Conversations With Betty: The Challenge of Deep Compassion

Kol Nidre Sermon
Temple B’nai Tikvah
5780/2019

Rabbi Mark Glickman

Over the course of my life, I’ve had to face many difficult challenges. There have been educational and professional pressures; the stress of parenting; the frustration of my futile attempts to learn song lyrics; and my anxiety and utter befuddlement as to why long is a monosyllabic word, and monosyllabic is a long word.  It’s all part of what I often describe to my wife Caron as “the burden of being me.”

But in some ways, all of these challenges pale in comparison to the difficulties I’ve faced in trying to engage meaningful dialogue with my friend Betty.

Betty (not her real name) is a woman Caron and I knew from when we lived in Washington State. She’s about sixty – a bookkeeper – with short, stylishly-cut copper-colored hair, a weatherworn face, and a voice a that betrays her many years of smoking. Betty and I are Facebook friends – in fact, I helped her navigate the site a little when she first got on it five or ten years ago – and in her postings, Betty never makes a secret of her politics. Betty’s politics are, to put it delicately, a little different from my own. Her place on the political spectrum is, shall we say, a bit to the right of mine. Actually, Betty’s politics are WAY to the right of mine. In fact, her politics are so far to the right of mine that sometimes their transmission from her to me gets garbled because of the curvature of the earth.

Most of Betty’s political views concern what’s going on in her native United States. Betty, you see, wishes that a certain group of Democratic congresswomen would “go back to where they came from.” Betty bemoans the murderous acts of Hillary Clinton and the demonic corruption of the Obama regime. Betty is terrified of the invasion of rapists and murderers coming over America’s southern border, and is convinced that the “deep state” in her home country is bent on the destruction of western civilization.

Once, Betty shared a post complaining that illegal refugees to America get checks from the government of almost $4000 per month. I looked into it, and responded that, no, it’s not true. First, I noted, there is no such thing as an “illegal refugee”; second, the case she was talking about wasn’t from the United States, it was from up here in Canada; and, third, what really happened is that one refugee family with several children once received a one-time check for that amount of support. “Look,” I wrote, “here’s the article on Snopes [the fact-checking site] with all the details.”

Betty responded by saying that Snopes is a left wing, anti-Trump organization, and she shared twelve YouTube videos to prove it. 

Another time, Betty posted a rap video showing a six-pointed star beneath the words, “Destroy democracy,” with lyrics grumbling about how “today’s Rothschilds” are bringing down the nation. 

“Betty,” I pointed out to her, that’s an antisemitic video.”

“I’m not antisemitic,” she said.

I responded, “Invoking dark images of “the Rothschilds” is a hateful old trope referring to rich Jews. And then there’s that Star of David.”

“The Rothschilds were evil,” Betty said, “Jewish or not. And that’s not a Star of David, it’s a sheriff’s star!”

Once, without comment, Betty posted a video showing hundreds – maybe thousands – of Muslims worshipping on a street in New York or some other American city. “Isn’t it great?” I said. “So many people gathered together in one place to worship God. What a great country you live in!”

“They weren’t worshipping God,” Betty replied. “They were worshipping Allah. And it’s horrible.”

“Betty,” I told her, “Allah is simply the Arabic word for God. It’s the same God as you and I worship.”

“The same God?!?!” Betty said. “Are you blind? There is no salvation in such a religion. It’s Satanic!!!”

“They worship one God,” I said, “we worship one God. There can only be one ‘one God.’”

“How dare you insult me by saying that I worship Allah,” Betty said. “I would never do such a horrible thing!” 

“Betty,” I said, “it’s important not to demonize people just because they’re different than we are.”

“What do you know?” Betty retorted. “You only read half the bible!”

At this point, Caron began questioning why I was even bothering to engage in this conversation.

“Why bother???” I said. “Well, somebody has to call her out! If I don’t, then who will???”

Caron was making an important point, of course. It’s not like I was going to change Betty’s mind. Why bother getting into it with her?

The answer, I think, was that I just couldn’t bring myself to read such horrible things and not say anything about them. Somebody has to call this stuff out. And having seen all the amens that Betty was getting from her other Facebook friends, I figured that if that someone wasn’t going to be me, then nobody was likely to step up.

So, I called my childhood rabbi – a man who also happens to be my uncle, Rabbi Robert Marx. My uncle is in his nineties now, but during the 1960s, he was a leading figure in the civil rights movement in Chicago and elsewhere. He worked closely with Martin Luther King, he was an outspoken advocate for fair housing and other such causes, and in 1964, he founded the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs, which now, 55 years later, continues to thrive as a major advocate of social justice in Chicago. 

“Uncle Bob,” I asked, “during your civil rights work, did you engage directly with the individual racists, or did you focus your efforts on larger-scale advocacy.” 

“Oh, I didn’t focus on the individual racists,” he said. “It would have been a horrible waste of time.”

“Really.” I said. “Have you been talking with Caron.”

So now two people had told me not to bother with the Bettys of the world. But what was I supposed to do – stay silent? I’ve preached the importance of speaking up for decades now. Now that it’s in my face, isn’t it more important than ever that I say something? But of course, when I do chime in, Betty deluges me with horrible rhetoric, vitriol, and more ugly YouTube videos than I could watch in a lifetime. I want to speak up; I feel morally bound to speak up; but I don’t know that speaking up with Betty would do any good, and to even try would drain me of enormous amounts my time and energy – time and energy that you people in this room have already claimed for yourselves. 

How could I speak up? And how could I not?

And this, my friends, is what I’ve been thinking about this year.

The sad thing, of course, is that Betty is far from alone. Throughout North America, anti-immigrant sentiment (much of it downright racist) is rising – we saw explicitly in the election debate just last night. Hate crimes are more frequent; politics seem increasingly disconnected from facts; and conflict grows. In other countries, too, authoritarian leadership is on the rise, as the power of populist dictatorships becomes ever more deeply entrenched.  

What is going on? There are many factors contributing to this current climate, of course. Certainly, the economy has something to do with it, as this generation of young North Americans may be the first one in a long time not to exceed its parents in earnings and socioeconomic standing. Technology is changing everything, as machines take over many jobs long held by people, and skills that were once valuable are now seen as outdated and anachronistic. Related might be the new challenges that racial and ethnic privileges are facing, as throughout the western world being white and European no longer brings the automatic social and financial benefits that it once did. Surely, there are other factors as well.

I’m not a sociologist or a social psychologist, though, so I’ll leave it to the experts to explain in detail the causes of what’s going on. All I know is that I’ve got this Betty situation to deal with; and all I know is that talking politics – and talking about anything else of consequence – these days only feels safe once I come to feel assured that everyone I’m talking to agrees with me; and all I know is that there’s a whole lot of yelling out there right now, and that the world feels really divided. 

As my interchange with Betty unfolded, I independently began reading historian Robert Caro’s magisterial, award-winning biography of the former American president, Lyndon Johnson. The four volumes of this work published so far comprise more than 3500 pages, and the fifth volume when it comes out, will certainly put the total well over 4000. Reading so many thousands of pages on a single guy is a fascinating experience. The author, Robert Caro, has been working on this biography since shortly after Johnson’s death in the 1970s. It includes well over 100 pages devoted to the topography and culture of the Texas hill country where Johnson grew up. There are 150 or so pages on the history of the U.S. Senate before Johnson was elected to it, a 75-page mini-biography of one of Johnson’s mentors, 50 pages on a political ally of his, another 75 on a rival, and another hundred or so on the history of the American civil rights movement before Johnson sank his teeth into the issue. 

Reading this book gave me an insight into who this man was as nothing I’ve read ever has done before. Reading it made me stand in jaw-dropping awe of certain elements of Johnson’s personality, and it made me despise others. Most important, however, the biography helped me understand Lyndon Johnson better than I do almost any other figure from history. With the vast amounts of context, knowledge, and insight that this biography brought me, I can comprehend what made him tick far more readily than I could before. Having read his 4,000-page biography, I can better appreciate Lyndon Johnson for the fullness of who he was as a human being. 

Now what do Lyndon Johnson and my friend Betty have in common? Well, aside from the fact that they both had two arms, two legs, and one head, not so much. 

In fact, now that I think about it, I’m not sure what they have in common, because I don’t know very much at all about Betty’s life – certainly not nearly as much as I know about Johnson’s. I know that she grew up in a small, working-class semi-rural community in eastern Washington State; I know that her father abused her when she was a little girl; I know she’s been married a couple of times, struggled with alcoholism, that she’s got a couple of kids, and some cute grandchildren whose pictures she’ll show anyone at the drop of a hat. 

That’s pretty much what I know of Betty’s story. It amounts to just a fraction of a typewritten page here – far less than the thousands I’ve read about Johnson.

I wonder what would happen if I could read the 4,000-page Betty biography. Maybe it would help me understand something about her father, and give me some insights as to what led to his terrifying abuse. Maybe it would tell the story of the community where she grew up, and help me understand the impact that growing up there continues to have on Betty as an adult. Perhaps it would tell the narrative of Betty’s first-ever sip of alcohol, and give some insights as to its impact up on her – chemically, emotionally, and in other ways, too. Maybe Betty’s 4,000-page biography would bring me to her church, and help me understand how perspectives that I see as so offensive she sees as so deeply religious. Maybe it would introduce me to her friends, and her first love, and her ex-husband. And maybe it would describe how Facebook gave her a voice political voice that she never had in the pre-Facebook era. – the one I find so objectionable.

Unfortunately, however, nobody has written Betty’s 4,000-page biography. The Bettys of the world rarely become subjects of published works of even a fraction of that length. And unfortunately, I’ll admit, I haven’t asked for anything beyond the briefest details of Betty’s life-story. I did a little bit at first, but then when I started reading her Facebook posts, I got so angry that I stopped being curious. 

It occurs to me that this might be the source of the problem. I’ve gotten so angry at Betty during the past few years, that I’ve forgotten to be curious about her. Of course, I don’t have time to read very many 4,000-page biographies, but I’m pretty sure that the closer I can get to knowing somebody’s full story, the more fully I will be able to appreciate where that person is coming from. I highly doubt that knowing Betty’s story will make me agree with her, but maybe knowing where she is coming from would keep me from wanting to wring her neck in frustration.

We Jews, I’ll note, are called upon to learn the stories of others – especially the stories of people who oppose us. Our tradition is full of biographical material about our enemies. Reading the midrash, you can learn all about their backgrounds. Pharaoh, Haman, Amalek, you name the enemy of Israel, there’s all kind of stuff to read describing where he came from. Much of it is imagined legend, of course, but it’s all part of our tradition’s urge to help us understand our enemies. 

And the rabbis? They also provide us with some good guidance here because they disagreed with one another all the time. In fact, having good juicy disagreements is a big part of what being a rabbi is all about.  Last Yom Kippur, I spoke at length about the sacred art of disagreement in Judaism. I spoke of what our tradition called a machloket l’shem shamayim – a disagreement for the sake of heaven. As I reminded you then, according to Judaism, disagreement isn’t necessarily bad. It can actually be quite a good thing, provided that you do it respectfully and kindly. Plus, everyone – every single human being – has something to teach us…even the people with whom we disagree. And one ingredient of respectful disagreement is the act of really hearing what another person has to say. The great rabbi Hillel was so revered, it is said, because whenever he went up against his archrival, Shammai, he always gave voice to Shammai’s argument before his own; he always made sure he understood the opposing view before articulating his own.

Our friend Peter Walker recently pointed me to a teaching from the late Reb Zalman Schacter-Shalomi about the 23rd Psalm. Psalm 23, Reb Zalman points out, describes God as setting a table before me in the presence of my enemies. Why would God set a table before me in the presence of my enemies? Because, Reb Zalman notes, God wants me to sit down with them and share a meal! Because God wants me to talk with them! Maybe we could talk about our disagreements, but maybe we could talk about the roast beef. Or maybe we could talk about sports, or maybe we could sing old show tunes, or maybe we could tell one another our stories. The point is that God wants us to figure out a way to connect with our enemies rather than just vanquish them.

It’s an important teaching. Everything I know about God – or at least everything I think I know – tells me that God wants me to oppose Betty’s odious politics with every morsel of my being. But that’s not all that God wants me to do. God also wants me to get to know Betty – to understand where she’s coming from and why she’s saying what she’s saying. Even though I’m pretty certain that she’s wrong, understanding her story may help me find some truth hiding somewhere in her hate, or it may help me show her how she’s wrong. Until I get to know Betty, I can’t ever hope to even have a chance of engaging in a meaningful dialogue with her.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who died in 1972, was a leader in the field of interfaith relations and interfaith dialogue. Modern religions, he argued, need to avoid falling into religious disputations. Christians, Heschel might have said, will never persuade us Jews that Jesus was the messiah, and we’re never going persuade them that gefilte fish is delicious. What we should do, Heschel suggested, is try to learn from one another rather than persuade one another, to help one another rather than defeat one another, to engage in what his daughter, Susannah Heschel described as not just “theology,” but as “deep theology” – the kind of theology that propels us to go beyond all that separates us and to find the common humanity with which we can all connect.

My friends, this is a time that calls upon us all to do what Rabbi Heschel taught us to do. It’s a time that calls upon us to demonstrate not only compassion, but deep compassion. Compassion calls upon us to welcome the homeless and the refugees into the confines of our own borders; deep compassion calls upon us to extend hands of friendship even to those who would have us turn them away. Compassion inspires us to make the world a gentler and more loving place; deep compassion reminds us that people who reject those values are the way they are for a reason. Compassion beckons us to protect our children and loved ones from needless violence; deep compassion drives us to reach out to the very ones whose actions contribute to the atmosphere that allows violence to grow. Compassion calls upon us to feed the hungry; deep compassion calls upon us to address the real needs and be sensitive to the real stories of those who make the world more selfish.

Of course, we must never allow our compassion – even our deep compassion – to excuse improper behavior. We must stand up to it now just as we’ve always done. But resistance alone will not make our world good, only love will – and real love, genuine love, rarely comes easy. It means that we need to push ourselves beyond ourselves, and acknowledge others around us in the full measure of their humanity.

We read in the Talmud that Rabbi Abba Isi ben Yochanan taught in the name of Shmuel Hakatan that when you look into a person’s eye, you’re really seeing a map of the world there. The white of the eye is the ocean; the iris is the world; the pupil is Jerusalem; and the face you see looking back at you is the holiest of all, the sacred Temple.

To look at another human being is to look at an entire world. That’s true even for the people we disagree with; even for the people who act so objectionably – Betty and all the rest. Let’s look deep into their eyes. Let’s remember that they, like us, each have compelling stories to tell. Let’s learn from their stories, even as we affirm the call of our tradition to stand for what is right and good in all that we do.  We may not agree with them, but when we disagree, we must do so with deep compassion – the kind of compassion that can only enrich us all as we navigate the choppy waters of our lives today.

Shanah Tovah