Blog

A few months ago, I stood in the rotunda of the Nebraska legislature engaged in passionate debate with a senator, on an issue that we both believed, to the very core of our beings, that we were right about. We were talking about abortion. But let me clear, this is NOT a sermon about abortion. 

In fact, this isn’t a sermon about politics or legislation or even about social justice. It’s a sermon about how to disagree with someone when what you disagree about confronts that which you each see as fundamental human rights, and moral and ethical truths.

You can imagine how, in a situation like this one, it would be easy to get heated and emotional. In fact, it’s hard not to be, when you each believe that what is at stake gets at the heart of what it means to be human. 

But to come to a conversation, any conversation, with vitriol and condemnation, I knew, would not get me very far in articulating my beliefs in a manner that could be heard. So, despite knowing that we would not agree and that it had the very real potential to become contentious, I promised myself that I would remain calm. That I would be true to myself and to my values. That I would share my beliefs and speak about why my faith guides me to them, in the same very real way that other people’s faiths guide them to a different conclusion. AND I promised myself that I would listen with the intent to understand rather than with the intent to respond. 

I hoped for a positive interaction, but the encounter was painful and disappointing. We spoke to one another calmly and with civility but it was clear that the senator was not interested in listening to my viewpoint with the intention of learning something about me and my beliefs. Still, I pressed on with the hope that some small piece of my truth could find its way into what seemed to be a barricade in his mind, unwilling to be opened even the smallest fraction of an inch to allow for new perspectives to enter into it. 

I wish I could give you a play-by-play; to share what, exactly, we said. But even minutes after the exchange, I couldn’t recall all of the specifics – only the anger and the sadness that I was left with, and the pain of feeling disempowered and disenfranchised. Because instead of listening to try to understand me and my perspective, the senator listened with the intention of proving to me why my concerns were unjustified and ill-founded, why my anger was illogical, and why my fear was irrational. When our conversation ended, I thanked the senator for his time and walked away, still reeling at what had just happened.

About a week later, I received a message asking if I would be willing to speak to a reporter doing a story on the rude and dismissive behavior of our state senators. And I confess – I thought about it. I thought about how good it would feel to call out this senator for his behavior, for his unwillingness to listen respectfully, for his inability to hear and represent the viewpoints of his constituents, whether or not they supported his own. 

In the end, I didn’t take the interview. I knew that there could be nothing gained from it other than feeding into the frenzied cycle of polarization and distrust that has become the cultural norm of our day. 

And precisely for that reason, precisely because of this intense polarization and siloing that is happening across the spectrum of beliefs and interactions in today’s world; because of the echo chambers that isolate us and breed this culture of mistrust, I want to share with you something that I’ve been thinking about and wrestling with over the course of these past few months. And that is to think about what it means to be in relationship – real relationship – with other human beings, that does not depend on thinking or acting or believing or feeling the same way, and wrestling with that dissonance, and even growing and changing as a direct result of that struggle.  

This notion that we cannot talk to one another and find some small kernel of middle ground has become more and more pervasive in the world as we know it today. Everything from the news that we read, to TV that we watch, to the social media that we consume tells us over and over and over again that we are right, and that anyone who disagrees with us must be inherently wrong. And that doesn’t only breed animosity and mistrust, it breeds something far worse– it breeds contempt. 
Arthur Brooks, Harvard professor, author, and social scientist, writes about what he calls today’s “culture of contempt.” Social scientists, he explains, define contempt as “anger mixed with disgust,” while nineteenth century philosopher Arthur Schopenhaur characterizes it as “the unsullied conviction of the worthlessness of another.”  
And when we put it that way, if how we see each other can be characterized as worthless, then we utterly dismiss the humanity in the person sitting on the other side of the table from us, and we give ourselves permission to win and to be right, at any cost. 

In his book, Love Your Enemies, Brooks delves into the idea that what we need to combat this ubiquitous culture of contempt has to be love. Why? Because, as he points out, civility in our discourse and tolerance of different points of view are pitifully low standards, and they cannot be the goalposts that we’re aiming toward. “Don’t believe it?” he asks, “Tell people, ‘My spouse and I are civil to each other,’ and they’ll tell you to get counseling. Or say, ‘My coworkers tolerate me,’ and they’ll ask how your job search is going.” 

The only way to actually combat this culture of contempt; the only way to move beyond disgust and suspicion for one another must be far more radical and far more subversive, Brooks says. Love is the only answer. 

In the pursuit of discovering how we might create a culture of love that is great enough to combat our culture of contempt, Brooks turned to the wisest man that he knew of. And though he is a Catholic, not a Buddhist, he sought out the Dalai Lama. “Your Holiness,” Brooks asked him, “what do I do when I feel contempt?”… And the Dalai Lama replied, “Practice warm-heartedness.” “To be honest,” Brooks writes, “at first, I thought, You got anything else? It sounded more like an aphorism than useful counsel. But when I thought about it, I saw that it was actually tough and practical advice. He was not advocating surrender to the views of those with whom we disagree. If I believe I am right, I have a duty to stick to my views. But my duty is also to be kind, fair, and friendly to all, even those with whom I have great differences….Your opportunity when treated with contempt is to change at least one heart – yours. You may not be able to control the actions of others, but you can absolutely control your reaction. You can break the cycle of contempt. You have the power to do that.” 

Like the Dalai Lama, our tradition does not expect or even encourage us to find unity at the expense of abandoning what we believe to be right. There is a text from Pirkei Avot where we learn that machlokot – disputes or disagreements—which are l’shem shemayim, that are for the sake of heaven, are virtuous and they will endure to move our world forward. But those machlokots that are not l’shem shemayim, that are not for the sake of heaven, those are the fights that diminish us and deplete us, and they will not endure.   

Rabbi Sharon Brous teaches that what we learn from this is that “our tradition holds that actually entering into the fray and being in the fight is not a bad thing. In some ways, it’s what gives us a chance to have a legacy in the world. If we engage in struggle, if we engage in battles in the right way, and for the right reasons, ultimately, we’re able to bring our community a bit closer to the truth. So, it’s not actually ultimately about being right or being wrong, it’s about being engaged in a struggle that’s worth our time and our energy and our fevered pitch and then engaging in it for the purpose of coming to a deeper truth and deeper meaning that can aid and benefit not only us as individuals, but all of us, as a human community.”
 
And that’s good news. Because when so many of us aren’t confident that we can sit at Rosh Hashanah lunch or Yom Kippur Break-Fast without rules of engagement or lists of appropriate subjects, the reminder that our tradition really values disagreement not for its own sake, but for the sake of heaven – because they ultimately move us closer to a deeper understanding of truth and how we can manifest that truth in the world – it can help us find our way towards real, authentic engagement and relationship. 

We learn from Pirkei Avot that the paradigm of machloket l’shem shemayim, the disagreements that we undertake for the purpose of finding that higher truth, are two great scholars, Hillel and Shammai, and their disciples, Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai. Now, Hillel and Shammai were great adversaries who disagreed on almost everything. The Talmud records over 300 disputes between them. Hillel and Shammai saw the world in fundamentally different ways – when one said that you have to stand up to say the shema, the other said you should remain seated; when one said that Torah could not possibly be taught while standing on one foot, the other came back with perhaps the most famous one-liner in Jewish history: “That which is hateful to you, do not do to another; that is the entire Torah. The rest is interpretation. Go and study.” 

And yet, even though these two could not be more different and they battled fiercely over matters of tremendous importance, they were not bitter opponents. In fact, they were in true and authentic and even intentional relationship with one another, allowing their families to marry into each other’s families. This is how we know, the Talmud says, that they practiced love and friendship. 

And they maintained this intentional relationship all throughout one of their most famous disputes, a three-year argument in which each side was absolutely sure that he was right. Shammai says “the halacha follows us,” and Hillel says, no, “the halacha follows us.” And finally, after three years, the Bat Kol, this heavenly voice comes down to say, elu v’elu divrei Elohim hen, “both these AND these are the words of the living God.”  

You are both right. There is truth in what you are both saying, the Bat Kol says. Just take that in for a minute – after a three-year long argument, you learn that you are right, but your opponent is also right. 

But then the heavenly voice says, “but the halacha, the law, will go according to Beit Hillel.” And we’re left to wonder, how can that be? Why is it that, if they’re both right, if both are really the words of God, why is it that Hillel gets to win? In fact, in almost every machloket, in almost every disagreement between Hillel and Shammai, Hillel wins. 

And the answer that we find is that while both Hillel and Shammai were engaging in this dispute for the sake of heaven and in pursuit of the greater truth, they did it differently. Hillel, it says, engaged with “kindness and with graciousness, and taught their own ideas and the ideas from Beit Shammai. [And not only that], Beit Hillel went so far as to teach Shammai’s opinions first.” 

Imagine if we used this model in today’s world. Imagine if we understood that this was what it takes to win an argument. To engage with kindness and graciousness and to teach your opponents’ ideas because you actually believe that there may be some merit to them; that there may be some small kernel of truth to them, even if you disagree. That rather than believing that opposing ideas must represent some kind of moral turpitude and that winning means leaving our friends and neighbors without the dignity of a voice in the conversation, that we actually took the time to understand and respect the complexities of the issues that we face, and to see the humanity in the other side. 

But this notion that there is truth to everything is something that, I think, we all struggle with. Because if I am right, and my ideas are what I believe to be moral and ethical truths, how can it be that this is a situation of elu v’elu – how can it be that we are both right? How do we hold space for the idea that for me to be right, someone else does not have to be wrong, and that there can be more than one truth?

One of the metaphors that the Rabbis offer us for how we can hold space for multiple truths is to create a “heart of many rooms,” whereby we can “take in the words” and allow them to find space in the different chambers of our hearts.  And then, we get to discern what truth is for ourselves. We don’t ultimately have to agree with our opponents, but we do have to create just a bit of room in our hearts to allow for the possibility that there may be more than one truth here. 

And maybe, just maybe, holding space in our hearts for another person’s truth will allow us to engage with each other with compassion and with integrity, and to treat one another with the dignity and respect that every single person deserves to be treated with, regardless of whether we agree with them or not. 

Holding space for multiple truths and becoming open and vulnerable enough to allow those ideas to take shape and to be moved by them does make us weak and it does not mean that we have lost.  

When the Israelites created the Golden Calf to worship, God told Moses to move aside so that God’s anger could blaze forth and destroy them. But through well-reasoned arguments, Moses showed God that there was more than one truth, and, ultimately, God changed course. 

The Torah is filled with stories of how God begins with a singular goal and a plan to achieve it, but almost always, God listens and engages with the voices of those who disagree. In fact, most often, God actually seeks out those voices with the express purpose of giving them an opportunity to present a different perspective. And usually, God’s heart is moved by those voices because, the Torah goes on to say, God is “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in kindness and truth, extending kindness to the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin, and granting pardon…”  

Tomorrow morning, when we stand before the open ark and we say those very words – 

יְהֹוָ֣ה ׀ יְהֹוָ֔ה אֵ֥ל רַח֖וּם וְחַנּ֑וּן אֶ֥רֶךְ אַפַּ֖יִם וְרַב־חֶ֥סֶד וֶאֱמֶֽת׃ נֹצֵ֥ר חֶ֙סֶד֙ לָאֲלָפִ֔ים נֹשֵׂ֥א עָוֺ֛ן וָפֶ֖שַׁע וְחַטָּאָ֑ה וְנַקֵּה֙

Adonai, Adonai, rachum v’chanun, erech apayim v’rav chesed v’emet. Notzer chesed l’alaphim, noseh avon v’pheshah, v’chata’ah v’nakeh,
when we’re pleading with God to have compassion and mercy upon us, to forgive our transgressions and our sins, what we are also doing is praying that in encountering God in this way, that we will bring these same qualities to our encounters with each other.

Because if God can be moved by someone else’s story and someone else’s truth, then how can we, as human beings made in God’s image with that spark of Divinity embedded within our spirits, do anything less? When I confront my opponent, and I want nothing more than to let my righteous anger blaze forth, and tear him down, instead what I am called upon to do is to respond with kindness and compassion and graciousness. To be slow to anger. 

When I got home from that encounter with the Senator a few months ago, and was given the opportunity to give an interview that would, in essence, contribute to a smear campaign, I was, as I said, tempted to say yes. But what that would have really done was allow my anger to blaze forth and tear someone else down when what I really needed to be doing in that moment was opening another chamber of my heart and making space for another truth so that I could engage with integrity and humility. 

I had a choice. So instead of giving the interview, I wrote the senator a thank you note. I thanked him for his time, for stepping out from the legislative floor during debate, for giving me the dignity of a conversation. And I said that I hoped we could meet again to continue talking about issues that really mattered to us. We would not persuade one another wholesale, of course, but perhaps we could still be in relationship and find ways to listen to one another with the intent to understand.
To my delight, a couple of weeks later, I received a hand-written response from the Senator, thanking me for my time and my perspective; thanking me for speaking to him with kindness, and agreeing that there may be opportunities to talk and work together in the future.

When confronted with these moments, we get to choose how we respond. Nobody is saying that we should not step into the fray. Nobody is saying that we should not fight for what we believe. What we are saying is that when we engage, our tradition gives us a model for how to do so in a way that upholds the dignity of the human being across the table, and helps us to seek out a deeper, higher, holier truth. 

In this New Year, I do believe that we are going to be called upon to model this kind of intentional dialogue with people with whom we disagree on some of our most deeply held moral and ethical truths. And if we can respond with compassion and with integrity, and draw from the deep well of texts and traditions that can help guide us to open ourselves to seeing the humanity in our opponent, then we have a chance to help build the kind of world we want to see. 

I’ve shared these words before from this bima, but they bear repeating. As we enter into these Days of Awe and take stock of our lives, I am going to leave us with the words of Yehudah Amichai, In the Place Where We are Right:

From the place where we are right 
Flowers will never grow 
In the spring. 

The place where we are right
Is hard and trampled
Like a yard.

But doubts and loves 
Dig up the world
Like a mole, a plow. 
And a whisper will be heard in the place 
Where the ruined
House once stood.

L'Shanah Tovah.

--

Watch the entirety of Friday’s service here.

Temple Talk is a recap of sermons given from the Bimah for those who missed a Sermon or who wanted to revisit the words spoken at a previous sermon.