Parashat Yitro
5 February 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
Two lives. The first is the life of the soldier and businessman Captain Sir Tom Moore who died on Tuesday 2 February in hospital, following a diagnosis of Covid-19. It was Captain Sir Tom’s daughter who originally suggested that he walk round the garden at her home where he lived in Bedfordshire to mark his 100th birthday in April 2020. In April, we were in lockdown; many had lost their lives in the pandemic, others were on ventilators in hospitals. It was a scary and traumatic time and Captain Tom hoped to raise £1,000 to help NHS staff. That target was quickly exceeded. By the time he celebrated his birthday, the fund had reached £3 million and two weeks later, with donations from 53 countries around the world, he had raised £32.8 million.
There was a quiet invincibility about Captain Tom, who had left school to become an apprentice civil engineer. Dressed immaculately in shirt, tie and blazer, his stoicism and resolve to thank the NHS for the care he had received were inspiring and moving. Such qualities seemed to come from a different era, taking us back to his time in the 8th battalion of the Duke of Wellington’s Regiment, where he was selected for officer training. He had served in India and in the Burma Campaign.
Witness statement by veterans, fighting in the Far East in the Second World War, don’t often focus on the darker side of events in that part of the world. But Leslie Cole’s painting Burma - 14th Army: The Battle of the Sittang Bend, portrays the desperate figures of soldiers, holding their guns aloft or over their shoulders, wading through a flooded paddy field during the monsoon, water up to their thighs, the sky black with swirling clouds and windswept trees appearing in the distance. And there is a disorientation among the men, some pressing forward, others stopping to look back. Apart from the extreme weather, there was rampant disease and difficult terrain to negotiate in Burma.
It was from this that Captain Tom Moore returned to be stationed as an instructor at the armoured vehicles school of fighting in Dorset and eventually as a salesman for a roofing materials company in Yorkshire. He went on to become managing director of a concrete products company.
On his 100th birthday, he was honoured with a fly-past by a Spitfire and Hurricane, gracefully tipping their wings from one side to the other. ‘I’m one of the few people,’ said Sir Tom, ‘who have seen Spitfires and Hurricanes flying past in anger. Fortunately, today they are flying past peacefully.’
In an interview with the BBC, his daughter by his side, he offered his philosophy of life: ‘Tomorrow you will maybe find everything much better than today even if today was all right. That’s the way I’ve always looked at things. Tomorrow will be a good day.’
And on Covid, he said, ‘If I get it, I get it. I’m not worried at all. You have endless chances of dying. In the end everyone has to have a turn. It has to happen sometime.’
The second life is less well-known. Dylan McFarlane, whose shorter obituary appeared in the paper on the same day as Captain Sir Tom Moore’s, also trained as an engineer; a man with a brilliant mind, dedicated to improving the lives of small-scale mining communities all over the world. He won one scholarship after the other and was awarded a first-class honours degree in human geography and sustainable development. He worked in Alaska, his home state, Chile, Colombia and Tanzania. He helped to improve the lives of miners in some of the poorest parts of the world, pushing for safer conditions and better remuneration in places as far afield as Burundi, Myanmar, Rwanda, Sudan, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Both Sir Tom Moore and McFarlane had engineering backgrounds; both had spent time in Myanmar, both had had two partners, both had two daughters. Both seemed to have a calm and easy-going manner and both had experienced their own struggles in life. We know little of what Captain Tom must have experienced during the war or what it must have been like to return from India and the Far East. He had been in hospital and received treatment from the NHS in recent years. McFarlane had a long struggle with mental health issues, but had concealed the true extent of his suffering. He took his own life at the age of 35.
Two lives – two full, selfless, generous, thoughtful lives. One of a man who lived one hundred years and one who had scarcely left behind his youth. Both leave behind the immense loss, in one case of a father and grandfather, the other of a partner, parents, sister and young children. Both accomplished much in their lives, both looked to the improvement of life for others. One reached his ripe old age, the other – his life had not even reached forty.
‘For all creatures death has been prepared from the beginning’ says the midrash in a famous commentary on Moses’ request to God to avert his mortality. It falls on all humanity – some in the fullness of old age, others before their years are done. Their days cease from the world, but they themselves abide, as it says ‘In whose hand is the soul of all the living.’
Even after their death, the righteous are called ‘living’ – whether their souls live in the world to come or their lives remain in the hearts of those who remember them, the lives of both these men – the older and the younger - will endure always as a blessing and as a continual influence for good.
Shabbat Shalom,
Alexandra Wright
Equality vs Equity
12 February 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
Four Shabbatot before Passover have special names. They relate thematically to Purim or Pesach. This Saturday we are marking Shabbat Shekalim. Its name comes from the word shekel – the name of modern Israel’s currency that originates from an ancient Near Eastern unit of weight - roughly 9 grams.
An additional Torah passage is read on Shabbat Shekalim - Exodus 30:11-16. It describes a census requiring every Israelite to contribute a half shekel of silver to support the worship in the tent of meeting. The egalitarian nature of this contribution is emphasized in the principle that 'the rich shall not pay more, and the poor shall not pay less than half a shekel.' Many Torah commentators suggest that the requirement that all individuals contribute equally to the community helped develop a sense of unity crucial to the new nation created by the Exodus. Rabbis use this passage to argue that Judaism supports equality for all – regardless of people’s income, origin or position in society. I think there is more in its message.
Shabbat Shekalim takes place on the week prior to the first day of the Hebrew month of Adar – the month leading to Purim. The Purim story has another example of treating everybody equally, but this time with a negative outcome. Haman, the person in power and the villain of the story, expected everyone to bow down to him. A Jew called Mordechai refused to bow and Haman was furious. Instead of punishing the one who refused to obey his command, Haman decided to destroy the entire Jewish people in Persia. He treated all Jews equally, thinking that one person represents the entire nation.
Perhaps, the Purim story introduces a balance to the concept of equality of Shabbat Shekalim. Treating everyone the same is not always the best solution. Sometimes it may lead to negative generalisations and unfair results.
A few years ago I came across this illustration:
Although it might raise a few objections and questions, it demonstrates the point very well. There are situations when it is unfair to make equal requirements for everyone and to treat everyone the same . Sometimes it is better to treat people according to their needs.
The main message of Shabbat Shekalim is that the world has enough resources for everyone to enjoy life, be safe and have a meaningful relationship with their culture and the world.
I hope that this Shabbat will bring you a sense of connection, balance, understanding, life, and peace. Even during these challenging times, we can think of others and make sure we make this world as fair as it can be.
Shabbat shalom,
Igor Zinkov
To read more about the illustration, please click HERE
Shabbat Terumah/Zachor
19 February 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
A few weeks ago, someone said to me, Purim is an anniversary of a kind – the last time many of us were in synagogue together in person. And that is partly true. We were in synagogue on March 9, 2020 to listen to the Megillah, to share food together from the Spice Caravan and to hear moving testimonies from five distinguished speakers on why they chose careers ‘In Pursuit of Justice’. It was a serious topic for what is often an absurd and raucous time in the Jewish year. But the world then was in a dark place and it seemed out of place to be laughing when an American president was separating children from their parents at the borders of his country, and when the #MeToo movement had uncovered rampant sexual abuse of women. Could we have known that we were on the cusp of a massive outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic? Could we have imagined the loss of life across parts of the world, the bereavements in our own community and how much our lives would change in the course of just a few days?
Liberal Jews have always had a complicated and ambivalent relationship with Purim and the Book of Esther. Abolished by our founders, several generations, like my own, grew up completely unaware of this minor festival in the Jewish calendar. There was no dressing up for Purim at Religion School, no reading of the Megillah, not even hamantaschen were on the menu in breaktime. It wasn’t until the late 1980s, that Purim crept back into Liberal Judaism’s festival calendar. The mood had changed and despite the early objections that the book was a mere fictional narrative, that it ended with the king’s reversal of his fatal decree to assassinate the Jews of Persia and instead with the Jews triumphant over their enemies; despite the absence of God in the book, it began to be acceptable in Liberal Jewish circles to let your hair down and laugh out loud, to turn the world upside down for 24 hours and wear a mask to conceal your true identity.
And we argued that there was also a more serious aspect to Purim, in the words of the Pesach Haggadah: she’lo echad bil’vad amad aleynu l’chaloteinu, ella she’bechol dor va’dor om’dim aleynu l’chaloteinu – ‘that not just one has stood against us to make an end of us, but in every age many have stood against us to make an end to us.’ There have been many Pharaohs and many Hamans who have sought to oppress and destroy our people.
There has been a lot less laughter over this past year. Less stepping out of ourselves to defuse our anger and frustration, less mining of the absurdities in our lives. For a few days, I wondered whether we should: a) forget Purim altogether this year; b) turn to a serious topic again; or 3) just go for it and use the story of ‘Esther in a time of Covid’ to lighten our mood.
In a way, there couldn’t be a darker story: a young Jewish woman experiences a multiple trauma – the loss of her parents and homeland as she is forced into exile with her cousin Mordechai. As if that isn’t enough, she’s taken into the harem of a drunken, narcissistic ruler, becomes his queen and then must face the terrible truth that her husband, the king, has signed a decree at the behest of his vile special adviser, Haman, to assassinate her people. In an attempt to get her husband to recognise Haman’s villainy, she suddenly becomes the victim of his sexual advances.
Not much to laugh at. But the thing about humour is that it can reveal the deepest truths about ourselves and about the world we live in. The story of Esther is grotesque and frightening. Yet we’ve turned Purim into a festival of self-mockery and laughter precisely because we recognise the truth of every aspect of the story. If we didn’t laugh, we would drown. Laughter is a way of preserving our humanity and resilience in difficult times.
As we attempt to convey ‘the vast terrain of Persia’s land within the cockpit of our tiny screens,’ we invite you to join us on Purim eve. Turn on your Zoom filters, wear fancy dress, cheer the heroics of Esther and Mordechai, shout as loudly as you like at Haman – but don’t wake the neighbours. Covid may not be over, but we can still laugh at ourselves and at some of the absurdities of our human condition.
'This year our play on camera we shoot,
Now players all, thy microphones unmute.’
Shabbat shalom,
Alexandra Wright
Erev Purim: Thursday 25 February at 8.00 pm. You can watch ‘A Purim Mask-erade: Who is Mrs Feather?’ by clicking HERE. No need to register - just tune in.
Turning Values into Habits
26 February 2021
Dear Members and Friends,
What is the greatest principle of the Torah? Ein Yaakov, a 16th Century compilation of Talmudic stories lists various sages who put forward their idea of klal gadol ba-Torah, the great principle of the Torah. Ben Azzai says it is the verse, “This is the book of the chronicles of man: On the day that God created man, He made him in the likeness of God’ (Genesis 5:1).
Ben Zoma says that there is a more embracing principle, “Listen, Israel, the Eternal One is our God, the Eternal God is one.” Ben Nannas says there is even better principle: “Love your neighbour as yourself.” Ben Pazzi says we find a more embracing principle still. He quotes a verse from this week’s parashah: “One sheep shall be offered in the morning, and a second in the afternoon” (Exodus 29:39) In other words: the greatest gift that Torah gives us is routine. In the time of the First and Second Temple, it was reflected in daily sacrifices. Now, when synagogues replaced the Temple, we have different ways to practice our religion. But the principle remains unchanged - agreeing with principles in theory is not enough. Turning them into your daily habits is the greatest value of Torah.
In his book Atomic Habits, James Clear argues that improving your life does not have to mean making enormous changes. You can make significant and important developments with small alterations in your routine - waking up five minutes early, or doing two push-ups a day, or holding a single short phone call. James Clear calls such changes atomic habits. Along the way, he tells inspiring stories of Olympic gold medallists, leading CEOs, and distinguished scientists who have used the science of tiny habits to stay productive, motivated, and happy. Small changes can have a revolutionary effect on people’s careers, relationships, and happiness.
Small changes may seem insignificant and insufficient. Clear argues, that ‘when nothing seems to help, I go and look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock, perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not that last blow that did it—but all that had gone before.’
Turning values, dreams and core principles into daily routine is the greatest principle of Torah. I hope that this week will be an inspiration for all of us to become a little bit better and happier.
Shabbat shalom,
Igor Zinkov
