Reaching Across the Divides
It may not surprise you that we clergy spend a great deal of time reflecting on how we can heal the rifts that fragment the Jewish community and equally reflect the divisions that undermine both Israel and the United States. In our own interactions with each other, and the community we serve, we seek to model a style of engagement that spans the divides and offers a vision of healthy disagreement and fundamental unity. I came across two sources recently that I endeavor to keep at the front of my own thoughts in my personal practice.
There’s a story in the Talmud (Bava Batra 106b) about two siblings who have the responsibility to divide their parents’ estate. As with most Talmudic parables, it enlightens on many levels. At first, the Talmud suggests the siblings draw lots. That is, let chance decide who gets which items of value and which parcels of land. Then another voice dissents and suggests that before lots are drawn, the siblings must “listen to each other” and agree to the process of dividing the property. “But what if another brother—they never knew existed– shows up from overseas?” asks a third voice. “Well,” says Rav (a great sage), “they must listen to each other and agree to re-divide the property.”
Interpreting this text, the modern scholar, Rabbi Alex Ozar (the co-director of the OU-Jewish Learning Initiative at Yale), says that this is a model for meaningful democratic discourse. We must be ready to listen to each other and modify our claims to our “property” (our long-held truths) as we encounter new information and challenges to the ideas that we believed were our own. We may not change our core values, but we might find meaningful areas of overlap with others.
In her book, High Conflict, Amanda Ripley suggests that we all have been victimized by the polarization in our society, perpetrated by the sources of information that portray the world in binary terms. Right-wrong, good-evil, with us-against us, etc. She suggests that the extent to which we can exercise curiosity about the views held by others, rather than pursue the negation of those ideas, is the extent to which we’ll understand each other and find places of agreement across the constructed divides. With our curiosity comes a form of empathy that, rather than passing destructive judgment on another, encourages us to try and understand the sources of their perspectives. The result may not be agreement, but it will be a far more productive and unifying civil discourse.
In a few short weeks, we’ll be sitting shoulder to shoulder at High Holy Day worship with some people who share our views and others who challenge them. During the course of those hours together, joined in prayer and community, we are reminded of what unity brings to our lives. May we carry that sense of unity with us into the New Year, opening our ears to listen and our hearts to non-judgment, and discover the many ways that we can strengthen our ties to our community, our nation, Israel, and each other.
—Rabbi Ron Stern