“Es Brennt, Brider, es Brennt!”
Out town is burning, brothers, burning,
Our poor little town is burning.
Angry winds are fanning higher
The leaping tongues of flame and fire,
The evil winds are roaring!
Our whole town burns!
And you stand looking on with folded arms,
And shake your heads.
You stand looking on with folded arms,
While the fire spreads!
Our town is burning, brothers, burning,
Our poor little town is burning.
Tongues of flames are leaping,
The fire through our town goes sweeping,
Through roofs and windows pouring.
All around us burns.
And you stand looking on with folded arms,
And shake your heads.
You stand looking on with folded arms
While the fire spreads.
Our town is burning, brothers, burning.
Any moment the fire
May sweep the whole of our town away,
And leave only ashes, black and gray,
Like after a battle, where dead walls stand,
Broken and ruined in a desolate land.
And you stand looking on with folded arms,
And shake your heads.
You stand looking on with folded arms
While the fire spreads.
Our town is burning, brothers, burning.
All now depends on you.
Our only help is what you do.
You can still put out the fire
With your blood, if you desire.
Don’t look on with folded arms,
And shake your heads.
Don’t look on with folded arms
How unlike any other Rosh Hashannah is this day. All the trappings of the holiday are in place. On the surface everything seems as normal as usual. Our homes are prepared for the festive after synagogue meal. Guests are expected. The table is set with silver and china, Kiddush cups, round challas, apples and honey for a sweet new year. We sit here in our finest holiday clothing. The Maron hall has been transformed into an appropriate place of prayer. The ark covers, table covers and Torah mantles gleam white and pure. On the surface, at least, everything seems just as it should be. But only on the surface.
Outside and all around, the world that we knew is in flames! It is gone! Violently ripped away from us. We are in turmoil. We are still in shock-no words can adequately capture what happened last Tuesday. Everyone is affected. There is almost no one who personally has not had a loss in one’s greater family, or does not know someone who has had a loss. We know people who came “just this close” to being there.” We know people who were in the buildings but made their way out just in time. Many of us were there-right in the neighborhood. Many of us saw it happen first hand-with our own eyes! Some of us were there-in the building-and are here only by the grace of God. Many of us know people who volunteered their help and services in the aftermath of the cataclysm. Some of us were with those volunteers. Some of us volunteered, donated blood and answered phones.
We have lost acquaintances, friends and family. We have lost our fantasy of America as a place that is safe, protected, and isolated from the madness of the world. We have lost our innocence. We have discovered that the world is a far more dangerous place for us and our loved ones than we had thought. We now comprehend how one moment can change our lives forever It will be worse in the days to come, as the names of those who have died become known; as funeral after funeral and a multitude of memorial services take place. “Ayn Bayit asher ayn sham met.” There is no home in America that has not felt the pain and does not share in the loss.
Today, exactly one week after the cataclysm, is Rosh Hashannah. Jewish Law teaches that we are not allowed to mourn publicly, that the Simcha of the Holiday takes precedence over any mourning, be it individual and totally personal or community wide or national in scope.
Rosh Hashannah also terminates Shiva. We have to move on. That is today’s message of hope. As a country we have to move on. It is time for the paralysis to come to an end. A new year is upon us… Yes, it will be a far different year from anything that we might have otherwise imagined. Life will never be the same. But we have to move on
We, the Jewish People, have been sustained from the very beginning by our religious faith. We will survive, overcome, be strong, and rebuild. We will continue to go on living meaningful lives and building a future for us, for our children and for America. We know this as a matter of religious belief. We know this from our experience. We, the Jewish people, survived the destruction of the First Temple and exile to Babylon. We survived the destruction of the second Temple and the resulting dispersal of the Jewish People over the face of the globe. We survived the Holocaust. Come to think of it, we survived a hell of a lot! However, each and every time, we did not despair. We did not give up. We did not bury our faces in the sand. We asked ourselves how we could do better and be better and we rebuilt!
As Americans we are a brave, courageous and resilient people. We have faced great national challenges and overcome. We fought hard to establish our independence. We faced civil war and great world wars and overcame. We had a dream to establish a land of the free and the home of the brave-and we did it. We have built the greatest democracy in the world. And even after last Tuesday it is still the greatest, strongest democracy in the world!
Have no illusions. The pain and mourning are not yet done, the grief is not yet at an end.. There will be sacrifices both great and small. But when it is done, we shall overcome and prevail.
All of which brings me to this very moment in time. We have a very specific job to do this morning. It is to understand the exact nature of what happened last Tuesday and how to respond to it-by drawing upon Jewish tradition for input and guidance. It is to understand that as a result of last Tuesday both our attitudes and understanding on the one hand, and our behavior and actions on the other, are the keys to the future.
The first lesson I learn from our tradition is that hatred and evil formed an unholy alliance that climaxed in last week’s cataclysmic fireball. We-not just you and I but all of us in America and in the Western world- we did not see it; we did not see it coming; or, if we saw it, we gave it little attention. The flames were burning bright for many years but we looked on with folded arms and shook our heads while the flames spread-until we, too, were consumed by the fires!
The Talmud tells the story of a man who had a bitter enemy named Bar Kamtza and a good friend name Kamtza. He invited all the notables of Jerusalem to a big party. His servant got mixed up and invited the bitter enemy, Bar Kamtza, instead of the friend Kamtza. When the host discovered Bar Kamtza was there, he told him to leave. Bar Kamtza begged that he be allowed to stay to avoid public embarrassment. The host refused and had him ejected.
Bar Kamtza was furious-at the host and at the Rabbis-all of whom were there, but did not interfere to save him embarrassment. He went to the Roman authorities and told them that the Jews were rebelling. They asked him what proof he had. He told them to send an animal to the Temple to be sacrificed and see if they would accept it. Bar Kamtza escorted the animal and on the way made a cut on its upper lip- in a place where Jews would count it as a disqualifying blemish, but the Romans would not.
The Rabbis were in a quandary. Sending the animal back would be interpreted as an act of rebellion and incur the military wrath of Rome. So they proposed to kill Bar Kamtza to save the Temple and the city and the entire country. Rabbi Zechariah convinced them not to do this because inflicting a blemish on an animal is not punishable by death. The animal was sent back. Rabbi Yochanan then stated, “Because of Rabbi Zechariah our homeland has been destroyed, our Holy Temple burnt, and we ourselves exiled from our land. PAUSE
This is a story as relevant today as 1900 years ago. It is a story of festering hatred-the hatred between the host and bar Kamtza. Like all irrational hatred, everyone forgot where it came from. But it grew and grew and fed on itself until the snapping point was reached-and then bar Kamtza exacted his revenge. He was not crazy. He was not a lunatic. He was devoted and committed to his hatred and anger. He carefully planned his revenge and executed it in a cold, calculating and methodical manner. It meant nothing to him that what he had done caused him and his family and friends and associates and his country to be swept away in the Roman rage that leveled the Temple, destroyed the Jewish state, and drove the Jewish people into an exile that lasted about 1850 years!
The story is also a blistering criticism of Rabbi Zechariah and the leadership! They had two opportunities to stop the evil. They did nothing! They could have intervened at the party. Instead they remained on the side lines, they tolerated the evil that they saw right under their noses, which set the whole chain of events in motion. At the last minute they could have killed Bar Kamtza. They could have eradicated the evil and saved their entire world from destruction. Because of their nitpicking they did not intervene. The rest is history.
The story of Bar Kamtza is our story. It has much to teach as we step forward into the New Year.
First of all, we must now recognize our enemies and terrorism for what they really are. Our enemies are not new to the world scene. The world knows exactly where this slowly growing cancer lives and breeds and expands. In places like Afghanistan, which harbors terrorist-in-chief Osama bin Laden. In Iran, which actively sponsors terrorism throughout the world. It is also exported in varying degrees by countries like Yemen, Sudan, even Saudi Arabia, America’s ostensible ally.
Terrorists are motivated by hatred-and like Bar Kamtza, their hatred is unchecked. They hate the West-and please note-not just Israel, which is high on the list-but they hate the entire Western World, a hatred rooted in a perverted religious ideology-radical Islamic fundamentalism. They are animated by the spirit of JIHAD-holy war. Their goal is the annihilation of Western culture and its replacement with their brand of Islam. This means violence, intimidation, devastation. Until world domination is complete.
It is a war against freedom, against democracy, against a way of life that has brought happiness and prosperity to hundreds of millions. It’s footwork –from the intelligence gathering to the suicide attacks themselves-is done by client groups, like Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah in the Middle East and bin Laden’s network of terror, Al-Qaede.
It manifests itself in the form of suicide bombings in Israeli pizza parlors and nightclubs, attacks on American embassies and military outposts, like U.S. installations in Saudi Arabi and the USS Cole.
And now at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Terrorism is fueled by a belief that the murder of innocents is a legitimate expression of a legitimate struggle. That is why Arafat does not condemn but instead encourages Terrorism against Israel. (And we will have more to say about this tomorrow) When the aggrieved party does not posses the force necessary to win their way in open battle or in negotiations, it uses terror: attacks by the aggrieved party - not on the soldiers of the enemy, but on the people of the enemy-innocent victims, chosen at random. The more innocent and the more random the better! Implant within the enemy an ongoing fear that never, ever goes away and makes them hesitate to go out into the streets and the shopping malls and the theaters and restaurants. Immobilize them and paralyze them! Make them cower in their homes, eat away at their economy, fray the social fabric, erode their sense of security until they give up and give in! PAUSE! We are not victims! We are casualties of war!
Everyone we lost last Tuesday is a casualty of war! Terrorists are not crazy lunatics who have no understanding of what they are doing. People who are wounded or die at their hands are not victims of a bunch of deranged madmen! To believe this is to minimize the danger. Terrorists are soldiers. Well trained soldiers with a goal and a mission. Perfectly sane, well indoctrinated, willing to give their lives for their cause! After their deaths, they are often celebrated as heroes by their families and their communities. In this sense they are no different from the members of any elite fighting group, trained to subordinate their own welfare to the common good.
Now we understand, now America understands, what Israel-a rock-solid friend of the U.S.-has been up against for so long.
Now we understand why Palestinians were again dancing in the streets, rejoicing over the deaths of Westerners-namely AMERICANS-just as they had cheered on Iraq’s Saddam Hussein in his war with the west more than 10 years ago. Now we understand why some Egyptians, Palestinians and Arabs were celebrating in Paterson, New Jersey. Now we understand why owners and workers at Arab owned Dunkin Donut Shops in Cedar Grove and Caldwell were dancing in their parking lots stomping on American Flags.
Their cheering reflects a longstanding anti-Western hatred that has festered for years-and not only in the Middle East! But in places like the Philippines, the Indonesian Archipelago, South West Asia; Afghanistan, much of the former Soviet Union-and of course in the Middle East. And now in New York and Washington.
Now we understand that this is not an attack against the United States because we support Israel. Don’t for one minute believe that if we stopped supporting Israel the terror would go away. It won’t. It is an attack against us because of who we are and what we stand for. It is an attack against the entire western world-as never before. The issue is Radical Islam. America, not Israel, is the great Satan. The sooner we understand this the better off we are.
Next, we must understand, as Israel has understood from the very beginning, and as Jewish tradition has always understood: there can be no compromise with this kind of hatred and evil. It has to be stopped in its tracks-the sooner the better! Like a cancer, if not completely eradicated; if even one cell is left anywhere in the world, it will grow back and attack us. If we show any moderation, if we show any lack of will, it will be interpreted as a sign of weakness on our part. It will be interpreted as a sign of strength and victory on their part. And it will encourage and enable them!
Next, we must understand that up until now we have tolerated an environment that did not take the terrorism seriously. We tolerated an environment that backed off from mounting a harsh, strong, determined, long lasting, and consistent fight against terrorism. Every time Israel was attacked by terrorists and we discouraged her from responding, we put another nail in our own coffin without ever realizing it.
We felt it really couldn’t happen here-even though it was happening all around the world! Sound familiar?
We backed off from responding forcefully because we really didn’t feel the pain of those who were under attack. We never understood what our Israeli brethren were going through-and neither did anyone else in the western world. How tragic that now we do understand. I bet our reaction to the next terrorist attack against Israel will be a far cry from what it otherwise would have been!
We backed off from responding forcefully because we had lost sight of the value of each and every human life. When a bomb went off somewhere and only one or two or six or ten or a hundred people were killed in a restaurant or pizzeria or night club, it was such a small number it didn’t affect us. Oklahoma City and the first World Trade Center bombing weren’t so terrible! It took a horrendous act of unimaginable magnitude to wake us up! Two huge towers, the pentagon, four huge jet planes, hundreds injured, thousands murdered, hospitals and morgues filled, an unending amount of funerals and memorial services, pain and grief all over the radio and television and newspapers and magazines. We now understand the Talmudic teaching that one who takes a single life is as if he had killed an entire world.
We backed off because we were afraid of how the rest of the world might have reacted. In the case of the first World Trade Center bombing it took years to achieve a few convictions-while the real culprits got off scot-free! In the cases of the Khobar Towers and the USS Cole-America talked loudly and wielded a very small stick. Nobody paid any sort of a price. The people behind last week’s atrocity had learned a powerful lesson from us-“you CAN get away with it!” We must create a world in which terrorists and those who harbor and support them know they can NOT get away with it.
Attitude is important. Attitude determines what we will demand of our government. Attitude determines what sacrifices we as a people will willingly make. Attitude determines how we will conduct ourselves and live our lives, even under the now ever present threat of terrorism.
Attitude is important. But we know-we have experienced it this past week- that attitude is only part of the picture. We know that in such times we need to find meaningful, concrete actions that declare our intentions to ourselves and the world! We are angry, we are upset, we are afraid. But we are also courageous and determined and we need to channel all this effectively. We are not in the situation room at the White House or in the high places of policy making. We are here in Essex County. But what we do makes a tremendous difference. So what can we do?
Do not avoid public places like malls, shopping centers, tall buildings, and large public gatherings. Courageously and bravely go where you would have gone before- even though we now live with the knowledge that it can happen anywhere without notice.
Stand up and let the terrorists know they have not won!
Stop canceling plays, concerts, sporting events, lectures, classes and other public events. It sends the wrong message. Put the world on notice that we will NOT be deterred, that public life will not be disrupted. That is precisely why West Orange Public Schools, the day schools and yeshivot, and our own Hebrew School did not close this last week.
Do not allow understandable fears to take control of our lives. Here at B’nai Shalom we actually received phone calls of concern requesting us to remove the “Solidarity With Israel’ signs on our front lawn. Those signs are now gone –the rally has been cancelled-NOT because we are afraid, but because New York City can not handle it at this time. I tell you now that we will not live in fear!
Do not allow our understandable rage and desire for swift punitive action to take over our sense of justice and blame an entire people for the crimes of a few. Last Thursday a 24 year old long Island mom from Pakistan narrowly escaped with her life when a drunken man tried to run her down with his car while shouting, “I’ll kill you! I’m defending my country. Your people and country are destroying my country. I’ll kill you.” PAUSE This is not our America!
As we look to the weeks ahead remember how much this synagogue meant to us during the crisis, and never ever take B’nai Shalom for granted again. You called, you came to our synagogue to pray, hundreds attended our prayer service last Wednesday evening. Our synagogue was the place to which we all turned to find each other and be together, and to find God’s presence, comfort and support.
As we look to the weeks ahead let us remember that a world that tolerates evil and injustice on the grand scale got that way because all of us tolerated it on the small scale, in our everyday lives. It sounds ludicrous to talk about a little “innocent” cheating on taxes or wiggling out of a deserved speeding ticket in the same breath with the events of last Tuesday. But how we live, and what we teach our children and grandchildren and each other about justice and morality sets the tone for society as a whole. We must begin by demanding the best from ourselves, even if it means paying more taxes or higher insurance points or points on our driver’s licenses. We have to rebuild from the bottom up! No more middle ground and no more toleration of wrongdoing-on the small everyday scale or on the grand scale of the world arena!
We must also find ways to transform our feelings of helplessness into helpfulness. The forces of good and light can overpower the forces of dark and evil. Evil may be louder, it may make a bigger splash in the papers, but we must be more determined, more persistent. We must be more visible! Join the battle for what is good and bright. Just look at the headlines in the newspapers these past days and you will see what we can accomplish: “They dig with their fingers,” “setting up stretchers,” “meals with heart,” “neighborly love,” “corporate bigs open their wallets,” “bravest, finest in greatest sacrifice,” “digging out buried friends,” “Samaritans respond from nearby states,” “rescuers flock to city” “public servants rally to response” “people responding in droves” “city has too many volunteers” “heroes emerge amid chaos” “Volunteers line up to donate blood,” “lending everything from ears to elbow grease.” “I’m here to do whatever…I can hold hands, listen to stories, sweep the streets, whatever,” “hands I’ve got, skills, I don’t. I’ll do whatever.” “People stand in line for hours to volunteer their help,” “This city is the center of the universe. I want to help put it back together.” PAUSE
Isn’t this what we all want to do! “Help put it back together.” It can never be the same again. But we can and will rebuild. We and our country will be strong. We can still give blood, make donations. B’nai Shalom is establishing a fund to which donations can be made and which will go directly to those in need. Make the checks payable to B’nai Shalom, put the words Special Fund in the memo and we will do the rest. Or come to the synagogue this Sunday and boxes for your donations will be available. We can volunteer our services-you will find an information sheet (in the lobby..in the Machzorim). We can be a presence for those who grieve and mourn. We can hold and comfort each other. We can come to the synagogue to pray together.
We can combat the evil and injustice that come into the world by continuously performing acts of Chessed, Acts of lovingkindness. I know almost everyone sitting in this synagogue today. I know from experience of the many acts of Chessed you perform for each other on an ongoing basis. They are beautiful.
But this morning I believe that B’nai Shalom, as an organized community, must take action to make a difference for good and light in the world. If we want to dispel the darkness that threatens to overtake us, if we do not want to stand by with folded arms while the fires burn our town, if we want to banish the hatred of Bar Kamtza from the world; then we as an organized community must respond by transforming our sense of helplessness into helpfulness!
To this end I am announcing the establishment of a Chessed Committee at B’nai Shalom. In honor of all those who gave so generously of their energy and skills and resources. In memory of those who sacrificed their lives so that others might live. In memory of those who died because of the evil in the world. A Chessed Committee, under whose organizational umbrella we will facilitate the performance of acts of lovingkindness in the B’nai Shalom Community and in the greater world. It will include all the current programs now functioning in the synagogue and will expand upon them. We will have one central address to which to turn for such needs as Shivah support, Bikkur Cholim-visiting the sick in the hospital and at home, “Hiddur P’nei Zaken,” assisting the elderly, providing comfort in the face of adversity, providing transportation for those who can not drive. We will feed the hungry and collect clothing for those in need. We will put our B’nai Shalom Blood Drive back on the agenda! Whatever, whenever, wherever; B’nai Shalom will initiate and respond! We will train volunteers so that they will feel comfortable in their tasks. We will develop a large cadre of volunteers so that no one individual will have to shoulder too much responsibility. You will shortly receive more information in the mail. What better ongoing response is there for all who have been asking, “What Can I Do?”
My dear friends, we are a great people. We have the benefit of two great traditions to sustain us in these challenging times-two great traditions: our Judaism and our great American Heritage. Standing together, as one United Community, with God’s help we pray that we shall soon emerge from the darkness into the sunrise of a better year!
All rise and sing together “America The Beautiful”