Rabbi Julie Saxe-Taller

There is a fascinating dialogue in the Torah portion this week. Sarah, Abraham’s beloved spouse, has died, and he owns no plot of land for burying her. He is bereft and at the mercy of the Hittites, on whose land he is at the time she dies. He is in need of a burial plot, one that he can be sure he will be able to return to, so he aims to purchase land from the Hittites. But they repeatedly insist that they respect him and offer him a plot as a gift rather than selling it. He does not trust their apparent generosity, and in the end, he is proven right by the high price that Ephron, the owner of the plot, finally indicates.

There are countless pages of commentary on this scene, but here I will point to Abraham’s combination of vulnerability and boldness. Some cultural models teach that vulnerability connotes weakness. But Abraham, in the midst of grief, models self-respect, power and graciousness at the same time as he openly shares his status as a guest in another people’s land and his urgent need to buy a burial plot. He  succeeds in negotiating the purchase of the plot, and the sale is completed “before the eyes of of the Hittites, in the presence of all who had come within the gate of Ephron’s city” (Genesis 23:4). As Abraham teaches, openly sharing our humanity with others can be part of inspiring both empathy and respect.

An Additional Note: To follow up from my invitation some weeks ago to work in solidarity with interfaith communities to protect immigrants, some TBH members will be joining a talk this Saturday afternoon at 1:15pm after services at Congregation Netivot Shalom in Berkeley, to learn about ways to support immigrants under threat of unlawful detention, family separation and deportation. The talk will be by Julie Litwin of the Kehilla Community Synagogue Immigration Committee. All are welcome to join me and the other TBH members who plan to attend.

Rabbi Julie Saxe-Taller

This week, we begin reading the narrative of Abraham and Sarah. They are the first Jews, (though they don’t yet go by this name) and the first of the ancestors we invoke in prayer. When, in the opening blessing of the Amidah, we invoke their names by saying that God is the God of Abraham, and the God of Sarah, it is to remind God that we are descended from them. It is our way of saying we are family – like name dropping when you meet someone new, to build trust or boost our reputation through our connection with someone already known by the other person.

This “name dropping” can be used disingenuously, but it can also be very powerful and positive when we do it honestly. There is a teaching in many circles that organizations grow at the speed of relationships, and relationships grow at the speed of trust.

In Jewish prayer, this tool also works as a reminder to ourselves. In citing the names of our biblical ancestors, we can remember that we come from people who have sought connection, inspiration, guidance from the Source of Life throughout Jewish history and throughout our family histories.

Who do you invoke or remember when you need support to reach for your spiritual connection? Are there ancestors, family or friends who inspire you in this way?

Let us call on our biblical and more recent ancestors to be with us as we begin to read this story again.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Julie

I wish I could share an interpretation of the Torah portion with a lighter touch this week. But as we read the story of a devastating flood, the building of an ark to save one human family, and the rescue of animals to preserve the bio-diversity of creation, dramatic actions are also occurring in our country.

According to government reports, 100+ Immigration & Customs Enforcement officials are arriving this week in the Bay Area, including the East Bay. Their actions and goals will likely follow those we are witnessing in other cities, where community members are being seized without due process, and whole neighborhoods and communities are plagued by fear.

As Jews, we know the experience of being blamed for large-scale social problems, portrayed as dangerous and targeted with violence and exclusion – this is the essence of antisemitism, and it continues in our time. In this moment, we are not the primary target of ICE, but we know that a society that is acting in this way is dangerous for all.

The instruction that we must protect the vulnerable among us, and particularly the immigrant, is the most prominent thread in the entire Torah. It flows from the central teaching that every person is created in the Divine image, and from the knowledge that we know the heart of the stranger for we have been strangers. It is a sacred responsibility – a central mitzvah – not only to welcome the stranger but to prevent their mistreatment.

If you are interested in taking action together to protect immigrants in our own and other local communities, please contact me by email. We have immigrants in our community, our congregation, and our families. This is a time to reach out, to ask about their experiences and what we can do to support them. And it is a time to speak out and to stand for what we know from both our Torah and our history: our treatment of immigrants is a reflection of our humanity and the course of our society.

This week, we hope with all our hearts that the Israeli hostages will return home beginning Monday and that and that the ceasefire agreement will lead to an end to the violence and suffering of Israelis and Palestinians. With all our souls we hope, pray and envision the coming year as a time when healing can begin for all who have lost so many loved ones. If that healing feels impossible to imagine, as it may for many of us, it can be helpful to look to Simchat Torah, the last of our fall season of festivals.

This coming Tuesday night is Simchat Torah, when we celebrate the Torah and read both the last and the first verses from the scroll. I hope you will join us for it. It is a holiday of rejoicing, but we will never again celebrate it without also remembering that it became the yahrzeit of 1200 Israelis and others in the attack by Hamas on October 7, 2023.  As Rabbi Elie Kaunfer wrote on the first anniversary of the massacre, “A day meant to celebrate our love of tradition, embodied in the Torah, was forever altered… [Yet we] cannot fully convert Simchat Torah to a time of sadness. We have to balance these two emotions — joy and devastation.”

We will mark the yahrzeit with a brief ritual, connecting us with Jewish communities all over the world who will be gathering both to celebrate and remember. The rest of our evening will include a casual dinner (please RSVP!) and joyful dancing to live music by the TBH troupe of musicians who have been excitedly rehearsing. Don’t miss it!

The Torah reading this week, Ki Tavo/“When you enter,” continues to lay out laws to be fulfilled when the Israelites enter the land toward which they have headed for forty years. It is hard to imagine a journey of this length, with its births and deaths, the multiple milestones in every life. And maybe just as hard to imagine living in an extended familial community that, despite disagreements, functions and moves from place to place together.

When they enter the land, they are to perform a ritual, using the dramatic backdrop of the two mountains surrounding the valley where they assemble, and enumerating the curses and blessings that are promised depending on the fulfillment of the mitzvot or the failure to fulfill them. There are several sections of laws, curses and blessings, some that apply to individuals based on particular actions, and others that are clearly addressed to the community and are based on an overall communal adherence (or lack thereof) to the full covenant of laws. To experience the powerful, public cataloging of these curses and blessings must have shaken the community of Israelites, as it was meant to do. For many readers, the text leaves us wondering about the power of threats and promises, and what are the most effective ways for authority to inspire respect.

With the New Year almost here, we will soon connect with similarly dramatic questions and metaphors in our High Holy Day liturgy. In this context, we will celebrate and also reflect on mistakes and challenges. We will wonder about big questions of life and death, and we will try to find the most effective ways to hold ourselves accountable. I look forward to celebrating and engaging these very real questions in community with all of you. 

Have you ever worked to gain an opportunity and found that it was very different than you expected? Or been appointed to a position without expecting or planning for it? Jewish sacred teachings, particularly the Torah, are meant to prepare us for all kinds of circumstances, so that when we find ourselves in new situations, we have thought about at least some of the questions and challenges that will confront us. This is especially true of circumstances when we find ourselves with practical and ethical choices that will impact other people.

Numerous areas of life are addressed in this parasha. When we find something that someone else has lost or left behind, we may be inclined to leave it be, or feel it’s not our problem. This week’s reading emphasizes that we are to go out of our way to return a lost item to its owner. We are also instructed to take responsibility for safe conditions when building a house, keep our promises, and refrain from cheating our customers in business. All of these instructions demand that we act with thought and compassion even when we may feel like acting on greed or convenience instead. Reading, discussing and thinking these things through gives us a leg up when we find ourselves in a situation that requires a considered response.

Some commandments in this week’s reading are confusing or even offensive to a modern sensibility, such as the prohibition against wearing clothing presumed to be for a different gender, and the inhumane and antiquated treatment of a disobedient son (which the Rabbis later legislated out of application). While the mitzvot in this parasha range from deeply humane and timeless to more questionable, studying the text and its commentaries can prepare us for circumstances we might not otherwise think through – part of the beauty of a Jewish-style text study is the conversation that it sparks and the ways that these conversations and the insights from them can stay with us and inform our choices when we might least expect it. So, next time you see your neighbor’s ox wandering in your local park, you know you can’t just turn your head and pretend you didn’t notice.

Shabbat shalom,

Rabbi Julie

The right to a fair trial is vital to a justice system. Impartiality of judges is part of the foundation for such trials. Our Torah reading this week, Shoftim (Judges), instructs judges against accepting bribes or rendering a decision they know is unfair. Some of the instructions seem clearly aimed at those who serve as official judges, and others can be understood to be part a moral code for all of us. The text includes the fundamental and all-encompassing directive, Tzedek, tzedek tirdof – Justice, justice you shall pursue – which animates much of what many Reform Jews as well as others find most compelling in our Judaism.

The repetition of the word for justice has been interpreted to convey emphasis, resulting in the translation “you shall surely pursue justice.” Medieval commentator Rashi takes the repetition to mean that just ends must be achieved by just means, while his contemporary in Spain, Ibn Ezra, writes that Moses repeats tzedek to indicate that one should pursue justice whether it leads to one’s gain or loss.

We are now witnessing and experiencing the dismantling of our country’s justice systems, from deporting immigrants without due process to misusing the power of the legal system to investigate political opponents as a means of retribution. The unabashed and purposeful attacks on our educational, economic, political and health institutions flaunt the Torah’s teachings against partiality, bribes and the taking advantage of people’s vulnerabilities.

In this context, how shall we read the repetition of the word tzedek? Today, I offer us this reading: Our tradition teaches us to persist in pursuing justice – to stand, sit, speak, write, love, sing, dance, defend and fight for justice/tzedek for ourselves and others, to share our actions so others will be strengthened and share theirs with us, and to know that our tradition and our ancestors stand behind and beside us.

Wishing everyone a restorative Shabbat,

Rabbi Julie

The Jewish path is not just a collection of laws or a schedule of holidays, but a way, a trail or course. And the course has purpose – it is meant to guide us to fulfill the values of our covenant.

There is a lovely linguistic construction in Hebrew that conveys directionality.  When we are heading somewhere, we can add the letter hey to the end of our destination, conveying the sense of motion. This gives us words such as habayitah – homeward; ha’irah – toward the city; and yamah – toward the sea. These words can help us feel simultaneously the importance of both the journey and the places or goals we are aiming to achieve.

In this week’s parasha, Re’eh, we continue to look toward the life we are to build together as a people. While some details are spelled out (You shall not gash yourselves in mourning), other instructions are broad and require interpretation in each new context (Open your hand to the poor and needy kin in your land). In the instructions for bringing offerings to the Temple, the place is not simply sham – there, but shamah – to there. While we are headed there, we are to travel with the goal in mind. This seems obvious, but when the way is long, such as a lifetime, it requires decision and practice to maintain our sense of direction, of heading toward our goals.

Whether we are thinking of personal spiritual goals (serenity, mastery of our actions, honesty, gratitude) or large-scale societal goals (creating a sustainable relationship with the earth, ending poverty, protecting our communities and the next generation), Jewish practices point the way. The path of mitzvot or regular Jewish practice both blesses and pushes us to step on the path and stay the course. As we near the month of Elul, which begins this Sunday and precedes the New Year, I look forward to building our communal pathway together!

Rabbi Julie