Rabbi Sacks’ wise words from the past speak to us today - opinion

Those who commemorated the fourth yahrzeit of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks that fell on November 21 (MarCheshvan 20) miss his wisdom, his erudition, his passion, and his deep insight into the state of humanity. In The Power of Ideas: Words of Faith and Wisdom, published after his passing, one can read the inspiring speeches he gave to diverse audiences, radio appearances he had, the essays and opinion pieces he wrote, his addresses to the House of Lords, and his remarks in response to invitations to speak at all manner of events all over the world.

The power of ideas, for Rabbi Sacks, resides in the ability of words to inspire and guide actions. Not just any actions, but actions to affirm human dignity and act with kindness and compassion, to provide comfort and care to the orphan, the widow, the stranger, the downtrodden. Those encountering his ideas do not emerge from those experiences unchanged. So many wonder, how did he know what was in my heart? How did he know my concerns? Why does his advice, which was not about my situation, seem so applicable to my life?

Because so much of what happens is a repetition of patterns in history, Rabbi Sacks’ words hold particular insight for us in our present-day situations – especially for what is happening in Israel and what is happening with extremist and often violent politics. When Rabbi Sacks calls upon us to forgive, he is not doing so as some Pollyanna or novice in world affairs. Rabbi Sacks knows, with kavanah, what he is asking and how difficult it is. And he is not suggesting universal forgiveness – he is focused on the mass of people who are victimized by actions of political leaders who have had their sense of humanity compromised for reasons of power or misconceived ideology.

What follows are words of Rabbi Sacks that have resonance for our lives today, for the future of Israel and its neighbors, and for world peace. On August 28, 2000, he was invited to the United Nations to deliver an address to the Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders. He chose to speak about forgiveness and reconciliation. Here is what he said at the time. Consider how this, and the excerpt that follows it, speak directly to us today:

TWO MILLENNIA ago, the rabbis asked a question: Eizehu gibor? Who is strong? Who is a hero? The simple answer is obvious. Who is a hero? One who defeats his enemies. But the rabbis did not give a simple answer. Instead, they gave me an answer so powerful that it still moves me today. Who is a hero? One who turns an enemy into a friend. And they were right. If I defeat you, I win and you lose. But in truth, I also lose, because by diminishing you, I diminish myself. But if I forgive you, and if, in that moment of truth, you forgive me, then forgiveness leads to reconciliation; reconciliation leads to friendship; and in friendship, instead of fighting each other, we can fight together in problems we share – poverty, hunger, starvation, disease, violence, injustice, and all the other injuries that still scar the face of our world. You gain, I gain, and all those with whom we are associated gain as well. We gain economically, politically, but above all, spiritually. My world has become bigger because it now includes you. Who is a hero? One who turns an enemy into a friend. So simple, and yet so hard. This time last year, I stood in the streets of Pristina, in Kosovo, amidst the wreckage of war. The NATO operation had just come to an end. The Kosovo Albanians had returned home. But in the air there was an atmosphere of bitterness and anger. Months earlier, the Albanians were in terror of the Serbs.

Now the Serbs feared reprisals from the Albanians. There was peace, but not real peace. War had ended, but reconciliation had not begun. Most of the soldiers with whom I spoke feared for the future. They thought that some day – perhaps not tomorrow, not next year, but some day – the conflict would begin again, as it has so often in that part of the world. And then I knew, standing there surrounded by broken buildings and broken lives, that one word has the power to change the world. The word “forgiveness.” If we can forgive others, and act so that others can forgive us, then we can live with the past without being held as a prisoner by the past. But only if we forgive. Without that, we condemn ourselves and our children to fight old battles again and again, with the same bloodshed, the same destruction, the same waste of the human spirit, the same devastation of God’s world.

It takes courage to forgive – because forgiving means letting go: letting go of the pain, letting go even of our sense of justice, our feeling that we or our people have been wronged. In war, even ordinary people become heroes. But in pursuit of peace, even heroes are often afraid to take the risk. I think of the exceptions. I think of the late Anwar Sadat of Egypt, and of the late Yitzhak Rabin of Israel. Both had the courage to make peace, and both were assassinated.

Why is reconciliation so hard?

Let me answer personally. I am a Jew. And as a Jew, I carry with me the tears and sufferings of my grandparents, and theirs, through the generations. The story of my people is the story of a thousand years of exiles and expulsions, persecutions and pogroms, beginning with the First Crusade and culminating in the murder of two-thirds of Europe’s Jews. For centuries, Jews knew that they were Jews. How can I let go of that pain when it is written into my very soul?And yet I must. For the sake of my children, I must. Will I bring one victim of the Holocaust back to life by hating Germans? Will I bring my people one step nearer freedom by denying that same freedom to others? Does loving God more entitle me to love other people less? If I ask God to forgive me, does He not ask me to forgive others? The duty I owe my ancestors, who died because of their faith, is to build a world in which people no longer die because of their faith. I honor the past by learning from it, by refusing to add pain to pain, grief to grief. That is why we must answer hatred with love, violence with peace, and conflict with reconciliation.

On March 10, 2016, “The Road Less Traveled” was published in the Islamic Monthly, in which Sacks reflected on the relationship and history between Judaism and Islam. In what seems like an intentional follow-up to his address in 2000, he urges Jews and Muslims to practice the best of their religions:

I WROTE Not in God’s Name as a religious protest against religiously motivated violence, against those who kill in the name of the God of life, hate in the name of the God of love, wage war in the name of the God of peace, and practice cruelty in the name of the God of compassion. For this is not the way of Abraham and those who count themselves among his heirs. The Abrahamic monotheisms – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – have all had violent periods in their history; but in the long run, these experiences have turned out to be disastrous. They begin by fighting the “Other,” but they end by fighting people of their own faith: Jew against Jew, Christian against Christian, Muslim against Muslim. That is when serious believers – at first only a few, but an important few – come to the conclusion that this cannot be what God really wants from us. They know that every life is like a universe, that the murder of the innocent is a sin, as well as a crime, and that terror in the name of God is a desecration of the name of God.

The great faiths consecrate the name of God when they honor human dignity, practice justice and compassion, lead people to feed the hungry and help the homeless, and teach their children to love, not hate. Those who respect others are respected, while those who practice violence eventually perish through violence.

Jonathan Swift once said, “We have just enough religion to make us hate one another, but not enough to make us love one another.” Let that not be said of us. We each have the responsibility to offer an alternative to the violent voices within our faith. Only Jews can do this for Judaism, Christians for Christianity, and Muslims for Islam. I wrote Not in God’s Name to encourage others to do the same within their own faiths. Real change only comes from within. In an age of extremes, it is easy to be an extremist. The real religious hero is the one who takes the road less traveled, showing that faith heals, not harms. This is what Islam did in the great age of Al-Andalus and La Convivencia in Spain, and it won the admiration of the world. Who will do it today?■

The writer is a professor of psychology at Rutgers University (melias@psych.rutgers.edu).