April 2016

Rabbi’s Letter

by Margie Klein

Dear Friends,

I write to share the teaching I offered this past Shabbat.

We are now about halfway between Purim and Passover.  On Purim, we usually focus on the costumes and the silliness.  But before we put the holiday behind us fully this year, I want to offer a teaching about a part of the Purim story that I believe is especially relevant today.

As most of you know, Purim tells the story about how the orphan Esther and her uncle Mordechai save the Jews from near annihilation.  I will sum up the story.

The Jewish orphan Esther becomes queen to the King of Persia, Ahashverosh.  Following her uncle Mordechai’s advice, she keeps silent about her Jewish identity.  One day, when Mordechai is visiting Esther at the palace, he runs into the King’s evil prime minister Haman, who asks Mordechai to bow down to him.  Because Jews only bow down to God, Mordechai refuses.

Haman becomes so furious with Mordechai and the Jews that he offers to give the King ten thousand talents of silver if the King will only pass a decree commanding his people to massacre the Jews.  The king agrees, and the Jews seem doomed, unless Esther can do something to stop Haman’s evil plan.  You know the ending.  Esther saves the day, Haman gets hanged, and instead of getting killed on the 14th of the month of Adar, the Jews vanquish their enemies.

But before the fairy tale comes to a close, before the happy ending, there is an interchange that I find very powerful.  Let me set the stage.

When the news of King Achashverosh’s decree to massacre the Jews on the 14th of Adar reaches the Jews, they all start crying and wailing and fasting, and they put on their special mourning clothes of sackcloth and ashes.  Mordechai wants to tell Esther what is going on and ask her to do something, but he is wearing his mourning clothes, a sackcloth, which was basically like wearing a giant potato sack.

Now, everyone knows that when you go to visit a king and queen, you have to get dressed up.  In Shushan, it was actually forbidden to wear sackcloth when entering the King’s court.  When Esther learns that Mordechai is standing at the gate of the palace half-naked, she sends her servants to bring him some fancy clothes that are more appropriate for the palace.

Now, until this point, Mordechai has been pretty good at fitting in.  Yes, he didn’t bow down to Haman, but he has played along well as a good citizen of Shushan, and was careful to tell Esther to hide her Jewish identity.  Mordechai is a guy who doesn’t like to make waves, who knows how to play the system.  But now, facing this imminent tragedy, Mordechai refuses to keep playing along.  He refuses to change into royal clothes, as if everything is okay.  He refuses to blend in.

So Esther sends her servant to ask Mordechai what is going on, and he sends back a message about the King’s decree for the people to massacre the Jews on the 14th of Adar.  Through the messenger, Mordechai asks Esther to go and plead with the king on the Jews’ behalf.

Esther responds to Mordechai, and I paraphrase, I can’t go to the king.  Everyone knows that if you enter the king’s inner court without an official invitation, you are sentenced to death, unless the king extends his royal scepter to you, granting you life.   But Mordechai, I haven’t been summoned for 30 days!  You are asking me to risk my life!

Now, here is the passage I find so powerful, from fMegilat Esther 4:12-4:17.

Mordechai sent back word to Esther: “Don’t imagine that you alone among the Jews will escape to the king’s palace, and that this will save your life.…Maybe it was for just such an occasion that you were made queen!”

Esther sent back word to Mordechai:  “Go and gather all the Jews in Shushan, fast for me: do not eat or drink for three days and nights. …Then I’ll go to the king — against the law — and if I perish, I perish.”

Mordechai left and did all that Esther had commanded him.

So let’s break this down.

After months of Mordechai telling Esther to play it safe, now Mordechai is asking Esther to risk everything for the sake of her people.  He says, “You may think you are safe, because you live in the palace, but don’t let the trappings of wealth and royalty fool you.  You and your family will be killed just like everyone else.”

Then, Mordechai challenges Esther – “Maybe it was for just such an occasion that you were made queen.”

In other words, you might think that your power and privilege will protect you from having to deal with this injustice to your people.  But actually, your power and privilege obligate you to take action in the face of injustice.  

These words affect Esther deeply, and change the course of her life and the life of her people.  Realizing her power, Esther speaks with her own voice for the first time in the whole Megilat Esther.  Instead of just taking instructions passively, as she has done up until now in the story, now she instructs Mordechai and the whole Jewish people on what to do – to fast and pray with her for three days.  And she says, “then I will go to the king, against the law, and if I perish, I perish.”

Esther here has found her courage.  She knows what she must do, and she knows that she will stand for her people even if it costs her life.  For me, this interchange and the story overall feel relevant on a number of levels.

Megilat Esther tells the story of a hateful man who tries to abuse his power.   Out of anger and insecurity, he uses his position, wealth, and influence to attempt to destroy a vulnerable and marginalized population whose dignity no one cares about enough to object to.  To me, this feels hauntingly familiar.

To quote a public statement from Truah, a large association of rabbis,

“This election season, one candidate for President of the United States has built his campaign on fear-mongering about Muslims, Latinos, and immigrants, and on disparaging language directed at women, Jews, and other minority groups. When his supporters have translated this angry rhetoric into physical attacks, he has done nothing to quell the violence, and has even appeared to encourage it.”

We might think that this isn’t our problem — that we don’t have to act, since mostly those targeted are Muslims and Latinos.  Perhaps because of our successes and stability we are safe.  Yet, as Mordechai said, don’t think that just because you are a bit more privileged, that you will be safe from the hatefulness you are trying to ignore. In our own middle schools, kids in our own congregation are confronting a rising tide of anti-semitic slurs and jokes about how Jews belong in ovens.   The culture of disrespect and callousness that we tolerate for others is a culture that will hurt us, too.

As the Truah statement says,

“History has taught us too many times that nationalistic and white supremacist vitriol spares no minority group. We know too the danger of violent incitement. It is no surprise that the same group of supporters who chant ‘Go to Auschwitz’ also have punched African-American rally attendees, or that the candidate who declines to condemn the Ku Klux Klan also smears Latinos and other immigrants.”

But, perhaps more important than any direct threat to our well-being, it is our moral responsibility to speak up and take action.  Most of us are citizens of the U.S., are white people, and are members of a religion that is generally considered acceptable today in America.  So in comparison to immigrants, people of color, and Muslims, we Jews do have privilege and power.

As people who have faced oppression in the past, it would be easier to sit back and say – now it is someone else’s turn to bear the brunt of hatred.  Yet, learning from Mordechai advice to Esther, our triumph over past adversity has its greatest meaning if we carry forward our memory of past oppression, and work to create a society that protects the dignity of those who are marginalized.

Though it is not my place or the place of any synagogue to tell you whom to vote for, as Truah’s statement writes, “we cannot remain silent in a climate that breeds hatred, negates the tzelem elohim, God-given-dignity of certain ethnic, racial, and religious groups, and contributes to violent actions.”

What does this mean in practical terms?

Well, first of all, it means that like Esther, we need to be ready to risk discomfort to work for justice and to stand with those who are marginalized and vulnerable.

For our own middle school students, perhaps more painful than the fact that one boy told holocaust jokes was that his friends didn’t say anything to stop him.  My guess is that the friends knew these jokes were uncalled for but stayed silent out of fear of social consequences, of being judged or disliked for criticizing a peer.

If we hear people around us making comments or jokes that dehumanize marginalized individuals or groups, it is our responsibility to speak up and teach our kids to speak up.  Rather than being guilty bystanders, who let injustice happen on their watch, we must become “upstanders,” who work to stop intolerant speech, disrespectful humor, and bullying.

Second, we need to work toward policies that create equal opportunity and dignity for all in our commonwealth and country.  One significant way to support this is to work on reducing incarceration rates in MA.  According to the Washington Post, the U.S. incarcerates people at a higher rate than any county in the world, and we have a big problem

And, as I have spoken about before, people of color in this country are given harsher and longer sentences than white people for the same crimes.  According to the Wall Street Journal, Black men get sentenced to an average of 19.5% longer prison sentences than white men for the exact same crimes, and Black men are 25% less likely to get out early than white men.

This past week, I was invited to stand with Governor Baker as he signed a bill into law that I worked to pass that will make it easier for ex-prisoners to get drivers’ licenses, thereby increasing their chances of getting jobs and staying away from crime.  In the coming months, the Pew Charitable Trust will release a report, commissioned by the State Legislature, with an analysis of the challenges in our prison system and recommendations for how to move forward.

In the coming months, our congregation will be choosing social action goals that we will work on as a community. Whether our community supports proposals that emerge from the Pew study, or other legislation that works to make our state more equal and just, I encourage our congregation to follow Esther’s lead, get out of our comfort zone, and work for the safety, dignity, and freedom of all of our neighbors.

I close with a blessing.  May we all have the courage to speak up in the face of hatred.  May we all have the vision to build a world of mutual respect and inclusivity.