I think it is fabulous that Chaz Bono is a contestant on “Dancing with the Stars” this season. He is the first transgendered competitor on the show, and one of the first on television, and I think his presence is going to push our culture in a positive, more inclusive direction.

And I am appalled by the opposition that his participation has wrought, particularly all the mean-spirited and ignorant comments from people who don’t have any understanding of the experience of being transgendered yet think they can stand in judgment of another person’s choices – especially when the ignorance comes from professionals who ought to know better.

“Today you all stand before Gd, your chiefs, your elders…all of Israel, your children, wives, the strangers in your midst, from the woodchopper to the water carrier, to enter into a covenant with Gd…”

With these words, the covenant between Gd and the people of Israel is established, or re-established, as we shall suggest later in the shiur. However, the verse itself is problematic in several ways. First of all, there is that unusual word, “nitzavim”, meaning “standing”. Furthermore, the segment lists all these types of societal positions, then sums them all up in the superfluous phrase “all of Israel”, a phrase double enigmatic because it uses a singular voice- the clause is literally “kol ish yisrael”- every person of the people of Israel, after listing a plurality of professions.

In order to understand this passage, we will move from textual explanations to a novel reading of this episode in its entirety. Along the way, we will encounter some interesting ties to Rosh Hashana, as this perasha is traditionally read the week before the New Year.

Rashi presents three different readings of this passage. He begins with the “peshat”, the so-called literal reading of the text. He then offers two “midrashic” readings, the second of which explains the word “nitzavim”, standing, as derived from the word “matzevah”, which means monument, and explains that at this moment, Moshe made of the people a monument, in order to make them more ready to listen, or more obedient (Rashi points out that in later transfers of leadership the root “nitzav” is also used). The Shem M’Shmuel takes off from this nitzav=matzeva connection to build his approach. He explains that a mizbeach, the sacred altar of the Temple, was made up of many stones, whereas the matzevah, the earlier form of monument or altar, forbidden after the Temple was constructed, was made up of one stone. Thus, for the covenant to be established, the people, despite their individual differences, must come together like the single stone altar, as one people. In other words, the purpose of the textual play between multiple societal roles and singular language is to emphasize the need for all to come together as a united whole. Furthermore, he adds, the term “Nitzav” means to be without fear, as in Bamidbar 16:27, and when the people are unified there is nothing to fear. Unity is strength, as it were. This approach is found in many of the later Hassidic thinkers. Rav Zadok Hacohen believes this interplay between higher and lower class positions in society versus the singular “all of Israel” suggests a time in which the entire nation will reach such a high spiritual plateau that all attain equal spiritual awareness, as was the case at the splitting of the sea, where it is described that the most lowly maidservant experienced Gd as acutely as did the greatest prophets. The unity of peoplehood will raise up the status of every member of society.

In a similar fashion, the Sefat Emet reads these passages as reminding us of the crucial nature of unity. The “today” at the beginning of the verse means “today”, that is, now, at this very moment, we are all called to stand before Gd, and the way to best do so is for the individual to make himself part of the klal, to surrender himself unto the people as a whole. This is the message of the extra word “kulchem”, all of you, as a people. Continuing as per Rashi, our unity stands as a matzevah, as a monument and reminder for future generations as well, as the verses state; the remedy for an individual who wishes absolution from sin, is to stand together with the people. And the reverse, so to speak, is also true. In order to become a part of the klal, it is adequate to be willing to shoulder the responsibilities imposed by the brit, by the covenantal community. Thus, in the later Hassidic commentators, the emphasis is on the communal rather than the individual.

As we move towards earlier Hassidic commentators, we find the opposite approach. The Meor V’Shemesh, a Hassidic thinker of the middle generations, may serve as an illustrative middle ground, containing both positions. On the one hand, the communal side,he argues that the verse speaks to us now, reminding us that “we, the people, are standing today”, that is, still exist today because there is a unity among the people as a whole despite the societal distinctions- no matter what position in society the individual occupies, ultimately we all share a deep love for the entire people.

On the other hand, leaning towards the centrality of the individual, he suggests that the odd word “nitzavim” derives from the word “nitzav”, which is used uniquely in Judges 3:20 to refer to the haft of the sword, the handle which supports the cutting blade. This etymology is meant to suggest a reading whereby Moshe is telling the people that no matter what position in society their life has placed them, they are each individually capable of serving as the vehicle for the revelation of Gd’s message to the world. In other words, rather than emphasizing the group nature of the covenant, there is an emphasis on the individual within the group as being primary, or more importantly, there is a recognition that each individual is made up of an entire set of identities, what we would today refer to as polyvocality. To quote Kenneth Gergen, who argues that one of the effects of contemporary technology, especially information technology, upon the individual is a situation of “fractionated being”:

By dramatically expanding the range of information to which we are exposed, the range of persons with whom we have significant interchange, and the range of opinion available within multiple media sites, we become privy to and engaged within multiple realities. Or more simply, the comfort of parochial univocality is disturbed…to the extent that these standpoints are intelligible, they also enter the compendium of resources available for the individuals’s own deliberations. In a Bakhtinian vein, the individual approaches a state of radical polyvocality…in this move from the private interior to the social sphere, the presumption of a private self as a source of moral direction is subverted. If negotiating the complexities of multiplicity becomes normalized, so does the conception of mind as moral touchstone grow pale…

Or to put it more simply, here is Roland Barthes talking of himself:

Philosophically, it seems that you are a materialist (if the word doesn’t sound too old fashioned); ethically, you divide yourself, as for the body, you are a hedonist; as for violence, you would rather be something of a Buddhist! You want to have nothing to do with faith, yet you have a certain nostalgia for ritual, etc. You are a patchwork of reaction; is there anything primary in you?

This approach, cognizant of the complex make up of each individual, is evident in several of the early Hassidic thinkers. For example, R. Nachman of Breslov reads this verse regarding the individual at prayer- he explains that the standing referred to in 29:9 is standing in prayer (as in BT Berachot 6: ), and the ten types of societal position refer to the ten fingers (in other words, they are a part of our own being), which clap during ecstatic prayer! Likewise, in the Or Penei Moshe, the ten job descriptions listed here actually refer to every individual’s spiritual levels. These spiritual levels are inherent in every member of the people (his argument runs: these levels all inhere in our forefather Jacob, also called Israel, as in the verse “all the souls to the house of Jacob” Bereshit 48:27, and consequently inhere in every one of us). All these levels need to be recognized in every individual person. (It is worth noting that R. Menachem Mendel Schneerson of Lubavitch, in one of his early lectures, synthesizes the Alter Rebbe’s approach, which refers to each person in the community as though they were an integral organ, ie, stressing the individual within society, with the later communal approach, and states that both the individual and the communal are perfected together, simultaneously, thus combining both approaches).

An attractive reading of this verse, addressing the polyvocal self, is found in the Tiferet Shelomo, where the verse is also linked to the High Holidays- the “hayom” , the “today”, in our verse, refers to a specific “today”, the big day of Rosh Hashana. The covenant is then read as a covenant regarding teshuva, repentance. In order to properly “stand before Gd”, in true contrition, one must analyze and recruit every aspect of one’s personality, explains the Tiferet Shelomo. He quotes the Magid of Zlotchov, who taught that “dividing up all the organs” of a sacrifice teaches us to align all the most innermost parts of our personality upon any action (it might be interesting to read this in terms of Deleuze’s “body without organs”). So, then, certainly on Rosh Hashana, when we are reexamining our lives, we need to involve and contemplate all the different aspects of our personality as part of what we call soul searching- but its not just the lofty soul aspects we involve here- the Tiferet Shelomo explains the phrase “kulchem”, all of you, as referring to both the physical body and the spirit, and explains the two trades listed, the wood hewer and the water carrier, not as referring to two different individuals, or as two different economic classes or strata- but as symbolic of every person’s journey, representing the starting point and goal within every individual trajectory: one starts out hacking away at the Tree of Life, as it were, referring to the spiritual Torah life, and ultimately one reaches the “water drawing” point where they draw forth the holy merciful efflux signified traditionally by water.

In this light, I would actually like to return to the text and suggest a more than metaphorical reading for our passage here in Perashat Nitzavim. Much has been written of the centrality of “covenantalism”, the covenant at Sinai; David Hartmann in his important book stresses the covenant at Sinai as central to the Jewish experience, and R. Soloveitchik speaks frequently of the concept. However, Rabbenu Bachye, following the Ramban, suggests that the covenant here in this section of the Torah, refers to an additional covenant that was enacted. (Technically, there needed to be a second covenant because the covenantal bond at Sinai was damaged by the sin of the golden calf.) This second covenant is defined by the Rabbis in BT Shavuout 39. as centering on the phrase in verse 13, which binds all future generations, not only to the commandments of Sinai, as in the initial covenant, but also includes within the “contract” a responsibility to relate to the imperatives of future societal challenges, including the enactments proposed by the Jewish leadership later in history (the example given is reading the Megilla on Purim). The binding covenant enacted here is that of the Oral Law, which derives its authority not from above, as in the Sinai covenant, but from the needs of the people, of the individual and societal challenges which arise over the course of a continued unfolding history. For this reason this text contains all these stringent warnings against division within the community which lead to breaking away from the people, as in verse 17. The Oral Law, as we’ve seen in previous perashiyot, is meant to ensure that any individual injustice within society is recognized and alleviated and prevented from recurring. Allegiance to the multiple voices and needs of all the different aspects of society, which as we’ve seen really means being true to the many voices we hear in that which we call our “selves”, and establishing a just society whereby all these elements are heard protected and cherished- that is the covenant Moshe established in our perasha, as his last words before the people were to enter the land, as the crucial message for the beginning of the Jewish People Project .

Nitzavim-Vayelech II. Face Hidden, Face Revealed

The opening verse of Perashat Nitzavim states: You are all standing together “lifnei”, before Gd. The Hebrew word “before” derives from the word “panim”, face.

The Kedushat Levi connects this opening use of the word panim in our perasha to the Talmudic explication (Rosh Hashana 16.) of the central prayers of the Rosh Hashana service. The Rosh Hashana service centers around three sets of verses dealing with the ideas of “malchuyot”- Gd’s kingly rule, “zichronot”-covenantal memory regarding the Jewish people, and “shofarot”-verses focusing on the use of the shofar. The Talmudic quote goes: Say ‘before me’ malchiyot…; in Hebrew the term ‘before me’ is again the term lifanay, deriving from “panim” “face”. The Kedushat Levi offers a set of definitions of the term “panim”, face, and its opposite, “achor”, which translates as “back of the head” connoting the face averted. He explains that when the term panim is used, it represents actions in accordance with Gd’s will, whereas achor is a signifier for not being in concord with Gd’s will. Hence, our desire on Rosh Hashana is that our our prayers should re-establish the covenantal moment of panim, that is, the signifying face representative of the positive relationship between man and the Divine Presence. The moment of our perasha is indeed that moment which established that covenantal relationship, as the verse states: You are all standing lifnei Hashem, before the “face” of Gd, basking in this divine good will meaning to benefit humanity. This is the desired state.

On the other hand, perashat Vayelech essentially ends (just prior to introducing Moshe’s last words, the poem that begins with the word Haazinu), with several repeats of the word panim in a negative context. In 31:17, we are warned that if the people become idolatrous, Gd will be angered and avert His face from them. Then, the people will say, because we have not Gd within us have we are in such trouble, (verse 18), and Gd will hide his face from them for all the evil they have done, in their turning to idolatry. The Ramban wonders why, after the first “hester panim”, where the people clearly understand, as the verse states, that they have betrayed Gd, why this second turning away on the part of Gd? His answer is that the people need to be brought to feel an even more profound sense of distance from Gd so that an even deeper level of repentance and subsequent “reconciliation” may be achieved.

R. Zadok Hacohen is unsatisfied with the Ramban’s answer, for after all, we believe that even the most preliminary unverbalized teshuva (“repentance”) is transformative, so why would Gd continue to bring about sufferings upon an already repentant community? He then offers a reading which is radically unique- that the “hastarat panim”, the “averted face” here refers not to Gd’s turning away from the people- rather it is a declaration that Gd will turn his face away from the people’s sins; that Gd will overlook even idolatry if the people are truly penitent and truly turn to Gd. In other words, verse 31:18 reads: On that day ( that is, after the people recognize that their plight is due to their failed relationship with Gd), Gd will turn his face away from all the evil the people have committed, overlook their mistakes even if they went as far off course as to worship false gods!

Thus, we suggest that the moments of the “turning away” by Gd may contain within them at the very same time the seeds of redemption and forgiveness; it is all a question of what is being turned away from. Perhaps we may be able to even re-incorporate the Ramban, who argues that increasing distance may bring about a greater reconciliation. This may be the great secret of the the schizophrenic nature of Rosh Hashana, being both a day of fear and awe, as well as being a holiday, a day of joy.

The Netivot Shalom (Slonim) points out the paradoxical nature of Rosh Hashanah as contained within one verse: tik’u bahodesh shofar, bakeseh l’yom haggeinu, “sound the shofar at the time when the month commences, as the new moon (literally the day the moon is hidden) signifies the holiday”- “bakeseh” means in the “hidden-ness”, and “yom hageinu” refers to a day of joy- we can read this verse as suggesting that Rosh Hashanah is an opportunity to meditate upon the state whereby we experience Gd’s keseh, “concealment”, the averted Face, the chasm created by sin between us and Gd. From that selfsame state of sorry distance we do not have far to travel, within this suffering lies the seed of joyous reunion. By reaching the existential despair of “concealment” we are brought back to a face to face relationship with Gd- and this is facilitated by virtue of the shofar, suggests the verse, because the shofar emits a simple sincere wordless cry from the heart, which symbolizes our true yearning for closeness to Gd, even as the tragedy of our lives renders us otherwise mute and unable to theorize or verbalize.

On Tuesday, September 20, the Palestinian Authority unveiled a large, blue chair in Ramallah representing Palestine's seat at the U.N. Photo by Joseph Dana.

According to a report from Haaretz, the Obama administration is engaged in behind-the-scenes efforts to delay voting on recognition of Palestine as an independent state in both the General Assembly and the Security Council.

A “silent agreement” is reportedly in place between several Western countries to postpone the U.N. votes through a number of bureaucratic stalling tactics, the use of which are being promoted by Washington.

On Friday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is scheduled to present an official request to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon which will specify the Palestinians’ desire to seek full U.N. membership through the Security Council. While a vote on the request could take place by early October, sources indicate that the potential exists for such a vote to be postponed by months.

According to Shlomo Shamir, there are several options available to the Obama administration for postponement of voting in the Security Council, including the use of closed-door consultations:

If the Palestinian request does go ahead on Friday, the United States can refer the request to a debate inside the framework of informal consultations that Security Council members hold behind closed doors – a procedure that could last weeks or months…a month ago, France distributed a draft resolution that included sanctions against Syria. The draft has not yet reached a discussion because Russia, with the support of China, has been delaying discussions of the draft at the Security Council.

Some suggest that Abbas might actually be interested in such a delay, for it would give him more time to make diplomatic progress. However, activity in the West Bank seems to run counter to such claims, for the PA is planning a massive rally on Wednesday in Ramallah in support of the U.N. statehood initiative. The Palestinians are hoping for tens of thousands to march in the streets, and anticipation for the vote is growing. According to Joseph Dana:

Schools will close early so that students can take part in large rallies in support of statehood. Roughly 80,000 government employees will be given time off as [Abbas] taps all of the resources that his governing Fatah party have in the West Bank to ensure mass turn out.

Additionally, the Palestinians are busy whipping votes on the Security Council to try and secure a majority, which would force the U.S. to use its veto – something the Obama administration is desperately working to avoid given the irrevocable damage such a vote would do to America’s already-shaky standing in the Middle East. Indications are that the African nation of Gabon, which is still undecided on the matter, may end up determining whether the Palestinians achieve a majority in the Security Council.

If the votes fall the Palestinians’ way, look for the Obama administration to begin utilizing procedural stalling tactics as a way to buy more time as Washington frantically works to derail the Palestinians’ U.N. bid.

If, like myself, you are a progressive who supports both the Palestinian initiative as well as the realization of two, self-determining states for two peoples, I urge you to add your voice to Tikkun’s petition for the recognition of Palestine by the U.N.

Rusty Stewart/Flickr

Here are some responses to the UN Recognition of Palestine discussion, including an article by The Israel Project strongly against the Tikkun position–part of our function to provide peace-oriented people with an understanding of some of the views we don’t normally encounter and that we need to understand. Our views are set forward in the petition to recognize Palestine and re-affirm Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state with ironclad guarantees for both Israel and Palestine to grant equal rights to all the minorities living within their boundaries without any imposition of religion and with full human rights to all of the residents living within those states. Click here to view and sign the petition.

Obama’s Unique Opportunity
by Gideon Levy

What is the American president going to say to his citizens? What will he say to the citizens of the world? How will he rationalize his country’s opposition to recognizing a Palestinian state? How will he explain his position, which runs counter to the position of the enlightened – and less enlightened – world?

And above all, what will Barack Obama say to himself before he goes to bed? That the Palestinians don’t deserve a state? That they have a chance to get it through negotiations with Israel? That they do not have equal rights in the new world that we thought he was going to establish? Will he admit to himself that, because of opportunistic election considerations – yes, Obama is now being exposed as quite an opportunist – he is also harming his country’s interests as well as the (real ) interests of Israel, and is acting against his own conscience too?

[UPDATE - On Monday 9/19/11, the clemency board denied Davis a stay. The NAACP is launching a last resort petition to urge the DA to ask the Judge to withdraw the death warrant]

The state of Georgia may take the life of an innocent man on Wednesday.

Troy Anthony Davis

For nearly two decades, Troy Anthony Davis has sat on Death Row for the 1989 shooting of off-duty White police officer Mark MacPhail. Though Davis has maintained his innocence for two decades and built a compelling case for his freedom, he has exhausted the appeals process and is now scheduled to die. The Georgia Board of Paroles and Pardons has the power to grant him clemency and spare his life.

The murder weapon was never found and there is no physical evidence linking Davis to the murder; the case against him was built solely on witness testimony. Of the nine witnesses that testified in Davis’s trial, seven have recanted their testimony, many citing police coercion. Multiple jurors from the original trial have since signed sworn affidavits saying that based on the recanted testimony he should not be executed. New evidence has also emerged implicating another suspect.

This is the fourth time in as many years that a death warrant has been issued for Davis. He was first set to be executed in the summer of 2007, but was granted a stay of execution following the efforts of a grassroots campaign whose supporters included Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu, Pope Benedict XVI, Harry Belafonte, Jesse Jackson, former president Jimmy Carter, representatives of Congress, members of European parliaments, a former FBI director and Federal Judge, and many others. Amnesty International organized the delivery of thousands of letters to the clemency board. Despite the recanting of trial testimony by the majority of the trial’s original witnesses, the Georgia Supreme Court denied Davis’s appeal for a re-trial in the early Spring of 2008.

President Obama plans to veto the Palestinians' statehood bid in the Security Council. Photo by Elizabeth Cromwell.

On Friday, after much speculation, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas officially announced that the Palestinians would seek full U.N. membership by going directly to the Security Council, setting the Palestinian Authority on a diplomatic collision course with the United States.

The Obama administration, which has vowed to veto any such efforts by the PA, has been engaged in frantic attempts to avert this move by the Palestinians. Why? Vetoing a Palestinian statehood bid at the Security Council will significantly damage one of President Obama’s main foreign policy goals: to cast the U.S. as a champion of Arab freedom and democracy in a turbulent and shifting Middle East.

This is why Washington has initiated last-minute talks with Abbas, trying to convince him to forgo the Security Council. The Obama administration understands that rejecting the Palestinians’ statehood bid on what will no doubt be a highly-dramatized world stage will do significant damage to this central foreign policy goal, and will likely further erode America’s already-shaky standing in the Middle East.

And this is precisely why Abbas is gambling with a move that is almost certain to fail. The Palestinians will force America to demonstrate to the world, once and for all, what most have known for some time – that the U.S. cannot be looked upon as the dominant brokering power in Middle East peace efforts.

American diplomats acknowledge that they do not have the votes to prevent the General Assembly of the United Nations from recognizing Palestine and granting it some of the rights of member states. The U.S. can block full membership only by exercising its veto in the Security Council, an act likely to intensify hatred of the U.S. in many countries around the world.

A far wiser strategy is for the U.S. to introduce a resolution to the Security Council providing full membership in the U.N. to Palestine while simultaneously reaffirming Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. Both sides win.

The resolution should make clear that this recognition is contingent on both Palestine and Israel respecting the rights of all its citizens and offering them equal protection under the law, and not imposing any religious practices on any of its citizens.

by Robert Cohen

Crossposted from Micah’s Paradigm Shift.

Meir Jacob/Flickr

As we move towards a United Nations Assembly vote on the recognition of a Palestinian State later this month, Robert Cohen looks at the effect Israel is having on interfaith relations between Jews and Christians in the United Kingdom. Could the UN vote push Jews and Christians further apart or could it be the spark that kindles a radical reassessment of the Judeo-Christian mission?

Something precious

As a child growing up in a Jewish community in South East London in the 1970s and early 80s, there must have been something precious seeping through into my bones.

Perhaps that ‘something’ came from our Rabbi’s passionate, intelligent and challenging sermons especially on his favourite of the Hebrew Prophets, Jeremiah. Or perhaps it came from our shul President’s annual reading and commentary on the Book of Jonah on the afternoon of Yom Kippur. It was through Jonah and the redemption of people of Nineveh that I understood the Jewish God’s love for all of His creation. Or perhaps that ‘something’ came later, when as a teenager I first heard the words of Rabbi Hillel, the 1st century sage and scholar:

If I am not for myself
Who will be for me?
If I am only for myself
What am I?
And if not now
When?

Speaking to Jennifer Herszman Capraru in Toronto, Canada, it is impossible not to be warmed by her passion for the work she does and the people it brings her close to. Born in Montréal, Québec, Capraru is the daughter of a mother who was a child survivor of the Holocaust, and a Romanian father, both of whom emphasized the importance of human rights and provided Capraru with the gift of creativity that she exercises with such love and intelligence today.

As an adult, Capraru received an MA in Theatre Studies from York University and also trained as a director in Germany; it has been through the medium of theatre and directing that she has always seen the opportunity to create a whole world – a world where real change could transpire. In her role as Artistic Director of the award-winning Theatre Asylum in Toronto, Capraru premieres thought-provoking plays by and about women and humanist issues. In 2006, Capraru was asked to be 2nd Script Supervisor on the Canadian feature film Shake Hands with the Devil about the experiences of Lieutenant General Roméo Dallaire during his tenure as UN Force Commander during the Rwandan Genocide of 1994. As Capraru explains, she went to Rwanda at the last minute, and without expectations, but following her work on the film, she found herself prompted to accept an invitation to give script development workshops for the Rwanda Cinema Centre. One connection led to another, and Capraru tumbled into directing for the National University of Rwanda, UNICEF, Kivu Writers and Mashirika arts. In Rwanda, years after the genocide, Capraru saw fertile ground for creativity and for transformation. There, alongside her Rwandan colleagues, she founded ISÔKO, The Theatre Source, a theatre company that blossomed from an inspired seedling of an idea to a full-fledged theatre company that tours, performs in three languages, and has has been the origin of many lengthy discussions on subjects such as genocide and loss as well as transformation and healing. In the Rwandan context, Capraru eloquently describes her view of “theatre as ritual, ritual as catharsis, catharsis as healing, and healing as hope”.

1. Seeing With Doubt: A Meditation Derived from an Unlikely Source

Perashat Ki Tavo, read this week, is noteworthy for containing a lengthy restatement of a blessing and curse sequence. Not the cheeriest or most readable of passages by any means, rather a long recitation of all the nastiness that will overtake the people should they fail to hearken to Gd’s word. I suspect the custom of reading these sections fast and sotto voce was not one that needed to be forcibly impressed upon the community; one wants to be done with these passages. Especially as this is a repeat performance, in that there already was a full set of curses already presented in Leviticus. Rashi attempts to differentiate between the two sets of curses by finding differences between them- the first set are divine while the second set is Moshe’s own set of downer predictions, the first set are national, while the second set here refer to individual sinners (this is supported by the use of the plural in the first set and the individual in the second). Either way, best to get done with these passages quickly and hope they remain in the realm of the potential (in the course of my life I’ve had the unfortunate experience of hearing rabbis claim these passages as “predicting” the Holocaust and other such gleeful readings).

It is then surprising that this segment provokes one of the most beautiful passages in the Zohar (to be specific, in the Zohar Hadash). The point the Zohar wishes to make about this section is wrapped in one of those poetic narratives that are often so unexpected that they strike one as truly inspired (as an aside, Gershom Scholem was dismissive of the Zohar, to say the least, because it was pseudo-epigraphic and not actually written by R. Shimon Bar Yohai. To my mind, the fact that this wild poetic riff was actually written by an individual in medieval Spain makes it one of the great works of art, a classic of Western literature, no?).

Here’s the Zohar’s literary framing of the teaching. R. Shimon Bar Yohai was hiding out from the Romans, and as per the legend, he was hiding out in a cave with his son, where the fruit of a carob tree nourished him, and a miraculous well provided him with water, and the prophet Elijah came twice a day to reveal secrets of the Universe. None of his comrades in the Resistance knew where he was. One day, his comrades (literally, chaverim) were discussing our Torah section, that of the curses, and they were perplexed as to why these curses were so bleak, as opposed to the earlier ones in Leviticus. As they couldn’t figure it out, they began to sigh, being certain that if R. Shimon Bar Yohai were not in hiding, he could explain it to them.  Then, they saw a group of birds fluttering about, and among them a dove. R. Yosi noted the dove, stated that the dove is frequently a metaphor for the people of Israel, and decided to ask R. Shimon Bar Yohai this question about the second group of curses, via the dove. He tied the message to the bird, and in fact, the dove brought the message to R. Shimon, who cried, saying that if he couldn’t get the message to the people, they would never know the truth. Suddenly Elijah the prophet appeared, saying it was hard for him to bear R. Shimon’s tears, and first gives a set of technical answers to the differences between the two sections, and makes a grand exit in a ball of fire, which doesn’t seem to comfort R. Shimon. Elijah reappears with the following teaching, which to my mind justifies this exquisite literary framing:

Fortunate are you, that Gd wants to honor you: All the promises and comforts of Israel are contained within this section. Check it out (pok u’chazei) A king loves his son, even when he needs to show anger in order to discipline him, he really deeply loves him (rehimu demayoi, loves him in his kishkis). Because this version of the curses was uttered out of love, as opposed to the first set.

The text continues with Elijah reading several of the verses in our section in this manner, with the last question of R. Shimon being, where is the redemption hinted at in this section? Elijah then responds, look at the darkest sentence and there it is- 28:66: And your lives will hang before you, you will fear day and night and have no faith in your own living (the word hayim is used both times). The word life, hayyim, here, explains Elijah, means redemption, and while the wise know that redemption is imminent, hanging before them, as it were, they maintain doubt about the actual time it will transpire, but the important thing is that they know it is dangling before them. At this point, a letter is written, and put in the beek of the dove, who then carries it back to R. Yosi, still sitting at the launch site; R. Yosi carries the latter back to his colleagues who cry but are consoled that even if they know not where R. Shimon Bar Yohai is located, they are still with him and learning from him.

Clearly, this was an insight the Zohar Hadash did not simply wish to share, but rather to stress, the literary framework implies a desire to shout it from the rooftops. It’s a revolutionary reading, and a welcome one, particularly as it is picked up by the Hassidic thinkers, whose hermaneutics on a broad scale can be expressed by this type of inversion of the most negative text possible into the most positive message. In fact, it is just this same verse that the Zohar identifies as crucial which provokes a teaching by the Baal Shem Tov, founder of Hasidism, which will occupy us now.

Now when we look at the passages here themselves, what we see are a set of blessings which suggest stability as opposed to the multiple displacements implied in the curses section. The curses are full of movement, one is being chased all over the place, dispersions, exile, and particularly confusion. A telling phrase for me is 28:34, that one will be driven mad (meshuga is the actual Hebrew word here) for what one’s eyes see. Again, towards the end, we have the line about not having faith in our own existing (or existence). Rashi uses the term “safek”, which translates as “doubt”. Doubt in what we see or visualize.

Just this kind of doubt is much discussed in attempting to understand the information age we live in, where vast quantities of data and information are continuously passing before us in a manner previously unknown in human existence. What’s more, the form of this information, more and more of it digital, has itself raised challenges to our understanding of our own ability to understand or center ourselves in this world. The media theorist F.A. Kittler has noted that the concept of digitization, where all information is reduced to pixels, has altered much of our conception:

…The general digitization of channels and information erases the differences among individual media. Sound and image, voice and text are reduced to surface effects, known to consumers as interface. Sense and the senses turn into eyewash. Their media-produced glamour will survive for an interim as a by-product of strategic programs. Inside the computers themselves everything becomes a number: quantity without image, sound, or voice. And once optical fiber networks turn formerly distinct data flows into a series of digitized numbers, any medium can be translated into any other…

At first glance, then, we find ourselves in a world without mooring, where we have no certainty about any reality around us, images are no longer photographic units but rather collections of pixels to be manipulated. This is a world in which one can feel threatened and lost. However, as argued beautifully by Mark Hansen in his recent “New Philosophy for New Media”, perhaps this apparent challenge actually opens up a role for a more central human experience- in a world abuzz with digital information, which we can longer assume as real and “self-sufficient”, the role of the body as processor, of the human mind as crucially central to the act of perception and giving meaning-

When the body acts to enframe digital information-or, as I put it, to forge the digital image- what it frames is in effect itself: its own affectively experienced sensation of coming into contact with the digital. In this way, the act of enframing information can be said to “give body” to digital data- to transform something that is unframed, disembodied and formless into concrete embodied information intrinsically imbued with (human) meaning.

Through the concept of affection in Bergson, in which the act of perception is essentially a creative one, on through Deleuze, to whom perception is an assemblage of perception-images, action-images, and affection-images, Hansen notes that the epistemological challenge of the digital information age actually makes more clear to us our human role in creating reality out of indeterminacy. “The “image” itself has become a process, and as such, has become irreducibly bound up with the activity of the body…the image, rather than finding instantiation in a privileged technical form (including the computer interface), now demarcates the very process through which the body, in conjunction with the various apparatuses for rendering the information perceptible, gives form to or in-forms information.” (pp 10).  Deleuze sees this very clearly with regards to film, even before the digital age, much of our cinematic experience is ‘filled in’ by the viewer, such as relations between characters, motion, what transpires between cuts and outside the frame. The centrality of the viewer in the construction of the cinematic image, the “gest”, leads him to the following conclusion:

The reaction of which man has been dispossessed can be replaced only by belief. Only belief in the world can reconnect man to what he sees and hears. The cinema must film, not the world, but belief in this world, our only link. Restoring our belief in the world- this is the power of the modern cinema (when it stops being bad).   Deleuze, Cinema 2, 172

In fact, Hansen argues, the ability to expand the normal capacity for perception through new media actually leads to an intensified recognition of the humanity of affection. The artist Bill Viola captured the emotional responses of actors using high speed sensitive video played back at normal speed showed “supersaturated” emotional expression that goes beyond what we normally perceive, leading Viola to conclude that “emotions are outside of time” (pp 264).

This leads us to the Baal Shem Tov (Besht)’s reading of verse 66. The Besht read this verse (you life shall dangle before you… you will not have faith in your life) as a means to fine tune one’s self-determination and perception. Life is not a static image, he argues, quoting from the first chapter of Ezekiel, where the chayot (here read as chayim, life) were seen to flit to and fro, and thus one’s own spiritual life is ever changeable and indeterminate. Thus, one must always see ones “self”, dangling, as it were, before oneself. Thus, one must examine ones love or fear of Gd, or any activity one has done, and break it down to the tiniest constituents (pixilate it, so to speak) and seek out any inadequacies, any deficiencies, in order to rectify them.  Following the Zohar’s lead, the text read as the darkest existential threat is really an analytic technique to self modification and “supersaturated” self understanding. His son in law, the Degel Machane Ephraim thus reads this passage as teaching us a creative visualization, so that seeing one’s life before them means training oneself to be able to visualize Gds name before one, as in the mystical reading of the verse “shiviti Hashem linegdi tamid”, “I have placed Gd before me” as being a meditative ability to “see” the name of Gd in one’s field of vision (ok, one might say seeing as with a third eye).

Hansen ends his work with the argument that the challenge of digitalization and machine time should lead us to “explore this machinism as the very catalyst for an empowering technical transformation of the human (pp 271)”. It seems to me that the Zohar, with its argument that the darkest, most intense confusion is exactly where one will find the path to redemption, would be supportive of such an approach, and the literary framing of this argument in the Zohar, so cinematic, really, where a simple statement of the theory might have been adequate, is itself supportive of the role of the “soul”- the capacity of the individual to extract beauty from the apparently ugly, “cursed” raw data of empiric perceptions, and truly create a “blessed” world.

2. Amen for Humanity

Last week I began commenting on this perasha by discussing the Tiferet Shelomo’s stretchy and fluid conception of time, based on his reading of 26:3. This week I’d like to jump a little further into the perasha, over to the passage starting on 27:11, in which various vices are cursed and the entire community is to answer “Amen” to this. Curious word, this Amen. We all know of it, but what does it mean? Its only previous mention in the Torah is in the rather unpleasant episode of the Sotah. In our perasha, as well, the context isn’t exactly the most positive either; it is linked to this series of curses for various offenses, mostly of a sexual nature, though it begins with idolatry and ends with a curse that is fairly totalizing, against one who “does not maintain all the words of this Torah to do them”.

The Midrash takes this opportunity to list a series of positive teachings regarding the answering of Amen, most importantly for our purposes is the linguistic analysis making the use of “amen” to imply 1. an oath (as in the Sotah episode), 2. an act of affirmation (as in our perasha), 3. An act of belief, as in Kings I, 1:36. The Sefat Emet uses the Midrash’s musings on Amen to cite another important teaching on this term in the Talmud, BT Berachot 53: and Nazir 66.: Greater is one that answers Amen to a blessing than the one who makes the blessing. In other words, affirming the blessing is a higher level of devotion than actually making the blessing. Why should that be so?

In the early medieval period, the Hasidei Ashkenaz in Sefer Hasidim explained in a mystical manner: because when one makes a blessing, only one form of Gd’s name is invoked, but the numerical value of Amen is 91, which mathematically symbolizes the two most widely known names of Gd, used in esoteric circles to refer to both the giving and receiving elements in the Godhead. So one who answers Amen has a two to one advantage over the person making the blessing, because the term subsumes within it more aspects of the revealed nature of Gd. Another kabbalistic reading is given by Moshe Haim Luzzatto, “Ramhal”, who explains that the amen act serves to protect the spiritual quanta released by the act of blessing. Spiritual energy of this sort once released can veer off in any direction; by affirming it with an amen, one assures that it travels in the proper direction. Thus, since the lone blesser may inadvertently release spiritual energy in the wrong direction, a blessing with an affirmatory response is a far greater one.

The Maharal discusses the Talmudic teaching regarding Amen several times; his teaching is based on the premise that a response is a more thought through process than the initial blessing. In his Netivot Olam, netiv haavoda chapter 11, he explains that in order for the “amen” to properly function, the responder must intend the amen, whereas the person making the blessing has fulfilled his obligation (to make the blessing) even without intentionality. Thus the one responding to the blessing with an “amen” needs to be more conscious in order to have his or her speech act become operational, whereas even unthinking reflexive action is adequate to fulfill the requirement in making a blessing.

The Sefat Emet takes the exactly opposite approach. According to him (year trm”a), the “blesser” is in a lower spiritual situation, because within his or her prayer act is contained only their own conscious intentional activity, whereas the “responder” answering “amen”, which means “faith”, as in the word Emunah, is speaking out of an undifferentiated affirmation of faith open to all the possible interpretations that can be read into it. In other words, the person making the blessing has a specific spiritual approach in mind, that which they are intending at that moment, and thus the activity is in a sense limited by that intentionality. On the other hand, one who answers amen is essentially invoking all the potential spiritual affirmations that have been, or can be read into, the spiritual speech act.

The Sefat Emet’s reading is not only theological, but it is based on a textual matter. Why is this teaching regarding Amen invoked in this perasha, at this point in the text? Why this act of blessing, with the entire nation answering Amen narrated here? According to the Sefat Emet, the communal nature of spiritual response needed to be taught to the people who are about to embark on the creation of a new spiritual society. The former slave class are about to enter the land of Israel, where their goal will be the formation of a new and positive spiritual community, no longer a group of eremites, living in the “desert” of solely personal and unique apprehension of Gd; now faith will require acceptance of the community’s history and spiritual development. It will be the communities’ growth as a whole, with concern for all members of that community, not merely individual high achievers that will manifest the Jewish faith; this is Torah She’b'al Peh, the Oral Law, which we’ve seen is meant to reflect the lived experience and striving for justice of the entire community, not just of gifted or “holy” individuals, but that of the klal, the totality.

It is interesting, then, that Derrida in his recent book “Religion”, argues that “religion is the response”. In order to properly understand what “religion” means outside of a set of propositions about Gd, he argues that one must know

“what responding means, and also responsibility…and no responsibility without a given word, a sworn faith…a sworn promise, taking immediately Gd as its witness…with Gd, a Gd that is present…all attestation becomes superfluous…Gd would remain then one name of the witness, he would be called as witness…present-absent witness of every oath or of every possible pledge”.

Just as justice is by definition a social phenomenon, and religion is meant to be the foundation upon which justice can be achieved- the ability to believe one another. This amen, this foundation of trust in one another which religion is meant to instill, is foundational of all interaction, not only of theology and social structure, but that of science and research as well. When treating patients, or operating machinery, we choose to believe one another, to affirm that all we know is not false or a deceit. I am not compelled to go back and redo every clinical or scientific study, because we have incorporated the ability to “have faith” in one another, that is, to answer “amen” to the human endeavor. The personal act inherent in answering Amen to a personal blessing is meant to connect all people to a commitment to mutual responsibility. Hence the Talmudic focus on social law and justice rather than personal spiritual attainment. The ability to answer Amen is not only prerequisite for membership in the spiritual community, it is an integral part of all human achievement.

We are Muslim Americans. We are American Muslims. We live as your neighbors, friends, doctors, lawyers, police officers, soldiers, cab drivers, newspaper vendors, teammates, co-workers, and family — seamlessly and without conflict. We are fully immersed in the American mosaic, and we are proud.

Our Muslims forefathers have been here since the founding of this country and we proudly continue upholding our legacy of investing in and contributing to America’s successes from culture to politics, medicine to business, law enforcement to philanthropy.

As Muslims, we believe there is only one God, the God of Adam, Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, Noah, Moses, Joseph, Jesus and Muhammad (God’s peace be on them all).

There is no country on earth that can boast as wide a variety of Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, Zoroastrians and Atheists as America can. As citizens of this country we feel truly blessed to be able to worship as we please, whatever our beliefs. The diversity of the American landscape is mirrored within each of its faith communities; our individual uniqueness, talent and energy make us stronger as one nation.

My post of a few days ago, “My experience of Sept. 11, 2001,” was a discussion of my emotional state at that time. This follow-up, while also emotional, is meant to be a more analytical reflection.

A few years ago, someone misunderstood my point for the following statement, meant not to denigrate what happened on 9/11/2001, but rather to provide some historical perspective and a new measure for grasping the magnitude of the genocide against Jews during World War II:

I made a rough calculation of the number of Jews murdered during the Holocaust. Using the approximate start date of June 22, 1941, the German invasion of the Soviet Union, for its beginning — the Einsatzgruppen began their mass shootings at this time — I calculated that an average of over 29,000 Jews were murdered each week until the war ended on May 8, 1945. This was over 4,000 per day; in other words, the European Jewish population of 11 million suffered the equivalent of more than one and a third 9/11-size catastrophes everyday for three years and ten months.

Still, there’s no gainsaying that the somewhat smaller number of people murdered in this country on Sept. 11, 2001 has had a singular effect on the world since that day, and not for the better. One thing which galls me is the proliferation of antisemitic conspiracy theories, incorporating the events of Sept. 11.

1) 9/11 is a tragic day. It was on on this day in history that a democratically elected government was attacked, the country’s capital was bombed, its president killed, a brutal military dictatorship installed that killed thousands and tortured tens of thousands. Remember Salvador Allende, killed with the support of the US government on 9/11/1973, a day that didn’t change the world, that was “nothing of very great consequence,” as Henry Kissinger assured his boss a few days later. (via Noam Chomsky)

2. Robert Fisk, in the Independent, points out that  For 10 Years, We’ve Lied To Ourselves To Avoid Asking The One Real Question

By their books, ye shall know them.

I’m talking about the volumes, the libraries – nay, the very halls of literature – which the international crimes against humanity of 11 September 2001 have spawned. Many are spavined with pseudo-patriotism and self-regard, others rotten with the hopeless mythology of CIA/Mossad culprits, a few (from the Muslim world, alas) even referring to the killers as “boys”, almost all avoiding the one thing which any cop looks for after a street crime: the motive.

Why so, I ask myself, after 10 years of war, hundreds of thousands of innocent deaths, lies and hypocrisy and betrayal and sadistic torture by the Americans – our MI5 chaps just heard, understood, maybe looked, of course no touchy-touchy nonsense – and the Taliban? Have we managed to silence ourselves as well as the world with our own fears? Are we still not able to say those three sentences: The 19 murderers of 9/11 claimed they were Muslims. They came from a place called the Middle East. Is there a problem out there?

3. Did Osama win? Andrew Sullivan (The Daily Beast) asks if we let Bin Laden win… but decides that we let our fear win, and concludes that, “Until we decide to grasp hope again, the war will live on. Within us all.”

Kristina Olsen at the Interfaith Worship Service We Held in Kabul

I’ve been blessed to have the opportunity to create and air over a dozen 2-minute “perspectives” on our local public radio station, KQED. The editor there asked those of us who have been on the program over the years to write a special perspective about how we experienced September 11th and the impact of those tragic events. Though mine didn’t make the cut for airing during a special half-hour program this weekend, I thought I would share it with my Tikkun Daily friends. What does the song I’ve Got You Babe have to do with September 11th? Read on.

A scene of horror that day.

Although I’m not a direct survivor, the attack on my hometown hit me hard, one of several traumatic events that disrupted my life within the course of a single year.

First, my mother passed away. She died of lymphoma but also had a form of dementia which plagued her for a number of years. Rightly or wrongly, I’m haunted to this day by a feeling that my family and I should have done more for her.

In a shocking instance of the personal merging with the political, her death occurred almost exactly as the Second Intifada began in late September 2000. It is quite a coincidence that my father’s death occurred simultaneously with the onset of the First Intifada in December 1987. Still, the First Intifada helped give rise to the peace process of the 1990s. The Second Intifada, however–especially as it deepened and worsened for several years, costing thousands of casualties–was not only a material blow to the prospects for peace, but also an emotional blow for me as a passionate Zionist peace activist.

And then came the outrageous outcome of the 2000 Presidential campaign. Although I could not know how bad George W. Bush would actually be in office, I knew that he wasn’t up to the job. So, I felt myself in a deep funk even prior to Sept. 11, 2001. The events of that day compounded my sense of loss into what may have been a clinical depression. For example, I found it impossible to summon the emotional energy to file my income taxes for some years thereafter. Was this really depression? Who knows? Regardless, it was palpable and bad.

When I returned from a six-month kibbutz experience in Israel in 1974, I felt the “culture shock” of reentry into American society. What surprised me most was that I suddenly became aware of women driving cars, and that it seemed strange.

You see, on the kibbutz where I had been living, only one woman was given permission to drive the kibbutz car, and she was considered a little odd. I had become acculturated to the gender bias of that time and place.

Of course, the Israel I knew has progressed in many ways around this issue, but the struggle continues. The details have changed, but the headlines show there’s still a problem.

Read this incredible speech on September 3, 2011 by Daphne Leef, who initiated Israel’s massive protest movement a few months ago, after pitching her tent in Tel Aviv’s Habima Square. You can find it here.

Then read the September 6^th commentary in the Sisterhood Blog (Jewish Daily Forward) about how male activists are spotlighted and praised, while female activists are relegated to the lower rungs of relevance. The speech is here.

Unfortunately, gender discrimination remains strong.

It’s time for this to change, too.

Last night’s GOP debate evoked a range of responses in me, from disbelief to revulsion. It was not only the content, but also the form and style of the lineup, the glowing white teeth and slick hair, the token woman and token black man, the cartoonish smiles, the obviously strained civility and the embarrassing pandering of each to distinguish him or herself from the others.

I was particularly horrified by the advance applause of the audience when Perry was asked what he thought of the fact that during his tenure as Governor, Texas had executed more people than any other state. Before Perry had a chance to answer, the audience erupted into wild applause! Perry then went on with great pride to explain his commitment to capital punishment. It was hard to stomach.

I was also in a state of somewhat bemused disbelief as I heard Perry incoherently dodge the question put to him about climate change. When asked which scientists and theories he could draw upon to support his claims that the science was still out climate change, he very awkwardly avoided the question and camouflaged his ignorance with in the rhetoric of “sound” economic policy.

But the most important issue, and I’d love to hear some others’ thoughts about this, was provoked by Romney’s assertion that there is now proof that “Keynesian” economics doesn’t work.

Around the country, people will walk with their neighbors in remembrance of 9/11. Photo by Gordon Bell/Flickr

As the tenth anniversary of 9/11 approaches, many of us are wondering how best to honor the many victims of that tragedy and its aftermath in a way that does not yield to the militarism, chauvinism, and Islamophobia that have often been linked to or justified as appropriate responses to 9/11. So here is a note we got from one spiritual progressive, Bart Campolo, whose ideas are closely aligned with the NSP:

Here in Cincinnati, my wife Marty’s answer is inviting some of our friends to join us on a walk with some Muslim and Jewish families she invited by simply calling their congregations. She got the idea from me and my friends at Abraham’s Path, who are sponsoring www.911walks.org to help people find or pull together their own 9/11 Walks all over the USA and around the world. The goal of these walks is simple: To help people honor all the victims of 9/11 by walking and talking kindly with neighbors and strangers, in celebration of our common humanity and in defiance of fear, misunderstanding and hatred.

I haven’t been able to write anything lately. Honestly, I don’t know what I have to say that is positive at this point. It’s demoralizing to watch what should have been a Democratic presidency disintegrate.