"JULY 4" == 3,000 Years Ago
by Rabbi Arthur Waskow
Dear companions,
Yesterday morning, I had arranged to send you this ancient ancestor of the Declaration of Independence. Its descendant, in the Age of Enlightenment, was the Declaration which listed a number of oppressive political acts by King George III that justified a breakaway from the British Empire for what became the United States of America.
Yesterday, later in the day, the Supreme Court made any president who committed a crime in the pursuit of an official act immune to prosecution, even after he ceases to be president.
That decision returns the USA to having a king who can violate any law as long as he is doing it as part of an official decision. The Supreme Court struck at the heart of America, its physical as well as moral and emotional and intellectual heart. It is trying to kill America — the America of Jefferson’s noble words, despite his contradictory acts; the America of Sojourner Truth, Abe Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, Emma Lazarus, FDR, Frances Perkins, Martin Luther King, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Gloria Steinem. America is bleeding, near to death.
Two key members of the Court — Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas — have been taking bribes of hundreds of thousands of dollars in fancy vacations. It would make sense to charge them with bribery and force them off the Court. If that were done quickly, it would leave President Biden with two seats to fill, making a 5-4 majority for the America that is striving to be an inclusive democracy. That legal process will take more than a few months.
The other escape hatch from the murderous Supreme Court is the election this early November. We, The Shalom Center, will do our best to get out the vote in the months between now and the election. We will make a special celebration and Actifest for Hoshana Rabbah on Oct 23-24. We will send you detailed information.
But it will be up to you to become a GOTV organizer. Saving and improving American democracy is up to the people. There is no other choice.
Here is the ancient echo from Torah. Please absorb it, make your own commitment to do what Torah hoped the Levitical priests would do: save us from corrupt judges and power-obsessed politicians.
More comments after the Torah passage.
The Passage on a King:
Deuteronomy 17: 14-20
If, when you have entered the land
that YHWH [pronounced Yahhh, or say “the Breath of life,” or just breathe] your God is giving you,
and you possess it and settle in it,
should you say:
I will set over me a king
like all the nations that are around me—
you may set, yes, set over you a king
that YHWH your God chooses;
from among your kinfolk you may set over you a king,
you may not place over you a foreigner
who is not kin to you.
Only: he is not to multiply horses [cavalry, the most powerful weapon system of its era] for himself,
and he is not to return the people
to Mitzrayyim [slavery in any Tight and Narrow Place by extreme taxes of forced labor]
in order to multiply armed cavalry,
since YHWH has said to you:
You will never return that way again!
And he is not to multiply wives for himself,
that his heart not be turned-aside,
and silver or gold he is not to multiply for himself to excess.
But it shall be:
when he sits on the throne of his kingdom,
he is to write himself a copy of this Teaching in a document,
before the face of Levitical priests.
It is to remain beside him;
he is to read out of it all the days of his life,
in order that he may learn to have-awe-for YHWH his God,
to be-careful concerning all the words of this Teaching
and the deep-carved laws, to observe them,
that his heart not be raised above his kinfolk,
that he not turn-aside from what-is-connective,
to the right or to the left;
in order that he may prolong (his) days over his kingdom,
he and his children,
in the midst of Israel [the Godwrestling People].
Especially as many US-Americans confront an election with two or three or four candidates that many fear are incompetent or dangerous, the sacred summary of the moral and political qualities and policies of a devoted king or president or prime minister may be unusually valuable. Please consider adding it to the Torah reading this coming Thursday and Shabbat, and encourage congregants to discuss it. Perhaps we ourselves should become the “Levitical priests” who insist on a candidate who fulfills the sacred role.
Shalom,
Arthur
