Righteous Indignation

Description

Can the teachings of Judaism provide a sacred framework for repairing the world?

In this groundbreaking volume, leading rabbis, intellectuals, and activists explore the relationship between Judaism and social justice, drawing on ancient and modern sources of wisdom. The contributors argue that American Jewry must move beyond “mitzvah days” and other occasional service programs, and dedicate itself to systemic change in the United States, Israel, and throughout the world. These provocative essays concentrate on specific justice issues such as eradicating war, global warming, health care, gay rights and domestic violence, offering practical ways to transform theory into practice, and ideas into advocacy.

Rich and passionate, these expressions will inspire you to consider your obligations as a Jew, as an American and as a global citizen, while challenging you to take thoughtful and effective action in the world.

Contributors:

Martha Ackelsberg, PhD • Rabbi Rebecca Alpert, PhD • Diane Balser, PhD • Jeremy Benstein, PhD • Rabbi Phyllis Berman • Ellen Bernstein • Marla Brettschneider, PhD • Rabbi Sharon Brous • Aryeh Cohen, PhD • Stephen P. Cohen, PhD • Rabbi Elliot N. Dorff, PhD • Aaron Dorfman • Jacob Feinspan • Rabbi Marla Feldman • Sandra M. Fox, LCSW • Julia Greenberg • Mark Hanis • Rabbi Jill Jacobs • Rabbi Jane Kanarek, PhD • Rabbi Elliot Rose Kukla • Joshua Seth Ladon • Arieh Lebowitz • Rabbi Michael Lerner, PhD • Shaul Magid, PhD • Rabbi Natan Margalit, PhD • Ruth Messinger • Jay Michaelson • Rabbi Micha Odenheimer • Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner • Judith Plaskow, PhD • Judith Rosenbaum, PhD • April Rosenblum • Adam Rubin, PhD • Danya Ruttenberg • Rabbi David Saperstein • Joel Schalit • Rabbi Sidney Schwarz, PhD • Martin I. Seltman, MD • Dara Silverman • Daniel Sokatch • Shana Starobin • Naomi Tucker • Abigail Uhrman • Rabbi Arthur Waskow, PhD • Rabbi Melissa Weintraub

Foreword David Ellenson Acknowledgments Introduction PART JUDAISM, JUSTICE, AND AMERICAN LIFE Can Social Justice Save the American Jewish Soul? Sidney Schwarz What Does Tikkun Olam Actually Mean? Jane Kanarek Divine Limitation and Human Responsibility Or N Rose Preaching What I Practice: The Power of Jewish Organizing Margie Klein The Legacy of Abraham Joshua Heschel: Jewish Spirituality and Political Transformation Michael Lerner Religious Leadership and Politics David Saperstein PART II RENEWING CREATION: JUDAISM AND THE ENVIRONMENT Rereading Genesis: Human Stewardship of the Earth Ellen Bernstein Jewish Textual Practice and Sustainable Culture Natan Margalit Wonder and Restraint: A Rabbinical Call to Environmental Action COEJL Toxic Waste and the Talmud Jeremy Benstein Judaism, Oil, and Renewable Energy Shana Starobin PART III THE TEMPLE OF THE SPIRIT: THE HUMAN BODY Redemption for Radicals: Jewish Congregation-Based Community Organizing Jonah Dov Pesner The Blood of Our Neighbors: American Health Care Reform Sandra Fox and Martin Seltman The Global AIDS Crisis: Caring for the Sick by Standing with the Activists Jacob Feinspan and Julia Greenberg A Jewish View of Embryonic Stem Cell Research Elliot N Dorff The Brownsville Legacy: Judaism and Reproductive Rights Judith Rosenbaum Looking Inward: Domestic Violence within the Jewish Community Naomi Tucker PART IV THE YOKE OF OPPRESSION: SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE Hearing the Voice of the Poor Aryeh Cohen A Jewish Vision for Economic Justice Jill Jacobs Why a Labor Movement Matters Arieh Lebowitz And If Not Together, How? Jews and Immigration in the United States Dara Silverman vi CONTENTS Gracious Giver of Wisdom: Recovering America's Great Public School System Marla Feldman and Joshua Seth Ladon The Possibility of Change: An Argument for Restorative Justice Sharon Brous and Daniel Sokatch PART V KLAL YISRAEL: CREATING AN INCLUSIVE COMMUNITY The Significance of Sex: Social Order and Post-Mythic Religion Jay Michaelson Beyond Same-Sex Marriage: Social Justice and Sexual Values in Judaism Martha Ackelsberg and Judith Plaskow Priority Lists: A Dialogue on Judaism, Feminism, and Activism Rebecca Alpert and Danya Ruttenberg Created Beings of Our Own: Toward a Jewish Liberation Theology for Men, Women, and Everyone Else Elliot Rose Kukla Multiracial Jewish Families: A Personal and Political Approach to Justice Politics Marla Brettschneider Differently Abled: The Lesson of Rabbi Elazar Abigail Uhrman PART VI SEEKING PEACE: ISRAEL, PALESTINE, AND AMERICAN JEWRY Warriors, Prophets, Peacemakers, and Disciples: A Call to Action in the Face of Religiously Inspired Violence Melissa Weintraub Plotting the Middle Path to Israeli-Palestinian Peace: The Role of American Jews Diane Balser Imitatio Dei and/as Shared Space: A Jewish Theological Argument for Sharing the Holy Land Shaul Magid Everything Falls Apart Joel Schalit The Challenge of Making Peace Stephen P Cohen PART VII THE SEVENTY NATIONS: GLOBAL CONCERNS Am I My Brother’s Keeper If My Brother Lives Halfway Around the World? Ruth Messinger and Aaron Dorfman A Jewish Response to Globalization Micha Odenheimer "Silence Is Akin to Assent": Judaism and the War in Iraq Adam Rubin Once Again: Genocide in Darfur Mark Hanis How to Split the Sea: Anti-Semitism and Social Change April Rosenblum Reopening the Tent of Abraham Phyllis Berman and Arthur Waskow Notes Credits Righteous Indignation on the Web About the Editors

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie
• Israel ? United States relations
• American Jews
• Jewish philosophy
• Judaism
• Religion

Informations

• Publié par: Turner Publishing Company
• Date de parution: 20 mars 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781580237406
• Langue: English

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CONTENTS
Foreword
David Ellenson
Acknowledgments
Introduction
PART 1 JUDAISM, JUSTICE, AND AMERICAN LIFE
Can Social Justice Save the American Jewish Soul?
Sidney Schwarz
What Does Tikkun Olam Actually Mean?
Jane Kanarek
Divine Limitation and Human Responsibility
Or N. Rose
Preaching What I Practice: The Power of Jewish Organizing
Margie Klein
The Legacy of Abraham Joshua Heschel: Jewish Spirituality and Political Transformation
Michael Lerner
Religious Leadership and Politics
David Saperstein
PART II RENEWING CREATION: JUDAISM AND THE ENVIRONMENT
Rereading Genesis: Human Stewardship of the Earth
Ellen Bernstein
Jewish Textual Practice and Sustainable Culture
Natan Margalit
Wonder and Restraint: A Rabbinical Call to Environmental Action
COEJL
Toxic Waste and the Talmud
Jeremy Benstein
Judaism, Oil, and Renewable Energy
Shana Starobin
PART III THE TEMPLE OF THE SPIRIT: THE HUMAN BODY
Redemption for Radicals: Jewish Congregation-Based Community Organizing
Jonah Dov Pesner
The Blood of Our Neighbors: American Health Care Reform
Sandra Fox and Martin Seltman
The Global AIDS Crisis: Caring for the Sick by Standing with the Activists
Jacob Feinspan and Julia Greenberg
A Jewish View of Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Elliot N. Dorff
The Brownsville Legacy: Judaism and Reproductive Rights
Judith Rosenbaum
Looking Inward: Domestic Violence within the Jewish Community
Naomi Tucker
PART IV THE YOKE OF OPPRESSION: SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE
Hearing the Voice of the Poor
Aryeh Cohen
A Jewish Vision for Economic Justice
Jill Jacobs
Why a Labor Movement Matters
Arieh Lebowitz
And If Not Together, How? Jews and Immigration in the United States
Dara Silverman
Gracious Giver of Wisdom: Recovering America s Great Public School System
Marla Feldman and Joshua Seth Ladon
The Possibility of Change: An Argument for Restorative Justice
Sharon Brous and Daniel Sokatch
PART V KLAL YISRAEL : CREATING AN INCLUSIVE COMMUNITY
The Significance of Sex: Social Order and Post-Mythic Religion
Jay Michaelson
Beyond Same-Sex Marriage: Social Justice and Sexual Values in Judaism
Martha Ackelsberg and Judith Plaskow
Priority Lists: A Dialogue on Judaism, Feminism, and Activism
Rebecca Alpert and Danya Ruttenberg
Created Beings of Our Own: Toward a Jewish Liberation Theology for Men, Women, and Everyone Else
Elliot Rose Kukla
Multiracial Jewish Families: A Personal and Political Approach to Justice Politics
Marla Brettschneider
Differently Abled: The Lesson of Rabbi Elazar
Abigail Uhrman
PART VI SEEKING PEACE: ISRAEL, PALESTINE, AND AMERICAN JEWRY
Warriors, Prophets, Peacemakers, and Disciples: A Call to Action in the Face of Religiously Inspired Violence
Melissa Weintraub
Plotting the Middle Path to Israeli-Palestinian Peace: The Role of American Jews
Diane Balser
Imitatio Dei and/as Shared Space: A Jewish Theological Argument for Sharing the Holy Land
Shaul Magid
Everything Falls Apart
Joel Schalit
The Challenge of Making Peace
Stephen P. Cohen
PART VII THE SEVENTY NATIONS: GLOBAL CONCERNS
Am I My Brother s Keeper If My Brother Lives Halfway Around the World?
Ruth Messinger and Aaron Dorfman
A Jewish Response to Globalization
Micha Odenheimer
Silence Is Akin to Assent : Judaism and the War in Iraq
Adam Rubin
Once Again: Genocide in Darfur
Mark Hanis
How to Split the Sea: Anti-Semitism and Social Change
April Rosenblum
Reopening the Tent of Abraham
Phyllis Berman and Arthur Waskow
Notes
Credits

About the Editors
Copyright
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FOREWORD
R ABBI D AVID E LLENSON , P H D
Rabbi David Ellenson, PhD, is the president of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, and the I. H. and Anna Grancell Professor of Jewish Religious Thought. He is also a fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute of Jerusalem, and a fellow and lecturer at the Institute of Advanced Studies at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Ellenson is the author of Tradition in Transition: Orthodoxy, Halakhah and the Boundaries of Modern Jewish History ; Rabbi Esriel Hildesheimer and the Creation of a Modern Jewish Orthodoxy ; and After Emancipation: Jewish Religious Responses to Modernity , winner of the National Jewish Book Award in Modern Jewish Thought and Experience.

W e live at a time marked by both an increasing interest in individual spiritual growth and, within the American Jewish community, a legitimate and needed return to classical religious ritual behaviors that promote community and religious devotion. Some fear that the renewed interest in ritual life will lead to Jewish insularity, which could cause the American Jewish community to abandon its longstanding commitments to social concerns. Righteous Indignation is a clarion call from those who are determined that this not be so.
Indeed, this book reminds us of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel s observation that individual spiritual devotion and social justice are partners. Writing about his personal participation in the famed 1965 civil rights march he made with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rabbi Heschel wrote, It is vital to learn how to stand before God. For many of us, the march from Selma to Montgomery was both protest and prayer. Legs are not lips, and walking is not kneeling. And yet our lips uttered songs. Even without words, our march was worship. Today, the question that flows from this observation- What are the qualities that are required for us to stand before God? -remains more compelling than ever, and this work is an attempt to provide answers to that question.
Engaging many of the finest minds in the progressive Jewish community, the essays contained in this volume cover a wide array of social justice topics. While the contributors express a diverse spectrum of postures on the various issues, they all reject the notion of Jewish communal isolation from the larger world and they all believe that Judaism must address the total human situation. These essays correctly teach that the command to work for social justice is a Jewish imperative.
After all, Jewish tradition requires Jews to apply the foundational Jewish values of righteousness and mercy to all humanity. Thus, in Hilchot Melachim (Laws of Kings) 10:12, Maimonides writes, One ought to treat the resident stranger [non-Jew] with derekh eretz [civility and humanity] and hesed [mercy and kindness] just as one does a Jew. Indeed, he justifies his position by citing a passage from Psalm 145:9, God is good to all and [God s] mercy is on all [God s] works. God is made holy as our community displays a concern for all those in need.
While I must confess that I do not agree with all the normative conclusions that every contributor advances in each essay, each article is provocative and thoughtful as well as passionate. Each essay will engender considerable discussion and, in many instances, promote action.
Rav Kook, the first Ashkenazic chief rabbi of the State of Israel and one of the great spiritual mentors of our time, summed up well the position that animates this book when he wrote, in his Orot Hakodesh , The love for Israel [ ahavat Yisrael ] entails a love for all humankind [ kol ha adam ]. In displaying the concerns it does, Righteous Indignation comports to the highest elements in Jewish tradition and seeks to help mend a fractured world.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A ssembling an anthology requires the work of many hands. We first want to thank those individuals and organizations who helped us understand the depth and breadth of the current movement for progressive Jewish social justice in the United States:
Jeffrey Dekro, Rabbi Mordechai Leibling, Mik Moore, and the Jewish Funds for Justice; Ruth Messinger, Aaron Dorfman, Jacob Feinspan, Merril Zack, and the American Jewish World Service; Rabbi Steve Gutow and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs; Jane Ramsey and the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs in Chicago; Rabbi Sid Schwarz and PANIM; Vic Rosenthal and Jewish Community Action in St. Paul; Daniel Sokatch, Rachel Biale, and the Progressive Jewish Alliance; Dara Silverman and Jews for Racial and Economic Justice in New York; Liore Milgrom-Elcott and the Coalition for Judaism and the Environment; Nancy Kaufman and Nommi Nadich and the Jewish Relations Council of Greater Boston; Rabbi David Rosenn, Rachel Chertok, and AVODAH; Rabbi Jennie Rosenn and the Nathan Cummings Foundation; the staff at the Jewish Coalition for Service; Lori Leibowitz and Jews United for Justice in DC; Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Phyllis Berman, and the Shalom Center; Dr. Dianne Balser and Brit Tzedek v Shalom; Rabbi Michael Lerner, Tikkun , and the Network of Spiritual Progressives; Jennifer Butler and Faith in Public Life; Rich Kotchmar, Lindsay Moseley, and Orli Cotel at the Sierra Club; Joy Heine and Kim Bobo at Interfaith Worker Justice; Zach Teutch and the SEIU Community Strength Division; Michael Brown and the Jewish Organizing Initiative; Idit Klein and Keshet; and Mark Hanis and the Genocide Intervention Network.
We also could not have crafted this book without the inspiration and guidance of several teachers and mentors: