Hope is Our Strongest Form of Capital

This is an expanded version of a derasha given during Rabbi Gerson's Tisch on Shabbat Toldot 5775

(with thanks to Rabbi Michael Gold)

It has been a difficult week for the Jewish community. 

As many of you know, two men broke into a synagogue in Jerusalem during morning prayers. They murdered four rabbis at prayer, three of them American citizens and one a British subject. They also killed a Druze policeman before they were finally killed. A number of worshippers were severely injured. We grieve for the dead as we would for our own relatives, and our hearts go out the victims and their families.

It was not only Jews who were confronted with evil this week. For the fifth time ISIS beheaded an innocent prisoner, this time an American.

In a stroke of coincidence, this week’s Torah reading contains the birth of the twin brothers Esau and Jacob. Esau came to represent evil in the eyes of rabbinic tradition. Esau was called Edom, who became Rome and eventually the Christian world, the enemy of Jacob. Even the prophet Malachi speaks about Esau, “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? Says the Lord, Yet I loved Jacob. But Esau I hated.” (Malachi 1:1 – 2) Through most the past two millennia hatred reigned between Edom, the Christian world, and Jacob, the Jewish people.

How ought we to confront such evil?

There are many religious thinkers who say we should confront evil with goodness, hatred with love. I have actually heard someone say, “Why can’t the Jewish Israelis and the Moslem Palestinians treat each other like good Christians?” I can certainly admire some religious thinkers for their forbearance. Jesus said regarding one’s enemy, “To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer him the other one.” (Luke 6:29) Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. preached non-violent protest. That may work with an enemy who has a heart, who has religious standards. But what do you do with an enemy who has no heart?

Rabbinic tradition actually speaks of two kinds of evil actions by human beings. There are people who act l’teavon, because they cannot control their appetite. This includes someone who hurts someone else while drunk or steals because of out-of-control greed. There may be regret and room for repentance afterwards. Then there are people who act l’hakhis deliberately and wantonly. The act is motivated by pure hatred, with no regret. After the murders in Jerusalem, there was joyful dancing in the street to celebrate among many Palestinians. How do we confront this type of evil?

Rabbinic tradition is clear. “Someone who comes to smite you, rise up and smite them first.” (Sanhedrin 72a) It is permissible to take whatever actions are necessary to defend against an attacker. Unfortunately, sometimes the actions need to be harsh. One might ask, is the attacker also a child of God? Of course. I imagine that God cries tears whenever one of God’s children turn evil. But God also realizes that “the devisings of man’s mind are evil from his youth.” (Genesis 8:21) People have great potential for evil, and we have the right to defend against evil.

But we mustn’t over-generalize our enemy … Like many Israeli officials have stated this week, we are not at war, nor do we seek war, with the Islamic faith.  To the contrary, now is the precise time to make overtures to those who wish to save the integrity of Islam. Here in Denver, I am proud to have been invited to a dialogue of Muslim and Jewish leaders, under the auspices of Rabbi Steve Booth-Nadav and Wisdom House Denver.  Our interpersonal efforts have begun with relationship building and, we hope, will evolve towards some of the discovery about each other's culture that can lead to mutual understanding.  Indeed, none of us expects to arrive at global solutions, but we have exerted ourselves to take some “baby steps” in the correct direction.

Let us not lose out to the cynicism of perpetual animosity.  There is good precedent for other schisms that at times seemed just as ominous as the current war with Islamists, and yet the relations have transformed into more positive tones.

For the last half of a century there has been a radical change in our relationship with Christians, especially the Catholic Church. It began with Vatican II, or perhaps earlier. Jews and Christians have learned to set aside their differences, respect one another and work together. There are still pockets of hatred, but it is nothing like the past. Jacob and Esau, the brothers who were forever fighting, have begun to get along.

What about Jews and Moslems? Jews are descendants of Isaac and Moslems are the descendants of his half-brother Ishmael. There is hatred between Isaac and Ishmael in the Bible that goes back even further than Jacob and Esau. But there is also a scene in the Bible where Isaac and Ishmael put their hatred aside to bury their father Abraham.

So is it hopeless? Must we defend against evil forever? Perhaps not!

Let us be mindful of the fact that the terrorists and the murders do not speak for all Muslims. In fact, there are a growing number of imams and Muslim leaders who point out that these individuals are giving the religion a bad name.  One of my fellow Muslim faith leaders actually went so far as to say that ISIS is the Anti-Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

Are all Muslim texts completely devoid of violence? No... But let's stop to remember that the bible has its fair share of savagery.  The critical point in all of this is that leadership step forward to assert a responsibility for denouncing the bloodshed and posture towards collaboration and cooperation with the other.

We must find common pursuits that compel both sides to set aside the anger, the rage that bring harm more so to their own communities than to that of the other.

Need we say how natural it is to become cynical about these conditions? ... To match violence with anger and accusation? While we have every right to be angry, rage has very little spending power. 

Instead, let us look to the time-honored Jewish capital spelled H-O-P-E.