When Society Falls Apart….

I sit and write these words as we begin our preparations for Shavuot (think Pentacostal, my non-Jewish friends, colleagues and readers). This is called Zeman Matan Torateinu or The Time of the Receiving of our Torah and is the celebration of what we have been waiting for since Pesah or Passover, commemorating our leaving of Egypt and our hopes and dreams for something so much better … a better way of life, a better society and better quality of the human condition, that finds its expression in the words, laws and instructive stories of Torah.

As always, our lives are so filled with so many mixed emotions and experiences for those of us who pay attention; and as you know so well by now, I am one of those who always do just that. Our family was blessed with a new soul that entered this world this past Thursday – our daughter Yoella and her husband’s fourth daughter, named this past Shabbat as Kassia Hannah (in Hebrew חנה קציעה ), in memory of both of my parents, Kenneth Gordon (Kalman HaLevi) and Hannah (Chanah), may their memories be a blessing for all and may this little girl carry and be guided by the grace of Hannah and the gentle strength of Kalman. Simultaneously, one friend of ours recently passed from this world and another is gravely ill. I often wonder how people go through their lives and to what degree they can hold onto their hopes and intentions as they navigate what life throws at all of us. So many emotions on a personal level!

Then there is the matter of our world and our country and these extremely frustrating, perplexing and troubling times in which we live. So I look at this new little girl and think about the legacy that she comes into our world with and the high hopes her parents and our entire family have for her and her amazing three sisters, Adel Raya, Neima Hadar and Neli Shimona – and all those whose legacies these little girls carry in their names from relatives and loved ones in their parents’ lives. And I wonder, how is it that we go from such high hopes and optimism to such opposite emotions and realities in our daily world? What is it that happens?

Today I completed learning of Masechet Sotah, the book of the Talmud that is titled for the wife that is suspected of going astray and committing adultery and the “test of the suspected adulteress” that is particularly painful to read about, much less imagine anyone going through this horror. While the Tractate begins with discussion of this woman who has done something so terribly wrong, it becomes quite clear, as it often does in learning Gemara, that she is not alone and this is NOT all about her. Rather, it is also about the man with whom she commits this act, the lawlessness in society in which they lived, and the conditions that led to the lawlessness that characterized that society in which these actions occur and may even be tolerated to varying degrees. The latter part of this Tractate clearly articulates that so many practices that represented the best of who the Jewish people were meant to be went by the wayside as time went on. Once the Temple was destroyed, the people lost their “clubhouse” and strayed a bit. Then learning ceased, great teachers died, and the chaos intensified to the point that practices that depended on the righteousness of that society had to be suspended and no longer practiced.

We are taught that the trial of the suspected adulteress was one of these suspended practices, never to be initiated again for there were not enough honest and blameless people in the community to point to the Sotah, who was to be an aberration. The point of the trial was not just for the wrongdoers, but to act as a clear warning and object lessons for the rest of society reminding them to act according to the laws that were set in place for a reason – to allow all to be the best they could be. If numbers of pious and righteous people were no longer the majority or critical mass, than who is blameless enough to point to such a person and wrongdoers are no longer the aberration but rather the norm! Certainly, we worry about that in our lives today when the question is too often no longer “what did X do wrong?” but rather, “can they get away with it?” As one lawyer stated to me several years ago when I was clearly wronged, “Just because its legal doesn’t mean its moral and just because its moral, does not mean there is legal recourse.” That was the point of Torah – it was truly intended to be both!

There is a critically important message here. We MUST hold onto our legacies as well as respect our past and the proper rule of society so that our children will continue to do so. This is, I believe the role of Torah (or whatever your code of law and practices is in your faith community, reader) in our lives – to remind us of what was, what should be and how we MUST continue to live so we can regain a sense of how we should properly go about this business called life.

So here it is Erev Shavuot and we are prepared to sit up all night and learn as we commemorate the excitement of receiving the code of laws that were intended to keep us honest and forthright and living in a way in which our dreams and hopes can be realized, while our wonderful legacies are protected. This is my hope for these four little girls and all of our children and future generations. May we all continue to be guided by the Torah we celebrate this week (or our appropriate Holy Writ) and bring its light into our world, regardless of what others around us are doing. In so doing, I hope that Kassia, Adel, Neima and Neli and all of our beautiful children will fulfill the hopes and desires we have for them as they grow and take on their place in our world and in our respective histories. In this way, they will fulfill the wonderful legacies they come into our world with as support.

Chag Shavuot Sameach and with hopes for all of us!