Surrounded by Leo, Ben, Vickie and Sarah before my surgery, November 29, 2012

Thanksgiving this year was wonderful. Sixteen relatives filled our house with laughter, mutual empathy and joy. Vickie made a fantastic meal, and it was a very special day.

Thanksgiving falls each year on the fourth Thursday in November, but for me—since 2012 and for as long as I live—Thanksgiving will always be November 29.

On that day in 2012 I was not sure whether I would live or die.

On that day Dr. Lars Svensson and his skilled surgical team at the Cleveland Clinic opened my chest to repair an ascending aortic aneurysm and at the same time replace a malfunctioning mechanical aortic valve with a tissue valve.

My Connecticut cardiologist, Dr. Robert Chamberlain, of blessed memory, did not overstate the case when he said, “You will feel like you have been hit by a truck.”

In addition to the physical pain and the prospect of a long recovery, there was nothing whatsoever on my professional calendar.

I was physically and emotionally devastated.

• I could not have imagined on that painful but life-saving day that four years later Vickie and I would have spent three months working in Milan and more than half a year—over a three year period—teaching and speaking in schools synagogues, churches and universities in Germany.
• I could not have imagined that I would finally publish the book I have been thinking about since 1975 and that it would be translated into German and Russian or that I would record it as an audio book.
• I could not have imagined that I would have published a second book as well.
• I also could not have imagined that I would publish 375 web page essays that thousands of people would read.

Many people held my hand and guided my steps from November 29, 2012, to today. I pray that they know who they are and that they know how deep my gratitude is.

While I am so very grateful for the opportunities given me, I realize that I have not ended world hunger, cured cancer, made peace between Israel and the Palestinians or solved any major world problems.

Still, I will always cherish the day in when I began my journey back from the physical and spiritual abyss.

I pray that there will be more days and more opportunities. And I pray the Eternal One will grant me the strength and the wisdom to use those opportunities to make this world—in ways however small—a more just, caring and compassionate place.

 

Where is the Line? When will we know that we must leave?

These are serious questions asked by serious questioners.

The election of Donald Trump has turned the world upside down.

At a lesson for adults at the Reform synagogue in Kiel, Germany last week, a highly respected and caring OB-GYN raised this question because of her concern about what might happen in next year’s German elections. She is proud of being Jewish and makes sure that the many Syrian refugee women she treats in her home city of Flensburg know of her heritage.

Shortly after we arrived home, my older son Leo asked the same question, “Where is the line?” Leo helped found a college preparatory elementary school—which he continues to serve as Principal— to give disadvantaged students a better chance at life in the inner city of Oakland, California.

Both of these individuals work tirelessly to make the world where they live a better place. Now both ask, “When is it time to realize that we cannot make our world better any more, and when should we leave our homeland for another?”

My response to both is, “Not yet! Let’s wait, watch vigilantly and see what happens.”

As a government major in college I learned the importance of giving a new administration every opportunity to succeed before manning the barricades in opposition.

I believe that we should follow President Obama’s wonderful example of facilitating a graceful and gracious transition. Nobody wanted Trump to lose more than our president. But his high road approach to the defeat of his candidate should be an example for all of us.

A disappointing number—to my mind—of Jews and other Clinton supporters are wasting their time and energy by trying to convince the electoral College to do something it has never done in the 240 years of the American Republic: Elect as president the candidate who by the established rules of the election suffered a decisive defeat.

Just imagine the turmoil and violence that will result if they succeed in this effort!

I believe there is much to be gained by Jewish leaders trying to meet with Trump and help him see the light about some of those his campaign has attracted. Engagement is always preferable to estrangement until we are quite certain that engagement will get us nowhere.

“Who is the greatest of all heroes? The one who turns his enemy into a friend (Tosephta to Chapter 4 of Pirke Avot)

It is a worthy goal, and before we organize demonstrations and protests, we should try that with the President Elect!

With Trump’s election  many are raising alarming comparisons to Germany in 1933 when that country legitimately elected Adolph Hitler as Chancellor

When Hitler came to power in Germany, there were two responses in my family. I call them the “Judith Response” and the “Dad Response.”

Dad and Judith were first cousins. They lived close to one another in Leipzig and loved each other deeply. When Judith left Germany in 1935, Dad drove her to the train station.

Judith must have been one of the first female dermatologists in Germany in the early 30’s. She paid close attention to what was happening there. When she saw the writing on the wall, she safely settled and re-established herself with her Husband Lazer and her infant daughter, Devorah (who also grew up to become a physician specializing in nuclear medicine) in Tel Aviv.

Dad—and there is no other way to put this—waited too long to leave. He was arrested on Kristallnacht and taken to Dachau where Nazi soldiers beat him and shaved his head.

But my father was fortunate. His brother and uncle already in the United States petitioned Governor Herbert Lehman of New York, a Jew whose father immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1848, whose office secured his release.

If I could ask my father one question, it would be why did you wait so long?

I do not think it is time yet for American Jews to leave the USA because of fear of Trump, but I do think it is time for us to:

• Keep a sharp eye on all that Trump and his administration do. We must not become the lobster who does not realize he is being boiled before it is too late.
• And we should weigh our options: where would we go if we do want to leave?

Yes, we must be vigilant, and we must weigh our options.

But the crucial question, “Where is the line?” is one that each of us must answer for ourselves.

 

 

 

Vickie and I among the students we taught at the Gymnasium Kaltenkirchen

 

Kaltenkirchen was one of the first places Vickie and I visited on our first extended trip to Germany in 2014.

Then we visited a tiny Concentration Camp site and noted the stately houses just across the street where people lived their lives and said nothing.

Two weeks later I became the first rabbi to  preach at Michaeliskirche in that village. Their wonderful Pastor, Martina Dittkrist was eager for me to do so because the church’s history was marred by a previous Pastor, Ernst Biberstein, who served during the thirties. Biberstein left the church and became a Nazi officer who was convicted of atrocity war crimes at the Nuremberg Tribunal and held responsible for the deaths of 2000-3000 Jews.

In the Social Hall of the church, a painting by Hannelore Golberg symbolizes the impact of Biberstein’s ministry on the church. It depicts a cross that is uprooted from the ground and tilted on its side. There is also a tasteful plaque in the main sanctuary expressing the church’s sorrow that they had once trusted such a man as their spiritual guide. I named a previous essay about that experience, “The Church of the Broken Cross.”

That sermon was the first time that I used what has become in many speeches in Germany since, my catch phrase:

We cannot undo the past, but the future is ours to shape.

It was a gratifying but gut wrenching experience!

Those words could also describe our recent visit to the Gymnasium Kaltenkirchen.

There we met for 90 minutes with a group of combined classes totaling some 80 students. They listened with rapt attention—some had tears in their eyes—as Vickie spoke about her mother and I spoke about my father. We emphasized how her mother and my father were among the truly lucky one’s to escape the inferno before it engulf Europe’s Jews. Still both Vickie’s mother and my father suffered, and it is important for students to understand their history.

Although the message of these two experiences was similar, our mood in the respective settings was quite different.

During the church service people looked back and realized the horror of the era with genuine regret. There was visible emotion, but most of those in the congregation had lived most of their lives.

By contrast the teenagers at the Gymnasium present a different picture. They are part of the group that will shape the future of Germany and Europe.

We left with a feeling of great hope. They seemed as determined as any group we have ever seen to insure that they want to create a better future for themselves, their children, grandchildren and generations to come.

Their responses to the lessons we taught made us very glad that we were there.

 

There was a plethora of things Clinton’s camp and the media miscalculated:

• The fear for their safety with which so many live
• The economic hardship under which so many suffer
• The resonance of Trump’s simplistic promises which Clinton could not effectively refute
• The backlash the derisive dismissal of Trump’s supporters by an overwhelmingly pro-Clinton intellectual and media establishment would cause.
• The smugness so many discerned in Ms Clinton’s demeanor.
• The smugness with which many in Ms. Clinton’s base dismissed any criticism of her at all.
• The scent of scandal that has dogged her on so many fronts for so many years
• The feeling many held that she was unduly influenced by sinister foreign interests.
• The feeling that the Clinton Foundation was—despite whatever good it  did—primarily fraudulent enterprise to enrich the Clinton’s and further their political goals.

Many will find these realities hard to read.

For many, myself included, Mr. Trump’s liabilities and scandals far outweighed Ms. Clinton’s debits, but the Clinton camp—for all their technical skill and political experience—could not make their case at the end of the day in a way that resonated with the overwhelmingly red stripe of middle America.

By portraying Trump as a buffoon and his supporters as in large measure “deplorables” the Clinton camp mobilized the sentiment against her to a degree her camp grossly underestimated.

There is also, for certain, the pendulum factor.

In ugly terms it was indeed a “white backlash” against  America’s first Black president. But it is also a consistent factor in American politics. Pendulums swing and after eight years of Bush, the country was ready for eight years of Obama. After eight years of Obama the pendulum swung back.

When congregations pick a new rabbi, they so often choose someone they perceive does not possess the traits or way of doing things that they did not like in the rabbi who is leaving or retiring. The retiring or leaving rabbis strengths, they feel, they can do without.

The American electorate choosing a new president is much like a congregation choosing a new rabbi. There is a natural tendency to choose a candidate unlike the retiring incumbent. Clinton’s camp underestimated the impact of Trump’s contention that, “Electing Hillary would be like another eight years of Obama.”  Again for Clinton’s base, who largely revere Obama, that would have been fine. But many were ready to forego Obama’s skillful statesmanlike style for the blustery “Tell it like it is” Trump.

The desire for change is especially important when people perceive their economic future is not bright, that their streets are not as safe as they should be and that a significant foreign threat looms with which the incumbent did not deal to their satisfaction.

Like many, I am frightened by the prospect of President Trump. I pray that our democracy will withstand the challenge ahead, and that our nation will find a way to move forward in a manner that promotes “liberty and justice for all.”