Sermons
One of the strangest, most difficult and at times most exciting responsibilities of being a rabbi is preparing and delivering a sermon. It is a strange form of communication, almost completely “one way,” with little opportunity for the congregation to respond or for the rabbi to know how it was received. The blank sheet of paper before beginning to write is so daunting: what should I talk about? What should I say about it? How should I say it? But looking back now over forty years of sermons, I realize that being required to stand up in front of the congregation and open my mouth and speak has forced me to think deeply about my own life, Judaism, and our world. Below are many recent sermons and some of the sermons from the past which capture important moments in my life, or the life of our community or the world.
Go Down Moses
April 8, 2022
it came to pass that in the middle of the 20th century, American Jews discovered a body of songs which combined both: our ancient Jewish story and one of the richest and most profound forms of American music, the African American spirituals.
Esther and Zelenskyy
Friday night, March 11, 2022
In this moment also, in our own terrifying moment in history, a Jew named Volodymir Zelenskyy is recapitulating Esther’s act of kiddush hashem.
Apology and Forgiveness
Yom Kippur 2021
In one of our religion’s most brilliant flashes of insight, Yom Kippur teaches us the awesome liberating, therapeutic power of a conversation.
Emma Lazarus
August 27, 2021
She wrote “The New Colossus” at age 34 and the poem “The New Year” when she was 33. She passed from this world when she was 38. What profound teachings about the meaning of America were lost to us when Emma Lazarus died? What passionate visions of the Jewish future might she have shown us had she lived?
On Charoset
March 12, 2021
To find the apple in the Exodus story, we need to go deep into Jewish folklore….beyond the written Torah….to stories of Egypt that were told by word of mouth, across the centuries, around campfires, by storytellers. There, in that bottomless well of Jewish memory and imagination, there was an apple tree in Egypt, and it is remembered in a verse from the Biblical book of love poetry, Song of Songs. “Under the apple tree, I aroused you.” Tachat hatapuach orarticha. “Under the apple tree, I aroused you.”
Helplessly Hoping
Yom Kippur 2020
As more and more singers joined their friends, I saw an emotional tsunami gathering force before my eyes: one after another, exquisite voices, hopeful, serious, profound young faces, each one singing out of their isolation, their voices somehow joining together, in heartbreaking harmonies, all against the tragic background of a great country brought to its knees by a terrifying modern day plague. Helplessly Hoping.
Passover and Pandemic
Friday night, March 27 2020
This year the old Passover story, out of our distant past, is suddenly speaking directly to us. Not only to us, the Jewish people, but to all of us, the entire Human Family.
The Voice of the Prophet
Yom Kippur 2019
Malala Yousafzai, Emma Gonzalez and Greta Thunberg have each spoken in a voice that has reached across the entire planet....before reaching the age of 18 years old. Each one of them, sadly but not surprisingly, has thousands of people who hate them and are trying to destroy them. Somehow, fear does not seem to affect them. Like the prophets of ancient Israel, each one of these young women speaks for something far beyond themselves. Something that I believe our ancient ancestors would have understood as the holy spirit.
Sacred Fear
Rosh Hashanah 2019
This, I think, is why Richard Levy emphasized so urgently the importance of balancing our love of God with sacred fear. Richard demanded a religion that feels completely true. Completely honest. Not just the warm and fuzzy side of God, the loveable side of the Creator....but also the God that we experience as cruel, the source of suffering, and the unbearable dimensions of our lives. Today we confront everything we know about God.
The Beginnings of Passover
April 5, 2019
in honor of the new moon, I would like to tell you a story tonight that is as close to the truth as I can possibly make it. It is a story that you may have never heard before. It is the story of how Pesach, that is Passover, how Pesach first came to be a festival of the Jewish people.
Hamilton and Prayer
Yom Kippur, September 29, 2017
For many of our people, just like for Miranda’s young, scrappy and hungry Alexander Hamilton, prayer has never happened before. We do not even know exactly what prayer is, or how to do it, or whether it is still a meaningful experience in our world. These are my questions tonight, on Yom Kippur, our people’s great night of prayer.
My Father
Rosh Hashanah 2016
The silence between parents and children has a purpose. A religious significance. As parents, when our children are small, we fill their lives. We teach our children language, stories, songs, religion and culture, we pour ourselves into them. And then a time comes…right around age thirteen…when we parents step back and simply watch and wonder. We invite silence to enter between us and our children. The silence between parent and child becomes a sacred space, a dwelling place for God. A holy of holies.
What is Revelation?
May 22, 2015
When those two young people opened up to each other, it was revelation! And when they shared their story with me, in all its strangeness and power, it was revelation again! Our souls can meet, in falling in love, or even just in sharing a story. The story of the volcano, and the thunder and lightning, and the voice of God speaking out of the silence, is all a glorious metaphor for the way that something deep and true can rise up within us and erupt in tears, laughter, and powerful words of truth. This is revelation; this is Torah. It is the best thing about being alive. And it takes courage.
The Day of Remembering
Rosh Hashanah 2013
We teach our children that on Rosh Hashanah we look back and review the past year, but honestly, who does that? It’s simply not possible. Way too much has happened over those 365 days, which come to over 6,000 waking hours. 6,000 hours of shopping, cooking, eating, cleaning, emailing, watching television, posting and lurking on Facebook, driving, reading, gardening, waiting in line, worrying, exercising, playing, working….. 6,000 hours….and who can possibly remember and distinguish one hour from the next?
The Muslims and Us
Yom Kippur 2012
When we dialogue with our Muslim neighbors, we will not agree about everything. We will disagree, sometimes passionately. But the question is how we will disagree. And whether we will press forward and continue to talk.
Running Away
Yom Kippur 2012
Tonight I would like to explore together what it means to stop running. To courageously take a stand. That is the opposite of running away: to stand our ground.
Hanukkah and Miracles
December 29, 2008
That shared experience kindled a light in our group. An old light, that burns without end. The same light Moses saw burning and burning in the bush in the wilderness. The same flame the Jews saw glowing from the tiny oil lamp in the Jerusalem Temple, day after day after day. That light blazed in our midst last Wednesday night. It was a miracle, nothing supernatural, but still a wonder…a revelation of the hidden presence of God.
After 9/11 WTC Attacks
September 17, 2001
This year the entire world is observing Rosh HaShanah. In a single hour, last Tuesday’s terrorist attack brought us all immediately to the central concerns of this season. Not just the Jews, and not just the United States. The entire world has been living for a week now with the fundamental existential questions posed by our Days of Awe: Mi yich-yeh umi yamut? Who shall live and who shall die?
Barefoot on Yom Kippur
Yom Kippur 1998
make no mistake: the authentic Judaism that is alive, and which has kept us alive as a people, is a physical faith...acted out in the realm of our bodies and the material world. We will only find the fire at the core of Judaism in mitzvot, physical practices which we enact with our hands, our mouths, our feet, our bodies.