Letter to the Public Editor of the NYTimes

When I was a teenager, I convinced my parents to get a daily subscription to the New York Times.  For the last fifteen years, I have been a daily reader and subscriber.  (I also do not know many other thirty-somethings who read a physical daily newspaper.)  As the paper of record, the New York Times has an obligation to fair-minded, honest and carefully accurate, yet timely coverage of local and world events.  Locally, I was impressed at you expose of the Pine Bush School System, which sparked change state-wide and got our local rag to finally focus on the anti-Semitism there.

Recently, I have been dismayed at your coverage of the Gaza conflict.  I was disappointed to see, day after day, photographs of carnage in Gaza, yet virtually no photographs of the terrorists, Hamas, who instigated the conflict with thousands upon thousands of rockets for the last dozen years.  When I heard the explanation that in the thousands of photographs the paper received from its photographers, it had only a couple blurry photos, I was disappointed in the Pulitzer-winning photographers who kowtowed to Hamas.  

I understand journalists and photographers need to protect their own lives, but they should not distort the truth in the process.  I was also very disappointed that there were so few photographs of the destruction from the rockets, exposes on the psychological horror of having to leave your home or needing a safe room to protect from a rain of rockets.  I was pleased to see your analysis of the casualty counts, recognizing that the numbers were horrifically inaccurate initially, but wish that that expose had been on the cover, rather than so far inside.

Even if I were to set aside the biased coverage from the last few weeks, today took the cake.  Online the article was quickly re-titled to, "In Israel’s South, Families Worry About the Future of Life Near Gaza", but in the paper, it read "In Israel's South, Families Worry About the Future of Settlements Near Gaza."  Maybe I am a little sensitive, but when the New York Times says "settlements", I hear illegal/unauthorized outposts in Judea/Samaria/the Occupied Territories.  While it may be technically correct, the shade one hears is that ANY land in Israel, is now contested.  

Does the New York Times subscribe to the theory of Hamas?  Is all of Israel occupied territory?  Will the editorial board now support a Juden-rein Middle East?  

I appreciate that the article was re-titled online, but I think a correction would be helpful--as would a clarification on civilian casualties.  Exactly how many Israeli deaths would be necessary for a military fight NOT to be disproportionate?  How many Jewish children need to die?  50? 100? 400?  How about in Iraq?  As the American military protects the Yazidi and bombs ISIS, how many American soldiers need to die for that bombing to be disproportionate?  Why the double standard on Israel and Jews?

Wishing you luck in your continued quest for "balanced coverage".  I do hope you will try to stick to the facts in the future.  Just because Hamas says 1+1=5, does not make it so.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/08/28/world/middleeast/in-israels-south-families-worry-about-the-future-of-life-near-gaza.html?referrer

Eat, be satisfied, and thank Gd, Eikev 2014

Rabbi Philip Weintraub

Congregation Agudas Israel

8/16/2014

Technology is a funny thing.  It helps us in so many ways, yet slows us down in others.  Looking at this week’s parsha, I realized there were topics I did not want to discuss, and topics I did, most specifically Chapter 8, vs 10  10 “When you have eaten your fill, give thanks to the Lord your God for the good land which He has given you.” (NJPS translation from http://learn.jtsa.edu/content/translations/eikev/torah-portion/eikev )

”   וְאָכַלְתָּ, וְשָׂבָעְתָּ--וּבֵרַכְתָּ אֶת-י--ה-ו--ה אֱ--לֹהֶיךָ, עַל-הָאָרֶץ הַטֹּבָה אֲשֶׁר נָתַן-לָךְ.

I knew that I had written about that verse, about the Talmud’s extensive discussion, but did not know when/where.  I scrolled down through pages and pages of tweets on twitter, eventually reminding myself that the Talmudic source for Grace after Meals is in Talmud Brachot 47 and following.  I searched my google drive--my old sermons in the cloud--and found from Rosh Hashanah 2012 the following:

Today’s study, p. 47, is in the seventh chapter, which mainly discusses Grace After Meals.  Just as the Gemara connects one story to another, this section reminds me of a story in my own life.  I was once finishing a lunch in the food court of a mall in Jerusalem.  Sitting with me was an Orthodox rabbi I had known in college.  As we prepared to say the Grace After Meals, he wondered aloud about people’s quest for spirituality.  He said he could not understand how some Jews described themselves as “spiritual but not religious” but that many of those very people did not say Thanks to Gd after they ate.  He said “How can you take the great blessing, that is eating, being blessed to have enough to eat in such an insecure world and NOT thank Gd for such good fortune!”  I was glad he spoke rhetorically, since I had no good answer to his challenge!  It made me think about my own difficulty in saying Birkat Hamazon, Grace after Meals, regularly, and he thus encouraged me to say it more often.

For us today, this is a great lesson.  Elsewhere in Brachot, it says that one of the reasons the Jews merited the land was that they blessed Gd even when they were NOT satisfied with their food, with their portion.  It is hard enough to offer thanks when we are satisfied, but to find it in our hearts to appreciate Gd when we do NOT have enough is even more challenging.  Returning to Rosh Hashanah two years ago, I wrote about the

the 47th daf/page of Brachot.  On that page I will see conversations about waiting for others to be served and bless their food before eating; when to say “Amen” to the blessings of others; how much food a waiter needs to eat to join a group who would like to say Grace after meals; the fact that a convert is not Jewish until he/she has gone to the mikvah (ritual bath); and can you have a minyan of 9 plus a Torah?  As you can see, some of those subjects are clearly related to Grace after Meals and others seem like tangents, but very interesting ones.  For more details, you’ll have to look at it yourself.  

The Talmud regularly demonstrates associative thinking.  Like many of us, it starts discussing a topic, then gets sidetracked.  For some modern thinkers, this is incredibly annoying--why can’t they just stick to a topic, but for others, the side notes are what they are coming for, those little pictures of Talmudic life, of Judaism in another era.  Yet, how many of us do exactly the same thing.  We are telling a story about our hilarious uncle, and then rather than finishing the story, we tell three others before getting back to the point.  On a side note, the books of Midrashim, Genesis Rabba, Sifra, Sifrei, include many early rabbinic sermons.  They start and end with a verse and tell many other stories in between--with the goal being to create a web of connections bringing you from the beginning to the end.  When Chasiddic rebbes would teach on Shabbat, this style was also very common, starting with a verse from the parsha, touching here and there and everywhere in rabbinic literature before coming back to the original to teach a lesson or a principle.   In some ways we have changed, in others we have stayed the same.

The real reason I shared this verse

וְאָכַלְתָּ, וְשָׂבָעְתָּ--וּבֵרַכְתָּ אֶת-י--ה-ו--ה אֱ--לֹהֶיךָ, עַל-הָאָרֶץ הַטֹּבָה אֲשֶׁר נָתַן-לָךְ.

was because of Robin Williams.  In the last couple days we have heard the story and the challenges of a man who struggled with addiction, with depression, with his own inner demons, yet managed to fight through all of that to teach poignant lessons to us all, to bring a light, a laughter, a humor to so many people.   He once joked “I went to rehab in wine country, just to keep my options open.”  His humor was incredible.  His openness to his struggles brought help to many.  I heard on the radio of his own openness to discuss therapy and the years that it brought him, the way it changed his life for the better.  As such, he was an inspiration for so many.  I pray that his death will encourage people to get the help they need.  All of us need the support of each other--one of the things I mentioned on Tisha B’Av.  Yet sometimes, we need more help.  With Judaism’s focus on Pikuach Nefesh, the saving of a life, we know that it is important to ask for help, but sometimes it is not easy.  

The challenge of depression is its power, its overwhelming nature.  In the midst, it seems there is no getting out.  The verse I mentioned is that we eat, we are satisfied and we bless/offer thanks.  When one is depressed there is no such thing as satisfaction.  Someone who is depressed cannot reach the level of thanks because they cannot recognize their own satisfaction.  Robin Williams could not be satisfied with the success, with the love, with anything, because he had a deadly disease--depression.  Until our society recognizes depression as a disease and not a character flaw, we are making this world more difficult for so many people.  I shared this week a blog from the wife of a rabbi I know.  She shared that when she was younger she went through a bout of depression.  At the time, she could see no way out.  Eventually she found support, therapy, etc., etc. and managed to be happy again.  Now she has been fighting cancer.  This time around, her community, her friends, her family, everyone rallied around her.  They helped take care of her son, helped around the house.  When people show the same level of support for those fighting depression as those fighting cancer, the world will be a better place. (See blog here: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/kenterskicklymphoma/journal/view/id/53ea7686a689b4bd04a369e2 )

From our holy Torah we learn that if we can eat and be satisfied, then we can find it in our hearts to be thankful to Gd for all of our gifts.  Many of us are good at the eating.  Some of us are pretty good at thanking Gd.  It is the being satisfied part that is challenging.  We may desire that which we do not have, that which our neighbors or friends or those on TV have.  If we live our lives in that space, we can find ourselves wanting, as in lacking and also wanting, as in wanting more.  As I mentioned earlier, we gain merit for offering thanks, especially when we are not completely satisfied.  The funny thing is that once we offer thanks, we find that we ARE satisfied.  Think about eating dinner.  How often do you go back for seconds?  What happens most of the time if you wait ten minutes--you realize you are full and don’t need those seconds!  If we took that time to thank Gd, we would realize we do not actually need anymore.  We have enough.  If we flip the order around, if we offer thanks second, we can find that missing satisfaction.

The simple lesson from this one verse is the secret to a good life.  Enjoy, be satisfied and offer thanks.  It can be lesson for how we treat one another--enjoy each others presence, recognize and appreciate it within yourself and then share that gratitude with the ones bringing you joy.  It can be a lesson for how we relate to Gd and the universe--for food, for comfort, for the very gift of life.  As we start looking ahead towards the holidays to come, let us recognize all the good and Gd in our lives and offer thanks.  Shabbat Shalom.

So much going on, yet there is still so much hope!

In the last few weeks we have seen tremendous upheaval in so many aspects of our lives, yet it is the loss of Robin Williams that prompts me to write this post.

• Anti-semitic outbreaks world wide have threatened our sense of security as Jews.
• Blood libels have been repeated by leaders of Hamas.
• Hamas has sent rockets into Israel, starting a war that took many lives and is still unresolved.
• Within our own community there have been several deaths, losses, shivas in close proximity.
• Student loans and job security are a questions for many.
• Mental Health concerns are not dealt with well in this country and remain stigmatized.

Depression and other forms of mental illness are common in our world.  They can be aggravated by every one of the stressors mentioned above.  In our country, we have a problem of inadequate mental health care AND a stigma for using such care.  Mental illness is ILLNESS.  It is not a character flaw.  It does not make a person defective.  It means they have a challenge to overcome or to manage.  Through therapy, through medication, through proper treatment, the majority of people with mental health challenges lead productive, happy and successful lives.  

One way to reduce the stigma of mental health care is to acknowledge that it is also useful for people in difficult times of their lives.  When someone is grieving, dealing with a trauma, or having a career or life difficulty; therapy, counseling, talking to a clergy person can be very helpful.  Having a non-anxious, non-judgmental person help you talk through whatever challenge you are going through can be very helpful.

In my own life, like many caregivers, I have check-ins with a therapist/counselor.  By discussing the challenging cases I see, I get assistance reminding myself of the importance of taking care of myself.  By talking to someone else, I am better able to help my community, my family, my friends and myself.

The hardest part of depression is the that when someone is in the middle of a depressive episode, they simply cannot imagine getting out of it. It can feel isolating.  A person may feel trapped, alone, without any support--even when those around are trying to help.  Yet, with the proper support, great strides are possible.  As the Talmud says, "A prisoner cannot free himself from jail."  Someone who is depressed needs the help of others to break through--yet they need to recognize the possibility of improvement.  It is not easy, but it is possible.

It does get better, but it can seem impossible at the time.  Life is worth living.

I could now include many, many biblical and rabbinic sources on the wonder and meaning of life.  While those might be happy to some, the most important number is below.  As always, I am here for you, too.

For more information, see:

http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org/

No matter what problems you are dealing with, we want to help you find a reason to keep living. By calling 1-800-273-TALK (8255) you’ll be connected to a skilled, trained counselor at a crisis center in your area, anytime 24/7.

If you feel you are in a crisis, whether or not you are thinking about killing yourself, please call the Lifeline. People have called us for help with substance abuse, economic worries, relationship and family problems, sexual orientation, illness, getting over abuse, depression, mental and physical illness, and even loneliness.