Who is the most Prominent Person in Our Congregation?
Shavuot 5767
Shmuel Herzfeld
Recently I got a call from a newspaper. They were doing a story on where the prominent people pray. They asked for the names of the prominent people who daven in our Synagogue.
First I am going to tell you the answer I gave them and then I am going to tell you the answer I should have given them.
This is the answer I gave: “It is the antithesis of Judaism to think that someone is more prominent because of their title or how much money they have. The point of davening as a community is that we are all in this together. We are finite humans standing in the presence of an infinite All Powerful and Majestic God.”
The death knell of a community is when communities start judging people and praising people as a result of their so called power or prominence. This leads to a situation where some people are viewed as more important than others and thus have special entitlements. In a community, this just cannot work.
There was once a basketball coach for UCLA named, John Wooden. He was such a good coach that he won ten championships in twelve years. During that time he coached a superstar named Bill Walton. Bill Walton was such a good player that he was later voted into the Hall of Fame.
Recently, I read a book by John Wooden and it contained the following story about Bill Walton:
There was a rule against facial hair for players on UCLA basketball teams. One day Bill
Walton came to practice after a ten-day break wearing a beard.
I asked him, “Bill, have you forgotten something.”
He replied, “Coach, if you mean the beard, I think I should be allowed to wear it. It’s my right.”
I asked, “Do you believe in that strongly?” He answered, “Yes I do, coach. Very much.”
I looked at him and said politely, “Bill, I have a great respect for individuals who stand up for those things in which they believe. I really do. And the team is going to miss you.
Bill went to the locker room and shaved the beard off before practice began. There were no hard feelings. I wasn’t angry and he wasn’t mad. He understood the choice was between his own desires and the good of the team.
If offering individuals special privileges and status can’t work for a basketball team, then how much more so can it not work for a spiritual community!
In a spiritual community we must recognize that we all need to stand humbly before Gods in recognition that we are all finite.
As we celebrate the giving of the torah on Shavuot, we should bear in mind that this is one of the main lessons of the way in which the Torah was given at Sinai.
When the Jewish people came to the foot of Mount Sinai, the Torah says, “Vayichan Sham Yisrael.” And Israel camped there at the foot of the mountain.
Rashi explains that this means they camped, “Ke-ish echad be-lev echad, aval shaar kol ha-chaniyot be-tarumot u-ve-machloket.”
All other times that they camped they had disagreements, but when they camped at Sinai there was a sense of unity; there was a single mind, as thought they were all one person.
According to the literal text of the Torah, in addition to the Ten Commandments there was only one set of mitzvoth given at Sinai. This is the law of the Sabbatical (Shemittah) and the Jubilee (Yovel) year. Before these laws—and only before these laws, the Torah says, “And God spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai.”
Indeed, the Torah says that at Sinai, Moses read to the children of Israel a portion of the Torah called Sefer Ha-Berit, the Book of the Covenant. What exactly did he read? Well, according to the medieval commentator Ibn Ezra, Moses read these laws of Shemittah. In other words, the Book of the Covenant that Moses read at Sinai was the passage about Shemittah and Yovel.
Shemittah and Yovel seem pretty esoteric. Shemittah is the law that once every seven years the land cannot be worked. All loans must be forgiven. The produce of the field is open to all. The Yovel law is that once every fifty years all slaves are set free and all land returns to its original owner.
What do you think people would say if you stopped them on the street and asked them: “What is the core commandment of the Torah?” How many would even know what Shemittah and Yovel are? And yet, the Torah focuses on them. These are the commandments of the Book of the Covenant; these are the commandments given at Sinai.
What is it about the laws of Shemittah and Jubilee that caused them to be singled out for teaching at Sinai? What is it about them that they received special attention in the Sefer Ha-Berit?
The Shemittah and Jubilee commandments remind us that our physical property is transient. They don’t really belong to us. Everything that we think is ours is not really ours. Every seven years we are reminded that we really own nothing.
The lesson we are being taught every seven years is that prominence does not come through material possessions or status. It comes only through a spiritual connection to Hashem.
The Torah teaches this fundamental lesson at Sinai. If you want to build a spiritual community, if you want to be worthy of receiving the Torah then you must recognize that we can not elevate anyone on the basis of their material possessions or who they know.
In a small way, this is a model that we try to emulate in our congregation. As a small example, this is the reason why no one sits on the bima of our shul. The message is that no one is better than the other. We are all part of one congregation standing humbly before Hashem.
So the answer I gave to the newspaper is that “no one is prominent.” We are all finite beings standing in the presence of the infinite. How can anyone be prominent?
But after reflecting, I think I should have given a different answer. Yes, we have prominent people, but we measure prominence differently.
For us prominence is not based upon a title or possessions; instead, prominence must be based upon closeness to Hashem. Prominence must be based upon spiritual heights.
I should have told them who I consider to be the most prominent person in our congregation. That person in my opinion is Doug Platt.
Every Shabbat morning Doug has the honor of opening the ark for us as we sing Anim Zemirot in praise of Hashem.
I am sure that you all know Doug by sight and of course, you all see the smile Doug brings to his task of opening the ark. But many of you might not know who Doug really is. So I will tell you just a little bit about him.
Doug is fifty one years old. He went to Whitman High School in D.C., where he starred as an athlete in football, rugby, and tennis. In fact, he was captain of Whitman’s Tennis team which was known as a powerhouse team. And his friends still remember the time he took a kickoff in football and returned it over 100 yards for a touchdown. He was a popular high school athlete.
At the age of 22, Doug was enrolled in a prestigious Law School in California, when his professor offered him a ride in his car. There was a horrible accident. There were four people in the car and only Doug survived. Doug was in a coma for six months. Miraculously he emerged from the coma. He suffered the loss of an eye and Traumatic Brain Injury.
Faced with a future life where things would no longer be easy for him, many people might give up or turn bitter. Doug did just the opposite.
Doug has not given up on life. He has turned his physical pain into sweetness. Once a year the Whitman kids go on an annual golf trip. They all go and Doug goes along with them. He doesn’t wallow in the bitterness of what might have been. He sees the sweetness.
He inspires me most because no matter what he doesn’t run from God; he embraces God. He seeks to do good things in the world. He volunteers every day at the Hebrew Home for the Aged and when we call upon him for help he answers.
He carries himself with great dignity at all times. I’ll never forget the time I asked him to come to the morning minyan at 6:30 AM. Doug came dressed in a suit and tie. I asked him if there was a reason he was so dressed up. He said, “I have come to daven. That is why I am dressed up.”
Today is Yizkor. It is a time when we remember the darkest days of our life; days of sadness and setbacks. Doug has shown us that one can go on despite setbacks. Doug has taught us that one can love God no matter if God changes our plan in mid-life. He has taught us this by embracing God’s word with sweetness and with a smile.
So the next time a reporter asks me who the most prominent person in our congregation is, I will tell them that it is Doug Platt. “Who’s Doug, you say? Well, just come and watch how he opens our ark for us every Shabbat. We are all just hanging on to the coattails of his talit.”
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