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Behar 5782

Behar 5782

May 20, 2022 by

Parashat Behar, our Torah reading for this week, introduces us to the Shmita year. Every seven years, Leviticus/Vayikra instructs us that the land must lie fallow—no agricultural or food production is permitted and there are a number of other restrictions put into place in addition. As it so happens, 5782 is a shmita year. For those of us living in the Diaspora, where shmita is not applicable d’oraita or on a Torah level, the question is often asked—what significance does the shmita year hold for me, for us?

The number seven is one of great significance in Jewish tradition. We are commanded to rest on the Shabbat and, here, the parallel between our need as human beings to rest and the need for the land to rest is striking and profoundly countercultural. Resting on Shabbat is mentioned multiple times in Torah and is compared to G-d’s rest on the seventh day after six days of creation. Just as The Divine rests from creative labor, so, too, do we. In a capitalist system which correlates human worth with human productivity, the Torah offers us a blueprint for what an alternative system could look like, an egalitarian system of rest and rejuvenation. Recognizing that no human being, no animal, and no part of the land, upon which, our portion tells us later, we are strangers and sojourners with God, not owners outright can produce without ceasing, guidelines are put into place enabling us to shape a society in which the Shmita year is taken seriously. Yet, in the world as it is, the Shmita is an incredibly difficult mitzvah to observe. How might a commandment prohibiting food production, for instance, impact those most viscerally affected by rampant structural and social inequality? If a person cannot produce their own food, how are they supposed to sustain themselves and their families? And if they have not been able to store a year or two’s worth of food because they are living month to month, where does that leave them? In many ways, preparing, saving and storing for the future are luxuries most in our own time still do not have access to. This societal restructuring reminds us that ultimately, we are but sojourners and that to be good stewards of land we must allow the land to be cared for rightly.

Shmita offers us all a paradigm for how we care for the land we live and work upon. This feels even more crucial as we are experiencing a global pandemic whose impact is felt differently for different communities. Many who have had the luxury of working from home and minimizing exposure have not had to get proximate to those who are going to work daily to keep the systems and structures we rely upon functioning, even as they increase their personal exposure and that of their families. Those who do not live with disability or chronic illness that puts them at greater risk for COVID and its complications tend not to consider the impact personal choice has on social fabric and the ability for all of us to live and thrive safely.

If we take seriously the Torah’s mandate to allow the land to rest, just as human beings are required to rest, we must recognize that in order to put this into practice, we are required to radically rethink and reconstitute our social structure. In our pandemic era, there is yet hope that radical reawakening can—indeed—must occur, even as we yearn to return to normal, whatever normal means.

Shmita is a difficult mitzvah and that is the point. Human beings thrive on routine and predictability, which is why it feels like the status quo is so intrenched that change is out of reach. It is nearly impossible to imagine a scenario in our own time when those with much are willing to redistribute resources for the welfare of all. Yet, we return to this portion year after year as a reminder that the systems we have and the ways of being we’ve grown accustomed to are not sacrosanct. We can make change if we harness all of our will and ingenuity into doing so.

 

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Finding My Possibility Model

April 13, 2022 by

A version of the below piece originally appeared as part of Hot Off The Shtender, a series of reflection pieces from SVARA.

 

It is hard, nay impossible, to adequately capture the feelings that came over me when I learned about the passing of a dear friend: the fierce and unapologetic activist for disability justice and lover of Torah, Sheryl Grossman. May her memory be a blessing. I dedicate my learning today to her.

I found out about Sheryl’s passing in the way so many of us do these days. It was a typical Tuesday morning (or so I thought). I was taking a moment to scroll Facebook and there it was. I slumped over my desk upon receiving the news, the traditional words we say upon hearing of a death far from my consciousness. What came out first was a cry of disbelief. I knew she struggled with a multitude of cancers for the better part of seventeen years. I knew she often experienced scares and interfaced with the medical system in ways I frankly cannot even begin to fully comprehend. And yet, I was left speechless. “Blessed is the true judge.” What more can one say? And how impossibly hard is it to say that? True judge? How can I, how can anyone, wrap their minds around that when a person leaves the world so young?

Sheryl is the second friend I have lost in the past few months. Both were people I knew through disability community. Both were folks I had taught and learned with. Both friends challenged me to think about disability and Torah more broadly. From Sheryl in particular, I learned the importance of finding ourselves in Torah. This isn’t done by stretching narratives to fit us but rather by reclaiming our disabled ancestors who are right there in the text. As mentioned at her funeral, one of Sheryl’s greatest mentors was Moshe Rabbeinu—Moses our teacher who, it seems clear from the pshat (or simple read of the text) had a disability of some sort.

It was Sheryl who challenged me to read Exodus 4:10-16 in a radical way. I met Sheryl while I was in rabbinical school, which was a time of great existential angst for me. Much of that was internal. Some was external, though the internal parts were by far the hardest to navigate. I was feeling confused and alienated from Torah, and yet I knew in my neshama that I wanted and needed to be in relationship with Torah. Sheryl, whether she knew it at the time, was a model of possibility for me.

In the fourth chapter of the Book of Exodus, we encounter a famous dialogue between G-d and Moshe. G-d has chosen Moshe to lead the children of Israel out of mitzrayim. Moshe demurs, saying that as a man of few words, who will listen to him? Without missing a beat, G-d replies rhetorically, asking who makes a person as they are—blind or sighted, deaf or hearing, speaking or nonspeaking? “Is it not I, G-d, your G-d?”

For years, I argued vigorously that this passage assumed disability to be a punishment, G-d-forbid, and that this passage was the foundation of the moral model of disability: a model of disability that assumes disability exists due to sin, G-d-forbid. G-d makes us as we are, so all the ableism and oppression we encounter is just something we’re going to have to deal with. I find myself taken aback by the self-loathing in that read now. How often do we read texts in weaponizing ways, not only because that’s the tradition we’ve received, G-d-forbid, but even worse— because we believe it. How often do we understand Torah through a distorted prism that tells us more about ourselves and the brokenness in our souls than it does about the written or oral text?

Exodus 4:10-16 is now my favorite text in Torah, and it’s something I strive to recite daily alongside the blessings I make over Torah study. That transformation came about due in large measure to Sheryl’s unapologetic challenge to me: “Have you completely forgotten the second half of the passage?” G-d responds to Moshe that, of course, G-d understands Moshe is not an orator and provides him with a reasonable accommodation. Aaron, his brother, will be his attendant. It is from here that the Torah affirms the crucial need for attendant care and accommodations.

I could hear and absorb that from Sheryl in ways I might not have been able to from anyone else. Sheryl, who cared as much about disability rights as she did about keeping Shabbat in an Orthodox manner. Sheryl, who would accept nothing less than showing up as her full, authentic self, including her religious self. Being disabled and religious were not mutually exclusive things, she reminded me again, again, and again. I often felt between two worlds—wanting to connect with observant disabled folks but not identifying as Orthodox. Sheryl helped bridge that gap for me. But even more than that, she showed me how I, too, could find myself in Torah.

As Rabbi Benay Lappe has noted, we all have our donkey stories—those stories that jump out at us because they give words to our experiences. G-d giving Moshe a reasonable accommodation (though of course the Torah doesn’t know or use that term) helped me realize that perhaps, G-d reminds Moshe that he, too, is created in G-d’s image, specifically because Moshe might have forgotten otherwise. Many of us forget our inherent worth because of the social positions we find ourselves in. We forget because of old, tired, harmful narratives. We forget because of our family systems. We forget for so many reasons. With Sheryl’s help, I have come to believe that G-d reminds us that we are created in G-d’s image again in this passage because it is so easy to forget—so easy to think of ourselves as subhuman.

I often wonder about Moshe’s upbringing in Pharaoh’s palace. I imagine, though of course can never know with any degree of certainty, that Moshe might have been taunted or humiliated because of how he spoke. Perhaps he, too, wondered whether he’d ever fit in with his own people. Perhaps, as Brené Brown writes about in her latest work Atlas of the Heart, Moshe feels like he’ll have to fit in by fitting a mold that doesn’t fit him. How many of us feel that way? How often did I wonder if I’d ever fit in with Jewish community, though my heart and soul longed to? How often did I wonder if I was on the wrong life path? How often did I ask myself, “who will listen to me, a blind female rabbi with many marginalized identities?” What I was asking, ultimately, was “am I good enough? Who am I?” The voice that told me I’d never measure up to an abled, sighted ideal that I could never achieve was making its presence known in destructive ways.

Sheryl’s funeral ended with a recitation of her favorite poem (which also happens to be my favorite poem), You Get Proud by Practicing, written by the incredible disabled poet Laura Hershey, may her memory be a blessing. Listening to the live stream of the service, I alternately cried and tried (through my tears) to recite the poem along with the reader. This powerful poem is an antidote to all of the self-loathing and internalized oppression that many of us struggle with every day. Feeling at home with oneself unapologetically is a spiritual practice in and of itself—one we must engage with every day. I know I have much work to do myself. I urge us all, whether we identify with disability or not, to integrate this poem’s powerful message into our lives and souls, just as Sheryl did. One of Sheryl’s most oft-repeated lines was “my mouth is my biggest organ and I’m not afraid to use it”! Amein v’amein, friend. Rest in power.

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Thoughts For Yom Kippur 5782

September 15, 2021 by

Yom Kippur is often translated into English as the Jewish day of atonement, though I feel that this is a mistranslation. Yom Kippur’s awesomeness, in the literal sense of the word, is that the Jewish tradition provides us with a 25-hour period, Shabbat Shabbaton (the sabbath of sabbaths) to focus wholly on realigning with who we want to be in the new year. Part of that work is doing a soul accounting of the ways in which we missed the mark in this past year, including making amends with those we may have hurt. Doing teshuvah, returning/realigning (I don’t use the translation “repent” for teshuvah because of its punitive connotations) is a practice that is particularly encouraged this time of year, though it is a spiritual practice that we can engage in any time. There is a lot of emphasis in the Yom Kippur liturgy on confession–we recite the vidui or confessional prayer ten times. In addition to this there are beautiful piyyutim or liturgical poems throughout each of the five services of the day. If one arrives at synagogue without a lot of grounding in the liturgy of Yom Kippur, it often can feel like our holiest day is spent recounting again, again and again all of the wrongs we’ve done, in hopes that a new and better year will be granted us. This perception of the day saddens me tremendously, as it does not allow us to experience what the rabbis insisted was, in fact, one of the happiest days of the year in its fullness.

In his tremendous book, This Is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared, Rabbi Alan Lew, of blessed memory invites us to reframe the High Holyday season is a season involving the very transformation of our souls. We are intimately aware as the year begins that we don’t know what the year will bring. Yom HaDin, Rosh Hashanah, is our opportunity to recommit ourselves to being in relationship with the Divine, that which is bigger than us. The imagery of the coronation of a king may work for you or it may not, and that’s just fine. The Jewish tradition offers us a wide array of names for the Divine. The call of the shofar on Rosh Hashanah is intended to wake us up as we usher in a season of deep holiness and personal introspection, culminating with the opportunity to wholly immerse ourselves in community, sacredness and contemplation on Yom Kippur.

Rabbi Lew’s book helped me begin to reimagine my relationship to the machzor, the prayer book used on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. I love liturgy and find myself wanting to know more about those rabbis, sages and seekers who composed our prayers, weaving together texts from the Tanakh (Bible), Talmud, Midrash and other sources, alongside the longings of their own hearts and their personal theologies. Some of that theology may resonate. Some of it may not. And that’s ok.

We are living at a time in which we are finally becoming better attuned to the myriad of life experiences that we all carry within, along with those of those we are in community with. Too many of us associate Yom Kippur with a feeling of punishment–I confess over and over again because I am somehow fundamentally flawed. Jewish tradition says precisely the opposite about human beings. Against all odds, and sometimes despite ourselves, we have hope that human beings are in fact capable of change. This capability does not mean that to forgive is to forget or reconcile. We can forgive to free ourselves of the resentment we hold, but that does not imply–nor should it–that forgiveness grants the other person an automatic invitation back into our lives. The two are distinct.

And it is precisely because we believe that human beings can change, if they/we choose to, that taking responsibility for our actions is of such paramount importance. Covenant is another important Jewish concept, the notion that relationship, to be genuine and lasting, must be mutual, based on obligation to each other. When we break trust with one another, we are given the opportunity to return and begin again. Yom Kippur is about doing that work with the Divine and ourselves. The days prior and indeed the entire year, really, is about doing that work with our fellow human beings–and all beings.

Yom Kippur is one of our happiest days because we know that we are granted a fresh start right from the very get-go. We proclaim as much just after we say Kol Nidre, the part of the service that Rabbi Lew refers to as our soul’s name being called. Why go through the next 25 hours then?

This time is set aside for us to do the work we need to do to realign with the Divine, that which is greater, and even more so, to come back into alignment with ourselves. The Machzor is a roadmap for helping us get there. Though the liturgy is profound and beautiful, it is not the be all end all of Yom Kippur. Give yourself permission to take whatever and however much time you need over this next day to do the soul work you need to do, the self-care you need. We come together in community in a year such as this one, with all of our sorrows, wounds and traumas, praying for a better world. May we all have a meaningful, transformative Yom Kippur.

 

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The Heart Knows the Bitterness Of Its Soul: Experience As An Integral Expression of Holiness

August 13, 2021 by

With the marking of Rosh Chodesh Elul this week, the Jewish tradition invites us into the holiest months of the year. It’s a time for personal introspection and stock-taking, a time to ask ourselves about the people we want to be in the new year. This Elul is particularly significant as with Rosh Hashanah, we usher in the Shmita or Sabbatical year, a time to think about personal and collective cessation and release.

We also direct our hearts towards teshuvah, or returning, realigning with our best and highest selves and with the Divine. Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar is all about this realignment.

This may seem strange, but Yom Kippur is, after Pesach or Passover my favorite Jewish holiday. The liturgical poetry of the day is soul-stirring. The collective responsibility that we affirm and reaffirm for the ways in which we’ve missed the mark. The joy that comes knowing that we are able to begin again, just as we do every year and every day.

The Jewish tradition provides us with several physical observances intended to spiritually situate ourselves for the awesomeness of Yom Kippur. One of those, and perhaps the best known, is fasting.

In SVARA’s Mishnah Collective this season, we are learning Mishnah Yoma chapter 8, the chapter that focuses most directly on teshuvah/return. The fifth Mishnah of the chapter explicitly stipulates conditions under which a person may not fast for their own wellbeing. “עֻבָּרָה שֶׁהֵרִיחָה, מַאֲכִילִין אוֹתָהּ עַד שֶׁתָּשִׁיב נַפְשָׁהּ. חוֹלֶה מַאֲכִילִין אוֹתוֹ עַל פִּי בְקִיאִין. וְאִם אֵין שָׁם בְּקִיאִין, מַאֲכִילִין אוֹתוֹ עַל פִּי עַצְמוֹ, עַד שֶׁיֹּאמַר דָּי: If her fetus smelled food, she is fed until her soul is restored. [The fetus smells the food, and she desires it, and if she does not eat, both are endangered. A sick person is fed on the opinion of experts [i.e., doctors who are expert in their profession]. And if there are no experts, he is fed on his own say, until he says: “Enough!”.

Our Mishnah presents several case studies for determining when and by whose authority a person may not fast or may break their fast early. We learn that one who is pregnant, who smells food and craves the food is fed until satiated. Satiety is achieved, then, both for the one who is pregnant and the growing fetus.

The second case we receive here is that of one who is ill. If experts IE medical doctors or the like are present and they stipulate, on their professional authority that the person must eat, the person eats. On the one hand, I completely get it. If experts are present and say that a person is so sick that their life is in danger, pikuach nefesh—saving a life supersedes all other mitzvot. On the other hand, I bristle, noticing the way in which my own prejudicial encounters with the healthcare system color my reaction. I wonder if paternalism, that all-too-common assumption that many have that they know better than we possibly can is at play. I notice that reaction arising and hold it lightly, as we do. The importance the rabbis place on qualified experts here is incredibly important to lift up, especially in the time in which we are living. Ours is a tradition that honors science and medicine, full stop.

Our Mishnah is not yet finished. If a doctor is not present, the one who is ill eats on their own authority, until they say enough. Juxtaposed to the earlier case, this piece of Mishnah illustrates for us the importance of bodily autonomy. We know our experiences best. The rabbis will state this even more clearly later in the Gemara, citing a verse from Mishlei/Proverbs, the heart knows the bitterness of its own soul. At the end of the day, we know whether or not we need to eat. In its context, this is a radical claim. Yom Kippur is the most sacred day; the fasting is an integral component of that. Yet, we are reminded that fasting is not the totality of the day, not even close. In too many communities today, those who cannot fast for whatever reason feel profoundly alienated, disconnected from everyone else around them. This feeling can easily become even stronger, and folks can feel like they are, G-d-forbid, failing in some way because their bodies cannot do what other bodies do.

Those of us who experience any number of oppressions—ableism, fatphobia, transphobia—meant to reenforce the narrow conception of which bodies are acceptable and which are absolutely not know the way in which that feeling gnaws at our souls. This is even more acute, in my own experience and that of too many people I counsel in religious spaces. May this Elul be a time for us to not only do our individual soul-work, but also to take to heart the ways in which our tradition makes room, explicitly, for a multiplicity of experiences as we reaffirm that the individual knows the bitterness of their own soul better than anyone else can.

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Kedoshim 5781

April 23, 2021 by

Our double parsha this week, Acharei Mot-Kedoshim, as with so much of Torah, covers a lot of ground and is multi-faceted and multi-layered. These parshiyot contain verses that have provided considerable strength and inspiration to us throughout the centuries, as well as verses that have caused tremendous pain. I am going to be focusing in this dvar Torah on a verse found in the 19th chapter of Leviticus. “לֹא־תְקַלֵּ֣ל חֵרֵ֔שׁ וְלִפְנֵ֣י עִוֵּ֔ר לֹ֥א תִתֵּ֖ן מִכְשֹׁ֑ל וְיָרֵ֥אתָ מֵּאֱלֹהֶ֖יךָ אֲנִ֥י יְהוָֽה׃ You shall not insult the deaf or place a stumbling block before the blind. You shall fear your God: I am the LORD.” (Leviticus 19:14, JPS translation).

This verse contains two distinct, yet simultaneously interconnected mitzvot. Leviticus 19 is often referred to by scholars as the holiness code of Torah, as it contains a variety of interpersonal and agricultural mitzvot whose intent is to create a world in which we are aware that we, like G-d, are holy and must live lives of sanctity. The mitzvot the Torah presents us with here—do not curse the deaf or place a stumbling block before the blind—you should fear Hashem I am Hashem—have been classically understood in a variety of ways. Ibn Ezra holds that we should not curse the deaf because we have the power to do so and if we do, G-d will punish us by making us deaf and blind. Rashi interprets the verse metaphorically, understanding the prohibition against putting a stumbling block before the blind to be about not deceiving someone or misleading them. The logic of the metaphorical read, which has been widely adopted, is that no decent person, upon seeing a blind person approaching would think to put a boulder in their path. Lifnei Ivir or before the blind has henceforth become an expansive halakhic category, whose application is manifold. We aren’t to mislead someone by giving poor advice, or in business deals, etc., as to do so is to place a stumbling block in their path.

I have argued for years that there is tremendous power in the Torah’s words here. As a blind woman and someone committed to Torah and to remaining in relationship with this holy tradition, even and especially when doing so is very painful, when I read these two prohibitions against cursing the deaf and placing a stumbling block before the blind, I experience The Divine affirming the very real, complex lived experiences of deaf folks, blind folks, and those who are deafblind. Our experiences are as varied as we are and the circumstances of our lives as diverse as anyone’s. Yet, on a very literal level, I have navigated more than my fair share of obstacles, tripping hazards and the like. G-d isn’t simply prohibiting boulders placed in people’s way deliberately or maliciously. Rather, what would the world be experienced and felt like if we took great care to create accessible paths for all of us, so that we could navigate with ease and freedom? These prohibitions also recognize the power dynamics that are inherent in human relationships. I say that without moral judgement but simply by way of naming a truth. As a hearing person, I could choose not to provide accurate renderings of what I’m saying to folks who sign. Blind folks’ access to visual information, while improving, is still highly limited, leaving many feeling increasingly separate from others. As an educator, I experience this on Zoom in numerous ways, at the same time as I am grateful that important work is being done to remedy these disparities.

The impulse to assume that the Torah’s prohibitions here cannot be literal is a natural one—it is hard to fathom a scenario in which an individual would intentionally place a stumbling block before a blind person or curse a deaf person. Yet, as with so much in Torah, we are, I believe, being divinely encouraged to look within and take an accounting of our actions and working assumptions. When we are not in relationship with individuals about or to whom particular verses apply, it is easy to narrow their scope. Put another way, without meaningful, authentic and mutual relationships with a diverse group of individuals, I might not think that something like refraining from placing a stumbling block in the path of a blind person means all that much. When I get curious about the lived experiences of those I hold close and those who are not in my circle but are in my society, I am able to expand the palace of my own understanding and thereby to expand the palace of Torah in all of its fullness.

I hold that Torah is eternally relevant, speaking to us in every generation. Or, put another way, the Torah speaks in the language of human beings so that we can understand and live it out fully in the world. The Torah, as we learn in Deuteronomy, is close to us, it is not far away, in the heavens or beyond the sea, but in our mouths to do it. Hashem has revealed Hashem’s Torah to us so that we might internalize it and live in right relationship. We are also given the opportunity to bring our interpretations and applications to bear on the lengthy and ongoing conversation across time, geography and circumstance. Mine is the perspective of one blind woman. I certainly do not speak for the blind community, nor could I, even if that was my desire. There is room for many reads, many challenges, many pathways in.

As a lover of Torah and as someone who believes passionately in the ability of people with disabilities to thrive and live lives of meaning, when I approach classical interpretations of this verse, I am being asked to stretch myself to accommodate multiple truths. On the one hand, Ibn Ezra’s interpretation hurts at first read. I do not hold for a moment that blindness or deafness are punishments from G-d, G-d-forbid. Blindness and deafness are normal, natural parts of the human condition that people across all lines of social difference live with. Many people live lives of incredible meaning and depth and think of their deafness or blindness as inherent parts of who they are, as integral to their individual and spiritual identities as anything else about them. It is also true that discrimination and truly abhorrent behavior from others are things that many of us have to contend with. And that is a hard reality, but a necessary one to name. Ibn Ezra’s comment, read radically differently, is a reminder to all of us that the energy we put out into the world, how we view others, has a tremendous impact upon them and even more, on us.

A story from the Talmud (Taanit 20AB) illustrates this quite aptly. A rabbi is riding on his donkey home after a day of Torah study, feeling quite proud of his learning. He encounters a man who has some sort of apparent disfigurement or is in the eyes of the rabbi very unattractive. The man offers a deferential greeting, to which the rabbi responds by disparaging him and asking if all of the people who come from his city are as ugly as he is. The man replies, without missing a beat that he doesn’t know, but that perhaps the rabbi needs to go and ask the Craftsman who made him, telling the Craftsman, “how ugly is the vessel you made”. By insulting another human being, created in the image of G-d, we are insulting the Divine.

A theological foundation of mine is that Genesis 1:27, which teaches us that every human being is created in G-d’s image is perhaps one of the Torah’s most radical teachings. As my teacher and noted rabbi, scholar and disability activist Rabbi Dr. Julia Watts Belser notes, believing that we are all created in the image of G-d is beautiful and essential theology, and it calls us to act on our radical commitments. Referencing this idea, in other words, carries little weight if I’m not actively living it out and embodying it in all that I am. Noted sociologist and shame researcher, Dr. Brene Brown noted in a podcast released shortly after the attack on the United States Capital that dehumanization fuels hate, urging her listeners to take great care not to dehumanize others in action, speech or thought, even as we do the crucial work of doing all we can to eradicate hate and prejudice from our midst.

So, too, our Torah is calling us to not ignore what might feel like a simplistic couple of mitzvot. Rather, G-d is reminding us that if we want to create a holy society, to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation, that it is upon all of us to create a barrier-free society.

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On COVID-19 and New Accessible Opportunities For Us All

May 11, 2020 by

New Accessible Jewish Paradigm shifts in the Wake of COVID-19

March 20, 2020

 

This week has been a challenging and uncertain one for our world. We know we’re in this for the long haul, that things are going to get worse before they get better. Many of us feel profoundly unmoored as mainstays of our lives are temporarily closing. The rhythms of our days feel off and knowing that we don’t know how long this will last, we don’t yet know when the structures of our days will return to what they once were. None of us have ever lived through something like this. We feel anchorless, directionless, and for the most vulnerable—including many people with disabilities and underlying health conditions—this time of deep uncertainty comes with a host of other unknowns.

 

The past two weeks have seen the proliferation of Jewish programming online. You can stream a synagogue service any day you choose, drop into a class or even attend a concert. All of this is done out of necessity for sure, but it is also coming from a deep knowing that people seek meaning, connection and solace. In the flurry of activity, something felt deeply discordant to me. The pace at which programming and even prayer books became available online was due to the fact that these things—accommodations, if you were—are now what the majority population requires. We structure our society to center and prioritize the needs of majority populations, even in this ever-shifting reality. We too often forget those on the margins, namely folks living with disability and chronic illness. I believe that this forgetting is because our communities of care—individually and communally–don’t often include us. We are not often seen as peers or equals. We tend to prioritize those needs and concerns that impact our lives most immediately and viscerally. Though the disability community is 20% of the human family, our needs are frequently deprioritized because the perception is that the needed accommodations and supports will impact a small number of people only—hence, not worth the time, effort and expense. When we have someone in our life who requires alternative means of access, we are more inclined to work towards that. Why? Because accessibility is no longer an abstract thing, it’s concrete.  Many folks living with disabilities and chronic illness have been dealing with the impact of isolation for a long time. Many have been dealing with the indescribable pain of wanting to be in community and not being able to access it. Imagine what it feels like, now, to get that taste of access. For some folks, it’s for the first time.

 

For many people with disabilities, this newfound ease of access is accompanied by a host of complex feelings. Many yearn to return to in-person gatherings, even as we recognize the access we now enjoy to things we may not have ever had access to before. For some of us, the ease with which electronic publications became available online has caused some challenging feelings to arise around how quickly things can become universally available when the need feels urgent. As someone who is blind, digital accessibility is a key concern of mine. Though we have seen the proliferation of e-books from Jewish and mainstream publishers on Bookshare, Kindle and other distributors, getting digitally accessible prayer books has been a challenge that has often felt insurmountable. When advocating for alternate format production of printed materials, there are important considerations that must be sensitively navigated which go beyond the scope of this piece. Nevertheless, it is important for all of us to reflect upon the perception that many folks in the disability community have that our needs are simply lower priority, which can leave us feeling dispensable and unwanted in Jewish community.

 

Moshe Rabbeinu, our greatest prophet is someone who had a speech impediment of some kind. In Shmot/Exodus 4, G-d tells Moshe that he will lead the Children of Israel out of Egypt. Moshe demurs, citing his speech impediment. Immediately, G-d responds with a rhetorical question—who created you? Was it not I, G-d? Did I not create you in my image just like every other human being? Here is your necessary accommodation—your brother, Aaron will serve as your spokesperson. Disability is a natural part of the human condition. I believe that the reason the Torah names specific groups of individuals in G-d’s reply—blind folks, deaf folks, folks with physical and speech disabilities—is because G-d understands that we often forget that we, too, are created in the image of G-d. Disability advocates have often pointed out that the world was not designed for us. And that is due to the choices that we humans make each and every day to prioritize some over others. In this time of turning inward, we are being given an unparalleled opportunity to make a course correction. I pray we take it.  G-d, through G-d’s retort to Moshe, reminds him and all of us that to build a mikdash—a sanctuary in which the Divine Presence can feel truly at home—we must structure our world so that we all can thrive as our best selves.

 

Many fear that once life returns to a semblance of normalcy, we will return to a world in which virtual offerings are fewer and not nearly as robust. What would it be like to use the gifts of this time—the gifts of out-of-the-box thinking and trying new things to shape a reality in which gatherings can exist in a variety of ways all at once? Let us remember and lift up the deep lived wisdom of the disability community for whom innovation has been the name of the game for generations. Let us learn from disability wisdom about emotional and spiritual resilience, being a problem-solver and creating community across geographic and spatial boundaries.

 

Ours is a tradition that revels in complexity and nuance. After the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE, the rabbis, who were, at best, a tiny minority realized that the world they once knew was no more, gone overnight. How were they to move forward and preserve our ancient, precious tradition? Their solution was to make Judaism portable through the compiling and codification of the Mishnah and Gemara which we call the Talmud. Yet, the rabbis never forgot the world they once knew. Entire tractates of Mishnah are devoted to studying temple sacrifices. Entire portions of traditional liturgy are devoted to daily study of temple rites. Even as a new paradigm occurs, the old is not forgotten. Similarly, in our time, even as we yearn to return to our synagogues, houses of study and community centers, even as we yearn to enjoy Shabbat meals with others, even as we wonder what Passover will feel like this year, may we not forget the gifts newfound communal access and ways of thinking give us.

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Rabbi Lauren Tuchman interviewed by the Women Rabbis Talk Podcast

March 4, 2020 by

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Emor 5777

May 18, 2019 by

Author’s note: This commentary was written in May, 2017, in the Jewish year 5777 and was significantly updated in 5779.
The LORD spoke further to Moses: Speak to Aaron and say: No man of your offspring throughout the ages who has a defect shall be qualified to offer the food of his God. No one at all who has a defect shall be qualified: no man who is blind, or lame, or has a limb too short or too long; no man who has a broken leg or a broken arm; or who is a hunchback, or a dwarf, or who has a growth in his eye, or who has a boil-scar, or scurvy, or crushed testes. No man among the offspring of Aaron the priest who has a defect shall be qualified to offer the LORD’s offering by fire; having a defect, he shall not be qualified to offer the food of his God. He may eat of the food of his God, of the most holy as well as of the holy; but he shall not enter behind the curtain or come near the altar, for he has a defect. He shall not profane these places sacred to Me, for I the LORD have sanctified them.” (Leviticus 21.16–23 JPS)

Parashat Emor (Leviticus 21-24) contains what many have dubbed this year in the commentaries I’ve read particularly as one of the Torah’s most disturbing passages. In Leviticus 21, we are informed that any Kohein who has a mum—often translated as blemish but which can also refer to any sort of disability or physical abnormality—is barred from serving in the Temple. Though kohanim thus barred are permitted to eat of the sacrificial meat, they are not permitted to go behind the curtain or approach the alter because by so doing, they will profane those places which God has made sacred.

After reading such a profoundly disturbing passage, it is quite understandable to ask why the Torah includes such painful, hurtful and exclusionary words. After all, this is not the only difficult text we find in Leviticus to our modern sensibilities. This text cries out to me, with profound pain and existential anguish—darsheini!—explain or interpret me. It is my deeply held belief that as Jewish communal leadership slowly begins to reflect the true diversity that is the Jewish people, we will each benefit immensely from the Torah of leaders with disabilities and others to which we previously would have been denied access precisely because positions of leadership—lay and clergy alike—were barred to us.

The natural inclination, when reading a passage such as this to ask why the Torah would include something so painfully alienating and disturbing for many of us is quite understandable, and that question does not interest me at present. I am more drawn to the question of what—given this passage is in our Torah, and given that many of us encounter it annually, what are we going to do with it? The reasons why the Torah included these prohibitions offered up by numerous contemporary and ancient commentaries I have read are profoundly dissatisfying and in many cases add to the pain and discomfort. There’s no way of getting around the starkness. Attempting to explain it away might make us feel better about its presence, and indeed, I have come to deeply believe that for Jews with disabilities and many others, unearthing messages in this text that apply to our lives is a subversively necessary act. As my teacher, colleague and friend, Dr. Rabbi Julia Watts Belser eloquently reminds me, when Emor comes around every year, we hear the Torah telling us a truth that is deep in our bones, a truth about the world in which we live with it’s half-baked, snap judgements about others based on appearance alone and the narratives we love to craft about those whom we fear or simply don’t want to know. . As our world becomes increasingly visual and increasingly uninterested in holy pauses to get to know others, or even in slowing down for the extra moments it takes a person with a disability to navigate a world which structurally disadvantages them, this truth rings even louder in my ears.

Throughout subsequent halakhic literature, we see the prohibitions of this text mitigated and qualified, and we see a clear line of reasoning pointing to the assumed natural inclination to stare at that which is different. The distraction that accompanies the presence of one whose body is unlike our own might mean that we are not able to direct our hearts towards our religious obligations. The challenge, then, is placed upon the community to hold its discomfort and anxiety about that which it does not know or understand. Just as people with disabilities are excellent innovators by dint of having to navigate a society human beings built to advantage some over others, so, too, are we excellent managers of the anxieties and discomforts of others. Ask around and you will surely get a wide array of strategies, some conscious, others subconscious that disability communities have developed to navigate that omnipresent elephant.

Often, we are inclined to either spiritualize this passage or thank God that we live in a time now in which discrimination of this sort is no longer commonplace. If only that were actually so. I am profoundly committed to the inner life and a life of heartfelt spiritual practice. Our Torah contains infinite opportunities and pathways for us to grow spiritually, emotionally, intellectually and religiously. However, thinking about the named disability groups as metaphors leads us down highly problematic paths. Those who do work at the intersection of disability activism and justice work, both in secular and religious contexts rightly bristle at the metaphoric use of disability because the stigmas attached to such metaphors—lame, deaf and blind come immediately to mind—are stigmas that are long-lasting and are nearly impossible to wholly eradicate. I still cringe when I hear this kind of language nearly every day, and I find myself despairing of there ever being a culture shift. Our tradition radically and boldly teaches us that we are all created b’tzelem Elokim, in G-d’s Image, and we are all inherently valuable and worthy of existing on this holy planet of ours. Unfortunately, we too often fail to live that value out when it comes to individuals with disabilities.
We might not think twice before calling something so lame, or asking why you’re turning a blind eye to something, but if we take but a second and think about the words we use, words which, particularly when they come from leaders matter greatly, we will hopefully come to realize that the metaphor we are employing is a profoundly negative, demeaning and disempowering one, ascribing an inherent negativity to disabled embodiment. How much of that assumed negativity is rooted in our own fears of our ever-changing bodies?

Leviticus 21 asks us to begin to challenge notions of normativity that we all, despite how far we have come in the past decades, still harbor. And the work is work we all must do, regardless of ability status. Simply living with one’s own disability or disabilities does not absolve one from the hard work of unlearning prejudicial beliefs about other disability groups. We can all perpetuate ableism, whether we ourselves are disabled or not.
Instead of getting hung up on why our Torah includes this passage, let’s use Leviticus 21 as a charge to each of us. The Torah is not in heaven but in our mouths to do it. So what are we going to do with it? Are we going to allow the Torah to remind us, no matter how uncomfortable it feels, of the truths in our world–that to inhabit an atypical, non-normative body means one is constantly navigating the anxieties and judgements projected upon it? How might our Torah’s charge here call us to live out our mission to be an or l’goyim? Bereshit calls us to remember that we are all created b’tzelem Elokim. Vayikra challenges us to live that out wholly and radically. If Torah is truly a Torat emet and a torat chayyim, and if we want to be in genuine and grounded relationship to and with it, we cannot only latch onto the things that we like. We must also allow ourselves to be met, face-to-face, panim-al-panim, with those dark corners of our own neshamot we’d prefer to keep hidden. We must do the cheshbon hanefesh required so that we might live our lives and treat everyone we meet with the knowledge that we each carry a spark of divinity within.

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Kedoshim 5779

May 7, 2019 by

It has become something of a cliché in the circles I run in these days that when a teacher of Torah or a clergyperson from any religious tradition, for that matter, sits down to write a sermon, the sermon they often write is that which they most need to hear. It has also become something of a cliché that often, that which emerges from our divrei Torah which lands less well is reflective of the inner struggles of the darshan or darshanit. Teachers of Torah, in other words, must always take great care when they are teaching and when they are preparing to teach to do a personal cheshbon hanefesh or soul accounting. What is calling out to me from this particular text and why am I drawn to teach it in this moment? Is it that I am truly moved and inspired by a specific teaching and I yearn to share that newfound insight with others? In tender moments, what is going on for me internally which draws me to a specific passage? Am I trying to work some inner emotional, spiritual or political struggle out from the bimah?

Those questions are examples of what that soul accounting could entail, and it is something I strive, imperfectly, to do every time I sit down to write a dvar Torah. The awareness that the cheshbon hanefesh is so foundational is borne out, unfortunately, from having experienced the spiritual and emotional aftermath of too many incredible teachers of sacred text conveying deeply wounding messages and knowing in the deepest part of my soul that in most cases, the intent and impact are worlds apart. Indeed, I firmly believe and seek to live this out in my daily interactions and in my generosity of spirit, that the vast majority of human beings are doing the best they can, even and especially, as hard it is for many of us to remember, in political and social moments such as our current one.
It has become something of an annual tradition that I write lengthy divrei Torah on parshiot Kedoshim and Emor. I begin with the premise that the Torah is speaking to us in every generation, or as we are taught in Perkei Avot, the Ethics of our Fathers, a tractate of the Mishnah, turn it turn it, for everything is in it. I find myself returning, like clockwork, to the same pesukim in these parshiot year after year, as new insights manifest themselves, and as the years’ worth of life experiences I have accrued allow me to be in conversation with the Torah text even more deeply than before.
This, despite knowing that both Torah portions contain within them endless possibilities for exploration and worlds of spiritual insight, unrelated at all to disability, which tends to be the focus of these commentaries.

And so, I find myself returning to the questions with which I began this drash. What is arising within me that is causing me to feel compelled from within to drash on the same verses year after year? I find myself engaging in that inner work even as I am presently writing, challenging the well-worn stories I tell about myself, about the disability community, about how others perceive and relate to us. I tell myself that I’m so well-suited, which, though not entirely untrue, is also not the only truth out there. I, blessedly, am not, thank God, the only spiritual leader living with a disability and I pray that our numbers continue to increase, speedily and in our days. The burden of representing the experience of blindness and the religious life is not mine to bear alone.
The Torah I feel called to teach tends to focus on the narrowness with which traditional Jewish commentators have understood Vayikra/Leviticus 19:14, do not insult the deaf or place a stumbling block before the blind. You shall fear Hashem I am Hashem. (Translation mine). Rashi, an 11th-century French Biblical commentator, and one of the Jewish tradition’s most famous understood this verse metaphorically, focusing mostly on the latter half and creating a category of halakhah called lifnei ivir or before the blind, which, rightly, forbids deceiving anyone, causing others to go astray or giving a person bad advice. To place a stumbling block before the blind, as I understand Rashi’s reading, is transformed from a seemingly literal commandment not to place a physical object that could be a tripping hazard in front of someone who is blind into an expansive read in which placing stumbling blocks is understood as behavioral in nature. In previous drashot, I focused a great deal on how Rashi’s understanding writes out the experiences of individuals who are blind. I have read numerous commentaries which imply or assume that of course, reading this commandment metaphorically is the obvious next step because what decent person would, Hashem forbid, place a stumbling block in front of a blind person?
Unfortunately, the assumption of the irrelevance of a literal read of this d’oraita or Biblical commandment is illustrative of the ways in which human beings tend to fall into the trap of placing those whom they do not know and whom they may indeed fear at arm’s length, not wanting to hear, understand or empathize with their experiences or lived reality in this world so desperately in need of tikkun. I would find myself feeling that I had to prove, endlessly, that the literal commandment held, just as strongly as it ever has, and that our Torah is commanding us to remove all barriers to access for folks with disabilities, not just blind folks. Those barriers are physical, attitudinal, economic, structural and spiritual, and it is this latter area that I am called to focus on this year.
I have sat for some time with the increasing awareness that my read, to which I had become just as habituated as so many of my fellow teachers of Torah had become to an immediate referencing to Rashi was itself metaphorical. Baruch Hashem, the Torah has seventy faces, infinite interpretations and insights which manifest themselves to us in varying ways. We all were at Sinai, and we all received the revelation of Torah collectively, as well as individually, in a way we could understand it. Perhaps, then, I am being called to reveal the increasing awareness I am holding around the spiritual imperatives of this commandment, even as doing so is quite difficult. Yet, to be an honest and authentic teacher of Torah, I can do no less.

In his incredible sefer, Aish Kodesh, a collection of sermons given in the Warsaw Ghetto, the Piaseczna Rebbe teaches in a drasha on Parashat Chayei Sarah that Sarah Emmeinu, Sarah our mother, died after the Binding of Isaac because the amount of suffering she had experienced was simply too much. With so much spiritual and pastoral sensitivity, borne out of his own experience of losing his family in the most horrific way several weeks prior, the Piaseczna notes that as much suffering as a person can handle in their life, there comes a time when they break, when it is all too much. It is, in my understanding, directly in opposition to the oft-repeated and deeply problematic idea that Hashem does not give a human being more than they are able to handle.
We don’t talk often enough about spiritual stumbling blocks placed in front of individuals living with disabilities because I believe, for many of us with disabilities, the immensity, the enormity of the pain and trauma is simply too much. We might have felt so systemically silenced that we lose the ability to articulate the woundedness. We might have found ourselves, particularly if we ourselves seek to live a richly rewarding religious or spiritual life explaining to people close to us why we are so drawn, as religious traditions as they are so often interpreted have been a source of profound emotional and spiritual violence. Indeed, I did an interview a month or so ago in which the host, rightly I believe, spent the first few minutes acknowledging that religious teachings have been interpreted in profoundly alienating ways for the disability community, urging her listeners, most of whom themselves were people with disabilities to engage as best as they were able. I feel it is my sacred obligation, in fact, to acknowledge this reality.
It is precisely because I am so deeply aware of and impacted by the ways in which teachers of Torah and of sacred text more broadly have too frequently been sources of spiritual alienation for folks with disabilities that I want to offer another way. Having experienced this both interpersonally and as part of a larger audience, I understand viscerally what these stumbling blocks feel like. There are moments when living authentically as a religious person feels nearly impossible, given the ways in which those who think of themselves as vessels of Torah are not manifesting life-giving Torah. And truly, all of us who cling to Torah are able to manifest our unique Torah into the world, though far too many of us have been told that we have no ability, no power to do so, a profoundly disempowering posture that is hard to overcome.
As Rebbe Nachman of Breslov, an early Chasidic master reminds us, even in those moments in which Hashem’s face is hidden, in which we feel divine absence and contraction most acutely, even there, Hashem can be found. This teaching has meant different things to me at different times. Broadly, I understand Rebbe Nachman to be saying that even amidst unbearable pain of any kind, Hashem does not abandon a person, created in Hashem’s image, even and especially when it feels like the rest of the world has.
The Piaseczna, in a later drash about Pesach notes that we are able to create our own sense of redemption, and that our redemption is created through finding ways to engage and grow spiritually, learn Torah and seek to be in service to the Holy One of Blessing. If the Torah is the heritage of all Jews, a tree of life to all who hold fast to her, we are able to live redemptively and well when we seek to take the da’at, the knowledge, for which we offer gratitude to Hashem thrice daily in a traditional Amidah that we have acquired and bring that to bear to the Torah we seek to reveal into the world. Indeed, revelation of Torah in its fullness includes all of us. Blind folks and disability communities are sources of profound knowledge and wisdom about the human experience, and our wisdom is often not brought to bear in religious conversation and theological understanding. If we are to remove the spiritual stumbling blocks that so often block us from thriving and flourishing, we must carve out spaces to bring our wisdom to sacred tables. This task is upon all of us, spiritual and lay leaders alike, working together in mutual, collaborative and authentic partnership.

I bless all of us that in those moments in which we find ourselves feeling particularly marginalized or like the Torah isn’t ours to hold onto because we are somehow unworthy or not good enough that we seek to remember that Hashem wants us to live in alignment with our best selves and to teach the Torah we embody. I bless those of us who find ourselves feeling that our knowledge, coming out of a lived experience of disability or any other human experience that is uncommon or discomfiting for many is not able to be heard and internalized by others, may we always remember that Hashem created us as we are, not so we could simply passively accept the world as it is with all of the need for tikkun and teshuva, but so we could remember that everybody, every life, is infinitely valuable, of worth. If we are to live with a geulah consciousness and experience moments of our own personal redemption, we owe it to ourselves and to the world to remember how unconditionally loved we are and how valuable our rich human experiences are. May we find partners in this holy work who are able to lift up our Torah and bring it to even wider communities of souls thirsting for life-giving waters.
May we each find the inner strength to allow our spiritual radiance to manifest itself in a world so desperately in need of it. May we not accept the world as it is but daily, even in the smallest of ways, even if it is only when we are alone with our own thoughts, strive for the world as it should be.

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Vayakhel 5779

March 11, 2019 by

This drasha was delivered at Beth El Hebrew Congregation in Alexandrea, VA, March 1, 2019/25 Adar I, 5779

Shabbat shalom! It is my honor and privilege to be with you this Shabbat. I wish to thank the Beth El Hebrew Congregation Inclusion committee as well as Rabbi Spinrad and Cantor Kaufman for welcoming me into your community this weekend. Our Torah portion this week, Parashat Vayakhel, meaning and he assembled, or he gathered together, largely concerns itself with recapitulating the building of the Mishkan or tabernacle, to which we were first introduced in Parashat Terumah several weeks ago. Jewish commentators have noted that the Torah devotes some 400 verses to the construction of the Mishkan. For many commentators, nothing in the Torah is superfluous or redundant. Why, then, does the Torah devote so much space to each and every exacting detail of the Mishkan’s construction, down to the smallest, seemingly least significant detail? It is commonly understood that the Torah here is teaching us a profound spiritual and moral lesson. We care about every detail because every detail matters. We read these Torah portions every year not just because every detail of the building of the Mishkan mattered at one particular time and in one particular cultural and religious context, but because it, though seemingly far removed from our modern Jewish lives and experiences, matters today as well. Though we no longer have a portable sanctuary accompanying us during our wanderings in the desert, and though the Temple no longer stands in Yerushalayim, our Torah’s instructions concerning the fashioning of our portable sanctuary, our dwelling place for God contains much wisdom for our daily lives and our collective experience as Jews.
We are concluding Jewish Disability Awareness, Acceptance and Inclusion Month, annually observed in February, though its imperatives extend all year. Jewish Disability Awareness, Acceptance and Inclusion Month is a time when Jewish communities globally take stock of where they are in terms of any number of metrics related to disability, whether that is on an individual congregational level, or whether that is with regards to inclusion efforts within larger organizations. This weekend’s theme is all about building an inclusive community in the big tent sense of the word—encompassing disability, of course, but also seeking to take the lessons gleaned from years of work in the disability space and broaden their application to many other areas and groups who may feel their voices aren’t being heard and their unique needs aren’t recognized. Parashat Vayakhel provides us with a blueprint for how we as individuals and communities might begin to shift our paradigms and culture around what building inclusive community truly means and entails.
Our parsha spends significant time describing the beautiful gifts that the Children of Israel bring for the Mishkan’s construction. Everyone whose heart so moved them, who was skilled in a particular area, brought that gift, that skill, that talent, to the construction of the Mishkan. Many of these skills are named, which signifies to us how crucial they truly were. Bring the best of who you are and what you can offer to this holy effort, our Torah proclaims.
Typically, when we think about building inclusive communities, though this is frequently unconscious, we imagine a norm that we are going to have to deviate from, as if there is an us and a them, and though the them might consist of folks who are the us, we forget they are the us because we build communities that center ourselves and folks like us. I believe that this is simply a byproduct of how we humans tend to operate and function in this world. Our awareness is naturally limited by our life experiences and so, when we think about the kinds of groups and gatherings we wish to be a part of, we tend to congregate with folks like us. The us, then, becomes the default norm, the them are outside of the camp, the strangers our Torah commands us to love for we were once strangers in Egypt. This attitude towards inclusion tends to manifest itself in such ways as thinking only about physical accommodations—the ramps, the alternate-format siddurim, the hearing-assistive devices—all of which are fundamental and essential ingredients—but tends to omit those things that aren’t as tangible. Are we creating a welcoming atmosphere, in which the presence and gifts of all are welcomed and embraced? How can we even begin to think about creating a welcoming atmosphere? It feels like quite a daunting, overwhelming, seemingly endless task. And given that, as our Mishnah reminds us in Masechet Sanhedrin, each person is unique unto themselves, how do I know if what I think of as a welcoming atmosphere is welcoming to someone else? How do I navigate the tensions that inevitably arise, the feelings of invisibility that emerge when one group’s needs are placed above another—or, perhaps more importantly, are perceived as such?
Perkei Avot, the Sayings of our Fathers, which is a tractate of the Mishnah or rabbinic oral law and is frequently studied teaches us that though we may not complete a task, we are not free to desist from it. Building inclusive communities in which the gifts, skills and talents of all are cherished takes hard work, and the work is often messy. It does not always bear fruit in the short term, but the long-term investment we make nets us amazing returns. How do we do this transformational work when we might feel like the odds of success are stacked against us and the possibility of failure or perceived failure feels right around the corner?
We must shift the paradigm we use. We live in a culture right now in which urgency feels acute, in which the pressure to get it done and get it right yesterday bears down upon us. And this is quite understandable. For too long, folks on the margins of Jewish community and of our society at large have been excluded. Gradual, incremental shifts sound, often, like an excuse to bide people more time, or like a desire to keep the status quo unchanged. Incremental shifts feel like too little, too late.
I resonate deeply with those who feel they have waited long enough, who feel that their and our communities haven’t wanted their gifts, their talents, their souls, and now that they are starting to do that work, it feels hard to excitedly jump in with both feet. My life experience, in rabbinical school and in general, has taught me that perhaps the most important ingredient in building truly inclusive communities, even more important and lasting than all of the best practices is the genuine, authentic, mutual relationship-building. When we show up in our Jewish communities and in our lives as authentically as we are able, demonstrating a true desire to get to know those who are unlike us as the unique and holy individuals they are, without pretense, our actions start a ripple effect. Just as all of the Children of Israel were commanded to bring their gifts, as their heart so moved them for the building of the Mishkan, we, too, are all needed to affect a lasting change in our communities. Naturally, we cannot expect one individual to do the holy work of showing up authentically and building those mutual, authentic relationships single-handedly. That task is all of ours. Taking a genuine interest in another human being, beyond what they can do for us feels so small but can truly make a huge difference. Even a simple hello at Kiddush or at Friday night oneg means a lot. Feeling like you matter, like you are heard, seen and appreciated, not feeling like you don’t belong or are out of place matters profoundly. It isn’t about liking everyone or getting along with everyone. It’s about each of us, bringing the best of who we are and what we have to offer to make our sanctuaries places in which HaShem’s presence can truly dwell. It’s about radically and deeply living out one of our Torah’s most famously oft-repeated teachings, that every human being is created in the image of God and carries a divine spark within. Do we want to conceal that holy spark through how we show up in the world? Or, do we want to use our God-given free will to reveal increasing light and holiness into our world by making manifest and embodying our Torah’s directive towards us? Living out deeply our Torah’s teachings is a practice. It is far from easy and feels increasingly complicated in our world today. Which means that it is even more essential than it has ever been. Rooted in our tradition’s call to us, let us strive ever always to build sanctuaries in which the gifts of all are welcomed, desired and wanted.

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