Sermon: Acharei Mot-Kedoshim

Written by Rabbi Elliott Karstadt — 26 April 2021

One of the most profound books I read as a teenager was The Giver by American author Lois Lowry. In this story, we are presented with a society that appears to be utopian, though soon the perfectness of that utopian society begins to crack at its edges. “The Community” as it is known, has taken away pain and strife from people’s lives by imposing “sameness”. This sameness means that even the way people physically see the world lacks colour. Despite this, the main character we follow through the narrative, a 12-year-old boy called Jonas, sees flashes of colour, and it is for this reason (perhaps), that he is selected by the community to become The Receiver of Memory – the keeper of the memory of a time before the community, before it shut itself away and before it sacrificed colour for black-and-white sameness.

So, he begins his training with the current Receiver of Memory, who has become the ‘Giver’ of the book’s title, who bequeaths to Jonas the memory of what life was like before everything was made the same. The memories that the Giver imparts to Jonas are of colour, of hills, of fun but also of tragedy and pain. As Jonas’s mind is expanded by these memories, so is his potential world. He becomes more and more isolated from his friends, whose world is smaller, who do not understand his broader comprehension of a world outside of their narrow and insular community.

By isolating and limiting the boundaries of their community, the leaders of the Community seek to limit pain; to ensure the wellbeing of the members of their society; to reduce the risk that they will be harmed by the potentially damaging outside world.

And so we read in our Torah portion this morning:

כְּמַעֲשֵׂ֧ה אֶֽרֶץ־מִצְרַ֛יִם אֲשֶׁ֥ר יְשַׁבְתֶּם־בָּ֖הּ לֹ֣א תַעֲשׂ֑וּ וּכְמַעֲשֵׂ֣ה אֶֽרֶץ־כְּנַ֡עַן אֲשֶׁ֣ר אֲנִי֩ מֵבִ֨יא אֶתְכֶ֥ם שָׁ֙מָּה֙ לֹ֣א תַעֲשׂ֔וּ וּבְחֻקֹּתֵיהֶ֖ם לֹ֥א תֵלֵֽכוּ׃

The children of Israel are told that they must not engage with the practices of the Egyptians (the culture from which they have just been liberated) or those of the Canaanites (the culture into which they are about to invade). The Israelites are to have their own laws and customs.

What follows are the sexual prohibitions – specifically, which members of your family and extended family you are forbidden from having sex with. It also includes the infamous prohibition of homosexual male intercourse.

These were considered to be the ways of outsiders (in the language of the Community in Lowry’s book, this would be the people of Elsewhere) – which had to be resisted if Jewish culture and morality was to be preserved.

The philosopher Martha Nussbaum puts this all down to the fear of the things we imagine people doing, despite the fact that it is not directly harmful to us. Fear, early and powerful, is what tends to drive our lives, and particularly our attitude towards things that are beyond our comfort zone.

The sociologist, Samuel Heilbron, notes that the standard among ultra-orthodox communities is to teach these laws to children at an absurdly young age – in order it seems that they are too young to really take cognizance of their meaning; you don’t want to teach that kind of thing to teenagers who might get tempted by the very thought of it.

This justification is used by those who want to keep their culture safely locked away from the modern world – by reference to the sexual licentiousness and corruption of those outside – not just the ancient Canaanites.

If our progressive ancestors had resolved to (misguidedly) hold on to the command against homosexual sex, for example, I am convinced that our progressive religion would not have survived. Thus, flexibility is at the core of those parts of Judaism willing to survive in the world.

This is what the rabbis of our tradition did in a very different way, when the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed in the year 70 CE – by expanding the horizon of Judaism beyond the space of the Temple, making it portable so they could take it with them to places beyond Jerusalem.

Sifra, an early midrash on the book of Leviticus from around the third century CE, specifies what is meant by the practices of the Canaanites – those of the non-Jews in the surrounding culture of Roman times: the theatres, circuses, and sports. Again, the fear is that such interactions with the outside world lead to abandonment – the fear that our Jewish identity is not strong enough to survive exposure to Alan Bennett, football, and fun.

However, the writings of our rabbis are not monolithic in this fear of the outside world.

The Mishnah recounts a conversation between Rabban Gamliel, one of the foremost rabbis of his generation in the first century, and Proclus ben Plospus, a learned non-Jew. Rabban Gamliel was the leader of the Jews in the province of Palestine at the time, and therefore was required to spend time and energy engaging with the leaders of the non-Jewish authorities.

Gamliel and Plospus are sitting together one day in the bathhouse in Akko, when Plospus asks Gamliel, surely it is against your religion to be here, since look, over there is a statue of the goddess Aphrodite! Rabban Gamliel’s response is, at first, not to respond. He simply says that, since this is a discussion of Torah, it is not permitted in the bathhouse, since discussions of Torah are not permitted in such places.

Once they have exited the bathhouse, Gamliel explains why it is not a problem for him, and how he justifies entering into the bathhouse despite the presence of Aphrodite. He says two key things: firstly, he argues that the statue to Aphrodite was added to beautify the bathhouse rather than the other way around – perhaps if the bathhouse had been constructed as a way of worshipping Aphrodite then he might think differently. But his second, and more profound argument, is that he is not worried that his Judaism is compromised in any case – for his religious life is not defined by bathing or defecating in front of his god.

The unspoken lesson that I take away from this story is that Rabban Gamliel does not feel Judaism has to be protected from Greco-Roman culture in this way (maybe there are other ways in which it should be protected) – but in this case it is something he is able to touch without breaking.

Those who have sought to separate themselves away this week have been quite vociferously rebuked by the public in this country and across Europe – those football clubs that colluded to create a European Super League. The owners and directors of those twelve European clubs were vilified as greedy and concerned only with lining their own pockets. If this were the case, of course it would be impossible for the clubs to admit it. But they did claim that what they were concerned with was the survival of their clubs, and football in general.

Similarly, the claim that is made by those who want to coset Judaism away and isolate it from the theatres, circuses and sports of the outside world, do not do so out of humbug or meanness. They do so because they believe it is the only way in which the distinctness and vitality of Jewish identity can survive.

However, this strategy can have an even more deleterious effect, in that it makes religion into a fragile artifact, that will shatter upon impact with anything from the outside.

A Judaism that engages with the world, which is supple and open to change, has a much better chance of surviving.

I don’t think this was what Rabban Gamliel was saying – actually I think he was trying to assert the supremacy of his Rabbinic Jewish theology over the idol-worshipping Romans. However, what he exemplifies in his arguments is a self-confidence we have lost.

A confidence that the best of our tradition will not shatter upon impact – that it has the ability to enrich the world outside, and in turn be enriched.

We do not strengthen ourselves by hiding away and isolating ourselves. And we can never be a voice that others will hear. Jews can become a light to the nations only when we make ourselves part of the world to which those nations belong, rather than keeping ourselves at arm’s length. Hence the importance, as Rabbi Josh pointed out last night, of maintaining the multiple circles of concern – our own, that of Judaism, and that of kol ha’olam – the whole world – of which we speak in our progressive liturgy.

Our world will never truly be in colour until we are able to see all of it – until we feel confident enough in our Judaism that we are able to take it with us into the bathhouse, or into the theatre, or into the clamour of the competition of ideas in which we may find ourselves wanting to challenge it. But if we set our religion up as a delicate thing that will break at the merest touch, then it’s probably not worth having except for show. I want a religious life that you can take anywhere – to the highest mountain and to the depths of the sea – which has the flexibility but also the strength to survive. To be my companion and to protect me, rather than the other way around.

Hence the final verse of our portion this morning:

וּשְׁמַרְתֶּ֤ם אֶת־חֻקֹּתַי֙ וְאֶת־מִשְׁפָּטַ֔י אֲשֶׁ֨ר יַעֲשֶׂ֥ה אֹתָ֛ם הָאָדָ֖ם וָחַ֣י בָּהֶ֑ם אֲנִ֖י יְהוָֽה׃

You shall keep My laws and My statutes, by the pursuit of which humanity shall live’ – as our Talmud tells us, to live by them and not to die by them. To live an open and expansive life, and not to hide away in fear.

Shabbat Shalom