 | Modern spirituality uplifts personal choice. Most of us understand liberal Judaism to invite each of us individually to question, wrestle, discern and decide for ourselves, liberated from mandate and commandedness. That's what liberalism means: the liberty to choose for ourselves, based on the rights and equal dignity of each individual. Yet Judaism also is a team sport. We can't all go our own way and survive, much less thrive. |
By Rabbi David Evan Markus
Re'eh 5784 (2024)
Click here for last year's Dvar Torah on this portion, "The Eye is in the Hand of the Beholder"
This week's Dvar Torah offers an appetizer of history, a main course of Torah, and a dessert of Fleetwood Mac. Bon appetit!
In global spiritual history, one issue transcends all others: groups that "must" versus "may." This divide is the key spiritual issue of our times, our souls, our communities and our planet.
Religions of "must" (or "must not") emphasize commander, commandment, compliance and community. In those systems, "must" does not ask consent or allow disobedience. Religions of "may," by contrast, emphasize autonomy, invitation, choice and individuality. In those systems, a "may" is a best practice, a good idea, a suggestion – not a mandate.
Every spiritual system, including Judaism, ebbs and flows on this "must"-"may" continuum of ideology and culture. This ebb and flow now matters utterly to our collective future.
From History ...
In Christianity, the 1500s Protestant Reformation and particularly the revolutionary thought of Martin Luther (unfortunately, an antisemite) marked a seismic break from the papacy's controlling "must." In Judaism, the shift began 250 years later, with the late 1700s Haskalah – in essence, the European Enlightenment that was delayed in reaching Jewish life because of insularity both imposed (by antisemitism) and embraced (for self-protection).
With the Haskalah came assimilation, political rights and Reform Judaism, which led the way in replacing Jewish "must" with "may." Other Jewish movements (Orthodox, Conservative, Reconstruction) and nondenominational paths (pluralist, "Just Jewish," Renewal, "Spiritual But Not Religious") followed. In liberal Jewish circles, gone was the idea that communities or rabbis could mandate behavior: choice based on individual autonomy became a core value. In essence, we all became Jews by choice.
... to Spirituality ...
And yet, Judaism is a team sport – and there is no "I" in "team."
It's impossible to "do Jewish" merely alone. We each can question, wrestle and make our way through life living by our own lights, but Jewish vibrancy and frankly survival depend on a whole more than merely the sum of its parts. That means having some "must" to balance the cherished "may" of liberalism and choice. It means some duty to commandedness and commander whether God, holiness, tradition, ethics or external rightness.
These spiritual needs for community cohesion and duty are why, in this week's Torah portion, Moses' deuter (second) onomy (telling) makes the point directly (Deut. 12:8-9):
Re'eh 5784 (2024)
Click here for last year's Dvar Torah on this portion, "The Eye is in the Hand of the Beholder"
This week's Dvar Torah offers an appetizer of history, a main course of Torah, and a dessert of Fleetwood Mac. Bon appetit!
In global spiritual history, one issue transcends all others: groups that "must" versus "may." This divide is the key spiritual issue of our times, our souls, our communities and our planet.
Religions of "must" (or "must not") emphasize commander, commandment, compliance and community. In those systems, "must" does not ask consent or allow disobedience. Religions of "may," by contrast, emphasize autonomy, invitation, choice and individuality. In those systems, a "may" is a best practice, a good idea, a suggestion – not a mandate.
Every spiritual system, including Judaism, ebbs and flows on this "must"-"may" continuum of ideology and culture. This ebb and flow now matters utterly to our collective future.
From History ...
In Christianity, the 1500s Protestant Reformation and particularly the revolutionary thought of Martin Luther (unfortunately, an antisemite) marked a seismic break from the papacy's controlling "must." In Judaism, the shift began 250 years later, with the late 1700s Haskalah – in essence, the European Enlightenment that was delayed in reaching Jewish life because of insularity both imposed (by antisemitism) and embraced (for self-protection).
With the Haskalah came assimilation, political rights and Reform Judaism, which led the way in replacing Jewish "must" with "may." Other Jewish movements (Orthodox, Conservative, Reconstruction) and nondenominational paths (pluralist, "Just Jewish," Renewal, "Spiritual But Not Religious") followed. In liberal Jewish circles, gone was the idea that communities or rabbis could mandate behavior: choice based on individual autonomy became a core value. In essence, we all became Jews by choice.
... to Spirituality ...
And yet, Judaism is a team sport – and there is no "I" in "team."
It's impossible to "do Jewish" merely alone. We each can question, wrestle and make our way through life living by our own lights, but Jewish vibrancy and frankly survival depend on a whole more than merely the sum of its parts. That means having some "must" to balance the cherished "may" of liberalism and choice. It means some duty to commandedness and commander whether God, holiness, tradition, ethics or external rightness.
These spiritual needs for community cohesion and duty are why, in this week's Torah portion, Moses' deuter (second) onomy (telling) makes the point directly (Deut. 12:8-9):
| לֹ֣א תַעֲשׂ֔וּן כְּ֠כֹ֠ל אֲשֶׁ֨ר אֲנַ֧חְנוּ עֹשִׂ֛ים פֹּ֖ה הַיּ֑וֹם אִ֖ישׁ כָּל־הַיָּשָׁ֥ר בְּעֵינָֽיו׃ כִּ֥י לֹא־בָאתֶ֖ם עַד־עָ֑תָּה אֶל־ הַמְּנוּחָה֙ וְאֶל־הַֽנַּחֲלָ֔ה אֲשֶׁר־יהוָ֥''ה אֱלֹהֶ֖יךָ נֹתֵ֥ן לָֽךְ׃ | You mustn't all act as we do here today, each as we please, for you haven't yet come to the haven and inheritance YHVH your God is giving you. |
If we all do as we please, Moses warns, we won't get where we're going. There won't be any collective haven or inheritance. The full gifts awaiting us cannot come to us.
That's why the prophet Isaiah, foreseeing Assyrians bent on destroying the First Temple (586 BCE) and exiling the Jews, echoed Moses in words popularized by Handel's Messiah (Isa. 53:6):
That's why the prophet Isaiah, foreseeing Assyrians bent on destroying the First Temple (586 BCE) and exiling the Jews, echoed Moses in words popularized by Handel's Messiah (Isa. 53:6):
| כֻּלָּ֙נוּ֙ כַּצֹּ֣אן תָּעִ֔ינוּ .אִ֥ישׁ לְדַרְכּ֖וֹ פָּנִ֑ינוּ | All we like sheep have gone astray. Everyone has turned to their own way. |
So harmful is excess individuality at group peril that on Yom Kippur, we will stand together to confess precisely that: like sheep we have turned astray, and like sheep we return under the Shepherd's staff. These liturgies are in every Yom Kippur service, in every High Holy Day prayerbook, in every Jewish denomination, everywhere in the world. We stand together.
We see today how urgent our collectivism is. If we all can say what we want whenever we want, then lies and deepfakes will corrode public life. If we all can buy and consume what we want at whatever prices we want, then the planet will overheat. If we all can do whatever we want, then hurt and anger and loss will flow like water.
There is no avoiding the consequences of excess individualism – and I say this as a liberal in the humanist sense of cherishing personal autonomy and choice. Yet if we each go our own way, then the collective withers and dies – and something in each of us withers and dies, too. No group can survive much less thrive that way.
Liberal spiritualists we may be, yet we still need "must" and "must not" to modulate rugged individualism and personal preference. The spiritual demand of our day is to tame the ego of personal preference and desire for the sake of something greater than just our own selves.
... to Fleetwood Mac
By now hopefully you're accustomed to me bringing in modern culture for spiritual purpose. This week, it's Grammy Award winning band Fleetwood Mac.
The band's 1977 hit song "Go Your Own Way" became an anthem for individual autonomy. On first blush, its words seem opposite those of Moses and Isaiah. Recently I heard the song again, and I realized that the lyrics intended irony: they're about autonomy's risk to the band itself. The lyrics mean precisely what Moses and Isaiah meant. Take a listen:
We see today how urgent our collectivism is. If we all can say what we want whenever we want, then lies and deepfakes will corrode public life. If we all can buy and consume what we want at whatever prices we want, then the planet will overheat. If we all can do whatever we want, then hurt and anger and loss will flow like water.
There is no avoiding the consequences of excess individualism – and I say this as a liberal in the humanist sense of cherishing personal autonomy and choice. Yet if we each go our own way, then the collective withers and dies – and something in each of us withers and dies, too. No group can survive much less thrive that way.
Liberal spiritualists we may be, yet we still need "must" and "must not" to modulate rugged individualism and personal preference. The spiritual demand of our day is to tame the ego of personal preference and desire for the sake of something greater than just our own selves.
... to Fleetwood Mac
By now hopefully you're accustomed to me bringing in modern culture for spiritual purpose. This week, it's Grammy Award winning band Fleetwood Mac.
The band's 1977 hit song "Go Your Own Way" became an anthem for individual autonomy. On first blush, its words seem opposite those of Moses and Isaiah. Recently I heard the song again, and I realized that the lyrics intended irony: they're about autonomy's risk to the band itself. The lyrics mean precisely what Moses and Isaiah meant. Take a listen:
| … Loving you Isn't the right thing to do How can I ever change things That I feel? … If I could Baby, I'd give you my world How can I When you won't take it from me? … You can go your own way Go your own way. You can call it Another lonely day. You can go your own way Go your own way. | … Tell me why Everything turned around. Packing up Shacking up is all you want to do. … If I could Baby, I'd give you my world. Open up: Everything's waiting for you. |
I imagine God singing those words to us – or Jewish life singing them to us, or communities singing them, or the planet singing them. Will we listen? There's a haven and inheritance up ahead. Will we hear? Can we open up to the wholeness that comes only with not going our own way, by putting "we" over "me"?
Everything's waiting for us, if we stand together. As the teacher of my teachers put it, "The only way to get it together is together."
Everything's waiting for us, if we stand together. As the teacher of my teachers put it, "The only way to get it together is together."
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