Finding Jewish Treasure

Sermon Theme for 5775 – Jewish Identity

Rosh HaShanah Evening Sermon

Who here would like to find a treasure?

Once a man named Avram lived with his wife and children in Crakow, and dreamt of finding a treasure. One night asleep, his dream whisked him away to the magical city of Prague to the outskirts of the King’s Palace. There he heard a voice that commanded him to dig under the bridge  which led  to the palace in order to find a treasure. But it was just a dream.

However, the next night he fell asleep, and once more he found himself journeying to Prague navigating the labyrinth roads of the city, and by the bridge leading to the King’s Palace he hears a voice “Dig, Dig! A treasure is to be found!” But it was just a dream.

Asleep a third night, he is revisited with the same dream again, the King’s Palace, the bridge, the voice. It was just a dream – or was it? Or was it? Finally, he decided to walk his way to Prague.

Everything in Prague seemed just as it he had imagined in his dreams, Well, perhaps the bridge was a little smaller than he had imagined. And…. he had not foreseen that there would be sentries standing guard at each end. One guard demanded to know what Avram was doing there, and Avram tells him the story of his dream.

The guard laughed and laughed at Avram. “Really, you came here because of a dream? How ridiculous! I have been having a dream over and over about finding a treasure under the stove of a man named Avram who lives in Crakow! Do you see me leaving my post?”

On hearing this, Avram returned directly home to his house in Crakow. He took a spade and dug under his own stove. And what did he find?… He found a treasure… that has been under his feet all along.[i]

Just as the treasure we seek might require a journey, so the treasure we seek might also be under our own feet.

This year I read the groundbreaking book by Andrew Solomon, “Far From the Tree” in which the author tells the story of children with identities different from their parents and how the parents deal with their child’s exceptional differences.  Andrew Solomon identifies two ways we assimilate our identity.

From our parents and family we are given a vertical identity. We are White, Black, Hispanic. We are American, Norwegian or French. We are impoverished or middle class or upper class. We might inherit genetic traits like dimples or the propensity to put on weight or to be skinny. These are markers that make us like our parents and our ancestors.

Yet sometimes we are not like our parents and ancestors. We have identities that differentiate us from them and them from us. We may be gay or dwarves or have Down Syndrome, we may be autistic, schizophrenic or live with multiple disabilities. We may explore a life of crime, be a prodigy or  transgender. This encourages us and our families to connect in a different way with folk that have these different life experiences. These connections, teaches Solomon, are our horizontal identity.

Reading this book got me thinking: Is being Jewish a vertical identity, something we pass on “L’Dor Vor” – FROM generation to generation. Or is it a horizontal identity – something we join “B’Dor V’Dor” ENTERING THROUGH a generation and effecting other generations. Is being Jewish a treasure that is directly under our feet, or is it a treasure that requires us to journey?

Those of us born into Judaism might immediately think that being Jewish is a vertical identity. An identity we pass down “L’Dor V’Dor” from generation to generation. Born of a Jewish mother or father or both, we too regard ourselves as Jews. We inherit ways of being and thinking which come to us generationally.

Our family customs make us Jewish. Children are named for someone who has died if we are Ashkenazi, or someone who is alive if we are Sephardi. If our ancestors are Ashkenaz we begin wearing Tallit at our Bar or Bat Mitzvah and if our families are from  Sepharad we may have been given a small Tallit as a child. Our family tradition is to be married under a Huppah if we are Ashkenazi and wrapped in a Tallit if we are Sephardi. We have a commitment to Tikkun Olam/ repairing this world and a sense of moral justice based in the Jewish prophetic tradition because we are inheritors of Reform Judaism.

We eat Jewish food – bagels and lox, herring and lekach, egg and onion. We have special dishes for festivals – bimuelos or latkes for Chanukah or apple cake for Rosh HaShanah or challah for Shabbat. We cook dairy and meat dishes and know that traditionally these things should be kept separate. We pass on our recipes for chicken soup and matzah balls and blintzes. We lament the absence of good Jewish delis in Northern Virginia and discuss which supermarket has the best pesach-dik selection as Passover looms in front of us. We have our culinary traditions!

We recognize Jewish language as “ours”, whether that be a smattering of Yiddish or Hebrew or Ladino. We do mitzvahs, we take a schloof, we sit Shivah. We find our beshert and make Shabbat. We take pride when “Jewish” vocabulary enter the Scrabble dictionary – this year “schmutz,” “schtum” and “tuchas” were added to the words permissible to play. We smile when a non-Jew like Mick Jagger speaks twelve phrases of Hebrew at his concert in Tel Aviv giving the crowd a festival greeting “Chag Shavuot Sameach” and asking “HaKol Sababa?” was everything cool?

But inheriting Judaism and being immersed in Jewish customs is not the only way of being Jewish. There are those who belong to the Jewish people through their horizontal identification. They are part of the Jewish people “B’Dor V’Dor” inserting themselves into the generations and affecting the generations that surround them. They choose to do so because of their own beliefs, or inspired by the Jewish life of the family they are raising, or because they have found within Judaism the questions they seek answers to.

Our tradition teaches that a convert to Judaism is more precious to God than one born into the faith.[ii] Why? Because if you are born Jewish, it is your vertical identity, you have no choice in the matter. Judaism does not even have provision for you  to convert out. It just puts you on the periphery till you come back. But one who chooses to be Jewish, who joins Judaism as their horizontal identity, knowing the good and the bad that has happened to the Jewish people, they are extra deserving of God’s love.

In Lydia Kukoff’s classic work “Choosing Judaism” she documents the testimony of folk who are proselytes to Judaism. For many of them, the process of conversion is not the end but a beginning of their Jewish journey. Lydia Kukoff writes of her own experience: “I suppose I expected a flash from the heavens to give me an instant personal Jewish past at the moment of my conversion. No such luck. It took practice and time, but it happened. And eventually you, too will have a Jewish past of your own.”[iii]

The Talmud contains a teaching which says that at Mount Sinai when the Torah was given, it was bestowed upon the Israelites and the souls of all their descendants, but also the souls of all those who would in the future convert to Judaism.[iv] In so doing, it teaches that those who choose Judaism have not just a horizontal identity but also a subliminal vertical identity.

And many folk who are born Jewish, realize on their own, or as they raise their children, that they still have much to learn about Judaism since their Jewish practice and custom has diminished over assimilating generations. They realize practically that Judaism for them is not just a vertical identity but it is also a horizontal identity they must acquire.

Being Jewish is not as simple as finding a place in a community through vertical or horizontal identification.

A folk tale tells of a Jewish skeptic, a soap maker by trade, taking an afternoon walk with a rabbi. The soap maker asks the rabbi “What good is Judaism? How does Jewish thought and practice make an impact on the world?” The rabbi does not answer but continues to walk contemplatively. They stop and watch some young boys playing soccer on the field. The rabbi turns to the soap maker and asks: “Tell me, what good is soap to those boys dirty from the mud on the soccer field?” “Rabbi”, the soap maker says, “For soap to be effective it must be used.” “Aha”, responds the rabbi, “So it is with Judaism. It must be learned and applied for its impact to be felt.”

Ultimately, whether we are born into Judaism or whether we choose Judaism, we continue Judaism as an inheritance “L’Dor V’Dor”, from generation to generation, and B’Dor V’Dor, needing to incorporate Judaism in our lives and the generations to come. For Judaism to be a valued treasure we must consciously create memories and values for ourselves, as moral and practical exemplars for our children, and for those around us.

There are so many different ways we can learn and grow in our Jewish lives, conscience and practice. We can take a class here at our synagogue. (Our Adult Ed brochures will be available for the taking after the service.) We can participate in family programming through our Religious School. Or use a skill we have in our secular lives and find ways to apply it Jewishly and teach a class ourselves – one of the best ways to learn is to teach.

We can take courses online or use “Rabbi Google” to procure and find information on customs, texts and doing. We can buy Jewish books and media that will give us how-tos and explanations. We can use social media to connect with Jewish organizations, learn from their posts and join in on their offerings. We can make Jewish retreats and learning part of our holiday plans. We can ask our rabbi questions by email or in person.

The name of our movement is Reform Judaism. Often it is mispronounced as “Reformed Judaism” with an “e.d.” We have not ossified our approach and engagement with Judaism. There is no “e.d.” As Reform Jews we are encouraged to continue enlarging our comprehension of Jewish practice and understanding, and find meaningful ways to incorporate it in our modern lives. We are the inheritors of a tradition and the ones who mold its practice.

Our Jewish identity is both a vertical identity, an identity that we inherit from the souls of our ancestors, and a horizontal identity, one that we create by conscious doing. It is a treasure that might require a journey, but it is also a treasure under our own feet.

As we begin this New Year of 5775, let us make the dream of Jewish continuity a reality, let us set out on a journey to find the Jewish treasure that is ours for the taking.

Ken Yehi Ratzon. May this be your will.

Anthem: Here I Am (Horowitz/Baesh)

[i] Tale of Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav

[ii] Midrash Tanchuma, Lech Lecha 6

[iii] Lydia Kukoff, “Choosing Judaism” p.24

[iv] Talmud Shavuot 39a