Sukkot: By the Seat of Our Pants

We just got back from a ten-day trip around the north of Israel (with a brief visit to Ein Gedi and the Dead Sea in the south along the way). This album is called "Sukkot: By the Seat of Our Pants" because everything we did was planned on the day it happened (if not later). And yet, we still had a wonderful time! Below, check out our pictures.

Follow this link to view the pictures on Picasa.

Gilad Shalit: It's Complicated

This post is by Daniel and Leah

When people ask us what it’s like to live in Israel, the answer is almost always the same: “It’s complicated.”

Over the past five years one of the most unifying issues in Israeli society has been the desired release of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who was abducted by Hamas in 2006 at the age of 19. On all sides of the political spectrum, the objective was clear—bring Gilad home. It was an issue that everyone could stand behind.

Tuesday morning, Gilad returned home. After five years of solitary confinement, no humanitarian aid or contact with the outside world, a gaunt and pale Shalit was returned to Israel and his family.

On a day which could have been marked by joyous celebration, the mood in Israel is decidedly heavy. Gilad’s return has come at quite a cost. In exchange for Shalit’s release, Israel agreed to return 1,027 Palestinian prisoners. It’s not the disproportionate 1-for-1,027 ratio that’s most troubling, but rather the résumés of the Palestinian prisoners who went free this morning. Among them are men and women convicted of terror attacks and murder. These people were not held in captivity for Israel’s diplomatic gain, but for committing serious crimes.

So how are we to feel on a day that is both joyous and somber?

On the one hand, we are overjoyed at the release of Gilad Shalit and his reunion with his family. The images of the boy being embraced by his father after five years of separation stir tremendous empathy. For Gilad, his family, and supporters around the world, this is the day they’ve been dreaming of.

On the other hand, how can one rejoice when murders and terrorists are being let free? After the deal was brokered, there were indeed many Israelis who protested the prisoner swap. Family members of terror victims petitioned the high court to stop the exchange. However, fearing that the window of opportunity to bring Gilad home wouldn’t stay open long, the court rejected the petitions and the exchange went forth as planned. For these people, whose lives have been ripped by terror, this is the day they’ve been dreading.

World leaders are hailing the exchange as a step in the right direction for the stalled peace process. Many are hopeful that this exchange will show that with hard work and negotiation, progress can be made. Indeed, both Israel and the Palestinians are hailing this day as a victory.

But one has to worry that “victory” may be too strong a word. In Gaza this morning, crowds lined the streets to celebrate the prisoners’ return. “The people want a new Gilad!” the crowd chanted, the implication being that if Hamas abducts more Israeli soldiers, Israel will be forced to release more convicted Palestinian prisoners. To the crowd, Shalit was not a human prisoner but a diplomatic bargaining chip.

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So the question becomes not “How do we feel?” but rather “How do we reconcile these conflicting feelings?” We’re at once joyful and mournful, hopeful and skeptical. It is impossible to erase one emotion to simplify the day.

It seems that the new developments in the Gilad episode reinforce our recurring motto: “It’s complicated.” And there’s no simple solution. The best we can do is learn to be comfortable with our discomfort, and continue to work and hope for a day when Israel and its neighbors can live together in peace.

Recommended reading (articles we've found helpful):

"Israel's Joy Tempered by Memories of an Intifadeh"

"Everyone's Son"

Misguided Heroism

This post is by Daniel
Last weekend, our class took a study trip to the Galilee region to learn about Israel’s early pioneers. On the trip, we visited the historical settlement of Tel Hai, the site of the first major skirmish between Jews and Arabs in Palestine. Tel Hai was established as a Jewish settlement in the early 20th century. At the end of World War I, the French and the British divided between themselves the lands of the former Ottoman Empire. Most Jewish settlements wound up in British territory, except for four sites, including Tel Hai. The surrounding Arab population was skeptical of the French, and thought Tel Hai might have been harboring French sympathizers. A group of Arabs was allowed to enter the settlement to look around. There was some miscommunication between the Jews and the Arabs and fighting broke out. Eight Jewish settlers were killed. Below, my response to the site.

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I was struck by our visit to Tel Hai. Before all else, it strikes me as peculiar that the focus of this site is not on Jewish-Arab relations, but rather on Jewish heroism. I expected Tel Hai, as “the site of the first major skirmish between Jews and Arabs in Palestine,” to engender a discussion on Arab responses to the chalutzim. I could imagine here a sensitive conversation on the role of otherness in Israel, on pioneering compared to colonization, on the difference between critical history and collective memory. Rather, this site politicized as a symbol of military courage. Mine is not a critique of our trip leaders, but rather of how the site fits into the Israeli national narrative. It makes me wonder how Tel Hai fits into the Palestinian national narrative.

I see in Trumpeldor’s dying words—“It is good to die for one’s country”—a rejection of the Old World experience. In its circumstances, the incident at Tel Hai very much resembles a pogrom. The surrounding majority enters a Jewish settlement; violence erupts; people are injured and killed. A pogrom is a catastrophe, but Tel Hai is a victory. Trumpeldor is seen not as a victim but a hero. At least in Palestine, a Jew can be killed for his country.

I can’t accept that it is good to die for one’s country. Har Hertzl, Israel's national cemetery, is not a “good” place. It’s a place of mourning, of sadness, of tragedy. I easily see a connection between Tel Hai and the suicide at Masada. Indeed, suicide was disproportionately common during the 2nd and 3rd waves of olim. Suicide accounted for 12% of all deaths. That’s nearly 1 in 8! History has labeled the Masada suicide as committed by “zealots.” Suicides tear families apart. We at once praise Trumpeldor’s martyrdom and condemn suicide bombers. Both types of bravery are misguided.

We see at Tel Hai a shift in the Jewish psyche. For the first time in centuries, we see Jews refusing to apologize for circumstances beyond their control. There are classic stories from the Old Country that you might live in Poland, but one day wake up to discover that your village is suddenly a part of Prussia. When Tel Hai suddenly became French, its inhabitants refused to apologize. This attitude is bold but dangerous. Still today, Israel can’t apologize for fear of looking weak. Imagine if this were how an adult acted in marriage—the marriage would break apart from inflexibility.

I say all this to illustrate what role place should not play in Judaism. While I’m glad that the Jewish state is in Israel rather than Uganda, I’d like Israel to be more flexible in order to achieve peace. I’d like to see greater compromise. As world leaders encourage Israel to pursue a two-state solution, I hope the settlers in the West Bank can reimagine what Tel Hai might symbolize. With a little more flexibility, there might yet be hope for peace.

Turkish Delight

Just got back from an AMAZING 9-day vacation in Turkey. Below, check out our pictures from Istanbul, Efes, Pamukkale, and Cappadocia.

Follow this link to view the pictures on Picasa.

Beit Cafe

Last night we performed at the HUC Beit Cafe (coffee house/talent show). Check out our performance in the video below.

Destruction and Mourning

Last night, on erev Tisha B’Av, we went to the Western Wall and had a fascinating experience. Below, our conversation and the event that followed.

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Daniel:

The Kotel on erev Tisha B'Av 

I have conflicted feelings about Tisha B’Av. Traditionally, the holiday commemorates the destruction of the First and Second Temples. From my observation, mourning the loss of the Temple necessarily means hoping for a Third Temple. Indeed, just outside the Kotel Plaza, we saw miniature models of a rebuilt Third Temple. Are people suggesting that we destroy The Dome of the Rock? On other days in the Old City, we’ve seen dream-like paintings of the Jerusalem countryside with the Third Temple in its center, smoke from the sacrificial offering ascending to heaven. Is the ethical Judaism we practice today not sufficient?

What has sustained the Jews for thousands of years is adaptability to change. Jews have been their most successful in the Diaspora. The Middle Ages in Spain saw a blossoming of Jewish religious, cultural, and economic life. Jews in America today are the most prosperous Jewish community in history. The Purim story in Sushan, problematic as it is, stands as the first account of Jewish triumph in the Diaspora. Our intransigence has cultivated our creativity. And yet, life in the Diaspora has been hard for the Jewish people. In Spain and in Shushan, our golden ages eventually met a tragic end. Tisha B’Av reminds me of our frailty.

For 2000 years, our people have hoped to return to the land of Israel, to Jerusalem. Today we’re here. As a professor at HUC put it, we’ve already achieved a modern Third Temple—the State of Israel. I was moved on Tisha B’Av by the sight of an Israeli flag flying in the Kotel Plaza. This is a symbol of our triumph.

And yet, Israel itself is frail. Were the country ever to collapse or be destroyed, Jews worldwide would feel the effects. For all its complications, I love deeply what Israel symbolizes. I get physical anxiety thinking of the consequences of a destroyed Jewish state. It gives new resonance to Psalm 137, written after the Destruction of the First Temple: “By the rivers of Babylon we wept, remembering Zion.”


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Leah:
To me Tisha B’Av is a day to remember and acknowledge our scars—the scars of our people as well as our personal scars. When I said this to Daniel, he asked, “Then why do we gather here at the Kotel, at the ruins of the First and Second Temples?” After some thought I offered, “It’s like visiting the grave of a loved one that has passed. We don’t bring flowers and weep over a tombstone in hope that the deceased will come back to life. We go to remember, to mourn. To try to find closeness to that which has been lost.”

When we break a bone or tear open our skin, we are left with scars, some that we will see for the rest of our lives. Yet these scars are often far less painful than the unseen lacerations we carry within. We’ve all had destructions in our lives, things that have quite literally shattered us. Regardless of why and how we’ve been shattered, these destructions are a part of our history. To let them go unacknowledged diminishes the power of our resiliency. That is to say, I believe that we are stronger and more resilient for our tragedies than for our triumphs.

Suffering is not a concept that I often indulge in. I’ve always had a light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel kind of attitude, and not a sit-in-the-tunnel-and-throw-a-party-for-the-darkness kind of attitude. But this is a holiday that encourages us to stay in the darkness, to remember our destructions. As we sat on the stones that line the Kotel Plaza, my invisible scars came to light—images of heartbreak, loss, personal exile, and true devastation. As the tears fell down my face, I mourned. I grieved for the broken pieces of my past and faced the scars that they’ve left. Faced with these scars, I found tremendous faith, faith in the resiliency of the human spirit. With time and with love we heal. Our scars can serve as a poetic reminder of all that we’ve overcome.

On Tisha B’Av we come to the Kotel, a living wound of our broken past, and we mourn. On this day, acknowledging our scars is a way of owning them. We return to the destroyed temple to grieve our losses and hopefully to understand our resiliency, which is another way of saying exactly the same thing.


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Together:
The Talmud teaches that the theological reason for the destruction of the Temple was senseless hatred.

We were sitting in the Kotel Plaza having this emotional conversation about Tisha B’Av. Leah put her head on my shoulder, and I put my arm around her back. A few seconds later, an older man walked up to us with an angry look on his face. (It’s forbidden to engage in romance on Tisha B’Av.) He motioned at us, shooing us away from each other, telling us in Hebrew that we shouldn’t be hugging. “We’re comforting each other,” I said in English. He moved closer and continued to scold us. I tried to tell him to leave us alone, but he grew more enraged. Not wanting to make a scene, we got up, grabbed each other by the hand, and left the Plaza.

What if we had been two men or two women comforting each other? Would this have been forbidden?

We went to the Kotel seeking an honest and nuanced connection with this challenging holiday. We sat and discussed and grew and remembered. And then, with the simple flick of a hand, our connection was destroyed.

We came to the Kotel to mourn. We left with a new scar.

How Do You Spell the Word "Yarmulke"?

This post is by Daniel

On the first day of rabbinical school, I started wearing a kippah. Having grown up at Jewish summer camp, the tradition of wearing a yarmulke always felt a bit formal. While working at Hillel, I would wear a kippah for Shabbat services, but would usually take it off for dinner. It just seemed like another article of clothing to have to straighten.

During HUC orientation, we listened to a talk from the VP of Academic Affairs, Dr. Michael Marmur. He spoke about his difficulty answering students when they ask: “Will we be expected to know (blank)? Will there be a test on (blank)?” As future leaders of the Jewish people, he says, we will be expected to know just about everything. We’re taking on the responsibility of bearing a 3,000-year-old heritage. It is important for us to realize, Dr. Marmur notes, that there is no way a five-year program could ever teach us the entirety of Jewish tradition. For exactly this reason, we can never take off our Judaism. That is to say, we can’t live a life divided between what we need to know and what we don’t.

HUC asks us to come to Shabbat services at the College a certain number of times throughout the year. That doesn’t mean that during the other weeks, we have Shabbat off. It isn’t as if the College has a certain quota of Shabbat services they expect us to fill. Rather, there’s a certain life they hope we’ll choose to live. Dr. Marmur wants each of us not to be a “bifurcated person”—a person who is divided. As Jewish leaders living Jewish lives, we must strive to be a whole person—to be as wholly ourselves as we can be in all situations.

It’s a natural tendency to for a person to act one way in certain groups and act another way in other groups. For example, when spending time with family, I have a tendency to revert to old behavior patterns, based on historical family roles. I become the youngest child again, the baby, quietly watching the action unfold around me, often irritable when I don’t get my way. When I act this way, I usually regret it and wish instead that I could at all times be “my best me.” I’m working hard on this balance.

For this reason, I really connected with Dr. Marmur’s words. I came home that afternoon and told Leah I was thinking about starting to wear a kippah full time. A couple days later, I was talking with a classmate who wears a kippah and mentioned I was thinking of starting. The next day, we passed each other on the way to class. He stopped me, reached in his pocket and pulled out a kippah. “I thought you might want to have this.” That was the start.

I have a dark-colored kippah for everyday use and a white one for Shabbat, holidays, and special occasions. I wear the dark one so as not to attract unwanted attention. In Israel, a kippah is often a religious or political statement. Various groups wear their kippot in different positions, colors, and sizes. (For more on this topic, see the film The Transparent Kippah.) In some neighborhoods and on some occasions, I choose not to wear one at all. I'm not wearing a kippah to make a statement. I'm wearing it for me.

I recognize what a growth opportunity this year in Israel and this rabbinical training represents. The way I see it, I can sit back, take everything in, and let the change happen to me. Or I can reach out and grab it, embrace the change.

Several folks have asked if I plan to keep wearing it when I get back to the States. As of now, I don’t know. Other folks have asked me how it’s going so far. It has its ups and downs. Unsurprisingly, putting on a kippah didn’t suddenly make me self-actualized. It does, however, serve as reminder to strive to be my best me, while at home and while away, when I lie down and when I rise up.