Dreams of Zion

Yom Kippur 5778 / 30 September 2017

לִבִי בְמִזְרָח וְאָנֹכִי בְסוֹף מַעֲרָב

“My heart is in the east, while I am at the ends of the west.”

With these words, Rabbi Yehudah HaLevi gave voice to one of the central concerns of Jewish thought, life, and liturgy: our yearning, wherever we might find ourselves, for our ancestral home in the Land of Israel. Longing for Zion has burned in the heart of Judaism from the very beginning, certainly since the days of Jacob’s sojourn in Haran and Joseph’s exile in Egypt. Moses led our ancestors from slavery toward freedom on their own land, and was personally devastated to learn his own feet would not cross the Jordan. The Psalms and the prayers that follow after continue this theme: on all festive occasions — not only holidays, but personal simchas like weddings and bnai mitzvah — we preface Birkat HaMazon with “Shir HaMa’alot,” a Psalm whose image of joy explicitly revolves around our people’s returning to the land of Israel. And yet our passionate longing for Israel presents a bigger problem in our generation than ever before. What does it mean for us to profess, in our prayers, a yearning to return to our homeland in an age when an autonomous State of Israel lies just a plane flight away?

This year we celebrate seventy years since the State of Israel was founded. Seventy years, a veritable lifetime, since a millennia-old dream became concrete reality. Among the many important issues this milestone raises, the time has come for us to grapple with what our traditional yearning, and the State of Israel itself, mean for those of us who live outside Israel and will, for the foreseeable future, remain outside.

In the spirit of the day, I will offer a confession: I can’t remember the last time I spoke about Israel from the bima, but I am sure it has been at least a year. I’ve been reticent to some degree since the beginning of my career. By the time I was ordained, seven years ago, just saying the word “Israel” in public felt to me like grabbing the third rail with both hands. There’s a lot of risk — I have seen vicious smear campaigns, from the left as well as the right, leveled against friends — for what seems like little, if any, constructive outcome. But for the past year, certainly, it has been deliberate on my part; I have actively avoided talking openly about Israel at all. Now, I can’t stay quiet any more, for all the reasons I outlined earlier: Israel is too important, too central to the Jewish soul, not to talk about it. Still, the fear remains.

I am very conscious that we don’t all see the same Israel. My parents came of age during Israel’s heady early years, watching against all odds as the UN validated our national aspirations and the fledgling State of Israel took root. My teachers’ formative years largely fell between the euphoric rush of 1967 and the crushing existential fear of 1973, and my own Zionist consciousness emerged in the whiplash years of Intifada, Oslo, and Intifada again. Some of us have been to Israel more times than we can count while others have never been, some to visit for a week or two and some to live for a year or more. It’s possible that each of us has a unique, personally shaped lens through which we look at the State of Israel. We need to be aware of those differences, so that we can communicate effectively, but we must also bear in mind that this is nothing new. From the very beginning, even before the First Zionist Congress 120 years ago, we have always held onto multiple Zionisms, numerous dreams of what a renewed Jewish homeland could be. These dreams shared just one common thread, a vision of a world in which the Jewish people, like other nations, had a place of refuge, where our safety and security would be guaranteed by our own defense forces in an autonomous homeland.

What became of these dreams in 1948? Israel’s founders, against all odds, brought to fruition the essential core dream: a secure Jewish homeland on the ground our ancient ancestors walked. I am just old enough to remember Israel’s airlifts of Ethiopian Jews in the 1980s, and still can’t help feeling a shiver of pride remembering that exhilarating moment — not just the operation itself, but more importantly the precious miracle of a nation that could and would undertake massive expense and risk to save our fellow Jews from persecution and danger. That miracle has come at a very high price: to date nearly 24,000 people have fallen in the IDF or various pre-State security forces, or were murdered in terrorist attacks, and as even we speak thousands of young Israelis are spending Yom Kippur on the front lines.

Beyond the baseline of a secure homeland, however, the picture becomes more complicated. Before the State, all options were up for grabs; anyone with passion and vision could contribute their dream to the Zionist conversation. No one vision came into being in 1948; instead, over time, through compromise and conflict, trial and error, Israel’s founders crafted a State that draws upon all of the dreams without ever fully realizing any one of them. The existing State of Israel, from its first days until now, has always represented a hybrid of the Zionist dreams. So the original dreams remained in place, and new dreams even arose, always in dialectic tension with the reality on the ground.

Something else important happened on that first Yom Ha’atzma’ut. The moment he read Israel’s Declaration of Independence, Ben-Gurion transformed the nature of Zionism. What had been a diverse but broadly coherent international movement split in two: those living in Israel and those living elsewhere who intended to make aliyah became Israelis, while the rest became Diaspora Zionists — staunch Zionists who, for a plethora of reasons, choose to remain outside of Israel. I have only recently started to understand this distinction; even as Israel’s founders consciously forged an “Israeli” identity, the Diaspora camp was left amorphous and undefined. Indeed, the early Israelis’ “negation of the Diaspora” mentality — a worldview that saw Israel as the only viable and meaningful future for world Jewry — in large part prevented serious consideration of important roles for Zionists outside the land of Israel. And yet we Diaspora Zionists occupy a distinct space in the fabric of world Jewry, committed to Israel while living apart.

Israel’s milestone anniversary highlights the need to define a place for Diaspora Zionism. Let’s start with the implications of those two words. “Zionist” proves tricky to define, precisely because of the freewheeling intellectual climate of Zionist thought from the very beginning. That said, as we mentioned earlier we do find one core at the center of all forms of Zionism: commitment to the Jewish people’s right to and need for an autonomous homeland — even if millions of Jews choose to remain in other countries. Any legitimate claim of Zionism must be backed up by a willingness to speak and act for Israel’s benefit. Our voice can take many forms, from lobbying in Washington to written advocacy and even to the level of conversations with friends and neighbors. But if we call ourselves Zionists, we have a moral obligation to speak up — especially in an age of Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran and ISIS.

The qualifier, “Diaspora,” distinguishes our Zionism from that of Israelis. The Zionist enterprise has always entailed dreaming. From the beginning, Zionist thinkers envisioned Israel in idealistic terms, the one place in the world where Jewish values — variously defined —  would come into full bloom. But this, too, becomes more difficult after 1948, for Israeli and Diaspora Zionists alike: a real, living State constrains our field of view. The original Zionists had a blank screen upon which to project their visions, whereas our dreams bump up against the real Israel. A few days ago we marked the first yahrzeit of Shimon Peres, the last living founder. The current Knesset has just eight members born before 1948, and the eldest — Menachem Begin’s son Benny — was just five years old at Independence.^[1] This generation of Israeli leaders never knew Zionism as a dream; they were born into the reality of Israel, a nation faced with hard choices and intractable challenges at every turn. Israel’s circumstances in their formative years demanded concrete approaches. But Zionism has always thrived on dreams.

There, I believe, is where we come in: devoted to the dream-in-progress of a Jewish homeland and removed from the day-to-day worries of statecraft, we can continue dreaming of what could yet be. Here we need a good measure of humility and caution. Living in the Diaspora may free us to dream, but it also distances us from the consequences — and any attempt to bring a dream into reality will entail consequences. Still, dreams have always been Zionism’s root system, the source of its ongoing vitality. If living outside of Israel allows us more space to dream, we owe it to Israel and to Zionists everywhere to own and share our dreams.

I believe in this definition of Diaspora Zionism — committed to Israel’s present and future, and willing to dream all the things that have not yet come into being — but it also leaves me in an uncomfortable place. If we’re honest about our dreams, we will always find something lacking in reality as compared with the ideal. Israel’s Declaration of Independence pledges “equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex.” While Israeli women face the same struggles as everywhere else, the country has done a respectable job ensuring equality for women and opening key leadership positions to women. At the same time, Israel’s successive governments continue to privilege Orthodox rabbis and restrict other expressions of Jewish religious practice; Israeli law will not allow me — or any other Conservative or Reform rabbi — to officiate at a wedding or funeral in the Jewish homeland. Immigrants of color live in poor conditions, hidden from sight in peripheral “development towns.” Zionist thinkers as diverse as Theodor Herzl, David Ben-Gurion, and Ze’ev Jabotinsky all saw equal treatment under law for Israel’s Arab citizens as a key brick in Israel’s moral foundation — but after seventy years, and with so many other remarkable accomplishments under our belts, we still haven’t managed to give the Arab minority a fair deal.

Most distressing for me, I can’t ignore the fact that, for the past fifty years, the autonomous refuge that was always Zionism’s first aim has come partially at the expense of another people’s self-determination. It is undeniable that the roots Palestinian disenfranchisement lie in Arab rejection of partition, Jordanian, Egyptian, and Lebanese discrimination against their fellow Arabs, and Palestinian embrace of terrorism. Still, those factors do not absolve Israelis and, indeed, Zionists everywhere, for some measure of its perpetuation, just all Americans today must be accountable for ongoing systemic racism, even if our own ancestors never owned slaves. I am not recommending any specific policy — I don’t have the training for that, nor is this the time or place — but I insist we have a moral obligation to remain conscious of the effect of occupation on millions of Palestinians living in the West Bank. To go on pretending that Israel’s settlement policies are without consequence, or that the Palestinian problem is one entirely of the Arabs’ own doing, would be a moral failure of the first order.

I imagine some of us find that hard to hear, perhaps out of fear that our critique might undermine Israel’s base of support in America and especially in Congress, or because we feel it tarnishes our rightful pride in the desert miracle our Israeli sisters and brothers have made. Some may feel downright angry. I feel frightened, heartbroken, and even angry myself, just saying it. But today is a day for honesty. I have spent Shabbat in Hevron, moved to tears davening Kabbalat Shabbat in מְעָרַת הַמַּכְפֵּלָה, the burial site of our Patriarchs and Matriarchs, and shocked at the settlers’ casual disregard for the Arabs living all around them. I remember, in the Kfar Etzion museum, feeling inspired at the story of the Etzion martyrs’ children returning to rebuild what had been taken from their parents. I also remember spending the night with a Palestinian family in Beit Lehem, on a trip sponsored by Encounter, and feeling for myself the ever-present pressure of occupation. Ultimately, I am left in conflict: How do I give full voice to my love for Israel and also talk honestly about these places where I don’t see my dreams reflected in reality?

Or, perhaps, there is not a conflict at all. Our Sages of Blessed Memory taught, כל אהבה שאין עמה תוכחה אינה אהבה, “Any love without admonition is no love at all.”^[2] Ask yourself: Could you watch a friend go down the wrong path, say nothing, and still consider yourself a friend? Our tradition links love and admonition because they form a mutually dependent relationship: we can’t really claim to love a person if we let them go astray without objection, and we also can’t challenge the other’s behavior effectively unless we approach them with deep love. I’m not worried this loving critique will in any way embolden Israel’s enemies; the ones who are not outright anti-Semites have shown themselves perfectly willing to tolerate anti-Semitism among their ranks, and any notion of influencing their opinion is a waste of time. But I have no more patience for those on the nationalist right who seem to think Israel can do no wrong. The former group never took part in the Zionist dream, but the latter have given up on dreaming altogether. In any event, I can’t see either group as a friend to Israel; where one group lacks any kind of love, the other lacks the critique that our Rabbis see as essential to real love. Israel deserves more from Diaspora Zionists.

Stav Shaffir, the youngest woman ever elected to Knesset and part of a new generation of Israeli dreamers, is right when she says that Zionism has always been “a movement that would not accept that things are impossible.” Israel faces real existential threats on its borders — and another existential threat from within, if we lose our ability to dream of what has not yet come to pass. When it comes to Israel, dreaming is hard work. Aside from the occasional glimmer, I don’t see much prospect for real peace in the foreseeable future. Here in America, we know the difficulty inherent in overcoming racial and gender bias, and Israel will face the same hurdles in dealing with discrimination. The Chief Rabbinate has amassed such overwhelming political clout — as evidenced by Netanyahu’s recent betrayal of the compromise plan to create an egalitarian prayer space at the Kotel — that I don’t expect we’ll see much religious liberty in Israel any time soon.

But as Zionists, we can’t “accept that things are impossible.” As Shimon Peres said in his final interview, “I don’t believe that we can achieve perfection. But … the attempt to achieve perfection is part of perfection. I’m not sure that we shall achieve it, but I am sure we have to try.” Some early Zionists, Ben-Gurion among them, strived to create a “normal,” country, like any other. That’s not enough for me. I believe Shaffir and Peres would agree with me that Zionism’s goal, even if it proves unattainable in practice, should be to build a state unlike any other.

That, for now, is my dream of Zion. I don’t expect everyone to agree, nor do I feel the need for agreement. Frankly, Zionism has always been better off in times of constructive disagreement and fertile conflict. We’ll continue exploring Zionist dreams throughout this milestone year, as we celebrate all of Israel’s blessings. I want each of you to be a part of that journey, adding your voice, your dream, your hope. I hope some of you will write, or make an appointment to come in and talk, and share your Zionist dreams with me. But more importantly, I hope you will speak up and share your dreams with others — friends and family, colleagues, elected representatives. Love Israel the way our Sages intended, deeply and with unflinching honesty. Keep your dream in mind, and do everything you can to bring it into the world. We may not achieve any of our dreams in full, but we certainly must try.

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Tags: Diaspora, Israel, Zionism