Volume #30, Issue #3, April, 1998
A Letter from the
Retiring Editor
Dear friends and subscribers,
The other day from the lofty place of
editorship I made a decision,
and behold it was good. And what was that?
I have always felt that being a
volunteer in the community it
is important for me to know when to give up those titles and powers that
may be the product of a lifetime.
And when is that? The
dishonest answer is that you resign when you are in decline, and when
you are a titular head and
others are covering for you. Even worse, it's time
to say good-bye to high office if your work is in decline and no one is
covering for you, so that your project fails even as you fail.
As Editor-in-Chief of Western States Jewish History
both I and the magazine have been
successful and enjoyed the cooperation of the officers and supporters of
our scholarly, yet popular and
readable, publication. And, have
I become unhealthy and let WSJH go into decline? A very loud
"No!"
With the help of the
calendar, I noticed that I was not
getting any younger and that before my
work showed that I was aging and improving my forgetfulness, it was time to recommend to the
board of the Western States Jewish History Association that we have a
new Editor/Publisher and that I
would remain on the board and continue to serve actively as Editor/Publisher Emeritus.
Now, who is my successor? One of the brightest and
most creative Jewish community
figures, and certainly one of
the most popular teachers in Southern California, has
agreed to take over the
responsibilities and the
opportunity for personal growth that the position offers.
Gladys Sturman, I am delighted to say,
has been nominated by me, been approved by the Board, and accepted the
leadership of the WSJH.
She has shared
plans with me which will take the publication to new heights of
achievement and which will elicit improved funding.
WSJH
board secretary David W. Epstein,
treasurer Sheldon Goldstein and I wish her a hearty
mazel tov.
We are delighted for the publication.
Now in order to
give up my post and to be true to my own responsibilities to myself, I
have begun new projects. I am
volunteering my time to Temple Ohr HaTorah of West Los Angeles and with the help of
my library and the Internet I
am studying Bible and commentaries four hours a day.
That's the trick.
Never leave accomplishment "A" without having started on challenge "B."
When you get older and of course when you are younger you never should
leave the brain in neutral . If you do so, your brain will certainly
coast downhill with heightened acceleration.
Friends, be assured that the gears of
my brain are engaged. I am smart enough to move on at the heighth of my
power and not the bottom of my ego.
This rabbi is going back to the Torah where it all
began for me.
THANK YOU EVERYONE !
—William M. Kramer, March, 1998
Dear Rabbi Bill,
Since my mother was an Orthodox Jew and
my father was an atheist I had a confusing relationship with Judaism as a
child. When our children were eight and five we decided to search for a
Temple home where we would be comfortable. When I saw you interviewed on the
Louie Lomax show in 1967 I knew immediately that you were the Rabbi for us.
The next week we went to Shabbat services
in a small frame house in Burbank. When we explained our situation
you welcomed us with open arms, "Rabbi
means `teacher,' you said, "Ask me questions anytime and we will learn
together." We were the 63rd family to join Temple Beth Emet, and thus began
sixteen happy years together.
For years I wanted you and Dad to meet,
but regrettably, I never invited him to services. Then Dad became ill
and you visited him in the hospital.
Kindred souls, you and Dad talked for hours about politics, philosophy,
literature, the universe, etc. You then arranged for one of your graduate
students to interview Dad and write his thesis on Dad's life.
You officiated at Dad's memorial
service. You ended the service by
saying, "I can just envision God and Jack having a lively discussion, each trying to convince the other that they do not exist !"
In 1982 our beloved son, George, suffered
a sub-arachnoid hemorrhage (stroke) while in the Army and stationed in
Germany. During the six weeks we were with him in Landstuhl you insisted on
frequent reports. Family in the States could only call family at the
hospital 1/2 hour a week. You got up very early and called me. We talked the
entire half-hour so you could "find out first-hand how my boy is doing."
Several weeks later when George was able to come to Temple for the
first time since his illness, you turned the
entire Shabbat service into a celebration of Thanksgiving for George's
survival.
What a dear, special friend you are !
Rabbi Bill - you are
extraordinary ! It has been an honor and joy
to be your congregant and your friend. Congratulations!
May you and yours know many years of
happiness and good health. Love,
--Lynne Schwalbe
A
Letter from the New Editor
It is with much pride and even more
humility that I step into a
role previously played by Rabbi William M. Kramer.
"How will I ever
know as much about these things as you do?" I asked the venerable Rabbi.
His advice was,
"Just immerse yourself in the subject for the next forty years."
So that's my plan
to devote myself to the task of maintaining the fine scholastic quality
of Western States Jewish
History as well as it's
"readability."
To do this I could use a little help
from our readers. I would welcome articles, suggestions, advice,
financial support, access to archives, photos, moral support and an
increase in circulation.
I am told that when Norton Stern put
out the first issue of Western States Jewish History
someone complemented him saying, "I
thoroughly enjoyed your first issue, but where are you going to find
enough material for a second issue?" As it turns out there is no
shortage of "Western States Jewish History" for us to discover and
relate to our readers. This excellent publication is now in its 30th
year.
My responsibility as the
new editor and publisher of Western States Jewish History Journal is to
keep up the good work for another forty years.
RABBI WILLIAM MORDECHI KRAMER:
MY FRIEND
by Herb Brin
Gather around, children, as I tell you
a little about Rabbi William Mordechi Kramer, my friend.
It's a story involving a variety of people
such as Joe McCarthy of red-hunting
infamy, some of the great rabbinic figures of the century and how Rabbi Bill
Kramer and Rabbi Edgar Magnin became weekly columnists for HERITAGE.
First, please note that I never refer to a
rabbi on a first-name basis. It is always Rabbi Kramer or Rabbi Magnin no
matter how intimate our friendship.
My father, of blessed memory, enjoined me
to honor the rabbinate thusly.
Never mind that some members of the rabbinic
estate might prove themselves
unworthy. But that's another story.
Rabbi Kramer has just retired as
editor/publisher of Western
States Jewish History, a
publication of unusual value to Jewish historical memory in the West.
I'll not offer dates in this short
recollection of my work with the
rabbi. I do know that he was ordained by the late, great spiritual
leader Rabbi Stephen S. Wise. He served as a favored student to
Dr. Wise and as an associate to luminaries such as Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver
and Rabbi Max Nussbaum.
Both Kramer and his brilliant wife, Betty
Wagner Kramer, hold honorary
doctorates as distinguished educators from Hebrew
Union College.
Rabbi Kramer is justifiably proud of his
gerontologist wife, who also
happens to be one of those rarities in Jewish life —a good
cook. (Now, I am in trouble, But, whatever.)
Rabbi Kramer is a scholar who has an
incredibly broad education that ranges from the arts to archaeology,
with credentials in a multitude of fields, including law,
education and family counseling.
He retired from Cal
State Northridge as a full-time professor. He is a well-known personality on
radio and television and an actor who has appeared in many motion pictures.
His classic visage is featured on national advertisements, he is an
authority on klezmer music and old newspaper engravings. His house contains
world-class collections of antiquarian books, objects of Jewish art,
Chinese furniture and walking canes. He
is a passionate urban archeologist
who digs up his prizes from thrift shops and garage sales.
Don't tangle with him on any philosophical
level. You'll lose.
After serving more than 50 years as a pulpit rabbi, he is now devoting
himself to the study of Bible. Repeat: as one of the West's foremost
biblical scholars, he insists that he is just now beginning to study the
Bible.
Also, having with this
issue retired from the historical quarterly
which he and the late Norton B. Stem had
been publishing since 1968, Rabbi
Kramer is having a ball as a volunteer associate of Rabbi Mordecai Finlay at
Temple Ohr HaTorah in the Westwood area.
One might say that
Rabbi Kramer retired at the height of his power and showed infinite wisdom
in selecting Gladys Sturman as his successor for the quarterly.
How to describe a William Mordecai Kramer?
Dan Brin (my son) who edits Rabbi Kramer weekly for his
HERITAGE
column, My Shtetele California,
describes the rabbi as "a sage."
A sage he is. And with
a pixie sense of humor. A pixie with an inquiring mind.
I met Rabbi Kramer in
March of 1954, when he came to my office on La Brea near Beverly Blvd. in
Los Angeles.
He came to express his sense of outrage that the
publisher of the B'nai B'rith Messenger
had leveled an editorial assault on a young
man on the
HERITAGE
staff. The charge was that the staff
assistant "is a Communist!" This
was during the darkest McCarthy Era days.
How to handle such a charge?
The intent was really to destroy the
credibility of HERITAGE.
"How can I help?" asked this young,
unbearded rabbi with a troubled look in his eyes.
This was out first meeting.
"With
Joe McCarthy around the corner everywhere in America,
I don't know how we might
survive," I said. "The man on our staff
has just admitted to me that he was once a Communist but was kicked off
their newspaper, The People's
World, for writing reviews of plays they considered to be capitalist. It would be
funny if it weren't so damned serious.
Just as
we were talking remember, Rabbi Kramer was with-out
a pulpit and with little power in the community —a phone call
came in from Rabbi Edgar Magnin.
How can
I help you, Herb?" came the voice of Rabbi Magnin,
spiritual leader of the
most important synagogue in the West, Wilshire Boulevard Temple.
That's
how Edgar Magnin and William Kramer
joined our Heritage
staff of columnists.
Rabbi
Magnin' s column appeared in Heritage
until the day he died.
Rabbi
Kramer hung around to become one of the most distinguished rabbinic
figures in the nation.
Oh what
a loss not to have taped Rabbi Kramer' s remarks dur
ing our weekly (vegetarian!) luncheons
at the 32nd Street Market, at
which Dan, Bob Lupo and I would pick his brains on how to handle the
Jewish news of the week.
And here's a fragment of fun. From the clean-shaven young rabbi I
encountered in my office that dark McCarthy day, Rabbi Kramer managed to
grow one of the great beards to grace a rabbinic figure.
One day, an important
dairy food company began using a picture of Rabbi Kramer to promote its
kosher food products. It was a picture of one of the most Orthodox-looking
rabbinic figures around.
When it was explained
to the company that Rabbi Kramer was
ordained as a Reform rabbi, it
became a matter of major concern
for the food processing firm.
How was it resolved
toll ich ah zay vissen!
Herb Brinwsis publisher the
Heritage and Southwest Jewish Press
and is, himself, a vast
depository of Southern California Jewish history. His autobiography,
recorded before his passing and complied by his sons is the
focus of WSJH, Volume 39#2.
WILLIAM M. KRAMER,
"MY LIFETIME OF
CAREERS"
AN ADDRESS TO THE
CENTRAL CONFERENCE
OF AMERICAN RABBIS (CCAR)
HONORING HIS 50 YEARS
ON THE PULPIT
105th Annual
Convention, Chicago, Illinois
May 30, 1994
by William M.
Kramer
I was ordained in 1944 when Stephen S.
Wise blessed me. Before that I had
served as a full-time acting rabbi in St. Louis,
MO and Pittsfield, MA. And that made me a rabbi.
Actually, I've had a lot of jobs. I've
been a university professor
and a law professor and a seminary
professor and a high school teacher
and a religious school teacher. More specifically, I've taught at Hebrew
Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion
(CA), where I was the founding chair of
the School of Education at the Los
Angeles campus, when it was up in the Hollywood
Hills. Of tremendous help to me in
developing my teaching career
was Rabbi Alfred Gottschalk during
his incumbency as De HUC-JLR in LA,
where he made me Adjunct Professor.
I've taught students at the University of
Judaism, (L.A.) USC,
UCLA, and a few other places, not to mention a couple of decades
at California State University at
Northridge, where I was a tenured
senior professor. To be totally
ecumenical, I chaired the commit-tee
for the State of California that accredited Yeshiva University
of Los Angeles. I've picked up seven degrees and two licenses
along the way, having attended college in
Ohio, Wisconsin, New York, Indiana, Mexico City and
California.
I've had other kinds of jobs, too, besides
being a teacher. I sold
neckties door-to-door in Springfield, IL,
just before Father's Day.
I was a dishwasher who graduated to
salad man in Madison, WI. I
was a camp counselor who woke the little boys at midnight so they
wouldn't wet their beds in the Berkshires of MA. I sold hipboots
to firemen in Cuyahoga County, OH, and
I worked as a scab tour guide
in Jerusalem (I wasn't licensed).
However, I have been
licensed for many things. In 1965, 1 received a MFCC and I was a family
therapist for many years in California. I still keep my license current by
taking in-service courses. I do the same thing to keep my license in force
as an attorney in California, having passed the bar in 1979. I am with the First Amendment firm of Fleishman, Fisher & Moest in Century City, where
I worked on briefs for both the California and US Supreme Courts.
I am a past member of
AFTRA and currently of SAG, which leads me to note that I have been an
actor, a commentator and a talk show host on TV. I did much the same on
radio, including a stint on Kol Tzion La-Golah in Jerusalem.
I've also done a little
"little theater" in my day, and I have appeared in videos. I received
attention for the role that I played on TV as an Orthodox rabbi giving a
Jewish divorce —a get,
on "L.A. Law." I did
a
shiva
call for the John Cassavetes movie
Opening Night. I
was a Chasidic rabbi in an unhappy role for the
movie The Seventh Sign. I
did a bar mitzvah on the TV show
"Sisters," a funeral on "Life Goes On," two more of the same on "Unsolved
Mysteries," and on a Stephen Cannell pilot. I was the
head of
a
yeshiva
in an American Film Institute production.
I was
a congregational rabbi for Israeli TV and
so on. I've even been on "Family
Feud" as a family of rabbis playing a family of priests.
And I played
a
mohel for a Bruce Springsteen
video, but it ended up on the
cutting room floor. (ouch!)
I have been a model, if not always a
model person. My face has
graced ads for yogurt and bagels and the
fronts of T-shirts and the covers
of greeting cards. I have been on the pages of periodicals
and the walls of my temple and the walls
of my temple members' households. Where I am most reproduced is in the bar and bat mitzvah and
weddings albums and videos of all of the above.
Created
especially for you on your birthday. .
The Kosher Lifesaver!
William M. Kramer in 1984
during his career as greeting card model.
—California
Dreamers, Inc. Chicago, IL, 1984
When it comes to writing, I have been
everything from associate
editor to senior contributing editor, editorial writer, and columnist
for the Heritage chain of papers. I've been a writer, too, for
a lot of other news
publications, such as the
Jerusalem Post,
the
St. Louis Modern Review,
the
Muncie Evening Press
and the
Los Angeles News.
In addition to Heritage, I am
currently writing articles for
The Guardian
of the Jewish Home for the Aging, and I'm editor and publisher of Western States Jewish History, to
which everyone should
subscribe. I also had ten years as a columnist
on the culture of the law of the attorney's
Los Angeles Daily
Journal
and its companion paper in San
Francisco. Among the magazines for which I've written are the Reconstructionist,
the Colour Magazine of the London
Jewish Chronicle, the Jewish Digest, the Jewish Spectator,
Western States Jewish Historical Quarterly, California History, Southern
California Historical Journal and various academic journals in
various fields with various offerings, including essays, poetry, short
stories and articles, popular and scientific.
My
first journalism job was at age 14, when I edited the Temple
Trumpeteer of the Temple on the
Heights in Cleveland. Two years
later, I wrote a weekly column for the neighboring throw-away
and covered police court and the City
Council for the old Scripps Howard
Cleveland Press. I was Managing Editor of Cleveland Heights High
School's Black and Gold.
I have
been hobbled with hobbies and collected collections. I
am definitely a booknik. I
developed the largest private collection
in English, including volumes and
fugitive clippings, on Jews in
art and Jews of the West. It was
at the Chicago World's Fair, back
in 1932 or 1933 that I first began collecting Judaica. I have
collected paintings and prints,
Palestine-Israel memorabilia, calendar plates and Blue Willow
china and a raft of Jewish ceremonial
objects.
A lot of those things are in museums now, including my
German Expressionist collection and more
at Los Angeles County
Museum, a few things at the Magnes Museum
in Berkeley, and a
heap of stuff at the Skirball Museum in Los Angeles. By the way,
Greeting card model William M. Kramer continuing with career
by
greeting the New Year. (William M. Kramer is on the right.)
—Unidentified greeting card from Kramer family archives
I am a life member honoree of the
Society for Religious Architecture
and an AIA affiliate.
So how did I get to be a rabbi? At age
four I made up my mind
when I was a student of the late Rabbi
Philip Jaffa at the Westside
Synagogue in Cleveland. A thousand years later we were col-leagues
together when I was
a
locum tenens
in Phoenix. The hero
of my childhood was Rabbi Stephen S. Wise. My rabbinical
leanings were also reinforced by Rabbis
Abba Hillel Silver, Barnett Brickner, Abraham Novak and Rudolph Rosenthal in Cleveland. At
age 13 my parents, Jeanette and
Simon, took me from Cleveland to
New York to see Dr. Wise regarding
finding me a sibling through his
adoption service. It did not work out, but Wise did bless me and announced
to my parents that I should become a rabbi.
In
1934, after my Bar Mitzvah, in the midst of the Depression,
my prospering parents took me to Jerusalem. There they went to
the Jewish Agency to see the family
entries in the Golden Book of the
Jewish National Fund. It was the great HaRav Kook who got the book out for
us, and he also blessed me and told my folks I would become a rabbi. My
father was raised speaking Swedish among the miners in Grassflat, Pennsylvania, where he was born.
My mother was the daughter of a Tennessee moonshiner who
lived for a while in a log cabin outside
Nashville or Memphis. Me,
I was born on Isaac Mayer Wise' s birthday, March 29, 1920, in a
Lutheran hospital in Cleveland.
With Reform and Orthodox agreement by two
rabbis who were
both rationalist and mystic, I was
"kismet-ed." Maybe their prayers
helped my mother, who thereafter
bore my late brother Ernest, college
professor, psychotherapist and father of three whom I love.
I went to Western Reserve University, now
Case Western. There I was a member of Phi Sigma Delta, now Zeta Beta Tau. I
got through it in three years and received a Bachelor of Arts in Political
Science and History in 1940. 1 got my masters from the same school in 1946
in School Administration with a minor in Social Work. Following receiving my
BA from Western Reserve I hedged by applying to graduate school in
education, library science, social work and law. However, I was accepted by
the Jewish Institute of Religion in New York, headed by Dr. Wise. I was
accelerated there as well because of World War II.
Doctor, Professor William M. Kramer during his art history career.
—Kramer family archive
photo
Before my 23rd birthday
in 1943, totally unprepared, I became
an acting rabbi at Temple Israel of St. Louis, and I have spent the last 50
years studying at least three hours a day to make up for it.
That includes the years when I engaged
a
melamed
to come to the office at Silver's
Cleveland Temple, where I rabbied to fill in the
many lacunae in my rabbinic and linguistic
resume. Subsequently, I received an earned Doctor of Hebrew Letters in 1965, to add to
my unearned Doctor of Divinity from the
Hebrew Union College, into which
JIR has been merged and submerged. Also in 1969, I was given
extra-ordinem, my
Master of Arts and Hebrew Letters from the
same institution.
For my sins and virtues I have been a
rabbi in pulpits in St. Louis, Missouri, and Pittsfield, Massachusetts, with
Silver in Cleveland, then in Muncie, Indiana, in San Pedro and Greater Los
Angeles, and then in Phoenix, Arizona.
Of greater tenure was my decade at Temple
Israel of Holly-wood with the noted Rabbi Max Nussbaum, a brief transition
at Fairfax Temple founded by my precious friend Rabbi Jacob Sonderling, and
then and now more than a quarter of a century at Temple Beth Emet of
"Beautiful Downtown Burbank."
I have lectured in synagogues in various
parts of the world, on land and at sea, and I have been a volunteer civilian
chaplain at military camps and prisons and Scout Jamborees.
Organizationally, I have volunteered for
many groups, including the Jewish Agency in Israel, the Skirball Museum,
the Los Angeles Jewish Community Library and various professional
organizations. I have served as President of the Southern California
Association of Liberal Rabbis, the Western States Jewish History Association
and the Western Association of Temple Educators. Among many vice
presidencies was that of the Southern California Jewish Historical Society.
At Temple
Beth Emet of Burbank, an amazing degree of mutual
tolerance has existed. They put up
with my meshugas
and I put up with theirs. They
elicit and accept spirituality from me and I grow
in devotion in their midst. Rabbi Mark Sobel, my associate rabbi, is special
to me, like a son.
Doctor, Professor, Rabbi William M. Kramer, Esq., (right)
congratulating his wife Betty Wagner Kramer (left) upon her receiving
an Honorary Doctorate from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish
Institute of Religion, in Los Angeles, California, May 9, 1994.
—Photo from Kramer
family archives
My current affiliations
include volunteering at HUC-JIR under
the leadership of dedicated
Vice-President Uri Herscher. I am also
the Louis and Florence Ross Visiting Professor in Art for Lee College of the
University of Judaism. I remain editor and publisher of
Western States Jewish History,
columnist for the
Heritage
chain of newspapers, and
The Guardian.
This work along with my affiliation with the law firm of Fleishman, Fisher
and Moest, gives me fields of service and satisfaction.
I have been one of the lucky ones. In the
non-Orthodox rabbinate, which I know best, retirement between ages 61 and 65
is the norm. Dropouts are no exception. I am still challenged by Torah and
Temple after half a century. My dear friend, Rabbi Jacob Sonderling,
alav-ha-shalom,
preached until age 86. That appeals to me.
I have also been the family rabbi. I have
been twice married and
twice blessed, and even more, I have had
two families, that of Joan and that
of Betty (with assorted delicious grandchildren) over terrain that includes
California, Florida, New Jersey, New York and Jerusalem. My wife Betty was
the recipient of an HUC-JIR honorary doctorate on May 9, 1994 at Los Angeles
and I was a participant. I have a
great many friends - people like those already
mentioned and others who erase the distinction between loving friends and
loving family.
I can't imagine leaving the
pulpit except for Aliyah.
I am still dreaming dreams and
planning plans. I still expect to see dreams come true and plans realized,
please God. I hope I have pleased God and never embarrassed Him. He is my
challenge when I succeed, and my comfort when I fail.
Editor's Note: Since presenting this
address William Kramer has retired from both the pulpit as well as
publisher of Western States
Jewish History. However,
he still teaches weekly Parachot
at Or HaTorah
Synagogue in West Los Angeles and keeps his finger well into the
literary parts of Western
States Jewish History.
RABBI WILLIAM M. KRAMER
SPEAKS:
"OF GOD AND HIS FRIENDS,"
1968
Editor's Note: Thirty years ago
another Jewish journal began publishing called
The American
Rabbi. In the very first
volume I found a wonderful sermon
by a young rabbi, serving Associate
Rabbi of Hollywood's Temple Israel. He was clea-shaven
with impressive hor-rimmed glasses as he stood befo
his congregation presenting this
sermon.
—G.
S.
Two years ago a little moppet of
six-year-old boy tugged on my coat
as I was making my rounds of the primary classes. When I greeted him with a
smile it was a little sober face that said, "Take
me into the Temple!" I was startled by his
tone and his manner and
reminded of the fictional man who meets
the little Martian who says `take me to your leader' . Somehow or other I didn't ask him why, but
pausing only to tell his teacher
that he was going to be with me for
awhile, I went directly with the boy into our sanctuary.
Once inside the room he
let go of my hand and with a dedicated
look marched up the pulpit stairs, fished an envelope out of a pocket and
slipped it between the Ark doors. I still said nothing (although I could
hardly wait to get back to the Ark after safely depositing the youngster
with his classroom teacher). At the door his somber look changed into a
smile and he gave me the explanation, "I just dropped a note to our friend
God, to thank Him for giving me a wonderful mommy and daddy."
Our little six-year old
had the natural Jewish impulse to look upon God as a friend and the mature
wisdom to know that though God is everywhere, you somehow feel more at home
with Him in the House of God, in the Temple.
I get the same sort of feeling from a
story that happened many years ago during the 18th Century when Rosh
Hashanah coincided with Shabbat. It was then that the wonderful Rabbi
Levi Yitschak of Berditchev had one of his friendly
conversations with God in the Synagogue "Ribono shel (Mom," he said, "Master of the Universe, to-day is
Rosh Hashanah when you normally inscribe Jews either in the Book of Life or the Book of Death for the coming year. But, Oh God, it is
also Shabbos, and if a Jew shouldn't write on Shabbos, all the more that
his God shouldn't. So, dear God, you have a problem, and I, Levi
Yitzchak, propose a solution.
If you will inscribe all the Jews for a year of life and not
a year of death, then it will
be all right for you to write on Shabbos.
After all, it was You,
Yourself that said, `The mitzvah of saving a
life is such that you can violate Shabbos to do
it.'
Like the boy's, this too is a delicious
story One cannot take it literally, but it re-enforces the ancient Jewish
belief that we all stand before the judgment of God, further, that God must
abide by His own rules, and more,
it makes the point that I want to share
with you: that the relationship
between God and man in Judaism is
not only made up of justice, mercy and love, but even more delightfully of
intimacy and friendly affection.
Traditionally, how do we think of
ourselves in relationship with God? We say that He is our Father and we are His children.
We say that we belong together as
the bride and groom belong to each
other. Simply, He loves us and we love Him, we love Him and He loves us, and
it's not just a kind of "duty love."
It is a love that has its roots back to
those days when the world
was young. It's the kind of love that
grows up when you have gone through
a lot together. It's a love tried by many apparent though not real
separations. It's a love strengthened by many real al-though not always
apparent reconciliations.
It is a personal kind of love, this love
of God and man, where those in love
get credit for trying even if results are not always as
it might be wished. It's the love
that makes you share the joys even
as it eases the burden of your
sorrows. It's the eternal romance and
to know it is to find it
irresistible; to feel it for a moment is to have
a warm glow forever.
Yes, the lad and I and Levi Yitzchak all
agree on the reality of
God, a living personal presence while at
the same time He is pure spirit,
One and Unique. And somehow we suspect, whether we
like the term "choseness" or not, that we
have a somewhat special
relationship with Him and He with us. We gladly admit that the daughter
religions have also come to know Him, but it is not in quite the same
friendly fashion.
Remember the story that is told about the
gentile who had visited the old-fashioned shul and being an observant member
of his own faith he was surprised
to find what to him seemed to be a
certain amount of casualness in the decorum? When he remarked on this to the
Jewish friend who brought him, the Jew replied, "I
will explain with a story. You see, when a
man moves into a new neighborhood
and meets his neighbor for the first few times, the
relationship is very formal. The neighbors
do not entirely relax in
each others presence. They tend to be
sparing of word and sitting bolt
upright.
"However, when new neighbors
become old friends they relax their
bodies and their speech and no disrespect is intended and none is assumed.
That's the way it is with us Jews. We have
known God for a long time and we've gone
through a lot together and so we
are quite comfortable in His presence. To you it might
seem that we are perhaps a little casual. But that's not the case, for
we and God are old friends. Your religion, on the other hand, knows Him less
than half as long as we do and you still are very reserved in your manners
because all the strangeness has not yet worn off. When you know God as well
as we know Him, you'll understand
better how we feel about Him and why we behave as we do and why we act
friendly as we do."
There is no getting away from it, whether
it was our little Sunday school
boy or a Levi Yitzchak that you would consult, you
would find that a proper Jew regards God as his friend. So, in a sense, to
know more about our God and man relationship in
Judaism you have only to consider some of
the qualities that make up a good
friendship.
Firstly, good friends try to be together
as much as they can. So
it is that God is with us always and we
are with Him even when we are not
aware of it.
Good friends are concerned about each
other. We begin many prayers with the words `Blessed be Thou' which is just
another way of the Jew praying for God even as he prays to Him. And how
is it with God? Does He pray for us?
The Talmud teaches in the words of Rab (Ber.
7a.) that God also prays. What a bold idea. And how does God pray? He says:
"May it be My will that My loving kindness
may overcome My anger, and that it
may prevail over My attributes(of justice and
judgment), and that I may deal with My
children according to the
quality of compassion, and not act towards
them according to the strict
judicial line."
Isn't the idea of God's praying for us a
lovely one?
Then according to our
tradition we find that as friends try to be together so God and man are
together, secondly as friends pray for
each other God and man pray for
each other, and now we find that
as friends share great joys and
sorrows so it is with God and man.
Wanting to get closer to God
as he was filled with great joy because of his wonderful parents, our little boy came right to the
sanctuary. And so it is with us Jewish grown-ups as well. More and more, we
Jews, when celebrating the birth of a new child,
have the baby named and blessed before God
in the synagogue. In fact, there is
a tradition of our people that there are three responsible for the child;
the father, the mother, and God —a sort of a God-father.
And more and more, and I cherish the
custom, couples are being
married in the sanctuaries and chapels of our congregations.
Thus they, as it were, invite God's presence and not just the
presence of the law. It is not only
that two become one, but that the Almighty One above is invited to stand up for them both as a friend.
And bar mitzvah, confirmation,
consecration and a host of other ceremonies take place in the House of the
Lord of Hosts. And that our friend God, shares Shabbat and Yom Tov with us,
and we with Him, is evidenced by
our being together on this day.
Yes, we are together with God, our
Friend, in joy and certainly
in our sorrows we feel His friendly
presence. He is our companion in
sorrow, our comforter, and ultimately He gives us eternity to compensate for
whatever may be grievous in time.
No, a Jew is never without God as a
friend, but there are moments when
even the most trusting Jew must ask of himself and
of his God how we can reconcile the
evil that is in the world with the
goodness that we associate with God? How can we feel that
God is our friend when the natural disasters beyond our powers,
and the unnatural disasters within
our powers, sometimes bring us pain
and death?
It is easy then to ask of the heavens:
where is my Friend? Easy
to ask, but not easy to answer. Because
God and man are friends
does not mean that God and man are
equals. And what One Friend
may understand, His friend may not. This
is where the human and
the Divine friendship like the man-to-man
friendship requires the greatest
trust.
Religion calls it, "the leap of faith" and
Judaism calls it, "yisurin shel
ahavah"
which means that we not only love God in
joy, but in pain, and we believe
that somehow, and far beyond our
comprehension, even the pain is an act of love from God.
It's that
kind of greatness of spirit that reminds a man at the death of a child of
the birth of a child. It's that kind of spiritual
wisdom that reminds Jewry that the death
of our people in Europe cannot be remembered apart from the rebirth of our people in
Israel. That where there is affliction,
there is healing.
Yes, God is our friend and we trust Him. Even
though His thoughts are not our
thoughts. Despite the fact that His wisdom is
beyond our understanding. When our six-year-old will be, please God, a man
full of years and ripe with learning, then he may see
God, not only as friend of the moment, but the
eternal friend of history. He may know
God, not simply as the friend of man, the
individual, but God the Friend of all mankind.
Perhaps, he
will discover a Divine friendship in the voice of thunder as well in "the still
small voice."
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