January 22nd the Caldewell United Methodist Church hosted the Peace Islands in an Abraham’s Table. The theme was: Muslims, Jews and Christians engage the thoughts and visions of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Turkish Lunch was served to all the guests that attended.
We thank, Rev Jeff Markay and everyone at the Caldwell United Methodist Church for this wonderful afternoon.
Rabbi Alan Silverstein
The rabbi within Conservative Judaism who most embodied the spiritual responsibility for Jews to engage in public policy in making a better society was Abraham Joshua Heschel.
It was Rabbi Heschel who introduced Dr King to the Conservative Jewish community.
Heschel, like his close friend, M L King, was motivated by the prophetic legacy of Moses
God selected Moshe to lead the People out of Slavery because Moshe had demonstrated an innate intolerance for injustice, and for being a bystander to evil within society
To that end, he intervened when
• A Taskmaster was beating a slave
• When 2 Israelites were fighting
• When shepherds attacked the daughters of Jethro in Midian
Like M L King, Heschel’s Teaching Legacy was in 2 Parts – Man in Search of God, God in Search of Man
A. Man In Search of God – Man Needs God – Man needs God in order to quench our spiritual thirst – a need as desperate as our need for water to drink
1. Heschel’s teachings about spirituality influenced not just Jews of all walks of life but also religious Protestants and Catholics as well
2. In a age of materialism and of skepticism, Heschel had the temerity to insist in Man needs for God – We must make a Leap of Faith into belief
a. Why is the METAPHOR of a “leap” necessary?
3. Because God is difficult to CAPTURE – God is beyond all comparisons and all types of human knowledge
a. totally unique –
b. transcends our mind’s ability to reason –
c. exceeds categories of time and of space
4. In classic Heschel formulation: “God is a certainty which we know without knowledge, a reality that is beyond words”
5. THUS God can only become known to us through a “leap” – a spontaneous entry into what Heschel called the HOLY
B. The Second Half of Heschel’s legacy was to affirm in God In Search of Man – that just as Man Needs God, God Needs Man, too
a.
6. YET -Why does God needs Man?
a. Because God is not merely the God of Creation – Transcendent – far above
7. God also is an intensely Caring God – as Heschel observed – an Imminent God, a God of Pathos – God suffers terribly when human beings, made in God’s image, are suffering
a. God is intimately affected and stirred by both the fate of and the resultant conduct of human beings
b. When we do “a mitzvah” [good deed], we enter into a world of cosmic meaning –
8. To that end, we owe it to God to embody what Heschel labeled “Spiritual Audacity” – Social Activism
a. THUS For Heschel – a person must not only make a Leap of Faith – but also a Leap of Social Action
b. Heschel’s political activism was prompted by his experience during the Nazi Holocaust.
c. Heschel launched a public role as a Social Prophet –
d. To that end, he accepted an invitation in 1963 to address a Conference on Religion and Race convened by the National Conf of Chr’s and Jews
e. Heschel continued by applying the Exodus Story to modern times: “The summit in Egypt of old has not come to an end. Pharaoh – in the form of racism – is still not ready to capitulate. The Exodus began 3000 years ago, but we are still stranded in the desert. Indeed it was easier for the Israelites to cross the Red Sea than for men and women of different color to enter many American institutions, colleges, universities and neighborhoods.”
f. At that seminal conference, both keynote speakers – Rabbi Heschel and Dr. King – quoted the prophet Amos: “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream”
9. Months later, they shared the podium at the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism convention. Dr. Heschel introduced M L King as a spiritual and moral gift to American society, presenting him with the Solomon Schechter Award. Dr. King reciprocated by praising Heschel for emulating the moral clarity of the prophets of old, calling him “My Rabbi” and “Father Abraham”
10. Reflecting upon his marching side-by-side with Dr. King in Selma, Alabama in the1965 Civil Rights March, Heschel attributed divinity to the task –
a. “I felt a sense of the Holy in what I was doing” “Our legs uttered songs. Even without words, our march was worship. I felt my legs were praying.”
b. For Heschel, faith in the goodness and oneness of God is expressed through the language of feet, hands and spine.
11. In the Spring of 1968, only 10 days before he was to be assassinated – At the Rabbinical Assembly convention celebration of Heschel’s 60th birthday, Dr. King was greeted by a thousand Conservative rabbis singing “We Shall Overcome” in Hebrew!
12. Heschel told the RA – that King was a modern-day prophet.
a. His presence was “a sign that God had not forsaken the USA. God has sent him to us. His mission is sacred… I call upon every Jew to hearken to his voice, to share his vision, to follow his way. ..His presence is the hope of America.”
13. Several tragic days later, after attending Rev King’s funeral with 2 younger Jewish activist colleagues. The 2 young Jewish disciples turned to their mentor, Rabbi Heschel, asking:“What do we do now?
a. Heschel responded: “You must teach the children, so that they remake the world.”
b. Heschel died on Dec 23, 1972 of a heart attack. But not before, he, too, and his written legacy had helped remake the world.
c.
14. As Rabbi Heschel’s and Dr King’s present-day students and disciples, we are enjoined to continued to implement their sacred legacy
15. Let us do our part in shaping an American polity based upon justice and amity throughout the Land
Rev Jeff Markay
Uniquely Christian aspects of MLK’s vision:
Dr. King was an ordained Baptist preacher, who was raised in the church and formed by the biblical narrative of the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament.
He understood the upside down nature of the Gospel. From the beginning of the birth narrative of Jesus, he took to heart the wisdom of Mary in the Magnificat:
Luke 1:51He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 52He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; 53he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.
Dr. King understood well, the distressing disguise of God in the face of the poor:
Matthew 25:35-36 for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’
He understood the call of John quoting Isaiah: “every valley shall be lifted up and every hill and mountain be made low.” He understood the non-dualistic wisdom of Jesus that “the first shall be last and the last shall be first.”
Dr. King elaborated on this preaching, “So I say to you, seek God and discover God and make God a power in your life. Without God, all of our efforts turn to ashes and our sunrises into darkest nights. Without God, life is a meaningless drama with the decisive scenes missing.
But with God, we are able to rise from the fatigue of despair to the buoyancy of hope. With God, we are able to rise from the midnight of desperation to the daybreak of joy. St. Augustine was right — we were made for God and we will be restless until we find rest in Him.
Love yourself, if that means rational, healthy, and moral self-interest. You are commanded to do that. That is the length of life. Love your neighbor as you love yourself. You are commanded to do that. That is the length of breadth of life.
But never forget that there is a first and even greater commandment, “Love the Lord your God with all thy heart and all thy soul and all thy mind.” This is the height of life. And when you do this you live the complete life.” MLK
Dr. King’s vision of the Beloved Community comes out of a Judeo/Christian understanding of all people being created in the Image of God, therefore Brothers and Sisters, who are interdependent.
In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, he addressed well meaning but fearful clergymen, one of whom was a UM Bishop Paul Hardin in Alabama who implored Dr. King to go slower, and cease and desist from the practice of civil disobedience.
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
Finally, Dr. King’s vision is so much more than the I Have a Dream speech. His greater prophetic vision and invitation to honest self-critique has the potential to make us more mature people, who live in a more mature society. The wisdom of Dr. King continues to be relevant, life-giving, and beneficial to not only this country, but the global community that God so deeply loves.
Sam Tuna
Touched bases on each quote he read,
1. Economic Injustice:
“Many white Americans of good will have never connected bigotry with economic exploitation. They have deplored prejudice but tolerated or ignored economic injustice” Why we Cant Wait 64
“Capitalism fails to recognize that life is social Communism fails to recognize that life is personal. The good and the just society is… a socially conscious democracy which reconciles the truths of individualism and collectivism”
Where do We Go from Here? Chaos or Community? 67
Poor People’s Campaiogn/Economic Bill of Rights
3 Weeks before a march in Washington, he was assassinated “We believe the highest patriotism demands the ending o the war and the opening of a bloodless war to final victory over racism and poverty”
“the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? Letter from Birmingham City Jail 63
It is not PPl to be hated or disliked, but it is characteristics, mind sets, Illusion of Kufr to be challenged: “we must be concerned NOT merely about who murdered them, but about the system, the way of life, the PHILOPOPHY which produced the murderers.” Eulogy for the Martyred Children 63
Pictures from the Event:
Rabbi Alan Silverstein
Sam Tunagur
Rev Jeff Markay