The Plague of Survivalism (Huffington Post)

The Jewish people have a knack for surviving, even in the face of great odds. Sometimes, however, it seems as if that is our only goal.

In the Torah portion Vayigash, Joseph, having grown in power and influence in Egypt after his brothers left him for dead in the desert many years before, now reveals his true identity to his assembled siblings. While his remorseful brothers are in a state of disbelief about his unexpected and seemingly miraculous reappearance, Joseph tries to reassure them and assuage their guilt.

"God has sent me ahead of you to ensure your survival on earth," Joseph informs them, "and to save your lives in an extraordinary deliverance. So, it was not you who sent me here, but God" (Gen. 45:7-8). There is a terrible famine in the land of Canaan, and Joseph, seeing this all as part of a divine plan to ensure his family's (and thus his people's) survival, encourages them to escape the impact of the famine by settling in Goshen. The story of the Jewish people has barely begun, and already survival itself has become a primary focus--and will be so throughout Jewish history.

Unfortunately, a kind of "survivalist" mindset will follow--and I would argue plague--the Jewish people for many centuries to come, one that disproportionately and even corrosively focuses on all those forces arrayed against us that threaten our survival. While there have been real and serious threats to Jewish survival, an almost single-minded preoccupation with them even when we have not been under siege has damaged the way that Jews have looked at the world--and at ourselves. We have been too often in a seemingly perpetual state of crisis, deeply focused on our numbers and a narrative that is both misguided and unhealthy.

Salo Baron, the great Jewish historian, opposed what he referred to as the "lachrymose" conception of Jewish history. According to this narrative--which Baron thought was as prevalent as it was false--the history of the Jewish people is nothing but a series of calamities and tragedies that have threatened our survival, one after the other after the other.

A colleague of mine recently attended an annual gathering of the philanthropic leaders of the North American Jewish community. She was shocked by the level of fear (and even reactionary tone) that permeated the multi-day event. Speakers and participants alike were consumed with and distressed by issues that they felt threatened the very survival of Israel and the Jewish people worldwide: the conflict in Gaza, European anti-Semitism, anti-Israel trends on college campuses, low affiliation rates at Jewish institutions, high intermarriage rates, and the like.

Though so many Jewish leaders are worried about our future, our past suggests that we will be just fine. Our well-being as a people is not about numbers, and it never has been. Devotion, not distribution, has always been our hallmark, and greatest strength, as a people.

Two thousand years ago, in the small village of Yavneh, a group of rabbis boldly transformed the Temple-based religion they had inherited into the Judaism we observe today--and they did it without being paralyzed by the trauma of the Roman siege and sack of Jerusalem. While a tiny and, at times, oppressed minority of the general population, the Jews of Muslim Spain generated a Golden Age during which some of our most important and innovative Jewish thinkers, mystics, and poets emerged and influenced medieval society for generations. And in the face of poverty and pogroms, Jews in Eastern Europe created the spiritual and joyous Hasidic movement, a movement that was led by a small band of itinerant preachers and teachers.

Size doesn't matter. What matters is creativity, courage, and commitment. Our national and communal narrative should not be one of fear and crisis, but of triumph and redemption.

What best defines us as a community of faith has always been qualitative rather than quantitative. Jews have encountered many obstacles over the centuries, and we have always surmounted them, through a balance of fidelity and innovation. To take a seasonal example (associated with the celebratory and miraculous festival of Chanukah), Judah Maccabi and his band of brothers--a miniscule guerilla force compared to the mighty Hellenist army--defeated their occupiers and rededicated the Temple in Jerusalem because of their imaginative, unconventional tactics, as well as their fierce determination.

That is the real miracle we should reflect on at this time of year, and a central message of our history -- the fact that we can evolve as a people and a religion, not in spite of our challenges, but often because of them.

The Terrors of Transition (Huffington Post)

In the Torah portion Shelach, the Israelites stand at the threshold of the Promised Land, the land of Canaan. Uncertain about what they will find there, scouts are sent ahead -- one from each of the twelve tribes -- to reconnoiter the terrain and assess its inhabitants.

It is a point of great transition in the community's life, and great leadership is required.

When the scouts return 40 days later, they offer a conflicting report about the situation. On one hand, they affirm that Canaan is a place of abundance, a land that is indeed flowing with milk and honey. On the other hand, they claim that the people who live there are fierce and powerful, and that the cities are very large and well fortified. The scouts continue: "The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers. All the people that we saw in it are men of great size; we saw the Nephilim there... and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them." (Numbers 13: 32-33).

Due to their fear and anxiety about entering this unknown land, the scouts' account of Canaan and its inhabitants seems overly dramatic. They anthropomorphize the land and transform it into a frightening place that "devours" its own people; they also claim to have witnessed the Nephilim (a mysterious, mythic race of giant beings first referenced in Genesis 6:4).

While the scouts' report seems to be a mix of fact and fiction, the reaction of the Israelites is swift and, based on their previous behavior throughout their journey in the Sinai wilderness, predictable:

The whole community broke into loud cries, and the people wept that night. All the Israelites railed against Moses and Aaron. "If only we had died in the land of Egypt," the whole community shouted at them, "or if only we might die in this wilderness! Why is the Lord taking us to that land to fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be carried off! It would be better for us to go back to Egypt!" And they said to one another, "Let us appoint a captain and return to Egypt" (Numbers 14:1-4).

To a person, all the members of the Israelite community would rather return to the bondage of Egypt than face an unknown future in, and represented by, the land of Canaan. As punishment for their ingratitude and rebelliousness, God decrees that everyone in the current generation twenty years of age and older (with the exceptions of Caleb and Joshua, who try to exhort their people onward) will die in the desert before reaching the Promised Land. After forty years of wandering, the older generation does die, and the younger one, led by Joshua, finally enters Canaan and initiates the next chapter in the life of the Jewish people.

What does this Torah portion teach us about how community changes and evolves?

When we stand at the threshold of something new and unfamiliar, as the Israelites did at the start of this story, there are often many questions that arise in us. What will we find on the other side? Will there be challenges ahead? If so, how will we surmount them? If the challenges are great, might it be a better course of action not to venture forth at all, but to retreat and return to the place from which we began our journey? These questions can be crippling.

Our fears and anxieties about the future can distort our perceptions and affect our attitudes and actions. Our terror over transitions can paralyze us, leaving us frozen in place rather than boldly marching forward toward new possibilities. Or it can cause us to make poor choices, to backpedal, to recoil from fearsome "giants" instead of embracing the adventure of the unknown.

In this biblical tale, the old generation of leaders must die off so that the new generation can move ahead. The Israelites needed to move beyond the timidity and fear of the slave mentality that was so much a part of its "establishment" mindset before it was ready to enter a world of fresh and challenging realities. Their nomadic existence had to give way to a more settled and secure way of life. Their leaders needed to be brash, bold, and fearless, unencumbered by the dark memories and constricting baggage of Egypt.

We are in a period of transition today not dissimilar from the one experienced by our post-Egypt forbears. For the old guard that came of age in the shadow of the Holocaust, steeped in concerns and fears about anti-Semitism and annihilation, the transition is terrifying. Their focus is often on the past, on "continuity," on battling the forces of assimilation and intermarriage, rather than embracing the future. But for younger Jews, and especially for the next generation of Jewish leaders, the current transition is exciting and filled with possibility. Their focus is on discontinuity, on new and disruptive models for Jewish life, practice, and community.

As a Gen Xer, I represent a generation in between the old guard and the millennials. I have tried, along with others in my demographic, to bring about change in the Jewish community. Will our efforts succeed? What will the Jewish future look like? It is too early to know. But one thing is certain: there is no future in looking backwards to an idealized past. Instead, we must move forward and engage, boldly and resolutely, with what lies ahead.

Who Needs Foreskin, Anyway?

I just watched some weirdo from the Bay Area debate Rabbi Shmuley Boteach on CNN about the issue of circumcision.

While I am on his side, Shmuley is all wrong.

It is precisely in its primitivity, the tribal character of the brit ritual--with all its blood, pain, and mystery--that the power (and hence the validity and relevance) of circumcision lies.  The "hygiene" or "medical" argument is not the path to take; rather, a defense of circumcision should rely on what it has always relied on--namely, ....