Passionate Judaism

Sermon, Parshat Pinchas 5782

I don’t know how many of you were raised in Classical Reform congregations, or experienced them in years past.  Almost all Reform synagogues were essentially Classical Reform in their liturgy, ritual, and music until the 1970’s, and if you attended Shabbat or the holidays or a life-cycle event at a Reform congregation from the 1890’s up to about 1974 you were very, very likely to experience a Classical Reform service.  In fact, in many parts of North America those Classical Reform services continued right up through the 1980’s, and there are still a few retro, anachronistic synagogues scattered around the continent that persist in making a Classical Reform experience their principal form of worship.

I am talking about services using the old Union Prayerbook, largely conducted in English, and based on responsive readings with a few musical anthems.  The only prayer texts typically offered in Hebrew included the Barchu, the Shema, the Kiddush, and the Kaddish.  A rabbi, who didn’t wear a yarmulke but did wear a black robe, would deliver a long, carefully reasoned sermon.  A stately organ would play, and there was frequently a mixed choir singing from somewhere invisible.  Many congregations took a financial offering at the conclusion of services, even on Shabbat.

Now Classical Reform Judaism had many wonderful qualities.  It was rational in nature, intellectually impressive, and never offended the intelligence of the congregation.  The English language employed in its prayerbook, the small blue Union Prayer Book, the old UPB, was elegant. My own grandfather edited the edition used by most congregations in the 1950s and 60s.  The UPB was like reading a Jewish version of Victorian prose and poetry, which was essentially what it was, most of it having been orginally composed in the 1890s.  Classical Reform Jewish music was reliably stately, homophonous, filled with heavy organ chords and sung in well-harmonized anthems that were clearly understandable: God is in His Holy Mountain, There Lives a God, Let us Adore the Ever-Living God.  People dressed predictably and formally. There was excellent decorum at services, with congregants showing up on time or even early, sitting quietly, rising when requested, sitting when told to do so, reading the words they were supposed to read and singing, sometimes, on cue. 

The rabbi spent many hours preparing a logical sermon that worked hard to sway the convictions of the congregation towards good purpose through reason.  The Oneg Shabbat was often elegant, with homemade treats and tea or coffee served in china cups.  The entire experience was predictable, pleasant, and usually quite peaceful.  And, well, rather Protestant in quality.

This brand of Reform Judaism flourished, in its way, for many decades.  But eventually the critique of it was that, for all of its strengths, the worship experience it presented was cold, rational, and dull.  There was very little warmth, less energy, and almost no emotional involvement.  The antique joke was that Reform Jews had become God’s Frozen People.  In part, the strongly rational nature of Classical Reform Judaism made it the enemy of religious passion.  If traditional services were filled with Hebrew prayers chanted by men, often energetically and fervently, with a certain chaos of people arriving and leaving, swaying and moving to the davening or even chatting with neighbors, Reform services were filled with the sonorous tones of the rabbi reading English, the musical swell of organ and choir and the not-very-passionate participation of a passive, orderly congregation.

Over time Reform Judaism changed dramatically, and eclectically.  You can find many congregations today that base their worship experience on sung and chanted Hebrew, use few or no responsive readings, and seek to carry the experience with vigorous congregational singing and contemplative meditation.  Some Progressive congregations have transformed their music into pop-oriented, English-based sets of camp songs, or even removed all prayerbooks and use video screens for what’s called “Visual Tefilah”—that started long before so many of us ended up on Facebook and Zoom screens—some congregations who dance during services, or have an extremely informal style that is its own orthodoxy. 

There are even some synagogues stuck in the faded orange-and-brown tones of the late 1970s and early ‘80s who use the Gates of Prayer siddur and the same music, a mix of Debbie Friedman, Ben Steinberg, and Joni Mitchell compositions, that they used when the rabbi or cantor completed his or her own education and stopped growing.   In effect, all are looking for what Classical Reform Judaism lacked: warmth. But they are also looking for religious passion. 

When many hundreds, even thousands of Reform Jews, overeducated, hyper-civilized, and superannuated as they are, rise up at biennial conventions and dance through giant ballrooms or auditoriums where Shabbat services are held, they affirm anew the resilient need we all have for something warm and, especially, something passionate in our religious experience.  By the way, they don’t usually dance very well.  No matter.

Cool, calm, rational Judaism just isn’t enough.  We need passion.  Or at least warmth.

I have a unique perspective on this because I was actually raised about 45% in the Conservative movement and 45% in the Reform movement, with another 10% in Orthodox shuls.  And I can tell you: Conservative Judaism wasn’t exactly a place to find religious passion either when I was growing up.  The services were a lot longer, all in Hebrew, and with less focus on decorum.  The cantor chanted, and chanted, and chanted.  Once in a great while the rabbi would interrupt to lead a responsive reading—usually a Psalm in archaic linguistic form.  Sometimes people sang along on the occasional congregational melodies.  People stood, then sat, then stood, then sat.  Then the Torah service ambled in, in all its semi-organized confusion, and often took a really long time.  And then the rabbi did a long sermon, which might or might not be good.  You know how rabbis’ sermons are…  And finally the announcements which were somehow even longer in Conservative than in Reform congregations and no more compelling.  Only after three hours or so were we released to head for the Kiddush.  Of course, lots of people avoided the issue by showing up an hour or even two hours late for services, in time for the sermon, Kaddish, Adon Olam, and the Kiddush

Orthodox services?  Um, let’s say they weren’t exactly lively themselves.  If it’s even conceivable, they were longer than the Conservative services, had exactly no English, seated the women away from the men, occasionally included some odd ritual I had never heard of, and somehow, the rabbi’s sermon was always about Israel, a place I had never been, of course.  That—the rabbi talking about Israel—was often, but not always also true in the Conservative services of my youth.  The Reform sermons in my youth seemed to be about the lettuce boycott, or racial issues, or the next presidential election, although sometimes they were actually about ideas.  I liked those sermons best.   

Look, let’s be honest: the religious experiences available in American synagogues in our youth, or at least mine, were not always exactly compelling.  And one word you could never use for Shabbat services of my youth: passionate.  They were surely not ever that, not in any of the shuls, congregations, synagogues, or temples of my youth or adolescence.

But the need for a form of religious expression that includes emotion and passion is real, and human, and present today.  It could not have been absent back then.  It is not exactly a new quest. 

The desire to connect with God passionately, and to unite with the human beings around us in fervent, energetic worship, is as old as religion, which means it is as old as humanity.  As I discovered on my sabbatical journey around the world back in 2015, the first major human structures ever built, 12,000 years ago, were temples for worship in today’s southern Turkey.  They were constructed by large teams of hunter-gatherers, 500 and more at a time, to allow for collective worship in a central site.  It is incredible to imagine the enormous effort needed to do this work, and the way that it banded together early human beings who lacked all the qualifications for civilization testifies to a deep and passionate need for holiness and community. 

Clearly the need for religious fervor and passion is the most ancient of our collective needs, and it still resonates today.  But what exactly is the role of ritual passion in Judaism?

This week’s portion of Pinchas, in combination with last week’s concluding section of Balak, explores this question in a fascinating way.  The Pinchas incident is the final one in a series of failed rebellions against the leadership of Moses and Aaron, and presents an extreme demonstrated lack of religious fidelity by the Israelites’ own leaders.  The disastrous actions of the princes of the people, who are just below Moses in the hierarchy of the Children of Israel, is stunning.  Only the passionate actions of the young priest Pinchas saves the Israelites from annihilation. 

Pinchas’ act of extreme violence is shocking, and his reward for doing this is shocking too. Instead of punishment Pinchas receives a brit Shalom, a covenant of peace, an eternal commitment that he and his descendants will be priests of the Holy One forever, honored and separated from the ordinary people and raised up to divine service.

In another sense, however, this is not so hard to understand.  For in his new role Pinchas, and his presumably hot-blooded descendants are prohibited from ever again carrying spears or going to war.  Instead, this jealous energy for God and the hot passion for the right, will be dedicated to religious service, avodah.  Not to war but to worship will the drive, determination, and fervor of Pinchas be directed.  His spear will be reforged into an incense censer, his sword into a menorah.  Redirected, instead of retribution he will have to develop a passion for prayer, and a covenantal commitment to peace.

In other words, although his act was needed at the time, it is now, and forever, going to be needed not for violence but for sacred service.

The lesson here is that the service of God requires emotional commitment and ardor, enthusiasm and zeal, equal to, even surpassing the kind of passion that leads to violence.  In fact, if that fervor is focused on worship it will be sublimated into the holiest of causes. 

The lesson is not just for Pinchas, and it applies not only to our ancient ancestors.  All Jews need to have some of Pinchas’ passion for God, in thought, prayer and ritual.  We have to find our own ability to serve God with all our hearts, souls, and strength, as the VeAhavta teaches. 

And when we, even those rational Jews with a legacy of infinite decorum, can do that then we will be able to bring about the true covenant of passionate, and compassionate peace.

May this be our will, on this Shabbat of Pinchas; and may this then become God’s will too.