Reflections on the Fourth of July
On this day 249 years ago, the Founding Fathers of the United States of America signed the Declaration of Independence, which includes these stirring words:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
But of course, the full application of equality was not self-evident to those who supported slavery or opposed women’s right to vote. The poet Tracy K. Smith evoked the hidden voice of the enslaved within the text by creating an erasure poem of the Declaration of Independence. (I encourage you to read the whole poem!)
The opening lines could as well describe the current terror our government is unleashing on immigrants and even citizens who happen to be Latino or brown-skinned:
He has
sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people
He has plundered our—
ravaged our—
destroyed the lives of our—
taking away our—
abolishing our most valuable—
and altering fundamentally the Forms of our—
Tracy K. Smith’s poem says what so many of us are feeling right now: The promises our America is built on have been hollowed out, and our hope and pride and passion for the inalienable Rights we yearn to actualize for all - no matter country of origin, color of skin, gender, sexuality, or religion - are at risk of being erased.
It seems significant to me that this year, the 4th of July coincides with parashat Chukat, in which Moses is told he will never enter the Promised Land (Bamidbar 20:12).
His mistake? Another great founding father, the 19th century German “father of modern Orthodoxy”, Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch, wrote:“Moses’s agitation arose from the bitter feeling of the futility of all his previous work on the people…” For a split second, Moses - feeling like the people were giving up on him - gave up on the people.
In a sense he has a crisis of faith, but it is not a lack of faith in God or God’s vision (the Torah). It is not even really a lack of faith in the people, although that was how it manifested. At core, Moses loses faith in the efficacy of his own actions. He practices and practices his communal stewardship but no perfection is in sight. In fact it almost seems like the more he tries the worse the results become!
Rabbi Shefa Gold wisely reminds us: “Our path doesn’t follow a straight line. Though the destination seems to be The Promised Land flowing with milk and honey, it is the journey itself that will transform us, opening us to that flow of nurturance and sweetness. That transformation is a complex process of working through layers of heartbreak, rebellion, loss and rebirth.”
We, like Moses, may never inhabit the Promised Land with its promises completely fulfilled. But we can learn from his mistake, and re-engage in the actions we can take, the practices we can follow, to keep building democracy and a responsible and loving community. If you would like to spend this weekend learning more about how to practice democracy from Jewish perspectives, check out this set of reflections from Reconstructionist rabbis on the twenty lessons-turned-practices that historian of authoritarianism Timothy Snyder wrote about in his 2017 book On Tyranny.
To return once more to the words of Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch (on Shemot 1:14), may our country and all nations soon live up to this vision of justice:
The degree of justice in a land is measured, not so much by the rights accorded to the native-born inhabitants, to the rich, or people who have, at any rate, representatives or connections that look after their interests, but by what justice is meted out to the completely unprotected “stranger.”
Shabbat Shalom!
Rabbi Jay LeVine
