Cantor's Blog

In Who’s Shoes Should I Stand Next  -Rosh Hashanah 2024
Sam had just moved into a new apartment and was out celebrating with his friend, Jeremy.
After midnight, he invited Jeremy back to his new place where they continued to celebrate. Sam proudly showed his friend the apartment and all the high tech it contained. Exploring Sam’s home office, Jeremy couldn’t help but notice a very large shofar sitting on the desk.

“Why do you have a shofar in your office?” asked Jeremy. “Are you the ba’al tekiah, the shofar blower at your shul?” “No, that’s my clock,” Sam replied.

Sam picked up the shofar and blew it at the top of his lungs, first a beautiful and strong tekiah, then a mournful shevarim, a perfectly broken and staccato teruah, followed by the wholeness of a tekiah gedolah that lasted a full 30 seconds. Impressed by Sam’s skill, Jeremy nonetheless asked how the shofar functioned as a clock. Suddenly, someone in the apartment next door bellowed, “Stop that, you inconsiderate oaf. It’s 2:30 in the morning!!”

Humorous, indeed, unless you happen to be the person living next door who, quite correctly, perceives his late-night shofar blowing neighbor to be an inconsiderate oaf.

Numerous reports and common experience point to an increase in the frequency of such thoughtless behaviors as well as a recharacterization of the line of what is appropriate. What was once considered terribly shocking has, in many instances, simply become normalized. And so, this Rosh Hashanah, I invite you to join me in exploring the often-lost art of empathy. Empathy can be defined as both a cognitive and emotional understanding of another’s world – reflecting both an ability to walk in someone else’s shoes and to share in their emotions and feelings.

Classic examples of a lack of empathy can be experienced at any major airport today. And if hanging out at Bush International or Hobby is not your idea of a good time, clear evidence can easily be witnessed on YouTube. Just search for the A&E series appropriately named Fasten Your Seatbelt.

In one 2021 episode, a woman on a flight was furious upon discovering that she had been seated next to an infant. So, without permission, she simply moved a row back to a new seat. When instructed that she could not do that, she made an uncomfortable scene, ranting and raving about how it was unfair and that she didn’t do anything wrong. Ultimately, to the delight of many of her fellow passengers, she was escorted off the plane, but on the way out, after treating all within ear shod to a barrage of colorful words, she actually leaned forward…..and spat on the baby!

Such an extreme example aside, we all sense that our society is distancing itself from derech eretz, from the treatment of our fellow human beings with respect and dignity. In our daily routines, we encounter more people than ever before, but ironically genuinely know fewer of them. Our treks away from derech eretz are further enhanced by the internet and smart phones, novel tools which simultaneously provide us with necessary information while intensifying the experience of isolation. Technology has undoubtably increased our access, but often at the cost of our very humanity.

We have learned that words comprise merely 30-40% of our total communication. Body language, facial expressions, tone and verbal speed provide the vast majority of not only what needs to be heard but which underlies true human connection. Yet so much of our contemporary communication is via text or email, formats in which we must rely merely on the words of others appearing on our screens, words which are then often misconstrued.

I recently joined my local online app, Next Door, and spent a month observing the postings. Depressingly, the vast majority of those posts were complaints and attacks on others for perceived injustices. One morning I awoke to a message from an individual who described being ticketed for having parked his car at the end of his driveway, the car extending across the sidewalk. I can certainly understand his frustration. However, rather than trying to find resolution, he chose, instead, to inform the world that, despite the extensive construction going on, he would now be parking in the congested street assuring full blockage so that no one would be able to drive past his home. Oh, what a wonderful world!

Later that day, my limit reached, without citing the specific incident, I posted asking whether it was, indeed, common for there to be so much negativity on the site. One kind woman suggested that I needed to sift through the site, for there were wonderful aspects to be found, including helping owners to find lost pets. I thanked her for her wisdom. Two hours later, someone who clearly had only skimmed the various posts, absent the normal cues of communication, arrived at the conclusion that I must be someone who hates animals and would not want them found!  In reality, No-one Next Door or TikTok offering makes a difference in our collective level of empathy. But in the aggregate, each click helps energize the tsunami that we all sense.

Alternatively, when face-to-face, a friend cries or shares with you a hilarious story, their voice and expressions leap through the air, changing the listener in the process. We are better able to decode their thoughts and feelings, we are better able to read the cues and are naturally charged with their emotions. We worry about or laugh with them. In other words, we empathize.

In his recent book, “Handle with Care,” describing his professional journey as a cardiologist and the state of modern medicine, our own Dr. Milton Klein portrays a common experience shared by many of us. As we sit in the office with the doctor who is asking us questions, the physician is seemingly preoccupied with recording our responses on his or her screen, only occasionally looking up. Milton emphatically rejected this type of medicine, insisting, instead, on having an assistant present to type the patient’s responses so that he could sincerely engage with the person in crisis.

Milton highlights the importance of looking at the patient and observing other contextual cues through the story of an older male patient telling him that is all proceeding well and that there have been no complications. All the while, standing behind the patient, his wife was frantically waving her arms to express her total disagreement. If we want to effectively understand and relate to others, to share their experience, we must look up, we must look at the face of the other, we must hear beyond their words. As expressed by Henry David Thoreau: “Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look into each other’s eyes for an instant?”     

Technology is but one obstacle. Our hustle and bustle, our need to scramble from one activity to the next, has also hampered our ability to connect with others. In a famous experiment, psychologists John Darely and Dan Batson once asked Princeton seminary students to prepare a sermon on the biblical parable of the Good Samaritan. The parable tells of a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho who is robbed, beaten, and left for dead by criminals. Fortunately, a resident of Samaria later stumbled upon him. As described in the New Testament book of Luke, the Samaritan “had empathy, and went to him and bound his wounds.” The Princeton seminarians clearly understood the story’s point, and each wrote about the power of extending such caring.

Darely and Batson then instructed the seminarians to walk over to an adjacent building to deliver their speech, but they added a twist. Some of the students were informed that their sermon would not begin for a while, and that they could take their time. Others were instructed that time was tight.

Students ambled or sprinted across Princton’s manicured grounds but, as they reached the adjacent building, they encountered a man slumped in a doorway. As the seminarians neared him, the man coughed and groaned in pain. In reality, he was an actor, secretly recording how the seminary students responded. Over 60% of the seminarians in no hurry stopped and helped the slumped man, but only 10% did so when they felt rushed. The irony here is palpable. Students would not help a man lying on a sidewalk, groaning in pain, because they were in too much of a hurry to give a speech about how important it is to help a man lying in pain on a sidewalk!

Have we become too busy, too hurried to see, to care, to act, to help? In the haste of our daily routines, what messages are we internalizing which seemingly crush our empathy for others? What messages are we providing our children when, in the rush to get from one scheduled activity to another, we don’t make the effort to notice or simply ignore the pain of others around us?

Our Jewish texts and sages have underscored the necessity of attending to the words of others, of caring for them, of providing for their needs, and of assuring that our lives are intertwined. In Exodus we are instructed: “You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” A later Torah verse commands us not to stand idly by the blood of our neighbors. Rabbinic texts demand of us: “Al Tifros Min Hatzibur” – do not separate yourself from the community. The need to feel for the other and to act on his or her behalf lies at the heart of what it means to be a serious Jew.

Foundationally, empathy and compassion are a direct outcome of a mindset, a worldview of love. In his recent book, “Judaism is about Love,” Rabbi Shai Held highlights the very centrality of love within Jewish tradition. He notes that the Bible commands us to love God, to love our neighbor, and to love the stranger (those outside our comfortable social groups). There can be no higher achievement, and Held asserts that the fulfillment of these obligations is considered nothing less than walking in God’s own ways.

It is almost always a mistake to ask whether Judaism asks for emotion OR action. Judaism demands both emotion AND action, believing they can be mutually reinforcing. Held describes love as an existential posture or life orientation leading us to feel certain things and to act in certain ways. The Bible also rejects the dichotomy. In the Tanach, emotions are indistinguishable from the actions, the rituals, and the physical experiences to which they lead. We must feel the pain of the widow, of the orphan and the poor, and all others who struggle, and we must act to alleviate their suffering. Jewish ethics insist upon deeds of love, from a heart of love.

The embrace of empathy is often demanding; it requires us to understand and feel for those who have annoyed us, for those who have angered us, or for those, in the extreme, who have even harmed us or our loved ones. It is instinctually easy to turn inward to our own needs, individually and collectively – and to ignore the suffering of the other. But in so doing – Meh chayeinu, Meh chasdeinu - what will we become?

At this time of year, the path to meaningful empathy is part of the arduous striving for true and meaningful Teshuvah. As discussed recently during a discussion with a chavurah -repentance over having eaten a piece of shrimp is easy. Don’t do it again... By contrast, in his Mishneh Torah, Maimonides taught, the turning of our hearts, the reshaping of actions elicited by deep emotions, reflect the more strenuous challenge before us. Moving from anger to empathy is a formidable pilgrimage through our own personal wildernesses. But it is this vey turning of ourselves, the curbing of our destructive emotions, for which we have gathered here this Rosh Hashanah.  We must depart this sanctuary differently, as better human beings, as better Jews, than we entered.  

While I am not a Trekkie in the traditional sense, I remain fascinated by the Next Generation series. There we encounter Deana Troi, half human, half telepathic Betazoid - renowned throughout the galaxy for her hyper-empathy. She can be, at times, incapacitated by her inability to shield herself from the pain of others. In contrast, Gene Roddenberry gives us the android, Data, who is blind to feelings of others. Data, driven by a computer-level cognition and precision, spends much of the series in search of the human experience of empathy. Ours it to find the equilibrium between the polar opposites of these mythical characters. Living in a society in which facts and education seem to be increasingly disregarded and/or denigrated, we need more scholarship; we need more learning. But I suggest that we find a way to superimpose upon our wisdom an additional challenge. Why not use our wisdom to be daring - to travel into the life of the other and see how it impacts who we are and who we wish to be.  Rather than asking “where can I go next?” perhaps we should be asking, “In Whose shoes might I stand next?”

This High Holidays, we pray that the blasts of the Shofar will engulf us, will shake us to our cores. May it be God’s will that the shofar accompany us out of the synagogue and into the larger world, daily stimulating our vast capacity for love and empathy.  As we plead with God Shema Koleinu – Hear OUR voices, may we look up and face one another, may we open our hearts to the souls of others, may we slow down and open our minds to notice the cues - so that we can infuse our world with new and deeper empathy. As we turn the calendar page, may we embrace our roles as vessels of goodness and Godliness.

TEKIAH – It is 11:253…am.