them. It was easier and sometimes cheaper to swing through McDonalds.

These are current, very current events. Last week the news reported that McDonald’s workers walked off the job in an attempt gain higher wages. Last month a McDonald’s representative told a low wage earner to apply for food stamps. The families of fast food employees nation wide receive $1B in food stamps per year according to a study by the University of California Berkeley and the University of Illinois. This year McDonald’s tried to train its staff by teaching budgeting. It was a good idea but it received a lot of negative press when it showed needing to have a second job, charging only $20 a month for gas and having nothing in the budget for childcare or groceries, although it did allow for $800 in discretionary spending. http://www.practicalmoneyskills.com/mcdonalds/budgetJournal/budgetJournal.php

While writing this sermon, I made it a point to call one of our members who owns 11 McDonald’s franchises. I began by thanking him since McDonald’s does use fair trade coffee and has worked with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers to make sure that the tomatoes McDonald’s uses are grown and harvested in the most ethical conditions. This partnership was ratified in 2007 and amounted to McDonald’s needing to pay a penny a pound more, something Wendy’s still has not agreed to.

Our member reports that in Chicagoland McDonald’s did not see many workers walk off the job last week. His interpretation—unions face declining membership and underfunded pensions and need new members so they trumped up the story. He assures me that McDonald’s puts its people first and that is an especially big focus this year. His franchise pays worker’s health benefits not through the corporate self-funded plan and he believes that for those who want to advance, there are plenty of opportunities for training, education, jobs beyond the line workers. He contrasts it with WalMart, which he says are next to impossible to deal with. At WalMart the majority of employees make less than $25,000 and many of them are forced to rely on food stamps. One WalMart in the Cleveland area was setting up its own internal food bank to support its own workers. HR personnel are equipped to give out food bank numbers to WalMart employees. Will organizing solve all these problems? No. Will raising the minimum wage to $15.00 an hour work? Maybe. But not if that cost needs to be passed on to the consumer and the consumer stops buying $1.00 hamburgers.

Recently a CEO of another fast food chain took the Food Stamp challenge. Ron Shaich, the founder of Panara Bread attempted to live on the $4.50 a day. He found it was nearly impossible. http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/25/opinion/shaich-food-stamp-challenge/ He believes that this is all of our problem and that we must solve it. “Eighty percent of households that have problems putting food on the table include the most vulnerable — children, the elderly and the disabled…. Throughout my SNAP Challenge, I kept returning to the same questions: What kind of society do we want to live in? Do we want to live in a country that turns a cold shoulder to the problem of hunger, or one in which we work together to face it head on? We, in corporate America, must be part of the solution.”

If you think that this is only for poor families, people we don’t know here at the synagogue and never see, think again. In our own congregation, we have families that are not making it financially. Families that take from our community pantry because that is the only way they can stretch their food budge. Families that make impossible choices between heat, prescription drugs, rent or food.

The sponsor of Human Rights Shabbat, Truah, is an organization of 1800 rabbis. Its mission statement reads: T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights is an organization of rabbis from all streams of Judaism that acts on the Jewish imperative to respect and protect the human rights of all people. Grounded in Torah and our Jewish historical experience and guided by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we advocate for human rights in Israel and North America. T’ruah continues the historic work of Rabbis for Human Rights-North America, which was founded in 2002 and renamed T’ruah in January 2013. – See more at: http://www.truah.org/who-we-are/mission-statement.html#sthash.HNEPSXAW.dpuf

Truah has worked effectively on issues of slavery and trafficking, on worker’s rights, on human rights issues in Israel both with Palestinians and Bedouins. I am proud to cast my voice with theirs.

So my question to you as a congregation—are we willing to pay a little more for our coffee, for our chocolate, for our tomatoes, for our olives. The sisterhood gift shop is already doing a good job. We sell fair traded kippot, like the one I am wearing today made by craftspeople in Guatemala and fair traded Shabbat candles from Africa. I exhort us to do more. To speak out. But not just to speak out. To take the next step. To be active. To be intentional. To take the slavery footprint survey. To commit to buying products for the synagogue and for ourselves that are fair traded. To make sure our own synagogue employees are treated equitably. To make sure that any of our employees are treated with dignity and respect, with a living wage that we pay as promised. To consider petitioning our elected officials to protect worker rights and to fight against trafficking.

Then when we read the text as we are about to do, of how Joseph was buried in Egypt and how the Israelites brought Joseph’s bones back out of Egypt, we will not be the oppressors, we will remember our legacy of being slaves, and of being set free. Chazak, chazak v’nitchazek.

Last week we continued to read the story of Joseph as the news was breaking that Nelson Mandela had died. I realized as I was putting my d’var Torah together that we needed to address what Mandela, King and Joseph teach us. All three were dreamers. All three were interpreters and implementers of dreams. All three were in prison. All three preached reconciliation, either by their words, or by their actions.

Joseph dreamed that everyone around him bowed down to him. Then he interpreted dreams while he was in prison, thereby qualifying him to be called upon to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams and as Lord Rabbi Sacks pointed out last week–implement the vision.

King was a dreamer. We all remember his “I have a dream”. When I hear the quote from Amos in our Siddur Sim Shalom, I hear it in the deep, resonate voice of King, “Let justice roll down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.” (Amos 5:24) King was working on implementing his dream when he was gunned down far too young. Others have taken up his clarion call for justice. Both the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were written on the conference room table of the Religious Action Center, the legislative arm of the Reform Movement in Washington DC.  We need to remain vigilant to assure that the hard fought equality becomes a reality and not just vision. We have that obligation as Jews.

Mandela was a dreamer too. He said, “I dream of an Africa which is in peace with itself.” and “A winner is a dreamer who never gives up.” He spent much of his time in prison writing and working to implement his vision of a world where his nation would not be divided by color and apartheid.

All three of these men went to prison. King famously wrote “A Letter from the Birmingham Jail” exhorting his fellow clergymen to continue the fight, that the time was right, explaining the four steps to non-violent protest. Mandela quipped that “In my country we go to prison first and then become President.” (to which some Illinois residents respond, in our state we become governor and then go to prison).

But for each of these men who spent time in jail, they learned something. They learned the power of forgiveness and reconciliation. Mandella has been saluted all week as a man of deep forgiveness. For saying things like, “You will achieve more in this world through acts of mercy than you will through acts of retribution.” and “Courageous people do not fear forgiving, for the sake of peace.” “We forgive but not forgotten.” “If there are dreams about a beautiful South Africa, there are also roads that lead to their goal. Two of these roads could be named Goodness and Forgiveness.”

And he said as he was leaving prison after 27 years, “As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison.” Would I have the strength to do that? I would hope so but I don’t know. None of us knows for sure. We can only hope–and model what Joseph, King and Mandela taught.

How does someone leave that sense of bitterness and hatred behind? How does one forgive without forgetting? What about the prison experiences of Joseph, King and Mandela allowed them to offer reconciliation to their enemies? to their brothers?

We looked at their actual words. I divided the group into three groups, one to study Joseph, one King and one Mandela. We read their actual words. We talked about what they teach us about dreams, leadership, reconciliation. The conversation was deep. The King group, reading excerpts of a Letter from the Birmingham Jail, did not want to come back together. We could probably still be talking about it!

In this week’s Torah portion, Joseph offers his brothers reconciliation. The very brothers that threw him in a pit, allowed him to be taken to Egypt as a slave and told their father that he was dead. So on Shabbat morning, we looked closely at the text. Some Christians developed something called “Liberation Theology,” the idea from Exodus that G-d wants us to be free–a dream shared by Joseph, King and Mandela, a hope that kept the African American slaves alive before the Emancipation.

It has been said that the book of Genesis is the story of our family–our patriarchs and matriarchs, the formative stories. And the story of Exodus is how we became a people. But the story of Exodus really begins in this week’s parsha. In Chapter 45 we are told that Joseph stood (nitzavim), like at the end of Deuteronomy when we all “Atem nitzavim kulchem” stood before…he cried out as did the Israelites under Egyptian yoke and he had everyone exit from his presence, hotzi’u, just as the Israelites exited from Egypt 400 years later. His sobs were so loud, when he revealed himself that the Egyptians who had exited could hear him. He embraced Benjamin, his youngest brother and wept.

One congregant pointed out the night before that we have become Judahites, not Josephites, because it is Judah who rescues Benjamin and would have been willing to take the fall for him. It is Judah who calls for reconciliation, not Joseph. I would argue however, that it is Joseph who powerfully acts out that reconciliation by weeping openly and supporting his brothers and father. Looking closely at the haftarah, we are given another image, of Judah and Joseph together, reconciled. Not only reconciled but as the text says “I am going to take the stick of Joseph–which is in the hand of Ephraim..and I will place the stick of Judah upon it and make them into one stick, they shall be joined in My hand.”

As I read these words in shul, I had goosebumps. I could not read these words of Ezekiel 19, without thinking about how Mandela used the World Cup Rugby victory in South Africa to heal a nation, how he brought the blacks and whites together and created one nation. I was reminded of watching the movie Invictus with my nephews just before they went to South Africa for the World Cup Soccer games. Part of the movie focuses on Mandela’s experience in prison and how the poem “Invictus”, by William Ernest Henley, inspired him and kept him whole:

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever base god may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

The last stanza gets me every time. May we all learn to be the masters of our fate and the captains of our soul. May we become like Joseph, King and Mandela, able to dream, interpret dreams and rise to be great leaders. Mandela understood that he was not perfect. He was human: “I have walked that long road to freedom. I have tried not to falter; I have made missteps along the way. But I have discovered the secret that after climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb. I have taken a moment here to rest, to steal a view of the glorious vista that surrounds me, to look back on the distance I have come. But I can only rest for a moment, for with freedom come responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not ended.”

Freedom does carry with it responsibilities. We learn that in the story of Exodus. We are reminded of that every time we sing Michamocha, every time we act out the plagues at a Passover seder by diminishing our joy of freedom by remembering the pain of the Egyptians with each drop of wine spilled.

One of Mandela’s mistakes may have been his oft quoted line, “We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.” For him, this was the responsibility of that until all of us are free, none of us are free. However, from this statement, some people began calling Israel an apartheid state without having all the facts. Israel is not an apartheid state. Nonetheless,  I worry about human rights violations. Deuteronomy is clear on how to fight a war and fruit trees may not be cut down. Olive trees are fruit trees. A house may not be torn down–and that would include being bulldozed an all too frequent occurrence on the West Bank. Citizens may not be expelled as was suggested for the Druze. (That situation may have been defeated this week with the pressure of 800 rabbis, including me).

Nonetheless, Mandela’s statement was wrong and frequently taken out of context. And yet, two wrongs do not make a right. While Israel sent its president, its prime minister, Benjamin Nitanyahu should have attended. That would have given the world a powerful example of reconciliation. He, who bears the name Benjamin who reconciled with his brother Joseph, in this week’s parsha, missed a critical opportunity to work for peace and stabilize the region.

The funeral is now over. In the meantime, may we continue to learn the lessons of reconciliation that being in jail can teach. May we learn not to be bitter in our own lives. May we continue to work for an age where all people can dwell under their vines and fig trees and none will make them afraid. May justice roll down like water and righteousness as a mighty stream. And may Mandela’s life continue to be a blessing.

Yesterday lunch I was at my monthly meeting of the 16th Circuit Court Family Violence Faith Watch Committee. We were discussing our annual conference about domestic violence and faith. We decided that the focus of the day would be how faith communities discuss forgiveness when it comes to domestic violence. It is a tricky topic and one that I wrote part of my rabbinic thesis about.

Over time, survivors go through a process of forgiving themselves, their abusers, their communities that didn’t shield them and G-d.

Sometimes we in the faith communities don’t help. Some of us tell victims to forgive before they themselves are ready. Sometimes, we add the words, “You should.” “You must” or add pressure by saying G-d forgives those who trespass so we should forgive those who trespass, or turn the other cheek, or in the 16th century words of Rabbi Luria, added to many Jewish prayerbooks as part of the bedtime ritual, “I hereby forgive anyone who has angered or provoked me or sinned against me, physically or financially or by failing to give me due respect, or in any other matter relating to me, involuntarily or willingly, inadvertently or deliberately, whether in word or deed: let no one incur punishment because of me.”

That last one becomes one of those difficult texts. Really? Forgive someone who hurt me physically? Financially? Can I do that? Can anyone do that? Or is it just something we aspire to?

My job at the conference will be to do an interactive text study of some of those texts, across religious traditions. It is a job I am well suited for, as I jokingly remind people that I got an A in a course entitled, “Justice, Forgiveness and Reconciliation in Jewish and Christian Thought.”

It was in this class where I read extensively the words of Nelson Mandela. Nelson Mandela,  held in prison for 27 years for his activism against apartheid, against racism. Nelson Mandela who became the first president of a unified South Africa. Nelson Mandela who reached out to his enemies and invited them to his inauguration. Nelson Mandela who insisted on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Nelson Mandela who is known for sitting in that jail and forgiving his captors.

In Simon Wiesenthal’s seminal book, The Sunflower, On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness, which we read for that class, Robert McAfee Brown acknowledges that “perhaps there are situations where sacrificial love, with forgiveness at the heart of it, can make a difference, and can even empower” (pp. 122-123). He cites Nelson Mandela and Tomas Borge as examples of men who have forgiven wrongs that many might see as unforgivable.

Mandela himself said in his book, Long Road to Freedom, “As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison.” He is talking about forgiveness. In his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech he said, “If you want to make peace with your enemy, you have to work with your enemy. Then he becomes your partner. We forgive but not forgotten…Courageous people do not fear forgiving, for the sake of peace.”

As part of the debate on the special report of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee he said, “We recall our terrible past so that we can deal with it, to forgive where forgiveness is necessary, without forgetting; to ensure that never again will such inhumanity tear us apart; and to move ourselves to eradicate a legacy that lurks dangerously as a threat to our democracy.”

Forgiveness is a difficult thing. Forgiveness does not mean forgetting. Forgiveness is not a one time thing. It is a process. Rabbi Harold Kushner teaches, “Since my husband walked out on us, every month is a struggle to pay our bills. I have to tell my kids we have no money to go to the movies, while he’s living it up with his new wife in another state. How can you tell me to forgive him?”   I answered her, “I’m not asking you to forgive him because what he did was acceptable. It wasn’t; it was mean and selfish. I’m asking you to forgive because he doesn’t deserve the power to live in your head and turn you into a bitter, angry woman. By holding on to that resentment, you are not hurting him, but you are hurting yourself.” Can a victim of domestic violence get to this place? Does he or she need to? Maybe for the reasons that Kushner cites. I would never tell a victim of domestic violence that they have to forgive their abuser. Until people feels safe, they cannot forgive.

Forgiveness is difficult. Forgiveness is complicated. Forgiveness happens slowly over time. Forgiveness does not mean forgetting. Forgiveness does not mean not pursuing justice. It is a softening, a flowering, a measure of healing–and only one measure. It is about putting the pieces of our lives back together and there is no one way to do that and no time line.

Nelson Mandela led by example. He led from the front and from the back when he needed to, as he himself said. Our job as leaders is to follow his lead.  I applaud Mandela for the courage that he displayed. I admire his leadership. May his memory continue as a blessing. May we all learn from his example.

A few weeks ago, a congregant, the chair of the VIsion Committee, presented me with a plaque she had purchased at a Hallmark Store. The quote, from Walt Disney himself, “If you can dream it, you can do it.” It was part of Clergy Appreciation Week. (Who knew such a week even existed!). Her comment was that because I am a second career rabbi, I inspire people just because I followed my dream. And while I am following another dream by running the Disney Princess Half Marathon for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, I don’t think she realized how big a role Disney played in my completing rabbinical school. One birthday celebration, at Disney, we watched Tinker Bell light Cinderella’s castle, while the theme from Pinnocio was playing, “When you wish upon a star, your dreams come true.” However, it is not just wishing upon a star that make a dream come true. Frequently it comes with hard work.

We have been reading about Joseph the dreamer in our recent Torah portions. Joseph dreamed that the sun and the moon, the eleven stars bowed down to him, that eleven sheaves of wheat bowed down to him. Joseph interpreted the baker’s dreams in prison, putting him in a position to be called upon to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams. That’s where we pick up our story.

One of the things that intrigued me about the interpretation of Pharaoh’s dreams is that Joseph explained that they are essentially the same dream. Many of us have that experience, we dream a dream deep in sleep, wake up and dream another dream with the same theme. Our subconscious is making sure we get the message, finding another way to deliver the same idea. Freud and Jung had lots to say about that. Joseph was seemingly ahead of his time.

Rabbi Lord Sacks published a brilliant  d’var Torah explaining the importance of Joseph the dreamer, in terms of leadership. Not only did Joseph dream dreams and interpret dreams but he had the ability to implement the dreams. “No sooner had he told of a seven-year famine then he continued, without pause, to provide a solution.” For Sacks, that is Joseph’s greatest achievement.

As he pointed out, some people find dreaming impractical. He argues that it is one of the most practical things we can do.  “There are people who spend months planning a holiday but not even a day planning a life. They let themselves be carried by the winds of chance and circumstance. That is a mistake.” He reminds us that the sages said, “Wherever [in the Torah] we find the word vayehi, ‘And it came to pass,’ it is always the prelude to tragedy.” (Megillah 10b) A vayehi life is one in which we passively let things happen. A yehi (“Let there be”) life is one in which we make things happen, and it is our dreams that give us direction.

”

So the call of this portion is to lead a life without passivity. To pursue our dreams. To actively chase after them. Theodor Herzl, “the father of modern Zionism” taught us all, like Walt Disney, “Im Tirtzu, Ain Zo Aggadah. If you will it, it is no dream.” The word aggadah is translated here as dream, but our portion uses cholom as dream. Is there a difference between aggadah and cholom? Aggadah is also story, fable, myth. What Herzl is saying is that if you will something then it can leave the story realm and become reality. Again, it requires implementing the dream. It requires hard work.

The early Zionists knew this. They had a song (a new one to my congregation),

Dreamers Keep a Dreaming
What did we do when we wanted corn?
We plowed and we sowed till the early morn.
(Repeat)
Chorus:
For our hands are strong, our hearts are young 
our dreams are the dreamin’s of all ages long 
(just a-dreamin’ just a-dreaming along)

What did we do when we needed a town
We hammered and we nailed till the sun went down 
(Repeat) (Chorus)

What do we do when there’s peace to be won
It’s more than one man can do alone
We’ll gather our friends from the ends of the earth
To lend a hand at the hour of birth

Bridge:
We’ll plow, we’ll sow, we’ll hammer, and we’ll nail 
We’ll work all day till peace is real.

They worked. They plowed, sowed, hammered, nailed and worked for peace.

That dream of peace is real. The haftarah for the Shabbat of Chanukah from Zechariah talks about a vision of a menorah, ” The angel who talked with me came back and woke me as a man is wakened from sleep. ² He said to me, “What do you see?” And I answered, “I see a lampstand all of gold, with a bowl above it. The lamps on it are seven in number, and the lamps above it have seven pipes; ³ and by it are two olive trees, one on the right of the bowl and one on its left.” ⁴ I, in turn, asked the angel who talked with me, “What do those things mean, my lord?” ⁵ “Do you not know what those things mean?” asked the angel who talked with me; and I said, “No, my lord.” ⁶ Then he explained to me as follows: “This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit.”

Debbie Friedman turned those words into a song, “Not by might, not by power but by spirit alone shall we all live in peace. The children sing, the children dream but their tears may fall and we hear them call and another song will rise…” This is the very song that I sang last year, exactly a year ago, the first night of Chanukah, as the unthinkable was happening in Newtown Connecticut, the town in which my college roommate lives. She is the mother of a young child, a first grader. He attends the other elementary school so he was safe that day. But I spent most of the afternoon on the phone with Lisa.

Newtown is a town I know well. I would stop many weeks on the way home from rabbinical school. Lisa and I would have sushi at Sennen or a quick Starbucks. It is an idyllic, quiet, bucolic town. The news of a mass shooting at Sandy Hook couldn’t possibly happen in Newtown, could it? The people of Newtown are still grieving. The recent report that came out was painful. There are no good explanations of why it happened. There can’t be. I applaud NBC who did not play the 911 tapes even though they were released yesterday. The families are exhausted. They want to grieve in private, not under a national microscope. They want to protect their children and shelter them and keep what ever childhood innocence remains. Let them have their space. They need it.

This is a vision, a dream of peace. Since Newtown there have been 30,000 additional deaths by gunfire. Rabbi Menachem Creditor wrote a powerful El Malei Rachamim in memory of the children and teachers of Newtown, http://rabbicreditor.blogspot.com/2013/12/a-newtown-el-malei-for-26-souls-and.html The rabbi in Newtown wrote this:

We dare to live again
By Rabbi Shaul Marshall Praver

The multi colored tulips show their joyous faces. 
Purple wild flowers unfurl their luster upon the countryside. The start of pastel buds are seen as impressionistic highlights adorning canvas. Upon closer inspection, remnants of dry fronds from years gone by are found supporting the luscious green virile buds eagerly making their debuts. 

Winter’s deep darkness is banished before the hope and vigor of spring. And while our tears and blood were shed without mercy, we dare to live again. 

We Kindle our love as a precious flame seeking shelter from a relentless storm. We caress light and welcome warmth of spirit from all places, creeds, and creatures. And in the absence of twenty precious children and six beloved teachers, we dare to live again. 

We know they would want us to walk upon the long island sound, allowing soft waves to slosh between our toes. We know they would want us to venture out into lush meadows and orchards feasting our eyes on the valleys below. 

They would say, “We have gone and what is done is done–so arise and celebrate the years we lived together.” They would speak like sublime winged angels exclaiming, “We are free to enter the garden of alluring fragrance.” They would tell us about fiery swords that briefly paused from their vigilance allowing them entry into a forgotten chamber of light. And those that dared to listen to their soft whispers would hear an accompanying plaintive voice emanating from the midst of the garden like a chamber of mist rising. 

Surely we would recall that a melody can embrace us as a welcoming spirit that delivers us to the source of beauty, bliss and splendor. And they would tell us, “we are like a tree arising from a broken seed. And if only you knew we were the tree and not the discarded seed, you would give yourself permission to live again.” 

And so–for them
We dare to live again! 
For them, We dare to love again!
and for them, light dares to shine again!

I would add we need to dare to dream again. Joseph taught us three things. To take the time to dream. To let our imaginations soar. To interpret and articulate our dreams. And then to find a way to implement those dreams. His words remind me of a poem in Gates of Prayer by Archibald MacLeish, one that brought me comfort after the death of my first fiancé killed by a terrorist bomb:

The young dead soldiers do not speak.
Nevertheless they are heard in the still houses.
(Who has not heard them?)….

They say, We leave you our deaths,
Give them their meaning. 

I cannot say what the meaning of these 30,000 deaths are. It is not for me to say. As we close out Chanukah, the festival of dedication, I rededicate myself, I pledge to continue to work for a world of peace, a world where children are not afraid to go to school because of the fear of gun violence, a world where mental illness is treated appropriately and without shame, a world where we can each become the bright light of those Chanukah candles glowing in the windows. That is my Chanukah dream. Now I just have to implement it. What is yours?