Sermons: High Holy Days

Many years ago, I stood outside an old wooden synagogue in Olympia, Washington. I hesitated for a long moment, examining a patch of peeling paint flakes near the door and listening to the flow of traffic on a nearby freeway. Raindrops began to fall. Despite my dry mouth and knotted stomach, I finally knocked on the door. 

The rabbi greeted me warmly, invited me in, and asked what was on my mind. She knew me from a visit weeks earlier, when I told her about my desire to raise a Jewish child with my Jewish spouse. I did not know how to begin.

The rabbi had given me two books to read. While reading Anita Diamant’s Living a Jewish Life, I felt something deep and profound stir within me, a strong sense that I had discovered my home, even though I did not know that I was looking for one.  At that moment, I felt absolute clarity.  Yet the words to describe my experience eluded me. 

“What brings you here?” the rabbi asked. The silence grew heavy before I let the words leave me in a rush: “I want to become Jewish.”

She nodded slowly, and said, “Why in the world would you want to do that?”

Only later did I realize that the rabbi was not being flippant. Her question had a basis in Jewish tradition. 

According to the Talmud, a potential convert is supposed to be asked: “What did you see (that motivated you) to come to convert? Don’t you know that the Jews at the present time are anguished, suppressed, despised and harassed, and hardships are frequently visited upon them?” (Yevamot 47a)

Had the rabbi asked me these questions, I would have answered that yes, I knew about the hardships visited upon the Jewish people. One of my teachers in high school gave my classmates and me a powerful and lasting education in the Holocaust. As a college student in Olympia, a town of very few Jews, I once overheard a security guard at a downtown bank mutter an antisemitic insult at a passing customer. I had also seen swastika stickers in public restrooms off the main interstate. 

I knew all this. Yet joining a people who had been “anguished, suppressed, despised and harassed” did not feel like a choice made based on reasoned consideration. Something deeper, something I felt in my heart and my kishkes, drew me to the Jewish people. I felt absolute clarity about my decision, even if it was difficult to articulate. Whatever the hardships I would take on, I knew my place was right here.  

“Schver tzu zein a Yid,” goes the Yiddish statement.  “It’s hard to be a Jew.”  This is especially resonant in light of the ongoing trauma of October 7th. 

It is still difficult to absorb the details of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas on that day. In the days following that brutal attack, Israeli journalist Amir Tibon described hiding with his wife and young children while Hamas terrorists raged through their kibbutz. His children kept so silent for many hours, even without food or water. In the late afternoon, they heard a knock and a familiar voice outside, and his daughter said “Saba higeyah – grandpa has arrived.” Tibon’s father Noam had driven from Tel Aviv to rescue his family as soon as he heard the reports of the attack. 

Tibon spoke about what would happen in the days and weeks ahead. Israel would respond to the attack with full force, determined to destroy Hamas and to rescue the hostages taken from Israel. There would be intense bombing, and many in Gaza would die, from the elderly to newborn babies.  In response, world opinion would gradually shift from sympathy for Israel to condemnation of Israel. Protests would erupt, many steeped in antisemitic intimidation. 

Tibon’s prediction came true. We have seen it ourselves. Hamas has executed hostages, and many remain captive, with no end in sight.  Antisemitism has flared on college campuses and elsewhere. Many we thought were our allies in the cause of justice have remained silent about the hatred directed towards us. 

The ancient words of the Talmud resonate clearly today: “Don’t you know that the Jews at the present time are anguished, suppressed, despised and harassed, and hardships are frequently visited upon them?” 

Our ancestors knew about life’s hardships. They created narratives that reflect human suffering. Some of these narratives are national and mythic: the story we tell at the Passover Seder each year about the suffering of the Israelites enslaved in Egypt, or the narratives about the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem. Other narratives of human suffering focus on individuals.

The traditional Torah reading for Rosh Hashanah is one such story.  In it, we read about Hagar and her son, Ishmael, cast out of Abraham’s household into the dangers of the wilderness.

When their water runs out, Hagar places her son under a bush, sits at a distance away, and says: “Let me not look on while the child dies.” Simple and heartbreaking words that capture the fear of a parent for a dying child, a looming tragedy too unbearable to witness.  

Yet this story does not end on a tragic note. In this darkest moment, as Hagar weeps, an angel appears. The angel calls to her: “Fear not!”  There is a well of water nearby. Hagar, blinded by her fear, had not seen the well before. God opens Hagar’s eyes.  Mother and child will live. 

 
In this post-October 7th world, we feel un-moored, cast out like Hagar and Ishmael.  We feel frightened by the dangers of the wilderness and thoughts of an uncertain future. We do not know what the future holds for Israel and for Jews around the world.  Like Hagar and Ishmael, we need something to sustain us in the wilderness.
 
The Talmud (Baba Batra 60b) describes a time in the land of Israel after the Romans destroyed the Second Temple in Jerusalem.  People were reeling from the tragedy, and they did not know how to go on. Some decided that they should stop eating meat and drinking wine, since both meat and wine were part of the Temple’s rituals, the Temple that now lay in ruins.   

 A rabbi questioned their actions, pointing out that they should also refrain from eating bread, since meal offerings were brought in the Temple.  The group in mourning agreed. Then the rabbi said, you should also refrain from eating certain produce, since we can no longer bring the first fruits of our crops to the Temple. No problem, the group said. We can live on other kinds of produce. 

Finally, the rabbi said that they should refrain from drinking water, since water was a part of an important Temple ritual for Sukkot. This silenced the group, for they realized that they could not live without water. 

The passage ends with the statement that after tragedy, it is impossible not to mourn. Yet it is also impossible to let mourning define our lives. We must make room for joy as well. Life is bitter and life is sweet. To live fully is to embrace it all.  

This has been a difficult and tragic year.  Yet personally, as one who embraced the Jewish people as my own, I am grateful for that moment, so many years ago, when I knocked on the door of the little wooden synagogue in Olympia, Washington, and told the rabbi that I was meant to be a Jew. 

I consider it a great privilege to be a part of the Jewish people.  We are resilient. We are strong in spirit. In our texts and traditions, we have access to a wellspring of meaning.  We have a mission and a purpose that is essential and enduring:  to bring our broken world a little closer to wholeness.    

And I am grateful that I am not facing the dangers of the wilderness alone. We have each other, here and now, in this sacred community. We have the wisdom of our ancestors to guide us.  May we, in this New Year, open our eyes to that wisdom, and open our hearts and our hands to others. In this way, we will find the strength to greet the light of each new day with resilience and with hope.