Sermon: Naso: The meaning of Jewish faith

Written by Writings & Sermons by others — 2 June 2013

As usual Rabbi Menachem Shlamazel started his class for Rabbinic students with a question.  Today however the question seemed particularly easy.  Could it be that the Rabbi was running out of questions?

This was his question:  Which group of Jews has the most faith?  Is it A) Rabbis, B) Orthodox Jews, C) Reform Jews or D) Uninvolved Jews?  After a few minutes the Rabbi asked his class for their answer to the question.  How many, he asked, think A is the correct answer?

To his surprise over half of the students raised their hands.  Picking a student at random, the learned Rabbi asked why he had selected answer A.  The student quickly shot back, “Rabbis have the most faith because they live religion almost every minute of their lives,  Virtually everything they do affirms their faith in the Almighty and their Jewishness.”

“Not bad,” the Rabbi said, “but does anyone think that B is the correct answer?”  “Yes” shouted a student from the rear of the class.  “I think that the Orthodox are the Jews with the most faith because they practice their religion just the way our ancestors did at the time we became a people.  They do not dilute their practice of religion.”

“Hmmm, Now”, the Rabbi asked, “is there anyone who would choose answer C?”  After some more hands went up, the Rabbi asked one student the reason for his answer.

“Reform Jews have the most faith because they believe that if you want a better world you must work for it.  You can’t depend on God to hand you a perfect world just because you sit in synagogue all day and pray for it.  They have faith that God will give them the strength and wisdom to achieve that goal.”

“Now who”, asked the Rabbi, “Thinks that the answer is D, the uninvolved Jews?”

Not surprisingly, no one raised their hand.  after glaring at the class the learned Rabbi walked around the room slowly, shaking his head.  He then disappointedly said, “I guess I have not done such a good job of teaching you.  I would have thought that at least one of you would have selected the correct answer, which is D.”

“D!!!!” the class exclaimed.  “How could those that are not involved in Jewish affairs at all be the ones with the most faith?”

“Well”, said the Rabbi, ” those that are not involved do have the most faith.  Although they make no effort to support Jewish life and institutions they have faith that when they need a Jewish service it will be there for them.  They have faith that if they have a need to pray or to come once to a service, a synagogue will be there for them.  They have faith that if they want a Jewish burial they will be able to find a Jewish cemetery, and obtain a Jewish funeral service.  They have faith that if they want Jewish books a Jewish bookstore will be there.  They have faith that if they are the victims of anti-semitism or need help or care that Jewish organisations will be there to help them.  Unlike all the others in answers A, B and C, they have faith that all these things will be there for them even though they do nothing to make sure that these institutions exist.

“If everyone had this much faith, ” the Rabbi said, “the Jewish people would no longer exist!  Obviously what our people needs is a little less faith!.”

Today our Torah portion began with the priestly blessing.  Right afterwards we heard how the chieftains of Israel, the heads of the tribes, came to Moses on the day that he finished the portable temple in the desert.  Each brought an extremely useful offering to give to a man who had just supervised the building of a huge portable tabernacle which was going to have to be carried around the wilderness for who knows how long – something to transport it in.  The Chieftains brought six heavy carts and twelve oxen to pull them.

Moses then gave the carts and oxen on to the Levites, who were going to be responsible for transporting and setting up the tabernacle wherever the children of Israel rested on their wanderings.  He divided the carts and oxen up among three out of the four Levite clans but, one of them the Children of Kehath did not get a set of cart and oxen.  They were going to have to schlepp.  Now you might think that the children of Kehat would have been most unhappy about this.  Indeed they were going to have to carry their part of the Tabernacle on their shoulders – and as it turned out, they were going to have to do this for 38 years of desert wandering.

But our commentator Rashi, who taught in France in the eleventh Century tells us that they were not displeased at all for the Kehatites had a special responsibility -it was their job to carry on their shoulders the very objects that enabled our Jewish religion to be passed down, the Ark of the Covenant, containing the Ten commandments, the Table and the Candlesticks and the altars and all the vessels which the priests, the Cohanim, used to perform the service of God in the tabernacle.  Clearly it would not do to chuck these into the back of a wagon and let some oxen tug them along.  Ox carts were fine for the pillars and the curtains and the door hangings, but for the vessels of the Temple service and of our religious memory, only the shoulder of a dedicated Jew would do.

Rabbi Morris Adler was especially struck by the verse which told us that the Kehathtes carried their load by shoulder, he said, “It seems to me, as I read this verse and re-read it, that we are being told not only about a detail of transportation but that we are being instructed in a very important matter.  When it comes to the very heart of religion, we must not try to find – and cannot really find- a substitute for our own shoulders.  We cannot transfer to anybody else, or to anything else, the obligations that rest exclusively upon ourselves.  There are things that others cannot do for us.

The Bene Kehat, the Children of Kehat – the “family that carried the ark of the covenant” – had a challenging responsibility; They had to carry the ark upon their own bodies; they had to feel its weight; they could not seek means to make the burden easier.  Religion, too , is a burden (a joyful burden) and it also is a discipline ( a fulfilling discipline –  which can give every week, every year of your life meaning as you follow the Jewish cycle of celebration and commemoration.).    Anyone who seeks to carry a faith easily, shouldering no special tasks, making no distinctive sacrifices, will have a religion that is neither true nor helpful.  (M Adler, The Voice, q in Plaut  Chumash  p1079).

At last week’s Synagogue AGM, Rabbi Josh and I spoke about four dangers for Synagogues, which at Alyth and most other shuls it is tough to avoid, identified by Rabbi Lawrence Hoffman (see http://urj.org/worship/worshipwithjoy/letuslearn/s15alchet/) .  These are the dangers of acting as a paediatric Shul – where everything we do is for the benefit of children or at a child’s level but we fail to challenge ourselves religiously as adults.  Of being an ethnic shul, where Jewish ethnicity and just the need to survive as Jews is seen as enough but the contemporary relevance and deep content of that Judaism is never addressed.   Of being a corporate shul where we are efficient and have a great bureaucracy among our staff but do not shoulder the responsibility of the mizvot of care for each other ourselves, all head and no heart.  Of being a consumer shul where we expect the shul to do and provide things for us – all validly Jewish but based on the same way that we relate say to a health club rather than to a family.

Challenging and escaping all of these dangers requires all of us to be like the Bnei Kohat – putting our shoulder under what Judaism asks of us – lifting up the burden and walking with it proudly supporting each other to make the challenge easier to bear and walk through life with it all the more delightful.

May we be blessed by God in this task and live a life that is blessed by the joy of carrying our Judaism upon our own shoulders along the path to tomorrow.