Sermon Archives

Enemies

I want to begin this morning by thanking the congregation for stepping up in such a significant way during the weeks when I was in Israel. Sara has shared with me how impressed she was by the volunteers who did whatever was necessary to ensure that shul ran smoothly in my absence. And I was able to engage with a full heart in being in Israel and in my learning there knowing that everything was taken care of at shul. I do not take that for granted.

Since returning to DC I’ve struggled to come up with the right response when you have asked me about my trip. I have resorted to saying that the trip was “special.”  It was not a “fun” trip, although there were moments of great joy - like having dinner with some of the Ohev teens spending a gap year in Israel. It was not a “sad” trip, although there is a sadness and trauma that exists just under the surface of almost everyone in the country. It was a productive visit - the time spent at Mechon Hartman was enriching and valuable and I’m looking forward to sharing some of that learning with all of you in the coming weeks. 

But, more than anything, it was a special time to be in Israel and I am so grateful I was able to be there for two weeks during a time of real historical significance. There were three rounds of hostage releases during the time I was there and following along, in real time and in close proximity to people who know them and love them is something I’m grateful to have experienced. And I also gained insight into two questions I had not been able to see before with clarity. 

At each of the three vigils / rallies / protests for the hostages that I was able to attend during the weeks that I was in Israel our prayers and our activism was explicitly for the return of living hostages to their families and for the return of the deceased hostages for burial in Israel. Most of the activism around hostages here has not been as blunt or as honest about what precisely it is that we are demanding and what precisely it is for which we pray. The Gemara shares that the fourth blessing in Birkat HaMazon, the blessing of Hatov HaHaMetiv, was composed in the aftermath of the Bar Kokhba revolt against Rome. The Jews who were slaughtered in Beitar were eventually released for burial and gratitude for the miraculous circumstances under which this was possible reverberates through all time at every Jewish meal. After the maddening delay, whether by malice or carelessness, of the burial of Shiri Bibas, I understand - and will never forget as long as I live - the importance of the closure and healing grief that is made possible by committing a loved one to their final resting place. [And in between the time when I printed these words yesterday afternoon and today I can confirm that Shiri has finally been returned to Israel].

There is another insight I gained during my trip and I can explain it through exploring a curious phrasing of one of the many mitzvot in Parashat Mishpatim.

כִּֽי־תִרְאֶ֞ה חֲמ֣וֹר שֹׂנַאֲךָ֗ רֹבֵץ֙ תַּ֣חַת מַשָּׂא֔וֹ וְחָדַלְתָּ֖ מֵעֲזֹ֣ב ל֑וֹ עָזֹ֥ב תַּעֲזֹ֖ב עִמּֽוֹ׃ 

If you see the donkey of your enemy, struggling under its burden, and you consider refraining from helping him, you shall certainly help him.

As a basic ethical insight this is easy to understand. Even our enemies are entitled to our help. Certainly their animals do not deserve to suffer because of some broyges that I have with their owner. But the Torah’s phrasing defies easy translation. What is meant by  וְחָדַלְתָּ֖ מֵעֲזֹ֣ב ל֑וֹ  and you refrain from helping him? Rashi says that the phrase should be understood as a rhetorical question: Do you think you should refrain from helping? No, go and help him! But the grammar does not work in Rashi’s favor. A rhetorical question in Biblical Hebrew would be “HaTehdal M’Azov Lo” with the “heh ha’she’elah” to indicate a question.  Ibn Ezra goes so far as to say that  וְחָדַלְתָּ֖ מֵעֲזֹ֣ב ל֑וֹ means we do not have to help our enemy, but do have a requirement עָזֹ֥ב תַּעֲזֹ֖ב עִמּֽוֹ to do the minimum action to come to the assistance of the struggling animal by untying the straps that keep its burden on its back so that this too-heavy load can fall aside. The 20th century Italian rabbi and scholar Umberto Cassuto notes that in Arabic the root Ayin, Zayin, Bet can have two meanings. One is to abandon, and the other is to help. The verse therefore says, do not abandon, but rather help your enemies donkey.

But the Midrash Halakhah, the Mechilta of Rabbi Yishmael may offer the best interpretation for this confusing verse. The Midrash embraces the apparent contradiction and concludes that sometimes we should leave the animal and sometimes we should help and the distinction hinges on the word עִמּֽוֹ - with him. If our enemy is sitting to the side and waiting for someone to see his donkey as a mitzvah project - we have no obligation to help. But if our enemy will work with us to unload his donkey, then we have to help him. Rav Amnon Bazak pointed out that working together with our enemy to rescue his donkey might actually help us overcome some of that enmity. 

This mitzvah features in a famous story from the writings of my teacher Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein z’tl,. Some fifty years ago, shortly after his aliyah, he found himself in Sha’arei Hesed, the Orthodox neighborhood in Jerusalem adjacent to Rehavia famous as the home of Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Aurbach zt”l. In the small and narrow Jerusalem alleway Rav Lichtenstein came across a truck that had broken down and whose owner was struggling to unload his wares. This was, Rav Lichtenstein understood, an almost textbook example of our mitzvah. And, he saw some neighborhood kids standing to the side and engaging in a learned Talmudic debate about whether or not they had an obligation to help this truck driver. Since, the kids reasoned, he wasn’t wearing a yarmulke, maybe he wasn’t meticulously observant of the Torah’s rules of  terumot and ma’aserot.  And there’s a Gemara that excludes him, on that basis, from the right to assistance and so on.

Rav Lichtenstein described that episode to his father in law, Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik and years later recalled his letter:

I wrote R. Soloveitchik a letter at that time, and told him of the incident. I ended with the comment, ‘Children of that age from our camp would not have known the gemara, but they would have helped him.’ My feeling then was: Why, Ribbono shel Olam, must this be our choice? Can’t we find children who would have helped him and still know the gemara? Do we have to choose? I hope not; I believe not. If forced to choose, however, I would have no doubts where my loyalties lie: I prefer that they know less gemara but help him.

I’ve loved that story for many years. But I learned something new this winter. While in Jerusalem we had the chance to meet Ghadir Hani, a Palestinian citizen of Israel and a peace activist with groups such as Omdim b’Yachad and Nashot Osot Shalom. Through her peace activism she had became a close friend of Vivian Silver and, after it was determined that Vivian had been murdered on October 7th and not taken into captivity in Gaza, and had been hoped, Ghadir Hani was one of the individuals chosen to deliver a hesped at Vivian’s funeral. 

Listening to her speak to our small group of rabbis, and finding her faith and decency and courage to be extremely inspiring, I came to the realization that the common denominator between the various Israeli and Palestinian peace activists whose work, over a period of decades,  I have come to admire, starting with the religious and even mystical activism of the late Rabbi Menachem Froman - whom I had the privilege, as a student, to see in action at an interfaith peace conference of Jewish and Muslim religious leaders - is the commitment to living and working alongside “the other” forever. Their activism comes from an expanded circle of concern and even love, and a concomitant recognition that our task is to find a way to be together under conditions of peace and equality. 

In contrast, I have felt alienated from American peace activists who, whatever their intentions, have come across as exclusively scolding Israel or condemning or wanting to punish Israel. Even if I had agreed with all of their moral evaluations, I cannot fathom how a more hopeful future could ever emerge from anything other than the sort of cooperation and mutual understanding that can transform a zero sum dynamic in which everyone suffers unspeakable losses, into a dynamic of cooperation in which everyone can live the life of freedom and dignity that they deserve.

As the Torah says, עָזֹ֥ב תַּעֲזֹ֖ב עִמּֽוֹ - working alongside someone who may have been considered your erstwhile enemy is the only way to overcome enmity.

I do not know if I could have listened and been inspired by Ghadir Hani after a week like this one. I am not sure I could have heard her message and I suspect I would not have believed that her vision represented a pathway to a brighter future. It is not always possible to reach out to an enemy. 

But it is always possible to preserve the love within.

A few days ago one of my colleagues asked Rav Yosef Tzvi Rimon if it was appropriate to say a berakhah of Hatov ve’HaMetiv when dead hostages are returned to Israel for burial. He said “no” but that it was appropriate to have them in mind when we read that fourth blessing of Birkat HaMazon. Our Sages did not add that blessing to our Grace After Meals because we are joyful in the aftermath of death and defeat. Our Sages added that blessing because our love transcends death. In the words of Shir HaShirim:  כִּֽי־עַזָּ֤ה כַמָּ֙וֶת֙ אַהֲבָ֔ה love is as fierce as death. We don’t stop caring for our brothers and sisters after they are dead. Our responsibility to our mothers and our fathers does not end until they are brought to a resting place and we are so grateful for the opportunity to express that love that we wrote it into Birkat HaMazon.

We saw love this week, which is indeed more fierce than death as Jews across the world brought the Bibas children to their final resting place. And we saw that love in the indignation and outrage and grief over the delays in bringing Shiri Bibas to rest. 

There is also a fierce love that is inherent in the call of עָזֹ֥ב תַּעֲזֹ֖ב עִמּֽוֹ. It is a call to responsibility and it’s a demand to work together and make whatever improvements we can. Sometimes, working alongside an enemy can turn them into a friend. Sometimes that is not possible. But we always preserve a love for humanity (and even a concern for  struggling animals). That isn’t always enough to solve intractable problems or end ancient hatred. But that love for humanity, which is more fierce than death itself, does determine who we are and who we can become. 

Shabbat Shalom