Rabbi Elizabeth Dunsker
Erev Rosh Hashanah 5786
Congregation Kol Ami Vancouver, WA
Screaming
As the time clicks down closer and closer to the High Holy Days, I regularly get asked what I will be speaking about during my sermons. Every year as I prepare, I try to think about where we Jews are in the world, how it’s going for us as a whole. Are our children safe? Is the world safer and better both because of Jews and for Jews. Are we as a people serving as a light to the nations, which is the essential calling the Torah assigns for us. Where could we do better and where could the world be better for us? Every year I try to evaluate that and speak to some part of it that I think we might all need to hear.
This year I’ve thought that possibly, possibly, the best sermon I could give might just be to stand here, look out at all of you, and offer a primal scream. And by primal scream I don’t mean just a little aaaah! I’ve been imagining something more like I start yelling from deep in my kishkes with crazy eyes, spittle flying, and it just keeps going and going, beyond a reasonable amount of time. I keep screaming for so long that you all look at each other wondering what to do about the crazy rabbi on the bima who’s just up there yelling. I keep screaming for so long that it becomes clear to you that you must also begin to scream. I have imagined and hoped that by offering my deepest, most emotional scream it might open the floodgates for all of you, and that my screaming would make it easier for you to all begin screaming with me. Our cries would carry from Congregation Kol Ami south to all of the synagogues in Portland and north to all of the synagogues in Seattle and they would pick up the screaming and it would continue north and south from there. And then our sounds would continue east and west across the ocean, until all of the Jews across the country and across the world sitting in Erev Rosh Hashanah services would also be crying out from their kishkes and our cries would be so loud that they might stir God in the way that God was finally, finally moved by the cries of the Israelite slaves in Egypt. Perhaps stirred by those cries, God would send us our own Moses to turn the world we have, the one full of violence and hate, cruelty and disease, one where it feels less and less safe for Jews every day, into the world we want—a world full of safety, peace, health, and love. How amazing that would be!
But then, when I started to imagine things a little more realistically, I thought, if I stood here and actually started to scream like that, the more likely scenario is that the microphones would make that horrible “it’s too loud” screech, everyone would cover their ears, possibly people would feel forced to flee from the room, and those left behind would roll their eyes at me, or laugh out of confusion or thinking I was just trying to be funny and failing. I would eventually have to just finish up services, wish you a Shanah Tovah, and we might either all just pretend nothing strange had happened. Or, more likely, some people would start writing some emails or make some phone calls, and for sure someone would suggest I needed some help. And nothing in the world would have changed. My offering here on the bima my scream from the kishkes realistically would not wake the congregations from here even to Portland and certainly not at the other end of the country let alone the world. Because, how could it really. How could one crazy middle aged lady rabbi in one small Jewish congregation in one small American city change much of anything at all?
And I think really, that’s where I’ve been stuck while thinking about what to say this Erev Rosh Hashanah. What is it that I could possibly say that would change anything? This, by the way is not a critique of you all, you’re great. I mean that for real. You, my congregation are kind, and generous, and passionate. You are thoughtful and inciteful, you are knowledgeable, you read and you listen. You take care of each other, you take care of me and my family, you take care of the greater Vancouver community. I brag about how amazing my congregation is regularly to other rabbis. And I was very pleased last weekend when our scholar-in-residence, Rabbi Berkowitz also commented on what an amazing congregation we have here. And perhaps it’s because you are already a great community that I wonder what it is you might need to hear from me this year, and why you might need to hear anything at all from me. What do I actually have to offer?
Later this year, along with my rabbinical school classmates, we will mark thirty years since our ordination. That makes this the 29th year that I have taken part in leading High Holy Day services since my ordination as a rabbi. To be completely honest, I did lead High Holy Day services as a student rabbi, but I’m not sure anyone would count that as actually leading. Every year I think, maybe this year I’ll feel like I know what I’m doing and this might be the year that the sermons just write themselves. And every year, this one included, there I am writing down to the wire, trying to cram everyone else’s good ideas into my head so that I might present that learning to you in some coherent way that moves us all forward. And still 29 years in, I fear that my voice makes no difference at all, and I still wonder why any congregation, believes I have it in me to move you in some way.
All that aside, I know that I am not alone in feeling like no matter how loudly I scream it probably won’t change anything. And possibly screaming is the wrong action here, that’s just making noise really. But so many people feel like their voices, even with carefully considered words spoken at the right time to the right people, don’t matter at all in the grand scheme. The irony is that we are bogged down and overloaded by everyone sharing their opinions on everything whether they know what they are talking about or not. Myself included. Media, social and otherwise does a lot of talking for us, so much so that we start to mimic what we hear without always knowing what we are saying. Or understanding the full implications of those words and opinions.
The writer, producer, director, and performer, Tina Fey once said, “The beauty of impostor syndrome is you vacillate between extreme egomania and a complete feeling of: ‘I’m a fraud!’”[1] I don’t believe she’s the only successful person to feel that way. I think many accomplished people feel like that a lot of the time. I also think that perhaps this year, maybe more so than in other years, we the Jewish people are also experiencing our own kind of impostor syndrome.
We Jews are generally comfortable here in the United States, we are citizens, we own property and businesses, we are highly educated, we are celebrities and doctors and teachers and scientists and writers and community volunteers and mechanics and garbage collectors and elected officials and models and Nobel prize winners and sometimes even athletes. And yet we are afraid that it could all go away in an instant, we could lose our citizenship and our safety and our businesses and our homes and our schools. Because we’ve seen it happen before. We often feel both safe enough to raise our voices on behalf of others and too unsafe to raise our voices for ourselves. We can feel empathy for the pain the world suffers but we wonder both privately and aloud if we are responsible for our own struggles. We wonder if our own actions, those of the Jewish people writ large are somehow the reason that antisemitism continues. We might even wonder if maybe we are responsible for much of the pain in the world, maybe we must either call it out or hide, in order to survive. To be clear, I do not believe that to be true, but I think we sometimes wonder if it is. We here in a small congregation in a small American city, as one of our members correctly points out to me regularly, we this wonderful community of intelligent people, are not even prepared to write to our small local community newspaper in support of Jewish causes when others have written incorrectly about Israel and about the Jewish people. We are afraid it will make us less safe to call out the inaccuracies in the newspaper and we might also even wonder if perhaps we are safer if we just let them say those things even when they are terrible and even when they are wrong. Or, maybe we just don’t have the time, energy, and strength for it. Maybe it just makes us want to scream.
It is only when Moses stops and notices that there is a bush on fire that doesn’t burn that God calls out to him and assigns him the task of bringing the Israelites out of slavery. Only when he notices something has changed in the normal order of things does God call to him. But when Moses hears what he is meant to do, he says,
אֶל־פַּרְעֹ֑ה וְכִ֥י אוֹצִ֛יא אֶת־בְּנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵ֖ל מִמִּצְרָֽיִם׃
“Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and free the Israelites from Egypt,” [2] In the Midrash, Pirkei de Rabbi Eliezer teaches that Moses tells God, “3 or 4 times that he has no power[3].” Time after time after time, Moses says, “I feel like I can’t do it, I’m not skilled enough, you have the wrong guy.” But God won’t let Moses give up that easily.[4]
Perhaps like Moses, we are afraid the words we have aren’t good enough, perhaps we fear that they won’t be heard correctly. Moses was the adopted prince raised in the Palace who turns his back on that royal family. Sometimes we the Jewish people might also wonder if our place is earned or if we are pretending at something. Both egomaniac and total fraud. We are not really royal and we are also not really slaves either.
As you know, God sends his brother Aaron to help him and speak for him until Moses feels ready to speak for himself. Because that’s what family and community can do for us, we can stand with each other and speak for each other when we don’t feel like we can speak for ourselves. Moses is not the only one who doesn’t feel up to the task of speaking out. Every prophet is concerned that they cannot possibly do what God is asking of them. Each one feels that they are not special enough or strong enough or brave enough. Esther is concerned that speaking to the king puts her in danger, and Mordechai almost rolls his eyes at her. She’s there in the castle beloved by the King, who else could possibly say it better, and yet even she does not feel safe enough to speak out for her people. But like Moses and Esther and every other prophet, if we do not speak out for the safety, dignity, and respect for the Jewish people everywhere in the world who else could? We, who are artists, and elected officials, and business owners, and doctors, and citizens, and even athletes and all the rest. It is hard to speak out alone and so we need each other to speak out with us.
Since the time of Abraham, we Jews have disagreed with each other about what to do and how to do it. We disagree about every course of action and every law and every everything. And that is a strength we have. We can disagree about politics and we for sure can disagree about Israel and about the war in Gaza. But what we should never disagree about is the value of Jews and Jewish community and the value of Jewish safety and dignity in the world.
In the end, the Torah tells us that Moses, who was afraid to speak, Moses who didn’t know if he was royalty or a slave, Moses who was never quite sure where his home was or where he belonged, Never again did there arise in Israel a prophet like Moses. And yet other prophets did arise and other prophets have spoken out to save our people at important moments throughout history. All of whom felt unprepared for the task.
A scream, no matter how filled with emotion it may be. No matter how loud, how consuming, no matter how much relief it might provide, is not the same as lifting up our voices with words. The world is full of voices, most of whom have no idea what they are talking about and plenty of them get attention and bring action. Your voice, my voice, is at least as competent as those, but most likely more competent, because when we are talking about Jewish experience and Jewish concerns and Jewish safety and Jewish dignity, we actually do know exactly what we are talking about.
In the end I decided the sermon I needed to give to you tonight was the one I also needed to hear. Yes, even me a crazy middle aged lady rabbi in a small congregation in a small American city has words to offer. My words may not move the world, they might not even move you my wonderful community, but I am hopeful they will at least move me. And maybe if I start there, if I find the value in myself and my own words I can be a model for each of you to find the value in your words. I would love to see more of your names printed in the Columbian and the Oregonian, and all the other places where opinions are read and considered. I would love to hear how you stood up for Jewish concerns and safety in the workplace and in our school districts. I would love to hear the arguments here between all of us about how to do that even better. Now, when our world feels riskier than ever for Jews is exactly the time that our words count. A good scream can accomplish a lot, but good words can create worlds.
May the New Year, 5786 be one where the world gets safer for Jews and everyone else, may it be a year when we stand up even more for ourselves, each other, and all those who need support. May we be like Moses and Esther standing up to tyrants wherever we find them, and may we also remember the words of Rabbi Tarfon who taught that while we may not be required to complete the work of making the world we have into the one we want, we are also not permitted to abstain from that most important work. A Moses will come, a Moses always comes, possibly that person or people are in the room tonight. Ken Yehi Ratzon, may this be God’s will.
[1] Tina Fey, “Tina Fey—from Spoofer to Movie Stardom,” interview by The Independent, The Independent, March 19, 2010.
[2] Exodus 3:11
[3] Pirkei De Rabbi Eliezer Chapter 40
[4] Thank you to Rabbi Jamie Field for directing me to this bit of Midrash, and here I have borrowed words from his excellent Senior Sermon on the topic of imposter syndrome.