Recently in Jews Category

ABC's Nightline has been running a series on the Ten Commandments in which they explore the issues and dimensions of each commandment in contemporary society.   Tonight's commandment:  Thou shalt not commit adultery.

The series is interesting and, in many ways, inclusive.  After all, the Ten Commandments form the ethical basis of the world's three great monotheistic religions.  Jews, Christians, and Muslims draw inspiration from them and, throughout history, developed the insights of the commandments in theological, moral, social, and legal arenas.  They are very important spiritually, morally, intellectually, and culturally.

But for all their inclusiveness, their interpretation is often the source of division.  It is one thing to say, "Thou shalt not...." and it is often a completely different thing to figure out how the "shalt nots" relate to human experience.  For, despite the moral idealism of the commandments, everyone knows that human beings actually do the "shalt nots."

"Thou shalt not commit adultery" is a good example of the problem with the commandments.  Martial fidelity is a practical way of honoring and respecting one's partner.  To be faithful--even when one might not "feel" like it--is a fundamental way of respecting another human being by taking into their feelings, emotions, and commitments before simply acting on one's personal inclinations.  To stop and think about the effects of one's actions on a larger community (in the case of adultery, thinking about a spouse and children) often inhibits bad choices.  That's a big part of morality--to reflect on one's actions in advance and to consider the communal consequences of behavior.  Moral frameworks--like the Ten Commandments--provide guidelines for such reflection.  And, as such, they form a vision for what constitutes the good society--a society that honors God and neighbor.

The problem comes with the obvious fact that human beings--even reflective and caring ones--don't always act in a way that honors God and neighbor.  We both flaunt and break the commandments on a regular basis.  So, what does society do with the violators?

Throughout history, religious groups have tried to enforce the Ten Commandments through legal means.  We might all agree that theft and murder are wrong and that thieves and murderers should go to prison.  But what about the "lesser" commandments--like adultery?  In Jesus' day, women caught in adultery could be stoned--and that is still the case in many countries around the world.  In early American history, adulterers could be whipped, jailed, divorced with their permission, or forced (as in The Scarlet Letter) to wear a public mark of shame. 

To point up the problem with adultery is only the beginning.  What of those who swear, lie, or worship other gods?  Should society make swearing a crime?  Idolatry?  Being angry at your parents?  Where does this end?  In some sort of Taliban-style legalism where the religion police enforce a literal interpretation of each of these Ten Commandments?  Do we rank the commandments in order of importance?  The bad ones get the most punishment?  The minor ones get overlooked?  The Ten Commandments--for all their moral grandeur--quickly descend into an ethical quagmire of angels dancing on the head of pins. 

The answer is obvious:  Very few people take the Ten Commandments literally.  We contextualize them, trying to discern the origin, intent, and purpose of these commandments in order to create a way of life that demonstrates the deeper wisdom of these teachings.  And we recognize the human disposition toward breaking them--and, to a greater or lesser degree, we offer forgiveness, understanding, and reconciliation toward one another in regard to the Ten Commandments.  And religious communities argue about how much forgiveness, understanding, and reconciliation is appropriate in any given denomination or tradition.   

Taking the Commandments out of context is spiritually and politically dangerous.  To hold up these ten commandments--in Hebrew they aren't even called "commandments;" rather, the Hebrew word is "terms"--to hold up these ten terms of the moral law without reference to the larger intent of the words leads to legalism, violence, and repression.  God intended for the Law to be joyful, a pathway for a way of life of devotion and respect for one other, a blessing and not a curse. Indeed, Jesus--a rabbi himself--made this point.  When asked what was the most important of the commandments, he replied:  "Love God and love your neighbor as yourself." 

That is the summary--the intended wisdom--of the Ten Commandments.  The ten terms of the law should bring us to the basis for a good life:  love.   Is it loving to murder, steal, curse, violate our vows, lie, envy or demean another?  That should be the first question of morality--and it is what the Ten Commandments teach.  

With yesterday's shooting at the Holocaust museum, I was reminded of a story told to me several years ago by a professor of when he had been a doctoral student. 

An eminent post-modern theologian had come to his university to deliver a lecture on morality.  The guest insisted that morality was completely embedded in culture, "and that there was nothing that was universally wrong from one culture to another.  "Nothing," he insisted, "there is nothing that has been wrong in all places, all times, and to all people."  Then he added, "I dare you.  I dare you to tell me one thing--one thing--that is always wrong!"

My friend, whom I knew to be a liberal Democrat and was also a serious Methodist, rather sheepishly raised his hand.  "You there," the famous lecturer called on him, "can you tell me something that is always morally wrong?"  The young student responded shakily, "I think so.  One shouldn't burn Jews in ovens?"

The post-modern theologian stopped, and he looked as Paul might have on the road to Damascus.  "That's right," he thundered.  "One shouldn't burn Jews in ovens.  That is one, universally true moral principle." 

Well, there it is.  A universal moral principle--along with a corresponding principle, "One shouldn't walk into the Holocaust museum and start shooting people."

Yesterday, all of the news commentators agreed that James W. Von Brunn's action was morally wrong.  And, whenever a criminal breaks violates the communal moral conscience, everybody asks, "Why?"  What was the source of his evil?  Where did he go wrong?  What triggered this episode?

As pundits discuss these questions on the airwaves, their answers will fall into two predictable camps.  Conservatives will emphasize that Von Brunn was a "lone wolf," a deeply troubled man, who, acted on a bad belief (hatred of Jews) and made a bad choice (to pick up a gun and shoot people).   Liberals will analyze anti-Semitism, placing Von Brunn's actions within a larger framework of structural sin involving racism.  Some may also comment on institutional sins--gun control laws, the current economic crisis, and the "climate" created by talk radio for example--as sources of Von Brunn's actions. 

This is, of course, an old argument.  For almost a century, conservatives and liberals have been arguing the same point about sin.  Conservative theologians believed that sin is a personal matter, a choice made to break a moral code, usually based in some flawed belief system; liberal theologians believed that sin resulted from structural evils, whereby people act out of subservience to some form of institutionalized sin.  Hence, conservative sought to reform individuals while liberals sought to reform systems.  What made someone sin?  The soul or structure?  The individual or institution?  And this theological division made its way into political life--and it has shaped the way we argue about moral events in our public discourse.

In the 1990s, biblical scholar Walter Wink wrote a series of books arguing a new progressive understanding of sin.  He suggested that Christian theologians needed to re-engage the ancient biblical idea of the "principalities and powers,"

In the biblical view the Powers are at one and the same time visible and invisible, earthly and heavenly, spiritual and institutional . . . the Powers are simultaneously an outer, visible structure and an inner, spiritual reality. (Wink, The Powers That Be)

In other words, sin--the "powers" are both.  They exist in the malformed soul and are intrinsically tied up in the ways in which the world and culture are structured.  Everything--and everybody--has both good and evil within. 

This integrated understanding of sin goes a long way to help understand Von Brunn, where inner and outer "powers" combined to push him toward a form of racial idolatry and personal wickedness that resulted in killing another person.  But an integrated understanding of sin also begs the question:  Where was I in this story?  What do I do to resist these dehumanizing powers?  What systems and structures that I am part of perpetuate the evil from which Von Brunn acted?  (Talk radio hosts, take note....)

To say that Von Brunn was a lone gunman in a lone incident misses the point.  However, to say that D.C. has weak control laws (which were recently weakened by the NRA) also misses the point.  Von Brunn lived--as all of us do--in a complex, connected web of unredeemed powers that act as a cancer in the world. 

Walter Wink proposed that:

Redemption means actually being liberated from the oppression of the Powers, being forgiven for one's own sin and for complicity with the Powers, and setting about liberating the Powers themselves from their bondage to idolatry.  The good news is nothing less than a cosmic salvation, a restitution of all things, when God will "gather up all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth". . . The gospel, then, is not a message about the salvation of individuals from the world, but news about a world transfigured, right down to its basic structures. (Wink, Powers That Be)

Progressive Christianity is in no way a morally relativistic vision; instead, it is emerging as a morally integrated theology.  We need to examine all the powers-at-play in Von Brunn's reprehensive moral act--to name and resist the Powers is one way to transformation.   It is wrong--in every case, everywhere, for everyone, and every institution--to target people and deny them basic human dignity because of their race, ethnicity, religion, gender, and sexual identity.  And equally wrong to let the "little" sins that contribute to the bigger evils to pass unchallenged.  

Following the President's Cairo University speech a number of journalists commented that it was a political speech and not very "religious."  Indeed, one referred to his policy remarks as "wonky" in which he primarily addressed seven areas of tension that exist between the United States and Muslims around the world.

The President moved the discussion ahead to shared political concerns relating to peace, economic development, and human rights.   And the tone was different, too.  In the Bush administration, speeches were often directed to Muslim people instead of coming from among them.  Patronizing language was banished from these remarks--as were such offensive concepts as crusades, fascism, competition, and "a clash of civilizations."  As I watched, my main feeling was of relief--and good riddance.  Let's get back to the mutually human business of building a peaceful world with maximum respect for all people.

In shifting the focus to policy, however, religion was present in a more subtle and helpful way than in the past.  President Obama moved the discussion of religion away from beliefs toward practices--away from creeds toward deeds.  The tone for this was set in the speech's first paragraph: 

I am honored to be in the timeless city of Cairo, and to be hosted by two remarkable institutions. For over a thousand years, Al-Azhar has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning, and for over a century, Cairo University has been a source of Egypt's advancement. Together, you represent the harmony between tradition and progress. I am grateful for your hospitality, and the hospitality of the people of Egypt. I am also proud to carry with me the goodwill of the American people, and a greeting of peace from Muslim communities in my country: assalaamu alaykum.

 

It is possible to read this as a rather perfunctory greeting, but that would be a mistake.  This opening paragraph was a nuanced piece of religious reflection that frames a Christian-Muslim dialogue differently than in the past.  It lifted up three spiritual practices shared by the two faiths:  1) learning as a path to both God and the good life; 2) the practice of hospitality; and 3) the exchange of peace.

The first practice--that of learning as a path to God and the good life--is one long honored in Islamic and Christian traditions.  A number of recent histories have argued that medieval Spain managed to create a relatively harmonious pluralism through the leadership of its religious scholars.  There, Jewish, Islamic, and Christian scholars sought commonality on the basis of new learning and intellectual curiosity rather than discrediting one another on their distinctive truth claims.  At their best, the monotheistic faiths share the heritage of "tradition and progress" affirmed by President Obama--a practice that both stands within a faith and yet lovingly pushes it at the same time.  Good, honest, open intellectual endeavor is part of the faithful life.

The second practice--hospitality--is the heart of all three monotheistic faiths.  In Genesis 18, Abraham and his family welcomed three strangers to their tents.  The three strangers were, according to the story, actually angels who affirm God's promise to make Abraham a nation of blessing to the whole earth.   Thus, in an act of hospitality was born Judaism, Christianity, and Islam--the act of welcoming the stranger both birthed and binds the three faiths into a single moral vision of reaching beyond fear and human barriers to welcome the stranger. To praise people for their hospitality is far more than saying, "thanks for the tea and cookies."  Rather, it is to affirm the deepest spiritual dimensions of religious identity. 

The third practice--the exchange of peace--is a symbol of reconciliation in Judaism, Islam, and Christianity.  To extend one's hand, open and without a weapon, is an ancient rite of trust and forgiveness.   "The peace of God" is an expression of the hope for a time when war shall be no more and that all God's people will live in harmony and unity.   The exchange of peace recognizes that we all called to live out the greater destiny of the universe to bring together of that which has been divided. 

Thus, the wonky policy speech was framed by the first paragraph's religious vision.  Obama essentially said, "We will no longer let our differing interpretations of truth divide us; rather, we will seek the common spiritual practices on which we can build a better world."   It is no longer about which one of us is right, and which of us is wrong.  Rather, a generative religious vision builds on faithful practices of people who honor each other's integrity.  And, the three core practices are: intellectual curiosity, hospitality, and reconciliation.     

Seems like a very good new beginning for all of us. 

In 2004, a little book appeared that made quite a splash among dispirited Democrats:  George Lakoff's Don't Think of an Elephant.  In it, Lakoff argued that Republicans and Democrats worked out of two different "framing" stories--frames are "mental structures that shape the way we see the world."  Republicans frame their politics in the terms of "a strict father family," while Democrats frame theirs on the ideal of a "nurturant parent family."  According to Lakoff, the party with the most compelling storyline often "wins" in public discourse.

Yesterday, in the dueling national security speeches of former Vice-President Cheney and President Obama, the two storylines stood in stark contrast--a visible demonstration of the difference between political approaches.

On one hand, Vice-President Cheney enacted the part of the strict father.  He chided Obama as a parent might correct an erring child--delivering a verbal conservative spanking to the young upstart who (according to Cheney) doesn't understand the ways of the real world.  He protected the traditions of the older generation, applauding himself for his own wisdom and insight--all the while reassuring the rest of the fearful family that his way is the right way.  Stay on the course of the Fathers (Cheney and Bush) and all will be well. 

And it was implicitly religious in the style of a Puritan jeremiad.  Cheney chastised the new administration for the sin of departing from the true path and threatened hellfire and damnation would result.  He insisted Obama repent and return.  Only then can the nation be saved.  It was a narrative masterwork of the old Republican frame--brilliant, scary, intimidating, and bizarrely reassuring all at the same time.

In contrast, President Obama's speech embodied many of the characteristics of nurturing parent politics--he empathized with people's worries about terrorism, and reiterated his commitment to national security (thus allowing for maximum human happiness).  He brought themes of freedom, fairness, community-building, trust, and open communication to the discussion--all of which are the nurturing values of progressive politics. 

However, Obama turned the prism of nurturing parent politics in an interesting and unexpected way.  Historically, progressives have said, "I empathize with you" (as did Bill Clinton), "These policies empathize with you" (as did Jimmy Carter), or "The government empathizes with you" (as did FDR).  But President Obama essentially said, "The law empathizes with you."  The entire speech, delivered at the National Archives (the building that houses our most cherished legal documents), argued that the closest possible attention to the traditions of the law would both protect us from harm and save our national soul.  The nurturing parent is not an individual, policies, or government.  In Obama's progressive politics, the law nurtures the American family with its hopes for happiness, fairness, community, and justice. 

This emphasis on the law-as-nurturing parent helps explain Obama's own coolheaded and dispassionate nature--he is able to stand alongside an issue and analyze it through the lens of legal traditions.  And it also explains his remark on wanting an "empathetic" Supreme Court justice.  He wants someone who shares this vision of the nurturant law as his legacy on the Court.

It is also a profoundly Judeo-Christian vision.  The law--as summed up in the injunction to love God and love one's neighbor--saves.  The law is not a set of rules to be adhered to in every circumstance (as some people misinterpret it); rather, the law is a summary of divine wisdom of how to shape a community in both devotion and ethics.  As rabbis, ministers, and theologians know, the law both instructs and empathizes.  According to Jewish and Christian scriptures, the law delights; the law forms the soul; the law teaches; the law nourishes; the law guides; the law frees; the law protects.  The law establishes Israel; Jesus reaffirmed the grace-filled power of the law in his own teaching:  The law is life.

Obama isn't trying to mediate between liberals and conservatives as Dick Cheney charged.  The President is trying to create an entirely new vision of progressive politics--one based deeply in American law, and one anchored in the wisdom traditions of Judaism and Christianity.  A progressive revival--both secular and sacred--of American community through the Law.

Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners tread or sit in the seat of scoffers; but their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night.  They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither.  In all that they do, they prosper.  Psalms 1:1-3.

While doves in the American Jewish community are lining up to support President Obama in his supposed confrontation with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, the hard-nosed supporters of the Occupation can sigh with relief. Nothing proposed by Obama is likely to change the realities on the ground in the West Bank.

Obama's insistence that negotiations begin again between Israel and the Palestinians toward a final settlement agreement sounds "tough" and "standing up to Israel" only to those who have no historical memory. But Netanyahu and the Israeli right-wingers who now run the Israeli government remember very well the willingness of a previous Likud prime minister (and former underground terrorist) Yitzhak Shamir to participate in just such negotiations in the early 1990s. Shamir explained to his constituents that he could sit in such negotiations for the next twenty years and still never concede anything that would resemble a viable Palestinian state: that is, one not still dominated by Israeli settlers, with their own exclusive roads and military protectors, which would make such a state nothing more than a string of Palestinian cities isolated from each other.

Why then will Netanyahu resist such negotiations? Why will the 50% of the Congress that showed up at the AIPAC conference--to prove their loyalty to Israel's most extreme rightist government ever--also do everything they can to block Obama were he to decide to demand for Israel to start negotiating a 2 state solution? Because the Right has learned that it works to press for far more than they can settle with,and then appear to be "compromising" when they are actually giving little more than what they really wanted in the first place. .

Over the past several decades, by vehemently staking out extreme positions the Right both in Israel and the U.S. have managed to shift the center of public discourse far to the Right. Positions once advocated by centrist Labor Party people in Israel (dismantling all the settlements in the West Bank, not just the so-called "illegal settlements") or by centrist Democrats like Clinton in the US (universal health care) are labeled "extreme leftist" views (health care is now called "socialism," for example).

In response, yesterday's centrists, now stuck with the label "left of center," think they are doing well if they can achieve success by "winning" concessions that were once the positions of moderate Republicans or moderate Likudniks. So the Democrats in the U.S., and now the peace forces in the Jewish community, imagine that they are winning some serious victory if they get those peace negotiations started again, when there is no reason to believe that they would lead to the kind of Palestinian state that is economically and politically viable, and to a just settlement for Palestinian refugees-the only outcome that could actually provide the preconditions for lasting security for Israel.

Don't put it past Netanyahu to make a dramatic "concession," either when he meets with Obama at the White House or when Obama visits Israel: that Israel IS willing to acknowledge the goal of a two state solution and even to start negotiations again, if the Palestinians (including Hamas) renounce all violence (something the US won't do in regard to its mission in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistant)  and if they agree to recognize Israel as a Jewish atate (though the US would never recognize, say, Saudi Arabia as a Muslim state--because we'd never want to impose a particular religious or ethnic identification on any state we recognize). Still, I don't put it past Netanyahu to let go of these demands at some point in the process, because he is a wily negotiator who knows how to deal with U.S. pressure--namely to appear to be making huge concessions while actually implementing none of them. Thus, when he was Prime Minister in the 1990s, he acceded to Bill Clinton's desire to appear to be making peace, but after a torturous process agreed to Israel to allow Palestinians some autonomy (not sovereignty) over about 2/3 of the West Bank (less than 14% of pre-48 Palestine). Meanwhile, he encouraged expansion of settlers so that between the signing of the Oslo Accord at the White House in 1993 and the time that the 2nd Intifada began in 2000 the number of settlers on the West Bank had actually doubled (though to be fair, part of that process took place with the blessings of Rabin before he was murdered by an Israeli right-wing religious fanatic and by Ehud Barak who now serves at Defense Minister in Netanyahu's government). The point here is that Netanyahu knows how to play "cat and mouse" excellently, and unless the US is prepared to impose a fair settlement agreement, Netanyahu could easily agree to start negotiations again and then produce nothing that would satisfy even the most beaten-down and ready-to-compromise Palestinian Authority leadership.

So should the Obama administration suddenly start acting tough, using the power of the U.S. purse to pressure Israel to make significant concessions?  Would that be the equivalent on the Left of the successful strategies of the Right in recent decades?

The answer is no. Not at this point, given the current configuration of American and Israeli politics. To do so would require Obama to spend lots of his political capital on an approach that is unlikely to succeed, given the likelihood that such pressures would be undercut by the AIPAC-subservient Congress and would not be understood or supported by the American people, Such pressure would be resisted massively by an Israeli government made up of parties that made no attempt to hide their opposition to the creation of a viable Palestinian state anytime in the foreseeable future (their sole goal: delay, delay, delay). And count on the extremist elements in Hamas, themselves quite content to let Israel continue the Occupation and make it so hard on Palestinians that more and more will be driven to Hamas' Islamic fundamentalist worldview or to its "armed struggle" perspective (though we do remember that Hamas has offered a twenty year cease-fire with Israel within which time a final settlement could be negotiated if Israel were to stop its violence against Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank and release Palestinian prisoners held without trial under horrific conditions), to take some kind of provocative violent actions to undermine any movement for peace, just as extremists among the Israeli settlers have been doing quite consistently in the past several years.

A far more effective strategy would be for the Obama Administration to forget about positioning itself as a neutral convener of negotiations, and instead develop and popularize in the U.S. and Israel the details of what a fair and just solution would be: 1. the creation of a Palestinian state in all of the West Bank and Gaza (with small border modifications mutually agreed upon to allow Israel to retain control of the historically Jewish parts of Jerusalem and to incorporate some border settlements, in exchange for giving Palestine equal amounts of land) that had full control of its own borders, 2. an international force that would protect both countries from the terrorist fringes in both populations that will likely resist any peaceful accommodation, 3. generous reparations for Palestinian refugees as well as for Jewish refugees who fled Arab countries, 4. fair sharing of the water and other resources, 5. Israeli settlers allowed to stay in their West Bank homes, but only as citizens of Palestine with no vote in Israel and subject to the laws of the Palestinian state without recourse to Israeli courts or armies, 6. a Truth and Reconciliation commission empowered to require testimony and to stop all teaching of hatred or demeaning of the "Other" in schools, media and religious institutions.

Obama could take another step that would help make this case to the American public:he should start a series of high profile meetings with those in Israel and the US who have been advocates for peace and for a genuine reconciliation of the heart between Israelis and Palestinians.  The American people must  be exposed to the voices and experiences of all the stakeholders, especially the many moderate Palestinians. But also let Obama introduce the American people to the vigorous debates that go on within Israel and within the worldwide Jewish diaspora itself, so that AIPAC is not the only voice being heard. Let Obama bring to the attention of the American public Israeli voices like Avrum Burg, Yossi Beilin, Uri Avnery, Rabbi Arik Aschermann, and American organizations like  J Street, Brit Tzedeck, the American Friends Service Committee, the Rabbis for Human Rights, Churches for Middle East Peace, the Network of Spiritual Progressives, the Shalom Center, and Tikkun. And don't underestimate the impact that Obama could have in Israel itself were he, on this visit in June and in subsequent visits explain to the Israeli public and the Palestinian public how to understand the way the other side sees their situation, why both sides need a fundamental new attitude of open-hearted compassion and genuine repentance, and why, if both sides can approach the issue from that standpoint and accept the points articulated above, both sides could achieve what they need: peace, security, and self-respect. Such a compassionate discourse, if it became the center of a serious campaign to change public opinion in Israel, Palestine and the U.S. (with the kind of money behind it that the US used to try, during the surge in Iraq to change its image among Sunnis and Shi'ites), could even have the impact of weakening the public support that Hamas has been building in the past decade, though we can be sure that they and their counterparts among Israeli ultra-nationalist and Jewish fundamentalist extremists, will do all they can to undermine this kind of peace-generating effort.

If Obama were to teach the American public and Israeli public how to understand both sides of this struggle as having legitimate claims and legitimate anger, recognize their need to overcome past humiliations and trauma, and simultaneously advocate for this solution, he might foster the kind of American and Israeli majorities that would enable him to, at some later point,  use American power to impose peace if the two parties can't get there any other way.

 You personally can help by sending these ideas to the White House yourself, ask your local and national media to carry this kind of analysis as well as their more limited pro-AIPAC views, and also by challenging your own elected Congressional representatives (in the House snd Senate) to realize that this approach is the best way to achieve peace and security for Israel--not the way of capitulating to the AIPAC demand that the US never put forward a substantive analysis of what we in the US are for in terms of a settlement agreement!  You could also circulate this to people on your email lists, and you could JOIN as a dues paying member Tikkun/Network of Spiritual Progressives and help us raise the money to hire organizers to build the organization that puts forward these ideas (at www.spiritualprogressives.org
 
). You can help us get interns to volunteer for the summer of for the Sept 09-June 2010 year, and you could volunteer time yourself to help us do outreach from your own computer and your own telephone  (in which case, contact Kay@tikkun.org). Donations to Tikkun are tax-deductible, and you can also put Tikkun in your will as a charitable bequest. 

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