CHAZAK, CHAZAK VENITCHAZEK!

                                                    Twelve Months of Studying Prophets

 I write this last blog entry roughly 2,744 years  after the writings of our Prophetic ancestors Isaiah and Jeremiah. If they and their collective Jewish communities could travel to our century they would no doubt marvel and assuredly quake at the spectacle of the changes that have taken place. However, I think in time, after they acclimated to the new era in which they found themselves, they would recognize us as we recognize them.  When we sit together in fellowship to study the collected books, it is evident that these writings are our stories too. I envision Bible study much like a trip in a time machine where we are enabled to travel back to our ancestral beginnings. I remain motivated to sustain weekly Tanakh study because for good or ill, it is our own imperfect image which we see reflecting off each page. After all, who would want to study one thousand six hundred and twenty four pages worth of self-actualized people making sensible choices?

Obviously dates, names and political boundaries have changed but human frailties endure. We remain botched and broken. Despite my intellectual pessimism regarding human nature, I choose to function as an optimist by embracing Tikkun Olam. In my estimation this is the only sustainable and productive orientation to adopt during our brief stay on planet earth. From the outset of this blog and in a spirit of full disclosure, I do confess that I began with no burning desire to prove or disprove the existence of God. In fact the more I read the less vested I feel about the existence of God, the historical veracity of the narratives or the intersection and parameters of logic and science. Here, I’m more than happy to leave these inquiries to others and enjoy the fruits of their labor. If the Tanakh is not dictated by a God then conversely it is constructed by men and we are left to ponder the relevance of their narratives. I do wholeheartedly believe that our story is real because it is truthful in the truest sense; it is true in the way dreams and great art are true as they are the most revelatory and human of activities.

It is very easy to prematurely discount these ancient writings, as they are exceedingly rife with murder and mayhem of all kinds. It is precisely these aspects of the text which are clearly reflections of a unique moment in time but in truth our baser human nature has changed little since then and flourishes into modernity with an especially brutish technological vengeance; all the more reason to seek the wisdom of our culture. I believe disappointment awaits those who expect to prove the existence of a supreme deity. It is my opinion that this is a personal affair and is impossible to prove therefore, it should not be the measurement of our book’s true worth. After all, Science has not enabled us to transcend the gross lapses of our own contemporary morality, nor has it successfully proved or disproved the existence of a God. The creation of robot drones over spears does not an argument for progress make.

At any age, one can read the Tanakh for instruction and be fed. As we read we can vicariously project ourselves into the stories and explore our responses to ethical dilemmas and moral snares. In so doing we learn and practice our personal and cultural responsibility to issues of conscience. During times of historical crisis, our default has been set to the highest good framed for our community to understand. I think the most salient message of the Prophets is that ethical behavior is learned and must be cultivated with conscious effort. We continue to strive to reach this goal.  Judaism presents no moral relativism; it is clear how we are all expected to act.  Simply put, we are expected to do nothing less than repair the world. Tikkun Olam is the physical manifestation of hope in action.

It is truly miraculous that we have survived as a people while so many others have been lost to history. There is something very laudable about our collective efforts and our desire to cleave together as a people. Torah Study is a powerful outlet for fulfilling this need. There are few places a person can go to be nurtured by committed community members who are willing to explore their culture and themselves. Tanakh study offers something for every manner of reader whether they be right or left- brain dominant: beautifully sophisticated prose, hallucinatory prophecy, magic, historical documentation, parable, mythos, political intrigue, numerology, (Gematria), codification of law, ethical behavior and more. All these aspects existing separately but conforming in relationship, like elements in a kaleidoscopic vision. The effect is an ever- changing experience that simultaneously presents our past, present and enduring future. For those of you who have visited this blog I hope it proved thought-provoking and has aided you in some way. Tanakh study is similar to an addiction but luckily for us it is a compulsion worth pursuing. Hebrews keep on reading . Read often, delve deeply, connect more. Chazak, Chazak, Venitchazek!

I offer my deepest gratitude to my husband Joel Silverstein for his tireless editing, his boundless enthusiasm and his true love for Jewish learning.

A Special thanks to our Rabbi Joel Mosbacher and my fellow Torah study partners, without whom Saturdays just wouldn’t be the same.

 

                          

 

 

 

Jeremiah Chapters 37-39; Do not delude yourselves...

Chapter 37

 A rough chronology of Jeremiah might assist us in framing the coming siege of Jerusalem.

640 BCE:  Josiah becomes the King of Judah

627 BCE: The Lord first speaks to Jeremiah

622: Book of Deuteronomy found in the temple. Reforms attempted but do not stick.

609: Josiah killed in battle at Megiddo. Josiah’s son Jehoahaz is taken in chains to Egypt after only a 3 month rule.    

609 – 598 BCE: Josiah’s other son Jehoiachim rules Judah as a puppet of Egypt

605 BCE: Babylonians defeat Egyptian forces. The first deportation of Jews to Babylon

597 BCE: Second Babylonian invasion. More Jews (like Ezekiel) taken into exile. Babylonians set up Zedekiah to replace Jehoiachim.

586 BCE:  The fall of Jerusalem. Exile for most of Jerusalem’s citizenry

 Zedekiah’s reign is nearing a close. The Egyptian army has left and the Babylonians will soon take advantage of this opportunity. The siege of Jerusalem is eminent.  Zedekiah sends men to Jeremiah in the hope that he will petition God for assistance. This is a no-can-do moment. The Lord stands firm in that the Babylonians will do his bidding. The people need to be cleansed in the fire of exile. The king, unhappy with this prophesy, jails Jeremiah.

 

Rabbi: The Egyptians are leaving and the Babylonians will soon be sacking the city. Jeremiah’s message is not what they expected to hear. He is telling them not to fight. They must accept defeat.

Jerry: How long was Jeremiah in jail?

Rabbi: I don’t know!

Paul: Where is the scribe Baruch in all this?

Bill: Maybe they put him in the house of Jonathan along with Jeremiah.

Ellen: Placing Jeremiah in this house seems like a witness protection program. Everyone knows where he is if they wanted to kill him.

Rabbi: Well I think that’s just it. They are sort of afraid that Jeremiah might actually be a true Prophet and they are afraid to do away with him.

Jonathan: They’ll put him in the pit, then  in the prison and if he dies they can say that they didn’t actually do it with their own hands.

Bob: No one wants to hear Jeremiah’s defeatist talk. They want a positive message.

                                                          Chapter 38

Rabbi: There is a very interesting relationship between Zedekiah and Jeremiah.

Ellen: Does Zedekiah believe that Jeremiah is a true Prophet? How would anyone know who is true and who is false?

Rabbi: Jeremiah is prophesizing doom – he is telling the king to surrender and his life will be spared.

Bill: Maybe Zedekiah sees that he can’t possibly win. He sees that some of the people are defecting to Egypt. It’s a lost cause at this point.

 

Bob: This battle occurred over time. They fought hard. They didn’t just give-up.

Ellen: If Jeremiah can see what’s coming why doesn’t he help the people and tell them to store bread – you know something that can help them?

Julie: I think you are missing the point. God can’t be tricked. There is no going around him. He has decided that the people will be punished and this is how it will go down.  Jeremiah is God’s servant. He would be smote if he did not speak God’s directives.

Rabbi: Jeremiah is telling them it’s over. Exile is here.

Ellen: It may have worked!

Julie: The lesson is that the people are idiots. They don’t learn from their mistakes and they repeat them over and over. They need to go through the adversity of exile and make it out the other end.

Bill: If the people continued to fight, who knows ; there may not have been a Jewish people.

                                                              Chapter 39

This is it! This is the siege of Jerusalem. The Babylonian army breaches the walls and king Nebuchadrezzar’s officers take up quarters inside the Middle-Gate.  Meanwhile Zedekiah has not heeded Jeremiah’s direction and he flees during the night with his soldiers. He is caught, his children are murdered before his eyes, his nobles killed and then he is blinded and chained. The palace is burned down along with the people’s homes and the walls of Jerusalem are toppled. Some of the poorest people are allowed to remain and they are gifted with vineyards by the chief of the Babylonian Guards. The Eunuch Ebed-Melech pleads for Jeremiah and Jeremiah is set free and goes to Egypt.

 

 

 

Julie: These poor who are given the land, aren’t these the same people who God will wipe out later once the remnant return from exile?

Jerry: This was a common practice in war. Some of the people who presented no threat to the victors were allowed to remain as stewards on the land in order to keep it profitable.

Julie: I get your point but I’m asking something different. I’m trying to figure out if these are the same people whom God will smite once the exiled return to the land.

Rabbi: I don’t know.

Bob: This sounds like Lenin’s tactics. This was a style of warfare in this time. People had to stay to administer for the winning side.

Jerry: Anyone who defied them got wiped out.

Bob: King Zedekiah spared Jeremiah’s life but he didn’t listen to his prophesy.

Bill: He just couldn’t convince the people not to fight.

Bob: Their army knew that they couldn’t win so you figure they would have tried to broker a deal.

The issues that Jeremiah brings out really go against any modern concept of nationalism. What country wants to submit to another and then dub it as God’s plan for the future? This kind of thinking could be seen as defeatist or even “Quisling” in its submission to hostile authority. Yet it was precisely this historical contingency that enabled Judaism to grow from a local nationalist religion to a global religion in exile, where a new religious character was formed. Whether we consider Judaism to be a nation in exile, or merely a religion, it is here in conflict and in submission to Babylon and Judah’s reinstatement under the Persians that modern Judaism truly began.

 

 

 

 

Jeremiah Chapters 34-35; In the seventh year...

               

                                                                   Chapter 34

God has directed the Babylonians to destroy Jerusalem as punishment for neglecting the freedom promise of the Sabbatical year.

Bob: Referring to 34:2-5 “…You will be captured and handed over to him (Nebuchadrezzar)…you will not die by the sword. You will die a peaceful death…”

 Why bother saving (Judah’s King) Zedekiah? He’s part of the old guard.

Bill: Referring to 34:5 “… so they will burn incense for you…”

Does the use of incense mean that he will die a good death? I thought he was a puppet King not worthy of a good death.

Rabbi: It just means he will be remembered.  Jeremiah is saying that the King will have a peaceful death.

Joel: I thought Zedekiah was taken back into captivity to Egypt and blinded. Doesn’t sound so peaceful to me.

Jerry: I think Joel is right.

Bill: So Jeremiah’s vision of a peaceful death for Zedekiah is incorrect prophecy.

Julie: Well, after he is blinded, he has a peaceful death. After reading the Prophets, I wish we had a Jewish slave’s perspective on all this as commentary. We don’t get the slave’s voice.

Ceil: Jeremiah 34:8. After the Sabbatical year a slave was supposed to be set free. This is not the same as our notion of American slavery where it was in effect held in perpetuity.

Jerry: This (the Biblical definition of Slavery) seems to be describing indentured servitude.

Rabbi: Slavery was indentured servitude based on a system of working off a debt.

Jane: Isn’t this similar to our military? The poor make up most of the military because their options are limited and they are offered a career or a free education in exchange for their service.

Rabbi: So we see in 34:10 that there is a new twist. The people let the slaves go but then take them back into bondage. After Exodus, (in the book of Leviticus) God established the Sabbatical year. They people clearly know they are to give up their slaves, this but do not keep their promise.

Joel: I’m still upset about Zedekiah. He is going to die very badly.

Rabbi: Let’s not over- read this. He is promised that he will not die by war.  Zedekiah attempts to get his people to comply with God’s demand in order to free the slaves, but they violate that covenant. He is exiled, but he does not get to die in his palace.

Julie: Referring to 34:18 “I will make the men who violated my covenant, who did not fulfill the terms of the covenant which they made with Me, (like) the calf they cut in two so as to pass between the halves.” Rabbi, what is the significance of this calf reference?

Rabbi: God is calling attention to the people’s public affirmation of the covenant as referenced by Abraham’s sacrifice from Genesis 15:7 but, then they disregard this affirmation by walking through the two halves of the cow, forgetting their promise. In the ancient Near East, if you transgress the boundaries of a sacrifice, agreement markers or the like, you violate that agreement. Remember Moses throwing the two tablets of the Law at the Children of Israel after the debacle of the Golden Calf. This is similar.

Editor’s Note –Genesis 15:  at God’s bidding, Abraham offers a three year old heifer, a three year old she-goat, a three year old ram, a turtle dove and a young bird as sacrifice. He cuts each animal, with the exception of the young bird, into two parts. God promises Abraham prosperity and peace in the Promised Land, the legacy of ancient Israel, but explains that the people must first endure four hundred years of oppression. As the sun sets, a flaming torch passes between the animal parts as a sign of God’s covenant with Abraham.

Julie: There is lots of physical learning and physical symbols going on in these

stories. Very much like performance art.

Joel: How much text did the Prophets actually know? What did they have at their disposal? This quote would suggest the text of Genesis, but did he actually have it? His audience must have known this story. It’s like Abraham Lincoln saying “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” Lincoln’s audience had to know the biblical text in order to understand Lincoln’s speech. In other words, for a joke to be funny there has to be an unspoken understanding amongst the audience or the joke wouldn’t make sense.

Rabbi: It’s impossible to really know for certain how much text he had, but I imagine Jeremiah would use references to earlier written text in order to teach the people. They must have been familiar with some of the references, otherwise why use them?

Bill: Maybe God was coaching them.

Rabbi: Well yeah, the prophets are teachers. We will see in Chapter 35 that now we are traveling back 15 years before Zedekiah to the time of king Yohakim. Referring to 35:3 “So I took Jaazaniah son of Jeremiah…” This is not the prophet Jeremiah. This is another Jeremiah.

Bill: referring to 35:5-6 “ I set bowls full of wine and cups before the men  of the house of the Rechabites, and said unto them, “have some wine.” They replied, “We will not drink wine, for our ancestor Jonadab son of Rechab, commanded us: “You shall never drink wine, either you or your children, nor shall you own such things; but shall live intents…”

Why can’t they drink wine?

Rabbi: The Rechabites are not Jews. Their descendants trace back to Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses. They are an Arab tribe that is nomadic preferring to live in tents and in contrast to the Jews they are adhering to the customs and covenant of their beliefs.

Bill: There is a Midrash that Jethro was a convert to Judaism.

Julie: I’m not sure I understand why they are coming into Jerusalem.

Rabbi: The Babylonians are coming so they are seeking protection inside the city walls against the Babylonians.

Julie: The city will be sacked anyway.

Rabbi: Yes but the Rechabite peoples are promised that their line will continue not because they follow the word of God, but because they have adhered to the precepts of their own declamations. They made a covenant on their own terms and they have kept their word.  The Jews have not been able to do this. God recognizes this and rewards them with a continued lineage. They are allowed to survive and even prosper. What makes this fascinating is that it is in the books of the Prophets where the notion of God, the nations and their respective destinies have been expanded. In the Torah, the plan concerns Israel and its destiny among the nations. It is primarily centered on Israel alone. It is in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the rest where other nations are held accountable as well. It is not enough that God uses the other nations to punish Israel for its misdeeds. What is important is that now each nation has a destiny based on its own deeds, its own system of rewards and punishments as per its accomplishments and collective behavior. The nations will be brought to account. This is a global scheme, far reaching, fascinating and much more modern. It’s not all about us any longer.

The words of Jeremiah remind us that the Biblical reality forms a complex web of morality, behavior and destiny where we are all bound together, whether we like it or not.  Even today the fate of the Jewish People as a separate autonomous religious and or ethnic group in exile or for that matter in Israel is offset by the common good of all the nations. The question” Is it good for the Jew’s” is always framed by the bigger question, “Is it also good for humankind?”

 

 

 

 

 

Jeremiah Chapters 29 - 30 ; You Shall Be My People

 

Chapter 29

Jeremiah has sent a letter to the exiled community leaders in Babylon directing them to tell the Jewish rank and file to carry on with their lives. Special emphasis is placed on refraining from following the diviners and false prophets in their midst. The exiled are told to suck it up and endure for an unspecified amount of time, until God brings them back to Israel. For those who have managed to avoid exile, they too will be punished and the land purified of their presence via pestilence, famine and the sword. It would seem that they are the carriers of spiritual and physical contagion, which if left unchecked would infect the returning Israelites.

 Ellen: Jeremiah gives these false Prophets too much energy. Why even react to them?

Joel: Jeremiah is a very specific personality. He’s a bit of a neurotic nudge. I think he can’t help but being annoyed at anything that rankles his defended personality.

Rabbi: Jeremiah is being persecuted! Even paranoids have enemies. These people can actually cause Jeremiah harm, so this is not just about neurotic behavior.

Ceil: Well, Jeremiah tends to be pettish!

Joel: Yeah, he is easily annoyed.

Rabbi: referring to 29:24 Shemaiah sent letters to all the people in Jerusalem to build houses and dwell in Babylon. Shemaiah wants the priests to rebuke Jeremiah for directing the people to accept their fate/punishment. Shemaiah wants Jeremiah to be punished.

Joel: People don’t want to hear that they must endure exile. This is counter- intuitive. A fight or flight instinct dictates that you run or mount an offensive. Exile sounds like submission to the enemies of Israel.

Ceil: Jeremiah is telling them to assimilate but only up to a point. They must remember who they are.

Rabbi: There is a shift in tone now. We can begin to see that Jeremiah is an optimistic realist.

Bill: Jeremiah has come a long way – he’s like the Energizer Bunny. He’s ready for the next round.

                                         

                                                           Chapter 30

Jeremiah is directed by God to write down his words which are to be committed to scroll. God is making the promise to restore the people of Israel. This is like a promissory note whereby God is paying the people with hope so that they will invest in their future. It’s a lot like a business contract.

Bill: referring to 30:10-11. God is going to handle those who have mistreated Israel, even though it was God’s hand that used Babylon to carry out the punishment of exile in the first place.

Joel: Corrupt empires are deserving of this punishment.

Ellen: I’m not sure that I know any longer why this (these books) is important to read. I really don’t! I see people behaving in history and the Prophets are like any leader saying stuff in order to get the people to stay together. They have to say the right thing in order to keep people along a certain path, but I don’t see any spirituality in this. It’s just politics being used by religion. I liked the early books much better. I liked the story of the Garden of Eden. It seems a lot more relevant even though it’s older.

Julie: There is a lot of repetition in the Prophets – same old, same old done in various ways in order to reach different people.

Paul: The value of reading these books, (the Hebrew Bible) is that they function like a compass. There are obstacles along our path and we can decide to go around, over or under them. It’s a compass of experience which we must negotiate.

Rabbi: I like this metaphor but I believe that Jeremiah is addressing a collective experience. It is not about the individual. We as a nation are meant to survive.

Joel: Whether these books actually happened or not Judaism functions under the logic of history. It reveals itself through history. It creates a history with a divine purpose and even if you don’t believe in God, it has great ramifications regarding secular ideas about progress and moral development. You can’t divorce Judaism from history. If you do you are stuck with myth and that’s a whole other story.

Ellen: I want the Torah to have amendments like the Constitution.

Rabbi: They do. Any amendments can be found in the Talmud and commentaries. That’s the purpose of them.

Whether we like those amendments or not, it is another story and entirely up to us. As Reform Jews we are often stuck with amendments to ritual behavior of the Orthodox world, when we as a movement have a history of secularizing Judaism or stream-lining it. How can we make the Torah relevant, when we may not believe in history as God’s particular punishment or reward? How can we remain Jews when laws regarding Temple purity are striven to be maintained in our local synagogue and we may question the legitimacy of those very arguments or requirements?  Our ability to make the Prophets meaningful is their very genius. We are forced to confront our own identity as individuals and as Jews belonging to a community precisely because Jeremiah asked the hard questions in the face of dissolution and annihilation. It is those very questions which posit “What is a Jew? Who is a good moral God-fearing Jew? Who survives and at what price? It is these questions which may be answered through moral, ethical and/or observant ritual behavior. Both exist in Judaism and both are actively addressed. But, it is up to us to make the personal or communal assessment as to how to these issues play out in our daily lives. The fact that Jeremiah presents us with as many questions as answers is our legacy. It is a personal commitment to moral behavior writ large and played out on the global stage. It is this personal commitment which makes up the greater tribal identity, that of B’nai Israel.

Jeremiah Chapters 24-25; Figs so rotten that they could not be eaten.

                                       Chapter 24

Tim: Referring to 24:2 “One basket contained good figs, like first –ripened figs, and the other basket contained very bad figs, so bad they could not be eaten.”

Who sorted these figs?

Ceil: Referring to 24:8 “And like the bad figs… so will I treat King Zedekiah of Judah and his officials and the remnant of Jerusalem that is left in this land… I will make them a horror – an evil-to all the kingdoms of the earth.”

 You would think that the remnant would be considered the lucky ones – the ones who were able to survive and remain in the land. Why aren’t they rewarded?

Ellen: God needs anger management!

Rabbi: God has been trying to direct and teach man all along – from Eden up to this point.

Ellen: God hasn’t stepped in for a very long time – now he will starve them and create hell on earth.

Ceil: Well, the people have misbehaved.

Rabbi: There is no pure good or pure evil/bad person who survives. Jeremiah is offering hope to those who will make it back from exile. All the people at that time will be purified.

Joel: This is the eve of the Babylonian invasion. To surrender to exile is counter-intuitive but that is what Jeremiah is directing them to do.

Jerry: The remnant will stay with the corrupt puppet-king Zedekiah, so maybe that is why they need to be purged.

Joel: The Jews did well in Babylon after a while.

Ceil: There wasn’t necessarily a climate of hate towards the Jews there. There were many different cultures of conquered people living together.

Julie: Sounds like NYC.

Ellen: Why didn’t God destroy the other people – why his own people?

Joel: In history bad things happen so humans make up reasons – God is historical contingency. If you believe he is a personality he or she is functioning in multiple dimensions. If he or she is not, then history sets up challenges and Jews have to survive in a Darwinian sense. So it’s a test either way.

Ellen: That works as an explanation if man made God but it doesn’t work if God made man.

Rabbi: I don’t believe in a God who makes people do things.

Bill: It seems that God wants people to earn things – learn and grow through adversity.

Rabbi: Ellen wants to know why if God stepped in once why won’t he do it again.

Bill: As we age our perspective changes.

Ellen: I don’t think God is on a linear plane.

Rabbi: I think it is man who is changing and discovering aspects of God. God doesn’t change.

Corey: The people were slaves in Egypt a long time. Maybe they needed and devised a reason to finally leave.

Joel: This is the evolution theory of God.

              

                                     

 

                                       Chapter 25

Rabbi: At this point Jeremiah has been prophesizing for twenty four years. This is his last appeal to the people.

Bill: This is in third person.

Rabbi: Yes, Baruch the scribe’s voice may be here.

Bill: This is like the end of the movie.

Rabbi: Yeah, like Lord of the Rings with seven possible endings.

Joel: Frum Jews believe that Jews are a nation. Real Jews yearn to go back. If we don’t, we are in exile regardless of where we may live and thrive. I see myself as an American and a Jew. This is a fundamental difference between Orthodoxy and Reformed Judaism.

Rabbi: Orthodox Jews pray three times a day for the time they can return to Israel.

Joel: These are two poles pulling in opposite directions. It isn’t resolvable.

Rabbi: In 586BCE this is where the diaspora began.

Ellen: Why would prophets stop existing? They seem to just end.

Joel: It’s easier to refer to a book than a prophet who claims to speak for God.

Ellen: I’m sure this was true back then too!

Rabbi: We stopped writing the book, but we continue to write commentary on it.

Ellen: Why can’t there be Prophets who add amendments to the Tanach, like we do with the constitution?

Joel: We do – it’s called the Talmud.

Rabbi: I am part of a group of Reformed Rabbis who are asked questions and we try to write answers or responsa. Of course the only authority we have is the belief that others have placed in our answers.

Joel: But this seems to be following the same Orthodox lines or reasoning. Judaism evolved for practical reasons. Great Rabbis and by extension the community can vote on the book and come up with their own commentaries to a particular problem.

Ellen: This is hard material to read – he is a nasty God!

Bill: In the parsha we read today God killed Aaron’s two sons. This upset me but he did and I have to accept this. It is what it is and some things happen as they are supposed to happen.

Paul: There is something about fire and the cleansing of fire. There is a line of thinking that fire was the cleansing element in the Holocaust.

Julie: This line of thinking is a very slippery slope!

Jerry: Fire is seen as an aspect of God, for example, the Burning Bush, the lights on Sabbath etc.

Joel: In this week’s Parsha Aaron’s sons, Nadab and Abihu, both Cohanim are killed for offering “strange fire” at the alter in the sanctuary. Some Rabbis say they were drunk, while others say “strange fire” was the wrong kind of offering, an unwanted offering or an offering to another god.

Rabbi: You laid this out very well, Joel. There are two branches. One is that we have sinned and we must change our personal behavior and the other is we are creative and try to figure out what God wants.

 

 

What does God want? What is the value of contemplating all this in the face of injustice and historical tragedy? Is God the source of all punishment and reward? Are we forever looking over our shoulders wondering when judgment will come down, despite our best efforts to live a good life? Whether you believe that these historical events are motivated by divine providence or not, it’s clear that bad things happen and often these things are out of our control. There is the issue that the Jews in Jeremiah’s time were doing what they thought was right, but God thought otherwise. There were also Jews who knew they were wrong, but chose to continue on that path. The response in Jeremiah is that following the laws is no guarantee of being saved or even rewarded in this life. We then must ask, what about those Jews that tried their best in Judah, but were swept away or killed by the Babylonians as a mark of collective guilt? What makes sense to me, are the ethical and moral teachings which can be used even when confronting these questions. Things are going to happen anyway, despite our efforts. What is critical is our moral response to these events. These teachings can stand on their own whether God is passing down moral judgments or not.  This is what makes the difference in repairing our own lives and the world.  

 

                                                                                      

Jeremiah Chapter 23; I did not send those Prophets, but they rushed in.

God is assigning blame to those who have led his flock astray.  There is certainly enough blame to go around equally to the priests, kings and false prophets, but a ray of hope is offered to the remnant who can weather the exile. They shall be brought back to dwell in their own land.

 

Ellen: During this time of Passover isn’t all life sacred? Animals should be included.

Joel: I’ve met Chasidic Vegans.

Ellen: When God directs us to treat every flock well I believe he is saying to be a good steward. Raise your animals well and kill them compassionately.

Rabbi: At its best, Kashrut means that we treat animals compassionately.

Ellen: The land is included too. We are directed to be good shepherds of the planet. I have a hard time with the hypocrisy during Passover when people are arguing whether Quinoa is acceptable but then these same individuals are serving factory farmed meat at their Seder.

Corey: I think if you care for an animal knowing that you will eventually slaughter it then it is more meaningful to sacrifice it or slaughter it for food. There is something more honest about that because it means more to the person.

Ellen: I agree! If you choose to eat meat, then treat your animals well so they have a decent life. It’s a sense of heartfelt connection that is missing. Abraham could have slaughtered his son but he chose not to and refused.

Julie: No Ellen, God or the angel stopped Abraham’s hand. Abraham passed the test. It seems that he would have killed his son for God.

Corey: The lamb that magically appears is not connected to Abraham but it is used to take Isaac’s place.

Bill: If Abraham killed his miracle son how would the blood line continue?

Ellen: God doesn’t want human sacrifice but animals seem to be exempt from this requirement.

Bill: Referring to 23:14 “But what I see in the prophets of Jerusalem/Is something horrifying:…”

 Is Jeremiah saying that he is the only righteous man left?

Rabbi: Jeremiah has been rejected by his people. We see his humanity.

Joel: When Jeremiah or God says “the prophets of Jerusalem” does he mean the non-Jewish seers?

Rabbi: This can be an example of some North and South bias. The North is seen by the Jerusalem Scribes as the unseemly evil doers, but the Prophets say all are guilty – it’s a matter of degrees.

Bill: Referring to 23:13 “In the prophets of Samaria/ I saw a repulsive thing:…”

Were the prophets of Samaria pretending to be true prophets?

Joel: As far as I know there are Hebrews in Northern Samaria and then there are Samarians who are not. These are a Quasi-Jewish group, like the Good Samaritan of the New Testament or the Samarians in modern Israel today. The Samarians were hated as not real Jews. At any rate, there seems to be a comparison of the North and South’s sins. It’s a rivalry of sorts.

Rabbi: The pagan priests were practicing human sacrifice and probably Judean sympathizers were doing so as well.

Ellen: In the Garden of Eden, the world was so beautiful and we still haven’t improved upon it. This is very depressing! We see what it can mean, to be God but humans seem to have given up.

Bill: For this crowd there is no redemption.  Crap is going to happen!

Joel: We can’t be good enough to please God. In every age the issue seems to come up. The logic is that if every Jew followed the law and every person the more general Noahite Laws, then this wouldn’t happen, but it does every time. I can see the thought process that led to Jesus as the Savior/Messiah in Christianity. Humans want redemption.  The Prophets go from setting the bar for good behavior through the word of God, to Apostles writing about one person standing for all our sins, for original sin. In Judaism we have never accepted this logic. Our sins are our own. There is no original sin.  It’s our choice -the individual can choose to be good and he/she may still survive the Exile and get back to the land, but there are certainly no individual promises made. What is really created is a collective promise of redemption.

Rabbi: We have an interim promise from God. The remnant will not be all good or all bad. This is a communal punishment. This is the struggle for humanity.

Ellen: We are no closer to becoming actualized to our highest potential.

Joel: Last week you were so hopeful and positive about human nature Ellen – what happened?

Rabbi: We have developed. We don’t slaughter our children to Baal.

Julie: we just call it something else – we send our children off to war.

 

I wonder if the parents of the children who were sacrificed to Baal felt that they were insuring the community’s well-being. In the modern world, some parents whose children serve in the Military speak in parallel voices. They understand that their children are going to war with the possibility of their not returning in order to preserve the morals and values of our country. I do not wish to demean their efforts or sacrifice but why does this sound so similar? When making these decisions, have we actually exhausted all other possible options which would lead us to such a limited framework of thought and action? Why do we cop to a “sacrificial” position so quickly?  In reading the Jeremiah text I am always struck by how few things have actually changed and how frankly, human behavior does not seem very progressive. We certainly make technological advances but we are in this perennial moral dance where the steps are three forward then back two. We are instructed to take a higher moral position, but in doing so, we run the risk of putting ourselves in harms way because humanity’s efforts are not in synch . There is always the ideal and the reality and how we function within this space. As Jews and as individuals of the Human Race, this seems to be the challenge. Luckily we are provided with a guide book to assist us around those pointed sharp turns.