How many of us are proud to be part of the Jewish people?

That’s good - I am too. I see myself - and I hope you do as well - as part of a very large family - a family with a long history and story that spreads over the globe and across the ages. As a Reconstructionist, I understand that my primary connection to this thing we call Judaism is through belonging - Belonging to B’nai Yisrael, the children of Israel.

This belonging may not always be obvious. It may not be the thing we think of first as we live our lives and attend to our business, Jewish or otherwise. Even our attendance and involvement in this synagogue may not always point us to the larger Jewish world of which we are a part. We come here to connect with the specific people we meet here - we like the services here and the melodies and the potluck dinners here - most of the time any connection beyond that fades to the background - icing on the cake.

But yet we maintain a sense of pride in our people, in our accomplishments - maybe in our very survival - still being here after several thousand years of wandering and persecution is pretty amazing. We most often sense this pride when “one of our own” does something outstanding. We keep an eye on Kevin Youklis’s stats and root for him a little louder when it is his turn at bat. We first cheered and then mourned when Ilan Ramon became the first Israeli astronaut and then died on his ill-fated mission. And like Adam Sandler’s famous Hanukkah song, we collect names of Jewish celebrities like some people collect baseball cards.

And why shouldn’t we be proud - proud that Einstein, Freud, Harry Houdini and Steven Spielberg are all Jews; proud that the cell phone, drip irrigation and MRI technology were all developed in Israel; proud that Jews in America have played such an important role and contributed so much to the growth, health and wellbeing of this nation.

I do not believe this pride is simply reflected glory, but hearkens, instead to something much deeper.

After all, we know that, like it or not, the fate of each one of us is somehow, tightly intertwined with the fate of all of us. We know that Jews survive as Jews because of the strength of our communal institutions and interpersonal bonds and connection. We also know that our failures, real or impugned upon us by others out to do us harm, affect us collectively as well.

If this isn’t made clear to us the rest of the year, we are particularly aware of it now, at Yom Kippur, when we stand together to recite long lists of confessionals, one sin after another, all phrased in the first person plural. “Please forgive us God because we have sinned, we have done wrong, we have turned astray,” says the prayer book. Ashamnu, bagadnu, ……..

Yes, we are obligated as individuals to do the work of teshuva - repentance and we have ample opportunity for private prayers of atonement. But we stand together here at Yom Kippur as a community, as one community among many, to offer our repentance for the collective sins of our people just as our ancestors did in the ancient Temple.

Remember for a moment what the original Yom Kippur observances looked like. The High Priest in Jerusalem would ritualistically, carefully and deliberately transfer the sins of all the people onto a goat - a scapegoat - that was sent away into the desert, presumably to die. In this way, all the collected impurities, the pollutions and sins that had accumulated within the people would be erased - and - if it worked - the people as a whole would be blessed for another year. It didn’t matter where a specific sin originated - who among the thousands was guilty - it only mattered that the resulting poison be removed from the entire community. The fate of everyone hung in the balance.

So today we stand here reciting these prayers in the plural. And I want to suggest that this year; we need to be especially cognizant of the collective nature of our fates. For as much pride as we have in being part of the Jewish people and in celebrating the accomplishments of our brethren, we must also carry our share of shame, embarrassment and remorse when some of our people go astray.

And this year, a number of our people have gone quite terribly astray. So we must reflect and say together, Ashamnu, for we have sinned.

Specifically, I am talking about three scandals that have rocked the American Jewish community in the past year, scandals that at first blush may have nothing to do with us, but to which I believe we must pay attention, we must atone. For as Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heshel said, “Some are guilty, all are responsible.” And whether we are compelled by ethical integrity or political realities, we must realize that as Jews in America, we sink or swim together.

Scandal number 1: Last October, months after the largest immigration raid in American history, Shlomo Rubashkin, CEO of the Postville Iowa meat packing plant Agriprocessors, was charged with over 9000 counts of conspiracy, identity theft, harboring illegal immigrants, violations of child labor laws, unfair labor practices, and many other criminal charges. The raid and subsequent fallout led to the arrest and deportation of over 300 illegal immigrants, some forcibly separated from their families, the shut-down of North America’s largest distributor of kosher meat (driving up prices) and the economic disintegration of the town of Postville.

Apparently, corruption and sleazy business practices had been the norm at this facility for decades, while the orthodox rabbinate that provides kosher certification turned a blind eye - as long as the meat was kosher.

Outrage in the Jewish community was rampant. The Conservative rabbinate and many smaller groups of Orthodox rabbis began asking questions about the ethics of meat production - can something really be considered kosher if laws are broken and people exploited in the process?
Ashamnu - forgive us for we have sinned.
Scandal number 2: Bernie Madoff. You all know the story - Bernie Madoff is the worst kind of swindler. He stole from his friends; he stole from the very charities he purported to support! Now I know that none in this congregation were involved in Maddoff’s scheme. I also know that none of us were ever in a position to invest heavily in plans like Madoff’s. One time we can be grateful for the lack of huge fortunes.

However, the resulting financial crisis among Jewish institutions around this country is something we must care about. Hadassah is almost broke. And lest you think I am simply talking about a few old ladies who like to play mah-jong, remember that Hadassah is single-handedly responsible for creating Israel’s world class medical establishment and network of hospitals. American Jewish Congress, Yeshiva University, Brandeis and many other important institutions are in serious financial trouble as a result of Madoff’s thievery.
Ashamnu - forgive us for we have sinned.

And finally, Scandal number 3: Organ dealing rabbis. At first, I didn’t even know how to address this heinous and evil crime. I can’t fathom the tortured logic someone must have to see this as permissible, ethical, or condoned in Jewish law. My initial response is still what I feel: Ick!

But it is even worse than that. The crimes committed by this man are compounded by the incorrect notion that Jews ourselves do not believe in organ donation. Somehow, there is an urban myth that our respect for the body and historical belief in resurrection means that we need to be buried with all our parts in tact - leading to the conclusion that this man was purchasing organs for Jews who would never themselves give in return! Again, we see one of our own playing onto the worst stereotypes, the worst canards that can be thrown at us.

Ashamnu - forgive us for we have sinned.

No - we are not guilty of these scandals. No more than we are personally responsible for Einstein’s’ discoveries or Steven Spielberg’s movies. But our fate is wound up in the fate of all Jews in the world - whether due to our own sense of belonging and connection or due to other people’s desire to link us together, see us as a group. If we accept this responsibility, if we pay attention to and claim a shared fate with the larger Jewish world, then we must also pay attention to its failures and make up for its shortcomings.

Rabbi Dan Moskowitz, in an article entitled “Shame on Jew” suggested that we need to feel a collective sense of shame and remorse for these scandals even we may have nothing directly to do with them. He went so far as to suggest three specific responses, three communal acts of teshuva for them.

For the scandal in Postville:
Now I am not under the impression that many of the households in our community regularly purchase kosher meat. But some do - and more of us opt for kosher catering and other products for special occasions and holidays. I believe it is incumbent upon us to find out where these products are from and what kind of corporate citizens these companies are. The Conservative movement has unveiled a new designation “Heksher Tzedek” to help people identify products that are both kosher and made under a standard of just and fair labor practices. I urge those of you who buy kosher meat and other products to learn about this, to seek it out and make informed choices when you purchase these products.

But we must also do something more. The Agriprocessors mess was made by taking advantage of the incoherence and confusion of our immigration policies. Illegal immigrants were brought to this country to provide cheap labor for Jewish businesses. This not only violates our ethics, it also plays right into the worst anti-semitic canards ever flung at us. We must counteract the disgusting images of Jews exploiting poor immigrants for financial gain by speaking up loudly for justice in our immigration policies and labor laws.

These actions are Teshuva. And Teshuva, Tzedekah and Tefila, we are told, change the decree that our collective sins write for us in the book of life.

For the Bernie Madoff Scandal: We can’t repair all the damage that has been done, but we can, in small amounts; help support those institutions that have lost so much through no fault of their own. Think about redirecting some of your charitable donations to the organizations hardest hit by Madoff.

This is Tzedekah And Teshuva, Tzedekah and Tefila, we are told, change the decree that our collective sins write for us in the book of life.

And finally for the Organ dealing in New Jersey: This one we have the power to change. A simple act of atonement: every single member of this community should make sure that his or her license indicates donor status. The Jewish law is simple - we can do anything to save a life. And giving organs that we no longer use to someone else does in fact save lives. Can you imagine how many lives could be saved if every Jew became an organ donor?

This act, signing this card, is an act of Tefila - prayer. And Teshuva, Tzedekah and Tefila, we are told, change the decree that our collective sins write for us in the book of life

And just as the High Priest would declare after the goat was sent away carrying all collective sins of the Jewish people into the desert, we can say “All is Forgiven” May we be sealed in the book of life.

Posted: September 18th, 2009 under High Holidays, Sermons.
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Congregation on the brink: Rosh Hashana 1 5770

Last night I talked about the spiritual opportunities presented by the various personal and familial crises many of us are confronting - the individual traumas of our lives. This morning, I want to talk about the challenges - and also the opportunities - facing us as a community - specifically Congregation Agudas Achim, our community, our Jewish home, as we enter 5770.

I titled this sermon “Congregation on the Brink.” We are indeed a congregation on the brink - on the brink of what, you might ask? First off, we are on the brink of celebrating 1 century of existence. That’s right, Congregation Agudas Achim is 99 years old this year - and at next Rosh Hashanah, we will embark upon a year of celebration and commemoration marking one century of Jewish life in the Attleboros.

As you may have read in the newsletter or elsewhere, a number of efforts are in the works for the celebration: collaboration with the city’s library and arts museum will help us look at and appreciate Jewish life in America and this region in the past century; a committee is working diligently to explore the commissioning of a new Torah scroll to mark the occasion and we plan a gala fundraiser and endowment campaign to expand our resources and financial security. We are on the brink of quite a celebration.

I am both awed by the idea of a 100th birthday for the congregation and profoundly grateful to be a recipient of the legacy our ancestors in this community have built for us. Those first eleven families, a few descendants of whom still participate in our community, bequeathed to us a firm foundation of connections - they built Agudas Achim as an integral part of the fabric of this city, creating relationships and traditions that continue to enrich our lives and insure that we are not only welcomed warmly by our neighbors, but respected members and valued contributors to the wellbeing of all residents and citizens of the Attleboro area.

Members of our congregation have and continue to support the cultural establishments of our city, sit on the boards of Sturdy hospital, the Library and so much more. Two of Attleboro’s public schools are named for prominent members of our community - Hyman Fine and Joseph Finberg - and many of our members work as dedicated educators in this and other nearby districts. The synagogue has hosted numerous political rallies and events for the city and, as current spiritual leader, my opinion and participation is often sought out by civic groups, interfaith councils and our local newspaper.

They also bequeathed to us a solid love of Jewish tradition that has enabled this congregation to remain a vibrant, evolving, and constantly changing place of worship and celebration deeply grounded in our roots as an Orthodox synagogue serving the majority of traditional Jews in this area for so many years. Our cemetery in the southern end of town remains a traditional burial site, but has added an interfaith section in recent years to address our changing needs. Our service style may change and adapt, but we continue to follow the traditional calendar set down by our ancestors.

And finally, both the early founders and a later generation building upon them, have bequeathed to us a place - a location - this building - which, with no mortgage on it and the surrounding land around it is the most financially valuable asset of our community and the base from which we do so many wonderful things. If we did not own this building, we would not be able to whether the financial storms that plague our era.

In recent years we have built on that foundation to add additional layers: we have started an endowment fund to secure the future of our congregation, we have sought and received numerous grants from national and regional entities to implement innovative programs; we have created a new vision for communal learning and engagement, we have integrated Social Action and Social Services into the fabric of our congregational life and we have become a recognized leader in the national Reconstructionist movement, the Rhode Island Jewish community and in the Attleboro religious community.

We have so many gifts from our predecessors - so many wonderful, strong, foundational supports. Thinking of all this leaves me secure in the knowledge that 100 years is a long, long record that is not easily broken. Agudas Achim isn’t going any where - this congregation remains as vital and vibrant as the day it was founded.

We have a lot to be proud of and a lot to be grateful for - we are indeed on the brink of quite a celebration and the dawn of another 100 years.

And, and, and we are on another brink as well.

Like so much of the American Jewish community we are living in a rapidly changing environment for Jewish life. Our population is shrinking and aging - particularly outside of the major metropolitan areas. People live further and further apart and are increasingly “busy” with the business of daily American life. Individuals are more and more dependant on technology to communicate and interact with the world at large. And, in a world where anything and everything is available at the click of a mouse, twenty-four hours a day, the traditional patters of Jewish life, synagogue attendance, Hebrew school, etc, are becoming harder and harder to sustain.
Here at Agudas Achim, we have seen a sharp decline in our school population. When I arrived here 9 years ago, we had close to 80 students in our school. Today, we have just about 40.

Mind you, our over all population size has remained the same - some people have left, others have joined. And more and more of the people coming to our doors are adults seeking a meaningful place for themselves in their life journeys. It is exciting and rewarding to see so many adults seeking Jewish learning and connection.

But the decline of our school population, the fact that we are not seeing the influx of young families with school age children that we once saw, must give us some pause. Where are the young families? How are they - or aren’t they - educating their children and raising them in the context of lived community?

Additionally, just as it has every where in American Jewish life, the economic realities of the Jewish community have undergone a radical shift in recent years. Yes -there are still some very, very wealthy Jews in America - although significantly fewer than their used to be. But in general, Jewish wealth has become concentrated in a few very wealthy foundations and organizations while the rest of the community - including us here at Agudas Achim, are members of that rapidly disappearing and financially stressed group called “the middle class.”

It used to be the case that synagogues were sustained by the generosity of a small number of very generous donor-families. Yes - every body else paid dues and gave what they could. But if a new Torah was needed, a few more classrooms built, or a new roof required, the rabbi or the president would turn to the “community’s angels” and the resources would be there. While I believe that generosity has not decreased - people still give what they can - and probably at a higher percentage of income for some than they used to - the capacity simply isn’t there any more.

As life in general has become more expensive - mortgages, car payments, health insurance, children’s school and sports expenses eating up more and more of a two-income household’s pay - available cash to support communal endeavors have decreased. And as Jews have become more integrated into larger society, there are more causes and organizations we want to support.

Whereas fifty years ago, almost all of a Jewish household’s charitable giving went to support the Jewish community, now, we find ourselves in competition with museums and theaters, athletic leagues, the Jimmy Fund and other health related causes, Habitat for Humanity, hunger organizations and more. It is good that Jews are so involved in our communities and so committed to supporting these organizations. But it does mean fewer donation dollars for synagogues.

And finally, the rapid explosion of new technologies and means of communicating raise challenges to our notions of how to create community like nothing ever has before.
Although I am still not sure what to make of online and virtual prayer minyans, I am amazed at the varieties and abundance of Jewish life on the internet. As a colleague recently pronounced, “Cyberspace is the fastest growing and most radical Jewish resource since the creation of the Talmud.” Using this technology - using it well - takes time, money, fore thought and patience and is something we at Agudas Achim have only just started to explore.

In fact, later this fall, I will be taking a class in social networking and Facebook/twitter as resources for synagogue outreach. [Half the people in this room are saying “it’s about time” and the other half have no idea what I am talking about].

So as we approach our 100th year we are on the brink of both a great celebration and enormous challenges. I believe, together, they create one amazing opportunity. As Marcia so elegantly spelled out a few minutes ago, the board - volunteer lay leaders all - is committed to working through these issues, to exploring new responses. We are embarking on a strategic planning process to enable us to think creatively and “strategically” in meeting these challenges. We are investigating the use of a consultant to help us with the technological aspect of these challenges - upgrading our web site, creating new content and streamlining and unifying our marketing materials to reach newer potential members in the area. We are taking a hard look at our school - trying to capitalize on the smallness of size with individualized learning and flexible scheduling. We continue to work with other agencies and organizations, brining in the resources of the larger Jewish community to us here n Attleboro, striving to create a one-stop-shopping environment for all your Jewish and communal needs.

The challenges are great, but so are the opportunities. Our leaders are up to the task, and I believe I am up to the task, of meeting them with grace, creativity and success. But the most important key to our future - to deciding if this brink we face is a springboard vaulting us to greater heights or a precipice from which we fall into spiraling decline, is you: the members of our community.

You are what makes this place real - more than the walls around us. You can decide to commit - or recommit to Jewish communal life, to engaging, to being a part of this endeavor we call Agudas Achim, or you can opt out and leave it to a shrinking pool of others. If you are a visitor - come back, get on our mailing list, and see what we have to offer. If you are regular “non-member,” join. Just saying you are a part of us, by filling out the forms and contributing what you can - remember we have a fair share dues policy - strengthens us. If you are a former member - consider coming back. Or consider a significant gift to our endowment so that others will have the benefits that you once had. If you are a member - explore, commit to being a part of one committee, help organize one program.

Our community is on the brink - crisis or greatness - it can go either way. Your action, in the next year, will help us determine which it will be.

Shana Tova, may this be a year of growth and exploration, learning and celebration for all of us. And may all of us reach our 100th year in health and wellbeing.

Rabbi Elyse Wechterman

Posted: September 19th, 2009 under High Holidays, Sermons.
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Rosh Hashana 1 5770, September, 2009

This past year, if there is one thing that we have learned as individuals, as a community, as a nation, it is that our security - our financial security (if we ever had it); the security of our health and physical integrity (temporary as it may be); the security of knowing what our future is likely to look like - is, and always was an illusion.

We have entered a time of deep anxiety, fear, instability and insecurity. Since last year, the market crash has disrupted the hopes, expectations, and life plans of many of our retired or near-retired members. Since last year, at least 14 families - probably more - have experienced job loss, furloughs or extended unemployment - more than one tenth of our congregation.
And within this last year, at least a dozen of our households are coping with new or recurrent diagnoses of life-threatening illnesses - most often cancer.

Rancor and bitterness fill the airwaves as the leaders of our nation debate means of providing basic health insurance to all of us. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - sapping our nation’s resources and the lives of our youth, continue, although so quietly in the background, we barely even pay attention, only to look up once in a while when a local soldier is brought home dead.

And the scandals - the bank scandals, the finance scandals, the political scandals, and yes - even the rabbi-selling-organs scandal, continue unabated.

It’s a time of deep anxiety.

We’ve been here before - eight years ago last week our country was viciously attacked, the World Trade Center, symbols of American prosperity, were destroyed. We were on the brink of war; all of us held our breath in shock, and waited for the next shoe to drop.

But this is different. Then, the fear united us, brought us together - Jew, Christian, rich, poor - we were all attacked, we all felt threatened and we responded together.

As awful as 9/11 was - and it was awful - it brought out the best of America and of our communities. We threw the doors of this synagogue wide open, and joined every other house of worship in the country in an embrace of solace and comfort.
Today, I have a very different sense of things. Those of us who have lost their jobs stay home. Those with jobs look over our shoulders and wonder, who’s next? Those who have taken ill cope the best we can - but don’t want to burden any one. Those who are healthy turn away, wishing there was something we could do, yet immobile in our helplessness.

Today’s threats, economic displacement, loss of health, loss of self-reliance and individual identity, are not the kinds of threats that naturally bring people together. These threats are the ones that drive us apart, push people away from each other, increase isolation, increase despair.

It scares me. But I refuse to lose hope and refuse to bow to my own natural instincts to shore up the bunkers, stock up for the long haul and batten the hatches. I refuse to withdraw. And, although I know there is very little I can do about economic realities, the nature and process of illness nor the happenstance of our lives, I will not let go of my conviction that redemption - healing and wholeness - is always possible and my belief that the way forward is always together.

Eight years ago, I looked to the sources of Judaism for guidance during that time of communal catastrophe - and found there much wisdom. Today, too, I turned to our sources for inspiration in times of individual and idiosyncratic trouble. And I was not disappointed. As Jews, after all, we know a little something about suffering.

The Talmud tells us, in Brachot 5a: “if a person sees that suffering comes to him, let him examine his deeds.”

For much of Jewish history this was understood to mean that the bad things that happen to people are deserved, are some kind of divine retribution for sins both known and unknown. “He must have done something to lose that job, she must have been careless to get that illness.” This blame the victim mentality is reprehensible, despicable and ultimately - simply not true. We know that. We can’t abide the notion that these troubles that afflict us are deserved - we won’t be mollified with platitudes that are simply false - and potentially hurtful.
But, the reality is here; troubles have befallen us. What can we do?

A different way to read the text, as suggested by Rabbi Doniell Hartman says that “When suffering comes to you, you may not be able to do much about it (the specific crisis), but you can do something about yourself (your stance, perspective, attitude in the world).”

No, it isn’t an explanation of the cause of suffering - no explanation is humanly possible. But it does open up, instead, an opportunity for the one who suffers. The teaching is urging us not to waste the spiritual opportunity in a material crisis. It is asking us to think: What might we learn from these difficult times? How might we grow? It is inviting us to a deeper examination and into a series of much more profound and relevant questions:

How have we been complacent, stuck in our ways? How have we held on to things that really don’t matter - what, indeed, does really matter? What do we want to do with the time, space, health, money we do have, at this very moment?

Does the loss of a job open up more time to spend with family, to volunteer in a meaningful way, to expand my education? Can the end of one career help me reclaim my center, my identity, which for so long was defined by “what I do” rather than “who I am?”

Does loss of income mean figuring out how to do more with less? Learning to distinguish better between needs and wants? Can learning to accept other people’s good will be a lesson in the value of true humility and the sin of false pride?

Does illness provide me the incentive to live every moment to its fullest? Can I learn to internalize how precious life and love are? Does weakness allow me the opportunity to accept help from others, to fully know what it means to be cared for and loved by another?

Can I learn to share my despair, both as a way to lighten my load and to lift someone else’s? Can admitting my vulnerability, showing it to loving friends, in fact provide me with a different, richer strength?

Can loss of ability, financial, physical or otherwise, allow me to drop the mask of self-sufficiency I wear and become a doorway to greater authenticity with the ones I love?

If I am healthy or able, or even if I am not, can I be present for others? Can I offer more of myself, my resources, and my time than I thought? Can I learn to sit in the presence of pain without needing to fix it or control it or make it go away?

If I am able and well, if I have a job that supports me and fulfils me, can I ask myself, even yet, what more can I do? Can I go beyond the familiar, beyond my comfort zone to make myself available, to reach out and give more. Can I see the pain and suffering of those around as a call to action - as a call to re-evaluate where I put my energies?

Can I see my blessings as a gift to be shared, not horded remembering Rabbi Hillel’s teaching that, “If I am for myself alone, what am I?”

For all of us, can I learn to hold the blessings of this life in the same hand as the curses? Can I learn to see that all I thought I had - my health; my job; my home; my very sense of security - are, as Rabbi Hartman further said, fleeting, momentary and that our lives really are, as we say in the prayers we read this morning, dust.

Can I - can we learn to only hold on to what is eternal: God, holiness, the spirit that we see in the outstretched hand of the other? Can we learn to cherish what is essential, the giving and receiving of love?

As we know, the word in Chinese for crisis is the same word as opportunity. So what opportunity have we been granted this year, this season through the varieties of crises that plague our community? Does changing our perspective, asking ourselves these questions in some way change our reality?

The facts remain the same - unemployment, illness, fear.

And yet, from the teaching in the Talmud to examine our deeds; by the words of today’s liturgy that reminds us that Tzedekah - righteousnees, Tefilah- prayerfulness and Teshuvah - turning and returning toward one another - may not change the circumstances, but make easier the decree; from the very commandment of the Torah to choose life over death, blessing over curse, we do in fact change the very nature of our lives.

“If a person sees that suffering comes to him, let him examine his deeds.” Not to find fault, not to place blame, but to regain our composure, rejuvenate our commitment, reignite our compassion and redeem our conviction that the world is a beautiful place, that love is always possible and that life is inherently meaningful.

Shana Tova.

Posted: September 19th, 2009 under High Holidays, Sermons.
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The haftarah that we just read this morning, those beautiful words from Isaiah, call on us to turn from this most holy of days, from our fast and our prayers and our petitions for a good year to the work of building a just society.

“This is the fast I desire:
To unlock the fetters of wickedness,
And untie the cords of the yoke
To let the oppressed go free;
To break off every yoke.
It is to share your bread with the hungry,
And to take the wretched poor into your home;
When you see the naked, to clothe him,
And not to ignore your own kin.”

Isaiah envisions a world in which our prayers, our study, our fast, our work here today informs the very fabric of our lives and provides a moral guidepost for the decisions we make that bear on society as a whole. And no where is this more in need today than in the conversation about health care in this country.

I am astounded at the nature of the rhetoric in this national debate. The fear tactics and lies spread by one side to panic those who do have health insurance into thinking they may lose it is met with counter arguments that focus on the rising costs, increased deficits and financial strains of health care in this country. Lost in the debate is the very real fact that 46 million Americans do not have health insurance, and over a quarter of a million people have died, since 1994, from treatable illnesses and lack of access to care.

I have to wonder what Isaiah would say if he were here today.

Chance are, he would be as outraged as I am by the tenor of the debate and he would seek to raise the level of discourse out of the realm of narrow self-interest and political one-upmanship to the larger questions of morality, responsibility and community that he raised again and again in his own time.

I can only hope that we would listen and heed his words.

As Jewish citizens, we have a role to play in this debate and resources to share - our tradition has much to add to the conversation and it is our right - maybe even our duty - to raise up a perspective based our teachings, experiences, and insights in creating the just society Isaiah imagined.

Recently, on a visit to the United States during which he became appalled at the broken nature of our health care delivery system, Rabbi Immanuel Jakobvitz, former chief rabbi of Great Britain, said, “I hear about millions of people who are not covered by any form of health insurance. We as Jews should be on the forefront of advocating and alerting public opinion to the urgent necessity of remedying a major fault in the structure of society.” He went on to say, “We ought to resume our role as Jews to play a part in the advance of moral concerns, in the preservation of human health and life. These are issues which are not merely marginal to Jewish concerns, but central to the Jewish purpose.”

And indeed, I suggest that if there is to be found any meaning in our coming together at this time of year, any meaning at all from our prayers and fasts, it will be found in how we take Isaiah’s words to heart and Rabbi Jakobvitz call to action and in how we add our voice to this unfolding debate that really is a matter of life and death to many in our society.

Any conversation about Jewish perspectives on health care and health reform must start with the basic biblical assertion that all human beings are created “Betzelem Elohim” - in God’s image. All humans manifest God’s image, all humans contain within them the spark of divinity. As such, all human life is understood to be a precious gift - any diminishment of that gift is an affront to God; any valuation of any one life over another is unimaginable. The right to live as healthy a life as possible is inherent on every single one of us and can not be thrown away lightly. To be a just society, we must, at the very least, make it possible for all who require healing to access the most basic forms of health care.

The secondary principle on which the Jewish conversation must rest is the obligation, stressed over and over again throughout the biblical texts, to help those less fortunate then ourselves - to care for the orphan, the widow, the sick. Our prayers imagine God as a healer and instruct us to act in God’s ways. It is our responsibility to shape a society in which the less fortunate are cared for and have their most basic needs met - including access to medical care.

And thirdly, rabbis of our tradition derive the specific commandment to heal, to work for the health of another person from two specific texts of the Torah. The first is found in Leviticus 19:16 - the very text we will read this afternoon. “Do not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor,” is taken to mean that if you have the means of saving someone from mortal danger, if you have the knowledge, resources or ability to heal someone or help some one - even to prevent someone form becoming ill, you must do so.

And finally, Moses Miamonides, a physician and scholar of the 13th century reads the commandment to return lost objects to its owner to include returning health and wellbeing to a sick person.

From the Torah’s point of view - and from the readings of the prophets, it is clear that providing for the health of all members of society is a Jewish moral imperative.

“But how,” You may say, “And at what cost?”

While the Torah may not outline specific public policies around the provision of health care, the Jewish people have long sought to implement systems that ensure care for all members of a community. As early as the middle ages, responsa, Jewish legal opinions were written forbidding scholars to live in a town that had no doctors. The Shulchan Aruch, the most comprehensive code of Jewish law written in the 16th Century prioritizes the use of communal funds to care for the sick over other communal obligations - including the building of a synagogue.

Rabbi Eliezer Waldenburg wrote in a legal opinion in the early part of the last century that “It has been enacted in every place in which Jews live; the community sets aside a fund to care for the sick. When poor people are ill and cannot afford medical expenses, the community sends a doctor to visit them and the medicine is paid for by the communal fund.”

And, as my colleague Rabbi Jill Jacobs has pointed out, the founders of the State of Israel instituted a universal, if imperfect, health care system administered by a quasi-government agency as one of their first orders of business, outside of fighting the war of independence.

The system in Israel, by the way, is a single payer system that, for most of the people, most of the time, works quite well and is the envy a many other small nations. And the availability of advanced technologies, expensive procedures and cutting edge research rivals that of some of the best hospital systems in the United States, belying the notion that universal coverage means lower quality care for every one.

And that leads me to what I believe is at the heart of the rhetoric in our country and the reason for so much fear mongering and scare tactics: Some people believe that health care for all by necessity, by the nature of limited resources, must result in less health care, less access, less security for those who already have health insurance. Some people believe that there is no way America can take care of all of its citizens and inevitably, we would end up rationing care, setting up panels to pit one person’s needs over another. We would triage care in a way that would leave some worse off, presumably, then they are today.

Rabbi Marc Gellman says that “our tradition supports triage when a society has limited resources and must select among various possible beneficiaries. But what we have in America today is false triage,” meaning that we in fact do have the resources we need to provide access to health care fo all of our citizens, we simply lack the political and communal will to make it so.

This too is a notion Jews have struggled with before. The Midrash tells the story of Rabbi Joshua Ben Levi who traveled on a mission to Rome - then the occupying force of ancient Israel. While there, he saw the magnificent statues erected in the squares throughout the city. He saw that those statues were draped in rich tapestries and expensive cloth to protect them from the elements. But at the same time, he also beheld men, wearing nothing but rags and tatters, resting at the feet of many of these statues. Rabbi Joshua marveled at the contrast and returned home more hopeful of Israel’s future then when he left. For he knew then that Rome, capitol of the civilized world, would rapidly fade into insignificance. For a city where statues wear robes and human beings wear rags can not long endure.

We Jews have an opportunity to bring this wisdom to the debate - to help this country find its way. We ca help guide the course - will America become the embodiment of Isaiah’s vision or, like Rome, a fading empire that can not care for it’s most needy citizens?

Today, if we take one thing from reading Isaiah, it is that we must raise our voices and point to a just world where in all human beings, created in God’s image, are cared for and treated with dignity, respect and the health care that our tradition says is a basic right.

Posted: September 28th, 2009 under High Holidays, Sermons.
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