Sermon: Ekev

Written by Rabbi Colin Eimer — 23 August 2022

A rabbi, so the story goes, has always wondered quite what the big deal about not eating pork was all about. Finding himself in a place far away from his community he thought he’d risk it. Who would see him? He goes into a rather classy restaurant and orders suckling pig. Just as he’s about to tuck in, a couple from his congregation who happen to be on holiday there, pass the restaurant, see him and come rushing in. “Rabbi! what are you doing?” Quick as a flash he says, “Look I was hungry, so I came in. It’s such a sprauntsy restaurant – I simply ordered an apple but just look how they serve it!”

Many years ago I led a synagogue group on a tour of Jewish Provence. We went to kabbalat shabbat service at the Reform Synagogue in Marseilles, who arranged a kiddush which included a whole range of meats: salamis, mortadellas, smoked beef and the like. Rather surprised, some of my people sidled up to me “can we eat this? Is it kosher?” Our visitors from France this morning would not have been surprised but few of my lot had ever seen such an array of kosher meats, products which are now, thankfully, available in this country.

Closer to home, major building works are due to start here very soon. The contractors have been told they must stop work early on Friday afternoon until Monday morning. It would obviously be too disruptive to Shabbat services to have them working on Shabbat. But what if we were building our home on a newly-acquired plot of land elsewhere? Would we still have told the contractors to up tools on Friday afternoon? Jewish law permits the employment of non-Jews when it is regular throughout the week and not just on Shabbat. That’s why synagogues can employ non-Jewish maintenance staff who work on Shabbat. Could that not apply to the contractors working throughout the week on another site? And it would cut construction time by one-sixth.

We’re great fans of sushi in the Eimer family and I remember being in a local sushi bar where, at another table, a guy wearing a kippah was eating his sushi. If he was wearing a kippah in public, it was likely that he also kept kosher. Yet, here he was, eating in a restaurant which didn’t have a hechsher from a Kashrut authority. I took it for granted he wouldn’t be eating any of the forbidden fish on the menu, but he would still be eating off plates which might have had shellfish and other chazerei on them.

Kosher restaurants serve non-dairy creamer for coffee after a meat meal. Would it be OK to have bacon-flavoured crisps at a kiddush here? Like that creamer, it’s a totally-artificial taste created in a laboratory. So why not?

Which brings us back to that suckling pig.

We’re dealing here with a general principle in Judaism called mar’it ayin, literally “for appearances sake.” It derives from a verse at the end of the book of Numbers where Moses speaks to the people, telling them that when they go into the land they must be “clear from before God and from before Israel.” (Numbers 32:22.) The Hebrew word for ‘clear’ is n’ki’im a word used in legal contexts for ‘innocent’; here, probably, it means to be ‘free of any obligation.’ It’s not enough just to be clear in God’s eyes – but also in those of the people.

Whatever other factors might be at play here, mar’it ayin is one of the reasons some feel proud when a Jew does something praiseworthy and laudable; and equally one of the reasons they feel embarrassed when a Jew is convicted of criminal behaviour.

But can Judaism really have been so concerned with “what will the neighbours say?” that it was felt necessary to formulate this mar’it ayin principle? Hardly worthy of being elevated into the ‘general moral maxim’ as Chief Rabbi Hertz calls it in his commentary to that verse.

The Talmud brings some interesting examples. In ancient Israel, those working in the Temple treasury had to do so barefoot and wearing clothes with no wide sleeves, pockets or cuffs so that – mar-it ayin – it was clear they were not hiding any coins for themselves (Shekalim 3.2) If you are collecting tzedakah, you should get somebody else to pay the money you’ve collected into a bank account, so that – mar-it ayin – there should be no suspicion that you are hiving off anything for yourself from what you’ve collected (Baba Batra 8b) The Biblical peg on which this principle hangs is that verse about doing things in such a way that you are clean in the eyes of God and of the people.

Mar’it ayin seems to be suggesting two things.

There should be no contradiction – not merely real or actual, but also apparent – between what we say and what we do. At the very least, mar’it ayin is a general caution against hypocrisy. It also seems to be saying something about not doing things which bring discredit on the Jewish people or on Judaism. Violating mar’it ayin has an effect both on those inside, as well as, outside the group. Those inside – because they might be led to follow our example; those outside – because if they perceive a gap between what we say and what we do, Judaism might be lessened or diminished in their eyes.

I wonder if mar’it ayin as a concept seems rather obscure for many of us here, exemplifying a somewhat fundamentalist approach to Judaism, from which we believe we’ve moved away, an approach which is constantly worried about “what will the neighbours say?”

But here’s a “what if?” What if I’m going shopping and I ask my non-Jewish, housebound neighbour, if she needs anything? Gratefully she gives me a list: a loaf of bread, some eggs, milk and cheese – and 6 rashers of bacon. Should I tell her I can literally bring everything home except the bacon? Should I buy it for her? Should I go to a supermarket where I know I’m none of you are likely to see me at the charcuterie counter? I wouldn’t have a problem buying it at the Waitrose down the road but I suspect that if I bumped into one of you at that moment you might have a problem. I might be at pains to say I’m buying it for my neighbour. “Yeah, yeah, rabbi,” you’re thinking, “just like that rabbi in the joke only wanting an apple.” And what would be the effect if you saw me buying it, but I didn’t know you’d seen me?

We could argue that we’re each our own master or mistress. If somebody is shocked or offended by what they see us doing, we say that it’s not for them to judge us.

Mar’it ayin is built on the premise that the individual reflects the group and is representative, in some way, of its ideology, its teaching.

Maybe it’s another dimension of the idea that kol Yisrael arevim zeh bazeh “every Jew is responsible one for the other.” That may get extra cogency, maybe, when you are all part of a beleaguered minority, knowing your behaviour is scrutinised by the majority.

The issue is not, of course, as clear-cut and easily defined as “In this day and age, I do my own thing and if you don’t like it, that’s not my problem.” Mar’it ayin might seem to deny validity to the individual qua individual; but we could argue, paradoxically, that it gives a very real importance to each one of us. You are important – don’t underestimate the influence your behaviour can have on others.

There’s an inbuilt tension here between the rightful claim that each individual makes for personal autonomy and the equally rightful claim that any community makes each of its members. While both claims might be equally valid, do they carry equal weight?

Carried too far, the personal autonomy argument risks becoming little more than a sophisticated front for sheer selfishness and narcissism: “nobody can tell me what to do!” But carried too far the other way, it can become a stranglehold on individual freedom and personal autonomy, where the claims of the community are paramount and all-demanding.

Individual rights and claims, communal rights and claims need to be balanced out against the other. Maybe we’ll never get that balance right, because it’s in constant flux as new situations and challenges present themselves.

The danger comes when we feel there’s no conflict between these different demands. When we claim there is no tension I suspect we’ve chosen the path which says “only my needs are important, only doing my own thing is valid.” And that’s when the alarm bells should start ringing.