"The Eye of the Storm"

Delivered on 9/3/05

Rabbi Joshua Heller
Congregation B’nai Torah
rabbi@bnaitorah.org

I am indebted to friends and colleagues whose wisdom inspired these words, in particular Rabbi Michael Bernstein.

This morning's parashah begins Re'eh. “See”, says God. We can't believe what we see. Normally, after the eye of the hurricane has passed, we open our own eyes, we see the blue sky, and we begin the process of recovery.

“See”- says CNN. See people dying in the streets and drowning in their attics. See a city underwater, a cesspool of violence and despair.

“See” says God “I have put before you a blessing and a curse. A blessing if you heed my commandments, a curse if you do not.”

How do we see Katrina? Do we read it in the Deuteronomic light of collective punishment? Should we be telling the good people of the gulf inspect their deeds? Is this some kind of divine retribution for Mardi Gras and Biloxi and Gulfport casinos. No.

Or do we say- “Olam Keminhago Nahag”- the world, and disaster, follow the blind dictates of fate and chance. Perhaps we are spoiled. Look at every major city of the world, every queen of its era. Rome was sacked. London was burned and bombed. Berlin, Lenningrad, Look at Jerusalem- conquered and destroyed 19 times in the last 3000 years. In our own country, Washington DC was burned by the British. San Francisco and Chicago were destroyed by earthquake and fire. Atlanta was burned to the ground 150 years ago. Even though I’m a Northerner, don’t blame me- my ancestors were in Lithuania at the time. Do we say that, in the history of world, it is the exception, not the rule, for buildings to stand, undisturbed for generations, for grandparents to pass on heirlooms to their grandchildren?

“See- I have placed before you today a blessing and a curse.” One response is to see everything as a blessing. The Talmud teaches “chayav adam levarech all harah mein hatovah” (Berachot 54a). A person must bless the bad as well as the good. When someone dies, we offer the blessing “Baruch Dayan Ha-emet”- blessed is the true judge. Must we seek out a Zen-like feeling that it’s all good, that even bad things give us an opportunity to respond and show faith.

But we must see- we must see the blessing, and the curse. We cannot be blind to the imperfections of the world- hide our heads and avoid the problems that face us. One must see the curse as well.

We must see what we don't want to see. Pirkei Avot 2:9 teaches: eizeh hu chacham- haroeh et hanolad. “Who is wise? The one who can see what is coming”. We often say "hurricanes are an act of God." There are many things that I blame God for, that I take God to task for, but this cannot be one of them. I cannot blame the victims, but we have to be blunt, and honest with ourselves as a society. Have we changed the environment by warming the ocean waters so that Hurricanes are more intense than they were before. Have human activities wiped away the Mississippi delta dunes and marshes that used to protect New Orleans? Was government lax in maintenance of basic infrastructure, the levees that kept the city safe and dry? In 2001, I read an article that the three greatest threats to American were a major terror attack in NYC, a hurricane in New Orleans, and a major California earthquake. Who wants to win the trifecta?

We have an obligation to cast an extraordinarily critical eye on our government, at every level. I heard a reporter ask- “What's the difference between the U.S. and a third-world country? About 3 days.” Within 24 hours of the tsunami- aid workers were, it would seem, everywhere. I can speaking personally from my experience after 9/11, working as I did with a synagogue in the shadow of the towers. I will grant you, it was a smaller scale, with just a few square miles and a few tens of thousands of people involved, and the death toll will be smaller- but within 24 hours, troops were everywhere, and millions of dollars of equipment brought in 'round the clock to recover bodies even though the chance of finding survivors was miniscule. Why did it take four days in New Orleans?

I am proud, if sad, that we are receiving offers of help from Israel- they have so much experience responding to tragedy, and have experts in identifying and dealing with remains. But Israel would never allow corpses, let alone live victims, sit in the sun for three days. I’m ashamed- that we need El Salvador to keep the peace.

When the dust settles, it would not surprise me to find that more people died on Wednesday and Thursday in Louisiana than were killed on 9/11. And every single one could have been saved. We can hide behind our powerlessness- who among us had the ability to charter a helicopter to pluck the stranded from the rooftops? Who would put on a flack jacket, take an assault rifle and wade into the worst neighborhoods? But we are responsible. We elect officials, and we pay taxes to ensure that government does its job. We need to demand answers.

And yet, where would we be without government? Pirkei Avot 3:2 teaches. Pray for the welfare of the govenrment, for if not, people would eat each other alive.

See. The haftorah we read today speaks of the Oniah So'arah, the storm-tossed boat, with no consolation. It is also the haftorah for parashat Noah. Parashat Noah tries to answer a basic existential question- is humankind inherently good? Not whether we *can* save mankind, but is mankind worth saving?

In Noah's day, the flood was preceded by acts of great lawlessness and cruelty, and was followed by the divine promise that such destruction would never return. In our day, we have seen the reverse unfold. First came the flood, and only then the destruction, the lawlessness, the cruelt. The rioting, the looting, the evil. How does the story end? It is not God’s responsibility to make a sign and a promise- it is humanity that owes a promise.

In Noah, God concludes- ki yetzer ha-adam ra mineurav- man's nature is wicked from his youth. As many of you know, I struggle with two competing interepretations of this verse. Normally I interpet it homletically- ra mineurav- it's because of our youth immaturity that we are evil. Not that we are all bad, it's not our fault. We are young and foolish, and we will grow out of it. But maybe you have to read it according to the plain sense- deep down, from the days of our youth our innate drives take us towards evil, and it requires superior self-control to turn away.

I don't know what I would do after 3 days with no food and water, with no hope of rescue. But based on what I saw coming from New Orleans, beneath the veneer of our society, and particularly in some cities and communities, lies someplace very dark. Are we all just three days away from total inhumanity?
See. this week's parashah, Deuteronomy 8:12: Moses warns the Jewish people, lo ta’asun kechol asher anachnu osim poh hayom, ish kol hayasher be-einav. Don’t do as we do here now, each man whatever is good in his eyes. If we each follow our own self-interest, if we each do as we see fit, bad things happen. In fact, if you look at the end of the book of Judges, where society is described as ish hayasher be-einav ya’aseh, the Jewish people engage in the the most horrible incidents of lawlessness and brutality. To get a sense of it, you did not have to watch the images on TV. You just had to see, or be on a gas line on Thursday. Rub us the wrong way, and the polish of southern politeness comes right off of us. The shouting, the cutting, the price gouging. How many of you bought gas on Thursday? We really love our cars. Just imagine what would have happened if there had actually been a shortage.

Sometimes I see a natural disaster and I say, "Why God?" But God gets a pass from me this time. We need to account for our own failings. I draw hope from a verse just a bit later in our parashah- the antidote to “ish kol hayashar b’einav” – every man for himself- is to do as it tells us in verse 25- hayasher b’einei adonai- to do what is just in the eyes of God, to act as if God is watching us at all times.

Many here today have heard that call. Many have offered to open their homes, their wallets, their hands, their hearts. I heard a story of someone who handed their college roommate a check. There was only one thing written on it, a signature. “Fill out whatever amount you need.”

Please give to the aid agencies that I have mentioned in our Shabbat shalom flyer :
http://www.uscj.org/Hurricane_ReliefYou_6553.html
http://www.shalomatlanta.org/content_display.html?ArticleID=161536
The needs continue. Many efforts are underway to collect supplies- we have taken on a project where we will send backpacks of school supplies to children who have been displaced. I would also note that there are people in shelters here in Atlanta who need basic clothing and toiletries, and Epstein is collecting these items.

However, this is going to be a marathon, not a sprint. New Orleans is going to be sleeping on America's couch for the next year. Even after we have saved as many lives and can be saved, the resources needed to return hundreds of thousands of people to a normal life will be staggering. It may take time for us to learn what the best ways are to help. What ways will truly make a difference, and not simply make us feel better for having tried. What ways will have the greatest impact.

I can tell you from my experience at 9/11: as important as meeting basic physical needs is providing dignity with care. The feeling of being at home, and not a refugee. This is accomplished through trivial things. We are having a bar-b-q next week. One purpose will be to raise money for relief efforts. But another will be to give those who are in our midst a chance to have an afternoon out, to reconnect and to make new friends.

Re-eh See- God lays before us a blessing and a curse. It is up to us to decide which will be adjudged. We have remarkable strength and commitment, the blessings are very powerful, but the curses have a mighty head start which we must overcome.

I close with the words of our haftorah:

"O afflicted one, storm-tossed, and not comforted...In righteousness you shall be established; you shall be far from oppression, for you shall not fear; and from terror, for it shall not come near you.”