Take Down the Posts!

I had a radical thought while perusing the Torah readings for this Sukkot holiday. What if the Promised Land for Jews is also the United States? That’s what my great-grandparents thought. If the USA is the Promised Land, what actions does the Torah direct in relation to that promised nation status? What are we spiritually commanded to do when we take possession of homes in this land?

The Torah reading for the intermediate Shabbat of the holiday Sukkot is Exodus 33:12 – 34:26. After Moses asks to see God’s presence, God reiterates some key concepts with a particular focus on how the land of Canaan will be delivered to the Israelites. The process requires more than a visa. The Lord of Hosts will lead the way as the Israelites wreak havoc on the Canaanites, Jebusites, and other inhabitants of the land.

The Torah then commands us to tear down the idols, smash their pillars and cut down their sacred posts of the inhabitants of the land? I believe that there is a modern counterpart that demands that we wage moral and ethical battles in our country.

Tear down the idols of greed and power that lead to corruption. I’ll energetically defend capitalism because I know that the aspiration to acquire wealth is important to the growth of an economy. Yet, there also needs to be a fix for the widening wealth gap in this country. With homelessness overwhelming cities like Los Angeles and 4 million children without health care, poverty has ramifications far beyond individual needs. We all benefit by efforts to eliminate extreme poverty. An immoral society sits idly by contaminated water, persistent hunger, and inadequate housing. While sitting in our flimsy sukkah, subject to cool wind and even drenching rain, we are reminded of the frailty of our existence and should consider the needs of those who don’t have a nice home into which they can retreat.

Can we smash the pillars of hatred? We must expose and deal a death blow to racism, sexism, anti-semitism, abelism, and discrimination based on sexual identity. Sukkot is a holiday of gathering, when all people came together in Jerusalem to celebrate. Today the sukkah is a place to gather, which should remind us to include everyone without regard to skin color, or whom they love or their physical status, or gender.

Finally we have to cut down the “sacred” posts – the insidious use of social media to promote hatred, the tweets that harm our national interests, and the interference with our democracy. The First Amendment, long held sacred in the United States, is a right to speech and not a cover for odium, abuse, venality and illegal activity. We can protect our rights and limit the exploitation of the internet as a mode of communication. To do so, we must reconsider the limitations on free speech in a modern world and appropriate standards for the internet.

Now that I’ve made my case, perhaps none of this is quite so radical. Maybe the desire to create a better more equitable country, a promised land, is simply Jewish.

Rabbi Evan J. Krame

PS – just after writing this, an op-ed piece was posted on the New York Times website that addresses some of my concern: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/17/opinion/tech-monopoly-democracy-journalism.html