Like the secular New Year’s Day, the upcoming holiday that celebrates the Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah, is a time for making noise. Its biblical name literally translates as “day of shouting, blasting of horns.”
Traditionally, in recent years, the president of the United States has marked the holiday with a conference call to American rabbis. This year’s call from President Donald Trump comes the day after he once again argued outrageously that neo-Nazi and white supremacist protesters were equivalent to those on the other side.
When the horns of Rosh Hashanah sound, many of the rabbis will not have taken Trump’s call. Those representing my denomination, Reform Judaism, along with rabbis from Conservative Judaism and Reconstructionist Judaism, announced several weeks ago that they were boycotting the Sept. 15 call in response to the president’s initial comments on last month’s deadly protests in Charlottesville, Virginia. The president is going ahead with the call anyway for those rabbis who still choose to participate.
I recently found myself in the position of having to say no to the president, too. I was asked to represent Jews across America in bestowing a blessing on the newly elected leader at a celebration of his inauguration held at Washington’s National Cathedral last January.
I must admit it was absolutely terrifying to have to decline. Who could know what the repercussions would be to myself, my community and even my family? It’s well known that the the president doesn’t like to be turned down.
In doing so, I bore no disrespect for the office. Yet the last year has been deeply unsettling for those of my congregation in the small western Maryland town of Hagerstown, and many members have come to me horrified by events, overwhelmed by the constant rhetoric of antagonism and derision. This is true even though Christian conservatives in the part of the state where we live have been understanding and empathetic to our concerns. Representing my community, though, I could not in good conscience bestow blessings on the man whose campaign had raised such tension in the American body politic.
I knew that in saying no, I risked appearing closed-minded myself. But clearly there are times to refuse, to not listen – to not take the call.
Those who marched by torchlight in Charlottesville were not interested in listening, and we must be clear that there should be no dialogue with white supremacists, racist bigots and neo-Nazis. Moral equivalency with hate is inconsistent with a culture of listening or dialogue.
But our tradition does tell us that there are other times when we risk much if we do not listen. In fact, it’s sometimes said that where you have two Jews, you get three opinions.
The importance of listening to different perspectives among ourselves is an important part of one of our most ancient stories. In the biblical tale of Abraham, the patriarch is told by God to sacrifice his only son Isaac on an altar in the wilderness. Abraham does as God orders, taking Isaac away, preparing the altar and bringing out the knife for the ritual killing. But God knows, the Bible tells us, that Abraham loves his vulnerable and innocent son. When the moment comes, and it is clear that Abraham is prepared to do God’s will despite his love for the boy, the old man hears an inner voice – that of an angel, the story says – instructing him to put down the knife and sacrifice a ram instead.
Refusing the call of authority to obey is difficult. We are all Americans, and we owe respect and deference to our leaders even though we sometimes disagree with them. But it is also true that the weak and vulnerable are indispensable to who we are as a nation. Sometimes you have to say no.
This Rosh Hashanah, the holiday will begin with the blowing of the shofar, the ritual horn, calling us to welcome with joy the coming year. As we listen for the shofar, we must listen for the sake of listening. It is a call to us – and not a conference call – to always heed with special attention the prophetic voice within ourselves.
As the ancient rabbinic sage Hillel once said, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I?”