Shavuot:  When Last We Were One Nation, Indivisible

Tonight, as we Jews begin the celebration markimg the giving of God’s Law at Sinai through his messenger, our teacher Moses, almost 4,000 years ago, we also recall probably the last time we were one people, together, united and committed as we pledged, in unison, “we will do and we will remember.”  Truth be told, we haven’t accomplished either of those goals very well, certainly not at the 100% level.

Nevertheless, the holiday does remind us of that pledge as we, once again, read the Ten Commandments as well as the story of Ruth, the Moabite woman, who voluntarily took on an obligation to follow God’s Law upon her conversion to Judaism.

The positive side of the story is, of course, the fact that today, almost 4,000 years later the people of Israel live and the nation of Israel survives.  Yet in the State of Israel, we are very much divided as we mark over 600 days of our existential war with our enemies.  A war we did not want, but one that was thrust upon us by people who, at their very core, believe it is a sin in their god’s eyes that we are here at all.

How do we move on from this relative low point in our history where we have achieved more than anyone would have predicted 77 years ago at the founding of the state, yet lack the security we believed would be ours in our own land?

The writer James Baldwin, in his 1955 book “Notes of a Native Son,” writes of the need sometimes to grab those in power by the lapels and drag them kicking and screaming before the mirror of history so that they can look and see where we really are.   To quote a line on the subject in a 1962 essay of his: “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”

It would seem that where we are failing as a country and what puts our future most at risk is not the external existential threats to our survival.  As a major regional military power, we have done an exceptional job over the past year of altering the face of the region and neutralizing a significant portion of our various enemy’s capabilities to wage war.  But our soul is in pain as we struggle to find a way to recapture our unity, severely ruptured by 2023’s judicial reform challenges, temporarily salved by the unity we witnessed after the October 7^th massacre but now, once again, trying to deal with the chasm that has opened between various sectors of our society.

It would seem that Baldwin was correct when he said we need someone or a group of people to grab the lapels of those in power who, we must remember, bear responsibility for our unpreparedness for what occurred on October 7^th, and force theme to face the truth.  Until then, the ills of our society cannot be addressed.  The reluctance of this government to empower a state commission of inquiry, coupled with the fact that we don’t seme to know how to end this war nor get our remaining 58 hostages back, prevents us from moving forward.

How will we get this done?  We have no Moses today of course, but we do have a long tradition to guide us.  Hillel the Elder, a prominent figure in rabbinic Judaism, stated: “Where there are no men, be thou a man.”  This injunction demands that during times like this people of moral courage need to stand up and act with integrity for the good and welfare of all of us.   To me that means that apolitical players here in Israel who have the respect of large swaths of the populace (e.g. the President of Israel, university presidents, some former miliary commanders, captains of industry, etc.) need to shake the lapels of the political establishment and help them understand the truths that face us.

I am experienced enough here to know that this approach might not work but that is not a reason not to try. Frankly, there is simply much too much at stake not to work day and night to find a solution to the divisions in our society.  Our national history has taught us what the downside is of not addressing this issue in a constructive manner.  We dare not be the generation that loses the commonwealth of Israel yet again.

Chag sameach to all.