Conflict and Resolution are both possible – which will we choose?

First let me begin by saying I just do not have the time to keep this blog going, so this is why my offerings are now so erratic and infrequent. If you want to see my weekly Parsha Shiyurim/Torah studies on our readings in the Jewish community, please do go to either of these Facebook pages (remembering you may have to ask to be accepted):

https://www.facebook.com/sunnie.epstein

https://www.facebook.com/groups/mbiee.org

So why do I not have time? Because as I am acutely aware of and pained by the amped up degree of conflict in our reality today, I am constantly working on the resolution end of this continually vexing and increasingly difficult question. Through my work in Multi-Faith Dialogue, insuring welcoming communities for Orthodox LGBTQ+ individuals, addressing women’s issues such as domestic violence and procuring a Jewish divorce, teaching, etc. I try very hard to use my time to be part of the solution, not exacerbate the conflict. What is important, actually critical to note, is that those of us who can work to maintain calm and validation are even more needed in our world today. I look at the news, listen to commentators and feel so dejected. Then I join my professional teams as we work on shared goals and feel so much better and empowered.

Both in the United States and Israel, we are sitting after recent elections – elections that tell us several things.

1. We are all living in countries with divided entities that are very separate and too often antithetical to each other, no longer even interested in engaging with the other in too many instances. In a recent poll in the United States, we have learned that the one thing that Republicans and Democrats agree on to the highest degree is that the other party is an imminent threat to democracy. How sad, and clearly, we are not living up to the expectations of our Founding Fathers.

2. How long will this election and the resulting Knesset hold in Israel? Clearly both countries are so divided and the notion of resolution and compromise, so clearly and painstakingly etched in Jewish learning culture, is lost to too many. In the meantime, while the opponents in the boxing ring of politics are amplifying their hatred and opposition to their opposing political party, REAL issues are not dealt with and people are having their liberties and lives threatened. How is this in any way appropriate on any party’s or leader’s watch in these countries and others that call themselves democracies?

3. There is a commercial in the United States for an auto insurance company. It’s about being safe drivers. Two people approach an intersection and each tells the other to go first. They go back and forth and in the midst of their very polite debate about who should go first, a cute “little old lady” in a third part of the intersection just throws up her arms and zips on through. It’s adorable but …. While we are all NOT allowing the other to go first or even to listen to them as we learned so well from Hillel and Shammai, who will barrel through and destroy way too much?

4. We all know the statement “Evil prevails when good people do nothing.” Evil is destructive. Evil is not valuing human life. Evil is an active desire to rid the world of all people who do not agree with the person who wants to do so. Evil is taking up way too much of our collective bandwidth and for those of us working to insure women’s reproductive rights, the dignity of ALL people who are created in the image of G-d, the notion that economic disparity is not helpful to anyone in the end, and so many other causes of justice and social/cultural health, evil too often sucks the air out of the room.

As you know, I am a religiously observant Jew. Trust me, I get way too much backlash due to the work I do and the beliefs I hold within the larger Orthodox Jewish Community as it exists today. Yet, as an educated Jew who learns as well as teaches from our sacred texts daily, I often find myself in the middle of debates about different approaches to what our Rabbis held to be the correct way. Yes, there is some name calling and glib comments to be sure, including a controlled degree of comedic interchanges. However, this is conflict for the purposes of trying to do and be what G-d wants us to be. Within that dynamic, there are NOT always solutions, but there is resolution, often only partially so. Sometimes. it means each person goes the way they believe, while at other times we are told there is not a final answer and we will just have to do the best we can.

Trying to do and be the best we can means acting as honorable human beings. It means listening to each other and realizing that if we do not, we all stand to lose way too much. We are indeed in TWO Americas and the same might be said of Israel, in which a recently released mini-series called Autonomies in which there are two entities – a right wing religiously closed society and a separate state for everyone else. It is dystopian to be sure and represents the worst of where present conflicts could lead, with the two warring factions being within the Am Yisrael – the Jewish people, forgetting any other parties to conflicting needs and hopes.

As an American, our money, our pledge of Allegiance and so much else reminds us that we are “one nation under G-d.” But are we really? It’s fine to disagree, to want different things, to use different approaches… this is human nature. BUT when one side – either side -- villainizes the other, then how can we speak of “one nation under G-d.?” The Hebrew name of the United States is Artzot HaBrit, meaning the lands of the covenant. Interesting, in both the cases of the United States and Israel, covenant is involved. G-d’s name is invoked. We are to act in a way that does honor to that connection and yet….. here we are.

There is a statement in the Qu’ran, Surah 48 that I love. Muslims are taught that G-d (Allah for Muslims) could have made all people alike, could have created one nation, but instead created all different groups so that we can “compete in good works.” In other words, we can all teach each other and work with each other. In my Multi-Faith work which I value more than I can say, I often suggest that we have all been given pieces of the larger picture that The Creator G-d alone knows. By sharing what we know and celebrating what we share, we can also acknowledge there will be differences that will distinguish us from each other. However, those differences are not intended to destroy any chance we have of working together to honor G-d and to respect and cherish each other. Resolution means I SEE YOU. Conflict means in today’s world I DON’T OR DO NOT WANT TO SEE YOU. Which one will you choose?