Congregation Emanu-El of Westchester: Sermon Archives

ROSH HASHANAH - 2002 - September 7, 2002

15 years ago, while excavating at Tel Dan, an archeological site in the north of Israel, uncovered a pottery jar next to the front door of a 4,000 old house. From the time of Abraham. When I looked inside the jar I saw a child's bones. The bones were the remnants of a child sacrifice. In this morning's Torah portion we read the Akedah, the binding of Isaac at Mt. Moriah. Abraham was poised to sacrifice his son, as was the tradition of that time but, at the last moment, he saw a ram, caught in the thicket and Abraham substituted a ram for a human.

The Torah identifies the child as Isaac, father of the Israelites. But the Koran, in a similar version, identifies the child as Ishmael, Abraham's first born son and the ancestor of the Arabs.

Isaac? Ishmael? Israelite? Arab? Who knows - but whatever version you accept, the wonder of the story is that Abraham intuited that God did not want child sacrifice. A ram would suffice. This was a major step forward in the evolution of civilization. Thanks be to God. Thanks be to Allah. 4,000 years ago the barbarism of child sacrifice ceased ---

Or did it?

"What will you give me for a Mickey Mantle baseball card? Will you give me a Phil Rizzutto and a Pee Wee Reese? What about a Joe DiMaggio card --- you can keep the chewing gum." These are echoes of my childhood. Do you remember when you traded baseball cards? Today the picture on the front would be Derek Jeter, or Sammy Sosa or Randy Johnson. Baseball cards still exist --- a collector's item. In Europe the cards are adorned with pictures of World Cup soccer players and on the streets of Arab East Jerusalem? There, Palestinians also trade cards. Baseball players? No. Soccer players? No. Palestinian martyrs. Heroes. Young Palestinians whose notoriety does not come from fielding a grounder at second base, or heading the ball into the goal. They will be remembered in heaven and on earth because they destroyed themselves in a pizza parlor or in a disco filled with children where spraying scrap metal and nails kill civilians.

According to an article in Time Magazine a March edition of an Arab newspaper announced: "The Abdel Jarrod and Assad families and their relatives inside the West Bank and in the Diaspora declare the martyrdom of their son, the martyr Ahmen Hafiz Sa 'Adat." The wording sounds like a wedding announcement - not a killing of four Israelis by a 22 year old Palestinian.

Martyrs. A euphemism for murderers. Does Allah want the gift of a young Palestinian? Did he want Ishmael? Does God want Isaac? Where is the ram? Please, Abraham, find me a ram in the thicket.

Hatred spawns hatred. When Ehud Barak was Prime Minister Israel offered the Palestinians 95% of the West Bank and Gaza. Certainly a promising beginning. I am deeply committed to the belief that Israel, over and over extended itself for peace. But hatred breeds hatred ---- and now both peoples live with tragedy. When I was in Israel in the spring I joined an Israeli friend, Gideon, a tourist guide, for lunch in an Arab restaurant on one of the side streets of East Jerusalem. The three remaining tables in the restaurant were filled with young Palestinians who were watching an anti-Israel demonstration in Ramallah on Arabic television. Suddenly one of the Palestinians raised his voice above the scenario on the television. "Enough posters. Enough marches through the streets of Ramallah. We need to act. We need to kill Israelis!". Gideon and I decided it was time to leave.

Later that day I was a passenger in a cab driven by a Russian Jew, but he could have been an Iraqi or Moroccan Jew. "We need to kill the Palestinians," he told me. "Kill them --- get rid of all the Arabs in Israel."

Hatred breeds hatred. And where is the ram? Abraham, where is the ram? Sadly, Israel's need to survive does not always permit her to be a democracy --- to uphold the morality that, makes Israel, in the words of the prophet, A Light Unto the Nations. As Americans have learned in our very recent history, unfortunately, it is different for a democracy to fight terrorists and remain a democracy. Often human rights suffer.

One day I visited an Arab family in their home on the outskirts of Jerusalem. A home? More accurately, what had been their home. Now it was a pile of rubble, destroyed earlier in the day by Israeli bulldozers. A touch of irony. The Arabs sat on a couch perched on a pile of rubble that had once been walls. Only a birdhouse stood intact on the arm of the couch. The door of the birdhouse was open --- the bird had flown to freedom while Israelis and Palestinians remained - trapped by the rubble of human sacrifice.

Where is the ram, Abraham? Please find me the ram.

In June, traveling in Turkey I became friendly with our lecturer, Matti Zohar. Matti was born in Berlin and, when the last member of his family was sent to the concentration camps, Matti, 5 years old, was smuggled onto one of the Kinder Transport ships and sent to Turkey. Eventually he made Aliyah to Israel where he became an ardent Communist and an extreme dove.

Not any more.

"Dan," he said, "Dan, Israel has only one choice. To be a fortress state. Militarily. Geographically. Only one choice."

And Abraham approaches the foot of Mt. Moriah, holding Isaac with one hand, Ishmael with the other.

I understand Matti. I question whether, even if Israel reverses an often ill founded settlement policy there could be peace. Thomas Friedman wrote that the eventual goal is to make Israel safe for the Israelis, not to make it safe for Israel to occupy the West Bank. On one level Friedman is correct but the problem of the Middle East lies far deeper than settlements or the refugees right to return. The real issue is whether an Islamic world that extends to Asia, Africa and the sub continent will ever accept a tiny Jewish state in its midst. I wonder.

And yet for Israel to remain a fortress state is inconceivable. What is a fortress state? A constant military presence? Yes. Checkpoints? Yes. And more. Much more. A fortress state means attending a synagogue in March in Jerusalem, Kol Haneshama, a Reform Synagogue. Two men stood on the corner in t-shirts, muscles rippling. Talking. A month later I returned for Shabbat services. The same two men had left the corner and guarded the entrance to the Synagogue with Uzis. How long can you live like this? What a high price to pay for Shabbat Shalom. Sabbath peace.

What is a fortress state. Building a security fence around the border. Hoping to keep out some Arabs but fencing in others as part of Israel. Strange for a country that was founded in part as an antidote to a history of ghettos. Do good fences make good neighbors?

No one is certain how the terrorist who exploded a remote control bomb in the Hebrew University cafeteria entered. Some believe he scaled the fence that encloses the perimeter of the Hebrew University. I know that fence. I know it well. One segment of my daily jogging route in Jerusalem circles the desolate fields around the Hebrew University. The route follows the fence and continues past an Arab village where a lone shepherd grazes his sheep. On occasion I have speculated on what would happen if I were threatened on that road. Perhaps I could climb the fence - but no, the fence is too tall. Too forbidding. But, not to an Arab terrorist who might have scaled the wall or slipped a bomb to a colleague on the other side.

Something there is that doesn't love a fence.

A fortress state? That may be the only answer today. But tomorrow. Tomorrow someone must stop Abraham, Isaac and Ishmael --- before they reach the alter of Mt. Moriah.

There are many Israelis who desire peace. There are many Palestinians who desire peace. In spite of the leadership of both peoples. And maybe, just maybe with the urging of an outside power such as the United States, assuming we can look beyond Iraq, Israeli and Palestinian will recognize their interdependence - founded not on love but on survival.

On a beautiful spring day when poppies embraced the countryside I stood at the border of the Israeli W. Bank town of Gilo, an extension of Jerusalem. A valley spread before me and on the other side of the valley the Arab town of Bet Sahur, straddled the road to Bethlehem. An Israeli acquaintance, Zehava lives in Gilo and, several nights earlier she had heard gun fire from Bet Sahur. Zehava took refuge under her kitchen table and phoned an Arab friend in Bet Sahur. "Ahmed, tell your people to stop firing at me. I'm hiding under the kitchen table!"

The phone crackled. "Zehava this is Ahmed. I'm also hiding under my kitchen table. Tell your people to stop firing on me." Hatred spawns hatred. Death brings death.

Israel and the Palestinians are Siamese twins joined by history, joined at the land.

One evening in spring I sat with a group of young people under grape vines at the Jerusalem Hotel near the Damascus gate. A cell phone rang and one of my companions began speaking.

"Yes, grandmother. Yes, I'll go home early. Yes, I promise to be careful. Yes, I know there are terrorists. Please grandmother. Stop worrying. I love you."

The call ended and he gave an embarrassed smile.
"Grandmothers," he muttered.
I smiled. I knew all about Jewish grandmothers. We all do. Except this was not a Jewish grandmother. The recipient of the phone call, Jamal, was a Palestinian and his grandmother was calling from Amman, Jordan. You don't have to be Jewish to have a Jewish grandmother because what is a grandmother if not a person who wants to protect those she loves --- to have peace --- and that is a harbinger of hope.
How we not all one Grandmother
---Has not one God created us? Have we not all one father?
Aren't Isaac and Ishmael both sons of Abraham?

On March 30th I arrived in Jerusalem. My second trip in two months. It was the eve of Passover and in mid day, after unpacking, I walked into downtown W. Jerusalem for lunch. The streets were deserted, the restaurants closed. Only the Cafe Hillel remained open. Hillel who taught "If I am not for myself who will be, but if I am for myself alone what am I?"

Approaching the entrance to the cafŽ I opened my bag for inspection by a guard; his hand on the trigger of his uzi. Passing inspection I entered the restaurant and made my way to the counter where an attractive young cashier took my order. Then, with a smile, she handed me a rose. "For Passover. Hag Sameach. Have a Happy Passover." I found a table in the restaurant --- and sat between the waitress with her roses and the guard with his uzi. Israel is involved in a delicate balancing act between the rose and the uzi. The potential for life, the potential for death. Which will win out for those who are forced to exist between the two symbols? Which will win out? The rose or the uzi? A blossom or a bullet?

We await the future, while Abraham wanders in the foothills of Judea holding Isaac with one hand, Ishmael with the other --- and no one has discovered the ram. No one.