Kindness is Not Always Nice - Rosh Hashanah Sermon

Before you know what kindness really is

you must lose things,

feel the future dissolve in a moment

like salt in a weakened broth.

What you held in your hand,

what you counted and carefully saved,

all this must go so you know

how desolate the landscape can be

between the regions of kindness.

How you ride and ride

thinking the bus will never stop,

the passengers eating maize and chicken

will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness

you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho

lies dead by the side of the road.

You must see how this could be you,

how he too was someone

who journeyed through the night with plans

and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,

you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.

You must wake up with sorrow.

You must speak to it till your voice

catches the thread of all sorrows

and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,

only kindness that ties your shoes

and sends you out into the day to gaze at bread,

only kindness that raises its head

from the crowd of the world to say

It is I you have been looking for,

and then goes with you everywhere

like a shadow or a friend.

I was talking with a fellow rabbi when he admitted to me, “My community is not where I want it to be.”

I asked, “Are they not kind to each other?”

“No, no. They’re very kind,” he insisted.

“Are they not committed to social justice?”

“No, no. They’re very committed to social justice.”

“Are they not interested in learning?”

“No, no. They love learning.”

Finally I said to him, “They value chesed, kindness, tzedek, justice, and limud Torah, learning. What could they possibly be missing?”

Sheepishly, he responded, “They don’t engage in ritual.”

I was quiet for a moment as I thought. Then I asked him, “What is prayer if not an opportunity to connect to God? We connect to God to be better people: to be kind, to be just, to dedicate ourselves to learning and growing. If they can do that without ritual, maybe they’re not the ones who need it.”

On Yom Kippur we will read from the book of Isaiah, one of our prophets. The people are complaining that they prayed and fasted and yet God did not answer them. Isaiah chastises the people for engaging in holy ritual while living unjust lives. He speaks the word of God, saying: “Is this the fast I desire? A day for people to starve their bodies? ... No! This is the fast I desire: to unlock the shackles of evil, to break the bonds of oppression. Only then will your God answer your cries.”[1]

If our words of peace do not inspire us to work for peace, our prayers have failed. If our rumbling bellies do not inspire us to feed the hungry, our fast has failed.

I began this sermon with a poem by Naomi Shihab Nye. She was traveling when everyone on her bus was robbed, and one of the passengers was murdered. Shaken and scared, her belongings stolen, all she had was a pen and paper tucked in her back pocket. Seeing their strife, a stranger approached and gave them bread. That kindness changed Naomi. She wrote this poem on the spot, feeling like the mouthpiece for a message from beyond. Before you know what kindness really is, you must lose things.

On Yom Kippur we also read from Kedoshim, the Holiness Code. God gives the Israelites a series of commandments which connect to the initial commandment: You shall be holy, for God is holy.

We read: You shall not hate your siblings in your heart. Rebuke your people without shaming. Do not engage in vengeance or bear grudges. Love your fellow as yourself.[2]

We often quote “Love your fellow as yourself” by itself, but it has a different valence in context.[3] We may want vengeance against our fellow who has harmed us, yet we must love them. We may be justified in a grudge, yet we must let go of the hate in our hearts. And lastly, rebuke. To rebuke our fellow is another way to love them.

Kindness is the deepest thing. Being kind is not the same as being nice. Sometimes they can be used interchangeably, but not always. “Nice” is wrapped up in politeness, decorum, and status quo. “Kind” is concerned with heart and soul. Sometimes niceness is not very kind. Sometimes kindness is not very nice.

Lately I’ve felt that the American Jewish community is more concerned with being nice than being kind. I read a quote once that has been playing back in my mind. Naomi Shulman wrote, “Nice people made the best Nazis. My mom grew up next to them. They got along, refused to make waves, looked the other way when things got ugly and focused on happier things than ‘politics.’ They were lovely people who turned their heads as their neighbors were dragged away. You know who weren’t nice people? Resisters.”

While it is always appropriate to be kind, it is not always appropriate to be nice. Sometimes rebuke is the best way to show love.

These High Holy Days I am musing on life and death, central themes to the Days of Awe. On Rosh Hashanah we celebrate creation, the beginning of all life. On Yom Kippur we ask the question who will live and who will die, and we recite vidui, the deathbed confessional, in case we are among those who will not be written in the Book of Life.

These themes seem more dire this year as we are confronted with war and devastation in Israel and Palestine. As we hear the stories of young children killed by bombs or starvation or gunfire, as we watch the death toll continue to rise, we may ask ourselves: how can we make sense of the senseless killing? What does it mean to live in a world tarnished by death?

Too often we as American Jews prioritize being nice. We don’t want to make waves, we look the other way when things get ugly, we focus on happier things. I include myself in this rebuke. How is niceness holding us all back from kindness?

Our prioritization of niceness is often based in fear. I am immensely privileged to be the rabbi of a community which embraces diverse viewpoints and is passionate about advocating for the human rights of all people, including Palestinians. Yet I am no stranger to fear.

I am not immune to retribution. What might I lose if I am branded a “resister”?

On the other hand, what might I lose if I don’t resist? What if, when I meet my Maker, God asks me: Why did you not do more to unlock the shackles of evil, to break the bonds of oppression?

I had to ask myself: do I fear for my social status, or do I fear for my soul?

Before we know what kindness really is, we must lose things. I’ve lost work and friends because of who I am, or what I said, but that is nothing compared to losing my soul. It was with this realization that I decided to be a voice for Palestinian liberation.

This past summer, myself and 26 other Jewish clergy protested in favor of food aid to Gaza. It was not nice of us to disrupt Senator Thune’s office by singing songs of peace. It was not nice of us to refuse the request to vacate, to engage in civil disobedience, and to be arrested as a result. But our rebuke was an act of love, stemming from our shared value of kindness. Each of us has our own mission. Your mission will not be the same as mine. There are countless ways to resist. Not everyone will be arrested; some will call their representatives, others will have difficult conversations with family members, many will donate time or money to a worthy cause.

As we contend with death, we confront how we live. All of my sermons these High Holy Days will ask the question: how do we want to live our lives, especially in the face of death?

As we go into the Ten Days of Awe, the Ten Days of Fear, let us heed the call from God spoken through Isaiah: our suffering is meaningless unless it awakens us to the suffering of others; our prayers are meaningless unless they inspire us to create peace and justice in our world.

Let us remember the Holiness Code: love includes rebuking others and ourselves, not to shame, but to encourage us to be holy. Love is resistance, and resistance is love. Even one small act can change a person’s life, like the stranger who gave Naomi a piece of bread. Every act of kindness increases the holiness in our world. Let us dedicate ourselves to kindness, to ourselves, to others, and to the world.

We must set aside our need to be nice and step into the role of resisters. Being true to our souls and living out our values is a risk. To know kindness we must be willing to lose things. What is really important to us? What are we willing to lose? If we are willing to risk for kindness, it will go with us everywhere – like a shadow or a friend, like the voice of God whispering in our ear. Then we will know kindness as the deepest thing.

[1] Isaiah 58:3-14; paraphrased.

[2] Leviticus 19:17-18, paraphrased.

[3]Rabbi Akiva said that no passage of Torah should be read alone, and must be interpreted alongside its connecting verses (Sifrei Bamidbar 131).