Dear Gen Z and Millennial Jews.
This heart-to-heart comes from a seasoned Boomer, who recently left my pulpit after nearly forty years. This year I’ll be sitting back in the pews; this year of all years, with so much that needs to be said, and with so many of you feeling despondent and let down. So I ask you to indulge me and let me speak to you, in the best way that I can right now.
I feel for what you’ve been through and the innocence you’ve lost. My parents endured Pearl Harbor and the Holocaust, but Millennials and Gen Z have been pummeled by the equivalent of three Pearl Harbors: Sept. 11, COVID and Oct.7. As for my generation, I was too young to be drafted for Vietnam, so my formative events were the Six Day War, Soviet Jewry and Watergate. I grew up believing in the ultimate triumph of justice, the surprising resilience of the Jewish people and the power of the Jewish message. I was truly fortunate. You are not.
Some have described this as a “break glass moment” for the world. For America, Israel and her neighbors, Ukraine, refugees and immigration, economic insecurity, crime, racism, antisemitism, A.I., gun violence, and hate.
And to top it off, the worst haters on the far left and right have libeled us and have ostracized and chased you, subjecting some of you to unspeakable violence. Many of you feel vulnerable at your own synagogues, workplaces and classrooms.
While no one can ever excuse the hate directed against us, we simultaneously find ourselves having to bear the brunt of horrific actions taken by leaders claiming to represent us, both in Israel and here who have enabled one another through corruption and cowardice.
I don’t blame you for coming to see Judaism and the Jewish people through the prism of these actions. But I also want to say: You can be proud of who you are and of the precious legacy you’ve inherited, focusing on three priceless and deeply rooted Jewish values: peace, hope and empowerment.
PEACE:
Genesis Rabbah (56:10), an early fifth century collection of Midrash, notes that Abraham called the place where he brought Isaac to be sacrificed “Adonai Yireh,” “God will show me a vision.” According to that rabbinic commentary, that exact same spot was claimed generations before by Noah’s son Shem, who called it “Shalem.”
One holy place, two names, two nations.
This posed a dilemma for God, who said, “If I call it Yireh as did Abraham, then Shem, a righteous man, will resent it; while if I call it Shalem as did Shem, the equally righteous Abraham will resent it.
Hence I will call it Yeru-shalem, including both names.”
Jerusalem, the city of peace, city of different names, got its universal name through an act of compromise and outreach.
Judaism has no core principle greater than peace.
No wonder SHALOM is the first Hebrew word most people learn and is literally one of the names of God. A form of that word appears 350 times in the Hebrew Bible. The word’s root denotes wholeness and perfection, shlaymut. Next Shabbat, if you are in the proximity of a gathering of Jews, especially at a service, count how many times you hear and say the word “Shalom.” I would set the over/under at 50.
We read it in scripture (”Seek peace, and pursue it” - Psalm 34:14); in commentary (“The world is sustained by three pillars: truth, justice, and peace” (Pirkei Avot 1:18), and over and over in our liturgy.1 The Talmud enshrines it: “The whole Torah is for the sake of peace” (Gittin 59b), and in his Code of Jewish Law, Maimonides calls the pursuit of peace “the purpose for which the Torah was given, to bring peace upon the world.” (Mishna Torah, Laws of Hanukkah 4:14).
The Judaism of victimhood, violence and vengeance is not the Judaism that has prevailed over the centuries. It is not the essence of our Jewish tradition, to revel in conquest and cling to a vision of blood and soil. With all the tragedies that have afflicted Jews and Palestinians, we know that at the heart of darkness burns a special light. We see it in countless acts of courage and love.
At the grass roots level, Israelis and Palestinians are literally driving the peace process:
Just before the Israeli Canadian peace activist Vivian Silver was killed by Hamas on Oct. 7, the 74-year-old was planning to drive six critically ill Palestinians to a hospital in Jerusalem. Silver, who lived in Kibbutz Be’eri, habitually volunteered with Road to Recovery, an Israeli organization enlisting volunteers to drive Palestinian patients to Israeli hospitals when they are unable to access medical care in the West Bank and Gaza.
And there’s the story of Yusuf Ziadna, a Bedouin bus driver who drove straight into danger to save over 30 people escaping the attacks on Nova music festival on October 7th.
Judaism, YOUR Judaism, desires peace over anything else. We are not “genocidal.” Our purpose for existing on this planet is to eliminate genocide, because genocide was done to us. Elie Wiesel said that Jews have a moral duty to speak out and intervene against indifference. You should be proud to take ownership of Wiesel’s legacy.
Sometimes that means taking tough stands even against the government of our democratic Jewish state of Israel. We have needed to do that all too often recently.
On one weekend in November 1977, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat went from being the most feared of Israel’s enemies to a partner in peace, simply by coming to Jerusalem. Everything changed overnight.
Which brings me to the second deeply rooted Jewish value: Ours is a tradition that not only champions peace. It also inspires us to have hope - the confidence that things can change.
HOPE:
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel entered his classroom one morning and proclaimed – “I saw a miracle this morning! I saw a miracle this morning!”
“Rabbi,” his students asked, “What was the miracle?”
“The sun came up!”
The Talmud states that whoever witnesses the miracle of a sunrise or a sunset and does not say a blessing might as well be dead. Darkness is simply a sunrise waiting to happen.
The rhythms of darkness and light are also played out in the ebbs and flows of history, something Jews know all about. But we also know that in Judaism, we have the power to change things for the better – and it is incumbent upon us to try.
Deuteronomy states that we have a choice between the blessing and the curse. Blessings are our vehicles for transforming hope into action. For the rabbis - and us - “saying a blessing” is not enough, unless it leads to acts of healing and justice and a lifetime of purpose. The sunrise is a blessing, but only if we harness its energy and reduce our carbon footprint. Our agricultural bounty is a blessing, but only if we use it to feed the hungry. Our sexuality is a blessing, but only if it is used to ennoble and never to subjugate. Our mind is a blessing, but only if knowledge is synthesized with a yearning for justice and a predisposition for kindness. And our democracy is a blessing – if we can keep it.
Which brings me to the third and final deeply rooted Jewish value:
EMPOWERMENT:
Power is a blessing too. Or at least it can be. True, “Power corrupts,” as Lord Acton wrote in the 19th century. But Jewish sources remind us that power also ennobles. Power is a gift if we use it wisely. And since the advent of modern Zionism, Jews have made the conscious choice of power and morality over recrimination and self-pity.
I want to repeat this message, especially for you, younger Jews who have been subjected to so much shame, ambivalence and fear. Being Jewish is ennobling. We can’t allow ourselves to live in a world that forces us to hide our yarmulkes and chai chains.
While others spent the Middle Ages building fences and re-drawing borders, Jews were constantly traversing them, carrying the best that every culture could offer. We traveled the world spreading a message of kindness and justice.
And then we built a Jewish state - because no one else would take us in. Israel hasn’t faced a day of serenity in nearly 80 years, but a single dream has kept it afloat, the Jewish dream of a peace-filled life, using our newfound power for good.
And for Jews, that dream holds us together. That’s the Israel we need to help build. The world needs that. America needs that too.
The upcoming Days of Awe represent a “break glass” moment. All we need to do is add one simple word to transform “break glass” into “break the glass,” a wedding feast where mourning becomes dancing, and silence becomes song.
Everything can change, just like that. Be proud of who you are. Be hopeful for what Israel and America can be. Everything can change in a single day.
Or maybe two days.
October 27 in Israel and November 3 here.
L’Shanah Tova Tikateyvu!
Rabbi Joshua Hammerman
PS - Please write me with your questions or concerns, and feel free to leave suggestions (there’s no paywall!) for me and for others in your age cohort to get the most out of the holidays. Below is a little sampling of New Year wishes through the centuries and across the continents.
Some vintage New Year’s Cards
If you don’t believe Judaism is a religion of peace and kindness, check this:
Thanks for invoking acts of heroism that tried to promote peace and healing in our lifetime and Judaism as a call to virtue, where vigilance is not an excuse for violence.
I think the thing I find hardest to take is my sadness and disappointment at the actions of other Jews. When i bring up things that Jews have done recently that seem so immoral, so against what I believe, I am countered with what Hamas or Hezbollah has done. Well, to me, that is not relevant. They do what I have come to expect from Hamas or Hezbollah. But when Jews commit horrible acts, it hits my heart and gut in a different way. And I want to be disconnected from their actions. And if they claim that they are acting in God's name, I feel morally obligated to say that we do not believe in the same God.