Approaching Nissan / My Story of the Past 180 Days
This Shabbat has a special name and function: Shabbat HaChodesh ("the Shabbat of the month") is the Shabbat that announces the new Hebrew month of Nissan. This means, too, that Pesach is just around the corner... the festival of sacred story-telling, collective identity, affliction and joy.
In honor of this special Shabbat and the arrival of the month of Nissan this coming Monday night/Tuesday, I wanted to take this opportunity to tell my own version of the story of this year (or at least one piece of it), from my vantage point as one of Kavana's two rabbis.
A year ago, as some of you may recall, I was preparing for my first ever sabbatical. This much-needed break happened for me in May, June, and July 2023; my fellow Kavana staff members all pitched in to cover my responsibilities in my absence. I had a glorious few months of down-time, filled with family, friends, and travel, and I returned to the office in late summer feeling quite refreshed... and with many ideas about how we might integrate all that we learned from my sabbatical time into Kavana's organization and being. First, however, August and September promised to be busy months, with the High Holidays and the launch of our busy program calendar. And so, there was lots that I looked forward to doing "after the chagim"... meaning, beginning the week of October 9th.
Of course, the "Black Sabbath" of October 7th stopped us all in our tracks. I'm not going to recount all the details of the deadly Hamas attacks on Israel here. I will, however, share that by that evening as the Kavana community gathered for Simchat Torah, it was already clear to me that my workload for the year was going to look totally different than I had initially envisioned.
The Kavana community has weathered crises before (a financial downturn, the Trump election, Covid!), and we have developed strong muscles for caring for one another and for jumping into action. Quickly, though, it felt apparent to me that there wasn't a single communal crisis unfolding for us after October 7th, but rather many different crises. Kavana's community is diverse, particularly when it comes to relationships with Israel (there are folks with very strong ties to Israel and with weaker ties, a political spectrum that ranges from progressive left to centrist, etc.). During October and November, I had more one-on-one pastoral meetings than I can count, and tried to serve as a sounding board for members of our community who were reeling (as was I) in the wake of both the initial attacks and also the retaliatory war that Israel was beginning to wage in Gaza. Like so many of you, I was consuming news reports at all hours of day and night, not sleeping much, and totally caught up in the drama of violence that Palestinians and Israelis were experiencing half a world away (and yet so close to my heart!). On a programming level, Kavana hosted a few specific gatherings around current events (e.g. a "Sanctuary Space" for sharing, song, and art; a podcast discussion group), but mostly, our programmatic "response" happened in already-established settings (e.g. the addition of special poetry and new liturgy in our Friday night and Saturday morning services, the adjusting of Living Room Learning topics/texts to help us reflect on relevant topics like the roots of human violence).
In November and December, pastoral conversations of course continued, but a new chapter began on top of that. Kavana partners started reaching out -- first in a trickle, and then a steady stream -- to run "language" by me. This language came from corporate memos, nonprofits' statements, and emails from schools and departments about what was happening in the Middle East. Some of these communications tried harder than others to be balanced or nuanced; many made me cringe because they were woefully one-sided or had antisemitic undertones. Over Thanksgiving week -- as we all watched a ritual of daily hostage exchanges unfold during a temporary ceasefire "over there" -- closer to home, the Seattle Jewish community was arguing over multiple drafts of a City Council resolution about Israel/Palestine. Wordsmithing was the activity-du-jour... and also felt to me like an incredible time-suck; however, the critical role that Kavana played in serving as a bridge between the "organized Jewish community" and the progressive Jewish left felt incredibly important.
The winter and early spring months brought additional challenges and opportunities as well. As Harvard, Penn and MIT's presidents testified before Congress about antisemitism on their campuses, hateful graffiti and politics-in-classrooms surfaced as local issues too. Many high schools and colleges have been struggling with how to balance between free speech and the safety of Jewish (and also Palestinian, Muslim and Middle Eastern) students on their campuses. Questions about where Jews and antisemitism fit into DEI frameworks have arisen everywhere. At Kavana, a couple of small support groups formed, rather organically, as community members sought peer support around questions such as these. In March, the local Jewish community launched a new initiative (Call it Antisemitism) to invite allies to join with the Jewish community in standing up to prevent anti-Jewish harm.
Throughout the past 180+ days, the situation in Israel and Gaza has continued to devolve. I know -- because I'm still taking lots of walks and having coffee dates with many of you -- that I am in good company here in the Kavana community in continuing to feel a deep sense of anguish at the totality of this awful situation. My heart is with Israelis, an entire nation still reeling and feeling the repercussions of October 7th (nothing there is back to normal, even six months out). My heart is also broken over the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, who are experiencing levels of violence, hunger, disease and trauma that are hard to fathom. I (like so many Israelis) am angry with the Netanyahu government, whose actions seem to me to be endangering Israel and the Jewish people far more than contributing to their/our safety; I am embarrassed at the disregard the Israeli military has shown for protecting Palestinian civilians, journalists, and even foreign aid workers. (I recently contributed to a drive called "Rabbis for World Central Kitchen"... but no amount of support I might send feels like it could be more than a symbolic drop in the bucket in the face of such a black hole of human suffering.) Stepping back and looking at the broader geopolitical context is enough to make my mind spin.
As we enter into Nissan this coming week, we will turn the corner again towards yet another new chapter of our Jewish year. The stretch that takes us from Nissan and Passover to Shavuot contains within it all of the "yoms": Yom HaZikaron (Israel's Memorial Day), Yom HaAtzmaut (Israel's Independence Day) and Yom Yerushalayim (marking the reunification of Jerusalem in Jewish hands in 1967). In other words, this is a time of the year when the modern Jewish calendar forces our focus to be on our relationship with Israel. This year, of course, the events of the past six months will inform Kavana's programmatic approach. This year, more than ever, it won't be possible for me to mourn for fallen Israeli soldiers without also mourning for the tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians who have been killed in recent months; to celebrate Israel's birthday without also reflecting on how 1948 is "the Nakba" ("catastrophe") in the eyes of Palestinians; to mark 1967 as the triumphant Jewish return to Jerusalem's Old City without also lamenting the start of an Occupation that continues to this day.
Through the compound crises of the last six months, I am proud that we have managed to stay true to Kavana's core values. As a spiritual community, I'm grateful that we have been able to focus resources (particularly staff time and energy) on providing pastoral support to our people at a time of difficulty. As a pluralistic community, it's been critically important that we have continued modeling a wide-tent approach rather than drawing red lines.
Now, building on the foundation of the work we have already undertaken, I feel ready to move forward programmatically this spring. I am so grateful to Kavana’s incredibly talented and hard-working staff, to our thoughtful board, and to key partners and lay leaders (so many of you!) who have helped to generate ideas about what kind of approach will feel most authentic for our community. We've decided to take a multi-pronged approach, developing a program series which will unfold over the coming few months (April/May/June). Hopefully this will allow everyone to find some pathway that feels interesting, helpful, and connective (without assuming that a one-size-fits-all approach will work for our diverse community). By creating new inputs and opportunities, we hope to help members of the Kavana community deepen their knowledge and understanding, and practice being in a community where substantive issues are discussed with nuance and where relationships are forged even across political difference.
Practically, here's what we're currently envisioning: a series of events this spring, through which, members of the Kavana community will have the opportunity to:
engage from an intellectual/academic perspective. We will be hosting an Adult Ed session that takes a side-by-side approach to examining the very different Israeli and Palestinian narratives that were constructed around key historical events, as a backdrop to understanding current events and narratives.
engage with personal narratives and accounts from individuals on the ground. We are setting up a Zoom session with the Palestinian and Israeli tour-guides who guided our 2022 Kavana-Mishkan trip (Emili and Karmit), where we can hear about what the last six months have felt like from their vantage points in the West Bank and Israel respectively and engage in an interactive Q&A session.
engage in emotionally-intelligent group processing spaces. Kavana will curate a space where we can practice unraveling the complex swirl of feelings and articulating our personal reactions and thoughts with nuance, and also practice deep/reflective listening techniques.
engage through the lens of Jewish ritual, wisdom, and liturgy. I will be teaching a Living Room Learning session in advance of Pesach where we'll delve into key questions for this year's seder; when he returns from parental leave, Rabbi Jay will be leading additional sessions on the Mussar of peace-building.
With regard to this whole program series, I ask that you stay tuned for details (coming soon!). Again, I want to thank the many Kavana partners who have served as sounding boards for me and the Kavana staff, who have stepped forward to generate and shape these ideas, and who are helping to plan and execute all of the programs described above.
Lastly, I want to mention that there are also many events that have been pulled together by other local Jewish organizations. (Truly, we are fortunate to live in the Seattle area, where there is such a wealth of opportunities to learn and engage right here in our community!) Again, I do not assume that all of these will be of interest to or a fit for every member of the Kavana community, but I do believe that there's probably something on this list that will interest the majority of you:
Shir Nosatzki of the New Israel Fund (a leading Israeli activist for Jewish Arab partnership) will be speaking at Congregation Beth Shalom on Wednesday, April 10th at 7pm. The session is called Jewish-Arab Political Partnership Towards a Shared Future in Israel. (In addition, a Kavana partner who is involved in NIF will be hosting a smaller session with Shir the following evening, Thursday, April 11th. If you're interested in being part of this more intimate gathering and supporting NIF, please let me know and I'll put you in touch with the host directly.)
Nadav Tamir of JStreet (the former Israel Consul General and JStreet Israel Director) will share his analysis on the unfolding war between Israel and Hamas and the potential long-term outcomes of this crisis at Temple De Hirsch Sinai before 6pm services on Friday evening, April 12th. Contact casey@jstreet.org for more details. (In addition, a Kavana partner who is involved in JStreet will be hosting a smaller salon-style session with Nadav on Sunday, April 14th. If you're interested in being part of this more intimate gathering for JStreet supporters, please let me know and I'll put you in touch with the host directly.)
Uri Weltmann of Standing Together will be speaking at Temple De Hirsch Sinai on Saturday, April 13th at 11am about how the movement is uniting diverse communities around the fight for a ceasefire and hostage deal. His talk is entitled Where There is Struggle, There is Hope, and advance registration is requested.
Dr. Rachel Korazim, a renowned teacher of Hebrew literature, will be offering a session called Poems for Our Days, featuring poems written over these past months from different parts of Israeli society, on Monday, April 15th from 8-9pm. Rabbi Jay and I heard her teach a few days again and we cannot recommend this session highly enough! Click here to register through host Congregation Beth Shalom.
It is my hope, of course, that all of these opportunities -- both the ones that Kavana will be setting in motion over the coming weeks, and the ones that other organizations are pulling together -- will feel supportive to the broader Kavana community, as we all continue to weather this heavy and fraught time.
Meanwhile, as we look towards the month of Nissan, its core celebration of Passover reminds us that periods of oppression, darkness, and constraint always have the potential to resolve into expanse, light, and new possibility. This redemptive arc is part of our history and gives us hope now as we continue to fumble our way through this excruciatingly difficult moment. As we say in the Blessing for the New Month: "Yehi ratzon milfanecha... she’t’chadesh aleinu hachodesh haba l’tova v’livracha" - "May it be Your will that this new month will bring renewal for us, for good and for blessing." So may it be this Nissan!
Shabbat Shalom and Chodesh Tov (a good month),
Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum
