people a moral blank check. Moreover, God’s we not live in a “post-ethnic America”? highly particularistic covenant with Abraham Amos’ words should be sobering. They may is intended to bless all humanity. So central is be bad theology, but triumphalistic notions of election to the Bible that contemporary Jews election are not rare. And so, chosenness leaves who wish to have a theology rooted in scrip- us with a paradox: From a biblical perspective, ture have no choice but to reckon with chosen- Jews are elected to serve God and, by extension, ness. To jettison the language of chosenness, I to question themselves. fear, is to jettison the Bible itself. In confronting chosenness, Jewish theology The notion of election faces many chal- faces many questions, none of them easy: In this Shma.com lenges in contemporary Jewish culture. In order day and age, do we find it plausible to believe in to speak of election coherently, one has to af- the kind of God who loves and chooses? Can we firm a God capable of making a choice — that talk about covenant without chosenness? Can is, a personal God who has a will. (It is no co- we affirm election without deluding ourselves incidence that Mordecai Kaplan, founder of into thinking that we have a monopoly on God’s Reconstructionist Judaism, denied both the bib- love? Is it enough to affirm election as a subjec- lical God and the concept of chosenness; he un- tive, experiential claim, but not as a metaphysi- derstood how entwined these two concepts really cal one? One thing is clear: To be an inheritor of are.) Moreover, we live in a time when, in some the Jewish tradition is to grapple with the pow- quarters, even speaking of the Jews as a people erful, mysterious, enchanting, disturbing idea is considered troubling and outdated; after all, do that we are God’s chosen people. Rabbi Rachel Sabath Beit- Halachmi is the national director of recruitment and Are Jews ‘Chosen’? admissions and a president’s In an exchange of letters, Rachel Sabath Beit-Halachmi and Aryeh Bernstein discuss how their scholar at the Hebrew Union thinking about chosenness has changed over time — whether chosenness, today, is a notion College-Jewish Institute that is instructive or detrimental to Jewish life. They consider how chosenness influences our of Religion in Cincinnati. relationships with Israel and the concept of peoplehood. Ordained at HUC-JIR, Sabath has a doctorate in Jewish Shalom, Aryeh, believe in a more universalist approach — are philosophy from the Jewish Theological Seminary of hat does chosenness mean for us often the same people who most severely criti- America. She also teaches at as Jews today? Should it still guide cize the State of Israel. But I feel that a deep un- the Shalom Hartman Institute Whow we act? I believe that the idea derstanding of chosenness allows for a deeper in Jerusalem. of chosenness must remain central to how we understanding of the complexities of nation- understand ourselves. That we are a chosen hood and statehood. Given our modern uni- Aryeh Bernstein is the coordinator of the Back- people is a core aspect of what it means to be versal ethics and pluralist contexts, chosenness to-Basics program for Jewish. It is rooted in the origins of our people, may seem foreign. But chosenness does not the Mishkan community in the biblical narratives of Abraham (Genesis mean we see ourselves as superior to others. (mishkanchicago.org) in 12) and in the redemption and revelation that Rather, it affirms that we have a particular role Chicago. After fourteen years in made us who we are. Exodus 19 says it in three to play and a particular relationship with God Israel, where he was director of different ways. First, we are an am segulah, pre- that demands creating and sustaining an ethi- activist learning for the TAKUM cious to God, as well as mamlekhet kohanim, cal society. The command to protect the most beit midrash for human rights (takumbeitmidrash.com), he God’s nation of priests, and a holy nation or vulnerable in the ancient world is no less es- has returned to his native people, a goy kadosh. It is significant that this sential today. And Israel, today, has the obliga- Chicago. He has also worked is how God names us at the moment we are tion and opportunity to be the nation that most as director of alumni affairs & given the Torah with its commandments to cre- protects the vulnerable and most ensures the recruitment at Mechon Hadar, ate an ethical society. I understand these three rights of all its citizens. This is what it means and continues as editor-at- statements to mean that from ancient times to to be a holy nation. large at Jewschool.com and editor-translator for the Koren the present era, whether we were celebrated In order to maintain this possibility of both English edition of the Steinsaltz or decimated, we understood ourselves to be peoplehood and ethics, it is essential that all Talmud. He is a board member precious, priestly, and holy. Jews understand their role as a chosen people, of Jewish Public Media, has Many Jewish thinkers have questioned this chosen to create and sustain Israel in all its led high holiday services at idea of chosenness — including the founder of struggles and in all its strivings. Whether we New York’s Kehilat Hadar since Reconstructionist Judaism, Rabbi Mordecai M. lovingly critique or more easily embrace the 2002, and has been involved in the founding and nurturing Kaplan. And today, many who criticize the no- specific policies of any particular government, of egalitarian learning and tion of chosenness for its particularist commit- the value of supporting the state of the Jewish prayer communities throughout ments — especially those on the far left who people should remain foundational. Israel and the U.S.

Feb-March 2015 | Shevat-Adar 5775 [5] For people who don’t see the connection Here’s my stab at it: The association of cho- between chosenness and commitment to the senness with superiority reflects the faulty as- State of Israel, is it a failure of understanding or sumption that what I know is all there is to be a failure of education? Is it that their universal known, that since I can testify to our chosenness sense of ethics has trumped their particularist because I remember Sinai, and since I have no identities? And, if so, what does this discomfort personal knowledge of anyone else’s chosen- with particularist Jewish commitments mean ness, therefore, we must be the only people to for Jewish peoplehood as the global realities have been chosen. However, other peoples know Shma.com continue to become more complex? things we don’t know and have their own inspira- With respect for our friendship and tion. Our covenant is no evidence of superiority. chevruta, Rachel Sabath Beit-Halachmi The reason non-Jews cannot testify to Sinai is simply that they weren’t there. I mean that poeti- ••• cally; I’ll translate this into prose: Culture exists Shalom, Rachel, and inheritors of a culture have something unique I agree that chosenness is integral to Jewish to contribute to the world. It would be spiritually life and that chosenness should not be under- colonialist for me to testify to any other people’s stood to imply superiority. However, some of your chosenness or revelation. My role is to listen and definitions seem to obscure more than reveal. For take people at their word, at their testimony to example, you say that chosenness “affirms that their experience, just as I hope they’ll take my we have a particular role to play…that demands word and listen to my testimony of my experience. creating and sustaining an ethical society.” But The character of this chosenness is our is creating and sustaining an ethical society the unique, particular story. When we are called to Jewish people’s particular role? Isn’t it our gen- the Torah, we say, “Praised are You…God…Who eral role, one that we share with all peoples? chose us from among the nations by giving us The state of Israel “has the obligation…to the Torah.” But all nations — all humanity — are be the nation that most protects the vulnerable responsible for a universal ethics as encapsu- and most ensures the rights of all its citizens.” lated by the seven Noahide laws that ordain core Why most? I agree that Israel has no less obliga- guidelines of civilized, human life. tion than anyone else, but why more? And why is Every nation must sustain an ethical culture. protecting citizens’ rights “what it means to be a As Jews, we must sustain the particular ethical holy nation”? Isn’t that just what it means to be culture shaped by having been slaves in Egypt, a nation? guided through the desert, etc. We are chosen to By contrast, you then distinguish people- serve as we are and it seems as though every- hood from ethics and identify chosenness with one else probably is, too. “creat[ing] and sustain[ing] Israel in all its strug- With regard to the State of Israel, I wonder: gles and… strivings.” You situate chosenness in Does Israel magnify or compromise our applica- tension with a universal sense of ethics that has tion of a particular, ethical culture? If it manifests perhaps “trumped” the “particularist identities” a chauvinist understanding of chosenness, how of those who don’t connect their sense of cho- should nonchauvinists interact with it? senness to a commitment to the State of Israel. B’vrakhah, Aryeh Bernstein Sh’ma How do you understand chosenness — as our ••• in your Inbox universal ethics or our particular nationalism? Take advantage of our You express concern that many Jews are Dear Aryeh, FREE Sh’ma e-letter. not sufficiently embracing Israel and they are I am grateful for your responses and your Every month, you’ll eschewing chosenness; perhaps this is because questions, because they highlight chosenness receive updates on they understand the current conception of cho- as what God uniquely commanded us to be. featured essays, senness as chauvinistic, and that it is this cho- This notion is essential to our identity, because S Blog posts, online art senness that creates the vulnerability to abuse it defines our uniqueness and our particular and exhibitions, exclusive for the most unprotected people in Israel: asy- universal mission as a people. Without a partic- bulk copy offers, lum-seekers, foreign workers, and Palestinians. ular commitment to the sacred narratives, eth- unique opportunities Terms such as “precious,” “priestly,” and “holy” ics, and commandments that are at the core of for subscribers, and are often associated with feelings of superiority our identity and spirituality, we have little that much more! — among those who embrace chosenness as is unique to us through which we can ground Sign up now at well as those who don’t. If we want to promote a our identity. God still wants us to create in our shma.com non-chauvinistic sense of chosenness, we need contemporary world the society of justice and to articulate that vision more clearly. ethics that we were once chosen to create.

[6] Feb-March 2015 | Shevat-Adar 5775 This does not mean that the unique foun- and sustaining an ethical society in the Land of dations of other peoples are less worthy, and Israel. We thus learn that we must be very care- we must vigilantly guard against perspectives ful as a nation and as individuals in the State that use chosenness to devalue or demonize of Israel today. While we have a right to defend other people. ourselves as well as the land, it is clear that it is Yes, our simultaneous commitment to both conditional upon moral behavior. universal and particular ethics certainly includes If we are not creating an ethical society in — perhaps, even necessitates — both ancient the ancient Land of Israel or in the sovereign Shma.com and contemporary forms of nationalism. And State of Israel, we must repent. We must engage though we have survived historically as a people in the necessary self-scrutiny and cheshbon without sovereignty, we are told in the Bible to hanefesh (accounting of the soul) to reorient create and steward an ethical society. Carrying ourselves, to recalibrate and do whatever we out this obligation is dependent on some form can to ensure that we are worthy of our cho- of national existence. But that sovereignty is de- senness, worthy of being God’s partners, wor- pendent upon our ethical behavior. We have to thy of the gift of God’s Torah, and worthy of earn the right to live in the Land of Israel every residing in the Land of Israel. I do not believe day. Deuteronomy 11:12 and Leviticus 18:28 that there can ever be a point at which one can crudely warn us that we will be vomited out of relinquish such a gift or its responsibilities. the land for not observing the commandments With respect for our friendship and that God chose for us to receive about creating chevruta, Rachel Living in a Chosen Land: America Claude S. Fischer

n irony of the American Jewish expe- led “as Israel of old.” Abraham Lincoln hedged rience: Just as America’s Christian by calling Americans the “almost chosen,” but as A leaders donned the Jews’ mantle of the Civil War raged on, his religious sensibilities “chosenness” to explain and justify the new intensified. By his second inaugural, Americans’ nation, America’s Jewish leaders shrugged off chosenness — just like that of the Israelites — that cloak to ease Jewish entry into America. also entailed punishment for moral failure: “So, Ministers of the dissident Protestants who still, it must be said, ‘The judgments of the Lord settled New England cast their flock as a new are true and righteous altogether.’” “children of Israel” who were fleeing a new pha- raoh and carrying a new covenant to the new In a nation defined from virtually the start as remarkably Promised Land. Although the Puritans were a egalitarian, claiming a special tie to God — even a strange regional sect that dissolved within a few secularized, sanitized version of that tie — sounds wrong. generations in America, their ideas have had a lasting force throughout the history of this nation. Over the generations, though the language Invocations of biblical language (the King James of chosenness shifted, the core sensibility re- version) and Israelite comparisons persisted be- mained. The “Manifest Destiny” of the 19th cen- yond the American Revolution, further fueled by tury combined America’s providential selection evangelical Protestants calling for the (final) ar- with a mission to save the heathens; they were rival of the Messiah. (Note that praise showered to convert or perish like so many Canaanites. the “Israelites of old,” not the Jews of the day.) Conservatives recently repurposed the 20th- American religious and political leaders ex- century phrase, “American exceptionalism” — plicitly or implicitly drew on chosenness rhetoric coined by socialists debating America’s seeming for generations. Todd Gitlin and Leil Leibovitz’s immunity to class revolution — into a claim of Claude S. Fischer is the book, The Chosen Peoples: America, Israel and special, probably divine, election. Television Natalie Cohen Professor of the Ordeals of Divine Election, compiles exam- personality Sean Hannity declares that the Sociology at the University of ples up to the present. George Washington, for United States “is the greatest, best country God California, Berkeley. The author instance, referred to “the Divine Arm visibly out- has ever given man on the face of the earth” — of Made in America: A Social History of American Culture stretched for our deliverance,” and Bible skeptic greater, one assumes, than the original Promised and Character, he serves on Thomas Jefferson labeled America as “a chosen Land. Conservatives harassed President Barack the board of Berkeley’s Center country” into which our fathers were divinely Obama, demanding that he declare his faith in for Jewish Studies.

Feb-March 2015 | Shevat-Adar 5775 [7]