On Yom Kippur, we hear the powerful words of Isaiah 58. This prophetic passage serves as both a challenge and a comfort.
The obvious reason we read this text is that it serves as a stark reminder that ritual alone does not fulfill what is required of us as Jews. As the talmudic rabbi, Hanina ben Dosa, taught: “Those whose deeds exceed their wisdom, their wisdom is enduring, but those whose wisdom exceeds their deeds, their wisdom is not enduring (Pirkei Avot 3:9).” Isaiah’s words echo this sentiment, urging us to move beyond the comfortable confines of ritual and into the sometimes uncomfortable realm of action and ethical living.
However, there’s a deeper, more nuanced reason for our engagement with this text on this holiest of days. By reading Isaiah 58, we acknowledge the profound difficulty of truly living out our values. It is a recognition that the gap between our ideals and our actions is often wider than we would like to admit.
In this context, prayer becomes not just a recitation of words, but an expression of our highest aspirations – a vision of who we hope to become. Particularly when we pray as a community, our collective voices should serve as encouragement, lifting each other up as we strive to be our best selves. Yet, we must also honestly confront the reality that it is not always easy to align our behavior with this lofty vision. Isaiah’s words, then, become a compassionate acknowledgment of our struggles, as well as a call to persevere in our efforts to bridge the distance between our prayers and our actions.
In Jewish thought, human imperfection is not viewed as a flaw to be eradicated, but rather as an essential aspect of our nature that offers opportunities for growth and partnership with the Divine. This perspective invites us to embrace our full humanity, including those qualities we might initially perceive as negative.
The rabbis recognized that traits such as ambition, egoism, and materialism – often maligned in spiritual contexts – actually serve vital functions in human society. These impulses, when channeled appropriately, motivate us to build homes, establish businesses, and raise families. They drive us to create, to achieve, and to leave a lasting impact on the world. The challenge, then, is not to eliminate these traits entirely, but to maintain a balance, harnessing their power for positive ends while preventing them from overwhelming our higher moral and spiritual aspirations.
This nuanced understanding of human nature aligns with the rabbinic teaching that the world was created in an incomplete state. Far from being a divine oversight, this incompleteness is intentional, inviting humanity to become active partners with God in the ongoing work of creation. We are called not merely to exist in the world, but to participate in its growth and evolution.
Our tradition teaches that this partnership can be found in the familiar blessing over bread. When we say “hamotzi lechem min ha’aretz” – “who brings forth bread from the earth” – we acknowledge a collaborative process. God provides the wheat, the raw material that springs from the earth, but it is human ingenuity, effort, and skill that transforms that wheat into bread. This seemingly simple blessing encapsulates a profound theological concept: the necessity of partnership between the Divine and the human in bringing the world to its full potential.
In embracing our imperfections and engaging in this sacred partnership, we find not just purpose, but a path to continual growth and self-improvement. Each challenge becomes an opportunity, each flaw a chance to refine ourselves and, in doing so, to participate in ongoing creation.
The task of teshuvah, the process of return and repair on which we focus today, is, therefore, not to perfect ourselves but to do our best to align our actions with our values. This task, far from being simple or straightforward, is a complex and ongoing challenge that lies at the heart of our spiritual practice.
If the path of teshuvah were easy, we might take it for granted, missing the growth and insight that come from genuine struggle. Consider the commandment in this morning’s Torah portion to “choose life.” On the surface, this might seem like a simple directive. After all, who wouldn’t choose life given the option? But as we delve deeper, we realize that our world isn’t neatly divided into separate spheres of life and death. The process of being itself entails a constant interplay of creation and destruction, birth and death. In navigating this complexity, we are called upon to exercise discernment and wisdom.
A concrete example of this complexity can be found in the ongoing debate surrounding reproductive rights. There are those who argue that to “choose life” means prohibiting abortion in all circumstances, asserting that the potential life of a fetus always takes precedence over other considerations. However, viewed through the lens of Jewish tradition, this perspective oversimplifies a nuanced issue.
Judaism acknowledges that there can be situations where we must weigh competing life-affirming values. The Jewish approach to abortion, for instance, takes into account both the life and the well-being of the mother, recognizing that there can be circumstances where terminating a pregnancy is not only permissible but may even be the most life-affirming choice.
This example illustrates the reality that “choosing life” often involves navigating complex moral terrain. In these situations, human thought and discernment are not just valuable, but essential. We are called upon to engage deeply with our tradition, to wrestle with difficult questions, and to make choices that honor the complexity of life itself.
As we grapple with the command to “choose life,” we find ourselves in a world where the destruction of life in the form of violence seems omnipresent, both in our immediate communities and on the global stage. This tension is not new to our tradition; indeed, the Hebrew Bible itself is replete with accounts of violence, presenting us with a complex legacy that we must navigate thoughtfully. Warfare is often portrayed as a necessary and even divinely sanctioned reality. The Israelites are frequently called upon not just to fight, but to completely eliminate their enemies – a directive that, to our modern sensibilities, can seem disturbingly genocidal. God is often depicted as a warrior, an image that can be challenging for many of us to reconcile with our contemporary understanding of divinity.
Yet, amidst these narratives of violence, our tradition also provides crucial limitations and nuances. There is a clear distinction made between killing and murder, with the latter unequivocally prohibited. The often misunderstood principle of “an eye for an eye” is not a call for revenge, but rather a mandate for proportional justice – “no more than an eye for an eye.” Biblical laws of war require attempts at negotiation before engaging in conflict, emphasizing that violence should never be the first resort.
Moreover, alongside the warrior imagery, we find depictions of God as nurturing and compassionate. Violence is never presented as the ideal state of being. The prophet Isaiah’s vision of the messianic age encapsulates this belief: “Then they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not take up sword against nation; they shall never again know war (Isaiah 2:4).” This powerful image reminds us that peace, not violence, is our ultimate aspiration.
The transition from biblical to rabbinic Judaism marks a significant shift in our tradition’s approach to violence. Living under the brutal occupation of the Roman Empire, the talmudic rabbis developed a worldview in stark contrast to the values of their imperial oppressors. Their firsthand experience of violence led them to abhor it, seeking instead to cultivate a path of peace and spiritual resistance.
The rabbis’ rejection of violence is summarized in several key texts that shaped Jewish ethics for generations. In Pirkei Avot 1:13, Hillel exhorts us to “be of the disciples of Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace, loving humankind and drawing them close to the Torah.” This teaching elevates peace-making to a central religious value, encouraging active engagement in building harmonious relationships.
Rabban Shimon ben Gamaliel articulates a worldview where peace stands alongside justice and truth as the pillars upon which the world rests (Pirkei Avot 2:18). This triad suggests that true peace cannot exist without justice and truth, and conversely, that justice and truth are incomplete without peace.
The rabbis also recognized the societal conditions that breed violence. Pirkei Avot 5:8 warns that “The sword comes to the world because of the delay of justice, and because of the perversion of judgment.” This insight challenges us to create equitable societies as a means of preventing violence.
Perhaps the clearest example of rabbinic attitudes toward violence can be seen in their reframing of the Hanukkah story. Originally, as recounted in the First Book of Maccabees, Hanukkah celebrated a military victory over the Greeks. However, the rabbis, uncomfortable with glorifying warfare, chose to tell a different story. They shifted the focus to the miracle of the oil, which became a powerful metaphor for the survival of the Jewish people against overwhelming odds. This reinterpretation demonstrates a conscious choice to emphasize divine providence and spiritual resilience over military might, proclaiming, in the words of Zechariah, that victory comes, “Not by might, and not by force, but by [God’s] spirit (Zechariah 4:6).”
The talmudic legend about the founding of the rabbinic academy at Yavneh illustrates another, often overlooked, turning point in Jewish beliefs about violence.
During the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE, Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai, a leading Pharisee, realized that the city’s fall was inevitable. To preserve Jewish learning and tradition, he devised a plan to escape the besieged city. He had his disciples smuggle him out of Jerusalem in a coffin, pretending he was dead. They brought him to the Roman general Vespasian’s camp. Once there, Rabbi Yochanan emerged from the coffin and prophesied that Vespasian would become emperor. When this prophecy came true shortly afterwards, Vespasian offered to grant Rabbi Yochanan a request.
Rabbi Yochanan asked for permission to establish a Jewish academy in the coastal town of Yavneh. Vespasian granted this request, seemingly unaware of its profound significance. At Yavneh, Rabbi Yochanan established a new Sanhedrin (Jewish high court) and an academy that became the model for future rabbinic academies and ensured the continuity of Jewish scholarship and practice in the post-Temple era. This story emphasizes that Jewish survival was achieved through the rejection of violence.
This narrative provides an important contrast to the much better known story of Masada, which resulted in mass suicide. The Sicarii (“assassins”) faction that held Masada were once romanticized as freedom fighters. We now recognize that their murderous extremism, especially against fellow Jews who disagreed with them, contributed to the disastrous outcome of the war for Judah.
Over the centuries, the rabbinic value of peace has evolved from one of many important principles to a cornerstone of Jewish belief. This evolution is reflected in our liturgy, our theological developments, and the founding principles of the Reform movement.
The centrality of peace in Judaism is perhaps most evident in our daily prayers. The Amidah, the core of our prayer service, always concludes with a plea for peace. This placement is not coincidental; it underscores that all our petitions and praises ultimately lead to the hope for universal peace. Moreover, when we speak of the Torah, we often say that “all its paths are peace (Proverbs 3:17).” This poetic phrase encapsulates the idea that the ultimate goal of Torah study and observance is to bring about a more peaceful world.
The Reform movement, in particular, placed significant emphasis on peace and nonviolence in its foundational documents. The 1885 Pittsburgh Platform, the original statement of Reform principles, explicitly linked the messianic hope of Judaism to the establishment of a world characterized by truth, justice, and peace. This statement not only reaffirmed peace as a core Jewish value but also framed it the ultimate goal towards which all of history is moving.
Building on this, the 1937 Columbus Platform went even further, declaring that “Judaism, from the days of the prophets, has proclaimed to [hu]mankind the ideal of universal peace, striving for spiritual and physical disarmament of all nations.” This powerful statement not only reiterates the centrality of peace but also ties it directly to the prophetic tradition, suggesting a continuity of this value from ancient times to the modern era.
Importantly, the Columbus Platform also asserts that “Judaism rejects violence and relies upon moral education, love and sympathy.” This declaration represents a bold stance, especially considering the historical context of 1937, with the rise of fascism in Europe and the looming threat of global conflict. It posits moral education and empathy as alternatives to violence, echoing the rabbinic emphasis on study and ethical development.
These statements challenge us to view peace not as a passive state to be wished for, but as an active process that requires our engagement through education, empathy, and tireless pursuit of justice. They paint a picture of a Judaism deeply committed to wellbeing, justice, and the sanctity of human life. They challenge us to reject violence not just as individuals, but to work towards creating societies and systems that promote harmony and minimize conflict.
These values have led me to join with other religious leaders in promoting restorative justice, a process remarkably similar to the traditional practice of teshuvah. This experience has given me first hand knowledge of the limits of revenge. Executing a murderer does not bring back their victim. In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hatred does not drive out hatred, only love can do that (Martin Luther King, Jr., “Loving Your Enemies,” sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Montgomery, AL).” If we want peace, we cannot call for violence.
For two thousand years, our tradition has emphasized the necessity of minimizing and, ultimately, eliminating violence. We must recognize the reality of conflict while striving to restrain its scope and impact. We are challenged to seek justice without resorting to vengeance, to defend ourselves and others when necessary while always working towards peaceful resolutions.
It was with these considerations in mind that I chose to join Rabbis for Ceasefire a year ago. I felt, and continue to feel, that it is the duty of rabbinic leaders to remind our community that, as powerful and painful as our emotions may be, revenge is not a Jewish value.
After a year of expanding warfare in Gaza, the West Bank, and now Lebanon I ask you, if you haven’t already, to re-embrace our rabbinic tradition of seeking peace and pursuing it. We must have the courage and imagination to envision alternatives to violence and demand that the growing harm not be continued in our name.
We are called to a deeper understanding of what it means to “choose life” in a world where violence exists. In essence, choosing life in the face of violence means actively working to create a world where swords can indeed be beaten into plowshares, where the sanctity of all life is respected and protected. It means aligning our actions and attitudes with the values we profess.
As our Torah portion and this prayer, written in the early days of the war, so clearly reminds us, we have a choice:
Instead of anger, we choose kindness.
Instead of revenge, we choose justice.
Instead of resentment, we choose empathy.
Instead of ideology, we choose compromise.
Instead of isolation, we choose relationship.
Instead of fear, we choose endurance.
Instead of violence, we choose peace.
Ken y’hi ratzon. May it be so.