Apparently, the storm that hit my community yesterday morning made national news. I got phone calls and emails from friends across the country wondering if the downed power lines and toppled trees they saw on the news were affecting me and my family in Rhode Island.

I'm happy to say that we are all fine. The wind blew open a newly-installed french door in our kitchen and the rain soaked the floor, but there was no major or lasting damage. A few people I know had big trees knocked down in their yards. I've heard plenty of stories of decks, roofs and cars that were badly damaged. I have not heard any stories of people who were injured. There is plenty to be thankful for.

The power is out at the synagogue I serve. Judging from the damage to the neighborhood, it may take a day or two to get it back. Because of that, we're postponing the Visual Tefilah service we had planned for this Friday. (We can't be sure that we will have power to run the projector that is needed for the service). Sometimes life reminds you that not all of the power is in your hands.

There is a lesson in that. In this week's Torah portion, Parashat Ekev, Moses warns the Israelites, "When you have eaten your fill, and have built fine houses to live in… beware against becoming arrogant and forgetting Adonai your God… so that you say to yourselves, 'My own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me'” (Deuteronomy 8:12-17).

It is wonderful that we have nice homes with the conveniences of electricity and running water. However, we should beware the temptation of thinking that we somehow deserve everything we have. We know that when we forget to feel grateful, we lose our humility and our humanity. A power outage may be just the thing to remind us not to take things for granted and not to forget our good fortune.

In a few weeks, all of the damage from this week's storm will be cleaned up. The repair crews and the insurance adjusters will do their jobs. We'll move on from this storm and count our blessings until the next of life's storms hits. Until then, there is plenty to be grateful about. We have houses with electricity and running water. We have homes filled with love and reason to be hopeful about the future. We can't take the credit for all the goodness that fills our lives. Our hearts are open.


Other Posts on This Topic:
Ki Tavo: Gratitude in a Recession
Gaza, Gratitude and God

Okay, I admit it. I am not overjoyed by the announcement of the birth of the future heir of the British throne. I do wish the new mum and dad all the best with their spanking new lad, but I don't join other Americans in finding this royal moment intoxicating. The romance with royalty and the pageantry of it all are lost on me. Sorry.

As an American, I am a firm republican (that's with a decidedly lower-case "r") and find the whole institution of royalty and its privileges a bit grotesque. Even the quaint anachronism just seems silly to me. It belongs in the world of make-believe, like at a Renaissance festival. (Now, those are fun!) To take it all so seriously, though,…well it's not my cup of four o'clock tea and crumpets. 

I sense, though, that it is not just good old American anti-monarchist values that account for my feelings about the royal birth. I think there is also something Jewish about the way I view these things. First of all, let's remember that Jews have not always had great experiences with the monarchs of the lands in which we have lived. Edward I expelled us from England. Ferdinand and Isabella threw us out of Spain. Don't even get me started with the Tzar. 

But there is another Jewish truth at work here. Judaism is, at its core, skeptical of the notion that any group of people have the right to unearned privilege based on birth. In this week's Torah portion (Ekev), Moses chided the Israelites against ever believing that they deserved the wealth to which they were born, or even the wealth they accumulated in life. Moses mocked them and warned them against saying to themselves, "It is my power and the might of my hand that have won this wealth for me!" (Deuteronomy 8:17). 

To be a Jew is to know that whatever you have is yours only because God has provided it for you. Everyone who comes into this world comes only because of an incalculably valuable gift that has been given to us without our deserving. Whatever wealth we create is just interest earned off of that gift. It is the height of arrogance for any human being to congratulate his or herself for anything achieved, gained or created in life. All of what we have is due to a power beyond ourselves. No one — not a prince, queen or king — can make a greater claim of deserving than anyone else. 

I have heard wonderful stories, as you have, about members of royalty who have proven their nobility by recognizing this truth. We are moved by the king who proves through his actions that he understands deeply the obligation of the ruler to serve his people. However, Jewish tradition teaches that we all have the same potential for that nobility. The Torah calls us an Am Segulah, "A Treasured People," and a Mamlechet Kohanim, "A Kingdom of Priests," to make this point. We are all princes and princesses who can achieve our highest nobility through acts of the greatest humility. 

And here is another teaching from this week's Torah portion about the birth of princes. Moses reminds us of the sign of the covenant between God and Israel — the circumcision that Jewish men wear upon the organ that connects one generation to the next. Moses compares the cutting of the foreskin to the cutting of the "the thickening around your hearts" (Deuteronomy 10:16). To be in covenant with God means the rejection of power and privilege. It means "to do justice for the orphan and widow, and love the stranger, giving him bread and clothes" (Deuteronomy 10:18). Jews come into this world — not with pomp and circumstance — but with a reminder of our duty to identify with the lowly. 

So, bully and huzzah for new Prince What's-His-Name! Long may the studs on his starched collar shine! If it pleases you to kvell at his birth, let it be as a reminder that you, too, dear Jew, are a prince or a princess. You have the honor of being a servant of the Most High!


Other Posts on This Topic:
Ekev: Cutting Away the Foreskin
Counting from Freedom to Covenant: Nobility

I am, of course, aware that there are people who feel uneasy about Jewish ritual circumcision. There are some who find it difficult to accept what they regard as cosmetic surgery for an eight-day-old boy, regardless of its spiritual significance and regardless of ample scientific evidence of circumcision's health benefits. I make no apologies for it. The ritual is emotionally difficult, even for those who most deeply appreciate its meaning. That difficulty, I think, is part of what makes the ritual so meaningful.

Looking over the table that the mohel set up for the bris, I saw a strange mixture of the modern and the ancient—surgical instruments and a tallit bag, anesthesia and a kiddush cup. Even after thousands of years, a bris still juxtaposes our fear of blood and pain with our reverence for the sacred and eternal. We confront our fears and our awe all at the same time.

There is a fitting connection to ritual circumcision in this week's Torah portion (Ekev). Moses stirs the Israelites with these words:

See, the heavens and the heaven's heavens belong to Adonai your God, the earth and everything on it. Yet Adonai fell in love with your ancestors and God chose you, their descendants, from all peoples, just as today. So, cut away the foreskin of your hearts and stiffen your necks no more. (Deuteronomy 10:14-16)

The reference to cutting the "foreskin of your hearts" is dramatic, maybe even wince inducing. It is an uncomfortable metaphor for us, and it is meant to be so. We should feel uncomfortable about our reluctance to appreciate the gifts we have received.

With beautiful words, the Torah reminds us that we live in a universe that is wondrous beyond our ken. (What on earth are "the heaven's heavens"? It can only mean something that is a mystery to our feeble understanding.) Yet, despite our seeming insignificance in this vast reality, we have been given gifts of immeasurable love—life and earth, thoughts and feelings. We should live in perpetual gratitude. So, why do we forget so easily? Why do we dull our minds to the miracles around us and within us?

Moses pleads with us to remember. He extols us to cut away the barrier that stifles our awareness. And that, I think, is also the meaning of the bris. We are meant to be reminded, uncomfortable as it may be, of the fact that we are made of vulnerable flesh and blood ... but we are so much more. We are feeble creatures that, yet, can be joined in covenant with God. We are temporary and transient, yet we can be in dialogue with eternity.


Other Posts on This Topic:
Ekev: Deuteronomy vs. Job
Brit Milah

The entire passage (through verse 21), traditionally is called "Kabalat Ol HaMitzvot," or "The Acceptance of the Yoke of the Commandments." It was omitted from the liturgy by the early Reform Movement on the grounds that it is theologically unacceptable. As a result, there are many Reform Jews who attend synagogue regularly and have no idea that this passage was ever recited prominently at the center of  every morning and evening service. In truth, there also are plenty of Conservative and orthodox Jews who never have noticed the passage and its problems as they mumble their way through it.

The problem with the passage is the problem of how we view divine reward and punishment. The early reformers argued that the passage seems to say that all good fortune is a reward for good behavior, and all misfortune is a punishment for bad behavior. Such a belief is neither  supported by what we observe in the world, nor is it ethically defensible. We know that there are, in fact, many good and innocent people who suffer catastrophes and there are many evil people who enjoy pleasure and comfort. The passage is, at best, troubling.

But who says that we should reject everything in Torah that makes us troubled or uncomfortable? Once the red ink starts in editing the Torah, it is difficult to keep it from flowing onto every page. I would prefer to see what is truthful in the passage and also to acknowledge the discomfort. I would rather argue with the Torah than ignore it.

We can view the passage as a poetic statement of the general idea that "what goes around, comes around." People who live lives of caring, love and compassion do tend to reap a harvest of joy and fulfillment in their own lives—even when misfortune falls. People who live lives of selfishness and hard-heartedness do tend to suffer from isolation and fearfulness—even in the midst of material comforts. You cannot say that it works that way in every case, but it is a generally truthful statement about our lives that is worth teaching and repeating. 

It is also worth remembering that the theology of this passage is not consistent throughout the Hebrew Bible. There are other sections that appear to be direct counterpoints to Deuteronomy's theology of reward and punishment. In particular, the book of Job seems to be in a twenty-five-hundred-year argument with the book of Deuteronomy. 

The book tells the story of Job (Iyov in Hebrew), a righteous man who is punished by God. When Job asks God why he has been made to suffer despite all his good behavior, God famously responds with a non-answer: "Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundations?  Speak if you have understanding" (Job 38:4). In contrast to Deuteronomy, the book of Job acknowledges that the good do suffer, but that it is beyond the ability of human beings to understand why. We were not there at the creation and we are not privy to God's plans. 

Deuteronomy says that our suffering is, in part, our own fault. Evil things happen to us because of our failings to sanctify God's presence in our lives. Job says that we have no answers to questions about human suffering. We can only hope to respond with reverence to a God who is beyond our understanding.

It is possible that neither answer will satisfy us. We may feel tempted to say that everything is random and there is no meaning—hidden or knowable—to explain the universe. But, if that is so, then our lives, also, have no meaning and there is no significance to anything we do in life, good or bad. I prefer to think that truth lies somewhere between Deuteronomy and Job. 

There is a divinity that shapes our ends—to coin a phrase—and our actions do play some role in hewing them. However, it is not for us to understand exactly how or why some suffer and others enjoy fortune. We try to make the best choices we can in life, not in order to receive a reward, but because the choice itself is its own reward.