Exodus

by Chris Orrey (5 minute read)

 

EXODUS (Merriam-Webster definition)

1. the mainly narrative second book of canonical Jewish and Christian Scripture
2. a mass departure

I am in year one of my journey through six of the world’s major religions. In a year that I envisioned experiencing Passover, attending Shabbat services, eating kosher, and learning Hebrew, I find that my thoughts and literary inspiration keep straying away from Judaism toward politics.

Can religion and politics be separated? Does Trump’s “travel ban,” which disproportionately affects Muslims, fly in the face of the Christian tenet to love thy neighbor as thy self? Do conservative Christians separate their religious beliefs from their political activities in opposing abortion? Do Jews have an obligation to aid strangers, since the Torah reminds Jews that they, too, were once a stranger in a strange land?

And if a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not do him wrong. The stranger that sojourner with you shall be unto you as the home-born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. (Exodus 19:33-34)

My partner, Cynthia, says you can’t separate religion from politics. She contends that they are intertwined; that everything we do is a political act. She gave an example of the simple act of us – two women – walking hand-in-hand down the streets of San Francisco, as a political act that makes a statement, even in this liberal city. We pondered the myriad of political acts and choices that we make each day and were hard-pressed to find anything that couldn’t be connected to politics in some way.

The recent Torah portions I have been studying have been from the Book of Exodus. In Exodus, God sent ten plagues to Egypt to show the ruling pharaoh His might and to convince the pharaoh to release the Israelites from slavery. The content of Exodus and my experience of studying the Bible will be forthcoming in my next blog post, but for now it is the idea of thousands of people travelling hundreds of miles to a new home that has been pawing away at my mind.

Cynthia and I watched a documentary this past week – Exodus – from PBS Frontline. The film, released in December of 2016, displayed the magnitude of the refugee crisis – over one million people smuggled themselves into Europe in 2015 alone – while telling the stories of the very real people who risked their lives for the dream of a better life.

The exodus in the Bible engaged my brain. Did this really happen? Could there have been ecological events that were similar to the plagues? What kind of God could commit a mass murder of human and animal first borns because of the actions of the pharaoh? Who wrote this book again?

But seeing the very real exodus happening today by thousands and thousands of refugees engaged my heart. In Exodus, filmmaker James Bluemel provides an inside look at the very real people fleeing their homes because of war or poverty. The film contains the best and worst of humanity – from the human traffickers risking refugees’ lives for their own financial gain to the young men who jump out of the overcrowded dinghies and into the frigid sea so that women, children and the elderly can stay dry and afloat while attempting to cross the Mediterranean from Turkey to Greece.

I was appalled to learn that desperate refugees bought life jackets that turned out to be fake, causing the wearer to sink instead of float. According to the International Organization for Migration, there have been 574 migrant deaths in 2017 thus far, 366 of which were in the Mediterranean. Anybody who watches the news or follows social media can recall the photograph of 3-year-old Aylan Kurdi, whose lifeless body washed ashore in Turkey after his family’s tragic drowning as they fled war-torn Syria.

Which takes me back to politics…

The United States has taken in about 15,000 Syrian refugees since 2012, according to CNN’s Peter Bergen. This is a staggeringly low .2% – yes, that is a decimal point in there – of the 5 million Syrian refugees. Not one of those Syrian refugees has been implicated in a terrorist attack against the United States. Yet, the current U.S. president seeks to ban any additional entry into the U.S. by Syrian refugees, citing national security. That is politics.

Which takes me back to religion…

This week’s Torah portion is called Mishpatim, a section of Exodus. In her own take on Mishpatim, Kehilla Synagogue spiritual leader Sharon Grodin explained in Shabbat service that this part of the Torah has a long list of rules for daily living. One such rule is in Exodus 23:5, which Sharon called “the rule about donkeys.”

If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under its burden, thou shalt forbear to pass by him; thou shalt surely release it with him.

Sharon translated for us. If we were walking along the road and saw a donkey struggling with its load, we should help it with its load, even if the donkey belongs to our enemy. She pointed out that the presumption here is we will not want to help the donkey of our enemy, as that would be helping our enemy do their business. In typical rabbinical fashion, Sharon took this story deeper. Why should we help the donkey of our enemy? This was a participatory Shabbat service and congregants had many thoughts. The animal is innocent and we should help it. The donkey is a member of the community. The enemy is a member of the community. Helping members of our community makes the community stronger.

What if we put it into today’s terms and make it a car instead of a donkey, one congregant asked? What if we encounter a car broken down on the side of the road and it has a bumper sticker on it espousing political beliefs of which we intensely dislike? (I know, I know. Difficult to imagine in today’s political climate.) What happens if we do nothing? What if we drive right by? What if our “enemy” is on his or her way to a life-saving mission? What if in our fear we do not stop to assist them, causing a tragic unintended consequence? And what if the person in that car isn’t our enemy at all?

Sharon massaged the dialogue, asking questions that confronted our egos. What if it is not our place to judge? What if it is not our place to decide that the person with the evil bumper sticker is our enemy? Even though it may be our instinct to pass judgment, or to act a certain way – such as passing an enemy’s donkey as it struggles with a too-heavy burden – maybe our Divine work is to be kind, even to our perceived enemies. That’s not easy work; thus the capital D in Divine. Yet, it is important work, critical work, life-saving work, maybe even soul-saving work.

Maybe, suggests Rabbi Matt Zerwekh, the actual heart of Parashat Mishpatim is compassion. “Torah reminds us that while we should recall that we were once strangers in Egypt, the reminder of prior pain is only the beginning. We must take the pain in our history and use it to motivate us to action.”[i]

My favorite temple, reform synagogue Congregation B’nai Israel in Sacramento, is doing just that. Senior Rabbi Mona Alfi, the CBI Board of Directors and their congregation voted to make their synagogue a sanctuary for refugees and undocumented immigrants. Despite being firebombed in 1999 – and despite today’s increasing incidents of anti-Semitism – CBI has chosen to face the risks and become a “sanctuary synagogue.” CBI member Bernie Marks, himself a survivor of the Holocaust, was a leader in this decision, recalling the lack of national response to the Holocaust in 1939.[ii]

Maybe this is what Cynthia felt, this call to turn pain into action. After watching Exodus, she researched agencies that assist refugees and made a donation to the International Rescue Committee. I don’t believe she was thinking about politics or religion when she did this. I imagine she was feeling compassion for the very real people fleeing their lifelong homes. I imagine she was feeling empathy for the millions of children travelling hundreds of miles to an unknown destination. I imagine she was feeling grief for 3-year-old Aylan, whose life was so tragically taken as his family desperately fled their home. I imagine she was feeling grateful for her own home, and the safety and security we take for granted. I imagine she was feeling grateful for our own sons, and our grandson, and the health and security of our friends and families. I know I was.

 

 

“Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.” – Albert Einstein

[The International Rescue Committee was founded at Albert Einstein’s request. Donations can be made at www.rescue.org]

 

[i] http://www.reformjudaism.org/learning/torah-study/mishpatim/moral-imperative-stranger

[ii] http://www.abc10.com/news/local/sacramento-synagogue-declares-itself-a-sanctuary-congregation/413736162