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THE SUDAN AND THE JEWISH PEOPLE
Summary of Rabbi Hauer's remarks - Pesach, 5766
Pesach is the festival of our freedom, the season when we celebrate the decisive liberation of our people from the bondage of Egypt. Yet our celebration is constrained on many levels. Midrash teaches us that we do not recite the (full) Hallel beyond the first day of Pesach because of the tragedy that enveloped the Egyptians with our Exodus. The same theme is expressed in our spilling of the wine during the listing of the plagues visited upon the Egyptians, and in the well-known Talmudic passage where G-d stopped the angels from singing during the splitting of the sea because His creations were drowning in it. Apparently the tragic fate of the Egyptians figures significantly in tempering our celebration of our own, new-found freedom. Yet we do recite the full Hallel on the first day of our liberation. And we do raise a cup of wine in celebration of our freedom. And we did proceed to sing as we emerged from the sea unscathed, even as the Egyptians were being swallowed by its waters.
It seems that there is a process of growth and maturation that goes along with our liberation. As suffering slaves, as a persecuted people, we rightfully limit our vision to our own sorry situation. Our liberation is then experienced with great personal and national joy. That is the immediate response, the Hallel of the first day, the cup raised in thanks, the song of the moment. But once we experience our liberation our field of vision widens and begins to include other elements of our world around us. We grow from the freshly liberated slave, thrilled with the improvement in his personal condition, to the responsible partner in G-d’s universe, now concerned with the entirety of the enterprise of Creation.
It is in this spirit that we conclude every formal prayer session with the Alenu prayer. We begin by expressing gratitude for our special privilege as G-d’s Chosen People, blessed with the opportunity to serve the true Master of the Universe. But then we move on from our satisfaction with our own privilege to express our yearning and our desire that all of the world may share this blessing, this opportunity to know and to worship the true G-d. We grow beyond satisfaction with our privilege to concern for the global enterprise.
It is in this spirit of concern for the global enterprise that I encourage your participation in the April 30th Washington rally to Save Darfur. Darfur is a part of the Sudan that has been beset by civil war, to the point where at present active forces are in the midst of pursuing a policy of ethnic cleansing that has resulted in the deaths of more than 400,000, the rape and terrorizing of thousands, and man-induced dire conditions of famine. I don’t know the citizens of Sudan; I don’t know their righteousness or their feelings towards my people and me. I do know they are G-d’s creatures and as such I may not view their wholesale destruction impassively.
Some may object, wondering why we need to get involved in trying to protect our enemies from each other. While we may have tempered our joy over the destruction of the Egyptians, we certainly did not try to pull them from the sea’s swirling waters! Why then should the Jewish community play any role at all in trying to save the people of Sudan? This is a fair question, a fair critique. I would however suggest consideration of the following.
Sixty years ago the world watched a genocide being perpetrated against the Jewish people. The world was not primed to understand that one cannot stand by while his brother’s blood is being spilled. Thus the railroad tracks to Auschwitz were not bombed, and efforts that a more responsible world could have performed to save millions of our brethren were left undone. This epic tragedy needs to teach all of us to never assume the world’s conscience is awake and active. If we want to protect ourselves and our children, we must do what we can to remove the blinds of isolationism from the eyes of the world’s civilized people and its leaders. Indeed, the Jewish people will not successfully ingratiate themselves to the world, buying our own protection for the long term. But we are in a position to encourage the world to respond to such serious destructiveness wherever, whenever and against whomever it occurs.
Yes, the Sudanese may not be our friends. But in the short term they do not pose one of our great threats. A greater threat to us in the short term is a world that can stand by impassively in the face of ongoing acts of horror and terror perpetuated against other people. We must do our part to break the silence, to stir the world’s conscience.
Some may still object, agreeing perhaps in principle but wondering if this is where our priorities should lie. After all, we have so much to worry about our own survival; do we
– any differently than the Jews of Egypt – have the luxury to concern ourselves with the far-flung corners of Creation? Shouldn’t the Jewish community be raising its voice more actively for its own, surrounded by hostile neighbors in Israel, or even for those of our brothers who have been abandoned by their own government in Israel? Is Darfur the first item on the communal agenda?
Indeed, I would tend to agree. Even I – convinced as I am of the two considerations presented above – would hesitate to declare this issue our first item of concern. Indeed, I don’t know of any Jewish organization that has. But it has been made a significant priority by the broader Jewish community. We do not necessarily share priorities with the broader Jewish community. On some matters we agree, on others we disagree, and on a certain number of issues we may agree that they have value, but we may sharply disagree on their level of priority. This is probably one of those issues. However I believe that it behooves us to join with the general community in matters that we agree have value. If we are to work together for the betterment of Klal Yisrael; if we are to maintain a relationship as partners for Klal Yisrael; we must find ways to work together, to support each other on that which we can agree is valuable, even if we do not agree as to exactly how valuable. By joining with the organized Jewish community in this rally we are demonstrating a partnership that will certainly extend to areas of our priority as well.
I hope you will join us on Sunday Apil 30th at noon as we travel from Bnai Jacob Shaarei Zion to Washington to participate in the National Rally to Save Darfur.
