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Neither the Jewish Emergent Network nor Dimensions are directly endorsing any of the artists, healers, diverse teachers of faith, or other content creators whose work is linked in this challenge. We are sharing the world of spirit equitably with many people as we endeavor to learn more about our need to work together across diverse faith communities to dismantle racism and white supremacy for us all.
White Jews Learning Track
For the sins we have committed through turning Black bodies into objects of lust and sexual gratification.
REFLECT:
From Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer (The Kitchen)
On Day I of Rosh Hashanah, we read the painful story of Hagar, Sara, and Avraham, where the politics of patriarchy, slavery, and reproductive oppression take root in our family tree. When we chant their story on the New Year, whose eyes are we seeing through? Whose voice are we listening to? In Sisters in the Wilderness, Womanist theologian Delores S Williams teaches what it means to listen to Hagar’s voice. To really listen to the one who survived slavery, rape, and reproductive injustice; to the only person in the 5 Books of Moses to give God a new name. Hear Hagar’s voice echoed today in the voices of Black women calling for Reproductive Justice, seeking to ‘liberate and emancipate vulnerable populations from all forms of reproductive and sexual oppression’. Shema b’kolah–Listen to her voice. Amplify her voice.
READ: Intro/chapter 1: Hagar’s Story: A Route to Black Women’s Issues from Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk by Delores S. Williams
ENGAGE in Reproductive Justice: Learn about the work of Sister Reach, and/or find a Reproductive Justice organization near you.
LISTEN: to La Femme Fetal by the Digable Planets
LISTEN: to Hagar by Pharaoh’s Daughter, with Michal Cohen
Black, Indigenous, Sephardi/Mizrachi and More Broadly Identified Jews of Color Learning Track
For the sins of racism we have committed through passing judgement.
REFLECT:
When have you adopted a certain demeanor and tone of voice toward one who can advance your aspiration? When have you then pivoted around, behaved in the opposite way toward another, assuming they could never impact you positively or negatively in any way, that there will be no consequences at all since there are no witnesses (and even if there were witnesses, events will unfold as though there were none)? When have you dissuaded someone from pursuing higher Jewish knowledge because in your eyes, they are not up to the task, “they will feel uncomfortable, they will not fit”?
READ:
From Mahzor Lev Shalem: Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur (New York: The Rabbinical Assembly, 2010), page 315-316]
UNETANEH TOKEF – THE SACRED POWER OF THE DAY
Let us speak of the sacred power of this day – profound and awe-inspiring. On it, Your sovereignty is celebrated, and Your throne, from which You rule in truth, is established with love. Truly, You are Judge and Prosecutor, Expert, and Witness, completing the indictment, bringing the case, and enumerating the counts. You recall all that is forgotten, and will open the book of remembrance, which speaks for itself, for our own hands have signed the page.
The great shofar will be sounded and the still small voice will be heard.
Angels will be alarmed, seized with fear and trembling, declaring, “This very day is the Day of
Judgment” – for even the hosts of heaven are judged; no one is innocent in Your sight.
All that lives on earth will pass before You like a flock of sheep.
As a shepherd examines the flock, making each sheep pass under the staff, so You will review and never and count, judging each living being determining the fate of everything in creation, inscribing their destiny.
How many will pass on, and how many will be born;
Who will live and who will die;
Who will live a long life and who will come to an untimely end;
Who will perish by fire and who by water;
Who by sword and who by beast;
Who by hunger and who by thirst;
Who by earthquake and who by plague.
Who will be strangled and who will be stoned;
Who will be at peace and who will be troubled;
Who will be serene and who will be disturbed;
Who will be tranquil and who will be tormented;
Who will be impoverished and who will be enriched;
Who will be brought low, and who will be raised up.
But Teshuvah, Tefillah, and Tzdakah have the power to transform the harshness of our destiny.
REFLECT:
Reflection on Unetaneh Tokef by Leonard Gordon
Most of us prefer to deny the unruliness of our fragility. But the facts on this list in Unetaneh Tokef are inescapable: some will get sick, some will be born; there will be deaths by hunger and in wars. The liturgy begs us to pay attention to these plain facts. And we all know that if we haven’t yet suffered an unbearable loss, one year, such a grief will permanently scar our hearts, or we will suffer yet another death that we cannot bear. We hope that we will live to see another year, but we know that without a doubt, certainly, definitely, and absolutely, a year will surely come that will break the pattern. That destiny is mysterious in its details, but death is our destiny, the fate of every person we know and love. Everyone dies, somehow and some time.
We are not praying to be spared an ending in death. We are not even asking that death be postponed. Rather, after reminding ourselves relentlessly of the many ways that life might end, we tell ourselves that the way to cope with ultimate vulnerability is through teshuvah (“returning”, an element of atoning for our sins), tefillah (prayer), and tzedakah (moral behavior, also charitable giving to right the wrong). Our goal is not security, but a life of meaning that recognizes our vulnerability but rises beyond it.
