Bubby has left us

 Last month. Barely six weeks ago. It doesn’t seem possible, but that’s when my oldest son got up at his Purim bar mitzva celebration to give his speech.

Thank you to everyone for coming to celebrate my becoming a bar mitzva. I want to wish Happy Birthday to Bubby (whose name is Esther!), who will be turning 98 next week, bli ayin hara, and is with Aunt Norma in New York tonight…

Shortly after, the world ended, and when it will restart is anyone’s guess. But it will be without our Bubby, my mother’s mother, who left us just before Shabbat started.

Me, Bubby and the bar mitzva boy, exactly thirteen years ago

I was Bubby’s oldest grandchild, and she was my last connection to the Greatest Generation, a generation which lived through the Depression, World War II and the Holocaust to see the founding of the State of Israel and the rebirth of Judaism.

I will never forget the food, the love, the fierce devotion to her family, to her faith, to the Jewish people and the Jewish State. My love for books and language started with her day job at Shulsinger Press. I remember being wowed by her Hebrew typewriter.

But the phrase I think I will never forget is “Bubby, sit down!” Because whenever you went to her home, on Haven Avenue or Overlook Terrace in Washington Heights, she was constantly on her feet. What could she get you? What did you need? Were you done with that; good, she’ll go get the next course. Because with Bubby, it was never about herself, it was about her family, her loved ones, her community.

Bubby deserves a funeral with ten thousand attendees, but of course there will be barely ten. Amid a global lockdown, most of her family and friends will not be able to pay her this final honor. They will not be able to receive the dozens, the hundreds, who would normally come to their homes for shiva. Kaddish will be said for her in bizarre, outdoor ad hoc prayer services.

And this would not bother Bubby in the slightest. Perhaps her neshama, her soul, decided to slip away and return to its Maker precisely at a time when we would be preoccupied with a global crisis. But we who remember her will never forget that she deserved so much more.

Jewish Countess

 Today is Day 32, which is four weeks and four days, of our lockdown/ quarantine/ isolation, since Israel’s schools shut down; but we are also on Day 4 of a new calculus, that of the seven weeks from Pesach to Shavuot, counting the Omer. Unfortunately, unlike the ban on weddings and haircuts (mourning the students of Rabbi Akiva who died en masse during this season) which ends with Day 33 of the Omer, our contemporary restrictions seem to be getting more stringent.

Now, there are some good things about this stay-at-home era. For Orthodox Jews, prayer is not usually a family affair; but when the synagogues are closed, you get a chance for a service that is truly egalitarian. The experience can be sincerely uplifting, assuming your younger children can stop fighting for 10 minutes. Or maybe even if they cannot.

Still, in our home, we started counting the Omer together long before we had heard of the coronavirus. Appending this biblically-rooted mitzva to the evening service and effectively excluding women from it seemed disingenuous to me. After all, Rav Yosef Karo in the Code of Jewish Law (OH 493:4) mentions only one custom which applies throughout this period:

The women are accustomed not to perform any labor between Pesach and Shavuot, from sunset onward.

He gives no explanation for why women specifically should refrain from working in the Omer eventide, but he gets this idea from the Tur, who cites a general custom to refrain from labor at this hour because that is when the students of Rabbi Akiva were buried; but then the Tur specifically mentions the custom for women to take it easy, comparing this to the counting of the years by the court for the jubilee cycle, both referred to in the Torah as “seven sabbaths.” Just as in the sabbatical year, (agricultural) labor is forbidden, so too during the time to count the omer, labor is forbidden. But what does that have to do with women in particular?

It is notable that while Maimonides explicitly limits the obligation to count the Omer to men, Rav Yosef Karo does not. Some commentators argue that while women should be technically exempt, as they generally are from time-bound positive commandments, “nevertheless, they have accepted it upon themselves as an obligation” (MA 489:1).

Others go further, such as Nahmanides, who argues that counting the omer is not a time-bound mitzva, comparing it to other commandments such as the firstfruits. Yes, they may come at a specific season, but that is not a reflection of some arbitrary clock or calendar, but rather the natural course of the year. Passover is the first day of spring, and when it ends, we begin counting seven weeks until Shavuot, until “the day of the firstfruits,” until we receive the Torah. Indeed, it is the women who are addressed first at Sinai, according to the Mekhilta: “‘So shall you say to the house of Jacob’ (Exod. 19:3) — these are the women; ‘and speak to the sons of Israel’ — these are the men.”

The notion that women cannot be trusted to keep the Omer count seems ludicrous when we consider that the first mitzva of counting seven is the exclusive domain of women–the counting of seven clean days to maintain family purity: “And she shall count for herself seven days, and then she shall be purified” (Lev. 15:28).

The sabbatical year count, carried out by the Jewish court, is indeed a masculine affair (because of Adam’s curse to work the ground?). It is formal and officious, though the sabbatical year is binding for everyone. In parallel, we may see the feminine side of the Omer count towards Shavuot, which is carried out in the home, by the family, while the women of the house refrain from labor.

This year, at least, we should be able to appreciate the unique power of women to bring us to Sinai.

Staying home with God

 It is hard to describe how furious I was to read about the refusal of many Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) leaders to close down their educational institutions as part of the new coronavirus guidelines issued by Prime Minister Netanyahu on Saturday night. Apparently, there is ZERO upside to having a Haredi health minister (unless, of course, you’re a pedophile from his community).

Then the news broke of a compromise, the Deal of the Century, no doubt: famously overcrowded Haredi schools and yeshivot would promise not to have more than 10 people in any classroom. Well, I’m sure that commitment will be honored.

But I soon realized that, while it may be convenient for me, as part of the national religious/ Modern Orthodox camp, to criticize Haredim, my hometown synagogue is no better. Here’s the official notification from that august institution, via WhatsApp:

2:27 PM: We need volunteers to arrange minyanim at different times. We can hold two minyanim in parallel, using the hall downstairs.

2:36 PM: At this point, we won’t split up the minyanim. If there are too many men, we will split into smaller minyanim, using the hall downstairs.

Minyan, or quorum, is a group of 10 men. Ten, as you might have heard, is now the limit of any public gathering in Israel. If nine men (and I do mean “men”) show up, it’s not considered public prayer. If 11 show up, they are violating the Health Ministry rules. And if there’s a revolving door for multiple minyanim, that would seem to pose the greatest public health threat of all.

The worst part of it, obviously, is the danger to the health of the public, especially the elderly and immunosuppressed. That’s not some modernishe Western value, Heaven forfend — that is a Torah value. A binding command, in fact. Public prayer is nice, so is public Torah study, but the inherent mitzvot may be accomplished very well in the privacy of one’s home!

Don’t take my word for it. Here’s the Mishna, from Avot (Ethics of the Fathers) 3:6:

Rabbi Halafta ben Dosa of Kefar Hanania said: When 10 sit together and occupy themselves with Torah, the Divine Presence abides among them, as it is said: “God stands in the congregation of God” (Psalm 82:1).

How do we know that even five? As it is said: “This band of His He has established on earth” (Amos 9:6).

How do we know that even three? As it is said: “In the midst of the judges He judges” (Psalm 82:1).

How do we know that even two? As it is said: “Then they that fear the Lord spoke one with another, and the Lord hearkened, and heard” (Malachi 3:16).

How do we know that even one? As it is said: “In every place where I cause my name to be mentioned I will come unto you and bless you” (Exodus 20:20).

Or go back even further, to Hillel the Elder (Tosefta, Sukka 4:3):

Wherever my heart lies, there my feet take me. [Thus God says:] If you come to My house, I will come to yours; if you do not come to My house, I will not come to yours, as it is said: “In every place where I cause my name to be mentioned I will come unto you and bless you.

This is a Divine promise: if we go to the study hall and synagogue when we can, God will come to us when we are at home. That is where I will be, with my family and with my God. So, sanctimonious rabbis of today, tell me this: Do you think you are smarter than Hillel?

Joseph the Survivor

 I have always had an affinity for my namesake, the biblical Yoseif/ Joseph. But it’s hard to know what to make of this character, since we rarely know what he’s thinking. An exception is his response to the birth of his sons (Genesis 41:50-52):

Joseph had two sons before the famine years came, borne to him by Asenath, daughter of Poti Phera, priest of On. Joseph named the first-born Manasseh (Me-nasheh) – ‘because God has made me forget (nasheh) all my travail and all of my father’s house.’ He named his second son Ephraim – ‘Because God has made me fruitful (p’ri) in the land of my suffering.’

At first glance, Joseph’s declarations seem contradictory. If Manasseh’s name indicates how relieved he is to forget his past, that would seem to indicate that Joseph views Egypt as his home. But in the next line, we hear that Joseph, even as he rules over the land of the pharaohs, sees it as hostile territory.

So let’s take a second look, particularly at Manasseh. Using the term “nasheh” to denote forgetting is profoundly bizarre, as the usual term is “shakhach.” Indeed, Joseph himself uses this term just a few verses earlier (v. 30), “All the satiety in Egypt will be forgotten (nishkach).” It’s also the final word of the previous chapter, in which the cup-bearer “forgets” Joseph after he gets out of prison, and so Joseph languishes in the dungeon for two more years.

Where does the term nasheh come from then? It only appears one other time in Genesis, 32:32:

The Israelites therefore do not eat the gid ha-nasheh on the hip joint to this very day. This is because [the stranger] touched Jacob’s thigh on the gid ha-nasheh.

This verse is the first time the term “Israelite” is used, and it describes the first dietary law: not to eat the sciatic nerve (gid) of an animal, where Jacob was injured when he wrestled a mysterious assailant. Thus, Joseph gives his firstborn a name which recalls the first rule of keeping kosher.

What about Ephraim? That name recalls the earliest mitzva in the Torah, “Be fruitful (p’ru) and multiply” (Genesis 1:28), which the School of Shammai interprets as having two boys (Mishna, Yevamot 6:6).

Thus, Joseph picks names which remind him of the commandments given to his forebears. Even in exile, in the land of his suffering, these are the “road signs” (as in Jeremiah 31:21, see Sifrei Ekev 43) which connect him to the land he identifies with, to the culture he claims, to the territory he will return to, even if only in death. This is the same Joseph who declares to the cup-bearer in jail (Genesis 40:15): “For I have surely been stolen from the land of the Hebrews.”

If we think about it, there is no contradiction between the naming of Manasseh and the naming of Ephraim. After the severe trauma Joseph undergoes at the hands of his brothers, he indeed wants to put the experience of his father’s house behind him. At the same time, Egypt remains not his home, but the land of his suffering. Joseph identifies as an Israelite, but not a son of Jacob. He keeps the traditions of his faith, but he cannot forgive his family.

We know that Joseph’s story has a happy ending, but we must not elide the decades of suffering which he undergoes. As a survivor of abuse, he has to forge a new identity. Eventually, this allows him to reconcile with his brothers and with his father. But the trauma never goes away. It is Manasseh and Ephraim who become tribes alongside their uncles, but Joseph himself never returns to the status of his youth, as another son of Jacob.

Flattery will get you

 Flattery will get you some bad places, the Talmud states, listing no fewer than seven calamities to befall an individual or community that engages in flattery/ hypocrisy/ cover-ups.

R. Eleazar said: Anyone in whom is flattery brings anger upon the world: as it is said: “But they that are flatterers at heart lay up anger.” Not only that, but their prayer remains unheard; as it continues, “They cannot cry for help when He chastens them.”

R. Eleazar also said: Anyone in whom is flattery, even the embryos in their mothers’ wombs curse him…

R. Eleazar also said: Anyone in whom is flattery will fall into Gehenna, as it said “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil etc.”  What is written after that? “Therefore as the tongue of fire devours the stubble, and as the dry grass sinks down in the flame”…

R. Eleazar also said: Any community in which is flattery will finally go into exile. It is written here, “For the community of flatterers is solitary,” and elsewhere it is written: “Then you will say in your heart: ‘Who has gotten me these, seeing I have been bereaved of my children, and am solitary, an exile wandering to and fro,'” etc. (BT Sota 41b-42a)

You get the point. Some of the medieval mitzvah-counters even list “Do not flatter” among the 613 biblical commandments, based on a verse we read this past Shabbat, although the context there is not flattering a human being, but the very ground we live on.

Do not flatter the land”– this is the source for the prohibition against flattery. (Sifrei, Numbers 35:33)

This should not be that shocking, as the severity of the parallel prohibition to speak falsely in order to smear the innocent is also derived from the Land of Israel, as described in this week’s Torah portion (Deut. 1):

It was taught: R. Eleazar b. Perata said, Come and see how great the power of an evil tongue is! Whence do we know [its power]? From the spies: for if it happens thus to those who bring up an evil report against wood and stones, how much more will it happen to him who brings up an evil report against his neighbor! (BT Arakhin 15a)

The curious thing is that I have no doubt that many, many sermons will be given this week about the danger of slandering the Land of Israel. It is the original sin of the Fast of Tisha B’Av, which falls out this Saturday, but is pushed off until the conclusion of Shabbat.

But no less serious a sin than flattering the land: denying corruption, crime and complicity which contaminates our society. Dissembling in the face of evil because we don’t want to air our dirty laundry — because “It’s inappropriate,” or because “What will the goyim think?” is indefensible and self-defeating. We can and must do better.

“An evil tongue” kept us out of the land for a generation, but a lying tongue has the power to exile us for millennia. We did not return home to repeat those fatal errors.

The Sword of Moses

 The Bible’s most hideous war crime. The most jaw-dropping line in the Torah. Precedent for genocide in the modern era.

All of these have been used to describe Numbers 31, a passage which we read last Shabbat in Israel, but Diaspora communities will read this Shabbat. It describes the divinely-mandated war with Midian, in which every adult male Midianite is killed on the battlefield by the Israelite forces. When the latter return to the camp with (hundreds of) thousands of women and children and millions of animals, Moses grows furious at the commanders and orders (vv. 17-18):

And now kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that has known man by lying of a male; but all the women children, that have not known lying of a male, keep alive for yourselves.

This directive is arguably the most disturbing thing Moses ever says. Let us remember that his biography begins with the following pharaonic decree (Exodus 1:22):

Cast every newborn boy into the Nile, but keep alive every daughter.

So how are we to relate to this? In the Sifrei, the original compendium of halakhic midrash, Rabbi Elazar explains that this is one of three instances in which “our master Moshe, because he was consumed by anger, made a critical mistake.”

But what, precisely, is the mistake? Let us consider the fact that although Moses gives the command to execute every boy and every woman, we do not find this carried out in practice. The chapter goes on to describe, in excruciating detail, the fate of every girl, sheep, bracelet, etc. — but not the boys and women. Is it possible that they were not subject to such a cruel fate?

In the Talmud (BT Yevamot 60b), the Rabbis expound “‘Keep alive for yourselves’–for male and female slaves.” Of course, if only the girls were spared, there could be no male slaves from Midian. However, if we combine the view of the Rabbis with that of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai ibid. (though they argue about the precise reading of the text), we may say that the girls were married off, while their mothers and brothers entered servitude. Essentially, these are two levels of conversion: the girls would become full Jewesses, eventually marrying Israelites; while their mothers and brothers would be obligated in certain commandments, having indentured status within the community. Considering that the reason Israel wages war on Midian is the role the Midianites play at Shittim in seducing Israelites into idolatry and adultery, resulting in a plague that kills 24,000, it is not inconceivable for 32,000 Midianite girls to marry into the people, while their brothers and mothers serve the nation.

Moses’ mistake, then, is that it is not necessary to kill these Midianites. Indeed, he may be referring to them when he talks about “the convert who is in the midst of your camp, from the hewer of your wood to the drawer of your water” (Deuteronomy 29:10), perhaps akin to Joshua 9:27’s “hewers of wood and drawers of water for the congregation and for the Lord’s altar” (see BT Yevamot 79a).

But why was Moses so angry in the first place? Because this is personal. He found refuge in Midian, he married a Midianite woman, he honored his Midianite in-laws, he offered them a share in God’s inheritance. The fact that at least one faction of the Midianites betray him is something which drives him to a horrific mistake, a lapse in judgment.

The very least we can learn from Moses, it would seem, is not to let anger drive us to forget who we are.

King Smotey I

 You gotta hand it to Member of Knesset Bezalel Smotrich. Four years ago, he was the junior member of the junior Tkuma faction of the Jewish Home, eighth of eight. He was mostly known for being the guy people downplayed. Pay no attention to his declaration that he’s a “proud homophobe.” Ignore his proposal that Jews and Arabs have separate maternity wards. He’s a backbencher, gadfly, firebrand.

But then he won the chairmanship of Tkuma, and as Jewish Home splintered and reformed (now with Kahanists!), Smotrich was suddenly number one, until the new Knesset could be elected. He’s number two in our current post-election pre-election surreality, but he has no intention of going back to the back benches. Before the April elections, he wanted to become education minister. Now he wants to become justice minister. And looky here, Prime Minister Netanyahu just fired the holders of both offices! All this and he’s not even forty.

But why does Smotey the Bear (which I affectionately call him because, of course, when someone is really hairy and really into the sex lives of gay men, “bear” is the proper term) want this office specifically?

We want the justice portfolio because we want to restore the Torah justice system…

When we talk about Torah laws there are many things. I think the Torah’s monetary laws are much better [than ours]. We need to grant the rabbinical courts a higher status.

Our country will return to the way it was in the days of King David and King Solomon, run by the laws of the Torah.

I suppose it’s appropriate to do this the week before Shavuot, since that holiday celebrates both the Giving of the Torah and the life of King David. However, they represent two very different systems of justice: the rabbinic and the monarchic are, ultimately, not on the same page. Consider what Maimonides writes in the Laws of Kings (Ch. 3):

Anyone who rebels against a king of Israel may be executed by the king. Even if the king orders one of the people to go to a particular place and the latter refuses, or he orders him not to leave his house and he goes out, the offender is liable to be put to death… Similarly, anyone who embarrasses or shames the king may be executed by the king…

The king may only execute people by decapitation. He may also imprison offenders and have them beaten with rods to protect his honor…

A killer whose incriminating evidence is inconclusive, or who was not warned, or who was observed by only one witness, or who inadvertently killed someone he hated–the king is granted license to execute them and to improve society according to the needs of the time…

The rabbinic tradition is one developed over millennia, but the monarchic tradition is the classic “Off with his head.” Many in Israel, including not only secular or traditional people but Religious Zionist and even Haredi Jews–not to speak of the Arabs, because you really don’t want to know what life would be like for them–fear a “halakhic state,” since the Chief Rabbinate has done such a fine job bungling what it controls now: kosher supervision, marriage and divorce, conversion, burial.

But a halakhic state is not what he’s proposing. Smotrich thinks Israel should “go back to conducting itself the way it did in the days of King David, while adjusting that for life in 2019.” No one knows what that would mean, but at least the halakhic tradition has been developed over the course of the past three thousand years, unlike Davidic monarchy.

The most curious aspect is his cryptic statement: “Nothing happens instantly and it doesn’t happen with coercion.” Coercion is exactly what we’re talking about. Brooking no dissent is a rabbinical standard as well (Maimonides, Laws of Rebels 3:4).

However, the “rebellious elder” mentioned in the Torah… has a difference of opinion in one of the Torah’s laws with the Great Sanhedrin and does not accept their views, but instead issues a ruling to act in a different manner. The Torah decreed that he should be executed… Even though he analyzes and they analyze; he received the tradition and they received the tradition, the Torah grants them deference. Even if the court desires to forgo their honor and allow him to live, they are not allowed so that arguments will not increase within Israel.

Our tradition is a complex one; we have been struggling with it ever since we received it at Sinai. The least we can do as we approach Shavuot is recognize the challenges. And cancel the coronation of King Smotey, First of His Name.