Torch Song for Optimism – Emor 5779

At the convention of the Rabbinical Assembly in Montreal two weeks ago, I led a session for fellow Conservative/Masorti rabbis. It was the first time I had been asked to do so, although I have attended conventions for more than a decade. The chairs asked me to do something musical, so I led the attendees in a bunch of early Israeli and Mandate-period Hebrew songs, from the ‘30s through the early ‘60s, a period of music that I find particularly fascinating, particularly since the composers of the time were effectively creating the soundtrack for a new nation.

Some were about life as a חלוץ / pioneer working the land (“Mah Yafim Haleilot,” “Hora Mamtera,” etc.); some were about love and camaraderie in the time of war (“Yatzanu At,” “Hayu Zemanim”); some were reflective songs about the range of human emotion (“Ruah Stav,” “Kalaniyot”). Afterwards, one of the participants told me about how much she loved these songs, how they had transported her to, as she put it, “simpler times.”

We are fortunate this week in Pittsburgh to hear the music of one of the most hopeful artists in the Israeli pop canon, David Broza. Broza’s career now spans four decades, and while I am sure that he will display his artistry on Thursday evening in playing the Spanish music that he truly loves, there is no question that he will play, probably toward the end of the concert, his most well-known song, the anthem that put him on the map: Yihyeh Tov. This song is almost absurdly hopeful; an ode to peace and a torch song for optimism. In 1977, when the lyrics were written by the poet and songwriter Yehonatan Geffen, peace with Israel’s Arab neighbors was a mere fantasy; the text references, as we shall see, the visit of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to Israel of that year, which ultimately led to the Camp David Accords, signed a year later.

I must confess from the outset that this song makes me cry, not only for its unbounded optimism, but also for the tragic sense of loss that I feel when I read the lyrics closely. I don’t need to review the history of Israel’s armed conflicts since the song was written, but we all know that real peace has not yet arrived.

And the bloodshed continues, yielding so much more pain and grief and loss. Just two weeks ago, there were rockets from Gaza and return fire from Israel, with casualties on both sides.

As was pointed out at the Yom HaZikaron (Israel’s Memorial Day, a very somber day) ceremony that I attended at the convention, led by our Israeli Masorti colleagues, 23,741 Israelis have died fighting in Israel’s wars, and 3,146 more have died in terrorist acts in Israel.

What makes me misty-eyed when I hear this song is that for many Jews in Israel, in America, and around the world, looking forward to a vision of peace as Broza does used to be the norm. Despite the situation in the 1970s, when Israel was still at war with the entire Arab world, when you could not buy Pepsi or Toyotas in Israel due to the Arab boycott, when the “Three Nos” of the 1967 Khartoum Resolution still hung in the air: No peace, no recognition, no negotiations with Israel, even so, there was still a palpable sense of optimism. Mahar, we sang, tomorrow there will be peace.

In the final stanza, the song references Isaiah’s messianic vision of a time of peace:

וְגָ֤ר זְאֵב֙ עִם־כֶּ֔בֶשׂ וְנָמֵ֖ר עִם־גְּדִ֣י יִרְבָּ֑ץ וְעֵ֨גֶל וּכְפִ֤יר וּמְרִיא֙ יַחְדָּ֔ו וְנַ֥עַר קָטֹ֖ן נֹהֵ֥ג בָּֽם׃

The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, The leopard lie down with the kid; The calf, the beast of prey, and the fatling together, with a little boy to herd them. (Isaiah 11:6)

Ladies and gentlemen, I cannot live in a context in which we throw up our hands and say, “We tried and failed; end of story.” I cannot live in a world in which we pessimistically believe that every option has been tried and exhausted, and there is nothing left to do; lo yihyeh tov – it will not be good.

I cannot allow myself to think that those 23,741 Israeli soldiers will be solely martyrs to the cause of Israel’s ongoing existence rather than to the cause of peace, and that those numbers will only continue to rise. In every single Amidah, and virtually every Kaddish that we recite, the final request of God is for peace. How can we resign ourselves to eternal struggle, when we accept that people will continue to die? How can we not recommit ourselves again and again to finding a peaceful solution?

How can we abandon the visions of Isaiah, of Yehonatan Geffen, of David Broza? How can we so easily dismiss the possibility of laying down our sword and shield?

It is true that we are no longer living in the “simpler times” that nostalgic songs invoke. Nonetheless, we cannot succumb to the forces of pessimism. I am not going to resign myself to that kind of future. Will you? Will we?

~

Rabbi Seth Adelson

(Originally delivered at Congregation Beth Shalom, Pittsburgh, PA, Shabbat morning, 5/18/2019.)