Far more virulent than religious anti-Semitism was racial anti-Semitism. Lord Rothschild’s pithy statement summarized it: “It is not my peculiar religion they object to; it is my peculiar nose.” The anti-Semitism of race cannot be dealt with, because if you are Jewish there is nothing you can do to make yourself not Jewish. Even if you convert you are still Jewish in racially-based anti-Semitism

The 19^th century Haskalah Movement (Jewish Enlightenment) came in various forms and each form had differing goals, but the general common denominator was to attempt to free Eastern European Jewry from what it viewed as the shackles of an ancient tradition that had somehow outlived its time, and to infuse it with a new vitality that would make it acceptable to their non-Jewish neighbors — or at least, acceptable to the Russian government.

One of the great fallacies of Haskalah, which we see plainly in 20-20 hindsight, is that it was based on a misunderstanding of anti-Semitism.

In the 19^th century there were two types of anti-Semitism. The first was the old religious anti-Semitism, which to a certain extent was on the decline. This was the anti-Semitism of the Middle Ages, of Jews being branded as Christ-killers and accused of needing Christian blood for ritual purposes. Even though these still existed in the 1800s, in the Enlightenment era — when the general populace’s belief in Christianity waned — the anti-Semitism of religion was muted.

However, a far more virulent form took its place: the anti-Semitism of race. Lord Rothschild’s pithy statement summarized it: “It is not my peculiar religion they object to; it is my peculiar nose.” The anti-Semitism of race cannot be dealt with, because if you are Jewish there is nothing you can do to make yourself not Jewish. Even if you convert you are still Jewish in racially-based anti-Semitism. That came to its fully logical crescendo in Hitler’s Nuremburg Laws where even somebody who was one-sixteenth Jewish was considered Jewish — even if for three generations he and his family had been good, practicing Lutheran Germans.

However, anti-Semitism in Russia in the 1800s was ostensibly based upon religious anti-Semitism. That is why Haskalah thought that by adjusting the religion, by showing that the Jews were not really the ogres that the Russian Orthodox Church portrayed them as, somehow they would be able to become more acceptable to Russian society; the pressure of the decrees would diminish, and the Jews would be able to function.

Looking back with hindsight we see the fallacy of this thinking. We see that in Russia it was not just religious anti-Semitism, but a hefty dose of racial anti-Semitism as well. Even decades later after Russia became the Soviet Union, Jews would be persecuted as Jews despite the fact that there was almost no Jewish religion! While the Soviet government subscribed officially to religious tolerance, a classless society and no bigotry, it was one of the worst times of persecution in Jewish history. Racial anti-Semitism in Soviet Russia had not diminished since the days of the Czars.

Therefore, the entire premise of the Haskalah was false. Of course, we say that with the clarity of hindsight. At the time that it was happening, however, many of the maskilim were sure that they were bringing salvation of the Jewish people — without realizing that they were bringing destruction.

In their long march through history, Jews have carried with them a lot of different languages. A Jew by nature is a linguist. He had to be in order to survive.

The Jewish people have a knack of borrowing things from other nations and “Judaizing” them. That cultural pattern began in Babylon. For example, in the Five Books of Moses and until the Babylonian exile the months were called by a Hebrew number: for example, the “First Month,” the “Second Month,” etc. However, the names we use now like Tishrei, Kislev, Tammuz, etc. are all Babylonian. Even more strangely, Tammuz, which takes place in the heat of the summer, was the Babylonian god of fire, whom they burned children to. It is even mentioned in the Bible as the name of one of their gods. Yet, it became a part of Jewish life.

As the minority culture Jews were always affected by the majority culture. However, they were able to absorb it in such a way as to make it Jewish. That process began in Babylon. The classic example of this is Jewish adaption of the host country’s language. Yiddish, the language of Eastern European Jewry, is a borrowed German dialect. Ladino is the equivalent for Sephardic Jews (Jews who once lived in Spain). Jews also borrowed dialects from the Turks, Arabs and everywhere else they went.

In their long march through history, Jews have carried with them a lot of different languages. A Jew by nature is a linguist. He had to be in order to survive.

The Yiddish language started about the year 1100 CE in Germany. By the time the Jews came to Poland in numbers, in the 1300-1400s, Yiddish had become their spoken language. In Poland they added some Polish words; in Russia they added Russian words — but Yiddish was by then a distinctly Jewish language.

Yiddish was more than a language to Jews. It presupposed the knowledge of the Bible, Midrash and Talmud. It presupposed a moral world. It had tremendous humor built into it. It reflected a Jewish outlook on the world and its neighbors. Through knowledge of the language, its idioms and clichés, one could be a scholar even if one had not learned much.

Yiddish was unique in that for 500 years it was the exclusive language Jews used; they never really learned the language of the land. In Germany, the Jews spoke German. In France, Jews spoke French. But in Poland and Eastern Europe they spoke only Yiddish. Many times, non-Jews had to learn Yiddish just to deal with the Jews, because the Jews would not learn Polish, Russian or Lithuanian except in the most elementary way, enough to sell a cow. No one thought of learning it.

Yiddish was more than a language to Jews. It presupposed the knowledge of the Bible, Midrash and Talmud. It presupposed a moral world. It had tremendous humor built into it. It reflected a Jewish outlook on the world and its neighbors. Through knowledge of the language, its idioms and clichés, one could be a scholar even if one had not learned much.

Part of the tragedy of the demise Yiddish in our times is that, with its virtual disappearance, a great deal of the fiber of Judaism has been lost — not only to the unobservant but even to those that remain loyal to Torah. There is a certain feeling, an aura and understanding that could only be expressed through Yiddish. Yiddish was the repository of the Jewish soul.

The disaster of 9/11 caused people to pray who previously were not counted among those that pray regularly.

Let them make Me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. (Exodus 25:8)

During the First Temple it is not clear if the Jewish people had synagogues or not, because the whole system was Temple-oriented. What did they do when they did not go to the Temple, which was most of the year? And if they did have synagogues what did they do there? For example, much of the prayer service today is made up of the chapters in Psalms. What did they do before King David?

Nevertheless, most authorities believe that some type of community services did exist.  However, even these opinions agree that at these services likely included little more than the paragraphs of the Shema (the declaration beginning, “Hear O’ Israel…”).

The need for formalized prayer only first arose when the Jews went into exile in Babylon. The missing experience of community that went part and parcel with the three-times-a-year pilgrimage to the Temple (for Passover, Shavuos, and Succos) left a vacuum. Without the Temple, essential nutrients in the peoples’ religious diet were lacking. Therefore, the leaders in Babylon codified a system of prayer that substituted the Temple service. They based this on the prophetic verse, “Our lips will substitute for sacrifices” (Hosea 14:3).

When the Jews returned from Babylon to the Land of Israel and rebuilt the Temple they brought along with them the prayers they had learned in Babylon. The Men of the Great Assembly ordered, edited, and formulated the words of the Amidah, the centerpiece of every service, as well as its surrounding prayers. This arrangement continued through the entire Second Temple era and remains today.

Although the individual synagogue system was inferior, it successfully compensated for the shift in Jewish life away from the centralized Temple system. Now, with the stamp of approval from the Men of the Great Assembly, Jewish prayer became possible in each community, in each individual, no matter how far away he/she was. Instituting prayer this way not only substituted for the Temple service but compensated for the loss of center in Jewish life.

True devotion in prayer, otherwise known as kavanat halev, “devotion of the heart,” is a great challenge to maintain on a regular daily basis. But it is this devotion that allows our hearts to open up to ourselves and to our Creator. It can bring people the true inspiration and serenity of spirit that is essential to living a successful and meaningful life.

One of the obligations of Jewish living is daily prayer. The rabbis described true prayer in terms of kavanat halev, “devotion of the heart.” Such devotion is a great challenge to actually achieve and an even greater challenge to somehow maintain on a regular daily basis. But it is this devotion that allows our hearts to open up to ourselves and to our Creator and can bring people the true inspiration and serenity of spirit that is an essential ingredient and result of true prayer.

Surveys regarding individual prayer in the United States reveal that Jews are the one religious group in the United States that does not pray regularly. Except for the Orthodox section of Jewish society in America, prayer is almost unknown to ninety percent of American Jews.

Even though American Jewry is pretty much organized according to synagogue and temple affiliation, when it comes to prayer, most of the membership of these synagogues and temples are perennial no-shows. And not only are they no-shows as far as public prayer services are concerned, but the concept of private, regular, individual prayer is almost non-existent in this section of Jewish society. The secular Jew, who is non-observant of Jewish traditional practices, and most of all, painfully ignorant of any knowledge of Judaism, its core ideas and value system, its history and struggle for survival, is therefore almost unable to pray. The entire concept of prayer has become irrelevant in modern Jewish secular life. Therefore, even the three-day-a-year synagogue attendee is rapidly disappearing from the American Jewish scene. In spite of all the public claims to the contrary by organization honchos, the synagogues and temples are steadily losing membership and influence in non-Orthodox Jewish life in America. Even bar and bat mitzvahs, celebrated in synagogues and temples, are declining in popularity. This alienation from participation in public and/or private prayer is a very sad situation. It does not bode well for the future strength of the American Jewish community.

The truth is that prayer, for someone who is not accustomed or trained to pray, can be a terrifying and wrenching experience. Enormous pressure caused by changed circumstances in a person’s life, circumstances that may be internal or external, must be exerted on such a non-prayer to bring that person to pray.

The current mood of apprehension and fear that grips much of the Western world — especially since the disaster of 9/11 — has, according to many published surveys, led to an upsurge in the participation of individuals in public and private prayer. Aside from the popular axiom that there are no atheists in the foxhole, the current turn to prayer may have a much deeper meaning. For prayer is not only an appeal to the Divine to deliver us from evil and pain. It is just as importantly an attempt at self-discovery and an opportunity for rethinking previously long held opinions and lifestyles. For prayer allows one to read words that transcend current circumstances and to speak to the eternal nature of human life and its relationship to the Creator.

It is not that God requires our prayers. Rather, prayer strengthens our ability to confront ourselves and achieve an inner serenity and a necessary balance to our lives and emotions. It is never too late to pray and never too early to begin.

Common sense is really the basis of all human based justice and laws. Without such common sense we are likely to find fulfilled before our eyes the dire words of King Solomon, “The place of justice has become the place of evil.” Some of the excesses of courts and their judges worldwide indicate how perilously close we are to Solomon’s comment being actualized.

These are the laws that you shall set before them. (Exodus 21:1)

One of the main requirements for judges, as for rabbis and for all of us, is common sense. Law can be manipulated and justice can be perverted. The integrity of any system of justice lies in the wisdom and good common sense of those who rule and administer it. Hitler’s Germany, Stalin’s Russia, Khomeni’s Iran, are all examples of systems where the courts and their judges were the agents of evil. But that is not the subject of this article. Rather, I write about judges and their judgments that defy any rational common sense. And there is unfortunately a recent trend in the Western world for these types of judgments and decisions.

An example of this type of legal irrationality is the decision by France’s highest court of Appeal, the Cour de Cessation. It ruled that disabled children are entitled to be compensated if their mothers were not given the chance to abort the defective fetus. Lance Morrow, writing in Time Magazine’s opinion column (July 16, 2001) stated:

The metaphysics is breathtaking. A child stands in court, and demands the legal right never to have existed. The judges on the bench nod gravely. Except that it is not the ‘deformed’ child that stands in court. It is parents and lawyers, collaborating in odious work.

The abandonment of common sense is not an exclusively French problem. But it is disturbing to find the French courts affirming Nazi principles of eugenics. The decision savors of Vichy. The court’s logic – which is the true deformity – would encourage wholesale prenatal slaughter. It stigmatizes the handicapped and states, as a principle of law, that they should never have been born. Such children are an error that would, in the utopia toward which the idealism of the law aspires, be eliminated, pre-emptively.

Under the menace of this decision, French doctors, whenever the slightest shadow turns up on the sonogram, will advise: Abort. Perfect children are mandated by law. Parents will be considered irresponsible if they bring forth a specimen less than perfect….

The idea of perfectibility by abortion is an odious meme that should have vanished with Dr. Mengele. But instead it has survived and prospered. Instead of being tried as a war criminal, the idea ends up being validated by a French court….

The problem with such nonsensical judicial decisions, is that they undermine the basic trust that society must have in a judicial system in order for that system to be effective. Court conclusions that fly in the face of common sense destroy public confidence and respect. Without such public confidence in the fairness and good sense of the courts and in the absence of public trust in the wisdom of the court’s decision, the entire base upon which a just society is built is destroyed.

There is an old rabbinic joke about common sense and rabbinical/judicial decisions. It seems a man came to a strange town late Friday afternoon and had no place to stay for the Sabbath. He went to the synagogue, where he was graciously greeted by a fellow Jew who offered him hospitality – lodgings and meals – over the Sabbath. The host entertained his guest royally over the Sabbath and when the guest was about to depart and was showering blessings upon his host for the hospitality extended to him, the man presented him with a bill for payment for the room he slept in and the meals he ate. Aghast, the guest appealed to the local rabbi to straighten out the matter. The rabbi contemplated the issues in the matter, researched the tomes of Jewish law and then most solemnly stated that according to his interpretation of relevant Jewish law the guest was required to pay the bill. Crestfallen, the stranger began to take money out of his wallet to pay the host, when that man stated that he would never take money for hosting a Jew for Sabbath in his home.

“Then, what was all of this with the bill and the rabbi all about?”

The host looked at the perplexed stranger and said, “I just wanted you to know what kind of rabbi we have in this community!”

Common sense is really the basis of all human based justice and laws. Without such common sense we are likely to find fulfilled before our eyes the dire words of King Solomon, “The place of justice has become the place of evil.” Some of the excesses of courts and their judges worldwide indicate how perilously close we are to Solomon’s comment being actualized.

A typical “blood libel” followed this pattern. First, the body of a non-Jew, usually a child, would be found dead. A Jew would then be accused of the murder, and the motive imputed to him was that he needed the child’s blood for ritual purposes, most typically for baking matzahs. The first such accusation came in 1144 in Norwich, England, but there were many more throughout history. In Spain in 1490, for example, six conversos and two Jews were accused, found guilty, and burned at the stake for the ritual murder of a child even though no body was ever found. Often these blood libels coincided with pogroms with the Church and government officials encouraging the mob violence.

Notably, this canard of Jewish ritual murder for blood was a strictly Christian invention. Though the Jews in Arab countries suffered in other ways, they did not face the blood libel until 1840 in Damascus, and then only when France had imperial control of what is today Syria and “imported” in the idea.

Congregation Adath Israel in Massena, New York

Neither was the United States immune. On Yom Kippur of 1928, after the disappearance of a little girl, Rabbi Berel Brennglass of Congregation Adath Israel in Massena, New York was forced out of services and questioned for four hours by the police. All the typical accusations of blood libel had been made by the townspeople who surrounded the synagogue, shouting and threatening. The girl was found alive and well in the woods where she had gotten lost.

Mendel Beilis being led away by police.

The last and perhaps most famous blood libel of Europe was the case of Mendel Beilis in 1911. It began when a Russian council of noblemen suggested to the Czar that he “purify” Russia by expelling its Jewish population. Mendel Beilis, an unfortunate and obscure Jew from Kiev was thus propelled into history. When a Christian child in Kiev was found dead, Beilis was accused of ritual murder. The police soon became aware of the identity of actual murderers, but, under instructions of the Minister of Justice, continued to gather “evidence” against the hapless Beilis. Protests against this travesty were lodged with the Russian government by agencies in Western Europe and the United States, but were ignored. Beilis was brought to trial at the end of 1913, found not guilty because of lack of evidence, though the presumption of the “blood libel” itself was never refuted.

I make no comment about Sarah Palin’s use of this term. I merely want to educate people about the facts of Jewish history, which is something I will comment on. And I certainly can comment about what all this says about the Jewish people. The core of the Jewish people has remained steadfast in our identity and beliefs in spite of blood libels and persecutions. The “stiff- necked people” has indeed proven to be stubborn. Like the walnut, we’re a tough nut to crack. But even when we’re at our lowest, our kernel fruit remains whole and protected.

The Plague of Flies, by James Jacques Joseph Tissot at the Jewish Museum, New York. People harbor the naïve belief that if God will perform miracles then everyone would become believers and all problems would disappear. Miracles are not the basis of religion. Rather, true religion requires an inner commitment and inner strength not built on miracles. Study, education, loyalty, and family are the keys to faith.

From the time Moses first reappeared in Egypt until the time the Jewish people left Egypt was less than two years. In that relatively short period of time the Egyptian nation suffered all sorts of “natural” disasters.

The thing about natural disasters is that they can be seen as natural or unnatural. Secular historians interpret history as a series of unconnected happenings that are to be judged as random events. Others see the hand of God, so to speak, in everything that transpires. It is the same thing with the Plagues that occurred to the Egyptians.

Pharaoh himself declared that he also had magicians and wise men that could make Plagues. “It is no trick to turn the Nile into blood,” he said. “We have done that before. It is no trick to create swarming frogs. We have done that before. We can bring lice, etc. Therefore, nothing you did is anything special,” Pharaoh insisted.

When the Bible says that Pharaoh’s heart is hard, one way of understanding it is that he could interpret all of these matters, if he wished to, as natural happenings and accidents.

The component that limits that claim, of course, is that Moses predicts them all. It is one thing to experience ten natural disasters. It is another thing to have them all predicted precisely – when they will begin and end, exactly where they will happen and why they are happening. That adds a new dimension to the entire matter. Indeed, Moses’ mission was not to make the disaster happen but to describe it in advance, to put Pharaoh on notice.

Yet, Pharaoh’s heart remained hard through it all.

In truth, miracles, no matter how spectacular, do not make a long lasting impression. Human nature is such that last week’s miracle, no matter how impressive, does not help one this week. That is why the foundation of faith has to be based on more than miracles. Miracles alone will not do it.

People harbor the naïve belief that if God will perform miracles then everyone would become believers and all problems would disappear. All of history tells us that that is not true. Miracles do not make a lasting impression… certainly not on the Jewish people, a stiff-necked and stubborn people, i.e. a people who are not easily influenced by outside phenomena.

In the desert, bread rained down from heaven. It could taste like anything they wanted (even bagels, which were no doubt first discovered in the desert). Their water supply in the desert was miraculous, the “Well of Miriam.” They were led by a miraculous “Pillar of Fire” by night and “Pillar of Cloud” by day. And yet the people said, “Where is God? What does He have to do with this?”

This teaches us an important lesson that this is not how the Jewish people are going to be built. In reality, thousands of years of Jewish history reinforce this point. We are not easily impressed. We are driven by an inner conviction, by a belief not dependent upon external events or miraculous occurrences.

Miracles are great, but not the basis of religion. Rather, true religion requires an inner commitment and inner strength not built on miracles. Study, education, loyalty, and family are the keys to faith. At times miracles are necessary for the physical survival of the Jewish people. However, the spiritual survival of Jews is wholly dependent upon Jews themselves.

Chanuka gelt -- the traditional giving of coins to children -- has morphed into eight days of present giving, concerts, sports events, vacations, trips and other sundry forms of indulgence and recreation.

This month marks the celebration of the holiday of Chanuka on the Jewish calendar. Due its fortuitous falling out in the month of December Chanuka has a special resonance for Jews living in Christian countries, especially Jews living in the United States. Even the most observant of Jews cannot deny that the celebration of Chanuka in those countries has been influenced by the month of December and the attendant societal spirit of Christmas celebration.

Chanuka “gelt” — the traditional giving of coins to children — has morphed into eight days of present giving, concerts, sports events, vacations, trips and other sundry forms of indulgence and recreation. Far be it from me to be a killjoy so I am happy to leave Chanuka celebrations continue as they currently are. However, even in the midst of all of the revelry and excessive food and material consumption, a certain serious note of historical and moral importance should be injected. And who is more qualified than I am to administer that injection? So, here it is.

The struggle of the Maccabees that is the basic story of Chanuka is not restricted to their successful war against the Syrian Greeks. Equally important was their ability to confront and weaken the large and powerful Hellenist Jewish community of the time. These Hellenist Jews viewed Jewish tradition and Torah law as being anachronistic and uninspiring when compared to the dazzling qualities of Hellenistic culture. The Hellenist Jews had very little loyalty to the Land of Israel, certainly not to an independent Jewish run Land of Israel. They also exhibited little loyalty to the concept of Jewish nationhood and solidarity. In their headlong drive for acceptance in the Hellenist culture and world of their time they became essentially traitors to themselves and their people. Unfortunately this is a scenario that has often been repeated in Jewish history over the ages.

Chanuka comes to remind us not to repeat that fatal error of assimilation and abandonment of Judaism and its Torah way of life. The results of such behavior are tragic for the individual and the Jewish people as a whole. The Macabees realized that this double battle against external non-Jewish foes and internal Jewish ignorance, apathy and assimilation had to be fought simultaneously. A military triumph over Syrian Greek foes does not guarantee Jewish continuity and survival, essential as that victory undoubtedly was. Only physical victory combined with moral and religious renewal and commitment to a Jewish way of life can preserve Israel, the lone sheep amongst seventy wolves.

The other lesson that Chanuka teaches us is that Jewish survival and accomplishment are part of a Godly plan for this world. The miraculous lights of Chanuka, burning brightly even though their physical source of fuel is no longer present, is the physical representation of God’s spiritual canopy that protects Israel even in the worst of times. Long after the demise of the Macabees and their kingdom, after the Syrian Greeks disappeared from the scene, after empires have risen and crumbled, the small lights of Chanuka continue to light the way for the Jewish people and its mission in the story of humanity. Let us never discount the miraculous and the unseen in our national and personal lives. Chanuka is the triumph of the rational and easily understood – the wars and victories – in Jewish life.

But equally as relevant, it represents what we cannot understand or predict, of the unseen hand, so to speak, of our Creator guiding us through the dangerous rapids of history and enmity. Only when these lessons are truly understood does Chanuka take on its Jewish dimension over and above the season of the year in which it falls. A happy Chanuka to all.

Most people are not aware that in March, 1933, long before Hitler became the undisputed leader of Germany and began restricting the rights of German Jews, the American Jewish Congress announced a massive protest at Madison Square Garden and called for an American boycott of German goods. This caused a great debate in the Jewish world whether or not to boycott Germany. In hindsight it made absolutely no difference.

Jacob is portrayed in the Bible as the symbol of truth (e.g. Micah 7:20). Yet, ironically, one subtext that runs through Jacob’s life is his constant confrontation with falsehood, which on the surface does not necessarily paint him in the best light. When buying Esau’s birthright he takes advantage of the fact that he was desperate and cuts a shrewd deal (Genesis 25).

Likewise, he takes advantage of his father – albeit under his mother’s instructions — and even though he does not utter a falsehood he speaks with enough ambiguity to allow Isaac to be deceived if he wished to be deceived (Genesis 27).

Laban, his father-in-law, is the master crook and changed the contract with Jacob ten times. Jacob has no choice but to treat him in a deceptive way and employs means (albeit nothing illegal) to make sure that the sheep come out the way he wants them to come out (Genesis 30). Ultimately, he leaves his father-in-law without giving him notice (Genesis 31).

Jacob does many things which do fit into our stereotype of the prototypical pure, truthful person.

This is a theological issue, not an historical one, so here is not the place to delve into it in proper detail. Nevertheless, this irony regarding Jacob is discussed in the classic commentators and Jewish philosophers more than anything else. It is a difficult thing to reconcile. Suffice it to say that the measure of the ethical man is how he deals with the knotty, gray-areas of life, not necessarily the obvious black-and-white good vs. evil ones.

If you have a brother like Esau you have no good choices. Whatever you do is going to be wrong. And there are many situations in life that are forced upon us in that way. The Jewish people have certainly found themselves in situations that whatever they do is wrong. In the 1930s there was a great debate in the Jewish world whether or not to boycott Germany. In hindsight it made absolutely no difference. Nevertheless, at the time, and in the heat of the moment, there were vehement disagreements within the Jewish community.

Similarly with Jacob. One Midrash says that he was wrong for meeting Esau, giving him gifts and bowing down to him in a subservient manner (Genesis 33). He should have kept a wide berth and avoided him altogether. Another says that he was wrong for not doing more to try to straighten out his brother; for example, he should have offered his daughter Dinah to Esau, in the anticipation that she would have had a positive influence on him. In one viewpoint he was wrong because he was too weak; in another because he was too strong.

Taken together these conflicting traditions reflect a truth in life we sometimes have to accept: Sometimes, you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. In a time of trouble and disaster, whatever you do is wrong. There is always room for a complaint against you. Often history puts us into situations where there are no right answers. Unless one is sophisticated enough to realize this truth one is constantly frustrated.

That is why the life of Jacob appears so jagged to us; the pieces do not fit. Jacob’s story is the most difficult. How come he favors Joseph over the other brothers? On the other hand, the child grew up without a mother and showed unusual genius. Indeed, he is the one who will ultimately save them all. Jacob saw that. So he has to invest everything in him. Yet he is criticized for favoring Joseph. There are so many situations in the life of Jacob that no matter what he does he is wrong.

Jewish tradition does not hide Jacob faults that they thought were present – and those faults are within the Jewish people today. However, the truth is the faults are often a result of the impossibilities of life’s choices that confront each of us. We would like to have the pieces of life’s puzzle to fit. We would like to say, “Well, if you are consistent then it will all turn out perfect.” People with life experience realize that sometimes it does not work that way. Sometimes you do everything right and it turns out wrong. Then you are faced with terrible questions. The life of Jacob leaves us with the questions more than with the answers.

This can be seen in the episode of Jacob wrestling an angelic being (Genesis 32). Metaphorically, he is the man who wrestles with life’s most difficult situations. And he wrestles with them all throughout the long, dark night of exile. He cannot seem to get on top, to win, to deliver the one, final knockout blow that will declare him the indisputable champion. That, too, is part of it. Sometimes the challenge is to continue wrestling even in the face of no clear victory. Why bother, a person can tell himself? Just give up. It is too hard.

Not Jacob. He keeps wrestling. He keeps facing the questions… even if he cannot answer them all with the clarity he wishes he had. That is his greatness.

Historically, the outside world has always contributed greatly to uniting the Jewish people. In Auschwitz they did not ask what kind of Jew you were.

Arguably the first and most obvious characteristic of the people is that they are a nation of individuals – or, more precisely: individualists, i.e. a non-conformist, independent people. Because of that they are a cantankerous group, not easily given to unity and reconciling opinions.

We all long for a placid, tranquil existence. However, in terms of ultimate good, lack of friction is not always a blessing. It can lull and seduce one into self-satisfaction to the point of inaction. An engine runs on friction. Torah is meant as the lubricating oil in the engine of the Jewish people. It helps harness the friction.

Each of the brothers was a righteous person, but individualistic almost to a fault. Jacob sought to harness their individualism by the blessings he gave them at the end of his life. He blessed “each one according to his own blessing” (Genesis 49:28), portraying them each in a different role, giving them each different assignments. Any parent realizes that every child is a unique world unto himself or herself. You cannot educate one child according to another child’s personality and talents. Just because it worked for one child does not mean it will work for the next child.

In total there were twelve brothers, each a founder of the Tribes of Israel. Tradition has it that there are twelve gates to heaven. Every brother had his own gate – his own pipeline, highway or conduit — to heaven, so to speak. The prayers, wishes and talents of that tribe only work in its conduit. Just as in a complicated piece of machinery you cannot mix wires, so too in a spiritual sense. You cannot interchange one conduit with another and expect it to work well.

Jacob gave each of his children a blessing perfectly designed for his unique talents and his task in life. His prophetic insight as to how they would be constituted is part of collective make-up of the Jewish people today.

Even though each brother contributed a unique gift to Jewish life they were all the “sons of one father” (Genesis 42:32). Jacob’s vision was of a single nation made of disparate parts — even to the point of severe friction — each contributing in its unique way toward a unified whole greater than the sum of its parts. He encouraged their individualism even as he sought ways to harness it in the service of a higher purpose.

Historically, the outside world has always contributed greatly to uniting the Jewish people. In Auschwitz they did not ask what kind of Jew you were. That is a negative unity; it is a unity imposed from the outside in circumstances which we wished did not exist. However, there is a positive unity also. The type of unity is reflected in what Jacob’s sons said to him on his deathbed: “Hear, O, Israel, God is our God, God is One.” Our devotion to the monotheistic ideal and opposition to paganism; our moral conscience and the fact that we hold ourselves to a higher standard, striving for something greater, unite the Jewish in a positive way. This was all foreseen and molded by Jacob, father of the Jewish people.

Even though the Jewish people are diverse and even disagree vehemently with each other at times it is not always a bad thing. The fact that a person does not agree with you forces you to look at yourself, to try to give an answer, to try to improve. Out of this confrontation rises a greater sense of purpose, direction, influx of ideas and allowance for the imagination to take hold. If we all were the same, not only would it be very boring, it would also not be very productive.

There is a Yiddish saying that translates, “Peace and serenity exist in the cemetery.” In the cemetery no one argues any longer.

There are major rifts in the Jewish people even today. We long for peace, but the peace of conformity is not the peace that we long for. As long as we breathe we will have different opinions — and the right to express different opinions – and from that will come positive developments for the Jewish people.

This lesson of the struggle between individualism and unity is poignantly conveyed to us through the stories of the twelve children of Jacob. They were completely different personalities who often clashed, but who in the end will say, “Hear, O, Israel, God is our God, God is One.”

Temple Valley Beth Shalom decorated for Shavuot. Photo published under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike.

When I was a lawyer in Chicago over thirty-five years ago, I attempted to obtain a new date for a trial. The judge, a scion of a great Eastern European rabbinic family, asked me the reason for my request. I told him that the original trial date was to fall on the holiday of Shavuot, and as such, I would not be able to attend court that day. He sneered at me, “Counselor, there is no such Jewish holiday!”

That is an illustration of the alienation and assimilation of much of Diaspora Jewry. The holiday of Shavuot has been completely forgotten, except by the small sector of observant Jews. Out of all of the Jewish holidays, Shavuot has no distinguishing mitzvot or ritual attached to it. It lacks the ‘glamour” of the Passover seder or the shofar of Rosh Hashanah. Yet, it is the Shavuot holiday that is the backbone of all Jewish life and vitality.

According to Jewish tradition and the Talmud, Shavuot marks the anniversary date of the revelation at Sinai and the granting of the Torah to the people of Israel. The Torah itself phrases it thusly: “Today you have become a nation!” The nationality of the Jews is founded upon its shared experience of receiving the Torah at Sinai 3922 years ago. Shavuot is the uniquely Jewish holiday. It does not represent the universal ideal of freedom as does Passover, nor is it a harbinger of all human happiness, prosperity and bountiful harvest, all of which characterize the Succot holiday. It stands in splendid isolation as a uniquely Jewish event that attests to our role in society and civilization, as the people who accepted the Torah when others refused.

It is therefore difficult to be assimilated and celebrate Shavuot. Shavuot prevents assimilation by reminding us of the event that is baked deep into the DNA of the Jewish people – the revelation at Sinai. Shavuot is therefore not just a commemoration of an historical date, but rather it poses the challenge of defining Jewish nationhood and of its relation to each and every one of us. Because of this challenging aspect of the holiday, it is easy (though painful) to understand why Shavuot just does not exist for so many Jews. It is much easier on one’s mind and conscience to simply ignore and then even deny its existence.

There are certain questions that have remained constant in Jewish life over the millennia. “Who is a Jew?” “Why be Jewish?” “Why marry Jewish?” and “Why all of the fuss, anger, hatred and jealousy in the world over the Jews?” Ignoring Shavuot and what it represents allows for seemingly easy answers, or worse, evasions of these questions. But none of those answers has yet been able to stand the test of time and circumstance.

Forgetting Shavuot has always led to spiritually dire personal and national consequences. The great Rabbi Yosef of the times of the Babylonian Talmud celebrated Shavuot with great enthusiasm, saying, “If it were not for this day of Shavuot, I would not feel chosen and unique, for many Yosefs can be found in the market square.”

This is certainly true of the Jewish people generally. If it were not for Shavuot, we would not be a special people, let alone “a light unto the nations of the world.” Shavuot therefore becomes our reason for existence, the justification of our intense role in the development of a better and more civilized world. Shavuot therefore demands some sort of mental and spiritual preparation to be truly appreciated. Since we still have some time until its arrival, now would be a good time to start thinking about it and its personal relevance to our lives.