Ahz mah (So what)

Recently, a high school student contacted me. He was writing a newspaper article on the phenomenon of "Holocaust denial," and wanted to hear my thoughts on the subject. He provided me with a few questions to choose from, and I picked one. In the end he only used a couple of sentences from my response. Here is my complete answer: What leads people to become Holocaust deniers? One answer: It is obviously a form of antisemitism. But that simply begs the question: What leads people to be antisemitic? To me, this question leads straight down into the dark, mysterious underside of the human mind. What is it about the human mind that makes it capable of irrationality, hatred, violence? I think that we tend to forget how young human consciousness is in terms of “geologic” time. Civilization is merely a thin veneer, and scratching the surface may be enough to uncover a fearful, potentially vicious animal response to perceived threat. Having been trained both as a psychologist and mor...

In chapter 19 of the biblical book of Exodus, the Israelite people are preparing for the revelation at Mount Sinai. God is giving Moses instructions about how it’s all going to happen. Here is the first instruction Moses gets: “Say this to the people: You yourselves saw what I did… and how I carried you on the wings of eagles and I brought you to me. And now, if you will really listen to my voice and keep my covenant, you will become for me a treasure among all the peoples, for all the earth is mine….” You will become for me a treasure among all the peoples. The standard understanding of this biblical verse is that the Jewish people will be somehow special, or privileged, or “chosen.” The Chosen People. What does it mean to say that we’re the Chosen People? Oy, Jews (and non-Jews) have been arguing about that for the past two thousand years! So instead of going in that direction, I would like to share another interpretation of this verse – an interpretation which I think is re...

[excerpted from my remarks on the occasion of being installed as Rabbi at Temple Kol Tikvah, 12/5/2010] Pharaoh has two dreams which he cannot understand – seven fat cows eaten by seven skinny cows, seven fat ears of grain eaten by seven skinny ears of grain – and he is very anxious. Joseph (a young Hebrew slave at this point) is fetched from prison to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams. Joseph explains that the dreams are one, that both are prophesying seven years of abundance followed by seven years of famine. Joseph then gives Pharaoh some management advice about how to prepare for the famine, and Pharaoh accepts his advice and puts Joseph in charge of carrying out the plan. Here is what’s amazing about this story: Pharaoh trusts Joseph. Pharaoh puts his faith in Joseph. Pharaoh hands Joseph the authority to radically restructure Egyptian society. And on what basis? All that Pharaoh knows about Joseph up until this moment is what he heard from his royal butler: that Joseph once successfull...