To Speak or Not to Speak

For those of us living on the alphabet street of American Jewish life, the intrigue of these weeks between the election and the inauguration has been due as much to what has been said as to what has not been said. Let us begin with the obvious. Five days after the presidential election, the ADL, the Anti-Defamation League, American Jewry’s premier voice in the fight against bigotry and anti-Semitism, condemned the appointment of Stephen Bannon as senior counselor to the President. In the words of the press release from the ADL: “It is a sad day when a man who presided over the premier website of the Alt Right, a loose-knit group of white nationalists and unabashed anti-Semites and racists – is slated to be a senior staff member in the ‘people’s house.’” While some Jewish organizations have joined the ADL in opposing Bannon’s appointment, others have remained noticeably quiet. The AJC, the American Jewish Committee, American Jewry’s leading advocate in public affairs, has been conspicuously quiet on Bannon, issuing the rather anodyne statement that “Presidents get to choose their team and we do not expect to comment on every key advisor.” Both organizations have come under fire. The ADL has been criticized not only for having its thumb on the scale against the Trump administration, but also for the tactical blunder of having alienated itself from an administration with which it, and the rest of the Jewish community, will have to work. Meanwhile the AJC, for not explicitly calling out Bannon by name, has been pilloried by some for having fallen short in its mission to “prevent the infringement of the civil and religious rights of Jews, and to alleviate the consequences of persecution.” As Eliana Lauter pointed out in a recent Haaretz op-ed, be it Senator Chuck Hagel’s 2012 nomination as Secretary of Defense, Jeffery Session’s 1986 nomination as US District Court Judge in Alabama, or others, the AJC has a decades-long record of voicing public concern over political appointments. (Haaretz, November21, 2016) Not speaking out now, the thinking goes, is a noteworthy stain on the blotter of AJC’s leadership.

Lest one think the debate is limited to the political right, the current drama is unfolding is on the political left as well. As the DNC, the Democratic National Committee, contemplates Congressman Keith Ellison as its new chairman, the ADL has characterized his views on Israel as “both deeply disturbing and disqualifying.” In this instance, the ADL has found itself under attack from the left for having unfairly criticized Ellison over his views, which are actually held by much of his party and for that matter, by much of American Jewry. Other groups such as J Street have rushed to defend Ellison, in their words “a champion of pro-Israel, pro-peace policies…whose thoughtful and considered leadership has shown deep respect for Jewish values and the Jewish people.” The AJC, which some years ago defended Ellison’s right to take his oath of office on the Koran, has not weighed in on his views regarding Israel, which, as Jeffrey Salkin recently pointed out, are ironically similar to those of Trump’s choice for Secretary of Defense, General James Mathis. From the left, from the right, it is a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t moment. The only real decision the lay and professional heads of these organizations need to make is by which segment of the community they want to be criticized.

The question of whether to speak out on the issues of the day is not merely one of pragmatics, of choosing battles, of deciding when it is and isn’t advisable to speak out or stay silent. The question is one of principle. Are there moments when the American Jewish community not only may speak out, but must speak out on the issues of the day? It could be hate speech or Israel or refugees, subjects in which American Jewry has a historical or parochial stake. But it could also be gun control, the environment, gender, healthcare, and others. There are a host of concerns on our nation’s docket that not only impact the Jewish citizenry of our country, but also – and it is to this question that I want to turn – about which Jewish sources have much to say. What is our responsibility to the stranger in our midst? What does economic justice look like through a Jewish lens? How shall we tend and protect God’s earth? How best do we ensure that every person created in the divine image stands equal before the law? We do our tradition and our people a great disservice if we circumscribe our sphere of concern to the Iran Deal, the plight of Soviet Jewry, and whether or not the Ten Commandments should be displayed on government grounds. As Jews we believe all of the earth is the Lord’s concern. Indeed, I am hard-pressed to think of a single area of human activity, and certainly political activity, that could not somehow be informed by our Jewish tradition.

Contemporary Jewry, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks explains, faces two political situations for which there is no precedent, at least not for the past two thousand years. First, and this is a sermon for another day, the State of Israel: Jews wielding sovereign power, a state created by Jews and informed by Jewish values. The second is the transformation of many diaspora Jewries, American Jewry being the foremost example, from the political margins to the center. (Sacks, in Religion as A Public Good, ed. Mittleman, p. 300) Judaism is no longer a lifestyle choice relegated to the private domain. In the United States, it is the First Amendment’s prohibition against the establishment of any religion and concurrent guarantee of an individual’s free exercise of religion that has served to set the expectations of a politically empowered American Jewry only higher. In other words, because the promise of America is freedom of religion, not freedom from religion, American Jews began to believe, and still do believe, that not only could they participate in the public square, but that Judaism itself bears the potential to inform public policy. After all, the thinking goes, if it is within the rights of America’s religious communities to advance their views in public, then how can we as Jews abdicate our place in shaping the public discourse that we inhabit.

Yet, nevertheless, we squirm. For a variety of reasons, we continue to wrestle with the question of just how assertive the American Jewish voice should be. You need only consider the primary mitzvah of the upcoming Hanukkah holiday, lighting the menorah, to understand the debate. We are commanded to light the menorah by a door or a window, in a visible place for both Jews and non-Jews to see. That said, both the Talmud and the Shulhan Arukh, the sixteenth-century code of Jewish law, explain that in certain times, when such public expressions of Judaism would be unwise or unsafe, one may place the menorah inside the home, away from the public view. By this telling, where we place the menorah signals a lot more than a technical aesthetic choice; it is a bellwether for our Jewish sense of self. Are we willing, both literally and figuratively, to put our Judaism “out there,” to have the light of our tradition shed outward, or do we restrict its radiance to our homes? The menorah placement is a litmus test for the question of just how assertive the Jewish community will or won’t be, and this year as much as any other raises the question anew.

It is a question that impacts not just the ADL and the AJC, but our own community. How shall we, Park Avenue Synagogue, think about political advocacy moving forward? How shall we speak out, and, when necessary, mobilize our community? To begin with, let me state clearly that we are a 501(c)3, and as such, according to the Internal Revenue Code, are “absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office.” Neither I, nor my colleagues, nor this institution as a whole, may engage in activities that would (a) favor one candidate over another; (b) oppose a candidate in some manner; or (c) have the effect of favoring a candidate or group of candidates. This ban on political campaign activity, however, according to the Internal Revenue Service “does not restrict leaders of organizations from expressing their views on political matters if they are speaking for themselves as individuals. Nor are leaders prohibited from speaking about important issues of public policy.” In other words, while endorsing or opposing a candidate is strictly verboten, to speak to the issues of the day is well within the purview of this pulpit and our programming efforts.

In my mind, however, the Internal Revenue Code is the least interesting part of the conversation. A synagogue or rabbi must be prudent on matters of political advocacy because as any student of our tradition knows, while our Jewish sources may speak to every issue of the day, they do not speak uniformly on any issue. It is intellectually indefensible for a preacher to claim that Judaism says “X” about any single topic, and it is altogether inadvisable for any Jew to claim to represent “what Judaism says” on any subject. Second, we should exercise caution before engaging in political advocacy because it has the potential to have divisive effects on our community. A synagogue is a place of community-building, often a refuge, and we must be careful of the sensibilities of all those who call Park Avenue Synagogue their spiritual home. Perhaps the most compelling reason for restraint on political advocacy is to be found not in the Internal Revenue Code, but in the mission statement of our synagogue, which, if you look at the Shabbat Shalom you were handed as you came in, states “Park Avenue Synagogue seeks to inspire, educate and support our membership towards living passion-filled Jewish lives.” The front line of this synagogue is every Jewish soul; our primary cause for advocacy is a shared and bright Jewish future. We must be insistent in seeking to fulfill our primary and differentiated and sacred mission. If we fail to produce educated and engaged Jews, then there is no ADL, AJC, or AIPAC. If we fail to create Jewish identity and continuity, then the question of what Jews and Judaism have to say about issue X, Y, or Z will cease to be relevant altogether.

There are many reasons to exercise caution before speaking out and acting on the issues of the day, and as your rabbi, I will continue to strive for prudence and wisdom as we do. But speak out we must. Notwithstanding our limitations, notwithstanding our primary mission as a generator of communal and individual Jewish identity, our synagogue must always seek to be responsive to the calling of the hour. The goal of any self-respecting religious organization, ours included, should be to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. Ours must be an institutional embodiment of the prophet, a person, in the words of Heschel, who “speaks for those too weak to plead their own cause . . . a person who is not tolerant of wrongs done to others, who resents other people’s injuries and rebels against the evil of indifference.” (“The Religious Basis of Equality of Opportunity”) The evil of indifference is a sin that I will not carry. Yes, we will seek to educate our membership on the range of opinions on any particular issue, but we must never let the paralysis of analysis obstruct our prophetic calling. Of course our primary mission is to bring Jewish souls closer to our tradition, but we must also be mindful of American Jewry’s expectation that our tradition speaks to our contemporary condition. Of course our goal is to not be unnecessarily divisive, but the goal of respectful dialogue and institutional leadership is not across-the-board agreement. Do I expect you to agree with everything my colleagues and I say? Of course not. That is, after all, why God created a Kiddush after services. As Rabbi Israel Salanter taught “A rabbi whose community does not disagree with him is no rabbi. And a rabbi who fears his community is no man.” As I tell all my interns and assistant rabbis: “You are not really a rabbi until someone has walked out on one of your sermons.” The relationship between clergy and congregant and among congregants is sacred, and so is freedom of the pulpit. My job and the job of my colleagues is not to tell you how the world is, but how the world, by way of Jewish values, ought to be. With all of the qualifications and all the caution, let me state clearly my hope and expectation that this pulpit and this synagogue will not only challenge you, but prompt you to act on the issues of our time.

“The Lord is in this place and I did not know.” (Genesis 28:16) These words, spoken by Jacob at the beginning of our Torah reading, signal his discovery that God’s presence can be found even in the most unlikely places. God is invested in the question of environmental justice. God is invested in the question of gun control. God is invested in civil rights, in poverty, in healthcare, and in economic justice. Whether we knew it or not, God is present in all these places and many, many others. To be a child of Jacob, to be a descendent of the children of Israel, means to believe that our faith informs every precinct of our lives. With prudence, with wisdom, and most of all, with love for the full diversity of our community, let us find our voice in the public square, each one of us doing our part to pull down a piece of heaven – and the peace of heaven – upon us, Israel and all of humanity.