DEAR ROSEANN ROSEANNADANNA

​A Mr. Jon Silberman of Annandale, Virginia writes in and says, “I've wondered of late what impact recent events have had on your views on interfaith outreach and your methods for pursuing it.  This is being prompted by the seeming (to me, at least) abandonment (or worse) of the Jews by America's "progressives" in the aftermath of the October 7 massacre.”

​
 
Wisdom Wherever You Find It
 
A Mr. Jon Silberman of Annandale, Virginia writes in and says, “I've wondered of late what impact recent events have had on your views on interfaith outreach and your methods for pursuing it.  This is being prompted by the seeming (to me, at least) abandonment (or worse) of the Jews by America's "progressives" in the aftermath of the October 7 massacre.”
 
Yeah, there’s nothing funny about this, but since you started reading, you might as well continue.
 
I will begin as I must, because if I don’t, you, the reader, will shut me down. What the Hamas terrorists did was commit an attack that was virtually incomprehensible, morally speaking. At every level – the planning, the timing, the targets, the recording, and, most of all, the actions themselves – there exists no excuse for their actions. Neither the ends nor the motives justify the means. Period.
 
And I will go a step farther: anyone who dismisses, excuses, or even downplays the criminal immorality of the October 7 actions is complicit in the acts themselves. Period.
 
But that’s not the question at hand.  The question is about interfaith work and methodology. Do I regret, or even second-guess, the work I have done for most of my adult life, including eight years as the president of a national interfaith organization? If you know me, you will not be surprised that the answer is “no.”
 
And the reason is not self-justification. Goodness, I have made enough mistakes in every aspect of my life to know that I can survive being wrong with my sense of self intact. I include my interfaith work in that category. Here’s an example: one of my predecessors on an interfaith board was quoted publicly as saying some very negative things about Jews.  (Not Israelis, if you are making that distinction; elders-of-Zion-type Jews.) I had put my trust in him, somewhat reluctantly because I did not know him well, and I appeared with him at all sorts of “unity” events. When he was called out on his statements, he asked me to stand up for him, and I asked him if he believed what he said. He replied that he regretted saying it. “Not the same thing,” I replied. I told him if he did not resign, I would seek to have him removed from the board. My trust had been misplaced. I felt no need to justify it.
 
By the logic of those who would turn away from progressives, Muslims, and others, some of whom have been wholly unsympathetic to Israel in the aftermath of the Hamas atrocities, I should have turned away from my predecessor’s entire community. I did not. In fact, I redoubled my efforts to shore up relationships within the community, whose leaders felt very insulted by the way the offender was treated.
 
Protecting the faith and freedom of practitioners and non-practitioners of faith communities is the right thing to do. It is guaranteed by the Constitution, whose structures and safeguards ought rightly to be available to every citizen (as long as they do not infringe on the same rights of others). As a person of a particular faith – that is, Judaism, subset Conservative Judaism – I am familiar with the assumption of obligations that may benefit me, but do not always indulge me. Just as my religious covenant obligates me to, say, observe the dietary laws, my covenant with America obligates me to, say, refuse to acquiesce to a registry of Muslims. I repeat: it is the right thing to do. Defending those rights may benefit me, but they do not always indulge me, especially when I am hurt or angry by the words and actions of those with whom I am allied.
 
One of the things I have been thinking about very deeply is how I/we express our devotion to Israel. The nuances of being a Jew whose life is in the diaspora but whose heart is in the East is almost impossible to put into words for myself, let alone for other Jews who share some of my shorthand. How much the more so is it difficult to express satisfactorily to those who are not Jews, and who apply a single set of their own standards to the local and the distant alike! And yet, I (and so many others in our community) expect others who are viewing Israel from a disconnected perspective or (especially for Palestinians) from an antagonistic perspective, to understand why it is that however horrific the murder and captivity of two thousand innocents are, they justify the collateral deaths of 30,000 in pursuit of the perpetrators.
 
It is why I insisted throughout my engagement with my national organization (for more than 25 years) that our concerns about the Middle East be left to other fora. Some of my closest allies in the religious freedom space were and are opponents regarding foreign affairs (and not just about Israel). Our concern for each other as friends and collaborators has allowed us to stand with each other’s pain (and, better, joy) at moments when our interests and values diverge.
 
I think it is natural, for me at least, to expect that if I have been a good friend to others, that they will be an equally good friend to me. It does not always happen. If I offer my compassion and affection only on the condition of quid pro quo, then I most certainly will be disappointed. But if I can resist the urge to generalize my pain and others’, there is hope that the hard work I and others undertake to create a more perfect union will not perish from this earth.
 
It just goes to show you, it’s always something.