This is the sermon I delivered at Temple Sinai in Cranston, Rhode Island on Shabbat Shemot 5786.
“A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph.” (Exodus 1:8)
This verse begins the narrative of this week’s Torah portion, Shemot, which is also the beginning of the book of Exodus and the longest and most complex story in the Torah. The story of how Moses led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt is the most central story to Jewish identity in the Torah. More than any other, this is the story that tells us who we are as a people and it is the story, more than any other, that informs what our values are.
And it all begins with the statement that "a new king arose in Egypt."
This is a story that Judaism seems to tell over and over again. We hear it again in the story of the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II whose army destroyed the First Temple and sent ancient Israel into exile for 70 years. We hear that story again in the Book of Esther, in which Haman’s power arose in Persia to destroy the Jews.
It happened again in the story of Chanukah, in which Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the cruel Seleucid Greek king, tried to force us to abandon our religion. It happened again in the story of the First Jewish-Roman War in which the Roman General Titus destroyed the Second Temple and exiled us from our land on the eve of his becoming the Emperor of Rome.
It seems like there is always some “new king” to threaten us, all the way up to the 20th century and to the present day. But, we should notice that the “new king” is never presented just as a threat to Jews and to our physical safety. The “New King” theme is also a symbol of all the forces in the world that oppose the values of the Torah – it symbolizes what happens whenever kindness, compassion, humanity and understanding are overthrown by the values of greed, violence, cruelty, and power-for-power’s sake. It is what happened during the Crusades of the 11th to 13th centuries. It is what happened during Spanish Inquisition starting in the 15th century. It is what happened during the anti-Jewish pogroms that swept Europe in the 19th century. It is what happened in Germany in the 1920s, '30s, and '40s.
There is always some new king who is trying to remake the world in the image of their own power and domination at the expense of humanity. Judaism from its very beginning has seen itself as the light unto the nations that stands in eternal opposition to the darkness of such power. It is an identity that we rehearse in the Passover Seder. We retell the story of the Exodus that begins in this week’s Torah portion and we transform Pharaoh from a wicked ruler who lived “once upon a time” into an eternal image of self-destructive selfishness that would rather be destroyed than yield any of its power.
During the Seder, we make it clear that we are not just talking about one cruel man long ago, we directly state, “In every generation, we are obligated to see ourselves as if we personally left Egypt.” The exodus did not just happen long ago. It is still happening now and in every age.
Growing up in the 1960s and 1970s, this was the main thing that I learned about Judaism. With grandparents who lived through the Holocaust, in a Jewish community calling for the redemption of Soviet Jewry, in a nation that was at war with itself over the quagmire of Vietnam, I readily internalized the message that to be a Jew, first and foremost, is to stand against the tendency of people to forget their values, to give into the allure of greed and might, and to forget that those they regard as enemies are living breathing human beings just like themselves. To be a Jew, as I first learned it, is to be wholly dedicated to fighting against such tyranny.
I know that I am not the only person who grew up feeling this way. I know that I am not the only Jew who holds onto this central lesson that we have been teaching for nearly 3,000 years. I know that you all take pride in being Jewish and in Judaism for the way it embodies these values. I also know that our faith is not the only faith that teaches this.
Yesterday, I stood under the rotunda of the Rhode Island State House with dozens of other faith leaders who called on state lawmakers to dedicate their efforts in the 2026 legislative session to ending the stain of poverty in the Ocean State. We called on them to assure affordable housing, provide school meals for all, maintain and expand public transportation, reform our broken criminal justice system, and to change our tax system so the wealthiest among us pay their fair share. We did not do this because we are all a bunch of liberals who believe in big government – even if we are often caricatured that way.
No. We did this because we all identify ourselves as people of faith standing up against the forces of greed that don’t mind seeing people living in the streets if it also means collecting higher rents. We see ourselves as people of fundamental values who stand up against allowing children to go hungry when we could easily afford to feed them all. We see ourselves as people of common decency who know that the very idea of a billionaire is offensive in a state where 15% of all children live in poverty.
For me, that understanding of self, values, and mission begin with the story we begin reading in the Torah this week. It is the story of Moses standing in front of Pharaoh and saying, Shalach et ami, “Let my people go.” It is the story that never ended, that will never not be needed, that exists forever as the call to conscience to return to the values of humanity and to be forever watchful of the human tendency to forget what it means to be human – to be forever watchful of the rise of a new king.
And that, of course, leads us to the present moment. For, if you look closely, you can see the new kings arising in the world today. It is in the charter of Hamas, written by its founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, dedicated to the killing of Jews everywhere. It is in the rise of authoritarianism throughout the world, chipping away at democracy and human rights in dozens of countries, including Turkey, Hungary, Poland, Russia, Belarus, Georgia, Sudan, Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea, Niger, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Myanmar and Afghanistan. There are too many to mention and it is too painful to recount all the ways that the rule of law is crumbling and executive power is growing beyond all checks and bounds.
And, of course, we cannot forget to mention the two countries that are most dear to us that have seen deeply troubling decay of humanitarian values. The President of the United States last week ordered the kidnapping of a foreign ruler, not to restore human rights or democracy there, but, in his own words because, “It’s going to make us a lot of money.” Just days ago, he defended the killing of Renee Good in Minneapolis by government agents with the false claim – against obvious video evidence – that she was acting violently. He even called her a “domestic terrorist,” as if anyone who dares to peacefully oppose the growing authoritarianism in our country should be treated as so much human garbage.
It all forces us to ask the question: What new king has ascended the throne in America?
In Israel, more than two years of war against Hamas have nearly numbed us from recognizing the agonizing truth that the country’s Prime Minister is still undermining the move toward a ceasefire and restoring peace and stability to the region, apparently to bolster his chances of staying in office and avoiding criminal prosecution. In the past two weeks, he has also renewed efforts that started before October 7, 2023, to strip power from the Israeli Supreme Court to enhance his own power as Prime Minister. Again, we Jews must be asking the question: Has a new king ascended the throne in Israel, one who stands in contradiction to the values of Torah and humanity?
These are difficult and painful questions, but I believe that we must confront them and take action – as Jews and as human beings – to be what the Torah calls us to be: A light unto the nations and a nation of priests. It is the mission, more than any other, that defines us as Jews.
But we should be careful not to be too disheartened by recent events and recent trends. Remember, our tradition tells us that this is the way it has always been and this is what we are always called to do, in every generation. And, in painful truth, we must acknowledge that, as bad as things seem now, we know that we Jews have seen far worse. We act in courage and in honor of those who have come before us to take up the task again of standing up against the darkness.
Don’t stop standing up for what is right. Don’t give up, even when it seems difficult, being the light, recognizing that there is a new king arising who does not know the values we stand for. Let us teach him the lesson that is coming to him – just like Pharaoh, just like Nebuchadnezzar, just like Haman, just like every cruel and selfish tyrant we have stood up against in the past. This is what we are here for.
Shabbat shalom.
“A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph.” (Exodus 1:8)
This verse begins the narrative of this week’s Torah portion, Shemot, which is also the beginning of the book of Exodus and the longest and most complex story in the Torah. The story of how Moses led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt is the most central story to Jewish identity in the Torah. More than any other, this is the story that tells us who we are as a people and it is the story, more than any other, that informs what our values are.
And it all begins with the statement that "a new king arose in Egypt."
This is a story that Judaism seems to tell over and over again. We hear it again in the story of the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II whose army destroyed the First Temple and sent ancient Israel into exile for 70 years. We hear that story again in the Book of Esther, in which Haman’s power arose in Persia to destroy the Jews.
It happened again in the story of Chanukah, in which Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the cruel Seleucid Greek king, tried to force us to abandon our religion. It happened again in the story of the First Jewish-Roman War in which the Roman General Titus destroyed the Second Temple and exiled us from our land on the eve of his becoming the Emperor of Rome.
It seems like there is always some “new king” to threaten us, all the way up to the 20th century and to the present day. But, we should notice that the “new king” is never presented just as a threat to Jews and to our physical safety. The “New King” theme is also a symbol of all the forces in the world that oppose the values of the Torah – it symbolizes what happens whenever kindness, compassion, humanity and understanding are overthrown by the values of greed, violence, cruelty, and power-for-power’s sake. It is what happened during the Crusades of the 11th to 13th centuries. It is what happened during Spanish Inquisition starting in the 15th century. It is what happened during the anti-Jewish pogroms that swept Europe in the 19th century. It is what happened in Germany in the 1920s, '30s, and '40s.
There is always some new king who is trying to remake the world in the image of their own power and domination at the expense of humanity. Judaism from its very beginning has seen itself as the light unto the nations that stands in eternal opposition to the darkness of such power. It is an identity that we rehearse in the Passover Seder. We retell the story of the Exodus that begins in this week’s Torah portion and we transform Pharaoh from a wicked ruler who lived “once upon a time” into an eternal image of self-destructive selfishness that would rather be destroyed than yield any of its power.
During the Seder, we make it clear that we are not just talking about one cruel man long ago, we directly state, “In every generation, we are obligated to see ourselves as if we personally left Egypt.” The exodus did not just happen long ago. It is still happening now and in every age.
Growing up in the 1960s and 1970s, this was the main thing that I learned about Judaism. With grandparents who lived through the Holocaust, in a Jewish community calling for the redemption of Soviet Jewry, in a nation that was at war with itself over the quagmire of Vietnam, I readily internalized the message that to be a Jew, first and foremost, is to stand against the tendency of people to forget their values, to give into the allure of greed and might, and to forget that those they regard as enemies are living breathing human beings just like themselves. To be a Jew, as I first learned it, is to be wholly dedicated to fighting against such tyranny.
I know that I am not the only person who grew up feeling this way. I know that I am not the only Jew who holds onto this central lesson that we have been teaching for nearly 3,000 years. I know that you all take pride in being Jewish and in Judaism for the way it embodies these values. I also know that our faith is not the only faith that teaches this.
Yesterday, I stood under the rotunda of the Rhode Island State House with dozens of other faith leaders who called on state lawmakers to dedicate their efforts in the 2026 legislative session to ending the stain of poverty in the Ocean State. We called on them to assure affordable housing, provide school meals for all, maintain and expand public transportation, reform our broken criminal justice system, and to change our tax system so the wealthiest among us pay their fair share. We did not do this because we are all a bunch of liberals who believe in big government – even if we are often caricatured that way.
No. We did this because we all identify ourselves as people of faith standing up against the forces of greed that don’t mind seeing people living in the streets if it also means collecting higher rents. We see ourselves as people of fundamental values who stand up against allowing children to go hungry when we could easily afford to feed them all. We see ourselves as people of common decency who know that the very idea of a billionaire is offensive in a state where 15% of all children live in poverty.
For me, that understanding of self, values, and mission begin with the story we begin reading in the Torah this week. It is the story of Moses standing in front of Pharaoh and saying, Shalach et ami, “Let my people go.” It is the story that never ended, that will never not be needed, that exists forever as the call to conscience to return to the values of humanity and to be forever watchful of the human tendency to forget what it means to be human – to be forever watchful of the rise of a new king.
And that, of course, leads us to the present moment. For, if you look closely, you can see the new kings arising in the world today. It is in the charter of Hamas, written by its founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, dedicated to the killing of Jews everywhere. It is in the rise of authoritarianism throughout the world, chipping away at democracy and human rights in dozens of countries, including Turkey, Hungary, Poland, Russia, Belarus, Georgia, Sudan, Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea, Niger, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Myanmar and Afghanistan. There are too many to mention and it is too painful to recount all the ways that the rule of law is crumbling and executive power is growing beyond all checks and bounds.
And, of course, we cannot forget to mention the two countries that are most dear to us that have seen deeply troubling decay of humanitarian values. The President of the United States last week ordered the kidnapping of a foreign ruler, not to restore human rights or democracy there, but, in his own words because, “It’s going to make us a lot of money.” Just days ago, he defended the killing of Renee Good in Minneapolis by government agents with the false claim – against obvious video evidence – that she was acting violently. He even called her a “domestic terrorist,” as if anyone who dares to peacefully oppose the growing authoritarianism in our country should be treated as so much human garbage.
It all forces us to ask the question: What new king has ascended the throne in America?
In Israel, more than two years of war against Hamas have nearly numbed us from recognizing the agonizing truth that the country’s Prime Minister is still undermining the move toward a ceasefire and restoring peace and stability to the region, apparently to bolster his chances of staying in office and avoiding criminal prosecution. In the past two weeks, he has also renewed efforts that started before October 7, 2023, to strip power from the Israeli Supreme Court to enhance his own power as Prime Minister. Again, we Jews must be asking the question: Has a new king ascended the throne in Israel, one who stands in contradiction to the values of Torah and humanity?
These are difficult and painful questions, but I believe that we must confront them and take action – as Jews and as human beings – to be what the Torah calls us to be: A light unto the nations and a nation of priests. It is the mission, more than any other, that defines us as Jews.
But we should be careful not to be too disheartened by recent events and recent trends. Remember, our tradition tells us that this is the way it has always been and this is what we are always called to do, in every generation. And, in painful truth, we must acknowledge that, as bad as things seem now, we know that we Jews have seen far worse. We act in courage and in honor of those who have come before us to take up the task again of standing up against the darkness.
Don’t stop standing up for what is right. Don’t give up, even when it seems difficult, being the light, recognizing that there is a new king arising who does not know the values we stand for. Let us teach him the lesson that is coming to him – just like Pharaoh, just like Nebuchadnezzar, just like Haman, just like every cruel and selfish tyrant we have stood up against in the past. This is what we are here for.
Shabbat shalom.
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