Naso 2, Numbers 6:1-7:89 – Parshat Ha Shavua for Shabbat, Saturday, June 6, 2020

Our country has been in turmoil over the past week, since the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis by the police and before that Breonna Taylor in Louisville, shot in her apartment by the police, and before that the killing of Ahmed Arbery in Georgia by two white men. And before that Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Philando Castile, Tamir Rice, Walter Scott, Atatiana Jefferson, Alton Sterling, Trayvon Martin and on and on. 

These killings are the ones we know, the ones that have been captured on cell phone cameras. We also know that there were many, many more killings that were never documented over the course of the centuries. 

And here we are today. These killings and the protests they have sparked come during a time when we are confronting a viral pandemic that highlights the deep divisions in our country: economic, racial, and political. 

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote in 1963, “How many disasters do we have to go through in order to realize that all of humanity has a stake in the liberty of one person; whenever one person is offended, we are all hurt. What begins as inequality of some inevitably ends as inequality of all.” It would be easy to give in to despair and to say to ourselves that the problems of our country are too big, too pervasive, and too intractable to solve. 

We Jews have been blessed in the United States to find a home where we have been welcomed, accepted, and allowed to flourish. Part of the reason is because here we are seen as white, while in most of the world we have been seen as “other” and suffered oppression. Our opportunity and our acceptance in America place a moral demand on us to ignore despair and to make sure that the gifts we have been given are granted to all Americans. 

Our Torah is filled with lessons on how to build a just society. Hillel put it simply when he said, “Love your neighbor as yourself. The rest is commentary. Now go and learn.” At the most superficial level, Hillel is teaching us to treat our fellow citizens as we would like to be treated. Anything that prevents us from acting as Hillel tells us too, any institution, any personal belief, any behavior, by us or by our representatives be they the government or the police causes us to commit the grave sin of denying another human being’s God given humanity. 

This week’s Torah portion, Naso, contains the priestly blessing: “May God bless you and watch over you. May God deal kindly with you and show you grace. May God’s presence go before you and grant you peace.” (Numbers 6:24-26) 

If we want to receive God’s blessings, then we must follow Hillel’s dictum of what Torah demands of us. We must take action and continue to do so until our country lives up to the God’s truth that all human beings are created in the Divine image. Then God’s presence will always be before us.