Sermon given September 13, 2025 If you’ve ever been in my office and taken a gander at my bookshelf, you may have noticed one of my most beloved possessions: The extremely old tractates of Talmud which occupy their own section of a bookcase. This set of Talmud is truly dear to me. It is over a hundred years old and resided in Poland in the early 20th century before being brought out to the States before the Holocaust. The ink was printed on the paper in the old-fashioned way, so if you gently touch the pages, you can literally feel the 3D nature of the letters. The smell that rises from the binding is old and dusty and welcoming. It’s amazing for me to think of who else might have learned from these pages before me, and what these precious books must have gone through to make it out of Poland before the Shoah, to the United States, and eventually, into my hands. These books are history. But sadly, they are beginning to fall apart. The covers and spines are peeling and cracking, the pages are starting to come out, and I am reminded every time I open one of the fleeting nature of ink on paper, and how even a book like this amazing set of Talmud, that has already lived longer than a human being lives, will still one day go to the genizah, to a special grave for sacred texts, and there, it will also return to the Earth. Beyond their impressive physical state, and beyond the sensory and historical facts ascribed to the specific masechtot of Talmud I am lucky to call my own, there is also something deeply soothing to me about opening these books. They remind me that no matter what is going on in my life, or in the world around us; no matter what the Jewish family is facing, to say nothing of the entire human family; no matter when paper crumbles, or ink fades, our stories, and our lessons, and our arguments, will live on, as long as we are committed to them. And physical books are just one of the tools at our disposal in ensuring that this chain is never broken. In Ki Tavo, which we read from this week, we get to witness how B’nai Yisrael, three thousand years ago, wrestled with the same question-- how do we preserve our lessons and stories as we evolve? In a world where permanence is relative, how do we ensure to the best of our ability that where we came from and who we are is not forgotten? In Deuteronomy Chapter 27, Moses gives very clear instructions to B’nai Yisrael about the very first things they should do after crossing the Jordan and entering into the Promised Land. First, Moses describes: וְהָיָ֗ה בַּיּוֹם֮ אֲשֶׁ֣ר תַּעַבְר֣וּ אֶת־הַיַּרְדֵּן֒ אֶל־הָאָ֕רֶץ אֲשֶׁר־יְהֹוָ֥ה אֱלֹהֶ֖יךָ נֹתֵ֣ן לָ֑ךְ וַהֲקֵמֹתָ֤ לְךָ֙ אֲבָנִ֣ים גְּדֹל֔וֹת And on the day that you cross the Jordan to the Land Adonai your God has given you, you shall make an altar out of great stones. And then: וְכָתַבְתָּ֣ עֲלֵיהֶ֗ן אֶֽת־כׇּל־דִּבְרֵ֛י הַתּוֹרָ֥ה הַזֹּ֖את בַּאֵ֥ר הֵיטֵֽב You shall write upon those stones all of words of this Torah, this teaching I your leader have been giving you, clearly and distinctly. On stone! (As a side note here, there is great disagreement among our sages about what was meant by “this whole torah”. There are claims of everything from including only overarching commandments to including minutiae. Rashi takes it even a step further, saying that “B’er heytev” doesn’t just mean that the words should be clear and legible, but rather that the Torah should all be written out in 70 different languages. Imagine how many stones and how many artisans we would need for that! But, I digress.) Back to Moses. Now remember, Moses himself was intimately familiar with writing on stones. He was, after all, the one who brought down the Tablets from Har Sinai, from Mount Sinai, inscribed with the Ten Commandments. And ever since that day at Har Sinai-- especially ever since B’nei Yisrael reached the borders of the Promised Land and Moses began to share his final wisdom in the book of Deuteronomy-- Moses has been teaching orally, speaking God’s words to the people, trying to prepare them for the life ahead of them. And now, suddenly, he is telling B’nai Yisrael that as they begin their next chapter, on the other side of the Jordan, they must begin to write everything down. Specifically, to inscribe the Torah onto stone. Why would Moses want the Israelites to do this? Perhaps it was because he was nearing death-- perhaps it was because leadership was changing-- perhaps it was because Moses knew that once the Israelites were in the Promised Land, they would spread out and have less contact with each other, which might threaten the future of the stories and history they had made together. Regardless of the specific reason, the act of choosing to inscribe the Torah onto rock-- literally making it “set in stone” instead of purely an oral tradition-- ensured a certain sense of permanence, a certain reassurance, perhaps, for Moses, that the people he had led with so much love and devotion would not forget the sacred learning he had dedicated his life to transmitting. There is great wisdom in this step. And yet. Have you ever visited a really, really old graveyard? One of the ones where time has worn the head markers smooth, where sometimes, even, the Earth itself is starting to reclaim the graves, where you can no longer say for sure who was there, when they were there, what they said? There is a haunting beauty in watching the biblical directive that we shall go from ashes to ashes, and dust to dust, in action. Because even stones, it seems, have their limits. Stones, like the paper pages of my century-plus year old Talmud, reach a point where they can no longer be relied upon as the main source of transmission: of information, of law, of names, of tradition. It seems that Moses wanted the Torah to be permanent, so he wanted to make it physical. But if everything physical ultimately falls apart, what can we do to ensure that our tradition not only survives, but thrives? Some of you had the pleasure of being in this room last Sunday morning. It was the kick-off of our new KBE Hebrew School year and it was AMAzing. We began with a guitar-led, energetic morning minyan with all 70 students, parents, and a cadre of wonderful teachers; we did a school-wide family tree activity with our director, Shane, exploring this year’s theme of L’dor Va’dor; and as the students went to class, the hallls were packed with happy chatter and laughter. It was heartwarming and exhilarating to see so many kiddos and parents making the choice, of all of the things they could have been doing on a Sunday morning, to get up, to drive to the synagogue, and to kick off to another year of Jewish learning. And I bring up KBE in our discussion of stones because if the question is, what is stronger than stone, where better to see the answer in real life than in the bright eyes of our children, and the love of our teachers, and the power of tradition as it is passed from generation to generation. This is the key: When we, as Jewish adults, surround our kids with a life that pulses joyfully with Judaism, that connects them to their ancient roots, that teaches them to interact with their daily world in a sacred way, we are inscribing Torah not on pages, and not on stones, but on their hearts. When we model welcoming Judaism in on a personal level, and engaging with and encouraging tough questions, we reinforce the rich invisible thread that binds us together l’dor va’dor, from generation to generation. When we invest in our own education and in the education of the next generation of Jews, we have ensured Jewish continuity more than any book or any stone ever could. Stone is stronger than paper, yes. But a Jew who loves being Jewish and shares that love with others is the strongest of them all. Whether we are involved in the Religious School or Adult Ed classes, whether we are engaged in interfaith discussions or just showing up to services regularly and chatting with fellow community members about the sermon of the day, we are doing our part to strengthen an ancient chain, begun millennia ago in a desert in the Middle East and surviving, God willing, for as long as possible. L’dor Va’dor nagid godlekha-- from generation to generation we will praise Your greatness. Shabbat shalom.

Sermon given September 6, 2025 Once upon a time, there was a young child named Rachel. Now, Rachel was very tall for their age and very loud for their age and had a tendency to ask a lot of questions, especially to try and get out of going to sleep at night. Their parents realized that this was not a child who could be calmed and quieted by “classic” bedtime rituals. And so, these parents-- who, of course, were my parents-- began inventing new bedtime rituals. They invented “The antonym game” and “the synonym game” and the “oops, I’m going to pretend to forget lyrics so Rachel memorizes them” game. And I loved these games, I really did. But more than the games, I loved it when my father gave up on trying to read me the kids books we were so frequently gifted-- Berenstein Bears, Thomas the Train Engine-- and began reading to me from books he liked. You know, normal books that five-year-olds like to read. Books like “Welcome to the Monkey House” by Kurt Vonnegut. I vaguely remember sitting at circle time in Kindergarten and the silence that fell when the teacher asked me what my favorite book was, and I said “Isaac Asimov’s Robot Stories”. It was, to be fair, a similar silence to when she asked me what my favorite card game was, and I said, “Euchre”. … in retrospect, I don’t think I ever had any chance of being normal. But I digress! I learned to LOVE those stories my father would share with me. He had one story in particular, Robot AL-76 Goes Astray, which he read to me over and over. It became, in many ways, “our story”. To this day, in fact, it comes up in conversation, and has become part of the lore of who I am, and of who we are as a family. I’d be willing to bet that some of you here today, or watching online, also have a favorite story that you were told as a kid, a story that you asked for over and over. These stories become a part of us. They become a framework for how we view the world and filter information, about how we organize new events, and how we tell right from wrong-- or learn to navigate the inevitable gray space in between. Of course, though, it really matters what lessons we internalize from each story. It matters who tells the story, and it matters how they tell the story. For example, my beloved robot story could be either a curious, fantastical sci-fi romp-- an encouragement of imagination-- or it could be taught as a warning about AI gone wrong, as a story of fear of change. How I internalized it had a lot to do with how my Dad told it, in a way full of love and excitement and safety-- and that’s true with any story. The focus, and the spin, matters. Similarly, our Torah has an abundance of stories that we hear over and over and over again each year. The book of Genesis in particular is chock-full of memorable tales and names, ones that we teach to our children and hear at the holidays. But as generations have passed and Judaism has evolved, these stories have revealed multiple possible interpretations and takeaways. Stories like the binding of Isaac, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and even Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden can mean very, very different things depending on how we tell them. As caring Jews, then, it behooves us to be intentional about which possible takeaways we focus on. And in this week’s Torah portion, particularly in the part that we read here today, we are urged to remember two specific, defining stories for us as a people. First, in Chapter 24, verse 22, our text says: וְזָ֣כַרְתָּ֔ כִּי־עֶ֥בֶד הָיִ֖יתָ בְּאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרָ֑יִם Remember that you were a slave in Egypt! And then, a chapter later, the text says: זזָכ֕וֹר אֵ֛ת אֲשֶׁר־עָשָׂ֥ה לְךָ֖ עֲמָלֵ֑ק בַּדֶּ֖רֶךְ בְּצֵֽאתְכֶ֥ם מִמִּצְרָֽיִם Remember what Amalek did to you as you escaped from Egypt! These two commandments urge us into the creation and nurturing of collective, cultural memory around two traumatic events-- the kind of memory that imbues our liturgy, our values, our fears, and our goals as a people. And those memories are transmitted through storytelling-- both in formal settings like Torah readings and the annual Seders, but also in how we apply our takeaways from these core stories to our own lives and the reality of being Jewish today. The question for each generation of Jews, then, is how should we tell these stories, and what is the takeaway we want our communities, and our children, to learn from the way we talk about them? Both the story of our slavery in Egypt and the horrific attack by Amalek on our most vulnerable community members are stories of pain-- stories of injustice that was wrought against our ancestors through no fault of their own. Pharoah and Amalek have become code words for evil actors throughout history. In the Purim story, which would have taken place centuries after the Exodus from Egypt, our tradition teaches that Haman was a descendant of Amalek. In modern times, the rabbinic organization T’ruah uses a particularly catchy phrase on their posters which also invokes this imagery, saying “Resisting Tyrants since Pharoah.” Following October 7th, many Jews drew clear parallels between the evil perpetrated by Hamas and the evil perpetrated by Amalek, as both attacked children and the elderly. This is all to say that one of the clear takeaways from both stories is that human beings not only have the capacity to harm each other, and to make sweeping, destructive, and evil statements and take sweeping, destructive evil actions against other groups, but also that we, as Israelites and as Jews, have again and again been targeted by this kind of evil, over millennia. But again, our question today is-- what is the takeaway we, today, want our communities, and our children, to learn from the way we talk about these stories? One option is to tell these stories as a way of identifying evil, of identifying that which is wrong in the world-- wrong action, wrong speech--and remembering that we have been attacked by evil many times. We can tell these stories to honor the memories of lives lost, and to affirm that we condemn the actions of those who perpetrated these evils. We can tell these stories in the hopes of gaining sympathy and empathy from allies, and use these stories as a rallying cry as we resist antisemitism and Jew hatred, and fight against those who perpetrate it. And this is a good and solid option. It is an honest option. It is a human option. It is an option we can and should do, and will continue to do as a synagogue and wider Jewish community. But if this option is the only takeaway we have from these stories, it also doesn’t go far enough. I say this because our very Torah portion-- the same one that, today, reminds us clearly that we must remember the stories of how we have been mistreated-- that same Torah portion embeds these stories into a list of guidelines for how we are, in turn, supposed to treat others. In the Talmud, Rabbi Yohanan teaches us in Masekhet Berakhot that when multiple commandments are smuchin-- that is, next to each other in the Torah-- it is not an accident. We can draw inferences and implications, he ruled, from such juxtapositions. So, that is exactly what we are doing here today. Consider what our Torah portion just said: “You must not withhold wages from the destitute. You must not pervert the judgement or choices of the stranger. You must not take a cloak from a widow. You must remember that you were a slave in Egypt.” And then: “When you harvest your field, you must leave part for the hungry. When you pick your olives, you must leave some for the hungry. When you pick your grapes, you must leave some for the hungry. You must remember that you were a slave in Egypt.” And then: “Do not have two weights in your pocket of different measures, one for buying and one for selling. Be honest in your dealings with others, because not to do so is an abomination. Remember what Amalek did to you as you escaped Egypt.” As we can see, a pattern begins to emerge. The Torah seems to be suggesting that part of remembering a story must be applying the negative life lessons learned from that story to our own positive actions towards others. Rashi takes it even a step further, saying that the admonitions to remember in this context show that God redeemed us from Egypt, and saved us from slavery, so thatthat we would learn from it to do the right thing, even if it’s difficult. עַל מְנָת כֵּן פְּדִיתִיךָ, Rashi imagines God saying. This is precisely why I saved you. Through this lens, when we take the command to remember the stories of being slaves in Egypt and being attacked by Amalek in the context of their surrounding scripture, a broader and deeper and more personal takeaway begins to emerge. This takeaway tells us: Yes, we have been treated badly. Yes, antisemitism is an ancient and awful thing, and a thing we also struggle with. Yes, we must fight that antisemitism, and we must talk to our children about it. And. At the same time, memory must become action. We must teach our children never to mistreat or condemn or attack an entire group, “othering” them in a way that dehumanizes them and takes away their worth and dignity, because this is what Pharoah and Amalek did to us, and it was wrong. We must also teach our children not to hold their own worth as being greater than that of any other on this Earth, and to defend those whose worth is not being respected. We must teach them to identify when others are being mistreated, and then do something about it, because we were slaves in Egypt, and we were victims of Amalek, and nobody stood up for us. We must teach this, and we must model it, not as a one-off, but as a way of life. And for us today, this can feel like a big ask. Because right now, on the one hand, the Jewish community is actively under attack. We need support from others and we are not getting enough of it. However. Our current pain does not take away from us the urgent need to put our memory into action and help others. In a lot of places in this world and in our own country, other people are also living surrounded by violence, living without access to sufficient nutrients or education, living without dignity, and also being targeted because of their nationality or religion. And although we are hurting, we must help. Because we know what it means to be victims, we must help. It’s ok if this feels overwhelming, but as our tradition teaches, our job is not to finish the work, but also not to turn from it. The first step is realizing the incredible brokenness in this world. Then, we must recognize our place within this brokenness-- both as victims and as potential actors, either in making the situation worse or in helping to heal it. And then, the next step is choosing a way to act on this brokenness, to act by speaking out, donating, campaigning, organizing, learning, reading, praying-- by doing any and all of the things we want others to do when we, as Jews, are attacked. That is truly remembering. That is how we can show that we truly remember what it is like to be slaves in Egypt, and to be attacked by Amalek. That is us saying: we remember, and so we are resolved to never, ever, EVER let this happen to anyone else, ever again. This is OUR story. Let’s own it, and hold it, and feel it… and then, let’s learn from it and act on it. Shabbat shalom. 

Sermon given August 2, 2025  ONE. God is all powerful. TWO. God is all knowing. THREE. God is all good, and FOUR. Unjustified suffering exists in the world. You may choose three. This is how Rabbi Elliott Dorff, the rector of my rabbinical school, opened his senior seminar. On the first day of class, Rabbi Dorff wrote those four points on the board and asked us which one we were willing to sacrifice in order to have a sustainable personal theology. Again, the problem is this: there are four statements, but only any three of them can actually theologically co-exist in harmony. I’ll say them again: 1. God is all powerful 2. God is all knowing 3. God is all good 4. There is unjustified suffering in the world. Think about it. If God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good, how do we explain the existence of unjustified suffering? It’s a classic question. Wouldn’t an all-good, all-powerful, all-knowing God be able to swoop in and save people who are experiencing unjustified suffering? Alternatively, if we were to say that unjustified suffering didn’t exist, that is to say, if we claim that all suffering IS justified, then yes, we could reconcile the other three statements. Whether we were talking about a skinned knee or a murder spree or a rare disease or a war or a massacre, we could just say: this is part of God’s plan and therefore it is justified. But you may be able to tell by my tone of voice that that argument does not cut it for me. At all. A god who in any way uses, say, the mass murder as a “justified” punishment is not a God I would be comfortable praising. And that’s exactly why lots of Jews stopped believing in God, in the wake of the Holocaust. Many Jews stopped believing, stopped practicing, stopped identifying as Jewish, or simply seethed in anger at God for what had happened. Because there was no escaping the fact that unjustified suffering had occurred, to us and to our children, and that God had not prevented it from happening. Our traditional theology needed an update. Tonight we will double down on the theme of suffering as we enter into the unique spiritual space of Tisha B’Av. We will sit on the floor in the small chapel, light candles, and grapple with the traumas our people have faced over the millennia: the destruction of two Temples, countless pogroms and expulsions and massacres, and in modern times, the Holocaust and October 7th and more. And contained within any discussion of suffering has to be the question– where is God’s responsibility in this, and where is ours? Because violent antisemitism is the definition of unjustified suffering. To be hated just for who we are. And it is not only historical. It is part of the world you and I live in as Jews, part of the world we are raising the next generation of Jews within, and that makes our observance of Tisha B’av this year not only a theoretical spiritual journey, or an obligatory one, but a real and personal one. How do WE, personally, reconcile our own generation’s immense suffering, in addition to the Jews throughout history, with our belief in God? Tonight we will also read the book of Eicha, of Lamentations, which describes the destruction of the Temple and the sacking of Jerusalem thousands of years ago. The name Eicha literally means “ how ?”, as in, how could God have let so many awful things happen to us? How could a God who is all-good allow for such hateful actions in the first place, including the slaughter of children? How could a God who is all-powerful not step in and fix the situation so that massacres didn’t occur? How could a God who is all-knowing not see the harm that would come long-term by allowing such vitriol to fester in the hearts of us humans? How - Eicha? Well, God as portrayed in the book of Lamentations certainly has a plan, and certainly is in control. But I don’t know if I would call this God all-good, or all-kind. In Lamentations, the suffering of the Jewish people is clearly portrayed as a very painful but also Divinely-sanctioned punishment for our own misdeeds. We will read tonight: הָי֨וּ צָרֶ֤יהָ לְרֹאשׁ֙ אֹיְבֶ֣יהָ שָׁל֔וּ כִּֽי־יְהֹוָ֥ה הוֹגָ֖הּ עַ֣ל רֹב־פְּשָׁעֶ֑יהָ עוֹלָלֶ֛יהָ הָלְכ֥וּ שְׁבִ֖י לִפְנֵי־צָֽר׃ {ס} [Zion’s] enemies are now her masters, Her foes are at ease, Because the LORD has afflicted her For her many transgressions; Her infants have gone into captivity Before the enemy. This concept of a punitive yet righteous God is reinforced by countless examples from Scripture. We know these stories. In the Torah, God is sometimes wrathful, God wipes out civilizations, God turns people into pillars of salt, God commands Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, and tells B’nai Yisrael to slaughter other cultures. God as portrayed in the Torah is not always patient, not always kind, not always forgiving. Now, on the one hand, this view can be accessible and even reassuring for people, because A) it lines up with a simple reading of the Bible and B) it means that God has a plan. God’s in charge! On the other hand, the problem with seeing God like this is that it’s really hard, in times of pain, to turn for comfort to a God who is not all-good or all-merciful or all-loving. This is why, throughout history, many famous Jewish thinkers have wrestled with how God is portrayed in the Torah. Some sages have preferred instead to preserve God’s goodness and mercy, at the expense of God’s omnipotence. Rabbi Akiva was one such proponent of emphasizing God’s mercy above all. He famously stated that the most important imperative in the Torah is to love. In Pirkei Avot, Rabbi Akiva is quoted as saying: הַכֹּל צָפוּי, וְהָרְשׁוּת נְתוּנָה, וּבְטוֹב הָעוֹלָם נִדּוֹן. Everything is foreseen, and freewill is given; and the world is judged in Goodness. Modern thinkers like philosopher Eugene Borowitz and Rabbis Harold Shulweis and Kushner agreed. In his well-known book, When Bad Things Happen to Good People, Rabbi Kushner says “”The God I believe in does not send us the problem; He gives us the strength to cope with the problem.” Does that match Scripture? Not exactly. But, by allowing limits to God’s power, these rabbis allow suffering to be seen not as punishment, but rather as a side effect of nature and of humans having free will and the ability to do evil– whereas God becomes the ultimate source, instead, of relief and comfort. Of course, there’s a downside to this view too. The problem with this view of God is that it takes away the ability to say “everything is part of God’s plan.” See? It’s quite a dilemma. What are we supposed to believe? Again, as Jews we usually steer around this discussion and focus on other parts of our tradition. But do we really have to choose one or the other? Do we have to choose either a God who has a plan and is in charge and is therefore the source of suffering, or a God who is the ultimate source of goodness and love, but who doesn’t have the power to stop our suffering? As we prepare for Tisha B’av today, and as we continue to sit with the ongoing pain and anguish over what is happening in the Middle East, over the deep tears in the social fabric of the United States, I’d like to offer a third option. It’s very similar to the view held by Rabbis Akiva, Shulweis, and Kushner. This solution supports the idea of God being all-good. For the purpose of my theology, though, God doesn’t have a plan– God has a hope . And instead, it’s up to us, as the humans, to take action. In this theology, God has a deep-seated, pervasive hope, an ache, a longing, a desire for peace in the universe, peace in the world, and peace throughout our lives. That hope, in this theology, is one of God’s key attributes, and it pulses through everything in the universe. It pulses through commands in the Torah and pulses through the rituals and services we have developed over millennia. But the kicker of this theology is that God both deeply hopes for peace, AND wants to have partners in creating that peace, and partners in bringing healing to a hurting world– which is where we humans and our pesky free will come into the equation. It’s up to us to act, not to God. This means that when we humans choose to pursue peace, and love, and justice, we are choosing to tap into the holiest portions of ourselves, the part that is closest to God’s deepest hope, that part that is most b’tzelehm elohim. The flipside, of course, is that unfortunately, when we humans choose to pursue violence and possessiveness and death, we drag the world further away from what God is hoping for. We can plan for the good of one another, or we can plan for destruction. We can plan for nuance and compassion and sacrifice, or we can plan for selfishness and exclusion. Either way, in this third theology, it is humans, and not God, who will determine the outcome of our interactions. And in honor of Tisha B’av, I’d like to name that there is an additional grief that we are carrying today, and that this third theology can help us address. Because in 2025, Tisha B’av is different than it was hundreds of years ago. We are in an overly-connected, social media-driven world, full of sound bites and tik toks and AI deepfakes. This year, for Tisha B’av, in addition to our grief over the loss of the Temple, and in addition to the pogroms throughout history, and the Holocaust, and October 7th–we are also looking at a human family that has absolutely no consensus as to how to bring about a better world, and is OBSESSIVELY focused on everything that is going wrong. In fact, studies are showing growing levels of general discontent, increasing isolation from social support, and pervasive concern over what the future will bring economically, socially, politically. People are unaffiliating religiously, distancing themself from the support of their communities. Rhetoric in the public sphere has become increasingly dangerous; attacks on public figures and violent graffiti are becoming commonplace. And this is, perhaps, one of the deepest griefs that we will sit with tonight: the grief that comes from looking around us and seeing the world go in a direction we aren’t comfortable with. Seeing so many people, regular folks and powerful folks all around the world, making choices not to be partners with God in bringing about peace. As I have met with TBE congregants, several of you have reflected to me that you are scared for the future and for your children growing up, scared about what is going to happen to our country and to us as Jews. You are not alone. And this is where it can help to see God as the ultimate source of Hope, and ourselves as the source of Action. Because collectively, as a species, we have no plan, and we won’t know where to start– yet. But. We have an opportunity, beginning tonight. With Tisha B’av this evening, we kick off our lead-up to the High Holidays, embarking on a journey of meaning and meaningful pain: of repentance and forgiveness, of reckoning. And tonight, we also can start, as individuals and as a community, to ask ourselves: what is our plan? How are we going to do our part to heal this hurting world, as individuals and as a synagogue community? Are we ready to do the individual soul-searching necessary to affirm what kind of a God we believe in, and what role our roots in sacred community could play in bringing about a better tomorrow? This can be scary. These are big thoughts. But the first good news is that we are not alone. And the second piece of good news is that we certainly do not have to be all-knowing or all-good to do our part. We just have to be our imperfect human selves, committed to leaning into the holiest parts of who we are. And if we do this, if we do our part, then God willing, next Tisha B’av we might carry a tiny bit less grief in our hearts. Shabbat shalom.

Sermon given July 26, 2025 Shabbat Shalom, everybody. This Shabbat, we find ourselves at the end of Bamidbar– about to begin the book of Deuteronomy. Our ancestors are standing at the edge of the Promised Land, after years and years of travelling and infighting and plagues and manna falling from the sky. Can you imagine what that must have felt like? Our ancestors knew they were approaching what would become, one day, Israel– approaching the Jordan River, ready to leave slavery and homelessness behind them and settle in what would become our homeland. But suddenly, there on the edge of the Promised Land, the tribes of Reuven and Gad decided to shake things up. With the Promised Land tantalizingly close, and the other ten tribes raring to go, Reuven and Gad pulled Moses aside and shared that actually, they didn’t want to enter the Promised Land after all. After everything they had gone through with the other Israelites, they told Moses they would rather stay on the East side of the River, and raise their livestock there. And Moses, quite understandably, was extremely upset. This was not the plan, nor was it how everyone else was reacting to their arrival outside of Eretz Yisrael. He warned the tribes of Reuven and Gad that they would bring God’s wrath down upon the Israelites if they didn’t cross the Jordan, and reminded them of others who had gone against God’s will and paid the price. But Reuven and Gad were not swayed. They continue bravely arguing their case, ultimately offering a compromise. They promised to fight alongside the other tribes to conquer the land of Israel, but reiterated that their personal wish was to return east of the Jordan River, and live the life of their choosing there. They promised: לֹ֥א נָשׁ֖וּב אֶל־בָּתֵּ֑ינוּ עַ֗ד הִתְנַחֵל֙ בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל אִ֖ישׁ נַֽחֲלָתֽוֹ: We shall not return to our land until each other Israelite has received their land. And fascinatingly, once they make this concession, Moses– and God– agree to this deal. And everyone lived happily ever after (except for Moses, of course, who didn’t get to see the Promised Land.) On a zoomed-out level, the request made by the tribes of Reuven and Gad was surprisingly chutzpadik. It also calls into question a core Jewish tenant: what it means to be connected to the Promised Land itself, and whether or not there are multiple legitimate ways to support Israel. Because there on the banks of the Jordan, Reuven and Gad essentially said to the rest of the tribes, “We care about the Promised Land, and we will support you in your quest for it, but our hearts are calling us in a different direction.” And in ways I could never have anticipated, this fascinating story from our Torah, the contention between the tribes, the understandable anger of Moses, the bravery of Reuven and Gad, and the wrestling towards compromise, directly mirrors some of the intra-Jewish tension that has been building within us as a community since Hamas attacked on October 7, 2023, and the war ensued. Because we sure don’t all have the same vision of the Promised Land right now. In this room, in this state, in this country, in this world. There is wide, and deep, disagreement among Jews all over the world about what Israel should and shouldn’t be doing, and what we as American Jews should or shouldn’t be doing about any of it. And at the heart of the matter is an uncomfortable, yet deeply important truth, which the tribes of Reuven and Gad remind us has been a part of our people for thousands of years: the truth that not only has there ALWAYS been disagreement among our people over how to relate to Israel, but that that’s OK. There is a way for us to navigate this sacred disagreement. Not only is it OK for us to disagree, but, as demonstrated in our Torah portion, as long as we can find the core values that unite us, as Reuven and Gad did, our disagreements do not have to tear us apart, even when they hurt. There’s a special name for sacred disagreement in Judaism, machloket l’shem shamayim, an argument for the sake of heaven. And this type of argument, this type of machloket, is especially hard to navigate in a caring community like this one, that values its members holding a variety of beliefs about all kinds of things. I’ve been at TBE for a month this week. In that time, I’ve had congregants and staff members share with me that they are nervous or scared to talk about Israel and the War in Gaza with their friends and family, let alone to speak up at shul. And you know what? That makes sense to me, because it’s not easy for me, either. It’s hard to speak up when we know that the people we care about the most might disagree with us. But as your Rabbi, if I want all of us to be brave, and I want us all to be able to have difficult discussions about the things that pull at our hearts, then I need to model that bravery first. And that is what I would like to do today. I’d like to tell you about something I did this week. This week, I signed a letter, a public letters, written by three international rabbinic colleagues across denominations and signed, as of when Shabbat came in last night, by over 750 other rabbis around the world, including several of my colleagues here in Maine. Part of the power of this particular letter is in that it does not compromise on our shared connection to Israel. As a Zionist, this is important to me, and it echoes Reuven and Gad’s willingness to support Israel even when they did not feel the same way about it that the other tribes did. The letter clearly affirms Israel’s right to exist and defend itself, along with acknowledging the existential threats over which Israel truly has no direct power. It names the evil that is Hamas, and calls for the return of the remaining hostages. And yet, the letter does not stop there. Instead, it names the areas where Israel does, indeed, have power and influence over the outcome of the situation. Specifically, the letter addresses the piles of food aid waiting outside of Gaza. The letter continues, and I quote: “In the name of the sanctity of life, of the core Torah value[...] that every person is created in God’s image[...] In the name of what the Jewish People has learnt bitterly from history as the victim, time and again,[...] In the name of the moral reputation not just of Israel, but of Judaism itself, the Judaism to which our lives are devoted, We call upon the Prime Minister and the Government of Israel To respect all innocent life; To stop at once the use and threat of starvation as a weapon of war; [and] To allow extensive humanitarian aid, under international supervision, while guarding against control or theft by Hamas;” Interestingly, the leadership of the Conservative Movement, to which TBE is affiliated, also decided to release a statement this week, calling on Israel to allow food aid into Gaza. It said, and I quote, “Even though we believe that Hamas could end this conflict immediately by releasing the hostages and providing care to its civilian population, the Israeli government must still do everything in its power to ensure humanitarian aid reaches those in need.” As a Zionist, as a Rabbi, and as a Jew, I believe it is important that any discussion of Israel be grounded in love, in ahavat Yisrael. And yet, like how Reuven and Gad disagreed with the other tribes about what kind of connection they and their descendants should have to the land, so too Zionists disagree amongst ourselves about what that ahavat Yisrael should look like. The Midrash in Bereshit Rabbah teaches us that: כל אהבה שאין עמה תוכחה, אינה אהבה. That any true love must contain within it the ability to remind each other when we fall short. As for me, I believe that Zionism, and Ahavat Yisrael– a true love of Israel– must include within them both an appreciation of the many things Israel does right (such as its democracy, its pursuit of human rights, and its innovations and inventions) as well as tochecha, or loving rebuke, when it does not live up to its own ideals. I believe that to love anything truly is to be able to speak up when we believe it isn’t being its best self. And I cannot look at what is happening to thousands of children in Gaza right now, or hear the openly racist and hateful rhetoric coming from some of the top lawmakers in Israel right now as they discuss the plight of the Gazans, and say that I believe Israel is being its best self at this moment. My heart has been broken since October 7 in a way that I don’t think will ever completely heal, and I know that I am not alone in that. The evil that Jews and Israelis in particular face from all sides is real and horrific. And at the same time, my heart has broken in new ways in the past months as the numbers and images of gaunt Gazans and the testimony of IDF soldiers being ordered to do things that go against their conscience have become public. My heart breaks for those soldiers, too, who out of love for their own people are being put into a situation that is deeply unfair to their own physical and emotional well-being. The status quo is hurting both Gazans and Israelis in the short term AND in the long term. This isn’t easy to say, but I believe I must. I find myself turning deeply to Torah in moments like this, because I know we are not the first humans or Jews to face difficult moments. As I speak today, I am trying to channel Reuven and Gad. I find myself, as I stand before you and share these words, hoping for the courage that they must have needed to approach Moses and say “We want a different way.” For the past two years, as we have read through the cycle of our holiest book, the plight of the hostages, the Israelis, the Gazans, and everyone impacted by the conflict has been near to our hearts. When in Genesis, Abel’s blood cries out from the Earth, we thought about this conflict. When in the desert, the Israelites cried out to God in fear and hunger, we thought of hostages wasting away in tunnels and the children above ground without access to nutrients. When in Leviticus, God tells us, v’ahavta l’reicha ca’mocha, you shall love your neighbor as yourself– what could we do, but think of this awful, awful conflict, and think of all of us? And when we opened our doors at our Seders this year, and we said, Let all who are hungry come and eat– we had to think of this conflict, and of the hostages, and the children without food amidst the rubble. Our own spiritual suffering has grown. Are these just words, or do we mean them? Are we comfortable having caveats on our deepest spiritual obligations to one another as human beings? I have to believe, as a rabbi, that there is not a limit to the compassion and love we can put into the world. I have to believe that saving a life, any life, especially the life of a child, is a priceless gift, and a sacred act. In the spirit of engaging in machloket l’shem shamayim, I offer my conclusions today as my own, as a starting point for future discussion, in the hope that as a community we can openly wrestle with this, and openly name the core values that we share. I know that this community has a wide variety of beliefs about Israel, and I want you to know that my door, my ears, and my heart are open to all of you. I do not have a monopoly on what is right or what is wrong. I do not know how to get the hostages back, though I desperately wish I did. I do not know how to guarantee Israel’s safety in the future, though I desperately wish I did. I know there is great disagreement within the Jewish community about how to proceed, and none of us know what will happen next. But what I am certain of is that allowing children to starve will not bring about the Promised Land any of us are hoping for. Shabbat shalom, my friends. 

Sermon given July 19, 2025 Shabbat shalom, everybody! Exhibit A: A few weeks ago, a child in the TBE community asked me what my cat’s pronouns were. This, first of all, absolutely delighted me. It also showed me that this is a community that so values honoring a person’s sense of self that our kids are applying those values across species. Exhibit B: There is a rainbow flag hanging in the window in my office. I did not put it there. Rabbi Estrin did not put it there. No, Rabbi Braun put it there– meaning it has now graced the offices of three TBE rabbis in a row– and this teaches me that it is ingrained in this congregation’s culture to proudly and publicly support marginalized individuals and to celebrate diversity and identity, even before it’s popular. This is a congregation that demonstrates that we are ALL made b’tzelem elohim, in God’s image. Exhibit C: Elijah’s chair, a ritual piece of furniture used to welcome babies into the covenant, also sits in my office. TBE’s version of Elijah’s chair was hand-painted and decorated with colors and flowers by TBE’s children. Unlike other Elijah’s chairs I’ve seen, which have been more ornate, or larger, or covered in rich fabrics– TBE’s Elijah’s chair is handmade and wooden. It is humble, collective, beautiful, and one-of-a-kind– and it reflects the multi-generational joy and heimisch nature of this synagogue. And finally, Exhibit D: A week after moving to Portland, I had the first-time experience of buying kosher meat out of an unmarked van in a parking lot. This taught me that the Jewish community in Portland is willing to go to great lengths to remain connected to our traditions, while also living here, and being present here, living lives both in a uniquely Jewish way and also deeply intertwined with the other Mainers and from-away-ers around us. Each of these experiences has given me a glimpse into the communal values of TBE, and what I have learned makes me feel honored to count myself as one of you. Now, we’ve had a rich set of Torah portions recently, and they’ve all been ones that inspire us to take a look at our communal values. Two weeks ago, Parashat Chukat opened the door for a discussion about approaching transitions in a way that reflects our values; last week, Parashat Balak inspired a conversation about how to live our values when under duress, or in the face of a culture or leadership that is telling us to act against what we deeply believe. This week continues the trend, but in a slightly different way. This week, we are going to focus in on one specific ancient value in our Torah– a specific and difficult value– and then examine how it can relate to us today. It just so happens that this is a value that, while hard to stomach, is also one I believe TBE excels at. It’s a value which is embedded in a very rich and detailed parasha, including the aftermath of Pinchas’ bloody and zealous actions; a thorough census of the Israelites; the actions of the brave daughters of Tzelophehad, advocating for themselves in the face of misogyny; and Joshua, son of Nun, being tapped to be the next leader of B’nai Yisrael after Moses’ passing. But then abruptly, when we reach the final chunk of Parashat Pinchas, which, thanks to our triennial Torah reading pattern is what we just read this week, things change. There’s no more narrative, no more stories. Instead, you and I just heard seven aliyot, plus a maftir, full of a review of the major holidays: Passover, Sukkot, Shavuot, Rosh Hashanah, etc., and listing off every single one of their corresponding sacrifices– seven he-goats here, twelve rams there, two bulls there. And I don’t know about you, but nothing gets me more in the Shabbat state of mind than reading seven aliyot about animal sacrifices. Because sacrifice, in all its messiness, is the value we are going to focus on today. The sacrifices our Torah describes are numerous, and bloody, and can be incredibly difficult for us as modern Jews to relate to. This is both because, ever since the destruction of the Temple, animal sacrifice has been replaced with thrice-daily prayer services, to which we are now accustomed; and partially because our sense of collective morals and responsibility have evolved. And yet– there is no denying that for our ancestors, sacrifices would have been a normal, routine, intense part of life. The root of the word korban, or sacrifice, is the same as karov, being close to something. And this makes sense, because for our ancestors in the desert, sacrifices would have been the practical way to be closest to God, by sending up the smoke, the reach nichoach (the pleasing scent) to the Holy One. Regularly practicing sacrifice would have been a core value to them. And it was a core value even though it meant giving up property and security. Because even millennia ago, our fledgling society grasped the truth that sometimes, giving up resources, whether to communal causes or to God, has deep value. The urge to belong to something beyond ourselves, and give of ourselves on its behalf, that is, to sacrifice for it, is in fact one of the most human things we do. Because ultimately, that’s what sacrifice is: doing something we don’t want to do, or giving something up that we want, in the name of something bigger than ourselves, something beyond us that is so important to us. I mean, consider the alternative to sacrifice. Imagine, for a moment, how it would be if we lived in a world where none of us were beholden to anything beyond ourselves. Imagine living a life where you didn’t believe anything was worth sacrificing for– where there was nobody you would lay your life down for, let alone be willing to sacrifice money and time and resources for. Imagine never, ever having a cause you believed in so strongly that you wanted to march or protest for or donate to, sacrificing time and energy and funds. Imagine not having a community like this one, whose success you were invested in, and which tied you into both the past and the future, and for which you were also prepared to sacrifice. The Midrash in Sifrei Bamidbar explains to us that the frequent use of verbs conjugated in the plural in Parashat Pinchas while discussing sacrifice means that, quote שיהו כהנים ולוים וישראלים עומדים עליהם That not just the priests, and not just the Levites, but ALSO regular, good-old-fashioned “Jews in the Pews” from B’nai Yisrael were present for and involved in the process of sacrifice. This was something the priests were responsible for carrying out, yes, but each member of the Israelite people was bound into the system. To actively belong to something means to be ready to give to something, to sacrifice to something, and that is a reality that touches every. Single. Member. Of this community. At the beginning of this sermon, I mentioned that I think that sacrifice is a value that TBE excels at. Of course, I don’t mean that we excel at killing animals– chass v’shalom. What I meant was that it is clear from me, even after only three weeks as your rabbi, that TBE is a community built by Jews who want to live intentionally connected, intentionally mutually supportive lives, and you demonstrate this in myriad ways. This is also a community that intrinsically understands the conclusion from Sifrei Bamidbar– that it is incumbent upon all of us, not just on our leadership, to be a part of these sacrifices. You’ll recall that I also started this sermon with a list of ways that the citizens of TBE have already charmed me. The common thread through each occurrence I named, though– the respectful curiosity, the cross-generational joy, the respect of the identities of others, even the van full of kosher meat in a parking lot– is the fact that this synagogue’s existence and success was built and is maintained by countless tiny decisions made by all its members, every day, that respect the rights and dignity of others, and sacrifice our human desire to be the fastest, the richest, the ones on top. As Jews and as citizens of the world, we are offered endless opportunities– whether in how we eat, how we speak, how we donate our money, how we spend our time– opportunities, every single day, to make ancient values new again, to make them our own. But interwoven in these opportunities is the ancient value of sacrifice, pervasive in our Torah. And I see countless ways that members of the TBE community are embodying the value of sacrifice, in big and little ways. Everyone here today, and everyone watching online, has sacrificed a Saturday morning to be in community. When we dedicate ourselves to prayer and to showing up for synagogue activities, we are sacrificing time and energy in order to keep ourselves and the Jewish people alive and spiritually nourished. When we give money in dues, in donations, and to causes we believe in, we are sacrificing our funds in order to build a better world. TBE members have been incredibly generous, both in annual campaigns and targeted giving, supporting the greater community and each other. And yet one of the most impressive types of sacrifice I have witnessed already in my time at TBE is the crucial social sacrifice required to peacefully and respectfully exist in community with those who have different viewpoints. I have delighted in my meetings with congregants and leadership so far at TBE, who have not only expressed a wide variety of opinions and beliefs regarding everything from halacha to Israel to politics to kashrut, but who are also eager to establish classes, discussions, and safe Jewish spaces specifically so that we can explore these and our differing opinions topics together. And this, too, is sacrifice. Because on some level, we all want to be right, and we want to be supported in our beliefs and surrounded by people who agree with us. That means that when we make the choice to give grace during an argument, or to bite our tongue before lashing out, or to put in the extra effort to find a compromise, we are in fact sacrificing the desire to be right in order to be in community and in relationship to one another. These are difficult times for our country and world, and sacrificing our urge to dig in our heels and stubbornly refuse to compromise is not only a gift to each other, it is brave. It is counter-cultural. And it is sacred. And with the current state of the world, the country, war in the Middle East, and the deep social divides across the board, it is likely that in the coming months we will in fact be asked to sacrifice even more. More time. More resources. More energy. We will be called on to model again and again, for ourselves and others, the social and conversational and communal sacrifices necessary to remain a safe and pluralistic space during this difficult time. And there will be times when some of us have more or less to give, and vice versa— whether we are talking about funds, or brainpower, or heart-and-soul power. We will all have moments where we say, I cannot give anymore. And where others will have to step up and say, that’s ok, right now, I can give more. As we prepare to face the months ahead, I bless us all with the reminder of how lucky we are to have each other and this community and this society— that is to say, how lucky we are to have things worth sacrificing for. And there is no other place I would rather be than right here, making those sacrifices with all of you. Shabbat shalom.