“Being Moved to Action”

Rosh Hashanah 5765/2004
Rabbi Judith Schindler

“Praise me,” says God, “And I will know that you love me.
Curse me, and I will know that you love me.
Praise me or curse me, and I will know that you love me.”

“Sing out my graces,” says God.
“Raise your fist against me and revile,” says God.
“Sing my praises or revile,
reviling is also praise,” says God.

“But if you sit fenced off in your apathy,
entrenched in ‘I don’t give a damn,’” says God.
“If you look at the stars and yawn,” says God,
“If you see suffering and don’t cry out,
If you praise and don’t revile,
Then I created you in vain,” says God.

This poem by Aaron Zeitlin teaches us about the purpose of this day. As we draw together to usher in yet another new year, our prayers should not be mere words of praise for God but rather they should serve a greater purpose: our prayers should open our eyes to the plight that exists in our world, our prayers should open our ears to the words of our ancient prophets who called for justice, and our prayers should inspire us to open our mouths and call out to the world for healing and for change.

There are many of you in the sanctuary who have difficulty with prayer. You are not sure of its purpose. You do not understand its process. Nor are you convinced of its power. There are even some of you who are weekly worshippers with us who come for community rather than connecting with God.

The story is told of a journalist who was assigned to the Jerusalem bureau and took an apartment overlooking the Wailing Wall. Every day, the journalist would look out and see a particular old Jewish man praying vigorously. So the journalist went down to the wall, introduced herself, and asked him: “I see that you come to the Wall every day. I hope you don’t mind my asking but how long have you done this and for what do you pray?”

To which the old man replied, “I have come here to pray every day for twenty five years. In the morning I pray for world peace and then for the brotherhood of man. I go home have a cup tea, and I come back and pray for the eradication of illness and disease from the earth.”

The journalist was awestruck. “How does this make you feel to come here every day for twenty five years and pray for these things.”

To which the old man replied calmly: “Like I am talking to a wall.”

Our Talmud struggles with these very same concerns. Hence, the rabbis ask themselves whether God even hears our prayers. One rabbi, Elazar, taught that ever since the destruction of the Temple the gates of prayer are locked. Our petitions are not as readily accepted by God as they once were. Our prayers must ascend to God through angels who act as intermediaries. But the gates of tears, Rabbi Elazar adds, are always open. Those who weep have a direct line to God.

According to Rabbi Elazar, God hears the cries of the oppressed. God hears the weeping of those who are hungry and have no food. God takes note of the lamenting of those who are cold and have no shelter. And God knows the despair of those who are victims of violence, oppression and discrimination. The gates of prayer have been locked, the Talmud tells us, but the gates of tears are always open.

Perhaps then, the key to finding God is to stand not with a prayer book in our hands but with a box of Kleenex. I believe that when we stand in the presence of those with overflowing tears, we hear prayers in their most heartfelt form. When we reach out to those in need… when we sit with our friends who are bereft or suffering… when go to soup kitchens or to hospitals… when we visit legislators to speak for those who have no political voice… when we go into impoverished neighborhoods and help to build desperately needed housing… when we help fight for causes which have not adequately been fought, then I believe God hears not only the voices of those in need but God hears our voice as well. Perhaps God hears our voice because we, too, cry inside ourselves tears of compassion.

When we worship at Temple Beth El each Shabbat, we are blessed to have before us a spectacular marble ark framed by majestic windows. According to our tradition windows are required in every synagogue because as Jews our prayers are not to be disconnected from the world outside. While meditation is widely popular in our culture, our religious worship should not be solely a self-indulgent journey through our souls, but rather our prayer should move us beyond ourselves -- so that we can feel more clearly the pain of others, and see more clearly the plight of our world.

This is our first goal of prayer – to connect with others and to witness the ways which we and our world need healing. Our second goal is to hear our sacred texts – especially the voices of our ancient prophets whose call to pursue justice is our most important religious mandate. The prophets of our Bible are the centerpiece of Reform Judaism. While over the past century and a half we have struggled with our relationship with ritual, our movement’s commitment to the justice articulated by the prophets has remained steadfast and true.

Those prophets of old – Jonah, Micah, Jeremiah had a gift for telling it like it was. They did not mince their word or soften their message as they shared God’s view of our lives. If the prophets were here today they would no doubt look at the society we have created and cry out with criticism.

“Your children our dying,” the prophet Micah would decry. “Do not raise your hand in resignation and say that suffering is far from your midst, for it is outside your very door. In your state of North Carolina that you call home, every fifteen minutes a child falls victim to abuse, every nine hours a child dies before reaching his or her first birthday, every four days a gunshot takes a toddler or youth, and every 9 seconds a woman is beaten.”

“Just lift your eyes and look,” Hosea would holler. “Racial inequity continues to abound. You see color rather than character. In your country that you claim furthers freedom, your doors to equal economic and educational opportunity are not open to all. You put up walls so that you cannot see your neighbor and thereby convince yourselves that the distance renders you powerless in responding to their poverty or plight. While you hide your eyes, God does not. God hears the calls of the nearly half million children in your state who are poor, and the quarter million children who live unnecessarily on the edge with no health insurance.”

“You worship idols,” Isaiah would call out with condemnation. “Your cars and your clothes have become more important to you than your compassion and caring. You put television above Torah, you put money above morals, your technology has consumed you so that you have lost touch with community, with humanity, with God and with yourselves.

No one liked the prophets of old. They were not invited to the parties of the prominent. They were thrown into pits and tormented and teased. Micah, Hosea and Isaiah were not popular in their day, nor would they be in ours.

Even modern day preachers who give such messages are castigated. A recent issue of Creative Loafing entitled “Holy Wars” commented on the ways in which the powerful voices of liberal preachers in this city have been stifled. Reverend William Wood of First Presbyterian Church remarked that he tried to balance the desire to speak out with the need to preserve the unity of the church. There is a current inclination to be cautious. “In this climate,” he remarked, “I don’t go picking fights.”

Yet in our faith, silence is unacceptable. It is not enough to sit in our sanctuary and witness through windows the woes of the world. It is not enough to hear the voice of the prophets of old inspiring us to pursue to justice. Our tradition demands that we speak out on issues of social concern. Thirty six times in our Torah we are told to remember that we were slave in Egypt. We are commanded again and again to create a free society for all.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who is one of the two current Jewish United States Supreme Court Justices, has a framed Hebrew text from Torah hanging on three of the four walls of her chambers. It reads: “Tzedek, tzedek tirdof – justice, justice you shall pursue.” As she engages in her most sacred work of ensuring that justice prevails in our country, no matter where she sits in her office she looks up and sees that text from Deuteronomy. “The demand for justice,” she explains, “runs through the entirety of Jewish history and Jewish tradition.”

There are times when we pursue justice that we feel like the prophets of old – criticized and alone. Author Elie Weisel tells the story of the one righteous man of Sodom -- that Biblical city of evil. The upright soul walked the streets protesting against the injustices that he saw. People mocked him with disdain. Finally a young person asked: “Why do you continue you protest against evil? Can’t you see, no one is paying attention to you?” He answered, “I will tell you why I continue. In the beginning I thought I would change people. Today, I know I cannot. Yet if I continue my protest, at least I will prevent others from changing me.

Becoming callous, apathic or exhausted by the sins of society is easy. Yet the purpose of this Rosh Hashanah day is to awaken us from our apathy and to inspire us to action.

Temple Beth El has a powerful presence in this community – we are the largest synagogue in the Carolinas. Much like EF Hutton in those old commercials, when we speak, the community listens. Let us not be afraid to use our voice, to use our numbers, to use our passion for righteousness and justice to cry out for change. This year let us use our power for an even greater purpose.

In the coming year, our social action committee will spread its wings and become involved in social justice. As a community, I pray that we will speak out on issues with which all of us can agree – on voter registration, on children’s issues, on domestic abuse, against the genocide in the Sudan.

Moses saw that slavery was wrong and spoke out. Abraham saw that idolatry was misguided and spoke out. The prophets saw the Israelites were subverting justice and spoke out. Esther, saw the pending destruction caused by the hatred of Haman and spoke out. We, the heirs of this great heritage, must speak out as well.

In just ten days we will begin to confess our sins – the sin of silence, the sin of indifference, the sin of callousness and of complicity. “Al chet she’chatanu l’faneichah,” we will say, “For the sin of allowing injustices to go unchecked.”


This year, at Temple Beth El, let our confession lead us to change. Let us be the voice in this community that is bold enough to speak out. Let us be the voice that collectively cries out against abuse, again injustice, again inequity, against poverty, against pain. This year, at Temple Beth El, let us recognize and use the power that we have to transform our city, our state, perhaps even our country.

The story is told of the great Rabbi Israel Salanter who was missing from his synagogue on the Eve of Atonement, the Kol Nidre, the holiest night of the Jewish calendar. The elders of the synagogue went out searching for him and they found him taking care of a sick child. They said to him, “Rabbi, why aren’t you in the synagogue?”

“Do you see what I am doing?” he replied.

“But Rabbi, it is your duty to be in the synagogue praying.”

“I am praying,” the great rabbi taught. “Every act of kindness is a prayer – a prayer that walks, moves, breathes, and lives.”

Every act that we do to pursue justice is also a prayer. Today we gather to usher in a New Year with worship. May our prayers this day and every day inspire us to see the wrongs of our world, to hear our religious mandate for justice, and to speak out in order to create change.

On this day, as we call out to God, may we also call out to one another and to ourselves.

Our tradition teaches that we should pray as if everything depended on God and we act as if everything depended on us.”

May we pray with sincerity, may we act with integrity, and may this New Year of 5765 be blessed with renewed purpose and peace. Amen.