Rabbi Noah Farkas Sermons

June 2, 2009 by Rabbi Noah Zvi Farkas

90 years ago, a German sociologist named Max Weber published a lecture of critical importance entitled, Politik als Beruf, or Politics as a Vocation. In which, Weber articulated an ethos of politics and civil activism based on the integration of two seeming incommensurable values. On the one hand, for those who choose public life, there exists the value of unbridled idealism that composes and shapes itself in dreams of love, dreams of justice, and dreams of peace. To which many of us have felt a calling to make the world a more just, more peaceful, and more harmonious place. This is a vision of a world broken by cynicism and apathy and repaired through hope and love. When this value touches the religious heart, its poetry, not unlike a Shakespearian sonnet, rises to the level of prophecy; casting itself again and again in gold to become, what in my tradition, Rabbi Hillel declares as the essence of Torah. Stating, that "Love your neighbor as yourself" (Leviticus 18:19) is the golden rule of God's Law. 

But Weber was quick to point out that, "[It is] not summer's bloom [that] lies ahead of us, but rather, a polar night of icy darkness and hardness." An ethic, in which we live only in our dreams, seems so distant from the reality we now face. Instead of an ethic of ultimate ends, ultimate ideals, Weber demonstrates a second and wholly different value that modern politicians must adopt to succeed. Weber's ethic of responsibility emphasizes the weight of decision-making taking into account the politicians' role as civil servant. Placing them into situations where he or she must adjudicate between competing and coequal moral claims. 

How much money to education? 

How much to health care? 

How much to repair roads and bridges? 

Whose pain is tenable, and whose is not? 

These decisions are not easy, but they must be made. That is the unending and irrefragable task of civil leadership. In Judaism this task is also prophetic, for the Torah relate that "There will always be needy in the midst of the Land."(Deuteronomy 15:11) And it is the prophet in the form of Moses who sits in judgment over the people. 

Nearly a century later, Weber's words still ring true. With hundreds of thousands unemployed and one in eight people in LA County at risk of going hungry (cf. LA Regional Food Bank), we stand humbled by the decisions which confront this body politic, which test our dreams and our convictions. But this is the very point of integration that everyone in public life must face; between the rule of gold and the reality of iron. 

And so let us take a moment before this day to pray, 

God of the ancient ones, 

Keep their hearts open to the golden, prophetic dreams that called them into civil leadership. Give them the strength to make the iron-hard decisions that are necessary in the times of austerity. And when they come home to their families, after a long day in the field, and in that quiet time when they lay their heads, exhausted, on their pillow at night, may You, God, give Your dreams to them of a beloved community and a world repaired. And when they awaken refreshed and filled with vision, may they endeavor to spend their days making those dreams into realities, so that when they lay their heads, exhausted, on their pillow at night, may You, God, give Your dreams to them, of a beloved community and a world repaired. 

And let us say, 

Amen

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