Shithole countries

 Believe it or not, this is a heartwarming tale of medical bureaucracy. You might want to grab a box of tissues — or maybe a roll of toilet paper.

Last week, my wife and I took our three boys on a tiyul up north, from the Galilee to the Golan and back. Days visiting national parks from Nesher to Nimrod Fortress, Rosh Hanikra to Banias, Yehiam Fortress to Yehiam Hot Dog Factory — plus IKEA in Netanya and chocolate-making in Deganya. A night in a bungalow at Achziv on the Mediterranean, another in a yurt outside of Jatt (named, I assume, for the galaxy’s greatest bounty hunter, Jango Fett), two more in a converted bus in a winery outside of Hatzor.

However, as I abruptly realized around one hour before we made it home Thursday, right before the turnoff from 90 to Highway 1, we had brought something nasty back with us. Trust me, you don’t want the details of a day of vomiting and fever or a week of relentless abdominal pain and diarrhea. On Monday afternoon, my wife wondered if it might be something more: the Golan lepto outbreak. We chatted with our awesome family doctor, Dr. Youngerwood, who thought it was unlikely, but based on Ministry of Health guidelines, we should get ourselves to the ER, especially since lepto has a first phase, then a period when you THINK you’re better, then a second phase which can be fatal. So off we went to Hadassah Mt. Scopus. Blood was drawn, kids were wild, much paperwork was generated, and five hours later, at 1 a.m., we were home with a clean (“You don’t have lepto, so good luck with whatever it is!”) bill of health.

As for the bill of wealth — that floored me. (To be fair, I was pretty close to the floor to start with.)  Taking a whole family to the ER, even if you aren’t admitted, is a month’s minimum-wage salary (not counting transportation). However, we are Israeli, and as such entitled to universal healthcare, which means that ultimately, after going back to the doctor and then to the office of our medical fund (kupat holim), we’ll be made whole. But my wife and I weren’t born here; we were born in the US, where there is no such guarantee. And I couldn’t help but think of all the tens of millions (used to be, and may soon be again, twenties of millions) who cannot get that reimbursement. For them, an ER visit could wipe out their cash on hand or their savings. It could snowball into debt they could never get out of. And their doctors must hesitate before sending them for treatment they may not be able to afford.

I am so profoundly grateful that I and my family live in Israel, for a host of reasons, but the commitment to universal healthcare is one I think of too rarely. And it is truly universal, as the ER signs indicate, in Hebrew, Arabic, English, Russian and Amharic: if you’re in spiritual need, call the hospital rabbi and he will find a representative of your faith community for support. That is the Jewish state at its finest — when, for lack of a better phrase, you’re in the shit.

A kinder Tisha B'Av

 or years, I have not said the Nachem (Console) prayer on the Fast of 9 Av, but rather this text from the Jerusalem Talmud (Taan. 2:2). I prefer it because:

1. It predates Nachem.
2. It comes from the Land of Israel (Rabbi Acha bar Yitzchak in the name of Rabbi Chuna the Great of Sepphoris).
3. It does not refer to Jerusalem as ruined or destroyed (chareva), but uses terms of emotional distress.
4. It does not refer to Jerusalem as a barren or childless woman.
5. It does not refer to Jerusalem as having no homes.
6. It does not dwell on violent murder.
7. It speaks of cruel occupation and tyranny.
8. It refers to Jerusalem as being given to Israel “in love, as a legacy.”
9. It invokes Jeshurun (Yeshurun), a poetic name for Israel which comes from yashar, just or upright. (And, as my friend Ori Weisberg points out, plays beautifully with the term for inheritance, yerusha.)
10. It refers to us not as the “mourners of Jerusalem,” but makes us, Israel, Jerusalem and Zion all equal as we seek compassion and kindness.

Have mercy, Lord our God, in Your great compassion and faithful kindness,
Upon us and upon Israel Your people and upon Jerusalem Your city
And upon Zion, residence of Your glory,
And upon the mourning, crushed, devastated city
Given over into the hands of foreigners and trampled by the soles of tyrants
Legions swallowed it and the worshipers of graven images desecrated it
But You gave it to Israel Your people in love, as a legacy
And to the seed of Jeshurun you granted it as an inheritance
Though with fire You destroyed it, with fire You are destined to rebuild it
As it says (Zech. 2:9) And I shall be for it, says the Lord,
A wall of fire around it, and I shall be its glory within it.

רַחֵם יי אֱלֹהֵינו בְּרַחֲמֶיךָ הָרַבִּים וּבַחֲסָדֶיךָ הַנֶּאֱמָנִים,
עָלֵינוּ וְעַל יִשְׂרָאֵל עַמָּךְ, וְעַל יְרוּשָׁלַיִם עִירָךְ,
וְעַל צִיּוֹן מִשְׁכָּן כְּבוֹדָךְ,
וְעַל הָעִיר הָאֲבֵלָה, הַהֲרוּסָה, הַשּׁוֹמֵמָה,
הַנְּתוּנָה בְּיַד זָרִים, הָרְמוּסָה בְּכַף עֲרִיצִים,
וַיְּבַלְּעוּהָ לֶגְיוֹנוֹת וַיְּחַלְּלוּהָ עוֹבְדֵי פְסִלִּים.
כִּי לְיִשְׂרָאֵל עַמָּךְ נְתַתָּהּ בְּאַהֲבָה לְנַחֲלָה,
וּלְזֶרַע יְשׁוּרוּן יְרוּשָׁה הוֹרַשְׁתָּהּ.
כִּי בָאֵשׁ הֶחְרַבְתָּהּ,
וּבָאֵשׁ אַתָּה עָתִיד לִבְנוֹתָהּ, כָּאָמוּר:
(זְכַרְיָה ב,ט) “וַאֲנִי אֶהְיֶה לָּהּ נְאֻם יי,
חוֹמַת אֵשׁ סָבִיב, וּלְכָבוֹד אֶהְיֶה בְתוֹכָהּ

The First Hasbara-fail

 Is Parashat Devarim fake news?

The Fast of 9 Av, which we observe this weekend, has its roots in the Sin of the Meraggelim, “those men that did bring up an evil report of the land” (Numbers 14:37). Jewish tradition (Mishna, Taanit 4:6) states that 9 Av was the date on which the Israelites who had left Egypt were condemned to wander and die in the desert over the course of forty years.

So it’s appropriate that on the Sabbath which precedes or coincides with 9 Av, we read Devarim, the Torah portion in which Moses retells the story; but shockingly, he barely mentions the Spies (Deuteronomy 1:25-28).

And they said, “Good is the land which the LORD our God does give us.”

Nevertheless you would not go up, but rebelled against the commandment of the LORD your God. And you murmured in your tents, and said, “Because the LORD hated us, he has brought us forth out of the land of Egypt, to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us. Where shall we go up? our brethren have discouraged our heart, saying, The people are greater and taller than we; the cities are great and walled up to heaven; and moreover we have seen the sons of the giants there. 

Aren’t those ten men (out of twelve scouts, excluding Caleb and Joshua) the ones responsible for the death of an entire generation of Jews? Aren’t they the ones who established 9 Av as a day of misery and misfortune, not only for the next nearly four decades, but the next nearly four millennia? Why do they get a pass?

Let’s t take a closer look at the original story (Numbers 13:27-33):

And they told him, and said, “We came unto the land where you sent us, and surely it flows with milk and honey; and this is the fruit of it. Nevertheless the people are strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are walled, and very great: and moreover we saw the children of giants there.The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south: and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Amorites, dwell in the mountains: and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.”

And Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, “Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it.”

But the men that went up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we.” And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched unto the Israelites, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to search it, is a land that eats up its inhabitants; and all the people that we saw in it are men of great stature. And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of the giant who come of the Nephilim: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight. 

The “evil report” comes only after Caleb’s interjection, which quite literally no one asked him for. The mission of the Meraggelim is to evaluate the land and its people geographically, militarily and agriculturally–not to decide whether it can be conquered. In their initial report, the Spies do their job; but Caleb cannot bear the suggestion that there is anything pejorative to say about the Promised Land. His intentions are honorable, but ultimately he steers the conversation off a cliff by raising the feasibility of conquering the land. Caleb is rewarded, but he is also one of only two “men of war” of the Exodus generation to suffer a full forty years of wandering. It is his companion Joshua, who remains silent initially but does rend his garments on that first 9 Av and join Caleb’s dissenting opinion, who becomes the national leader.

So it’s not surprising that Moses editorializes here. Strikingly, Caleb and Joshua’s protest in Numbers, “Good is the land, exceedingly so,” becomes the Spies’ report here in Deuteronomy: “Good is the land which the LORD our God does give us.” As Rashi notes (Numbers 13:3), all twelve Spies start out “kosher.” The Sin of the Spies, for Moses, is not about the ten evil Spies or the two righteous ones; it is about the catastrophe which befalls the people because they don’t know whom to trust: is the land good and impregnable or good and conquerable? The Spies’ consensus that the land “flows with milk and honey,” i.e. the only question they were supposed to answer, is quickly forgotten amidst plaintiveness, paranoia and panic.

This is a powerful lesson for everyone engaged in public advocacy, but especially for those of us who love Israel. It is hard to hear anything negative about the Promised Land; our first impulse is to leap to its defense. But when we overreact, shooting down any criticism as vile, cowardly, ignorant or bigoted, we may hurt more than we help. Good is the land, we should all agree. Now, isn’t it our sacred duty to make it better?

Soldiers and semen

 When you choose prophecy as your career, you don’t expect to spend eternity swimming in a sea of seething seed, but that’s exactly what happens to Balaam, the protagonist of this week’s Torah portion.

He then went and raised Balaam by incantations [from Hell]… He then asked: “What is your punishment?” He replied: “With boiling hot semen.” (Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 57a)

That gemara is disturbingly specific, but the Mishna twice mentions eternal torment for Balaam and his followers:

Three kings and four commoners have no portion in the world to come. The three kings are Jeroboam, Ahab, and Manasseh. The four commoners are: Balaam, Doeg, Ahitophel, and Gehazi. (Sanhedrin 10:2)

The disciples of Abraham, our father, enjoy this world, and inherit the world to come… But the disciples of Balaam, the wicked, inherit Gehenna and descend into the nethermost pit. (Avot 5:19)

Why does Balaam deserve to suffer such a sticky fate?

He [Balaam] said thus to him [Balak]. “The God of these hates lewdness… Come, and I will advise you. Erect for them tents enclosed by hangings, in which place harlots, old women without, young women within, to sell them linen garments…”

Balaam knows the Jewish heart well, and how easily it can be seduced by the chance to purchase wholesale. An idolatrous orgy results, leading to a horrific plague and ultimately to war — in which Israelite soldiers use a sword to send Balaam to the world to cum.

So it comes as some surprise that none other than Moses is a HUGE fan of Balaam’s work.

Moses wrote the five books of the Torah, then went back and wrote the passage of Balak and Balaam. (Jerusalem Talmud. Sota 5:6)

Let’s remember that Moses completes the original Torah on his dying day. That means he was about to finish his life’s work, but then said: Wait, I left out the poetry of Mr. Boiling in Hell — get me a caret!

Indeed, Moses’ own epitaph in the closing lines of the Torah is reinterpreted as a backhanded compliment by the Sifrei:

‘No prophet arose in Israel like Moses’ (Deut. 32:10) — No one among Israel, but among the nations of the world there was. Who? Balaam son of Beor.

In fact, the Talmud states that Balaam’s words were so well-regarded that they almost made the daily prayer cut:

Rabbi Samuel bar Nahman in the name of Rabbi Judah bar Zevuda: Really, we should read the passage of Balak and Balaam every day…

Rabbi Chuna says: Because it speaks of lying down and getting up.

Rabbi Yosi bei Rabbi Bon says: Because it speaks of the Exodus from Egypt and of kingship.

Rabbi Elazar says: Because it is referenced in the Torah, Prophets and Writings. (Jerusalem Talmud, Berakhot 1:5)

In practice, although we do not read the entirety of Balaam’s hundred-verse prophecy, we do quote one line whenever we enter a synagogue: “Mah tovu,” “How goodly are your tents, Jacob!”

This presents something of a conundrum: if Balaam spends eternity in Hell, should his words really be on our lips? If he’s so despicable, why is he so quotable?

The fact is that this is a question we struggle with regularly, especially since the #MeToo movement gained prominence over the past year. We would like to believe that bad people produce bad art (the Hitler analogy everyone loves), while those who produce good art must be good people — or at least, good enough people. But that just isn’t the case. Good art, great art, even divine art may be produced by execrable people. We must not destroy that which is beautiful because of the ugly actions of the people behind it; at the same time, we cannot excuse their awful actions because of the awesome literature, music or visual art they have produced. Let their work soar even if their actions drag them down.

So here’s to your poetry, Balaam. You’ll understand if I don’t shake your hand. I know where it’s been.

Zombie Torah

 I didn’t want to read the article. I read The Jewish Press nearly every week in my youth and still maintain some residual affection. Sure, they subscribe to a particular ideological bent, but I read Haaretz, Israel Hayom, MSNBC and Besheva, so what’s new?

But this… item kept on popping up in my feed, in which the author (I’d tell you his name, but it’s a pseudonym anyway) blames the flash floods in the Holy Land the week before last on — can you guess? The gays!

Whatever the opposite of pinkwashing is, this op-ed exemplifies it, in a trifecta of theodicean idiocy. Not only is it unabashedly homophobic, it uses the still-fresh corpses of teenagers in the Holy Land–one of whom hailed from my town of Maale Adumim–in its vicious agenda.

What is worse is whom the author enlists to support his position, rabbinical all-stars of the past century and a half, from Hirsch to Kook to Soloveitchik.

But what is the most egregious is that Rav Soloveitchik’s son-in-law, Rav Dr. Aharon Lichtenstein, is used for the kicker in the closing paragraph. I don’t say that just because he was my rebbe, just because we recently marked his third yahrzeit, or just because Sunday marks what would have been his 85th birthday. I say it because, while it is bad enough to twist the words of Rav Kook, Rav Soloveitchik or Rav Hirsch to justify this idea of God killing teens because Israel isn’t persecuting queer folk, Rav Aharon was on record about contemporary Israel and changing attitudes towards homosexuality. Just read this article from YNet, or the original from an interview with my friend Dov Karoll, addressing the issue of religious schools refusing to march alongside LGBT groups in New York’s Celebrate Israel Parade:

If I open a Gemara in Sanhedrin, or if I open a Chumash, for that matter… what is a more serious sin, desecrating the Sabbath or homosexuality? Or, for that matter, there are people who worship idols who march in the parade, too!  Is it proper, is it fair — and I say this without relenting in our position to homosexuality — to decide that all the sins which the whole entire Jewish community has, all of that we can swallow and march with them, with pride and with their flags and everything that they want; but this is the scapegoat, dispatched to the harsh wilderness? That’s what happens to the scapegoat! I discussed this point with people for whom I have the highest regard, and I asked them this question.

In other words, Rav Aharon explicitly condemns the idea of scapegoating homosexuals. But the author of this op-ed knows better, apparently.

I shouldn’t be surprised. Just weeks after Rav Aharon’s passing, someone on Facebook started spinning conspiracy theories about the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. When I pointed out how movingly Rav Aharon had spoken about the guilt he felt for Yigal Amir’s actions, as Amir was a product of the Hesder yeshiva system which Rav Aharon championed, this interlocutor told me that undoubtedly Rav Aharon would have changed his mind, had he lived long enough. I pointed out that Rav Aharon lived twenty more years after Rabin’s assassination and at no point endorsed such nonsense. Were the revisionists already at work on Rav Aharon’s legacy, as they had done to his father-in-law (this individual’s rebbe)? For this, I was promptly blocked. But hey, the guy’s only a PhD in Jewish History from Harvard who teaches in one of Israel’s premiere universities!

I understand that people want to enlist the greats on their side. Moses and Deborah, Maimonides and Einstein–they’d all agree with me if they were here. But the luminaries who touched our lived directly are different. And I will never allow you to invoke my rebbe’s name to perpetuate the most vile, hate-filled rhetoric.

Who shall live

 Since Passover, Diaspora Jews have been playing catch-up in terms of reading the Torah, That’s why there are four answers to the question of “What’s this week’s portion?” In the Diaspora, Leviticus 12-15 will be read, Tazria and Metzora; in Israel, it’s Leviticus 16-20, Acharei Mot and Kedoshim.

At first glance, these portions don’t share much. The former two are focused on ritual impurity, particularly that of the leper; the latter two are focused on the concept of holiness as a communal construct. Still, there is a striking similarity in two unusual offerings:

The priest shall order that two live clean birds and some cedar wood, scarlet yarn and hyssop be brought for the person to be cleansed. Then the priest shall order that one of the birds be slaughtered… After that, he is to release the live bird in the open fields. (Lev. 14:4-7)

Then he is to take the two goats and present them before the Lord at the entrance to the tent of meeting. He is to cast lots for the two goats—one lot for the Lord and the other for the scapegoat. Aaron shall bring the goat whose lot falls to the Lord and make it a sin-offering. But the goat chosen by lot as the scapegoat shall be presented alive before the Lord…  The goat will carry on itself all their sins to a remote place; and the man shall release it in the wilderness. (Lev. 16:7-22) 

In each case, a pair of animals is taken, one to be slaughtered to God and the other, “the living one,” to be sent to the wilderness.

The Mishna makes the similarity all the more striking.

The two goats of Yom Kippur: their mitzva is until they be alike in appearance, height and value, and they are to be acquired at the same time. (Yoma 6:1)

The two birds: their mitzva is that they be alike in appearance, height and value, and they are to be acquired at the same time. (Nega’im 14:5).

In fact, the other elements of the leper’s purification also pop up in the Yom Kippur service, as the High Priest is purified with a hyssop during the preceding week, the bowl used for casting the lots is made of a type of cedar wood, and scarlet yarn is tied on the scapegoat’s horns.

In each case, the symbolism is clear, as the purification process, for the individual leper and for the community on Yom Kippur, represents a transition from a deathlike state to life in its fullest sense. The leper, once considered like a corpse, returns to the world of the living; the sinner, once guilty and condemned, now has a clean slate.

This seems to be a fitting message for the week in which Israel’s Memorial Day for Fallen Soldiers and Terror Victims and its Independence Day both fall. Two birds, two goats, two citizens– “alike in appearance, height and value.” One dies to sanctify God’s name; the other, “the living one,” is released in the field. Why is one slaughtered and one saved? Why is the blood of one spilled, while the other is freed? Why do the lots fall the way they do?

We can’t hope to know. We can only honor those who are among the dead and celebrate with those who are among the living. And remember.

Outing the Torah

 While it’s been quite a week worldwide, in the much smaller confines of Orthodox Judaism, it seems like two awful trends show no signs of letting up.

First of all, there is the perverse case of Malka Leifer, wanted for 74 counts of child abuse stemming from her time as principal of a Jewish school in Melbourne. She has been hiding from justice in Israel, a depressingly widespread phenomenon. Her case would be horrific enough, but then prominent Rabbi Yitzchak Dovid Grossman came forward to ask the court to release her into his care, as imprisonment would be a “humiliation” and injurious to her mental health. What exactly do you think child rape is, Rabbi? The judge, I wish I could say shockingly, sided with the [alleged] rabbi and the [alleged] rapist. And even if Leifer is tried and convicted, will she still receive rabbinic support, like Moti Elon and Eliezer Berland? And it’s not just Israel–the Chief Rabbi of the Netherlands has been implicated in covering up child abuse in his Jewish school as well!

In parallel, yet another senior rabbi publicly attacked the LGBT community. Rabbi Yehoshua Shapira of the Ramat Gan Yeshiva. Yes, according to him, Israel is becoming LGBTstan, and it is time for those who follow “an opinion that has been the basis of all humanity and the entire Torah” to “wage war” against the gay tsunami. If this sounds familiar, you might be thinking of Yigal Levinstein or Eli Dahan or… well, the list goes on and on.

What do these two troubling phenomena have to do with each other? Perhaps it’s time we listen to what these rabbis are saying, distasteful as it is: they’re just following the Torah. In the Torah, two men who have consensual sex are condemned to death; as for a man raping a boy, not a word is uttered.

Now, I’m sure the apologeticists will be hopping up and down to tell me that a death penalty isn’t REALLY that important, it was rarely applied, it required so many prerequisites as to be nigh-unimaginable. Yet, it is there, black on white (Leviticus 18:22, 20:13). And, they would declaim, there are many very important elements of Judaism that are not explicitly in the Pentateuch, certainly pedophilia is considered an abomination in the eyes of God! Yet, it is not there in the Torah.

OK, that’s the Written Torah, but certainly the Oral Torah sets things right, no?

Our Rabbi taught: When one has sex with a male, a youth is not like an adult, but when one has sex with an animal, a youth is like an adult. What does “a youth is not like an adult” mean? Rav says: Sex with a child under nine is not like sex with a child above nine; Samuel says: Sex with a child under three is not like sex with a child above three.

(Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 54b)

In case we had any questions, Maimonides lays it out:

Once a male has penetrated another male, if both are adults, they are stoned…

If one was a minor but at least nine years and a day old, the active or passive adult is stoned while the minor is exempt.

If the minor was exactly nine years old or less, they are both exempt. Still, it is fitting for the court to give lashes of insubordination to the adult for sleeping with a male, even though that male was less than nine.

(Laws of Forbidden Relations 1:14)

So, in a Jewish court, the defense might save a child rapist from the biblical death penalty by noting that the victim was marking his ninth birthday. But at least Maimonides thinks the rapist should be lashed; Sefer Ha-chinuch (The Book of Jewish Education) picks up the whip for the victim.

Now, if one was a minor who was between the ages of nine years and a day and thirteen years and a day, the adult is stoned whether he is the active or passive partner, while the minor is exempt biblically but rabbinically subject to lashes.

(Mitzvah 209)

But if you think it’s bad for Jews, just wait. The foremost commentary on Sefer Ha-chinuch, the Minchat Chinuch, notes ad loc.

If a male Jew had sex with a non-Jewish boy who is conscious of the action, the one who was the passive partner is also executed…  And if a Jew who has passed nine years of age has sex with an adult non-Jew, the non-Jew is liable for being the passive partner as well, as well as for being a stumbling-block, just like an animal (raped by a human). Even if this non-Jew is not conscious of the action, his law is still like that of an animal.

If child rape was not bad enough, we now have rape of the developmentally disabled,

Let us conclude this awful parade by returning to Maimonides (ibid. 12:10), who brings girls into the equation.

If a Jew has sex with a non-Jewess, whether a minor of the age of three years and a day or an adult, whether single or married, even if the Jew is only nine years and a day, once he intentionally has sex with a non-Jewess, she must be executed, because she has been a stumbling-block for a Jew, just like an animal. This matter is explicitly stated in the Torah, as it says (Numbers 31:16-17), “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice… And kill every woman who has slept with a man.”

I’m sure I’ll be called heretic, self-hating Jew and worse for citing these sources. But I stand firm in the belief that if we are to change our communities, if we are to make them welcoming for LGBT people and survivors of sexual abuse, if we are to cease providing refuge for rapists, abusers and victimizers, we must confront the ugliest parts of our tradition–and dedicate ourselves to the neverending work of tending the Tree of Life which the Torah must be.