Building a Noble Community
Vaera, 5768 -- Shmuel Herzfeld
Today our shul welcomes and gives honor to our oldest member, Anna Yuter. We especially note Anna’s presence today, because this is a transition time in Anna’s life, as starting this week for the first time, she will be retired. For the past 73 years (since 1934), Anna has worked at Hotel Washington.
She started working at the hotel back when FDR’s Vice-President John Garner, used to live in the hotel. Over the years she held many different jobs in the hotel. Now that the hotel has closed for two years of renovations, Anna has gracefully accepted retirement.
In honor of Anna, let us pose this basic question about this morning’s Torah reading: How did Moshe have the courage to approach Pharaoh on behalf of the Jewish people?
In Parshat Shemot, we read that after the first time Moshe approached Pharaoh, he was not only rejected by Pharaoh but he was also rejected by his own people. Pharaoh then responded by doubling the work load of the Israelites. He said, previously I supplied you with straw, but now you have to find your own straw and produce the same number of bricks.
The people were infuriated with Moshe. By raising a voice he had made things worse for them. Says the Torah, “Vayifgeu et Moshe, the people of Israel attacked Moshe.” They continued, “Hivashtem et reicheinu be-einei pharaoh, you have ruined our reputation in the eyes of Pharaoh.”
They were screaming at Moshe: “Shhh. Be quiet. Do not ruin our reputation in the eyes of Pharaoh. Do not raise a voice.”
They were being persecuted by Pharaoh and yet they screamed at Moshe to remain quiet. Can you imagine such a thing?
Of course, we can because this has been a frequent response of leaders of the Jewish community whenever Jews wanted to speak out against anti-Semitism.
There are so many examples in history of the mentality that it is better to remain quiet that it seems almost a cliché to repeat it. But it happens over and over again.
Felix Frankfurter reminisces in his memoirs that when word got out that FDR was thinking of appointing him as a supreme court Justice, it was the leaders of the American Jewish community who led a delegation to FDR. The delegation did not applaud FDR but (led by the New York Times’ Sulzberger) instead pleaded with FDR not to appoint Frankfurter because it would anger Hitler and make Jews too visible in this country.
When the Student Struggle of the Soviet Jewry movement got started the leaders of American Jewish community were at odds with the students who began the movement. The leaders of the community wanted no one to raise a voice about the Jews of the Soviet Union so they pressured Congress not to act. On the eve of Jackson—Vanik amendment, the head of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations walked into Scoop Jackson’s office and begged him not to sponsor this legislation (which turned out to be the decisive turning point in the struggle for Soviet Jewry) as it would anger the Soviet leaders.
And recently, in my own small way I felt this myself. After I saw press reports that the Jews of Venezuela are being threatened, I called Jewish leaders and leaders of Congress and asked them to raise a voice on behalf of the Jews of Venezuela. The response was, “Let’s be quiet so as not to anger Chavez and endanger the Venezuelan Jewish community.”
In the face of people telling him to be quiet, how did Moshe have the strength to continue to go to Pharaoh?
We can broaden this question and ask: “In the face of so many obstacles that face our community, how can all of us have the courage to continue to work on behalf of the Jewish people?”
The truth is Moshe needed Hashem’s help.
Hashem tells him, “Bo el Pharaoh. Go to Pharaoh.” And Moshe responds, “Hein benei Yisrael lo-shamau elai ve-eikh yishmaeini pharaoh, va-ani aral sefatayim. Indeed the children of Israel will not listen to me, how will Pharaoh listen to me, as I have clumsy lips.”
Aral sefatayim literally translates as “clumsy lips.” But, I really prefer Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan’s translation for “aral sefatayim.” Sometimes people translate it as Moshe saying “I have a speech defect.” Instead, Rabbi Kaplan translates it as, “I have no self-confidence.”
Moshe has turned to Hashem and exclaimed: “Why should I bother going they aren’t going to listen to me? How can I go? I have no confidence that I will succeed. The people themselves are telling me not to go.”
The interesting thing is that the Torah does not directly answer Moshe’s challenge to Hashem. Instead, the very next verse of the Torah then goes into the lineage of Moshe and lists the genealogy of the tribes of Reuven and Shimon and Levi.
The commentators all struggle with this very strange interruption. How come the lineage appears now? It seems to be out of order and out of context.
Many beautiful answers have been suggested to this question. Just as an example of one approach: Rav Hirsch suggests that the Torah presents Moshe’s genealogy at this point in order to stress the humanity of Moshe. Moshe is about to become the leader of the Jewish people and cause plagues to reign down on Egypt, but in the end we must never forget that he is human.
Nachmanides provides another answer. He writes that the lineage of Moshe is given here, “Likhvod Moshe, for the honor of Moshe.”
Moshe has said, “How can I go?” Hashem responds by telling him who he is and who he came from. Hashem is telling him: “You are not just Moshe who grew up in Goshen, and lived as a shepherd in Midian. No! You are Moshe who is a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. You are the great grandson of Levi, the grandson of Kehas, and the son Amram. Your father’s name Amram, means ‘great nation.’ Your mother is Yocheved the daughter of Levi. You have a distinguished lineage.”
When Moshe goes to Pharaoh he is being reminded that he does not only represent himself, but he represents his ancestors and his future descendants. He must carry the nobility of his family. If he lacks courage, then he is disrespecting the honor of his ancestors.
That is why Hashem tells Moshe in this week’s parshah: Ve-gam hakimoti briti itam, I will keep my covenant with them”—with your forefathers. Hashem reminds Moshe that the covenant he has with Moshe and with the children of Israel is not just a covenant with their generation, but with all of the Jewish people, present, past, and future.
This is the answer that Hashem gives to Moshe. Say to the children of Israel: “I do not only represent you. I am speaking on behalf of the Jewish people, past and future. You are telling me that you prefer to live in danger under Pharaoh. But I tell you that the decision is not yours. The decision was made by your ancestors to have a covenant with Hashem. That covenant requires us to speak up to Pharaoh and to leave his land.”
This is the secret to the survival of the Jewish people throughout the millennia. It is the recognition that our primary commitment is to the covenant with Hashem which is obviously much bigger than any one person or any one community.
The Jewish community is a seamless community; where past and future meet together as one. Even if a local community chooses to remain silent in the face of persecution, the larger Jewish community has a responsibility to not remain silent. As the Talmud says, “silence is like acceptance.”
The idea that we live as Jews with a trans-generational responsibility is true in both a negative context –when we face persecution -- as well as a positive context, as it relates to our responsibility to build and strengthen the Jewish community.
We commit to our community, not only for ourselves, but also as a result of our responsibility to our past and to our future. We make sure that the place we live is committed to Hashem and doing His will, strong in Torah study, serious about Tefillah, committed to tzedaka and chesed. Our community must be a noble one; otherwise we are disrespecting ourselves, our ancestors, and our descendants.
This is the nobility that we are celebrating today.
When Anna’s parents (Itzhik Yankel and Meryl) came to DC from Lithuania in 1900, they chose to settle in SW. They left a thriving tradition in Lithuania; it was home to tremendous Torah scholarship and very pious Jews. It was a noble community. They were poor and persecuted, but they were noble.
They came to DC where there was practically nothing. There were no Jewish schools and just a handful of synagogues.
They knew their responsibility; they built a noble community. They became involved in the building of Congregation Ohev Sholom. And when their daughter, Anna, was born in 1913 they practically raised her in the shul.
When they built the shul and their community they knew that they weren’t only building it for Anna, but were building it for generations and generations to come. And when we build the very same shul and our larger Jewish community today we feel the same way.
As a community we must always remember that our responsibility transcends our family, our location, and our generation.
We have a covenant with Hashem and we have a commitment to our ancestors and descendants. That covenant is what gives us the courage and the responsibility to speak to Pharaoh: past, present, and future. This covenant is what inspires us to build our community: past, present, and future.
4