Which Ties Bind?

Friday August 22, 2025/ 28 Av 5785/Parshat Re'eh

Hevre/Friends,

Last night, 25 of us gathered to watch the documentary, “October 8”, which chronicles vicious antisemitism on the campuses, social media screens and streets of America that exploded barely a day after the Hamas massacre; well before Israel had a single boot on the ground in Gaza. It uncovers the decades-long campaign of hate and propaganda that continues to divide American society today. Conversely, the effect of this chilling but powerful film on its viewers does the opposite. It unites the Jewish community and our allies; it ignites communal resilience and pride and a shared passion to fight for the Jewish future. 

It wasn’t lost on me that we watched it at the end of a week during which the strains on Jewish unity reached a fevered pitch, especially in Israel: a nation-wide strike to demand a ceasefire and the return of the hostages; hundreds of thousands protesting the government’s latest planned offensive in Gaza; Haredim held a “Day of Rage” against military enlistment blocking roads, smashing cars, tussling with opponents, and even spitting on police; and, communities around the world reckoned with the intensifying, controversial, Jewish unease over the suffering in Gaza, dramatically expressed by UJA-Federation of NY pledging $1 million to an Israeli humanitarian organization providing aid to civilians in Gaza.

The truth is it's been almost two years of families, friends, communities and Israeli citizens struggling to maintain a sense of unity in the face of deeply divisive conflicts. At stake isn’t just politics. To many it’s our very identity; our very integrity. Each of us, at some point or another, has asked ourselves: What is it that keeps me bound to the people with whom I so profoundly disagree? Not an easy question.

We are a religion, but we’re also a people. We have a set of beliefs, practices and values, but we also have a set of relationships to each other. So what exactly defines collective Jewish identity? Are Jews connected to one another simply because we’ve all been born Jewish or have become Jewish and so we all belong to the same family or nation, with all of our religious, cultural, and ideological diversity  -  what Donniel Hartman has called “the Judaism of Being”?  Or, are we connected to one another because we share a commitment - real or aspirational - to a particular way of behaving, whether religiously, ethically, or ideologically – what Donniel has called “the Judaism of Becoming”? 

Let’s ask it another way: is collective Jewish identity unconditional: I am bound to all other Jews simply because we all belong to the same nation and I need not have any expectations of them, or even of myself. Or is collective Jewish identity conditional: I am bound to other Jews who share my Jewish commitments about how to show up in the world, and my own Jewish identity in addition to theirs is accountable to those shared commitments.

Could the answer simply be” yes!”? That both feel true as the markers of our collective Jewish identity, even as they emphasize different expressions of belonging to the community? Maybe. 

But what happens when they clash? When the different choices that different Jews make around their values or their actions strain the relationship between them as Jews? When identifying with others who share your Jewish ethnicity but who have very different values makes you feel like you’re compromising your own? When making shared identity contingent upon people taking certain actions feels like you’re excluding others who also feel like family to you? What do we do in those moments? How do we deal with that tension? 

What about the risks of elevating one over the other? Does the fact that different people with different sensibilities were all born into or converted into the same tradition make Jewish peoplehood merely a function of coincidence? Is that enough to unite us? And if we define peoplehood as a set of shared behaviors or choices, what happens to shared history and solidarity?

Israel, Zionism, the war with Hamas, Palestinian statehood, hunger in Gaza and other contentious issues are threatening Jewish ties in ways that feel unprecedented. And yet, despite their ferocity today, these tensions aren’t new. They arose from time to time over millennia of Jewish life. In our own generation, many experienced them - and some still do - over such vital issues as the inclusion of LGBTQ Jews or intermarried Jews in Jewish communal life. What binds us as Jews - our shared identity or our shared values? Or some dynamic, creative tension between them both? 

As we enter the new Jewish month of Elul and begin the hard work of introspection and renewal leading us to the High Holy Days, I hope this question percolates in your hearts and around your Shabbat tables. May our wrestling and reflections help heal the factions that divide us. Our future depends on it. We need each other more than ever.

With continued prayers for our ability to bring home all the hostages, protect the soldiers, heal the injured, comfort the bereaved, and build a lasting peace in Israel and around the world, and with blessings for a Shabbat Shalom,

Dini