Rich In Love

Psalm 148

     My seminary teachers told me to read with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. Faith, they said, is a conversation, a dialogue, a living thing. So ever since I have been reading with the newspaper in one hand and the Bible in the other. And the news is not so good.  Four and one-half million cases of coronavirus have been reported in the US, and 200,000 people have died from the disease according to official statistics. And we all wonder and worry about what happens once the school year starts this fall. On the other hand, Black Lives Matter is forcing us to have a new conversation on race. The adult education class here at Pine Valley Christian Church is to be congratulated for tackling the tough issue of racism and white supremacy in America. I have listened to the TED Talk the class is discussing. The speaker says that as a nation we are at a tipping point. The history that we have tried to ignore or soft peddle for too long has to be faced. The chickens are coming home to roost. Watching that TED Talk I thought of William Faulkner’s line, “History isn't dead; it'snot even past."

 

     On a personal level, many of us are trying our best to stay home. Some of us have cabin fever. We are asking questions. How long will this go on?  What’s a person going to do? What does our faith teach us?  So if you have your Bible handy open it to Psalm 148.  It is called a psalm of praise. Some people call it a hallelujah psalm. It may have been written for the dedication of a place of worship. As you read it you might think about celebrations or dedications you have attended. Maybe you participated in a house blessing.
Sometime later today and again tomorrow, find Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony or his Ninth Symphony on the internet, and as you listen to that music read this psalm--out loud. Take a deep breath and read it: “Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the heavens. Praise God in the heights above. Praise God all the angels. Praise God all heavenly hosts. Praise God, sun and moon, Praise God all you shining stars. Praise God in the highest heavens. Praise God. Praise the name of the Lord.” Halleluiah. Joyful, joyful, we adore thee, God of love.
        Some people think this psalm was written when the temple was being dedicated. Other people associate it with St. Francis. I have an image of John Muir standing in Yosemite Valley reciting this psalm to El Capitan and Half Dome. In a world that is being paralyzed by a global pandemic it is no small thing to stand up and give praise. “Yea though I walk through the valley of shadow of death, I will fear no evil.” Do not under estimate the power of praise.
In the very next verse the psalmist declares: “God commanded and they were created, established for ever and ever, fixed by bounds they cannot pass.” Isn’t that an interesting paradox? Creation lasts for ever and ever, but every created thing, every created being has boundaries, which we cannot pass. We live in a web of mutuality and interdependence. Thus, in verses seven and eight the psalmist says: 

       

“Praise the Lord from the earth, you sea monsters and all deeps, fire and hail, snow and frost, stormy wind fulfilling God’s command. Mountains and all hills, fruit trees and cedars, beasts and cattle, creeping things and flying birds. Praise the Lord.
The psalmist is telling us that God has a covenant with all of creation. All of creation is an expression of God’s love. God’s love makes creation possible. God’s love sustains creation. God’s love tells the sun to rise in the morning and set in the evening. God is rich in love. God’s love makes life possible.
          Then, in the very next verses, the psalmist reminds us in verses eleven and twelve, that we have a role to play. We have a responsibility: “Kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all rulers of the earth! Young men and maidens together, old people and children, Praise the Lord.” We are accountable for the things that we do, and for the things we ought to have done buthave left undone. We are responsible for ourselves and for the care of the earth to the seventh generation, responsible to our children and our children’s children. The psalmist has a vision of praise that expands our understanding of praise. The meaning of praise has a horizontal dimension as well as a vertical one. Praise binds us to God and to the earth and to all people.
     Then in verse 14: “God has raised up a horn for the people.” Hear the sound of the trumpet. Lately Sally and I have been reading a collection of Greta Thunberg’s speeches. They are published in a slim volume entitled, No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference. She is a trumpeter of the Lord. She entitled one speech, “You can’t simply make up your own facts.” She said in that speech, “I’ll tell you this, you cannot solve a crisis without treating it like a crisis. You cannot leave the responsibility to individuals and politicians, the markets or some other parts of the world. This has to include everything and everyone.” 

       In a speech that she gave at Davos, Switzerland, she was speaking to the one-tenth of the one-percent who own more wealth than ninety-nine percent of the world’s population. She said, “I have come to tell you our house is on fire.” She told them, “You like to talk about your financial success . . .  but your financial success comes with an unthinkable price tag.”  And in a speech to the US Congress she said, “I have many dreams, but now is not the time to dream. Wake up.” God has raised up a horn, a trumpet, for the people. The trumpeter’s name is Greta. She is reminding us of the wisdom of the psalmist. Creation does not belong to us. “The Earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.” Creation does not belong to us, but we bear responsibility for it.
     

     Just recently, our nation paid tribute to another trumpeter of the Lord. If Martin Luther King, Jr. was the drum major, John Robert Lewis was the lead trumpet. This morning I am holding the image of the Congressman’s caisson carrying his casket across a bridge that I believe will soon be named in his honor, the John Robert Lewis Bridge. I learned last week that when he was a child and even to this day his family calls him Robert. Robert Lewis. That’s his name. When he became head of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee he took the name John. He wanted the world to know that he was a disciple of Jesus, so he took the name of a disciple, and called himself John. And he praised God with his words and with his deeds. This strong and gentle and nonviolent disciple of our Lord said, “If you see something wrong, say something. Do something. Go and get into good trouble.” 

Rev. David Hansen

Leaving The Baggage Behind

           

Peace Brigades International (PBI) was started in 1981 as a new experiment from an older idea implemented by Gandhi in the Indian freedom struggle. In response to Hindu - Muslim conflict, Gandhi developed groups of unarmed peacekeepers, who would go into situations of violence to temper and calm both sides. The volunteers were non-partisan in their approach, wore clothing that identified them as peacekeepers, searched out facts to scotch rumors and misinformation and identified points of common resolution.

PBI began its efforts in the early 80's in Guatemala, accompanying the Mutual Support Group for Families of the Disappeared (GAM), as they became politically active for the cause of their loved ones, and in turn, began receiving death threats. PBI volunteers would accompany the leaders of the group and their family members wherever they went, as an unarmed international presence, prepared to report back to an international audience that would send telegrams and assert international political pressure on the appropriate persons and parties.
        Gradually, as human rights workers and organizations requested help, the work expanded. Presently PBI is organized in 13 country groups for recruitment of volunteers and fundraising. Since 1981 the organization has been active in a total of 16 field projects and is currently working in 7 different country locations.
       Several years ago I was serving on the International Council of PBI. As an International Council member, I had the opportunity to attend a General Assembly meeting of PBI in Switzerland. It brought together representatives from all of the different country groups and the various field projects. We were a group of about sixty, speaking several languages and using three in our sessions. Some of the issues before us were highly contested.  As a group that was committed to operating by consensus, I couldn't imagine resolving those deeply felt issues in the limited time frame we had. I thought, perhaps, they could never be resolved to everyone's satisfaction.

 Early on in the gathering, a decision was made to start a working group that would focus on the most contentious issue before us. The group included the most vociferous adherents on both sides with a few others and a trained facilitator and mediator. They devoted themselves to the task, using every spare moment. At the end of the gathering they presented their resolution, which to my utter amazement, was adopted by consensus of the whole group.

I've thought about this PBI event many times since. It has loomed large these days as I watch a deeply partisan Congress and divided society struggle to do what's best for the country. Where are our facilitators and mediators? Where are those committed to building consensus?

In the same way, I wonder why we haven't yet learned that there are alternative ways to resolve conflict than war and violence? PBI has been in operation for almost forty years without loss of life to any of those they accompany. The Nonviolent Peace Force is active around the globe offering nonviolent alternatives. Yet, my country continues building an arsenal that can destroy the world several times over while the forever rising defense budget is the only item to get overwhelming bi-partisan support. Where is the vision and support for nonviolent alternatives?

Whenever we enter into any kind of disagreement, we all carry some baggage. It might be the baggage of personal ego. We all like to be "right." It might be the baggage of responsibility to others. Maybe we are representing our family, our workplace, our community, or Congressional constituency. Or it could be the baggage of "belief." It's when my religion tells me this is wrong, so you must be wrong to believe differently. Sometimes it's the baggage of fear, for my own or others personal safety or welfare. Sometimes it's the baggage of money; losing it!

As I ponder the "miracle" of that gathering in Switzerland, I have come to recognize that the baggage people brought was modest. No one was paying them or lobbying them with threats or money. Their fundamental belief in nonviolent conflict resolution had been formed and tempered by personal experience in the fields of conflict. That belief rose above all others. Those they represented were committed to the value of consensus, so they weren't too worried about those back home. And with good facilitation and mediation, ego is exposed and vulnerability is affirmed.

It's possible to travel lightly, leaving the baggage behind. This experience in Switzerland and the promise of groups like PBI continue to give one some modest hope for the future.

Carl Kline

 

Through the Harsh Passages of Torah and LIfe

     
In the still heat of mid-summer, despair and hope vie in the shimmering haze. It is a season of struggle in the world around us and in the cycle of Torah and Jewish liturgical time. For three weeks before Tisha B'Av, day of mourning and fasting for the destruction of both Temples in Jerusalem, we chant prophetic words of warning. For  seven weeks after Tisha B'Av, we chant prophetic words of comfort. We try to hold both as we make our way in a world convulsed by the pandemics of a virus, of racism, of so much brutality among people and nations, all separating us from each other when we most need each other. In the Torah portions from the end of the Book of Numbers, Sefer Bamidbar, into the beginning of the Book of Deuteronomy, Sefer D'varim, we encounter the violence of conquest, painfully brutal passages among those that Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel describes so helpfully as the "harsh passages." Learning to navigate the harsh passages of Torah, we gain training and skills in the way of confronting violence in the world around us, while learning through sacred confrontation the ways of nonviolence.

I would not presume to say that it is the Torah's explicit intent that in our encounter with its own violence we are to wrestle and struggle toward another way, toward transcending and transforming such violence. In the Jewish way of engagement with text, wrestling, crying, arguing, that dynamic becomes so inevitable, however, that we cannot miss it as implicit intent. In the way of a quiet plea, as hearing God in the "still, small voice" (I Kings 19:12), implicit becomes more powerful than explicit.
 
On the mystery of its opening words, given human voice through Rashi and rabbinic tradition, the Torah says, dorsheni/interpret me, search me. And so we do. That the harsh passages do not represent the ultimate concerns and lasting values of Torah, in the way that Rabbenu Heschel teaches, is clear: "the standards by which those passages are criticized are impressed upon us by the Bible, which is the main factor in ennobling our conscience and in endowing us with the sensitivity that rebels agains all cruelty...; [the harsh passages] stand in sharp contrast with the compassion, justice and wisdom of the laws that were legislated for all times" (God in Search of Man, p. 268). The values with which we confront the violence are from yet deeper wellsprings within the Torah itself, page and parchment the context in which human struggles play out. It is also clear that from the very beginning of our people's encounter with Torah, and onward through the ages, that our teachers have not backed away from wrestling with the violence. They have planted seeds in furrows that run with blood, seeds of very different fruit, right there in the context of violence, there in the midst of the harsh passages. Facing down the violence, they have offered teachings of peace and nonviolence.

With enough similar occurrences, it seems no accident, then, that from out of the brutal slaughter of Sichon, king of the Emorites, recounted by Moses at the beginning of the fifth book, D'varim/Deuteronomy (2:26), midrashic emphasis is given to the unique nature of pursuing peace as a mitzvah.  It is a familiar midrash that occurs in various sources, such as in the minor Talmudic tractate called Perek Shalom/the chapter of Peace, here emerging in Midrash Tanchuma (22) to Parashat Chukkat (on Numb. 21:21). Acting on his own initiative, Moses has sent messengers of peace to Sichon. The midrash immediately draws a proof text from Psalms (34:15), emphasizing the rightness of Moses' action and the evil of war, sur me'ra v'aseh tov/turn from evil and do good.

 We ask, as we always need to ask, why does the midrash draw support from that verse, toward what purpose? The point is then made that the Torah does not direct us to seek out mitzvot, telling us, rather, to fulfill a particular mitzvah when it is at hand, its doing dependent on time and circumstance. We remove a mother bird from the nest before taking fledglings or eggs only when happening upon such a moment of encounter, even then remembering the urging of Maimonides that it is preferable not to take the young in any case (Moreh N'vuchim 3:48). We are commanded to help our enemy raise up their fallen ox only when encountering such an opportunity to make a friend of an enemy. Giving more examples, the midrash then says of them all, if they come to your hand, you are commanded concerning them, but do not pursue after them. Only in regard to the pursuit of peace, the midrash makes clear, are we not to sit back and wait for the opportunity to fulfill the mitzvah, v'ha'shalom/and regarding peace, seek peace from your place, and pursue it in another place/bakesh shalom mim'kom'cha, v'rodfei'hu b'makom acher. Wrestling with violence, bravely entering the harsh passages, we become part of a noble tradition of those who are horrified by brutality and seek another way. Engaging with violence in the controlled context of Torah, so we are meant to learn to engage with violence in the worlds around us.

Encountering Sichon, Moses appears to have learned, though only partially, the lesson that is ultimately meant for us to learn in all of its fullness, to be a seeker of peace. Earlier, God has told Moses not to do battle with Seir, the people descended from Esav, using the phrase, al titgaru bam/do not let yourselves come into strife with them (Deut. 2:5). A short while later, in regard to Sichon, the same phrase is used, here in the singular, adding a word for emphasis, horrifying us now, as God tells Moses to engage in battle with Sichon, v'hitgar bo milchama/and let yourself come into war with him (Deut. 2:24). At first it seems that Moses has learned the earlier lesson, do not fight. Disobeying God, in the way of holy disobedience, that, perhaps, God waited for, hoped for, Moses sent words of peace/divrei shalom to Sichon. It is the moment celebrated in the midrash, Moses becoming a rodef shalom/a pursuer of peace.

Something went wrong, though, Sichon refusing to allow Israel's passage through his land. The stakes are raised higher, Moses saying that God had hardened Sichon's spirit. Is that it, and what does that mean? Peace-making is hard and the stakes are always high. The painful passage in all of its harshness brings home just how high the stakes are as we become the slaughterers of so many innocents, of women and children.  Screaming out, we find ourselves as Moses. It is not there and then to which the text points, but to here and now, so many flash points ready to explode in our world, or to be defused with new and courageous thinking. What else might have been done to defuse, to find ways to accommodate and diminish the fear in the adversary, to find another way? What would we have done? What will we do? Weeping for Moses' failure and raging at his deeds, the shimmering text becomes a mirror in which we see ourselves. It is not about them and then, but about us and now.

Others have seen themselves in the mirror of Torah before us. From an ancient midrash and onward, the tears of the peace-makers flow as waters of life, our own tears added to a river of peace, yet to fructify the land and cleanse it of violence. Approaching the land of Seir and told not to fight, Moses is warned, they will be afraid of you, watch over yourselves well/v'nishmartem m'od (Deut. 2:4). What is this great care to be taken in regard to ourselves? It is the question that Rashi asks, And what is this watching/ma'hu ha'sh'mira? The answer has already been given, do not fight with them/al titgaru bam. From nineteenth century Germany, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch writes, "The fact that Israel is reminded of these things when it is about to receive its land from the hand of God would seem to have far-reaching implications. For it gives the Jewish people to understand that God's providence also reigns over the destinies of nations other than the Jewish people, and that Israel is to take its place among the nations with a God-fearing respect for their possessions. Israel must not see itself as a nation of conquerors from whom no nation on earth will henceforth be safe...." Of a time that Rabbi Hirsch could only imagine, when the warning of Torah, amplified by Rashi, had become operative in the land, blurring there and then with here and now, Nehama Leibowitz wrote from her time and place in the early years of the state of Israel, "The new generation, full of their own strength and vigor had to learn to practice self-control and curb their own aggressiveness aroused by the very fear displayed by the weaker neighbor..." (Studies in Devarim, p. 29).

In the interplay of despair and hope as held in the shimmering haze of mid-summer heat, it is a season of struggle in the world around us and in the cycle of Torah and Jewish liturgical time. Making our way through the harsh passages of Torah and life, we find our own voice in the voices of those who have cried out before. Crying out first in horror, then to learn another way, it begins with our answer to the Torah's own plea, dorsheni/interpret me, search me. Searching ever more deeply, we come to read Torah as a context in which to confront violence and learn the ways of nonviolence. Getting up from the learning table, the challenge is to learn to do the same in the world around us, going forward into the weeks of comfort, allowing hope to rise.

Rabbi Victor H. Reinstein

Majors and Minors

Psalm 138 is about majors and minors and knowing the difference. The major theme, introduced in verses 1-3, is thanksgiving and praise. “I will give thee thanks, O Lord, with my whole heart . . . l will bow down toward thy holy temple.” (V.1a, 2a, RSV). The word “heart” comes from the Latin, cor, from which we also get the word courage. We live in a time that calls for people who are centered, and who have courage. The next verse spells it out clearly, “On the day I called, thou didst answer me” (3 RSV). God listens us into being, thereby establishing the rhythm of life as one of call and response.

I think it is an African proverb that says, “We listen each other into being.” Translation: God’s temple is that place where people have the courage to listen each other into being.
In verses 4-6, the psalmist expands the image of the temple to include the whole of society. “Kings of the earth” (v.4), bear a special responsibility to ensure the welfare and the well-being of the most vulnerable members of society: “For though the Lord is high, he regards the lowly; but the haughty he knows from afar” (v.6). Then the psalmist bring the message home. “Though I walk in the midst of trouble . . . . The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me” (vs.7a, 8a). Translation: in the memorable words of Representative John Lewis, we are all called get into “good trouble.”
I have been thinking about Psalm 138 as I reflect on the Democratic National Convention. There are many good things to say about it. One highlight for me was Ady Barkan.      Using a wheelchair and an electronic device Barkan said, “We live in the richest country in history and yet we do not guarantee this most basic human right.” Before his public appearance he hold the press, “I support Medicare for All and Joe Biden obviously doesn’t . . . . The pandemic and depression have proven how dangerous it is to tie insurance to employment.”
Another highlight for me Gerald Walker, a worker in a Nebraska meatpacking plant. She said: “They call us essential workers, but we get treated like we’re expendable.”
Best of all, I learned how much a person can pack into 97 seconds, the amount of time the DNC gave to AOC. Representative Ocasio-Cortez said: “In fidelity and gratitude to a mass people’s movement working to establish 21st-century social, economic and human rights, including guaranteed health care, higher education, living wages and labor rights for all people in the United States; a movement striving to recognize and repair the wounds of racial injustice, colonization, misogyny and homophobia . . . that rewards explosive inequalities of wealth for the few . . . . In a time when millions of people in the United States are looking for deep systemic solutions to our crises of mass evictions, unemployment and lack of health care, and espiritu del pueblo and out of love for all people, I hereby second the nomination of Senator Bernard Sanders of Vermont for president of the United States of America.”
These three people, Barkan, Walker, and AOC, embodied the words of Psalm 138. They spoke from the heart and they spoke with courage in the temple of the Democratic Party. They were not and are not unwilling to get into good trouble.

I want to close with what I think is a contemporary translation of Psalm 138. It is a poem titled “Union.”

Union

Not me alone--

I know now--

But all the whole oppressed

Poor world,

White and black,

Must put their hands with mine

To shake the pillars of these temples

Wherein the false gods dwell

And worn-out altars stand

Too well defended,

And the rule of greed’s upheld

That must be ended

            --Langston Hughes

Rev. David Hansen