What Kind of Triumph are we Talking About?
By Rabbi Corinne Copnick
One good thing about getting older is that your memory is long, in this case historical memory based on facts, on events you have experienced. You remember things that are new to a millennial generation, and to the even younger people who are succeeding them. For example, the media announcements that our current leader is envisioning a military march to showcase our American strength set off warning bells for me. Liberty bells, you might say.
I was born in 1936. The first, never forgotten, military march I ever witnessed was in the arms of my father in Canada in 1939 when I was three years old. As we viewed the march of young soldiers parading in unison in Montreal’s streets through the slatted venetian blinds of his dental office, my father said to me, “I’ll soon be a soldier along with those young men, Corinki” (his pet name for me). “I’ll be in a uniform like that.”
And soon he was. Although he was a married man with two children and didn’t have to go, my father volunteered to fight Hitler along with other Canadians who answered Britain’s call for help from their allies in the Commonwealth (if you’ve seen the movie, “The Darkest Hour,” you’ll understand why). Canada – then the Dominion of Canada — entered World War II in 1939. The U.S., isolationist at the time, really didn’t want to be part of a European War, but was compelled to do so after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
I still remember my mother almost collapsing when my father — now in military uniform instead of a white lab coat — told her he would be deployed overseas, and my father scooping her into his arms and carrying her into the living room. Children remember things like that long after the event has faded into history.
The next march that is engraved in my memory took place on a movie screen when I was a student at McGill University, which I entered at age 16. Our class was shown an infamous, controversial movie in order, despite its content, to demonstrate the best propaganda film ever made. An artful film made specifically in 1935 by writer/producer/director Leni Riefenstal as highly effective propaganda for the Third Reich, it was called “The Triumph of the Will.” It documented the Nazi Party Congress in Nuremberg, attended by more than 700,000 Nazi supporters. When I close my eyes today, I can still see the mesmerizing, filmed waves of uniformed men marching or raising their hands in a synchronized Nazi salute.
In 1932, before this propaganda film was made, my school teacher mother toured Europe with her graduating Macdonald College classmates. Along with another Jewish teacher, she was barred by German authorities from attending a celebratory party in Berlin given in the Canadian teachers’ honor. At the time, she didn’t understand why, but by the next year, 1933, Adolph Hitler and his Nazi party had already come to power in Germany. By 1936, Berlin was showcasing Germany’s victorious athletes as its government hosted the memorable Olympic games. Last night, I watched a current generation of superb Olympic athletes as they were televised competing in South Korea. Among the global athletes from over 170 countries, were those of the U.S., Canada, Israel, the U.K., Australia, Germany, Italy, Russia (under the banner of the Olympics instead) and, of course, the many countries of Asia, including Japan, China and both Koreas.
So that is how my personal memories of marches (aside from the annual Santa Claus parade in Montreal) are associated with imminent warfare, war in which thousands of valiant young people would be killed or wounded, sometimes beyond repair. That is why my warning bells are sounding.
Historical memory is a good thing. It can be very helpful to have some elders around to caution against the dangers of nationalistic pride taken to an extreme, especially when expressed in needless, costly marches to demonstrate a military strength of which the world is already, often sadly, all too aware.
Shabbat shalom!
©️Corinne Copnick, Los Angeles, 2018. All rights reserved.
Mishpatim
(An Introduction by Rabbi Corinne Copnick)
My friends,
This past week, my grand-daughter, Samantha Spiegel, turned 18, legally the age of adulthood. In 1999 I moved to Los Angeles from Canada to welcome my grand-daughter’s birth on the cusp of the new century and to help my daughter, Janet, a single mother, bring her to this happy day.
In Judaism, however, religious and moral responsibility begins a few years earlier, with the Bat or Bar Mitzvah ceremony. When my grand-daughter was assigned “Mishpatim” as her Torah portion, I gasped because there are so many complex rules about how to live as a Jew, so much to absorb, so much from which to choose for a young girl’s commentary.
In the end, Samantha, decided to talk about the Three Festivals, and in particular, Passover, because it raised the topic of liberation from slavery, a subject that certainly did not end with the Exodus from Egypt. Slavery still exists in various parts of the globe, and, sadly, even in our own country, human trafficking takes place.
Here is Samantha’s D’var Torah, just as she expressed it on her Bat Mitzvah day. I was proud of her considerable Jewish learning then, and as she looks forward to her college days to come, I am proud of her now.
Mishpatim (Exodus 21:1 – 24:18)
By Samantha Spiegel
Shabbat Shalom,
In the biblical book of Genesis, we learn about human relations. In Exodus, we learn about the development of a nation. The section in Exodus, chapter 23, in which my Torah portion is found, is called Mishpatim. These are the laws by which the Jewish people were supposed to live in biblical times in order to have an orderly and holy conduct of life. If you read all of the laws, you will find many that make a lot of sense and that still apply to everyday life today. In fact, our American constitution contains some of the most important of these laws.
The particular portion that I read from the Torah today, my Maftir, is called Shalosh Regalim. Literally that means three legs; that is, three pillars of Judaism. It refers to the Three Festivals that were celebrated from the early days of the Israelites in the Holy Land. They are Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot. All of these are festivals of gratitude to God: Passover is not just about eating Matzah for eight days. It marks the time when the Jews were liberated from 400 years of slavery to the Egyptians. It is a festival of freedom. Shavuot, which coincided with the agricultural barley festival, is not just a holiday when we eat cheesecake. It is the holiday that marks the giving of the Ten Commandments and the Torah to Moses on Mount Sinai, and we are eternally grateful for that. Shavuot occurs exactly 50 days after the last day of Passover. Sukkot is yet another festival of gratitude, and this one coincides with the fall harvest. We are so grateful to have the fruit and crops of the field for our sustenance.
So, you may be surprised to learn that our first Jewish holy days were not Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. They came later. So did Hanukah and Purim and the other Jewish holidays. And the Three Festivals of Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot are holidays that taught the Jewish people to thank God for the good things they have in life.
And another thing about the Three Festivals. Unlike the Sabbath, which was a day of rest for all of humanity, they were created especially for the Jewish people, and they must take place at the set times that I have described. You can’t have them any old time.
For this Bat Mitzvah speech, I want to focus on the festival of Passover, because it concerns liberation from slavery, which is what my Haftarah portion from Jeremiah 34, chapter 8, is all about. In ancient times, most nations had slavery. Either they captured slaves in battle, or else people who were very poor sold themselves into slavery. Finally the Judean King, who was called Zedekiah, told the Jewish people in Jerusalem to set free their Hebrew slaves, that no Judean should enslave another Judean. So the slave owners reluctantly let them go. But later on they were sorry, and they forced people into slavery again. This is where Jeremiah came in. He heard the word of the Lord who was furious that the people had broken God’s covenant with them by forcing people into slavery. And the prophet Jeremiah spoke out strongly against slavery.
Some of you may think that all this happened a very long time ago. It may shock you to know that forced hard labor and slavery still exists today in many countries of the world, but it is hidden, and, generally speaking, people don’t think about it. Judaism is a religion of action. Jews are supposed to DO things to make life better. They are supposed to follow the Mishpatim, the laws of moral human conduct. They are good rules for everyone, not only Jews.
Out of sight, out of mind is a phrase which often gets me thinking. So many people choose to ignore some of the horrible things that happen to other people in the world because it is not happening to them or anyone they care about. We are very lucky to live in the United States. But after you have the experience of seeing something like a graphic picture in a book or movie or on television that depicts human suffering, it hurts you because it shows the pain in the eyes of the workers, and you feel their pain. It is called empathy. For example, when I was in fifth grade I watched a movie in my Hebrew school class that told about World War II, and there were pictures of people in concentration camps — they looked like skeletons — and it terrified me to think that humans would not feed other human beings and work them so hard that they would die, and, if they didn’t die, they would be killed. Of course, I couldn’t actually feel their pain the way they did because I was not actually being starved or imprisoned against my will or facing death. The worst part of it was that they knew they were going to die a horrible way. The anticipation alone is enough to kill someone.
However, seeing such painful situations does make each of us think, “Wow, maybe I should do something to help stop this injustice,” but the thing is, we so rarely do. I know that I have often said, “I’d like to help them,” and I’m sure you have thought the same thing, but it takes a lot of effort and moral, physical, and emotional strength to change these horrific situations. One person may not be able to do it alone. But sometimes one person can stimulate others to take action together against injustices that still exist. Like slavery.
The purpose of studying the Torah and the Haftarah is to remind us how to live a good life and moral life and to help others live a good and moral life too. This is what a poem in the Mishkan T’fillah says:
When Torah entered the world, freedom entered it.
The whole Torah exists only to establish peace.
Its highest teaching is love and kindness.
What is hateful to you, do not do to any person.
That is the whole Torah; all the rest is commentary.
That is the message I want to bring to you today.
A Generational Implication: We Need Kids
Dear Friends,
We are living in such a divisive and potentially violent period, politically and environmentally, that I hope, one day soon, we will individually and collectively come to our senses and realize the spiritual strength we can gain from setting some common goals. Hopefully, we will once again remember one another’s needs and, ultimately, bond together in maintaining this incredibly beautiful world – if only we take the time to look – that surrounds us.
In that hope, I offer this poem, which I wrote originally for a marriage ceremony — an age-old bonding our free-wheeling society should also remember to honor. Keep the bonds of a covenantal relationship safe. They need to be nurtured. And, if you can, however you can, have some kids (or take care of some or help them have a better life) to carry on our Jewish tradition. There is a generational implication in the privilege of being alive. Do I sound like a rabbi? You bet!
Shabbat Shalom!
The Bond
By Rabbi Corinne Copnick
Amidst frankincense and myrhh,
budding spring flowers color
the air with an ancient song.
“I am for you and
you are for me,”
the most fragrant lyric ever sung.
And in the scented forest,
tall trees inhale
resounded notes and
rebreathe new memories.
Old roots clasp gnarled
hands more deeply in
the rich, red earth,
their bonds long-forged
leafing freshly toward
a misty, blueing sky,
as gentle sun showers
envelop a bridal
duet.
Butterflies dance from
trees to celebrate this
covenant of winging
spirits.
©️Corinne Copnick, Los Angeles, 2009, 2017. All rights reserved.
By Rabbi Corinne Copnick
“Ours is a tradition that insists that God has spoken – yet is open to a variety of possibilities of how God spoke and what, in fact, God said,“writes Daniel Gordis in Revelation, Biblical and Rabbinic Perspectives [1]. It is this tradition of explication and interpretation of the written Torah, compiled over many centuries” that is continued by Richard Elliott Friedman in Who Wrote the Bible? [2], a scholarly book that reads like a detective novel. Now he has a new book out, The Exodus: How It Happened and Why It Matters [3], which promulgates a brand new theory.
The Sources and the Questions
In Who Wrote the Bible?, Friedman – building on the Deuteronomistic theory first advanced by Christian scholars in the 18th century, maintained that the Hebrew Bible was compiled by a general editor (called a Redactor) mainly from four entwined sources, defined as: J for the document that called the deity Yahweh; E for the document that referred to God as Elohim; P for the large legal section that also dealt with priestly matters, and D for the book of Deuteronomy. He lays out his basic issues very clearly, explaining in a detailed and methodical way how each of the sources contributed to a Torah composed of many genres and many documents. Historical interpretation, Friedman claims, is dependent on the point of view of the person or persons telling the story and raises many questions:
This last question is an essential consideration in reading Friedman’s book because it is the final editor, the Redactor (what might be called the General Editor — Friedman thinks he was likely Ezra, probably aided by his scribe, Baruch), who, as he attempted to reconcile the different sources, shaped the text that we have today. It is this editor (R) who is really the “rabbi,” Friedman says, telling the biblical story that itself has been a page-turner for centuries.
A New Take on the Exodus
However, the piece de resistance of Friedman’s new book, The Exodus, is this: We have learned, in the decades since Who Wrote the Bible? was written, that the four biblical streams (J, E, P, and D) were enhanced by the interwoven, much smaller documents of at least 75 additional writers and editors, and sometimes the Redactor. Then, at the end of The Exodus, Friedman cites the specific biblical verses that make up each of the four streams. So by looking them up, we can actually read the story threads that make up each of the original streams separately. Exciting stuff!
The biblical text itself has long represented a giant puzzle that biblical investigators have been trying to solve through their different disciplines – historical, linguistic, literary, and architectural analyses – all vying to make each one preeminent. Each discipline has professed to have the most likely answers, and the validity of the Bible as an historical source rather than just literature has been disputed. But now that the disciplines have pooled their knowledge, their combined investigations support one another’s findings – and, in the process, also shed light on much of what we read in the biblical text.
It is a welcome departure from some earlier biblical critics (who, believing that Christianity had superseded Judaism) seemed almost to take pleasure in discrediting the Hebrew Bible’s account of the Jewish people’s encounter with God. Then, in more recent times, various, politicized “experts”(and some serious scholars who are influenced by their findings) have taken to calling the Hebrew Bible’s account a fairy tale. The Exodus didn’t happen, they say; it’s just a great story. Also, the Jewish people have neither a claim to the Holy Land nor to Jerusalem. (It’s usually illuminating to discover who is funding the research of these self-proclaimed authorities.)
The Exodus Happened!
In fact, one of the latter day misreadings of the Bible that Friedman’s new book, The Exodus, dispels is that it did not happen. The Exodus did indeed happen, he asserts, but a little differently than we had formerly thought. Historians have documented, he explains, that there were many groups of Western Asians in Egypt at the time of the famine, and among them were a people called the Habirus (Hebrews), probably descended from the seventy Jews (Levites, since Joseph’s family were Levites) who originally came to Egypt seeking food when Joseph was the Pharaoh’s right hand man. So these Jews, who unfortunately multiplied too quickly and consequently were enslaved in Egypt 400 years after Joseph was long gone, comprised a tribe that derived from a single biblical ancestor, Levi, one of the twelve sons of Jacob. It was not nearly as large a group of oppressed Hebrews to leave Egypt as previously estimated; rather, the Jews involved in the Exodus comprised only one tribe — the Levites – not twelve tribes. If this hypothesis is correct, then the hurried departure of Jews from Egypt fits in very well with current architectural, historical, linguistic, and literary analyses.
The Missing Piece of the Puzzle
This theory (it is still only a theory) provides the missing piece that fits the puzzle, Friedman claims: If the Levites were the only Hebrew tribe to have traveled to Egypt (in North Africa) at a time of great famine – and later fled enslavement – where were the other 11 tribes? In Israel (Canaan), of course. Many historians of what used to be called the Near East [4] agree that the ancient Hebrews were a semi-nomadic, shepherding people that gradually settled in the land of Canaan as farmers, keeping separate from pagan tribes [5]. After the Exodus, the Levites rejoined their brethren in Israel.
In other words, Friedman is positing that eleven tribes of the ancient Israelites were indigenous to Israel centuries before the tribe of Levites fleeing from Egypt, and bringing with them the moral precepts of the Ten Commandments, arrived in Israel after the Exodus. The other 11 tribes had already divided the land, however. The latecomer Levites didn’t get any – just a few cities. But from this group came the priestly class and the establishment of a society that valued holiness, enacted laws to preserve it, looked after the widow and orphan, and welcomed the stranger.
[1] Daniel Gordis. “Revelation: Biblical and Rabbinic Perspectives.” Biblical Religion and Law, 1398.
[2] Richard Elliott Friedman. Who Wrote the Bible? (New York: Harper Collins, 1987).
[3] ——————————. The Exodus. Kindle edition, 2017.
[4] Today we refer to Israel as being situated in the Middle East, which is a region, rather than referring to its location in Western Asia, which is a continent.
[5] It is rather the story of “Joshua fit the battle of Jericho” that never happened. In the revised version of Exodus, there is no conquest.
©️Corinne Copnick, Los Angeles, 201 7. All rights reserved.