The March of the Future

It’s a bizarre place to take a group of high school students. On this year’s March of the Living, I traveled with the teenagers to Poland and Israel. Frankly, it is a gut wrenching journey. An itinerary that includes ghettoes, concentration camps and death camps is gruesome, even for people with thick skins; so why were sixteen year olds visiting these sites in Poland?

We went because we had to go. No one wants to visit some of the most horrific places on earth. But for Jews, history is current events. Year after year, we sit at the Seder and recount the exodus from Egypt. Even though 3,300 years may have passed, the exodus is still our story, one that reminds us who we are. Certainly the most recent chapters in our story, the Holocaust and the State of Israel, cannot be ignored. And so we traveled to Poland and Israel, on a journey to reconnect with our history.

In some ways, 60 years ago could not be more distant. Here they were, a group of comfortable 21st century teenagers armed with ipods, cellphones and digital cameras, confronting the unimaginable. At first, many of the students found it difficult to feel sadness; they simply could not grasp what they were seeing. It was too foreign, too unbelievable.

That changed when the survivors began to speak. Traveling with us were six survivors, eyewitnesses to the Holocaust. As we heard their stories of suffering and survival, everyone’s tears flowed.

The survivors, all senior citizens, did not come along to serve as guides. They came back to Poland, one last time, to offer testimony on behalf of the six million. This was their last chance to make sure that future generations do not forget.

Our digital era teenagers may not have realized it, but they are the last generation to hear eyewitnesses to the Holocaust. As time marches on, there are fewer and fewer survivors. Ultimately, we will be left with witnesses of witnesses; our ipod wearing teens are the ones who will retell the story of the Holocaust in the future.

When I returned, a student asked me: will there be a March of the Living 50 years from now? Will people still care about this story?

My answer to her was simple: It’s in your hands. You will decide whether future generations remember the horrors of the Holocaust and the miracles of Israel. You will decide if future generations know what it means to be a Jew. The future of the Jewish people is in your hands.

On the March of the Living, I saw the Jewish future. I saw a group of ordinary teenagers learn about Judaism with idealism and intensity. I am proud to have gotten to know them. To be honest, I can’t think of better people to entrust with the Jewish future.

In Poland, I was Thinking of Darfur

On the map, Poland and the Sudan are a continent apart. Yet, when I visited Poland three weeks ago, my mind continually wandered off to the Sudan. What I saw in Poland reminded me how today, in the Sudan, history once again repeats itself.

I did not go to Poland for a holiday. I was traveling with the March of the Living, an educational program that brings teens to visit the concentration camps. We toured the sites of awful atrocities: Treblinka, Majdanek, Auschwitz-Birkenau. We stepped inside a gas chamber; the thought of what had occurred there was overwhelming. We viewed a display of children’s clothes, taken from toddlers before their death. A survivor spoke to us about the time when a few Nazi thugs went to his barrack, took a two by four, walked over to a bunk, and pressed it down on the necks of four sleeping inmates until they choked.

And then we arrived at the greatest monument to man’s inhumanity to man. In the concentration camp of Majdanek, there is a dome of ashes. Inside the dome is a mound of human ashes over fifteen feet tall, the horrific proceeds of burned victims. The sight is simply too hard to bear. Our students were immediately overwhelmed with grief, and began to weep. They had come face to face with evil.

It was here that I remembered Darfur. Intellectually, I understand the human capacity for evil, yet it is difficult for my heart to accept it. Living in an open and tolerant country like Canada, it is difficult to imagine the hatred necessary to perpetrate these crimes. Our shining record on human rights leaves us blind to the reality: human beings can be exceptionally evil. They can slaughter other humans by the million, and burn their bodies into a pile of ash. And this sort of evil didn’t just happen 60 years ago. It continues on today, in the Darfur region of Western Sudan.

For the past three years, the Government of Sudan, along with allied militias, have been massacring black tribes in the region. Tens of thousands have been murdered, countless women have been raped, and up to 2.5 million people have been driven from their homes. Various estimates peg the death toll at somewhere between 200,000 and 400,000. Today, thousands of miles from Poland, a genocide marches on.

It is critical to remember that without indifference, the Holocaust could not have occured. During the Holocaust, the world ignored the plight of the Jews. At a conference in Evian in 1938, and at a later conference in Bermuda in 1943, the entire world community refused to help Jewish refugees fleeing from the Holocaust. The United States refused numerous requests to bomb Auschwitz, and Canada refused Jews entry during the Holocaust, sticking to a policy of “none is too many”. The Holocaust amply demonstrated, as the famous quote goes, that “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”.

The same pattern of indifference has repeated itself with Darfur. Until recently, there has been a virtual media blackout about Darfur. Media studies show that in June, 2005, TV news spent 50 times more coverage on the Michael Jackson molestation trial than it did on the Darfur tragedy, and it devoted 12 times the coverage to the tomfoolery of Tom Cruise than it did to Sudanese oppression. Obviously, celebrities matter more than mass murder. In addition, most members of parliament have kept a wary distance from this issue, afraid that a proper resolution to this humanitarian crisis will require Canadians to make costly commitments. So, as diplomats debate and discuss this issue, a genocide ensues. Only recently has the government of Canada, as well as a multiparty group of parliamentarians, started to pay attention to Darfur.

After visiting the concentration camps, many of the teenage students I was with began to search for a way to respond. They wondered if the slogan “never again” really had any meaning, if after the Holocaust, the world stood by during subsequent atrocities in Cambodia, Bosnia and Rwanda. They wondered if they could make a difference for the people in Darfur.

As their Rabbi, I felt responsible to do something. Before leaving to Poland, I had explored the possibility of a lobby mission to Parliament about Darfur. But I was afraid that no one would pay attention, and it would be a waste of time.

After coming home from Poland, I realized I had to go to Ottawa, no matter what. How could I do otherwise, after seeing the dome of ashes? There were now 6 million voices in my head, shouting “never again”. And prodding me was the passion of these students, wondering if they could make the world into a better place.

At the end of June, I will visit Ottawa with a group of students from the March of the Living, and talk to anyone who will listen. I have to. I cannot ignore what I saw in Majdanek, and I will not disappoint the students.

More Bar Than Mitzvah?

At times, even a Orthodox Rabbi can have trouble with tradition. In particular, I believe it’s time to change our Bar-Bat Mitzvah traditions.

Yes, we’re too rigorous in our Bar-Bat Mitzvah “traditions”. (I somehow neglected studying these “traditions” in Yeshiva.) “Tradition” states that each Bar-Bat Mitzvah must include a night affair, a game room for the teens, and expensive giveaways. In addition, the event must have the proper caterer, florist, photographer, band, D.J. and videographer. Despite my own traditional inclinations, these “traditions” make me uncomfortable. To me, these “traditions” smack of true fanaticism.

Yes, these indulgent Bar-Bat Mitzvahs are actually the products of fanaticism. George Santayana once said “a fanatic is someone who redoubles his efforts while losing sight of his goal”. Considering this, our Bar Mitzvahs are events only a fanatic could love. Having abandoned all but the most perfunctory religious rituals, our Bar-Bat Mitzvahs have become oversized celebrations with a slightly religious veneer. The contemporary Bar-Bat Mitzvah is an empty festivity, a party that celebrates itself.

Many have remarked that our Bar-Bat Mitzvah celebrations are “more bar than mitzvah”. Indeed, there are many non-Jews who are clamoring for a Bar-Bat Mitzvah of their own (no Haftorah necessary). An article in the Wall Street Journal 2 years ago, reported on the “faux Bar Mitzvah”, a party for affluent non-Jewish teens who felt neglected because they had missed out on the big Bar-Bat mitzvah party. Of course, the very existence of the “faux Bar Mitzvah” reveals a sad truth, that even our “real” Bar-Bat Mitzvahs are pretty phony as well, much more about bars than about mitzvahs.

I know this may sound radical, but it is time to bring religion back into the Bar-Bat Mitzvah celebration. I agree that the Bar-Bat Mitzvah should follow some serious preparations; preparations where the young person has done communal volunteering, some serious Torah study, and has spent more than an obligatory three weeks coming to services. At the celebration itself, Judaism must be a priority, not an afterthought. And after the Bar/Bat Mitzvah is over, the guests should have something better to talk about than the gowns and the hors d’ouerves.

At a recent Bat Mitzvah, the young woman got up to explain the theme of the night. The theme of her Bat Mitzvah was not a kitchy movie or pop musical group, but rather a quote from the Mishna: “Whoever saves one life, has saved an entire world”. She explained that this quote had inspired her to donate the gifts from her Bat Mitzvah to help buy an ambulance for the Magen David Adom. This act of remarkable charity made it a memorable Bat Mitzvah, an evening that celebrated Jewish values.

I hope this young woman’s generosity will inspire others to follow her example. It’s about time we break tradition, and make the Bar-Bat Mitzvah into a religious event again.

Hi! the article about Seville (somewhat edited) appeared in the Toronto Star. For the unedited version, see below, on March 28th.

Stop Whining and Start Moving

I have nothing against complaints. Complaints are society’s quality control mechanism, targeting ineffective things for improvement. More importantly, righteous protest is the first stop on the road to freedom. From the Exodus to the civil rights movement, outcries against injustice are a call to responsibility.

Yet there are complaints, and there are complaints. Many of today’s protests are old fashioned whining, with paranoia and self pity masquerading as calls for justice. A few insensitive cartoons in an obscure Danish paper, and all of a sudden you have a worldwide cause celebre. A public figure makes an errant remark, and all of sudden, there are accusations of anti-Semitism or sexism or racism. These complaints are more about making noise than pursuing justice.

Whining is a form self pity, and a way to shift the blame to someone else. This way, we are no longer responsible or in control. And it is natural. We all like to indulge in self pitying fantasies of helplessness.

So how do you break out of a whining spell? Do you need to read books or attend workshops? Actually it’s very simple. You just have to move on. When the Jews were being chased by the Egyptians at the Red Sea, they cried out to God, paralyzed by uncertainty. God’s answer was simple: "Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on”. God’s advice, to rephrase it in a less formal way, is to “stop whining and start moving”.

God tells the beleaguered Jews at the Red Sea to move on, because no one should ever believe that they are helpless. The moment we start whining, we must find ways to take action, any action, to change our circumstances. Even in the bleakest moments, a person can choose his destiny.

I draw inspiration from people who made the best of awful situations, like Rami Harpaz. Harpaz was an Israeli pilot who was an Egyptian prisoner of war for 3 years, along with 9 other Israelis. During this time, they conducted classes for each other, and worked on plans for their lives once they were freed. Then one day, a parcel arrived with a copy of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, and they immediately started to work on a translation. Together, the ten P.O.W’s completed a translation, which is now one of two standard Hebrew translations of Tolkien. They may have been prisoners, but they refused to give up. Harpaz put it best in a recent interview: 'Falling into captivity presents one with a number of choices. You can either pity yourself and wallow in misery, or do something to organize your time as constructively as conditions allow”. His advice is useful to anyone, no matter what their situation: when you’re feeling sorry for yourself, you have to stop whining and start moving.

Hi! this is a first crack at an op-ed about Seville (see links in previous post).

Can Imams and Rabbis Make Peace?

This story does not have a happy ending.

Last week I traveled to Seville, Spain to attend the Second World Congress of Imams and Rabbis. On the surface, the Congress, organized by the Hommes de Parole Foundation, followed a good plan. First, you bring together religious leaders, who ostensibly are committed to goodness and generosity. Then, they meet in Andalusia, the cultural center during the “golden age of Spain”, where arts and literature, along with warm Jewish-Muslim relationships, blossomed in the 9th – 12th century. You start the proceedings in areas of common concern, like family, technology and secularization, and set a positive tone for a more freewheeling conversation on the following day. After four days of proceedings, you hope these leaders can contribute something positive towards world peace, and towards peace in the Middle East, in particular.

With all of this careful planning, the conference began with high hopes. But, like the “best laid plans of mice and men”, it quickly started to unravel. A session on the first day about family was disrupted by sharp voices of discord. An Imam from France was angered by a proposal the night before to outlaw insults to religious figures such as Mohammed; he called this proposal ludicrous. Some of the Palestinian Imams issued harsh attacks on Israel, and insisted that the only thing worth talking about was the Arab- Israel conflict. The Israeli Rabbis became leery and apprehensive. At the same time, many of the Rabbis and Imams from other places around the world were wondering if their concerns, often local ones, would be drowned out by the politics of the Middle East. This conference now felt uncomfortable and chaotic, the religious version of a bad day at the U.N.

Yet precisely when chaos started to set in, a quiet transformation was taking place. Rabbis and Imams began to talk to each other. Over dinner and in the lobby, conversations about the theological, the political, and even the trivial began to sprout. At night, the musically minded sat together and shared Jewish and Muslim songs. I began a series of heartwarming conversations with Ibrahim, an Imam from London. We spoke of the challenges we both faced in our communities, of being religious minorities, of sustaining faith in secular times. While no comprehensive solution to the Mideast conflict was achieved, many of us genuinely connected on a personal level.

These informal interactions made the conference into a genuine success. It’s impossible to expect that a couple of clergymen will fashion a blueprint for peace in a half a week. But what we did do is open lines of communication. Perhaps someday, both communities will have more to say to each other. For now, communication is an excellent first step.

More importantly, the conference offered an alternate model of reality. The general expectation is that any gathering of Jews and Muslims will be much like a wrestling match: noisy, nasty, and ultimately embarrassing. Yet in Seville, we realized that Muslim-Jewish conflict need not be the norm. The vast majority of us sat together, ate together, and became friends with each other. Despite disagreements and disputes, we appreciated our time together. Unfortunately, the comfortable everyday socializing we had in Seville is far too uncommon elsewhere.

In one of my conversations with a Muslim diplomat, I related to him a Chassidic story. A King is told by his advisors that there is no healthy grain for the coming year. The only grain available is diseased and will temporarily turn the entire population insane. The King and his advisor realize they have no choice but to eat the tainted grain themselves, and then lose their own sanity. But they decide that both of them will make a mark on their foreheads. This way when they look at each other’s forehead, they will realize for a short moment they are both mad, that their imagined reality is completely distorted. I explained to him that conflicts between Muslims and Jews, like all conflicts, are a bit of temporary insanity. And for three days, the Rabbis and Imams were stopping for a moment to look at the mark on the forehead, and remembering what peace could be like.

The conference of Imams and Rabbis did not proceed as planned. But well executed plans are not the only barometer of success. Success can lurk under the surface, at coffee breaks and late night conversations. Sometimes, it is an achievement for Rabbis who have never met an Imam, and Imams who have never met a Rabbi, to sit and talk to each other amicably.

As I was switching planes in London, Ibrahim came over and gave me a big hug. No, we weren’t anywhere near the end, but at least we had made a first step. And I realized that this story doesn’t have a happy ending….yet. However, many of us were moving in the right direction, one conversation at a time. And if we keep talking, it just might have a happy ending eventually.

Hi! i'm back from Seville. I will be posting about this early next week, I hope. In the meantime, you can read about it here and here and here.