Book Review: Zohar Gazit’s A Struggle to the Death

Following the tragic passing of my father, I spent a lot of time thinking about mourning rituals, and particularly about the invaluable work of Menuha Nekhona (“A Righteous Rest”), the all-volunteer organization that runs the secular-civil cemetery in my parents’ town. I was so impressed with them that I started drafting a book proposal about secular burials in Israel, but a few days later found out that someone has already written a book about alternatives to religiously sanctioned deaths: Zohar Gazit’s A Struggle to the Death (Tel Aviv: Resling, 2016) (Hebrew.) The original title, “Osim et HaMavet” (“making death”) is a double entendre: it’s a figure of speech meaning “haranguing someone” and also, in this context, implies the creative remaking of a hegemonic ritual in a way that fits the needs and concerns of deeply underserved populations.

Gazit’s book, which is based on his doctoral dissertation, examines three alternative death initiatives: in addition to Menuha Nekhona, he looks at Path to Life, an organization devoted to the healing and welfare of family survivors of suicide and to the destigmatizing of these deaths, and at Lilach, an organization promoting death with dignity (passive euthanasia) for terminally ill patients. Gazit’s theoretical framework heavily relies on Bordieu’s “field” concept (what sociological work doesn’t?) and shows the complicated relationship that each of these organizations has with the death “field.” All three of these organizations struggle against the hegemonic death rituals and perceptions in Israeli society: the religious concept of suicide (and any other actively chosen form of death, including some forms of euthanasia) as defying halakhic rules; the aggressive and greedy religious monopoly on burials in Israel, run by Orthodox Hevre Kadisha organizations who perform alienated, antiquated rituals, discriminate in plot allocations, and humiliate the dead and their loved ones; and the Israeli hierarchy of death, which glorifies military casualties and features a constant contest among other groups about their relative prestige, access to services, and differential stigma.

Gazit’s analysis is incisive and sensitive. His ethnography (participation in meetings and rituals, plenty of interviews, clever media analysis) shows internal conflicts and contradictions within the organizations he examines. What they want to highlight, and who they want to associate themselves with, is a delicate and carefully strategic dance of courting legitimacy and support. For example, Path to Life activists fiercely oppose efforts to downgrade the status of soldiers who committed suicide beneath that of supposedly legitimate military casualties; at the same time, they assiduously avoid even the semblance of supporting suicide as a legitimate option. They also contest professional opinions that discourage open talk of suicide as potential encouragement, arguing that open conversation can invite attention, help, and saving lives. Similarly, Lilach activists try to disengage from suicide organizations and stick to passive euthanasia, so as not to invite displeasure. And Menuha Nekhona have faced a complicated relationship with the very few people in Israel who sought cremation, an option associated with deeply negative stigma in Israel due to the legacy of the holocaust; at the same time, they’ve had to partner sometimes with Hevre Kadisha for burial services, among other surprising disclosures in procuring coffins: traditional Jewish burials are in shrouds, with no coffin, but bodies flown in from abroad arrive in coffins and Hevre Kadisha sell these to Menuha Nekhona.

Gazit’s book is full of fascinating information for anyone interested in social movements, sociology of religion, political theory, and constitutional law. I learned a lot. There is plenty I’m interested in that I didn’t find in the book (such as the negotiations of individual burial styles, headstones, and maintenance), but there’s only so much one can include in one work. My only quibble–a minor one, and by no means limited to Gazit’s book–is that he repeatedly relies on the terms “good death” and “bad death” for, respectively, the hegemonically sanctioned death and the alternatives. I know these are both well-established sociological terms of art and Gazit is correctly using them. But terms of art in sociological theory can sometimes sound jargony and, in this case, given that these organizations fight deep injustices, come off a bit precious and more than a bit jarring in their aesthetic and moral removal. I would have preferred “hegemonic” and “alternative.”

This minor issue aside, Gazit’s book is an important and worthy addition to other texts investigating national-religious hegemonies in Israel and those who try to contest them, such as Daphne Barak-Erez’s Outlawed Pigs and Michal Kravel-Tovi’s When the State Winks. I’ll end with my favorite passage (in my own translation from Hebrew):

All three organizations have emblazoned death on their flag, but they carry a message of life. Better, safer, richer, more mindful life, achieved through dealing with the “bad death.” From an event that happens to us, death is shaped as an event that we are active in. Passive social isolation, leaving decisionmaking to the medical establishment and later to Hevre Kadisha with no input from the individual and their loved ones, are replaced by decisions, choices, and action. Addressing “bad death” is framed as an empowering resource in the activists’ lives–an expression of courage, principled stance, and a struggle against injustice.

A “Shloshim” (“Thirty”) Ceremony for my Dad

Today, my family will observe the “shloshim” (“thirty”) ritual for my dad, a little over a month from his death. This Chabad resource explains the ceremonial significance of the passage of the first month of mourning. It is customary for family and friends to visit the grave and witness the unveiling of the new headstone (“giluy matzevah.”)

Headstones are placed on graves for various historical, practical, and cultural reasons. I see dual symbolism in a heavy, sturdy stone. First, there is the idea of finality, of coming to terms with the loss, which reflects the complicated psychological process of grief after the shock and confusion that characterize the time of the funeral. The grief is far from dulled, but it begins to transform as loved ones try to adjust to their bereavement. And second, there is the idea of the stone not as an end, but as a beginning–as a cornerstone for what will eventually become a memory palace for the person we grieve.

The concept of a “memory palace” comes from memory science, where it is also known as the “method of loci.” It is an ancient mnemonic device which uses the visualization of familiar spatial environments–or the detailed imaginary construction of spatial environments–in order to enhance the recall of information. I think that the idea of spatially constructing memory during bereavement is hugely important. Events immediately preceding death, as well as death itself, tend to loom very large in the loved ones’ consciousness, which I think is true in cases of a sudden, shocking passing as well as when a prolonged period of suffering and caregiving overshadows a lifetime of happy memories. This understanding transforms the meaning of a headstone from something final to a new beginning–a freeing process by which having the dying process and the death settle into the memory makes room for preceding memories to emerge and populate the palace.

In light of this understanding, I choose to interpret my dad’s headstone as a cornerstone for the memory palace I’m building for him in my heart. The ceremony I’m officiating today is therefore designed to ceremonially and emotionally place this cornerstone, through sharing memories and through special prayers and texts crafted to move along the memory-building project.

The central prayer of the ceremony is my version of the traditional Jewish “El Maleh Rakhameem” (“God full of mercy”) recitation, which is a deeply spiritual call to find a proper resting place (“menukhah nekhonah”) for the soul of the deceased. The original prayer is full of flight, bird, and wing imagery, which reminds me a lot of one of my dad’s favorite songs, El Cóndor Pasa:

My version of the prayer retains the flight motif and invites the memory to soar (English translation follows the Hebrew original):

חברים אהובים, מלאי רחמים, חברים עצובים והמומים, המציאו מנוחה נכונה על כנפי זכרונותיכם הטובים במעלות קדושים וטהורים, כזהר הרקיע מזהירים, לנשמת חיים אבירם בן שרה ושמואל יוסף שהלך לעולמו. רננו לכבודו, הללו את זכרו בכינור ובנבל עשור. שירו לו שיר חדש. היטיבו נגן בתרועה. זכרו את הווייתו הזכה, את חכמתו הרבה, ליבו הגדול והחומל, צחוקו הטוב, מעשיו הנאצלים, ועשו מעשים טובים בשמו ולעילוי זכרו. את הציווי לחיות חיים מוסריים, טובים ומשפרי עולם שמרו – אל נא תעזבום בשמו. בכל לבכם דירשו את צרכי תיקון עולם – אל נסטה ממצווה זו כשם שהוא הגשימה בכל נשימה מנשמות אפו. הנה תאבנו לדעת איך לרפא תבל – בצדקת מעשינו נחיה כשם שחי הוא את חייו הטובים והראויים.

על כן ברחמיכם הגדולים תסתירוהו בסתר כנפיכם לעולמים, ותצררו בצרור זכרונותיכם היקרים מפז את נשמתו. ליבותיכם האוהבים הם נחלתו, וינוח לשלום בנשמות כולנו, ונאמר שלום.

Dear friends, full of compassion, shocked and saddened friends, find proper rest on the wings of your good memories in holy and pure realms, like the shining stars that sparkle in the skies, for the soul of Haim Aviram, son of Sarah and Shmuel Yosef, who has passed away. Sing praises in his honor, glorify his memory with a ten-stringed harp. Sing a new song for him. Let your trumpets ring. Recall his righteous being, his abundant wisdom, his big and compassionate heart, his hearty laughter, his noble deeds, and do good in his name and for the elevation of his memory. Preserve the commandment to live a moral life, good and world-improving – do not abandon it in his name. Seek with all your heart the needs of repairing the world – do not neglect this commandment, as he fulfilled it with every breath he took. Indeed, we desire to know how to heal the world – through the righteousness of our deeds, we will live just as he lived his good and worthy life.

Therefore, in your great compassion, hide him under your wings for eternity, and gather tightly the dear memories of his soul as a precious treasure. Your loving hearts are his legacy, and may he rest in peace within all our souls, and let us say, peace.

Film Review: Holding It In

Filmmaker Omer Yefman and I went to school together and, after wanting to see his films for years, yesterday I finally had an opportunity to attend a screening of Holding It In (2020), his film with his partner Chen Rotem, an honest, no-barred-holds window into their surrogacy journey.

I’ve been interested in Omer’s work since hearing about All Happy Mornings (2012), in which he and Chen opened up about Omer’s bisexuality and their complicated journey into nonmonogamy (something I had written about from a legal and sociological perspective.) I remembered him vividly from our school days as an authentic, real person, who met the world around him with humility and curiosity, and it was a pleasant discovery (though not at all a surprise) that Chen is also a fantastic and openminded person. I especially appreciated the film’s entry into a fraught conversation in Israel about surrogacy. Israel’s limited adoption market, a product of its decided natalism, means that people aggressively pursue IVF treatments with enormous social backing, and that queer couples and people for whom IVF is not an option pursue surrogacy. This has produced a ferocious debate in the queer community about the power differential and exploitative potential of surrogacy, as well as legislation that excluded same-sex couples from surrogacy in Israel (surrogacy is still an option for opposite-sex couples and single women.) Some surrogates have spoken up against the assumption that they are exploited or powerless in the relationship, while other commentators have dismissed their perspective as privileged and not representative of the overall population of surrogates.

Issues of money and power are not at the center of Chen and Omer’s journey–they are frank and vulnerable about conversations of partnership, giving, children, family time, and camaraderie before and during Chen’s pregnancy–but they are not far from the surface. In one scene, Chen and Omer’s two young kids are asleep in the back seat of the car while the parents discuss Omer’s discomfort using “surrogacy money” to go on a family vacation abroad. Earlier in the film, discussing their decision with friends, Chen is adamant that she would insist on paying for surrogacy, and there’s an agreement that payment is fair and important given the sacrifice and risk. “It’s our money,” Chen says. “I’m still uncomfortable,” Omer replies.

Surrogacy and adoption are distinguishable in important ways: by contrast to surrogacy, which is a service from the get-go (in one touching scene, Chen explains to her young kids that the baby is “a guest in our family” who “will return to his parents” after he is born), the decision to place a child for adoption can only be made after the child is born, no matter what theoretical agreements birthparents and adoptive parents reach before the birth, and therefore there is no compensation, as such, beforehand, which could be constituted as bribe. But to say this is to some extent hypocritical. I’ve written before about the fact that, like surrogacy, adoption is a situation in which a baby usually passes from poorer hands to wealthier hands, while money changes hands in the opposite direction. The meticulous limitations on what is, and is not, remunerable, obscure this important point–an effort to quantify the unquantifiable. Regardless of the legal or ethical taxonomy of payments (support? compensation?) the quantification of such a fundamental and immense human process is at the heart of the discomfort.

Because of this deep truth, people on both sides of either adoption or surrogacy relationships would do well to remember that there are some things that this money should not buy. One of the most stunning moments in the film, for me, was when Chen returned from a medical checkup and told Omer that the prospective parents discussed a C-section with the doctor–without having discussed it with her first. Here’s the scene:

I felt rage bubbling in me while watching this scene. I’ve been in a similar situation from the opposite side, I thought. Someone else gave birth to my child. And it would never occur to me to make any demands, requests, suggestions anything at all about the birth. I feel very strongly that the only person who should be entitled to make decisions about a birth (what form it would take and who would be in the room, to name just two factors) is the person giving birth. As the scene progressed, Omer’s resentment toward the parents was palpable, while Chen explained that she did not want him to be angry on her behalf and that she was listening and trying to see things from their perspective (in the conversation we had after the movie, some details emerged that somewhat ameliorated, though did by no means eliminate, my deep concerns about the parents’ stance.) I had to actively remind myself that it was also Chen’s choice whether to feel resentful or not, and that adoption was fundamentally different from surrogacy. A birthmom gives birth to her own child and therefore makes her own decisions. A surrogate gives birth to someone else’s child. But a birth is a birth, I thought. What can be more personal than giving birth, regardless of the genetics of the child? The greatness of the film is that it is willing to ask these difficult questions without giving pat answers that rely on definitions and self righteousness.

And this is at the heart of my deep appreciation for the film: more than a film about an unusual, deeply stirring journey, it was a film about two incredibly brave and honest people, who are willing to confront not only complicated social and psychological questions, but their own demons, and to do so authentically in front of a camera. Their struggles and epiphanies are never self-serving, and never take the form of the all-too-common “lived experience” narrative one encounters all around us, where people marinate in their own goodness publicly. We’re flawed, just like everyone else, they seemed to say, and we want to share our process with you. In our conversation after the show, the filmmakers mentioned that, while documenting their experience, they weren’t thinking “people will be seeing this later”, but I think that there is a profound act of service in making this film that parallels the profound service of surrogacy. By opening a window into their personal life, far from generalizing their experience or making ethical proclamations, Chen and Omer are offering me and you an opportunity to engage with our own sense of ethics and question even the assumptions we clutch most tightly. What more can one possibly want from a film?

Family and Predisposition in the Age of 23andMe: The Cat Is Out of the Bag

Just a few days ago, I did the hardest thing I had ever done: I officiated my father’s funeral. Hundreds of friends, colleagues, and students of my dad came, many of whom remembered me only as a very young child. Many of these people commented, to my mom or to me, what a shock it was for them to see me: I am a dead ringer for my father, especially in my now short haircut that resembles his own haircut when he was in the army. The striking resemblance is hard to ignore. I took a lot of pride in these comments. It is wonderful to resemble my precious dad, who was the best person on Earth, and if I ever live up to be a tenth of the person he was, I’ll be very proud of myself.

Sleepless and weeping, I just read Kwame Anthony Appiah’s column in the New York Times from 2022, in which he applies an ethical lens to two letters written by adopted adults who want to contact their birth families. At the time these people were adopted, it was customary to keep their provenance secret from them, with a possible revelation (or not) when they came of age. Consequently, people who now, thanks to 23andMe and similar platforms have access to their genetic makeup, can now more easily find their birth families, which opens up lots of complicated moral dilemmas.

As regular readers know, I’m an adoptive mother. My wonderful son is the light of my life and the best thing that ever happened to me and my partner, as well as to our parents. I’ve written about our adoption journey and its implications for my worldview here, here, here, and here. The gold standard in current adoptions is open adoption, in which the child and the adoptive family know the birth family and vice versa. Some birth parents choose to be in touch and involved. Some do not. How people handle the immense pain of placing a child for adoption is profoundly individualized and should be respected as such. But at least one’s biological origins are never a shameful secret that needs to be hidden from them, awaiting a big revelation.

This newer adoption regime is not without its complications, and works differently for different families, but current science widely considers it significantly superior to closed adoption. The main argument for it is this: people are naturally drawn to their biological provenance. It is deeply important to them. In the first few days we spent with our son as a newborn, during the long, exhausting, and yet precious nights of hourly feedings, I was drawn to reading Charles Dickens novels, and remember being struck by the centrality of the mystery of provenance in so many of them: Bleak House, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Little Dorrit. Dickens himself had great interest in this issue, as one of the key founders and benefactors of the Foundlings Hospital. He published an article about it in 1853 titled Received, A Blank Child. The psychological distress of not knowing who one is, where one came from–especially in the rigidly stratified Victorian era–permeates Dickens’ writing. At the time, I also encountered many adult adoptees who so deeply resented the secrecy of their own adoption that they came to oppose adoption altogether, alongside many birth mothers who feel that the secrecy and shame surrounding the process created sickening opportunities for pressuring them to place their children for adoption. While anyone is entitled to their opinions, which are naturally shaped by one’s own life experiences, I wonder if the distressing legacy of unscrupulous closed adoptions is unfairly skewing these folks’ view of a much-transformed (and for the better) adoption landscape.

In his sensitive responses to the adult adoptees, I noticed that Appiah, who is characteristically careful with his terminology, does not use the terms “right” or “birthright” to know one’s biological origins. I’m not super versed in the jargon of philosophical rights theory, and the word “right” means different things to different people. But it does strike me that knowing who your birth family was is deeply important to many people and it makes a lot of sense to me that it does. Regular readers know I’m very far from a biology determinist, and even I was surprised by how gratifying I found it to be physically compared to my beloved father. It was deeply meaningful and brought me unexpected comfort in this devastating time. At the same time, It’s clear to me that even though people have a “right” to know their provenance, as they do other aspects of their biology, these discoveries do not necessarily make things better for them. A 2017 study by Lebowitz et al. highlights some significant downsides: today’s technologies, which give people access to a plethora of information about their genetics, make them overestimate the impact of their predisposed genetic properties and thus makes them pessimistic about their physical and mental health–despite what we know about epigenetics and the considerable impact of environment.

All these threads boil down to this: knowing things about your own genetic makeup, including about your birth family, has advantages and drawbacks, and plays out differently for different people. Thing is: good or bad, simple or fraught, freeing or burdensome–knowledge about your DNA is now easily available and secrets are near impossible to keep. Law and policy in a variety of areas–including family law and criminal law, two fields I’m deeply interested in–must be shaped with the understanding that the cat is out of the bag.

I think the idea that our deepest and most unsavory secrets will come to light–and living with the inevitability of discovery–looms large in our collective nightmares. In Clarissa Pinkola Estés book Women Who Run with the Wolves (now experiencing a well-deserved renaissance), she tells the story of a golden-haired woman murdered by a spurned lover and buried near a river. In time, reeds resembling her beautiful tresses grow over her grave and sing the song of her murder and her killer’s name. It’s no coincidence that many cultures feature similar stories. The wonderful Argentinian film noir Los Tallos Amargos is based on the same plot point. The new, democratized access to DNA testing has ushered an age in which these deeply embedded cultural fears are here.

In the adoption field, this means that birthparents and adoptive parents have to be very clearly apprised of the fact that their child will have access to information about their provenance. This is true for closed adoptions, open adoptions, and even kin adoptions to hide all kinds of unsavory family secrets. DNA testing services are here and in wide usage, and so whatever you think you are hiding about a child’s biology–to protect them, to protect yourself, whatever the reason–will come to light. Whatever role you play in the adoption triangle, you have to play it with the understanding that you have no control over whether, or when, the facts will come to light. This can cause a lot of distress and fear, but it is nonetheless true.

In the criminal justice field, it means that much of the concern about invasive DNA testing methods is now moot, whether positive or not, given their increasing availability and sophistication and decreasing costs. I see these concerns raised by privacy advocates and racial justice advocates. Honestly, it seems a bit ridiculous to resent the role that private DNA testing services and familial DNA testing played in unveiling and prosecuting California’s most heinous murderer and rapist, or to begrudge the relief that the current wave of cracking cold cases through novel uses of DNA technology brings to families even decades after the crime. In 2013, Charles MacLean called for accelerating another helpful DNA-based tool: producing an artist’s rendering of a perpetrator’s face based on an ancestry analysis of their DNA, which raised concerns about AI-generated over-racialized portrayals of perpetrators. Regardless of where you stand on the range between enthusiasm and concern about these technologies, they are here now and have helped crack at least one horrendous cold case.

This also means that some arguments about rehabilitation-versus-retribution are going to be skewed by our increased knowledge about whether and how people can change. In 2005, the field of juvenile justice was rocked by new insights from neuroimaging and developmental psychology about the malleability of the adolescent brain, leading to many welcome enlightened developments regarding the sentencing of people for crimes they committed at a young age. But what about kids who, from a very young age, present symptoms of what might later be diagnosed as psychopathy? In this piece, Angela Lashbrook looks at a difficult paradox we face now: on one hand, we want to exercise extreme caution before labeling children as psychopaths, opting instead for the still scary, but perhaps less so, diagnosis of oppositional defiant disorder. On the other hand, it now turns out that the earlier the psychopathy diagnosis, the easier it is to do something about it, both clinically and through environmental redirection; adult psychopaths are notoriously resistant to any treatment or remediation. But talking about the advantages and drawbacks of labeling people with a diagnosis we now have the scientific means to determine they actually have is moot in an era of accelerated discovery and decreasing costs.

I would like to see more scholarship and policymaking in these areas leave behind the “pros and cons” discussions about disclosures, and move toward the more important question: how are we to shape our personal lives and public policies knowing that, whether we like it or not, genetic knowledge is widely available? How do we shift the conversation from talking about the virtues of keeping secrets that are impossible to keep toward framing the validity and immutability of these revelations in a scientifically valid way? Rather than trembling in fear of discoveries that will shake up our self perceptions and our families, wouldn’t it be better if we thought about the extent to which these discoveries have the power to shape our lives, and the varying degrees of freedom to shape our futures even as we know more about our pasts and presents?

A Secular Kaddish Yatom for My Father

Today we held my father’s funeral, which was heartbreaking and moving. Hundreds of people whose lives he touched came to help us say goodbye and many spoke of him with such love and admiration. I officiated the funeral and said the final kaddish, which I based on Tally Ornan’s secualr kaddish:

יִתְגַּדַּל וְיִתְקַדַּשׁ בֶּן הָאָדָם עַל שֶׁיָּדַע כִּי מִן הֶעָפָר הוּא וְאֶל הֶעָפָר יָשׁוּב, וְעַל אַף זֹאת בָּחַר בַּחַיִּים וְשָׂמַח, וְעָלַץ, וְרָגַשׁ, וְאָהַב.

יִתְבָּרַךְ וְיִשְׁתַּבַּח בֶּן הָאָדָם אֲשֶׁר מִן הַחֹמֶר בָּא וְאֶל הַחֹמֶר שָׁב, וְעַל אַף שֶׁיּוֹדֵעַ הוּא כִּי סְפוּרִים יָמָיו עַל הָאֲדָמָה, הָיָה חַי וְשׁוֹקֵק, תְּאֵב דַּעַת וְשִׂמְחָה, צוֹחֵק וְדוֹמֵעַ , אוֹהֵב וְאָהוּב עַל כִּי אָדָם הוּא.

יִתְפָּאַר וְיִתְרוֹמַם בֶּן הָאָדָם עַל כִּי יָדַע שֶׁעָמֹק הַבּוֹר הוּא וְרָחָב וְלֹא יִמְתְּקוּ לוֹ שָׁם הָרְגָבִים. עַל כִּי יָדַע שֶׁאֵין בִּפְנֵי מִי וְאֵין עַל מָה לָתֵת אֶת הַדִּין כִּי אֵין אַחֲרִית בַּשַּׁחַת. רִיק וַאֲבַדּוֹן יִשְׁכְּנוּ שָׁם לְעוֹלָם וּלְעָלְמֵי עָלְמַיָּא.

וְעַל אַף זֹאת דָּבַק בַּחַיִּים, וְלָחַם עֲלֵיהֶם בְּפִכָּחוֹן, בְּאֹמֶץ, בִּגְבוּרָה, וּלְלֹא מוֹרָא.

יִתְנַשֵּׂא וְיִתְהַדָּר בֶּן הָאָדָם עַל כִּי יָדַע כִּי רַק בּוֹ מְצוּיָה מִדַּת הָרַחֲמִים. עַל כִּי קִוָּה, הֶאֱמִין, וְשָׁאַף לָשִׁית שָׁלוֹם עַל הָאָרֶץ בְּיוֹדְעוֹ שֶׁרַק עָלָיו וְעַל שֶׁכְּמוֹתוֹ מוּטֶלֶת מִצְוָה זוֹ וְאֵין אַחֵר זוּלָתָם שֶׁיָּשִׂימוּ שָׁלוֹם עַל הָאָרֶץ וְעַל כָּל יוֹשְׁבֶיהָ.

עַל כָּל אֵלֶּה וְעוֹד יִתְגַּדַּל וְיִתְקַדַּשׁ, יִתְבָּרַךְ וְיִשְׁתַּבַּח, יִתְנַשֵּׂא וְיִתְהַדָּר, וְיִתְעַלֶּה בֶּן הָאָדָם, חיים בן שרה ושמואל יוסף, בעלה של אמי יעל אהבת חייו, אבי הנהדר והמסור, חותנו האוהב והחם של אישי צ׳אד, סבו המאושר של בני ריו בבת עינו, אח וגיס למיכל, עודד, אתי, נוני ואסתר, דוד לטל, דן, אנאבל, שרון, שי, שחף, ילדיהם של אחותו אסתר ואחיו דוד ז״ל, חתן מופלא לשמואליק ז״ל ואביבה, חבר שלא יסולא בפז ועמית תומך לאלפי אנשים ברחבי העולם, מורה נערץ, מרצה בחסד וחוקר דגול שהעמיד דורות תלמידים, מהנדס, כלכלן, ומתכנן תחבורה מחונן, סופר מוכשר, רב לעת מצוא בקהילות ברחבי העולם, הראשון להתנדב לכל מטרה ראויה, לוחם עשוי לבלי חת לשלום, לשוויון ולזכויות אדם ואזרח, איש דעת מבריק רב תחומי, ברוך כשרונות כשם שהיה צנוע הליכות, איש שנשמתו זהב טהור ופיו וליבו תמיד שווים, שצחוקו הגדול ועיניו הטובות שימחו כל לב עצוב, ושכשרונותיו הגדולים האירו באור יקרות של קידמה ופיתוח אפילו את הפינות החשוכות, הנידחות והנחשלות ביותר בעולם. יתגדל ויתקדש ויתברך וישתבח ויִתְנַשֵּׂא וְיִתְהַדָּר, וְיִתְעַלֶּה שמו של אבא היקר מפז לְנֶצַח נְצָחִים, לְעוֹלָם וּלְעָלְמֵי עָלְמַיָּא.

וְאָנוּ כָּאן, הַנּוֹתָרִות: נִדְהָמִות, המומות, כאובות, נְטוּשִׁות, וְגַלְמוּדִות, ומתנת חייו עמנו צרי ללבבותינו השבורים. וימצא זכרו הנפלא מכל מנוחה נכונה, בעגלא ובזמן קריב, בנשמותינו האוהבות והבוכיות. וכל אשר נזכר, חי.

English translation:

May the human being be magnified and sanctified, knowing that they come from dust and shall return to dust. Yet, despite this, they have chosen life and found joy, delight, emotion, and love.

Blessed and praised be the human being who knows that they come from clay and shall return to clay. Although aware that their days are numbered on the earth, they lived and yearned, thirsted for knowledge and joy, laughed and wept, loved and were loved because they were human.

May the human being be glorified and exalted, for they knew the depth of the pit and its vastness, and the bitter taste of its earth. For they knew that there is no one to be judged by and nothing to face judgment for as there is no future in destruction. Emptiness and oblivion dwell there forever and ever.

Yet, despite this, they clung to life, fought for it fiercely, with courage, bravery, and without fear.

May the human being be elevated and adorned because they knew that only in them resides the measure of mercy. Because they hoped, believed, and aspired to establish peace on earth, knowing that only they and their kind can bring peace to the earth and its inhabitants.

For all these reasons and more, may the human being be magnified and sanctified, blessed and praised, elevated and adorned. May the human being, Haim son of Sarah and Shmuel Yosef, beloved husband of my mother, Yael, my noble and devoted father, the loving and warm father-in-law of my partner Chad, the doting grandfather of my son Rio, the apple of his eye, the brother and brother-in-law of Michal, Oded, Eti, Nuni, and Esther, the loving uncle of Tal, Dan, Annabelle, Sharon, Shai, and Shahaf, and the children of his sister Esther and his brother David (may he rest in peace), the wonderful son-in-law of Shmuelik (may he rest in peace) and Aviva, a friend and colleague more precious than gold to people around the globe, a beloved teacher, gifted lecturer, and distinguished researcher who has educated generations of students, an accomplished engineer, economist, and transportation planner, a talented writer, a beloved ersatz rabbi in communities worldwide, the first to volunteer for any worthy cause, a fearless warrior for peace, equality, and human rights, a renaissance man of brilliant and versatile intellect, blessed with talents and yet modest in his ways, a person with a pure soul whose inner thoughts and outer words were one and the same, whose big laughter and kind eyes brought joy to every saddened heart, and whose immense talents shone a bright light of progress and development even upon the darkest, neglected, and most decrepit corners of the world. May his name be magnified and sanctified, blessed and praised, elevated and adorned, and may his name, brighter than gold, live on in eternity, forever and ever.

And we, who are left behind: stunned, shocked, grieving, abandoned, and bewildered, the gift of his life a healing salve for our broken hearts. May his wondrous memory find a proper resting place, quickly and soon, in our loving and tearful souls. And whoever is remembered, lives.

Dad Is Gone

It is with a heart full of shock and grief that I announce the untimely death of my beloved, wise, good, and precious father, Haim Aviram, after a brutal battle with a rare lung disease. Dad leaves behind the love of his life – my mother Yael – me, my spouse Chad, our son and his beloved grandson Rio, his siblings in blood and in law Michal, Oded, Nuni, and Ettie, his nephews Tal, Dan, Annabelle, Sharon, Shai, Shahaf and many others, hundreds of dear friends and colleagues from all over the world, and many generations of adoring students. Dad was a very special, one-of-a-kind man, and we are heartbroken.

The funeral will be held at the civilian-secular cemetery Menucha Nechona in Kiryat Tivon on Monday, June 12, at 6pm. We will hold no shiv’a and we ask for no condolence visits.

Miriam’s Tambourine: Women and Liturgical Music

Then Miriam the prophet, Aaron’s sister, took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women followed her, with timbrels and dancing.
Miriam sang to them: Sing to the Lord, for he is highly exalted. Both horse and driver he has hurled into the sea.

Exodus 15: 20-21

Caring for my dad in hospital is a labor of love, dedication, optimism, in the face of fear, grief, and shock. It’s been quite the thing to be here, spend every day at the hospital, and keep up my spirits and my mom’s as much as possible. This has not been made easy given the surrounding political context. The volatile cocktail of religious, ethnic, and national differences here is so close to blowing up that everyone is on edge. Among the many loathsome trends all around us is a religious push to marginalize and silence women, which my friend and colleague Yofi Tirosh is fighting with everything she’s got.

A few days ago, I was horrified to learn that the mom of 13-year old Eliana, who was invited to sing at an event in her community and practiced long hours for her performance, was told at the last minute that she would not be allowed on stage because an Ultra-Orthodox Rabbi was in attendance. Her mom, Abigail, recounted that she couldn’t even begin to explain to her daughter that women’s singing was disallowed. Eliana is now invited to sing the national anthem at each anti-government protest, and may her voice ring loud and clear. But the problem runs much deeper. The prohibition on women’s voices has reached pathological levels: rabbis are opining on the age that girls are not allowed to sing in the presence of their brothers. I was under the impression that much of the recent craziness goes far beyond what was regarded reasonable in religious communities until not long ago; my dad vividly remembers going to his religious youth movement, B’nei Akivah, and singing and dancing with girls. But it turns out that the nutty silencing of women from song has deep historical roots, and beyond the famous “kol ba’ishah ervah” (hearing the voice of a woman is akin to watching her display her genitals) from Tractate Brakhot, there’s a whole discussion in Tractate Sotah page 48 about the practices of liturgical singing during the days of the Second Temple. On that page, Rav Yosef Bar Hiah, a chap I would have probably enjoyed ferociously debating on this, opines that “men singing and women answering invites promiscuity; women singing and men answering is like setting fire to bramble.” Essentially, allowing women to open their mouths at all is horrendous, but having women initiate, rather than follow, is by far the worse transgression.

So how does this learned group of pious men (duh) explain away Miriam, Moses’ sister, who, per Exodus, vocally and musically participated in perhaps the most memorable victory song in the Tanakh? Here the Talmud does what it does best, which is engage in breathtaking interpretive gymnastics so that there’s no contradiction. The less impressive commenters argue that Miriam’s singing was only audible to the women. The more sophisticated commenters say that the moments immediately following the marvelous miracle of parting the Red Sea (evocatively visible in Judy Chicago’s feminist illustration for the Haggadah, see above) were of such unique spiritual quality–the rapture before such an otherworldly occurrence, the release from bondage, the vivid connection with, literally, Deus-ex-Machina coming to the aid of his people–that they merited an exception to the prohibition on women’s singing. If you read Hebrew, here’s a lecture by Admiel Kosman that walks you through the whole thing.

I got thinking about Miriam and her singing, and Eliana and the small-minded men who wanted to keep her from singing, because I came across an interesting study. Starting in the 1970s, many symphony orchestras hold “blind” auditions: musicians play behind a screen and are thus judged on the quality of their music, not who they are. A Harvard study showed that the “blind” auditions were successful: after their introduction–between 1970 and 1993–the percentage of women in the five highest-ranked U.S. orchestras increased from 6 to 21 percent. Now, however–in the name of representation/diversity initiatives–there are calls to remove the screen so as to increase diversity, primarily along racial lines.

Pretty much every classical musician I know, of all genders and ethnicities, thinks that removing the screen is a profoundly idiotic and unfair idea, which will stymie true integration and inclusion of folks from disadvantaged backgrounds in classical music–because, if the idea is that diversity increases quality, wouldn’t you assume that the behind-the-screen musicians the orchestra hired would be diverse? Wouldn’t you immediately hire Jessye Norman, Reggie Mobley, Wynton Marsalis, and countless amazing others, whether or not they sang or played behind a screen? And if we removed the screen, what would that say about the qualities of the people we hired, and how would it feel to have been hired under those circumstances?

What we need is to strongly enhance and enrich and provide opportunities for musical education and musical education for kids–even very young kids–of all backgrounds, so that class/race/gender will not be a hindrance to anyone who wants a classical music career at its inception. If we invest our effort in fostering, supporting, and nurturing musical excellence from infancy, then of course we can keep the screen up to prevent the Yosef Bar Hiahs of the world from sabotaging people they disdain out of bias and bigotry, and we can ensure that everyone has a fair shake from the start, resulting in their excellence sparkling through the screen. But investing in early-age education and artistic development in disadvantaged neighborhoods is challenging, expensive work, whereas posturing and bloviating about diversity is lazy and cheap. I really hope we invest in raising generations of musical Miriams who don’t need any special favors for their beautiful voices to ring even from behind a screen; when their prodigious talents and hard work get them to the finish line, appreciate their voices; and then remove the screen, so we can amplify their music a thousandfold.

At Dad’s Bedside

For those of you wondering why the stream of posts has whittled down: for the last three weeks I’ve been in Israel, at my dad’s bedside. Dad became aggressively ill, was hospitalized at Carmel Medical Center, and deteriorated so quickly and alarmingly that he’s now been for about ten days in the ICU. He suffers from a rare lung disease called BOOP (bronchiolitis obliterans organizing pneumonia), is connected to an ECMO machine as well as a ventilator, and we’re now at the stage where experimental treatments are attempted. My mom and I are experiencing shock and grief, supported by wonderful family members and friends, and visiting the hospital when we can. The staff is professionally superb and incredibly kind – truly, we’re so fortunate to be in the care of such angels. I’m also getting a real education in obliterating the past and future, dwelling a lot on the Four Noble Truths, discerning which connections and actions are gold and which are garbage, and reading Ivanhoe to my father at his request before he was intubated. I think it’s no coincidence that he was drawn to an epos of bravery and combat.

Where to get news: One thing I’m finding is that it is exhausting to respond to individual queries for updates, even when they come from the sweetest friends. So, my friend Valerie kindly made a resource for us, where you can read the latest news on my dad in both Hebrew and English. You can subscribe to get updates. I try to update frequently because I know how much everyone loves my dad and worries about him.

What is helpful: hugs and supportive outreach without expectation of reply. If I think you can help, trust me, I will contact you if I haven’t already. Prompt and effective follow-through if you have been asked to help. And, offers to take professional things off my plate.*

What is not helpful: wild medical diagnoses/prognoses/suggestions based on your friends/relatives/things you read online, fatalistic talk (whether Jewish or New Age) along the “everything happens for a reason” lines, burdensome diatribes, efforts to get me to do work obligations.

Beyond all this awfulness, a small piece of news on my part is that I’ve been accepted to the Jewish Studies program at the Graduate Theological Union and intend to start school next fall, on top of my full-time job, as part of my long-term plan to seek rabbinical studies and ordination in the secular humanistic tradition. My spiritual interests are helping me frame this horrendous experience and I’m glad I at least got to tell my dad about this before they put him to sleep and intubated him (he was happy, and we even got to study a page of Gemara together one night before he was moved to the ICU.) This is just to say that future posts will be more diverse in topics, as I expect my new academic journey to inform them as much as my current line of work.

*If you were expecting any professional dealings with me this summer, be it LSA, the animal rights workshop, the animal liberation conference, etc., everything is off. I’ve done the best I could to follow through with cancelations and replacements; I’ll just say that the ease of canceling everything for the summer was incredibly instructive regarding the illusion that any of us is super important or irreplaceable. If I’m supposed to grade your exam or paper, I promise you I will do that (and in fact am nearly done.) If I’m supposed to get back to you regarding the impending publication of FESTER, I will do that as well. Everything else will happen in due course.

It’s a Bitter Little World: VaYikra Rabbah, Achare Moth

Today I had the great joy of visiting a seminar taught by the fantastic Deena Aranoff at the Graduate Theological Union. The students (who were a delightful interfaith group of very astute people) engaged with Daniel Boyarin‘s theory of midrash.

For the uninitiated (most of us, I assume), midrash is rabbinical commentary on scripture, which illuminates aspects of the text through a variety of hermeneutical and literary devices. Some midrashim remind me a lot of dharma talks–a series of beaded parables, anecdotes, and examples; others, like Ruth Calderon’s retelling of talmudic tales, take the form of a fictionalized narratives. Talmudic era midrashim on the Humash (the first five books of the Old Testament) were collected and published as compendiums, starting with Bereshit Rabbah” and vary in terms of how closely they track the original text. The question that midrash scholars confront is: why did the rabbis do it? What is the point of this commentary?

Prof. Aranoff introduced us to two schools of thought on this. Some commentators see the point of the midrash as the artistry of collecting text selections from scripture–all of which, for the orthodox, are a perfect fit with each other and free of contradiction–and beading them together. Others offer a more critical approach: the midrash is merely a stylized form of commentary that reflects the rabbis’ own ideologies, affairs of the day, etc. Boyarin’s approach is that both perspectives are valid, and each of them as incomplete. Yes, the rabbis were making ideological and philosophical points. But an important aspect of what they were doing, which goes beyond just form, was that their textual universe–the sum of sources that they drew on–was a vast treasure of storytelling of various sorts, styles, and perspectives, which they drew on to make interconnections. If you will, it’s the original art of the hyperlink, or the inspiration for games such as the HipBone Bead Games. The point is that each paragraph of scripture from this immense textual universe can bear on, and illuminate, another; the sophistication is not just on the choices of text but also in drawing the connections.

Today’s selection was a midrash from VaYikra (Leviticus) Rabbah, which focused on the brief mention of the death of the sons of Aaron. I don’t know that I expected lots from Leviticus, which is not what you would call a page-turner: Leviticus is largely a temple operation manual with detailed and completely obsolete instructions on sacrifices and holy tools. Since the midrashim were written long after the temple was gone, the text itself is slim pickings for those reading it literally. But precisely because of this, the rabbis didn’t see themselves as bound to the original text, and wove a tapestry of intertext connections with vastly more interesting stuff.

The big mystery about the death of the sons of Aaron goes to the heart of the plot of every film noir I’ve ever seen. We don’t know if these people were actual historical figures (were they? more importantly, does it matter to you, and why?) but the idea that two young people would be suddenly and tragically taken away does resonate with things we experience in real life: overdoses, suicides, homicides, accidents. The Chabad website tells the story: On their very first day of service at the temple, the two youngsters, Nadab and Abihu, brought a “foreign fire” and were tragically consumed. 

The rest of the story goes into the horrendous lament of anyone who loses a loved one: why, why, why did it happen. The midrashim try to figure out, at length, how these young men might have offended God. Some suggestions include: they were drunk, they were egotistic, they didn’t marry and have families. But these sort of retributive stories are seldom very satisfying, because guess what: every day we hear of people who did absolutely nothing wrong to deserve horrendous, sudden ends. In other words, we have to find some way to deeply comprehend a difficult truth–namely, that shit happens and there’s nothing we can do about it.

In her phenomenal album La Llorona, one of my favorite singers, the late, unforgettable Lhasa de Sela, evokes this incessant, uncomprehending grief, in her song De Cara a la Pared:

Llorando
De cara a la pared
Se apaga la ciudad
Llorando
Y no hay màs
Muero quizas
Adonde estàs?
Soñando
De cara a la pared
Se quema la ciudad
Soñando
Sin respirar
Te quiero amar
Te quiero amar
Rezando
De cara a la pared
Se hunde la ciudad
Rezando
Santa Maria
Santa Maria
Santa Maria

The wisdom of the Achare Moth is that the rabbis don’t try to furnish some schoolmarmish rationale a-la Nietzsche’s “slave morality.” They know that we seek explanations for tragedies that visit people who do not deserve them, and that we’re also looking for some prescriptive comfort: if we do this or that, we’ll escape that ugly fate. It’s human to look for these tranquilizing explanations. I see it time and time again in the early writings in the field of victimology, such as in Menachem Amir’s concept of victim precipitation and in the uphill battle that imperfect victims face in the criminal justice system. But they also know, and they know that we know, that these sorts of facile explanations are ultimately unsatisfying, because life offers us daily proof that shit happens and cannot be avoided, that controlling the outcomes of our lives is an illusory and ultimately futile endeavor, and that the best thing we can do is try to come to terms with the impermanence and vagaries that come hand in hand with being alive. In other words, that the First Noble Truth is real, and you don’t have to be the Buddha to know that.

So, what do they do? If you read Hebrew, check out the text here. They pull a quote from the book of Kohelet (Ecclesiastes), arguably the most noirish part of the Old Testament. Kohelet is a cynical voice-over which, in this particular section, Kohelet says that everyone ends up the same way: the righteous, the evil, the pure, the impure. The rabbis proceed to pull out of all corners of the Bible a variety of examples of personages from different eras, locations, and contexts, drawing connections between these people’s lives and their fates. For example: Noah (a righteous man) and Pharaoh Necho (the opposite) both ended up bitten by animals and becoming lame. David (a good man) and Nebuchadnezzar (the opposite) both ended up with the same fate, even though one built the temple and the other destroyed it.

They also proceed to pull a quote from Psalms, which admonishes people for rowdy joy, and follow up with a series of examples of righteous, perfect figures in the Bible (Adam, Abraham, Sarah…), all of whom were unhappy. You can almost hear an ancient Manhattan grandpa shaking his head and telling his kids, “who ever told you we’re supposed to be happy?” And the most astonishing bit comes at the end, where they throw in a shocking story that does not come from scripture: A well-to-do man from Kabul (a city near Acre) celebrated the marriage of his son with friends. As they were wining and dining, he sent his son to the attic to get another barrel of wine. Upon getting to the attic, the son was bitten by a snake and died. The man wondered what might have happened to the son, left his guests and went upstairs, when he found his son’s body. He proceeded to wait until the friends finished their festive meal and then told them the chilling truth: they had come to usher the son into his wedding and will now usher him to his grave. The lesson returns to Ecclesiastes: laughter is mixed with tears, joys with sorrow. We can’t rationalize it. We can only come to terms with it and practice our equanimity chops.

I recently read an interesting article about the appeal of true crime podcasts like My Favorite Murder. Even though the show deals with heinous crimes, it has developed a vast and loyal following of people who claim that it has improved their mental health. One listener interviewed in this Atlantic piece explains: “I sort of exorcise that anxiety through obsessively reading about true crime and learning about it. . . You’re like, I’m not afraid of this. I’m going to face this, and I think it’s like exposure therapy.” What is interesting about the true crime movement, as I’ve written elsewhere, is that it diversifies the categories of victims, offering empathy in places where it used to be in short supply and reminding all of us that there is no line dividing the “deserving” and “undeserving” where violent crime is concerned. This may be the point that the rabbis tried to illustrate through their study of Biblical figures and their fate; the man from Kabul could be the tragic hero of a film noir or the protagonist of the newest podcast, and the emotion–horror, empathy, and opening heart–that we feel is just as fresh as it was for the people who studied this centuries ago.

This midrash offers good opportunities for learning about intertextuality, narrative devices, plotting, and connectivity, but I was really struck by the content. I’m still working on coming to terms with the young man I found dead on BART last week. The grief and horror of this poor kid sitting on the train, pale and unmoving, with no one noticing him, is hard to shake. The many friends I shared this story with have commented, “no one deserves to die alone on a BART car.” But maybe what we deserve, or do not deserve, is not the point. Adjacent to the magnificent peaks of our joys are deep oceans of sorrow and tears. And both are an inevitable part of our human experience.

Everyday Bavli Project: Brachot 1 – Evening and Morning Rituals, and a Dead Man on the Train

Every January, lots of people I know (and lots more whom I don’t know) resolve to be better in a variety of ways. Some of these have to do with adopting healthier habits: meditating every morning or every night, listening to some app, reciting affirmations, dunking oneself in an ice bath, getting one’s workout out of the way, drinking or eating something good for us, you name it. The Internet is brimming with advice about these various things, pouring out arguments for an against this ritual or other.

The Talmud Bavli opens with a tractate about the whens and hows of the different blessings, and its first page deals with the question of timing the “shma” blessing, the one many believing Jews recite morning and evening as part of their daily prayer structure. The Jewish day, just like the day in many religions, belief systems, and communities, is rather regimented with habits, and it looks like the conversation between the Talmudic teachers focuses on the best timing for the habits. These suggestions are remarkably fresh in their reasoning–they sound a little bit like a group of health hackers debating the exact timing and components of drinking their bullet coffee or taking their supplements.

Some scholars tie the blessing to the early temple days (long in the rearview mirror when this was written), linking its timing to the timing of sacrifices in the temple. Some, like Raban Gamliel, tie them to the natural world (debating the timing of sunrise.) And some seem to set a deadline for the blessing–midnight–to distance the person from evildoing.

This plan–tying virtuous behavior to a certain hour at night to prevent oneself from drifting into, well, less virtuous behavior–speaks to a dispute that pops up once in a while in criminal justice policy: to what extent is criminal behavior situational? Take a look, for example, at San Jose’s teenage curfew policy: Under a city ordinance, a person under the age of 16 cannot be in a public place within the City of San Jose without adult supervision between the hours of 10:00pm and 5:00am. Minors who are 16 or 17 years old cannot be in a public place within the city without adult supervision between the hours of 11:30pm and 5:00am.

Can one get into trouble at noon, or at 3pm, or at 5pm? Sure (indeed, many of those who balk at the puritanism of U.S. sex education point out that, if one prevents their teenager from having sleepovers with their partners, they’ll have sex in the daytime, in cars or in other places, arguably less safe and with less disclosure to the adults in the teenager’s life.) But then there’s opportunity theory, which claims that offenders make rational choices and thus choose targets that offer a high reward with little effort and risk. Nighttime creates opportunities and risks that are not present during the day.

I should know: twice a week this semester required an early morning BART commute with my bicycle. In the last few years, there is a lot more visible suffering on the train, and the hour of travel makes an important difference: the early morning features a lot of the aftermath of whatever bad things happened during the night. It’s not rare to see people injured (sometimes profusely bleeding) on the train; fights; exhausted folks sleeping, eating, and eliminating unhygienically on the train, on the platform, or in the elevators; and sometimes outright scary and dangerous activity, like people lighting up joints inside a closed train car. Most people on the train try to ignore this stuff even when it’s flat-out hazardous, because who wants to get in trouble, but sometimes our determination to mind out own beeswax has horrendous consequences.

This is what happened last Wednesday. I was on my way from Berkeley to San Francisco on the early afternoon train. At some point, I realized that the man sitting close to me was not breathing. He seemed pale. I asked the other passengers whether they had seen him breathe or move. No one had. I tried to touch the man. “Don’t do it, he’ll jump at you” someone said. “Junkie sleep,” someone else chuckled. But no. The man was dead. He was in his twenties, with a head full of curly hair like my son’s, wearing clothing that was somewhat disheveled (but who doesn’t look disheveled on BART?). For all I know, he might’ve ridden the train from the early morning hours, or even slept on it, and died at some point in the morning, continuing to ride unnoticed by the people around him. What happened to him–overdose, cardiac arrest–is anyone’s guess. He was found in the daytime. Did it happen at night? I’m not sure.

I’ll write more about my dead fellow passenger in the weeks to come – finding him was deeply saddening and unsettling and made me think of many ways in which our communal spirit needs an infusion of fresh compassion. But for today, this incident is relevant not only in that it raises the question of whether bad things happen at night, or early in the morning, but also in that it provokes the question, how we can leverage our habits and attention to meet each day (even on BART) with a larger reserve of compassion for others.

The next part of the mishna deals with the morning blessings, and it looks like the New Agey idea that you create your own reality by setting the tone for your day is not all that new. Brachot 1 offers us two approaches on when to punch the Shma prayer card. Shammai is all about consistency: make sure you say your blessing as you get up and as you go to sleep. Hillel, always the mellower of the two, is all about “just make sure it happens at some point during the day.” I’m generally part of the Hillel crew (big shocker there, I’m sure), but this time, I gotta say, I can see the logic in Shammai’s prescription, as I have (forgive the tiresome idiom) some lived experience in this department.

On the early morning commute days, I usually start my day in one of three ways: praying and singing (I created a morning blessing playlist with a meditative component), listening to classic literature (something I’ve read many times before, like Jane Austen), or listening to a true crime podcast. The podcasts are very engaging and I feel a strong pull to dive into these horrendous stories, but I’ve noticed that, when I do that first thing in the morning, I spend the rest of the day in a mental fog, and am somewhat more watchful and suspicious of people around me. I don’t think serious crime does not exist. It is definitely a part of reality. But I do think that disproportionately inclining my mind toward these scary and traumatizing scenarios does set a more somber tone to my day. The best of the three commute beginnings is the one that involves praying, singing, and meditating, but it definitely requires setting a habit.

Which is where being secular can be a bit difficult and, at the same time, freeing. When you read the Talmud as a follower of orthodox theistic edicts, you pray in the morning, or at night, or both, because your wise ancestors said you should. When you read it as a freethinking secular person, you are the boss of you, and you decide if and when to pray based on what, if anything, it contributes to your life. If that’s the case for you, you have the freedom and the responsibility to figure out which of your habits takes you in a direction you appreciate. Would we all be quicker to detect a fellow passenger in medical distress on the train if we took a moment in our busy morning–a clearing in the dense forest of our lives–to incline our mind toward compassion and caring?