The story of the binding of Isaac - the akeidah as it’s known in Hebrew and in Jewish sources - is central not only to Jewish thought, but also to the High Holiday liturgy. It serves as the Torah reading this morning essentially to reinforce the religious message that God hears our prayers and will answer us. If we have the faith of Abraham - to trust in God and to be committed to the Jewish ethical and moral value system - then we can trust that God will hear our prayers today and forgive us.
Aside from the religious message, the story also prompts us to think about several other ideas - faith, God, moral choices and others - which I have spoken about over the years. But the idea I want to discuss today is the authenticity of the story itself. Traditional Jews understand that the Torah was written by God and was given to or dictated by God to Moses on Mt Sinai. For those of this traditional outlook then the story of the binding of Isaac is “true”. It happened nearly 4,000 years ago and we accept the details of the story as described in the Torah and read this morning as an accurate eyewitness account.
But many Jews with a non traditional outlook, myself included, understand stories in the Torah to be just that - stories. Tales that have been passed down from generation to generation and edited in the time of King David 3,000 years ago or perhaps edited before or after the exile to Babylonia 2,600 years ago. They are ancient stories that define the values and lessons that serve as the foundation of Israelite/Jewish society, but they are stories and not eyewitness accounts of factual events.
Depending on who we talk with in the Jewish community today, Jews understand the Torah to be factual and therefore nothing about it can be questioned. Many others in the Jewish community see the Torah as ancient literature serving as the foundation of Jewish culture. Therefore, either our stories - let’s call it our Jewish narrative - is true and can’t be questioned, or it’s ancient and can be studied and interpreted and understood in light of scientific/academic research.
Our Jewish approach to our narrative is different from how Muslims understand their narrative and how Christians understand their origin story too. On top of the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem stand two domed buildings. One which we are familiar with and can see in our mind’s eye is golden and is known as the Dome of the Rock. And the other is known as the Al Aqsa Mosque. The rock which serves as the basis for the shrine of the Dome of the Rock according to Islamic tradition, is the very rock upon which the prophet Mohammed ascended to heaven. The rock inside the Al Aqsa Mosque is the one on which Mohammed landed after traveling from Mecca to Jerusalem. For Muslims today, those 2 buildings serve to make Jerusalem the 3rd holiest site in their religion - after Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia - and make the area around those two buildings, what we know as the Temple Mount, into Muslim holy ground.
The fascinating thing is that the stone in the Dome of the Rock - the stone the Muslims declare Mohammed ascended to heaven - is understood by Jewish tradition to be the very rock that is known as the foundation stone - the אבן השתייה - from which the world was created and on which Isaac was bound and from which the Temple was built. In other words, the stone which is holy in our tradition and has been so supposedly for 5785 years - since the creation of the world - is now also understood to be a holy stone in the Muslim faith.
Now this isn’t unusual. We know of many instances throughout history how an older religious shrine, monument or house of worship was transformed by the conquering power into a new house of worship. There are one or two churches in Spain for example that have evidence of being mosques before they were churches and even being synagogues before they were mosques. The newer religious society in the area sees a place that has been seen as holy and transforms that holiness for its own purposes.
Such is the case then with Islam and its construction and then veneration of the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque. Their narrative takes a pre-existing site and monument and transforms it into a key Muslim holy site. The narrative, in force for over 1,000 years, has become central to the Muslim faith and is seen by Muslims to be true.
It is so true that Muslim countries have threatened war with Israel if Israel were to allow non-Muslims, especially Jews, to pray on the Temple Mount. Israel has given the Muslim Religious Authority - known as the Waqf - partial control of the Temple Mount because Israel has preferred to leave the religious status quo as is. The Temple Mount has been Muslim since the 7th century, so Muslims have the right to remain there. But, for the Muslim faithful anything that looks like Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount can be seen as an act of aggression because it threatens the Muslim narrative which they see as true.
Christians have gone one step further. Muslims have taken a pre-existing site, made it Muslim and then made it a central part of their origin story. Christians have distorted evidence and actual events and made that distortion a central part of their narrative. According to the Christian Bible and reinforced by the Church Fathers as they formulated Christian doctrine, the Jews, 2,000 years ago, killed Jesus.
We know that claim is not true. We know based on hard evidence of the Jewish community in Israel 2,000 years ago, that that charge is false. The Jews had no authority to execute anyone. The Jews were under the authority of the Roman Empire and the Roman authorities alone had the power to adjudicate capital crimes. If anyone killed Jesus it would have been the Roman Governor of the province of Judea, Pontius Pilate, and no one else.
However, because the charge that the Jews killed Jesus was in the Christian Bible it was seen to be true. It’s part of the narrative of Christianity and relates to the most significant part of Christianity itself, namely the death and resurrection of Jesus. It has been central to the Christian narrative for 2,000 years. And it has served to be the impetus for so many Jewish deaths in the name of Christianity.
Many communities in medieval Europe would perform what was called a passion play before the Easter holiday. The play would tell the story of Jesus, from his birth to his death. The play would inspire the Christian community and would also incite the community to act out against the Jews in their midst. Because the play highlighted the Jewish role in Jesus’ death, in fact charging Jews with deicide - killing God - often the audience would be riled up and asked to seek vengeance. Countless times over the centuries Jews were killed in pogroms and Jews knew to hide when the passion play would be performed.
Even though Pope John the 23rd in his important religious document 60 years ago declared that Jews today aren’t responsible for Jesus’ death, many Christians today still call us Christ killers. The charge that has been central to the Christian narrative, though clearly false and inaccurate, is still seen to be true today.
This exploration into the formation and promulgation of religious narratives hasn’t just been an academic exercise. I haven’t been discussing it out of curiosity. I think it has a tremendous impact on how narratives are understood today. For centuries, people have been taught a “truth”. They have been taught falsehoods that have been sanctified by religious tradition to be true. So, if religion can play with facts and create new truth, then why can’t we do the same with facts today?
Creating new truths and false narratives isn’t unique to faith communities. Nations do the same thing. For example, we all were taught in American History class that America in the 1st half of the 19th century carried out a doctrine of manifest destiny. This doctrine taught that America and its founders had the God given right to seek freedom in America and to carry out its democratic and republican ideals all across the North American continent. As America expanded westward it acquired and conquered territory - killing many native Americans in the process - all in the name of this philosophy. This doctrine became so much a part of American history and culture that only recently have we started to come to terms with this infamous past. Only now do some question our history and try to have students understand the toll this expansionist policy and philosophy took on the native American community. Our American narrative glorifies our White founding fathers and many today still sweep under the carpet anything that would threaten the iconic and heroic status of the Founding Fathers.
Narratives then have had the power to transform what we think and how we think. They have the power to ignore actual facts and even allow us to believe which stories and falsehoods to be “true.”
This background has helped me understand another aspect of what I and many of us in the Jewish community have been going through since Oct 7. Not only do we feel abandoned and unseen and unheard as I spoke about yesterday. But we also are bewildered and incredulous that people have a different understanding of what has been happening since Oct 7.
I mentioned yesterday that I had called a meeting of the Olney Interfaith Clergy group back in January. I hadn’t heard anything from my colleagues for the first 3 months of the war and I thought it would be helpful to me to have them understand what I and the Jewish community had been going through. I thought since clergy are trained to listen and to be comforting, that it would be safe for me to share my pain with them.
But I was shocked to see and hear how quickly after I shared my thoughts that they turned those words around on me. They talked about the inordinate amount of civilian deaths in Gaza. Yes, we should be appalled by that high civilian death toll. But they didn’t just highlight the civilian tragedy. They also alluded to the idea that the Hamas terrorists are actually considered freedom fighters. The clergy themselves were buying into the narrative we see portrayed in the media daily, namely that Hamas is the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people; Israel is committing acts of genocide. Though the clergy didn’t say this, others have chanted slogans, like “from the river to the sea Palestine will be free”, that reflect the Palestinian narrative and ignore the legitimacy of Israel and the legitimacy of the Jewish narrative.
I left the meeting in January feeling betrayed and shocked. Not only did I feel alone, unseen and unheard, I felt like we were talking past each other. They had one story that they have bought into and we have ours. Preparing this sermon has helped me understand why it is that people can buy into false narratives. Religious traditions and even our American civic history have perpetrated stories that contain factual inaccuracies. Some people recognize what those inaccuracies are yet, because they have been told and retold for hundreds and sometimes thousands of years, they keep on being told. The inaccuracies are allowed to be ignored for the sake of perpetuating the main story itself.
The religious narratives and the narratives about Israel and Palestine and the American Manifest Destiny have been around for a long time. But the same way in which those narratives keep being maintained and disseminated applies to other false narratives today. Just last month a story was told about Haitian immigrants. A woman named Erika Lee posted on Facebook that her neighbor thought her cat was the victim of an attack by her Haitian neighbors. According to NBC News, Erika’s was among the first posts on social media accusing Haitians of cruelty to animals. That theme was posted and reposted and spiraled into accusations of Haitians eating cats and dogs. Even former President Trump in the debate with Vice President Harris last month referred to this story as if it were fact in order to bolster a particular narrative - that is to promote the idea that immigrants are a threat to our country. It doesn’t matter that this story has proven to be false. It doesn’t matter that the city of Springfield has discounted all elements of this story on their website. It doesn’t matter that the Governor of Ohio has said it is all a fabrication and a lie. The story serves a purpose and truth be damned.
The question today is how to break this cycle. How can we have honest and open dialogue when these false stories are still being told and are still believed? How can we as Jews hope to be seen, to be heard, to be legitimized when the false antisemitic and anti zionist narratives are so strong and pervasive? How can we have honest and open political dialogue when false stories are promoted?
Frankly, I must admit that I personally don’t have the emotional fortitude to argue. I was very disappointed by my clergy colleagues and have felt let down by them. I have felt that they should have been able to allow themselves to hear me and understand where I was coming from. The fact that they did not has left me wounded to this day - 9 months later. It has also prompted me to step back from my role as organizer of our meetings.
But if we do have the energy to argue In order to overcome false narratives, we need to be educated about our story. We need to know what our narrative is and to be proud about our story. I will share more about that over Yom Kippur next week. Knowing our narrative is not enough. We also need to bolster that knowledge with sources to read and trust. I have shared over the past months the sources I trust. I read those, and only those, because while being bombarded by falsehood and hate, I need to know that I’m not crazy. I need to know and to reaffirm that my story is true. I need to know that others see me and hear me.
I also think we need to find solace in prayer. I don’t necessarily think that God is actually, physically listening nor do I dare hope that God will answer my prayers. But I pray to find comfort in the ancient words. The ancient liturgy cries out to God and the ancient repetition of Jewish values in our prayers help boost my morale and help strengthen my resolve. Coming together today, in this holy time and this sacred community gives us the spiritual fortitude we need to face the chaos of the world around us.
Education, reinforcement and prayer must also lead to advocacy. We need to find partners who will listen. We need to find leaders who have the courage to speak out against these false narratives and who see the value of listening to the other side. Gone are the days when political opponents, after a heated debate, could still go out to dinner together. Now all we hear is name calling and threats tossed from one side to the other. We need to advocate for a return to civil and respectful discourse in order to bring an end to this discord; to stop the trend of false narratives.
May our prayers today lead to change. May the coming year be one in which we will be heard and seen. May we see the day that all people can see the truth in each other’s stories and feel blessed by one another. Amen.
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