Say little and do much

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks once said, “Non-Jews respect Jews who respect Judaism.”

When I first read that sentence, it struck me as odd. How did Rabbi Sacks define a “Jew that respects Judaism?”

Did he mean orthodox Jews, like himself? Strictly adherent Jews? Shomer shabbat, kosher keeping, kippah wearing Jews? I’m not any of those things. Am I not a Jew that respects Judaism?

Although I really love and respect Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Initially, this quote, made me bristle.

But over the past few years, thanks to a self-imposed social experiment and some deep learning, I have come to view the quote quite differently. Perhaps Rabbi Sacks wasn’t referring to observance or adherence. Maybe he was asking us to take seriously what Judaism asks of us, how we respond to its prophetic call to serve humanity, and to be an ohr l’goyim, a light unto the nations. Maybe, just maybe, he means that we should be Jews, not just in name, but in deeds.

I am an ardent believer in the idea that there is no one right way to be Jewish. None of us in this room are on the exact same Jewish journey. We all have different backgrounds and that unique shapes how we see ourselves as Jews in the world, but despite all of that, we can and should all be asking the same question: What does being Jewish call me to do?

And I think our answer has something to offer a world in which so many people seem ready to tell us who we are.

We spend a great deal of energy figuring out how to respond to antisemitism. We look for the right arguments, the right facts, the words that will finally make someone understand. We defend Israel. We defend our right to exist as Jews.

That work matters. But it can also be exhausting. Most of us did not sign up to do full-time PR for the Jewish people. We have enough trouble keeping up with our email.

And I worry about what happens when defending Judaism begins to consume the whole of our Jewish lives. When we become so busy responding to what other people say about us that we have much less time to show them who we are. The cynical side of me thinks that is probably by design.

We can’t eradicate antisemitism. As the world’s oldest prejudice, it’s not going anywhere. We need to focus on what we can do.

We need to show people what Jewish goodness looks like and counter antisemitism one mitzvah at a time.

So how do we do this? Let me tell you about my aforementioned self-imposed experiment. Shortly after October 7th, I began wearing a Star of David necklace every day. I made sure that it was displayed prominently. Whenever it tucked itself into my shirt, I brought it back out, regardless of who I was talking to or what setting I was in. I began talking, out loud, in public spaces about Judaism, rather than using hushed tones. I told people about my travels to Israel without using the ubiquitous phrase that most Jews (including myself) often use: “I was traveling abroad.”

And something interesting happened. Instead of encountering hostility because of my prominent, outward Jewishness, I found that most people treated me pretty much the same. Some even seemed a little friendlier.

Some of that may have had to do with them, but I suspect much of it had to do with me. Being visibly Jewish was a reminder to be kinder.

It wasn’t a reminder to them; it was a reminder for me.

I discovered that being visibly Jewish makes me more conscious of what I bring into an encounter. This little star, the outward display of my Jewishness, guides my behavior and reminds me to be at my very best, because I’m representing my people.

Years ago, a campaign at Ben-Gurion Airport reminded Israelis traveling abroad that their behavior would could have either a positive or negative impact on how other people perceive of Israel. One of the campaign’s slogans translated as, “Abroad, you are the country—represent us with dignity.” My personal favorite was “You are the face of Israel to the world—be nice!”

I keep thinking about that reminder. Whether we wear a Star of David, or a kippah, or have a Hebrew accent or carry an Israeli Passport or speak openly about our Judaism, we represent our community in every encounter. The person in front of us may never read a book about Judaism or walk into a synagogue. But they will know how we treated them. They will respect us as Jews, if we are Jews that respect Judaism.

But there is a painful other side to this.

If our actions can bring honor to Judaism, they can also bring it shame. Our tradition calls this chilul Hashem, the desecration of God’s name. When people associate our Jewishness with cruelty, something sacred has been dishonored.

And I want to name an example that I know has been weighing on many of us: violent settler extremists in the West Bank who attack Palestinians and destroy their property.

These are Jews. Some wear the same religious symbols that we associate with reverence, humility, and moral responsibility. And many of us look at their actions and feel horrified. Angry. Ashamed.

It’s what we call in Yiddish, a shanda.

 I love this people. I love this tradition. I love Israel. And it hurts to see these things I cherish associated, in any way, with brutality. I don’t think a relatively small minority of sadistic idiots should get to undermine the legitimacy of the Jewish and democratic country that I love. I think the state should call this what it is…terrorism. I think the IDF and the Israeli police and judicial system need to crack down on this disgusting, patently un-Jewish form of violence. And I know most Israelis agree.

As rabbi Hillel said, whatever is hateful to you, do not do to anyone else. We as Jews know terror, we hate terror, and we cannot ask people to recognize the goodness that grows out of Judaism while refusing to confront the violence committed by Jews. Our pride has to be honest enough to hold us accountable. That does not mean accepting blame for every act committed by another Jew. It means refusing to excuse an act because the person who committed it is Jewish.

On Yom Kippur, we stand together and confess in the plural. We make room for an deep examination of our community, the conduct we tolerate, and the things we have been reluctant to say.

So let us say this clearly: violence against innocent Palestinians is terrorism. Those responsible must be held accountable. Our love of Jewish values and the Jewish state gives us every reason to insist on that.

And then let us bring that moral attention home, into the lives we actually lead. Into how we use our own power. How we speak about people. How we respond when someone vulnerable needs us.

Last week, I was leaving my doctor’s office when I noticed a young woman standing by her car in the parking space in front of mine. She looked forlorn and was holding a set of jumper cables. Her need was clear. I rolled down my window and she asked if I could give her a jump. I didn’t know if my electric car was up to the task, but I was willing to try. I called my husband, Ben, and with some help from chat GPT, we discovered that jumping her car might work, but there was a very good chance I would fry my battery in the process. I offered to stay a little longer and hold my parking space so that, if she found someone who could help, they would be able to pull in close.

She thanked me. But an empty parking space wasn’t really what she needed. She needed someone to jump her car.

She had already been there for more than half an hour, asking people for help. Everyone had turned her down. For a few minutes, I watched as she got rebuffed by a guy on his lunch break heading out of chipotle, two women in hijabs walking back to their car, a T-Mobile employee taking a smoke break. Everyone turned her down and she looked miserable and desperate.

So I started walking around the parking lot, asking people myself.

And I discovered that I was quite a bit more persistent on her behalf than I might have been on my own. When you’re asking for yourself, it can be easy to feel embarrassed and give up. But I was asking for her. I wasn’t going to leave until I could find someone to help.

Within minutes of hounding motorist, we found someone. As I was pulling out and he pulled in, the young woman looked at me, genuinely grateful that I had been so dogged to help.

For me, it was a few minutes in a parking lot. But for her, in that moment, it was everything.

Perhaps she noticed my necklace, maybe she didn’t. What’s most important is that I did.

Shammai teaches in Pirkei Avot: “Say little and do much, and greet everyone cheerfully.”

I love how ordinary that sounds. Your actions speak much louder than your words.

We can spend a great deal of time talking about our values. Virtue signaling is very in vogue these days. But Shammai asks us to shut up and put those values into action. And we should do it b’simcha,with pleasure, because we are getting the opportunity to do a mitzvah.

That woman needed help. My Judaism obligated me to put her needs above my own. That is what I want people who aren’t Jewish and may not know anything about Judaism to have the chance to encounter. Jews that are exemplars for moral living, or, as Rabbi Sacks might put it “Jews who respect Judaism.”

The Talmud, in Yoma, describes a person who studies Torah and treats people well in everyday dealings. Those who meet that person come to admire the Torah that has shaped them. How we comport ourselves in our everyday lives is how we can be ambassadors of Judaism to the outside world.

But, here’s the rub:

You can’t be an ambassador of Judaism if no one knows you’re Jewish. And for so long, we have been told to tuck those stars away, put baseball caps over our kippot, speak in a hushed tone about Jew-y things, like Israel.

When fear pushes Jewish life out of sight, something is lost. People can know a Jewish neighbor for years without knowing that neighbor is Jewish. They can have a Jewish colleague who helps them through a crisis, or a Jewish friend who always shows up, and never connect that person with the people they hear being discussed on the news or social media.

Meanwhile, someone else is very willing to tell them what Jews are like.

I believe ordinary relationships can interrupt that. A person has a name and a face to place beside the stereotype. Someone they know. Someone whose kindness they have experienced.

That won’t change every mind. But there are people whose understanding of us is still being formed. I want them to have the chance to know us.

I want to be clear, a necklace doesn’t make us kind. A kippah doesn’t make us honest. But either can prompt us to pause. To choose our next words more carefully. To notice someone we might otherwise have walked past.

The obligation is there whether anyone can see our Jewishness or not. The symbol helps us remember it.

The star around my neck asks something of me. It cannot be only a declaration of who I am. It has to remind me how I am called to live.

That responsibility includes the way we respond to our own failures. We will get impatient. We will have days when we are distracted, ungracious, or simply wrong. We are here on Yom Kippur because Judaism doesn’t demand perfection

 It demands reflection.

And then, it demands repair.

Being a Jew who respects Judaism means taking the call to repair seriously. Returning to the person we hurt. Making the apology. Keeping the promise we should have kept the first time.

What if that, too, became part of someone’s experience of Jews? Someone willing to say, “I was wrong. Let me try to make this right.”

Non-Jews respect Jews who respect Judaism.

We can fight antisemitism best if we are open and proud Jews that strive to live Jewish lives of goodness.

That might mean wearing a necklace or a kippah while doing a random act of kindness. Or explaining, when someone asks why you volunteer, that caring for other people is part of how you practice Judaism.

There is no need to announce yourself before every good deed. No one needs a press release because you brought over a casserole.

Just allow your Jewishness to be known as naturally as your kindness.

We would do that work even if it changed no one’s mind about Jews. The person who needs help matters in their own right. But there is something precious about allowing others to see where our commitment comes from.

And there is something precious about allowing our children to see it, too.

Last week, on Rosh Hashanah, we did some learning with our kiddos about Jewish pride and how we can show that pride outwardly, but that lesson was incomplete. What good is Jewish pride without Jewish values?

They need to know their own story, and what there is to love about being Jewish. But more importantly, I want them to understand that the star they wear connects them to a tradition that asks something of them and gives them something to offer.

When Sacks says that non-Jews respect Jews who respect Judaism, I hear a call to live our tradition with confidence and integrity. To let it shape our actions enough that someone else might become curious about it and want to learn more.

We cannot control what everyone thinks of Jews. But we can help shape what someone experiences when they meet one of us.

Say little. Do much. Greet everyone cheerfully.

May we, in this new year of 5787, find the courage to let our Jewish lives be seen.

May the symbols we wear remind us of the people we hope to become.

And may someone’s life be better because we showed up, openly and wholeheartedly, as Jews.

G’mar chatimah tovah.