Rosh Hashanah 5784 sermon, delivered at Temple B’nai Abraham of Livingston, NJ
Just like today, in ancient times in Eretz Yisrael, we were all too familiar with droughts and how water can be the difference between life and death. The Talmud tells us that one Rabbi Eliezer, to try to force God’s hand to bring some rain, called for a cycle of thirteen fasts, which unfortunately, got no results. But then, the great Rabbi Akiva, from the depths of his heart, said Avinu Malkeinu, we have no ruler but you! Avinu Malkeinu, for your sake if not for ours, have mercy upon us. Akiva’s words were heard, rain fell, and a prayer was born.
On this Shabbat Rosh HaShanah, you may have noticed that a few service elements are missing. We did not hear the piercing call of the Shofar, which the rabbis tell us is in part because we’re close enough to God on Shabbat that we don’t need the extra help. And, we did not sing Avinu Malkeinu, the high holy day staple, so well known that even the band Phish has a version. Why is there no Avinu Malkeinu today?
If we look to its text, we see that Avinu Malkeinu is a series of supplications to God. Avinu Malkeinu, grant us forgiveness, remove the harsh decrees. Avinu Malkeinu, ensure that those who seek our harm fail in their efforts. Avinu Malkeinu, Have compassion upon us, grant us a good year, and more.
Many of these requests are not unique to the high holy days, they’re embedded in our weekday Amidah. As most of us come to pray on Shabbat, we don’t see them, since we don’t ask God to work and fulfill our individual needs on Shabbat, that is, unless it’s a literal matter of life and death. Instead, on Shabbat, we count our blessings and enjoy our deeper connection with God and our community. And even though today is Rosh Hashanah, the New Year, the Shabbat rules apply, and we focus on celebrating, giving thanks, and spending time with God and each other. The requests can wait for tomorrow.
Except. In some sephardic Jewish communities, Avinu Malkeinu is prayed on Shabbat. The rationale is that the prohibition on making requests of God on Shabbat remains true for individual needs, but when it comes to the needs of the whole community, even Shabbat services may be interrupted. In Judaism, the individual certainly matters, but the community, klal yisrael, is paramount.
In this spirit, it may be that we do, in fact, need this prayer today. Not only for our concrete requests, but also, if not more so, for that holy connection that this prayer demands of us. The text of the prayer uses the strongest language possible to remind God and us, of the nature of our historical relationships.
When we cry Avinu Malkeinu, we’re crying out, our Parent! Our Ruler! Oh God, the one who brought us into this world, individually and as a people, who cares for us no matter what happens, with that unconditional love that can only come from a parent. Oh God, judge and ruler, our protector and governor for the generations of our people.
We have been in this relationship for thousands of years, and we’re drawing on that relationship when making our asks. God, remember us, remember what you’ve done for us, all that you’ve invested in us, and what we’ve been to you, so that you might again remember us with kindness, favor, and grace.
This request to remember us, as one community, is ever present in our rituals and traditions, and especially so on these holy days. We are a people that goes back thousands of years, beginning with our ancestors, Abraham and Sarah, and we draw on that history every time we pray the Amidah, getting our foot in the divine door, reminding God of our ancestors’ merits in the ways that a parent might remind their younger kid’s teacher of how great their eldest child was in their class.
In some ways, though, these reminders of our collective history are just as important for us to take in, because too often, we forget. The Torah warns us of this. Moshe tells us near the end of his life as we’re about to enter the promised land, that one day, when we’re surrounded by resources and riches, by everything we could ever want and need, we’ll forget God, we’ll forget Torah, we’ll forget what it means to live a meaningful and constructive life in community. Moshe was right, of course. It happened then, and it continues now. Too many of us too frequently forget what it means and what we need to live in community with one another.
This past spring, I was sitting around a table with some congregants for a strategic planning meeting, and it occurred to us that many here don’t know our story, the history of our relationship with each other, with the broader Jewish community, and with the larger community as a whole. How can we request that God remember our community if we don’t even know who we are?
Fortunately, we here are blessed, with a few members who have kept the memory of our congregational history alive, just like the ancients responsible for keeping our sacred texts memorized in aural form. In fact, we celebrated some of them last week when we honored those who have been members at Temple B’nai Abraham for 50 years or more. Let us share in that memory, and remind ourselves of who we are as a community.
It all started back in 1853 in Newark. We were founded to be the spiritual home for a first wave of more traditional Eastern European immigrants in the 1800s. A group of these immigrants started at the oldest congregation in Newark, our neighbors, B’nai Jeshurun, but the communities quickly realized that B’nai Jeshurun’s German Reform traditions didn’t meet the needs of these more traditional Jews. So, one of B’nai Jeshurun’s founders gave us a home in his house, and soon after, a Torah scroll, and there, B’nai Abraham was founded. By the way, our name, B’nai Abraham, translated as children of Abraham, is not only referring to our ancestor Avraham, it’s also referring to that first benefactor, Mr. Abraham Newman! We’ve been making puns from the start.
We grew, outgrowing site after site. We transitioned from an all-Hebrew service to one with English, making services more accessible and welcoming under Rabbi Julius Silberfeld at the start of the 20th century. We helped Jewish immigrants adjust to American life, teaching courses in German and English. We helped publish and disseminate one of the first prayerbooks created in America for Americans, and we even provided a home to a Newark satellite campus of the conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary. In 1924, we built our famous congregational home, the largest synagogue ever built in New Jersey, on Clinton Avenue, known both for its breath-taking coliseum-like sanctuary where magic was made every Shabbat and for its pool and recreational facilities used by Jews and non-Jews alike.
While recovering from the Great Depression, our congregation hired Berlin’s most famous rabbi, Joachim Prinz. Rabbi Prinz insisted on having a modern religious school based on contemporary educational practices rather than traditional cheder models. He brought in the best minds of the time from around the country and globe for conversation and debate. We were deeply involved in the Civil Rights movement, with many of our congregants at the front of the freedom marches, and many of you know that the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed our community right from our pulpit. Meanwhile, we were Zionists before Zionism was widely adopted by American Jews, regularly sending missions of hundreds to the holy land while spreading word, lobbying, and gathering resources here. I’ve actually heard stories from several members whose parents (or themselves) were actively involved in smuggling supplies and weapons from the Newark shipyards to the fledgling state.
It was with the utmost reluctance that we left Newark, but 50 years ago, we eventually settled into our new home here in Livingston. In this home, we continued to flourish, to be that hub for learning and arts, to be a source of goodness and support for the larger region, to be that meeting ground for loved ones and friends.
Under Rabbi Barry Friedman’s leadership, our spiritual practices deepened, in part with the new prayer book that he edited for the congregation.
We remember well our Rabbi Emeritus, Clifford Kulwin, who among many accomplishments, attracted to Temple B’nai Abraham countless writers, scholars, politicians, and thought leaders. He brought our social action efforts to our roots in Newark, giving back to the community that blessed us for so long. And, in working to be environmentally responsible, we adapted our home to be green-faith certified.
One cannot leave out our musical history. Our community was served by the brilliant composer, choral conductor, and educator, Max Helfman who created for us much of the music that we hear today on the High Holy Days, unique music only heard here, performed through the years by a long line of talented cantors and musicians, including Cantor Abraham Shapiro, Cantor Nathaniel Sprinzen, Cantor Emerita Lee Coopersmith, and of course, Cantor Fox here today. These spiritual artists have kept us immersed in ritual music that cuts right to the heart and soars to the heavens.
These impressive accomplishments, often driven by our clergy, would never have taken root and grown without a dynamic, involved, and committed membership who attended regularly, who gave of their hearts and resources, who made this place the spiritual, educational, and social center of their lives.
Many of us know pieces of this history. Some know most of it. Some have been here only for a few months, and others are part of Temple B’nai Abraham families who go back five and six generations. As community members, regardless of longevity or memory, this is who we are and this is what we have inherited, and when we pray Avinu Malkeinu, citing our ancestry and merits before asking for blessing, this history and these ancestors are what and who stand with us, supporting and directing us.
Here’s the thing about having this kind of a history. We can be girded by it, but we do not get to take credit for it. What we get, as I mentioned before, is that foot in the door. It’s not the merits of past that make us worthy of compassion and blessing; it’s how we use that past to guide the present that determines what blessings this year will bring.
We are now at a crossroads. One of the casualties of these past few years has been precisely that which has made us who we are for nearly two centuries— community.
The trauma of these last years taught us, consciously and subconsciously, to avoid large groups, to stay in our smaller social bubbles, to caring almost entirely for our nearest and dearest, and ourselves. To be clear, this was necessary, but with consequence.
We’ve taken to choosing immediate over meaningful, to focusing on the needs of our own at the expense of the welfare of our extended community family. The past few years highly accelerated the very real trends of diminishing volunteerism, declining communal institutions and dialogue, less religious participation, more polarization, and more isolation. We’ve fully entered a world that is infinitely connected and yet enormously lonely. In this atmosphere, community cohesion and participation has frayed. Too many have lost, and even forgotten, their extended Jewish families, and the comfort, the excitement, the challenge, and the growth, that they add to our lives. Too many have lost that rootedness that comes with our shared history.
Fortunately, our community is still here. There are many, particularly here at Temple B’nai Abraham, who kept our torches aflame, through showing up, through taking part, through learning, volunteering, and giving. Each one of you, here in person and online, clearly cares to be part of this sacred institution and network. We remember who we are, and we remember, at least a taste, of what it is to be deeply plugged in to real community.
To ask God to remember us, we must first remember who we are, so that we will be driven to deepening action and engagement. That means, committing, right here, right now, to coming back again and again, regardless of what’s going on, because we recognize the power and importance in being here for each other. It means looking at our great history of education, worship, social justice, and engagement, and being inspired to do more, as much as it may be challenging to fit into our busy lives. It means bringing our resources, assets, and connections and sharing them with each other, so that one person’s richness can become a blessing for hundreds. We are 50 years in this building, 170 years a community, and thousands of years a people. Let us not let one more day go by without remembering that we are all better off, that our local community and beyond is better off, and that our prayers these holy days are more likely to come to fruition, when we are in it together.
Avinu Malkeinu, grant us the gift of an engaged and passionate community.
Avinu Malkeinu, grant us the blessing of long memory.
Avinu Malkeinu, remember the deeds of all our ancestors when calling us to account.
Avinu Malkeinu, grant us the wisdom and drive to follow the example of our ancestors, so that we may build a world worthy of you.
Avinu Malkeinu, remember us with favor and with blessing.
Shana tova u’m’tukah.
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