​Jacob left Be’er Sheva on the road to Haran. He came upon a certain place and encamped there for the night. Taking one of the stones there, he used it as a pillow as he lay down. He had a dream: a stairway was set on the ground and its top reached into the sky, and angels of God were going up and down on it.

And the Lord was standing beside Jacob and said: "I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac."

After the revelation, Jacob awoke from his sleep and said:

"Surely the Lord is present in this place, and I did not know it!" Shaken up, he said, "how awesome is this place! This is none other than the abode of God, and the gateway to heaven."

Before he left that place he named it Beth El -House of God. 
 
According to our Torah, that is how Beth El -- the one in the Promised Land -- received its name.

And what about our Beth El? How did we get our name?? I’ve been wondering about this a great deal, as we move into our 90th Anniversary Celebration.
Related to this question, I recieved a call the other day from Lillian Rappoport, who needed a few minutes of my time. I thought it was about the upcoming March of the Living group, where we have a handful or more participating, but it turned out that she had a surprise for me. Over the summer a staff member at the JCC told her he had something to give her that he didn’t know what to do with, so she accepted it.

Once she looked at it she knew I - we - would want it. It is an original copy of the original Beth El Temple Building Dedication Booklet from 5688 - that is, 1928. Holding this one in my hand helped me focus my attention on this evening’s sermon.

As we begin our 10th decade of existence as a Sacred Community, a Kehillah Kedosha, and as we look forward to concluding this decade with our centenary celebration in 2026, we should pause throughout this year to ponder the past, celebrate the present and set our sights on the future. I believe that our future can be planned, envisioned, and realized; it might not happen exactly as we hope it will, but the future is coming. There are issues locally, nationally, and internationally that are beyond our control; there are social trends that we cannot buck and events we cannot imagine that will occur, hopefully all or at least most of them for the better; and tonight we can plan and commit ourselves to a strong future presence here in Harrisburg.

I believe that Beth El Temple plays a significant role in the future of both the Jewish Community in Harrisburg and in the future of the Conservative Movement. On the first day of our new year I spoke of our people’s founding story, the degradation of slavery, the challenges of freedom and the celebration of deeply spiritual and humanistic virtues our religious community developed.
What is our congregation’s founding story? What led to Beth El Temple’s establishment as a Conservative Congregation at a time when the newly settled Jewish immigrant community had largely focused on the economics and civics of assimilation and not the spirituality of assimilation?

90 years ago, Henry Brenner wrote:

The idea of the Temple was conceived early in 1926 when some twenty of our present membership were brought together in the hope that somehow they might bring into being a Synagogue dedicated to the re-emphasis of Jewish traditions and to an idealism and culture that breathes the traditional spirit and zeal for the Jewish faith. The practical accomplishments of this ambition seemed so visionary that only a rare optimism could foresee its early realization.

Within 18 months this group had raised $50,000 so the original Temple structure could be built with a Sanctuary seating 550 people, a canvas tapestry hanging from the ceiling, colorful windows to the outside and inside, and a growing congregation, from two or three hands full in 1926 to nearly 200 by the time the building was completed.
What characterized this group? Henry Brenner wrote that they were
Imbued by an unusual unselfishness and working with extraordinary zeal…
He concluded his thoughts 88 years ago by saying
Hence it is our hope that the young and old may come to enjoy a Judaism that is modern, constructive, completely Jewish, and religious, firm in the belief that only by being true Jews can we be true Americans. For this purpose Temple Beth El is dedicated, to advance the true principles of Judaism, and to serve our community.
While it is safe to say that it takes those types of people, those who are imbued by an unusual unselfishness and working with extraordinary zeal to found a congregation, we could not have continued as a congregation and become our Conservative Movement’s trail-blazer and trend-setter between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh without exceptional lay leadership, volunteers who worked during the day and took care of their congregation at night, volunteers who were selfless and devoted and passionate about this building, the clergy, the support staff, and most importantly, their fellow congregants. For the women and men who have led and who we will remember tomorrow at Yizkor, we thank God for their devotion.

We continue to be led and inspired by our volunteer leaders for whom we thank God -- for whom I thank God every day. In a certain, deeply spiritual manner, our volunteers and your devotion to this cause justify our title -- House of God -- Beth El.
 
But why, in 1926, did the Congregation decide to call itself “Beth El?” While nowhere in the Dedication Booklet is this answer spelled out, we know that Beth El was then and continues to be a popular name for synagogues in America. Why? Because it represented a connection between the Biblical Land of Israel and the newly established Jewish presence in America, the New Promised Land. I also think the title “Beth El” was popular because in America it is an aspirational name whereas in Israel it is a factual name, a place name. In the Bible Beth El is revealed to be the place where God reveals the Divine Presence to Jacob and connects him to the covenant through his parents. In America, Beth El is the place where we aspire to affirm the covenant with God that connects us to eternity and to each other; Beth El is a place we enter to Experience God’s Presence and be inspired; and Beth El is the place we establish to learn deep and more meaningful interpretations of our traditions and behave in such a way as to make this a Holy Congregation, a true House of God.

Jacob fled his brother’s wrath and found a safe haven in Beth El. We flee the darkness outside, we flee the sadness of the world, we flee the spiritual chaos that is our civilization, and we gather together to create a safe haven at Beth El.

We know this building, this institution, is only a building, and yet we imbue it with sanctity because of what we do here. Pray. Study. Celebrate. Engage in Fellowship. Break bread. We imbue it with sanctity by dint of what we learn to do here to help lead our communal agencies, to lead community hunger and housing relief agencies, to lead in establishing and maintaining communal, national, and international organizations, and to give generously to them all.
 
In so many ways we are Beth El -- A House of God.
 
Tonight I’d like us to consider how we can do even better as a congregation as we move forward into our 10th decade.

Permit me to share a two hour experience I had this past summer, at the Hartman Institute. One afternoon I attended a workshop entitled “Can the Synagogue Be Saved?” led by two Rabbinic Colleagues: my classmate Eddie Feinstein, of Valley Beth Shalom Congregation in Los Angeles, and my colleague Noa Kushner, a younger colleague who has a congregation in San Francisco aptly called “The Kitchen.” Imagine my surprise when one of the texts we discussed was the Membership Brochure from the congregation in which I grew up, the Congregation my parents helped to found in 1948, The Israel Community Center of Levittown, Long Island! The brochure was dated from that first year, 1948. I was surprised and flattered.

In 1948, someone who I probably knew growing up wrote this copy:
Many of our people have had little previous contact with synagogue life, having hitherto regarded the synagogue as a province of their elders. Many have not seen the inside of the “shule” since their Bar Mitzvah. Now, however, they feel it is time that they “grow up” and they have consequently acquired a renewed interest in synagogue activity. The responsibilities of parenthood have led many to rethink their position with regard to Jewish heritage which they now seek to maintain in order to be able to transmit it to their children. In Levittown, this “return to Judaism” is facilitated for them through the existence of a synagogue consisting of like minded young Jewish parents.”

For the Jewish veterans of World War II, and their spouses, this text resonated loudly in their consciousness. Moving out from the Big City to the suburbs, starting a family, and seeking to Americanize as first, second, and third generation immigrants, The responsibilities of parenthood led many to rethink their position with regard to Jewish heritage which they sought to maintain in order to be able to transmit it to their children.

Does this text continue to resonate today? It does for me. The problems and the challenges have not reinvented themselves! After WWII, Conservative synagogues were established with afternoon Hebrew Schools to attract parents of young children, baby boomers. Now, this quickly became a problem. Already in 1951 there were studies documenting the tension between what parents wanted for their children -- for the Synagogue School to teach their children all about Jewish heritage and traditions, customs, and ceremonies, on the one hand; and on the other hand their parents not wanting to observe any of the specifics their children were learning. Teach them about Kashrut -- but we won’t keep Kosher. Teach them about Shabbat -- but we won’t observe Shabbat. Teach them about the importance of Life Long Learning, but their Jewish Education will end with their Bar Mitzvah -- and later their Bat Mitzvah and/or Confirmation.

In an article in Commentary Magazine, from January 1951, Herbert Gans concludes his remarks with the ominous sentence “The fruit of this might well be a Judaism that ends rather than begins with Bar Mitzvah.” While these texts are from 65 years ago, they still resonate today.

Beth El Temple’s founders wrote the following in their dedicatory booklet, in the section entitled “Aims and Purposes of Our Congregation.”
 
            We are Americans, and as Americans we have had to give up a great part of Jewish Civilization. We have surrendered the Jewish civil code; we have little time for Hebrew Language and literature; we have no Jewish community life. But, if we want to remain Jews, we must retain enough of Jewish civilization to make a difference not only in our mode of praying but also in our mode of living, not only in the way we keep the seventh day but also in the way we spend the six days of the week.

The authors of this Statement of Aims and Purposes couldn’t have imagined the Holocaust and the impact that played upon Judaism, could only have prayed fervently for the establishment of a Jewish State in Palestine but not imagined the impact that would play, nor could they have imagined the impact the turning towards the “me generation” -- the America culture of “what’s in it for me” -- or the impact that plays upon Judaism here.
Today, decisions concerning Judaism that many of us make are inextricably wrapped up in the search for personal meaning. Moderately affiliated Jews today are not abandoning tradition but refashioning it. They have no wish to sacrifice the particularity of ethnic and religious loyalty in the name of America or of humanity. They aim to make Jewish narratives part of their own personal stories by picking and choosing among the new and inherited practices and texts to find the combination they as individuals can authentically affirm.

Many, many Jews today emphasize personal meaning as the arbiter of their Jewish involvement. Their Judaism focused on the self and self fulfillment rather than directed towards the group -- the people of Israel, the Jewish Community, the Jewish Community Center, the synagogue. Many Jews today believe that being Jewish is an extremely voluntary identity -- assuming rightful freedom of each individual to make his or her own Jewish decisions…as a result, Judaism is strictly nonjudgmental. Each person interacts with Judaism in ways that suit him or her. This phenomenon has come to be called “the sovereign self” -- when the individual feels empowered in making their own Jewish decisions.

What should we do? How can we respond to the move that many Jews are making away from institutional affiliation, including Synagogue and JCC affiliation, and believing that “Do It Yourself Judaism” is good for them? How are we to move ahead into our 10th decade with purpose and passion if everyone just wants what they want to help them feel fulfilled?

I believe we are moving in the right direction, but we need more impetus to envision the future we want for our congregation and our community. The challenges to us here in Harrisburg are serious challenges. The demographic drop in young families with children in Harrisburg has led us to a point unimaginable just five years ago; Chisuk Emuna, Temple Beth Shalom, and Beth El have merged our Religious Schools into a new school called “Gesher” -- a bridge between our congregations, a bridge bringing Jewish learners of all ages together to approach Jewish traditions and Jewish texts in age appropriate, serious ways. Under the leadership of Rabbi Ilyse Kramer and our active Gesher Religious School volunteer committee, our Gesher Religious School is in its second year; our Gesher Life Long Learning Program for adults kicks off in February and March with a co-sponsored course in Jewish Ethics.

The demographic drop in the general Jewish population is also dramatic. There are very few Jewish people moving into our neighborhoods who wish to affiliate. Dues is not a problem; desire to affiliate and be counted upon as a Jew is the problem. The Life and Legacy project you’ve heard about is one mechanism to maintain our financial viability and the financial viability of other Jewish agencies in our community into an uncertain future. Continued co-operative programming with Chisuk Emuna is also important.
           
But at the present we must be concerned with our vibrancy, not simply our viability. The days of obsessive concern about survival ended over two decades ago, and Jewish renewal, Jewish vibrancy, Jewish Renaissance must be our goals as we move ahead. One path to achieving the goal of renewal, vibrancy, and renaissance for Beth El Temple is a renewal of our vows from 1928. In 1928 our founders wrote the following under the heading “Aims and Purposes of our congregation”:
 
What are Members of Beth El Expected To Do?
- To provide their children with an intensive Jewish training which should continue far into the years of adolescence
- To affiliate with communal organizations which are essential to the continuance of Jewish life in the Diaspora
- To take an active part in the restoration of Palestine by giving it both material and moral support
- To foster the cultivation and growth of the Hebrew Language and literature
- To encourage in the Jewish school and pulpit the reevaluation of Israel’s past in terms of the present day world outlook.  
- To devote some time each week to individual study and group discussion of the ethical aspect of all problems touching human life
- To translate their ethical ideals into actual conduct in their home life, in their dealings with their neighbors, in their work, and in their play
 
            Permit me please to translate the above into doable actions -- mitzvot -- for 2016-2017: include Jewish social interaction, Jewish intellectual interaction, and Jewish spiritual interaction. My goal is for us to gather together next year at this time on our Jewish spiritual national calendar as a revitalized community of "more doing" Jewish congregants.

Come to Adult Education and establish or renew your relationship to our traditional wisdom and talk with others about how to apply those ideas to real life. Support and engage with our Jewish communal organizations. They need your leadership and your followership to thrive. Make a commitment to Jewish life in Israel. Read one American and one Israeli Jewish newspaper on line every week. Go to Israel to visit and volunteer.
Our Beth El is a place where we come to experience God’s Presence. It is not the only place we can go for such an experience, but Beth El offers those seeking Jewish spirituality a home, those seeking Jewish intellectual stimulation and satisfaction a home, those seeking Jewish fellowship, friendship, and love, a home. Our Beth El is a place where we can dream of God’s presence informing our lives for the better, for the sake of fulfilling the ultimate commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself.
 
Friends, we deserve to give ourselves a gift for our 90th Anniversary, and that gift is a Renaissance of Judaism here at Beth El Temple for our sacred space and for our sacred congregation. It is in our power to do this; we will make it happen when we imbue our actions with an unusual unselfishness and work with extraordinary zeal on behalf of our Beth El Temple.
​
May this be a year of renewed zeal, revitalized Jewish activities, and a Renaissance of Jewish Life for our Congregation and our Community. And may everyone be written and sealed for a year of good health, sweetness in all interpersonal activities, celebration, and joy. 

Shabbat Shalom.
 
For the past two weeks
I’ve been thinking again
About our desensitization to violence
And massacres happening in our own country.
 
A week ago,
In my Shabbat sermon I asked the question
Since when did the founding father’s expression
We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator
with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are
Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. —--
 
Become less important to protect
Than the second amendment to the Constitution’s
A well regulated Militia,
being necessary to the security of a free State,
the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,
shall not be infringed.?
 
I believe that our tradition teaches us
That human life is priceless -
Murder is the cardinal sin of one human against the other.
If we’re permitting people to commit mass murder,
People who are not members of a militia,
Not members of a “well-regulated militia”
To purchase weapons of mass destruction
We are contributing to the sin of murder.
 
We are desensitized, inured,
To the violence and tragedy
Perpetrated upon innocent children, women and men;
If we were not inured
We would demand relief from this violence
By renewing the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act
And expanding it to include an Assault Weapons ban.  
Named after James Brady, president Reagan’s Press secretary,
Who was wounded and paralyzed during
The attempt on President Reagan’s life,
When he also was seriously wounded,
It imposed background checks on handgun purchases
From licensed dealers.
 
It’s been 22 years since the Brady bill passed.
From the law's passage until 2009 --
the latest year statistics are available --
over 107 million Brady-mandated background checks
were conducted.
 
But Gun politics have changed since the passage of the Brady bill. Here are a few notable examples.
 
1. Now, When gun policy gets passed, it's usually about loosening gun restrictions, not tightening them.
 
The New York Times did a study in December 2013 analyzing gun policy since the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School the previous year, a year when 71 other children were killed by gun violence. Around the country, 1,500 state gun bills were proposed, 109 became law, and 70 of those new laws loosened existing gun legislation. According to a Gallup poll from January 30, 2014, 55 percent of Americans are dissatisfied with existing gun policy.
 
In our own commonwealth the Republicans have proposed
Lowering the 15 day waiting period,
Passed and signed into law in Governor Ridge’s administration,
To a 3 day waiting period.
If passed this will be vetoed by Governor Wolf,
But it has been proposed.
 
2. 242 members of the House had an "A rating" from the National Rifle Association in December 2012.
 
46 senators did.
 
3. In 2013, a plan to expand background checks failed.
 
Fifty-four senators were for it, 46 were against -- and it couldn't pass without a 60-vote threshold. Only 56 senators voted yes on the Brady bill. The background checks bill, co-sponsored by Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), would have required checks on all commercial gun sales, and was a part of the big federal push on gun violence policy after the school shooting in Newtown, Conn. The president did sign 25 executive actions related to gun-violence prevention in 2013, however.
 
4. In 1998, gun violence was seen as the most pressing issue in the country, according to a Gallup survey.
 
In October 2013, 1 percent of respondents saw violence and crime as the most pressing issue in the country.
 
5. Opinions of the National Rifle Association are about the same as they were 20 years ago.
 
 
December 2012, Gallup
In a 1993 Gallup survey, 55 percent of the country had a favorable opinion of the NRA. At the end of 2012, 54 percent of Americans had a favorable opinion of them.
 
6. In the 1993-1994 election cycle, the NRA spent $2.3 million.
 
In the 2011-2012 election cycle, they spent $24.8 million.
 
7. New gun-control groups are starting to spend big money, too.
 
Gabby Giffords, who was shot at a constituent meeting in Arizona in 2011, started Americans for Responsible Solutions, a gun-control focused 501(c)4. The group raised nearly $12.5 million this year. Michael Bloomberg started Mayors Against Illegal Guns in 2006. The organization has spent nearly $2 million lobbying since its formation. According to the National Journal, "gun-control groups spent five times as much on federal lobbying in 2013 as they did the year before, but the NRA and others still outpaced them by more than 7-to-1."
 
8. In 1993, 34 percent of Americans thought it was more important to protect the right to own guns than control gun ownership.
 
 Pew Research Center, December 2013
In 2013, 48 percent of Americans thought that.
 
9. Firearm homicides reached a peak of 17,075 in 1993.
 
In 2011, about 9,900 people were murdered by guns, according to FBI data. Statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that 18,253 gun homicides happened in 1993, while 11,078 gun murders occurred in 2010.
 
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
in 2013,
firearms were used in 84,258 nonfatal injuries (26.65 per 100,000 U.S. citizens)
and 11,208 deaths by homicide (3.5 per 100,000),
21,175 by suicide with a firearm,
505 deaths due to accidental discharge of a firearm,
and 281 deaths due to firearms- ...
 
10. In October 2011, 47 percent of Americans said they had a gun in the home -- the highest number since 1993.
 
 11. Things that didn't exist in 1994 that politicians have to think about now: online gun sales, 3-D printing and smart guns.
 
When I returned home from Wednesday night’s Board Meeting
And saw the sit-in taking place on the floor
Of the House of Representatives,
I appreciated how far the abyss had opened up
Between those who truly, honestly and religiously believe
That the right of people to Life, Liberty
And the Pursuit of Happiness is paramount
And those who believe
That the right to bear arms is paramount.
 
I believe we are in a very sad state of affairs.
Guns have become our society’s new fetishes, our new idols.
Assault Rifles are the Venus DeMilos,
The preferred, highest valued fetish objects,
Valued Over life itself.
 
We have run amok of basic religious principles.
In Judaism Life is infinitely valued,
Infinitely treasured,
To be Nurtured at the expense
Of almost all other things.
 
Talmud Torah Kineged Kulam;
Jewish Education is fundamental to a meaningful, examined life.
 
We must get back on track,
And I don’t know how.
 
But I believe the first step is
To challenge our legislators
To work on protecting the living
As passionately as they do the unborn;
To work on protecting me and my family
As passionately as those who seek to purchase
Handguns and assault weapons,
To work on protecting those who worship in this synagogue
And all other houses of worship
As passionately as they protect themselves;
To work on protecting our children as they are learning and playing
As passionately as they protect themselves;
To work on protecting our citizens
As passionately as they protect themselves.
 
I believe a society that becomes inured to violent acts,
To mass murder and terrible tragedy
Is on the verge of collapse.
 
This cannot be what the framers of our constitution wanted.
This cannot be what we want.
 
Shabbat Shalom.
 
 
 
 

Shabbat Shalom.
 
Thanksgiving is my opportunity to share with you
That I remember when it was an indesputable truth
That the United States of America
Was a nation of immigrants,
Staring with the aborigines who came here hundreds of years
Before Columbus, or Leif Erikson, discovered our east coast
Or perhaps the Japanese discovered our west coast
And continuing through the first generations of settlers
from Europe
Starting in 1492
And never ending -
Never ending.
 
What happened to that indisputable truth is, I believe,
A shame for our country.
What happened to that indisputable fact is
That our natural tendency to xenophobia,
To fearing the stranger, the other, the outsider,
Is threatening to conquer our natural tendency
To welcome the stranger,
To reach out to those who are the most diverse,
Most different from us,
And welcome them, and settle them,
And assimilate them into our great civic society
While encouraging them to maintain
Their diverse behaviors that make them unique.
 
Who celebrated the first Thanksgiving?
Two groups of immigrants -
Those called Indians who are, of course, our predecessors here,
The Native American community, the Wampanauge Tribe -
And those called settlers, the Pilgrims
Who had fled religious Persecution in England.
 
And, from then on, the xenophobia
and the tolerance
Have been fighting with each other;
This fight continues today.
 
Here’s the rub:
There is this political hot potato called
“The Dream Act”
Which is both Federal and State sponsored legislation.
 
On the Federal Level the dream act
Didn’t pass congress, despite bipartisan support,
Because of the political quagmire we see in Washington.
Its important for all of us to remember
It was President Bush - W -
Who introduced the Dream Act in 2001
As part of his Conservative Republican platform.
 
Republicans refused to support the Bill in 2010
And it was defeated.
 
There is a Pennsylvania Dream Act
That needs our support if it is to pass our State House.
 
 The PA Dream Act has been introduced in the State Senate as SB760 by Senator Lloyd Smucker.
 
What is the PA Dream Act?
 
The Pennsylvania Dream Act will provide the opportunity
for undocumented students
who have graduated from high school in Pennsylvania,
or have a GED certificate,
to pay in-state tuition rates
at public institutions of higher education in the Commonwealth.
 
The PA Dream Act will improve college access
for undocumented youth
and allow them to give back to the state they grew up in.
 
Why is it important?
 
Access to education should be fair and equitable,
regardless of your immigration status.
Undocumented students with high school diplomas
and GED certificates in Pennsylvania
are frequently charged 2-3 times more
than the in-state tuition rate when they apply to college.
This is unjust
and against the fundamental value of equality
upon which this country was founded.
 
State Dream Acts have already passed in 20 other states, including New Jersey and Maryland,
providing huge economic benefits to public institutions.
 
In my mind,
Using the Jewish values we share,
Values of welcoming the stranger in our midst,
Of treating the stranger like a citizen,
Of offering kindness and compassion
To those who are generally marginalized by society -
Using those values
The Jewish Community is in favor of the PA Dream Act.
 
The Jewish Values we share
Are birthed in the Torah,
When Sarah and Abraham welcome strangers
Into their tent;
They are reinforced when Jacob,
Himself a refugee from violence in his own home,
Is welcomed in his mother’s home of origin;
And they are concretized into law
When the Torah teaches us 3 dozen times
“You shall not mistreat the stranger in your midst
Because you were strangers in the land of Egypt
And were abused, objectified and enslaved.”
 
These are not comfortable values;
They challenge us to reject xenophobia
And embrace tolerance;
And I’m sorry there is not a better antonym for “xenophobia,”
Tolerance will have to do.
 
But when we reject xenophobia
We embrace a diverse, welcoming, accepting society;
We embrace a democratic, pluralistic society;
We embrace the very root meaning of “Western Civilization.”
 
When we reject xenophobia,
We embrace real, authentic and modern Jewish values.
 
And, we embrace the core meaning of Thanksgiving,
From the Wampanagues and the Pilgrims
Through today and into the future.
Happy Thanksgiving. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  

Edited for 2015 - Delivered by Dale Kaplan

Shabbat Shalom. 

It is a sobering realization that I am in the last generation of Americans 
Who saw the Reverend Martin Luther King alive,
Heard him speak,
Saw him on the news and read about him in the newspapers
With fresh eyes and when, indeed, his message was news.

And not just news, 
But truly as revolutionary, as counter-intuitive, 
As subversive 
As Moses’ voice is to us this morning:
Let my people Go. 

Speaking truth to power 
Was uncommon and uncomfortable; 
Now it seems blasé. 

Speaking truth to power
Seemed to be the soundtrack to the 1960’s, 
And civil protests, civil disobedience, non-violent demonstrations
Were the norm, 
Although often we remember the violence, 
The upheaval, the riots across America. 

It is important to remember the non-violent message, 

And prayer for peace 
that the Reverend Martin Luther King embodied 
in his words and his deeds
When he rose into the national spotlight in the 1960’s 
Until his assassination in 1968. 

And, it is important for us to remember
And memorialize the truth 
That our own Dr. Abraham Joshua Heschel
And Dr. King were dear friends
And fellow travelers on the road to non-violence and peace;
As Dr. King challenged Dr. Heschel to engage 
His powerful resources in the struggle for equal rights,
For civil rights for all Americans, 
So Dr. Heschel challenged Dr. King
To engage his powerful resources 
In the struggle against the War in Vietnam. 

And we must not forget that Dr. King 
Was a great support of the State of Israel
Both preceding and following the Six Day War of 1967. 

Just 10 days before his assassination
He spoke to us, 
He spoke directly to the Jewish Community. 
He visited the Rabbinical Assembly Convention 
And, after being introduced by Abraham Joshua Heschel 
Dr. King answered questions posed by Rabbis at the convention. 

In his response to the final question, 

Regarding his response to the report of 
the Kerner Commission;
The Kerner Commission was created by President Johnson
To study the reasons for the race riots of 1967. 
And, lo and behold, the report stated 
That America was a racist country. 
The report ominously warned, 
"Our nation is moving toward two societies, 
one black, one white--
-separate and unequal."

Dr. King responded to the Kerner Commission report 
With these challenging words: 
The religious community, 
Being the chief moral guardian 
Of the overall community,
Should really take the primary responsibility 
In dealing with this problem of racism.”

That challenge still exists for us today,
Throughout America and in many parts of the world.

As I read Dr. King’s words,
I am transported to another time
When great religious leaders 
Took up the challenge of speaking truth to power;
And I am reminded of the challenge that we live with 
Every day;
As Jews, the challenge is one
We are reminded of each day 
In our prayers 
And today because of our Torah portion.

Our Amidah, our standing meditation
Which we are about to recite states: 
Praised are You, Adonai, 
Our God and God of our ancestors;
God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob – 
(Of course, we add the names of our matriarchs) – 
And we rarely if ever ask
“where does that formulation of connectedness to the past, 
To patriarchs and matriarchs, 
Where does that come from?

The answer is, it comes from the first chapters of Exodus. 
In God’s introductory words to Moses, 
From the eternally burning bush, 
God says: I am “elohei Avraham, 
Elohei Yitzhaq vay’lohey Ya’akov” –
The same formulation of Patriarchs as in the Amidah. 

Three times each day -and a fourth time in Musaf
On days such as Shabbat -
Our sages urged us:
Consider yourself no less chosen, 
No less obligated to your tasks, 
No less inspired 
That Moshe was as he stood before the burning bush. 

In other words, 
Each one of us is equally challenged to speak truth to power. 
Who was Moshe to speak to next? 
Pharaoh, of course.

Heschel, of course, picked up on this right away. 
What paved the way for the friendship
That blossomed between Dr’s King and Heschel?

In January 14th

52 years ago this past Wednesday, 

King attended the National Conference on Race

And heard Dr. Heschel deliver the opening address.

Heschel said: 

At the First Conference on religion and race
The main participants were Pharaoh and Moses. 
Moses words were:
Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, 
Let my people Go that they may celebrate a feast to Me.
Pharaoh retorted:
Who is the Lord, 
That I should heed this voice and let Israel go?
I do not know the Lord,
And moreover I will not let Israel go!

Heschel concluded his introduction as follows: 
The outcome of that summit meeting
Has not come to an end. 
Pharaoh is not ready to capitulate. 
The exodus began, 
But it is far from having been completed. 
In fact, it was easier for the children of Israel 
To cross the Red Sea 
Than for a negro to cross certain university campuses.

King and Heschel met after Heschel’s speech, 
King invited Heschel to march with him in Selma,
And they became fast and dear friends.

Friends gathered here today, 

The Torah’s message

As lived through the lives of 

Martin Luther King and Abraham Joshua Heschel 

Lives on in our midst today, 
Not only because of their message
But more importantly 
Because the challenge has been met but not won; 
We are still a country where civil rights 
Need to be won and defended;
There are always those around us 
Who seek to take away from us our
Constitutionally granted civil rights, 
Be that granting explicit or implied. 

The message from the Burning Bush, 

The message from Sinai, 

The message from God to each one of us
Is that we must be the advocates 
For freedom for all people
And equal rights for all people. 
Either all of us are created in God’s image
Or none of us are endowed with the inalienable dignities 
Of absolute equality, infinite value 
And near-infinite potential to perfect our world. 
As God’s partners in creation
We owe it to ourselves 
To aspire towards these divine gifts. 

As we recite our Amidah,
Let us feel the heat from the burning bush
And recognize the challenge which lies before us:
to bring freedom and equality to our civilization. 

May the gifts we’ve received 
From our Matriarchs, Patriarchs, Prophets and Rabbis
Serve us well as we strive to maintain
Civil rights for all. 
May Martin Luther King’s memory
And Abraham Joshua Heschel’s memory
Always be for a blessing. 

Amen.