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Handing It Over to God Temple Beth­El of Great Neck Rabbi Meir Feldman’s Sermon on Yom Kippur Morning 5776 Rabbi Wolpe Joke It’s a story about two poor Jews taking a walk. They pass by a church with a sign: “Come in, get converted, and receive $50.” They stand there. “What do you think?” One says to the other. “Psh, I’m not going in there.” The other says: “You know what? I’m gonna go in. What does it matter? I’ll go, I’ll get the money. So what.” He goes in. Friend waits outside. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Twenty minutes later, the guy comes out. The one waiting says: “Well, did you do it?” Other, “Yep, I did it.” “Did you get the money?” Other goes: “Psh, that’s all you Jews ever talk about.” ​ ​ This joke is a wake­up call. It makes fun of something so deadly and serious. It highlights the idiocy of anti­semitism. Striving to soften our fear with humor, it reminds us to wake­up. And waking up is the mission of the shofar. We hear it every Rosh Hashanah. It’s true ­­ no one likes their alarm clock. But for some reason, we return every year to hear the primal call of the shofar. But our shofar­alarm not only opens this Season of Forgiveness, it also closes it. Rosh ​ ​ ​ ​ Hashanah’s shevarim­teruah initiates these Days of Awe, and Yom Kippur’s tekiah ​ ​ ​ gedolah concludes them. The shofar unites the brokenness and yearning of Rosh ​ Hashanah and the exultant joy of the close of Yom Kippur. These 10 Days of Awe are a journey and the shofar is our guide. What is its message? “Wake up to what?” we should ask. JOSHUA’S SHOFAR In the books of Joshua, Judges, and Samuel, the shofar warns us ­­ prepare to defend ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ yourselves, prepare for the battle against those who hate us, those who seek to destroy us. For many of us, there is no more serious and urgent message. This is a moment of ​ awakening. On this day, when we feel the blessing and potential of community, the shofar calls us to open our eyes to the anti­Semitic hate that is exploding in Europe and beyond. SHOFAR OF MT. SINAI But on this day and season of introspection, the shofar wants to hold us tight by the shoulders, look with love into our eyes and say: “go deeper. Don’t stop there.” During ​ ​ these Days of Awe, our ears should hearken not only to Joshua’s Jericho, but also to Moses’ Mt. Sinai. We may be sitting in the neck of Long Island, but the shevarim­teruah ​ and the tekiah gedolah, propel us to the foot of Mt. Sinai. ​ ​ If Joshua’s shofar thunders, Mt. Sinai whispers. Wake up to the blessing and the abundance that is bein einekha, right between our eyes­­Tekiah. Note what’s broken ​ ​ ​ ​ inside, honor those quiet tears.­­Shevarim­teruah. Elevate the yearnings for joy and life ​ ​ ­­ Tekiah gedolah. ​ ​ The calls of the shofar guide us on a journey: from evening to nighttime to morning; from fear to wisdom; even to joy. Our journey is from the tekiyah of vision to the ​ ​ gedolah of faith. Done with intention, the final tekiah gedolah tonight can raise for us a ​ ​ ​ mountain of love and purpose and joy. Mt. Sinai’s shofar whispers and speaks and even sings. FAMILIES OF CHARLESTON Friends, I heard this shofar in a most unlikely place, in a Church. It was probably the most powerful tekiyah gedolah I have ever heard: a shofar blast that will forever ring in ​ ​ my mind and form an imprint on my soul. Tara and I decided to make an unusual shiva call. It required a plane flight. We knew none of the mourners, or their loved ones, who had died, two weeks earlier. Let me back up. The time ­ Wednesday, June 17, 6:00 p.m. The place: Mother Emanuel church in Charleston, where folks were doing what 40 of us do every Saturday morning. [Join us, 9:15am. It’s the best way to discover the richness of Jewish learning and community.] They were engaging in their weekly Bible study class, when a 20­year old boy walked in, sat for 45 minutes, and then murdered nine innocent, beautiful human beings. Two days after this hate­filled tragedy, the families of the Charleston 9 appeared at the first court hearing for the murderer. Listen to one report from that hearing: “Relatives ­­ of the nine victims shot down during a Bible study session at their historic black church ­­ confronted the shooting suspect Friday, during his initial court hearing. They spoke of love and forgave him. They advised him to repent for his sins, and asked for God's mercy on his soul.” Myra Thompson was one of the murdered Charleston 9. Her husband, Anthony Thompson, said this in court: "I forgive you. My family forgives you. Take this opportunity to repent. ... and you'll be better off than you are right now." [Myra’s sisters and husband will be with us the weekend of November 6.] Those words, and the other stunning, unimaginable expressions of forgiveness that day, caused Tara and me to make this shiva call. So, a few days later, on July 1, we arrived at the Charleston airport and went straight to Mother Emanuel Church. We immediately met Althea, with whom I had spoken the day before. Althea is an amazing woman, overflowing with love and kindness and compassion, even after her dear friends were murdered in cold blood. For many years, Althea was the assistant for Clementa Pinckney, the extraordinary pastor of Mother Emanuel Church, whom President Obama eulogized on June 26. Friends, we have so much to learn from our Charleston brothers and sisters. I am not exaggerating when I say to you that I would be a better rabbi, a better Jew and a better human being, if I spent some months praying with them, davening in their shul, learning their Torah. So many of us hold grudges, bitterness inside our hearts. So many of us nurse our resentments, as if they are our children. It doesn’t serve us well. It doesn’t raise our ​ ​ days higher. It does not bring God or love or good into our lives. Fifteen hundred years ago, the Talmud taught that our redemption depends entirely on forgiveness. In a volume devoted to justice, the rabbis state that, “Israel will only be redeemed through forgiveness.” Our lives will stand or fall on this one quality, teaches our Talmud. Our Sages surely knew that forgiving is often harder than repenting. To let go of that rage, that weapon, that power, is so much more difficult than to give a heartfelt apology. I have learned from these Charleston families, honestly for the first time, what forgiveness is not and, I think, what it is. Forgiveness is profoundly misunderstood. First, forgiveness is not a “get out of jail free” card. It does not relieve a person from paying the price of his misdeeds. Far from it. [You may not be surprised but I played a lot of Monopoly with my kids this summer.] I am a former federal prosecutor. I know a little about proving guilt and enforcing punishment. That’s a different field entirely from forgiveness. When I left that prosecutor life, I felt grateful to my colleagues for choosing that work. I just didn’t feel that it was my work. Today, I want us to see how easily, and maybe how often, we confuse the work of forgiveness, with the work of enforcing punishment. All too often, we withhold our forgiveness because we don’t want to “let them off the hook.” Be clear, ​ ​ Dylan Roof will likely spend his life behind bars. Second, forgiveness is not something we grant because the other person has changed. It’s not something earned. Two days after his hate­filled murder, our Charleston families gave forgiveness without ever speaking to Dylan Roof, without requesting or receiving anything from him. Lastly, forgiveness is not something we grant one morning, and then say, “been there, done that.” Rather, forgiveness is a daily undertaking. We must return to it, lashuv, we must choose it, embrace it, over and over again. Every day since June 19, our Charleston families are striving to do the torturous work of forgiveness. Our daily liturgy makes this explicit. Every morning we recite the blessing chanun ​ Come to Minyan, on a Tuesday or Thursday .חנון המרבה לסלוח ha’marbeh lisloach ​ morning. Try it once and you’ll discover that every day our liturgy invites us to become gracious and generous granters of forgiveness. We learn three truths from the forgiveness granted by these families immediately after this horrific murder: a) forgiveness is not a “get out of jail free” card; b) the victimizer does not earn, the forgiveness given; and c) The work of forgiveness is never really ​ ​ “done.” ​ ​ APARTHEID, PUMLA Dr. Pumla Gobodo­Madikizela was appointed by Nelson Mandela to serve on South ​ ​ Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Pumla spent hours interviewing Eugene de Kock, who was serving a 212 year sentence for his role as the commanding officer of government death squads. De Kock was responsible for more atrocities than any other individual, in defence of Apartheid and white minority rule. In her award­winning book called, A Human Being Died That Night, Pumla writes about forgiveness and this prolific ​ ​ killer. She writes: “Forgiving may appear to condone the offense, thus further disempowering the victim.

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