At the end of each year, Jewish World Watch invites our board member Malkah Schulweis to share her thoughts. This year, Malkah chose this opportunity to re-introduce a poem by her late husband, Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis, who, along with Janice Kamenir-Reznik, founded JWW in 2004. The poem, excerpted below, describes the rabbi’s foundational belief in the mission of Jewish World Watch.
We tend to get weary when there’s a lot of worrisome news, and the weariness says ‘Oh, not another one.’ And so we tune out what happens in other parts of the world. It’s understandable to take a break from worry and concern about the condition of human beings, but not for long. When we read the important parts of this poem that Rabbi Schulweis wrote, we realize we must reconnect in order for us to feel like decent, honorable, thinking human beings concerned with more than ourselves. This poem goes deeply into the human soul and revives the sacred meaning of our lives.
– Malkah Schulweis, December 28, 2018
Not Ours
By Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis
“With all due respect, Rabbi,
why spend energy, time, urging us to shout protest
to lift up people ground mercilessly into the parched soil
that grows only ghosts?
“They are a different fate and faith
They own a different geography and history
Theirs is a different language, a different culture
Have we not burdens enough?
Theirs are not ours.”
How respond?
What answer would satisfy?
There is no utilitarian benefit that will accrue to us for the spending of our passions
Would it not be wiser to turn a blind eye and to seal lips to silence?
The question is honestly presented
the answer must not be less forthright
It is not a quick and simple answer
but one that lies deep at the core of our being
We are Jews, and we have been raised as Jews
And we have faith in our God who is the God of the entire globe
who plays no favorites but embraces all His children
especially the lame and the poor and the sick and the frightened
and the pariah the lepers of our society.
Are God’s children not ours?
If a child not the color of my skin is tormented by savage hate
if a child not my own is beaten by men on horseback
smitten with whips and swords and hacked to pieces
can our Jewish faith say to us,
“Sorry, but they are not ours” …?
If a woman Black, Muslim, Christian, Animist
is frightened and raped and humiliated, her future wiped out
will our Jewish soul say,
“They are not ours” …?
…
Do you know of any Jewish prayer that concludes with the words
“Sorry, but they are not ours” …?
We have been better taught by our prophets
and our patriarchs and our sages:
Be the fathers and mothers of the fatherless and motherless
And if they are abandoned by the world, exposed to all kinds of
diseases, gather our children close.
Prepare knapsacks with mosquito netting, shoes, medication and
colored pencils along with a note in a language not our own
– in Arabic –
“You are not alone.”
…
Not an easy faith, ours.
Not a faith set to dogmas
but a faith that offers no excuse
whoever, wherever, whenever.