Parshat Ki Tavo: Why not?

As we Americans engage in a consequential presidential election, I remember back to my first involvement in a presidential campaign.

In April 1968, I was one of 1,000 or so college students camped out on the floor of a hotel ballroom in Indianapolis, after a day of knocking on doors on behalf of Robert Kennedy’s presidential campaign. Senator Kennedy spoke to us that night and uttered words that he would repeat a number of times over the last two months of his life.

RFK said: “There are those who look at things the way they are and ask: Why? I dream of things that never were and ask: Why not?”

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A few months later, as an American exchange student at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, I heard David Ben-Gurion speak about his concerns for Israel’s future after the Six Day War. He said: Time works both for us and against us, depending upon how we use it”

This week our Torah reading begins with the words Ki Tavo, in Deuteronomy 26:1-2:

“When you enter the land that Adonai your God is giving you as a heritage and you occupy it and settle in it, you shall take some of every first fruit of the soil which you harvest from the land that Adonai your God is giving you, put it in a basket and go to the place where Adonai your God will choose to establish His name.”

These opening words of our Torah portion, grammatically expressed in the second person singular, is a command to each of us to be grateful for our blessings. Later in this portion we are confronted with a series of blessings and curses, also expressed in the singular, which are reminders that both rights and blessings come with responsibility. For the biblical Jew to whom this passage originally was directed, bringing the first fruits of his labor to the Temple in Jerusalem, it was a command both to support the institutions of government and to support the poor, the hungry and the homeless; including, but not limited to, the widow, the orphan, and the stranger.

The setting for this speech by Moses is a moment of transition. Moses knows he is about to die and that the leadership of Israel will pass from him to Joshua, and from Joshua, according to the Mishnah in Pirkei Avot, to thousands of future generations.

When I began drafting this d’var Torah, I was lifted up with hope for a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of the hostages Hamas is holding. I wanted to find a thread of hopeful challenge in the words of Moses ben Amram, David Ben Gurion, and Robert Kennedy, and I prayed that together they could help me to overcome the despair of 5784 and motivate me to be both thankful for my blessings and dedicated to work together with others to repair the damages to our society and our souls we have experienced in the past year.

The challenge to be hopeful became even more difficult on August 30, with the discovery in the tunnels of Gaza of the bodies of Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Hersh Goldberg Polin, Ori Danino, Almog Sarusi, and Alexander Lobanov. Hamas had murdered them.

Parshat Ki Tavo is always read in the month of Elul, our time of personal and communal preparation for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, which our tradition calls the Yamim Noraim, the Days of Awe. This year, these awe-filled days come at the end of a truly awful year for Jews.

The curses that have befallen us weigh heavy, and it’s not easy to recall our blessings, let alone count them. Yet the command in our Torah portion today reminds me that it remains a mitzvah to give thanks that we live in a time when once again, Jews have sovereignty in the Land of Israel.

In the spirit of our parsha, I believe it is our obligation to search for light within the darkness that descended upon us on October 7, 2023 — Simchat Torah 5784. In the spirit of the text of Deuteronomy 26, I find myself wrestling with questions.

What are the responsibilities that accompany the blessing of the existence of the State of Israel?

In the spirit of David Ben Gurion, I ask myself, how can we make time in the year ahead work for us?

Rather than the pessimism we rightfully feel regarding peace between Israel and Palestinians, can we nonetheless echo the words of RFK and ask why not?

What responsibilities are imposed upon us, the Jewish People, by the command found in the opening of Ki Tavo to extend some form of affirmative action to not only the widows and orphans of our own communities but to the ger, the stranger living in our midst?

Does this command apply to Palestinians?

In verses 26:5-10 of our Torah portion we find a familiar passage that became a part of our Passover Haggadah. It begins with the narrative: “My father was a wandering Aramean. He went down to Egypt with meager numbers and there became a great and populous nation. The Egyptians dealt harshly with us and oppressed us.”

With the post-October 7 rise of antisemitism world-wide and most shockingly to many of us, particularly here in America, and specifically on our college campuses, these words have taken on new saliency. The cancer of antisemitism, which many of us, including me, felt was in remission in the America of the 21st century, has returned with a virulence and vengeance. Its expression within communities with whom our American Jewish community has worked together for social justice made the words and actions even more hurtful.

Does this reality exempt us from our responsibility to care for the hungry and homeless here in America? Do we have to establish a litmus test of excluding any group that questions Israel’s responses in the current war from our social action efforts? Or should we perhaps double down on our interfaith and intergroup activities? Can working together with others, creating opportunities for building bridges of understanding and cooperation, have the corollary blessing of giving us an opportunity for us to explain our compassion and passion for Israel and its citizens?

When I entered the Bergen County community 36 years ago, I was blessed to become an active participant in our Jewish Community Relations Council, and through the JCRC, a leader in the Brotherhood/Sisterhood committee of Bergen County, which included eight faith groups. Because of relationships that were created, many of those faith leaders stood together with our Jewish community during both the first and second intifadas and went on trips to Israel with me and other rabbinic colleagues. I count those decades of encounters as true blessings.

As we approach the dawn of 5785, look back on this year of war, and mourn those who were slaughtered on October 7 and in the subsequent 11 months, I believe that I must not only acknowledge the curse of hate that lies at the core of this terrible war, but also ask: What responsibility do our blessings of living as Jews in the 21st century impose upon us to be God’s voice and hand in the world?

The hundred thousand Israelis and the million Palestinians who have been made homeless by this war, as well as the thousands who have died, temper my joy this Rosh Hashanah. My heart breaks for the hostages still held captive and the families of the slaughtered, and those still held captive, who will have empty chairs at their holiday tables. I look back 56 years to the words of Robert Kennedy and David Ben Gurion for strength and hope. For both America and Israel this coming year, and in particular these next two months, similar to the autumn of 1968, find themselves at generational turning points.

As we face the unknown of 5785, may all, in the spirit of Ben Gurion, make this moment in time work for us, by participating in our American elections and by continuing to work for peace in the Middle East. May we all take to heart the words of RFK and not only dream of a better life for ourselves, for America, for Israel, and for all the world, but ask with true chutzpah, “why not?” and transform those dreams into reality.