Israel tour 1 the sermon

Israel tour 1 the sermon.

Shalom!

Even though I am giving this sermon in my home in United States consider this the first in my series of videos from my Israel trip because this is the gist of the words that I am going to offer as that of Torah in the contributive Synagogue in Jerusalem that we are going to be attending at the next Shabbath.

Now this week, what I am going to tell is the Torah portion is Bahar by next week it is Bechukotai which is the final Torah portion of Leviticus the Vaicra. Now, I have a video on Bahar-Bechukotai but this is a special word for a mixed audience some Israelis and Americans. And many of the people attend that synagogue in Jerusalem who are actually were born outside of Israel and many in England and of the United States. I think and I hope these words will be appropriate for those communities.

Well first of all, the Torah portion, I will start with the Torah portion, Bechukotai has one of two main Toca quote which are in the Torah. Now, a tocaka is an admonition. It is a very severe negative promise by God that severe problems that will rise if the people do not obey.

Now, in Vayikra there is a particular characteristic of their Tocaka which is national. The admonitions and curses are in plural but when you read it its clear that there would be a national disaster that will take place if in fact things do not go right, if the people do not know how to obey the covenant.. That is why I believe in etiology but it is interesting to know that of course there was national disaster with the destruction of the first temple of Solomon that he built in 586 BC.

Now, there is an additional Tocaka which is in Deutoronomy the last is with Torah. And that is very different. That Tocaka is mostly in the singular it is of an individual character. Now Meir Lau, who was the chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv at one point, he said that when we read the first Tocaka it seems that knew what a national disaster which is also some loss of statehood.

His conjuncture is supported by the fact the warnings in the portion that we read in the Bechukotai or in the pleural. They refer to what is called a lot of land collapse of the nation. They describe the destruction of the soil. The devastation will come to the country and its national institutions. However in Deuteronomy, it pointed out its individual morality is a disintegration of the individual, you showed no now face in your own existence.

And so, how do we understand those two different Tocaka in the context of what we face today. Well, at the end of the Aicha rise at the end of something that was set when you are a team of the rules of the Cohan and most of their many other laws and the beautiful laws about people should get along in Leviticus 19. But the fourth book of the Torah is called Bamidbar, the wilderness and that consists of stories which really have no end because at the end of that book things are not clear. The Jewish people are still not in the Promised Land.

Now, it depends where you take advantage from where you are reading from. If you would step back 100 years and look at the two major Jewish communities in the world today Israel and United States but in 1908 they were very different. There was no guarantee that United States is going to be amazing Jewish community that it has become but moreover six million Jews of course there are challenges but there are volumes and volumes of pages of the amount of Jewish institutions that exist, the amount of Jewish infrastructure, the contribution of Jews in America, the vitality in richness, and thoroughness and vibrancy of the Jewish community.

Same point, if you would have stood in Israel in 1908, who would believe that there will be a Jewish State, they will be have almost the majority and maybe the majority well jewelry that it will be one of the most successful nations on earth. Who would have believe it? In fact, we celebrated the 90s at a birthday of a cognitive last week who was nearly a college sash has been rented in Israel in the early 1930s and stayed for several years and helped build Israel and he only early falling stage this is well 15 years before Israel became a state.

Now we do not want those sterility points, we look ahead and we see the beauty at birth ad also we know the dangers. There are many unknowns today. And that God forbid we should face a Tocaka that the consequence of the Tocaka which is a destruction of the individual or the nation. From advantage point of the Tocaka today and we are concerned about the nation of Israel in spite of this amazing success and I believe it is the most successful country per capita in the world.

Israel still faces very serious challenges toward existence. From Iran and the potential nuclear consequences that it faces, The more on Bin Laden who is a very dangerous terrorist leader so to all the problems that is runned across by Israel. Now, it is really sounds which are the most problems in the world. Problems are caused by people like Bin Laden.and Israel faces those challenges with daily rockets coming from guys like Hamas. He is increasingly gaining power at e Lebanon the other challenge that is real Israel faces.

And in the United States, of course we have responsibilities to support as well. I am going to APAC convention in American’s Public Affairs Committee right after getting back from Israel. And there were also three major presidential candidates are going to give major addresses prime minister. All men wealth and the leadership of the house of senate then I will a have to have senate house will be at the final dinner on Tuesday night. It is an amazing show of solidarity and support for the state of Israel. Of course that is unnecessary and thank God America does that.

In terms of the second Tocaka in the Deuteronomy we have an additional challenge of the individual because Jewish communities are made by individual and even as I participated in the conversion of five different new Jews today, I will still face those great challenges of assimilation in America.

Just to tell you a couple of stories, I enjoy reading and sometimes I would enjoy the wedding section of New York Times every Sunday because it gives you a light and a look at what is happening in American high society. Now, last week there was a wedding which said that there was a couple that get married we got an Episcopalian priest who performed the ceremony and he had included Jewish and Muslim element to a Persian cleric conducted another ceremony later for them.

Now, how do you get a couple that has a mismatch of Episcopalian and Jewish-Muslim version and then there is an interview on Greg Magazine with Sarah Jessica Parker which is signing a big new movie coming out. It said that her father is Jewish and her husband I think it is her husband Broderick’s mother is also Jewish they consider themselves culture Jews and they are raising some of the same tradition. What does that mean? It means she said, a lot empathy its bagels its wife your selling. But, they have a baby sitter that they said that she was a developed Catholic from Brazil and she says she is scared since she has influence on him too. Alright no problem, do you think I am going to end up going to synagogue. I do not know I will probably end up a unitary she says about her son.

So, that is the extent of Jewish commitment in that couple. Well, obviously we have many problems in America dealing with the assimilation, education, and inculcating Jewish commitment among our own people. And, I asked to do more as told on Deuteronomy of the individual also. And suddenly, we have both those challenges facing us today. For an American-Jewish community, there is really two challenges one is how do we communicate the vitality and beauty and love of Jewish tradition in a way that they are perpetuated? Bring more people to it, keep the people that we have and raise their desire to live even more Jewishly.

At the same time, how do we continue to use our resources and our energy to no longer is Israel are poor stepped shout because it is a very successful country but do what we can to influence the United States to continue the support as all the way it has. President Bush and Israelis though was actually is on speaking may have just left Israel but when I give the sermon a week, some have just been to Israel and get a very strong supportive statement about Israel in Israel.

And for the Jewish people in Israel who made at their home, thank goodness, their responsibility is to help to provide a spiritual center for Jury it is an incubator for Jewish life to the family in Israel to continue to be a light to the nations. Well, if you think about the amazing success as an Israel has, just the first six months of 2008, in every area of technology, in medicine or agriculture compared to what contributions is the Muslim world made in 2008 other than pump oil from their sand it is amazing. And, just today in the newspaper what I am delivering this there was a story that Israel ranks number one in the world by pro life index that would mean anti-abortion.

By putting together all the things that go in to whether a society loves life Israel scored number one in the world in that survey according to the newspapers. It is a testimony to the amazing vitality of that culture despite the fact that it has to spend more than a third of its resources more than any of the nation in the world and just simply surviving against the enemies that surround it.

And so, as we deal with this Tocaka today this Torah portion that is red and a very quick and husky voice because it is so terrifying. And, the way Deuteronomy that comes in a couple a months. When dealing with the national concerns among with the individual concerns. We have to continue in both levels of our person and our people hood to encourage and support and welcome Jewish life. Shalom!


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