Rosh Hashanah 5774

Given the fateful events happening right now in Syria and Egypt and the possibility for similar ones happening in Iran later in the year, it seems hollow to wish everyone a peaceful, prosperous New Year.

But hope springs eternal and the leaders of the world may surprise us and pull a rabbit out of a hat and resolve some or all of these crises in constructive ways. So here’s to hope!

Seems to me that those most in need of the sort of moral stock-taking called for on the High Holy Days are the ones least likely to do it.  But just because Barak Obama or Bibi Netanyahu aren’t considering the moral issues involved in their actions, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t.  So let’s determine that in the coming year we will be the ones to bear witness, to call for justice, to call out the errors and indignities inflicted on the world.

It seems appropriate that the Torah reading for Rosh Hashanah is the Akedah, which tells the story of Abraham’s near sacrifice of Issac at the behest of God.  I’ve always found this story to be deeply troubling and wrote about it here.  But the slaughter of kin seems to be the way of the Middle East now and for past millenia.  Let us hope it’s a cycle that can be stopped.  That’s the spirit of Leonard Cohen’s brilliant, Story of Issac:

You who build these altars now
To sacrifice these children,
You must not do it anymore.
A scheme is not a vision
And you never have been tempted
By a demon or a god.
You who stand above them now,
Your hatchets blunt and bloody,
You were not there before,
When I lay upon a mountain
And my father’s hand was trembling
With the beauty of the world.

And if you call me brother now,
Forgive me if I inquire,
“Just according to whose plan?”
When it all comes down to dust
I will kill you if I must,
I will help you if I can.
When it all comes down to dust
I will help you if I must,
I will kill you if I can.
And mercy on our uniform,
Man of peace or man of war,
The peacock spreads his fan.

May you all be inscribed in the Book of Life and have a good and sweet New Year! L’Shana tovah.

On a separate note, I’d been planning an event to discuss the crisis in Egypt this coming Sunday, September 8th here in Seattle.  If anyone planned to attend, it has been cancelled.  The organizer of a separate event that was scheduled for the same venue compelled me to cancel.  I hope to reschedule some time in the near future.