Brad Hirschfield: December 2008 Archives

We are all effected when 50 billion dollars vanishes from the economy in an instant as it did with the unraveling of Bernard Madoff's gigantic Ponzi scheme which masqueraded as a legitimate investment. Trickledown economics may not work to our benefit, but it sure works in reverse.

We all feel the ramifications of this kind of thing. From the Billionaires who suddenly discover that they are "only" millionaires to the doormen who work their buildings. But the strongest shock waves right now, beyond the investors at least, are being felt by the philanthropies that relied on their generosity and are discovering that probably billions of pledged dollars are simply not there.

From Yeshiva University and Steven Spielberg's Wunderkinder Foundation, whose loses top one hundred million dollars, to Elie Wiesel's foundation or the endowment of my own kid's school, the Madoff meltdown challenges blue chip names in Jewish charities. Among the questions that people are asking themselves is, "how did this happen?" "How did we get into this mess?" "Why did Madoff do this to us?"

The easy answer to all of these questions is a simple one word answer - greed. And like most easy answers to complex issues, the answer is certainly insufficient and probably plain wrong. I appreciate how we are tempted to feast on righteous indignation as a replacement for the financial support which may no longer be forthcoming. But that kind of righteous indignation is nothing more than spiritual junk food. It provides little sustenance for the long-haul even if it tastes great going down.

So what do we need?

The Chinese have the year of the cat, rat, etc. Now Jews have the Year of the Sun. This new observance is based on an ancient tradition. Every 28 years, according to rabbinic tradition, the sun returns to the precise place in the heavens which it occupied at the moment of creation.

This year, the event, called BIrkat HaHama in Hebrew, will occur on the morning of April 8th, which also happens to be my father's 85th birthday. And in honor of that event, a coalition of Jewish organizations is working to promote our awareness of the sun as a clean, green, sustainable source of energy.

While some will see this as nothing more than the bastardization of an ancient practice by people who do not even believe that the underlying cosmological premise is even close to correct, others will see this as the creative use of an ancient tradition to address a real human need in our era. There is wisdom in both of these reactions.

Let's leave aside the organizers being open to charges of gross hypocrisy by invoking a practice based on rabbinic science whose truth even they reject. After all, the 3000 year story of the Jewish people has been sustained by such re-readings of the meaning implicit in many practices that may have changed little since their inception.

It is fair to ask however, whether or not this new practice actually betrays the Rabbis' sense of what the blessing of the sun was all about.

The answer to the first question, at least, seems obvious to most of us. But as this story by AP writer Jesse Washington demonstrates, it's a question that won't go away. Perhaps that's a good thing too. Why? Because definitions matter.

In a world where we are told that definitions are unimportant or that "labeling is disabling", we have become squeamish about defining things in specific ways. But discussing complex issues like racial and spiritual identity requires useful and useable language, including definitions of the things under consideration. In other words, we can not have a meaningful conversation about the importance of electing our first black President, unless we share a definition of what it means to be black.

But the need for clear definitions does not require them to be simplistic. In fact, the very idea that anything as complex as a person's identity could or should be reduced to a simple formula is wrong. In fact, the question about Barack Obama's blackness, which at first seems silly and then perhaps ugly, provides a great opportunity to reconsider the importance of definitions in our culture.

The question about the President-elects blackness, or who is Jewish or what it means to be Christian reminds us of both the importance of such questions and that the answers may be as multi-faceted and nuanced as the people they seek to define. Gone is the era of one definition that can be imposed on all people. Gone is the presumption that we can not be many things at the same time. And gone is the ability to assure our own identities by denying others the right to claim the same label. So what's left?

Efforts to keep nuclear weapons out of Iranian hands are likely to fail, according to New York Times columnist David Brooks. Speaking to a large Jewish audience at a New York synagogue, Brooks mirrored my own long-held belief that ultimately, Iran will get nuclear weapons. Short of going to war to keep that from happening, I don't see how it could be otherwise.

Technology, for better and for worse, spreads. That's just how it is. Whether it was gun powder in the late Middle Ages or nuclear weapons today, eventually nations get the weaponry they want. And that will likely be the case in Iran. In fact, it is actually a little dangerous to pretend that anything short of a massive military intervention will keep the Iranians from getting the nukes that the mullahs do deeply desire.

Does that mean that we should not do what we can to slow the process? Of course not. We may even succeed in keeping the nukes out of Iranian hands. Should we go to war over their getting nukes? I hope not. I keep hearing arguments in favor of just that solution though, from many in the Jewish community. In fact, those attending Mr. Brooks' lecture relate to a nuclear Iran as an almost apocalyptic event.

While there is no moral equivalence between the two governments, I do find it ironic that the only nation to have ever use nuclear weapons against other human beings is the most aggressive in keeping others from having them.

Esther Wachsman, mother of slain Hamas kidnap victim Nachshon Wachsman, made a bold appeal today to Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert. She asked the prime minister to consider freeing her son's murderers in order to secure the release of Cpl. Gilad Shalit, who has been held by Hamas for 900 days.

Wachsman said she told the premier that "if Gilad comes home, give them my son's murderer. I give up on the murderer of my son. My Nachshon will forgive me."

There is no question, that whatever one thinks about this bereaved mother's plea from a policy standpoint, she is a model of spiritual greatness from whom we can all learn. Esther Wachsman's bold request flows neither from naiveté or a simplistic desire to appease her enemies as is often the case with such requests. She is unwavering in her knowledge that those who murdered her son and kidnapped Shalit are terrorists, pure and simple. But she also knows that acting for justice in ways that drive out mercy is not right either.

Esther Wachsman knows that just because there are many reasons to keep her dead sons' murderers in jail forever, there is one better reason to free them - a living son named Gilad Shalit. What we can all learn from Ms. Wachsman is that even in the most righteous of causes, real people's lives must always come before theoretical principles. In fact, the ability to keep those priorities in the proper order may be the most significant difference between a just cause and one that is not.

Thank you Ms. Wachsman for the kind of spiritual greatness and genuine wisdom from which we all can, and must learn.