Congregation Emanu-El of Westchester: Sermon Archives

KOL NIDRE - SEPTEMBER 15, 2002

For several months this spring I lived near a small village in the south of France.

These are thoughts, occasioned by that visit. They are travels on the winds of time.

Provence: Mid March.

Usually the strong winds of the mistral clear the air but even after a blustery night a heavy laden sky had settled over the fields of white asparagus in the countryside near Carpentras. A French companion and I watched with fascination as a row of swarthy No. Africans searched for the pink tips of white asparagus barely protruding above raised dirt mounds. A long handled metal spoon dug up the deep roots.

My acquaintance and I talked --- primarily about the previous day's French Presidential election. France was in turmoil. The ultra rightist, anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant candidate Jean Marie Le Pen, his posters often decorated with a Hitler mustache, had made a strong showing. The future of France seemed overcast. The winds of the mistral had not cleared the air. "Well," I asked the Frenchman as the asparagus pickers bent over brown rows stretching to the horizon. "Well. What did you think of the elections?" We had stopped next to an elderly north African with a handlebar mustache and a stained blue beret.

"Ah, the elections. You might not understand this --- after all you are an American, but, although I could never vote for Le Pen, no never, he does make sense. We are not ready for these immigrants," and he pointed to the North Africans. "Not yet. No not yet. France has too many strangers. Too many." Too many strangers. Who did this Frenchman with his luxury BMW, houses in the 8th arrondisement of Paris and Brittany mean? Too many strangers? Would this sophisticated man have included the Jews if the conversation had continued? That morning I had read of a Synagogue burned in Marseilles, 15 masked hoodlums had crashed cars into a Lyon synagogue, firebombs were hurled at a Belgian synagogue. European Jewish leaders saw the latest wave of anti-Semitic attacks as the worst since Nazi era violence against Jews. Deep roots of prejudice beneath the protruding tips --- not easily dug up. These were the winds of fear blowing over the European Jewish community. And the winds blew across the ocean. To America, to our own land where polls suggest there may also be a resurgence of anti-Semitism - although polls are deceptive. According to ADL, in 1992 20% of the respondents held anti-Semitic views. In 1998 12%, in 2002 17%. --- In a world in turmoil will the Jew once again be a victim? A question raised in the asparagus fields of Provence.

A second reflection.
Paris. Late April. I was hungry. How can you be hungry in Paris? Not only hungry, but, after 6 weeks abroad hungry for a corned beef sandwich - and a delicatessen. A delicatessen in Paris? That's sacrilegious. But I walked to the Marais, a section of Paris with a large Jewish population and there I found Goldenberg's Delicatessen. At the entrance a Hasidic Rebbe passed and the winds of spring tossed his sidecurls and filtered through his silver beard. Why was he outside on the streets, this Rebbe? Only days before a Rabbi was killed in Berlin and warnings had been issued against Jews traveling in Europe --- especially Rabbis. "Wait," I cautioned myself. "Why am I worried about him? I'm a Rabbi." But I certainly didn't look like a Rabbi! Not in my khaki pants and blue button down shirt. Still, maybe I should be afraid, at least uncomfortable. After all, can a Jew ever be at ease? With all of our acceptance, and acculturation, especially in America are we still insecure? As I pondered this question in front of Goldenberg's my thoughts wandered to a Woody Allen movie, Annie Hall. Woody Allen, always neurotic, visits Annie's typical non-Jewish midwestern family. In the middle of dinner he imagines that they see him as an ultra Orthodox Jew with peot, dressed in black. In another scene Woody Allen is playing tennis and when he comes off the court he says to his partner, played by Tony Roberts, "Did you hear what that guy we were playing against said to me?"
"No, what."
Woody Allen replies: "I asked him if he ate yet and he said: `No. Jew? Did Jew eat? Jew?'
"How could he say that?"
And Tony Roberts says to Woody Allen:
"What are you? Paranoid?"

Sometimes we are. And if not paranoid then, sometimes, overly sensitive. In the novel Music and Silence, a historical novel set in 17th century Denmark, the author writes. "History teaches us that feelings of good fortune should be treated with suspicion and are but interludes; brief moments between one winter and the next, between the wars that are past and all the wars yet to come." The author was not writing about Jews - she was writing about the court of King Christian, but she might have been writing about Jews. We are always suspicious! We never seem to trust our good fortune. We wait for the next winter. But is it possible that we overreact? And yet, no one can deny the upsurge of anti-Semitism. Especially in Europe. But is this classic anti-Semitism? I don't think so. Much of the anti-Jewish reaction stems from a European Arab population opposed to Israel. And in this country? In the wake of 9/11 an entire nation is unsettled.

No one is comfortable or entirely at ease. At such times our anxiety as Jews often exceeds reality but our anxiety may also be a source of inspiration --- urging us to fulfill the words of the Prophet Isaiah:

"I the Lord have called thee in righteousness
And have taken hold of thy hand
To open the blind eyes
To bring out the prisoners from the dungeon
And them that sit in darkness out of the prison house
I the Lord have called thee in righteousness
To be a light unto the nations.

We can not rest at ease. We have a responsibility to ourselves and to our country and, to understand this, for one final time I returned to France - to the city of Carpentras. Whenever I am in Carpentras I visit the synagogue located near the truffles market. Then, from the synagogue I embark on a pilgrimage and reenact a scene that occurred 500 years ago. The age of the Inquisition. To save themselves from the Inquisition Jews would leave the synagogue and wend their way through narrow streets to the adjacent St. Seffereins Cathedral. There they would disappear into the dark sanctuary of the church, accept baptism and their descendants would be lost to Judaism. Today, standing outside that Cathedral which looms over outdoor cafes, a bubbling fountain, and the banking house Credit Agricole I look up at the giant Gothic entrance doors. They are known as the Jews doors and I hear the wind stoking the flames of the Inquisition.

In St. Seffereins square, with the ghost of a once thriving Jewish community as a backdrop I am aware that whenever a country silences its people and imposes authoritarian religious or political beliefs the Jew suffers. Then the flames of hatred engulf our freedoms ---- Our constant challenge as Jews is to exert great vigilance and an outspoken voice to prevent this from happening. September 11, 2002. 9:00 a.m. I was dedicating a memorial stone for the one member of our congregation lost on September 11, 2001 at Ground Zero. 2,801 were lost. And for me this was the 1 of the 2,801. Yelena Belilovsky. A Russian immigrant. An American but not any different from the 2,800 who perished with her. Howard Kestenbaum, Heather Ho, Brian Sweeney, Rev. Mychal Judge, Avnish Patel, Aisha Harris, Jesus Cabbegas, Laura Rockefeller, Shabir Ahmed, Yelena Belilovsky. Americans, infused with a common love of family, personal dreams, embued with the promise of this land --- melded by a ball of fire into a single entity.

In the middle of the service at the cemetery my words were overcome by the sound of the wind, racing through the branches of nearby weeping willow trees. Who will ever forget the winds of September 11th.? And silently I prayed that these would be the winds that cleansed our country. Following the tragic events of a year ago we prayed that America would develop a new sensitivity to the diversity that makes our land great. And we remain a remarkable country, unique in the world, enjoying the luxury to appreciate the preciousness of life. But now, a year later, there is the age old inclination to withdraw, to close ourselves off to those who are different from us and to run the risk of infringing upon civil rights.

For instance, at the University of North Carolina those who believe Islam is evil challenged the university's required freshman reading; a book on the Koran. Indian entertainers excited by their first view of New York City from a plane created uneasiness among the passengers and an escort of F16's followed them into the airport. Jewish readers have cancelled subscriptions to responsible newspapers that advocate justice for the Palestinians. If, as Jews, we are wary of our own security then this much is certain. It is not sufficient to be wary for ourselves alone. We need to be wary for all peoples, all Americans. If the rights of anyone are suppressed then we are also threatened. In the words of Leviticus, may we proclaim liberty and justice to all the inhabitants of our land.

In 1945 Rev. Martin Niemoller, a German u-boat captain in World War I who eventually became a pastor, then broke with the Nazis, eloquently expressed what happens if we do not speak up.

First they came for the communists,
And I didn't speak up,
Because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
And I didn't speak up,
Because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics,
And I didn't speak up
Because I was a Protestant
Then they came for me
And by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.

The winds blow. From the Mistral of Provence, to the breeze ruffling a Hasid's beard. They feed the fires of the Inquisition and wend their way through the branches of the weeping willows. May they also be harbingers of an age when the Jew flourishes because all humanity flourishes. Then there will dawn a time when none shall be afraid.

These are the reflections and this is the prayer of an American Jew in France --- who travelled on the winds of time.