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The Rabbis Respond
Rabbi Steve Greenberg Reflects on Trembling Before G-d
in Light of the World Trade Center Attack
New Yorkers are still in shock over the monstrous bombing of the World Trade Center two weeks ago. Our hearts are all still torn by tragic loss of so many lives. We all feel like mourners. The sadness has seemed to dampen not only our spirits, but also the sense of urgency we feel for the concerns of social justice. Many have found it hard to continue to speak of any other suffering that the one that grips us now. However, just the opposite is true.
We were attacked because America is a beacon for freedom and human dignity made real by opportunity. Our work to build that just and fair city on the hill has never ceased from the moment of our founding. Just as this country has struggled to make real its promise of inclusion for people of all races, for people of all religions, and for women, it now struggles to do the same for gay and lesbian people.
However, standing up to religious fanaticism will not work from the outside. Only insiders using the richest sources of Islamic tradition can wage the war of minds and hearts compellingly enough to sway the majority of Moslems world-wide to see that a pluralist and tolerant Islam is more religiously compelling and more spiritually deep than a theocratically imposed one.
The battle now will be waged between the open and fearless, humble and inclusive versions of religion and the closed and fearful, arrogant and exclusive versions. Every faith has within it the potential for demeaning humanity of others. Now more than ever we need, not to reject religion, but find within our oldest and most venerable religious traditions the resources to undo their potential for harm.
The film demonstrates the need for all traditional religions to take a good hard look at themselves. Just as important, it suggests that religious leaders and their communities will be most effectively reached by simply telling stories that they would otherwise not hear. There is no argumentative retort to a personal story. It does its work well because it challenges the halcyon illusion that all is well in "our community" leaving the audience to ponder the possible solutions.
The struggles of traditional communities to confront gayness offers great hope for the larger world as well. By honoring and not fearing the differences on the inside of our communities, even difficult differences like sexual orientation, each faith will be able to heal itself and learn better how to live a diverse and manifold world populated by many faiths.
The film opens the dialogue on the very meaning of sexuality and love for our times. While the exploration is focused inside a single tradition, we are carried on a journey whose destination is a set of questions that challenge all our religious traditions on deeply religious grounds.
After the film we feel empowered to go home to the religious communities of our youth that may have rejected us and demand of the preacher, rabbi, or imam to grapple fully with our experience and us. People of faith will then challenge their own communities of faith to grapple with the deep-rooted and often ignored fundamentalisms with them.
Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld, Hebrew Institute of Riverdale
"This past week I had the very meaningful experience which I am deeply grateful for of being on a rabbinic retreat sponsored by Clal. The retreat brings together rabbis from different denominations in Judaism and we spent a week studying together in Newport R.I.
And there is one moment in particular that happened on that retreat that will stick with me for a very long time. On Thursday night, we saw the film Trembling before God, which movingly and emotionally portrays the conflicted and torn lives of individuals who come from a background of Orthodox Judaism and in many cases still wish to remain within the Orthodox Jewish community and yet have publicly announced that they are gay.
Chok and Egel Ha-Zahav: Homosexuality and Orthodox Jews
The director of this movie did a wonderful job of contrasting the views of rabbis whom he interviewed for the film-including R. Shlomo Riskin-who uniformly responded that a gay Jew is someone we must love, but is also someone who is entirely violating halakhah, with the reaction of the community's and more particularly the families of these individuals, who generally ostracized the open homosexuals and made them feel unwelcome in our Godly community.
As powerful as this film was what will make the moment unforgettable was what happened after the film, when I found myself in front of 35 other rabbis, some of whom were openly gay, and I felt a need on some level to explain how I as an Orthodox Rabbi could advocate living in a society whose laws can at times be used as a vehicle which inflicts pain on individuals who by all other standards that we know of today are entirely innocent and noble.
And so I sat there and openly wept for the pain of these individuals and their families. These people are in many ways real heroes. They are engaged in an extremely serious struggle. The concepts of kedushah and Torah are ideas that are daily inhabiting their lives. And I cried for the tragedy that they faced such a terrible conflict in their spiritual lives. But when I finally found the words to speak I actually pointed to a text that we read today and I thought of Rashi's commentary to that text. We read this morning the mitzvah of parah adumah, the red heifer, about which the Torah states, zot chukat ha-torah, this is the law of the Torah. And Rashi explaining the concept of Chok says, Lefi she-hasatan ve-umot ha-olam monin et yisrael lomar mah ha-mitzvah ha-zot u-mah taam yesh ba-hen le-fikach katav bah chukat, gezerah hi milfani ve-ein lekhah reshut le-harher acharehah, for when the Satan and other nations will throw arguments at you and say what is the meaning of this law and what reason is there for it, we should respond, "it is a chok," it is a decree before me, and I have no permission to think evil thoughts about it.
And about this mitzvah of parah adumah, the midrash says, that Shlomo Ha-Melekh states, "Amarti achakhmah, vehi rechokah mi-meni." I said that I would understand it, but it is distant from me. Now why is it that Rashi and Shlomo say that there are no explanations for this mitzvah. In fact, over the years I have heard many suggestions that quite rationally explain the mitzvah of parah adumah. The reason is because they felt that no one suggestion fully justified the commandment in their eyes.
And so at that moment I personally turned toward these texts, and said chok hi, ve-rechokah hi mimeni, it is my law and it is distant from me. I know that the Torah says the word toevah-usually translated as abomination--about this prohibition, but I also know that word toevah also appears in contexts throughout the Torah that are not morally charged like the prohibition of Shatnez, mixing wool and linen.
So I cited the concept of chok as an explanation for this prohibition.. Not because there are no explanations, but because all of the explanations are distant from me.
And yet as I sat there listening to the tearful words of an openly gay Conservative rabbi, I felt new insight into the depth of the pain of this community. For someone who is Gay and yet loves the richness of an otherwise Orthodox Jewish lifestyle, there are basically 3 responses. This person can subdue their homosexuality which they usually believe is given to them by God and live an Orthodox Jewish life. Or they can leave the Orthodox lifestyle entirely. But to do that is often exceedingly difficult, because as this gay rabbi said to me, "I am not defined by sexual identity."
And so the third possible option is to live a life, like we all do, on different levels, full of conflict and internal pain. And then it becomes our responsibility to rise as a community to a level which this film showed that our wider community is not yet at-to be able to say, your actions violate our laws, and yet we will not ostracize you, we will love you the same we love all of our brothers and sisters.
However, there is a flip side to this analysis. We did not just read this morning about the mitzvah of parah adumah, we also read about the sin of the egel ha-zahav, the golden calf. And the closeness of these 2 concepts is very apparent. Both are the same types of animals-cows; both are similar colors-red and gold. In fact the Midrash comments on this close relationship and says, "Tavo ha-em ve-khaper al ha-ben." The mother comes and atones for the son, meaning that the mitzvah of parah adumah is an atonement for the sin of the golden calf.
Why does the Torah select a chok that is so similar to this sin of idolatry to atone for this sin of idolatry? Perhaps the reason is because when people are unable to accept the obligations of a chok upon themselves their actions can very easily turn into idolatry. The rejection of the parah adumah can very easily turn into the acceptance of the egel ha-zahav.
And the danger for this is certainly great when people feel rejected. Once feeling rejected, people often feel the need to defend themselves to the hilt. And since our sexuality is such an important part of us, homosexuality can thus more easily and even understandably become the centerpiece of their life. But when anything other than God is the center of someone?s life, then we have entered the realm of idolatry. And so when homosexuality becomes someone's primary identity, when the axis of God has been replaced as central in someone's life, then it is idolatrous.
And so my response to the film Trembling before God is that we as a community have to formulate a better response to someone who appreciates the beauty of Torah and halakhah and yet lives as a homosexual. Our response should be to create an environment where we as a family can sit and cry with such a person and say chok hi, it is a law of the Torah, but rechokah hi mimeni, it is distant and I do not understand it, ve-ein li reshut le-harher acharehah, and I have no permission to raise a voice against this prohibition. For it is only by sitting and embracing such individuals that we as a community can prevent someone who loves Torah from turning their homosexuality into an idolatry, moving from a rejection of the parah adumah to an acceptance of the egel ha-zahav."
Response to the Rabbis:
I was saddened to see Rav Meir Fund's attack against gays and lesbians.
In his letter ("Grave Sin", 9/14/2001), Rav Fund writes:"Homosexuality is a grave sin and is also linked to a deadly epidemic. Yetgays and lesbians, not unlike cigarette smokers, will go to great lengthsto avoid the truth so unpleasant to them."
But as Rav Fund undoubtedly knows, homosexuality is not a sin of any kind. The lives of gays and lesbians do not revolve around sex any more than the lives of heterosexuals do. The essence of our relationships isemotional, just as is the case for all people. We love, we bond, we grow together. We build families. Where is the sin in this?
Furthermore, not all sexual acts between members of the same sex are forbidden, so even if Rav Fund meant that "homosexual intimacies are a grave sin", he'd still have been inaccurate. And even, since this is hardly the place to launch into an entire debate on which acts are permissible and which are not, even if all acts of physical intimacy between members of the same sex were forbidden, there is only one that could properly be called "a grave sin", and that one is only relevant to men, while Rav Fund clearly expresses equal condemnation for gay men and lesbians.
Furthermore, homosexuality, as such, is not linked to any epidemic. I assume that Rav Fund is referring to AIDS. But saying that homosexuality is linked to AIDS is like saying that hot weather causes people to gain weight. It's true that in hot weather people tend to eat more ice cream,and it's also true that ice cream is fattening. But to conclude from this that hot weather *causes* weight gain would be ridiculous. Similarly,it's wrong to claim that homosexuality is linked to AIDS. Rather, the refusal of some people (Rav Fund among them, it seems) to countenance healthy and monogamous gay relationships has resulted in a situation where many gay men have found an outlet in promiscuous multi-partner sex. It is promiscuity, both homosexual and heterosexual, which is linked to AIDS. One could make the case that it is actually the rejection of healthy gay relationships by people like Rav Fund which is linked to a deadly epidemic.
Unfortunately, Rav Fund's letter did not reflect the compassion that he seemed to want it to reflect. Instead, it came across as an attempt to protect himself from the more extreme homophobic voices in the Orthodox community, who condemn him for having appeared in the movie Trembling Before G-d. And that's too bad.
Lisa Liel
California
Orthodoxy And Gays:
As an Orthodox woman committed to dealing in an honest,constructive and compassionate manner with important problems facing our community, I can only hope that Rabbi Steven Dworkin, executive director of the Rabbinical Council of America, was quoted out of context in his reaction to questions about the movie, "Trembling Before G-d" ("The Trembling Phenomenon," Nov. 9). Having not seen the film, how can Rabbi Dworkin categorically state that it will not be shown to Rabbinical Council members or that it is unnecessary to see the film to "deal with that issue" (homosexuality)? Can he point to any ongoing programs he has developed to help RCA members cope with the unique and heartrending problems faced by gay Jews and their families? Pretending that the number of Orthodox gays is negligible, and ignoring or denigrating the suffering they and their families experience, may be the path of least resistance, but itis not honest, constructive or compassionate, and it does not redound to the credit of Orthodoxy. I believe many rabbis in the RCA realize the need to deal with these issues, and this sensitive movie provides an opportunity for our leading rabbinic organization to do so within halachic parameters.
Judith Feder
Broooklyn, N.Y.
Trembling Attacked in Jerusalem Post
"Dissembling Before G-d" - The Agudath Israel Reponse
Comments on the film at aish.com
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