What the world needs now is love sweet love. It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of.
By Hal David and Burt Bachrach. I learned it as part of the choir at Temple Emanuel, Grand Rapids as part of Jewish Music Month which is held in February.
Today is Valentine’s Day. Not a very Jewish holiday some would argue because it is really St. Valentine’s Day.
Yet love is very important in Judaism. There are really two words for love, Ahavah, the first use of it in the Torah is in Genesis when Isaac takes Rebecca to Sarah’s tent and he loved her. The other word is chesed, perhaps best translated as lovingkindness.
Shai Held recently wrote a book called Judaism is About Love. It is 643 pages and on every page, I found myself highlighting something. I am not finished with it yet. It tells the kind of things I have been saying for years. Having grown up in a highly Christian community of Grand Rapids, the myth that Christianity is about love and Judaism is about works, or law or something not quite as good. Everyone wants to know that they are loved. That they are worthy and Christianity offers that assurance. So does Judaism but too often it gets hidden. Part of why I became a rabbi is to change that dynamic.
The official review of the book says this: “He shows that love is foundational and constitutive of true Jewish faith, animating the singular Jewish perspective on injustice and protest, grace, family life, responsibilities to our neighbors and even our enemies, and chosenness.”
Last week our littlest ones made heart shaped cookies, one to eat and one to donate and then read Larry Kusher’s book The Hands of G-d. They then hid the platter of extras in the ark for our Saturday morning crowd to discover. Their hands were the hands of G-d, doing gemilut chasadim, acts of lovingkindness. Pirke Avot teaches: the world stands on three things, on Torah, on work or worship and on acts of lovingkindness.
Psalms teaches and Rabbi Menachem Creditor composed the song, “Olam chesed yibaneh” The world will be built on love. (We taught his song on Sunday morning to all our students!)
Micah teaches that G-d demands three things, “do justly, love mercy and walk humbly with G-d.” The Hebrew is v’ahavat chesed. Love lovingkindness. Both words for love, back to back.
What about ahavah? We are told that we should love G-d, love our neighbor, love the stranger. When people ask me what is a Jewish value, a moral imperative? I think that is it.
Our service tonight includes two of these examples. All evening services have this example. Our choir director Stew Levin talks about it as the ultimate love song. I say, it is like being wrapped in a warm blanket. Ahavat Olam tells us that G-d loves us and like a loving parent, G-d gives us rules, commandments, laws so that we will live long. It is like the parent who sets limits and says “No you can’t touch the stove!”
Then we have the Sh’ma. The watchword of our faith. The proclamation that G-d is one. This powerful proclamation is something we witness, and it is in the code of the words themselves. The word Sh’ma ends in an ayin. Echad ends in a dalet. Ayin Dalet spells witness.
Immediately following we chant the V’ahavta, “You shall love the Lord your G-d with all your heart, with all your spirit, with all your everything.” But wait, you say, you can’t legislate an emotion. And yet, the “prayer” continues with ways that we demonstrate our love. We study these very words. We put them on the doorposts of our houses. We recite them at home and away, when we lie down and when we rise up. And we teach these very words to our children. That’s why I am so happy when we have a child present who can lead this portion.
A warm blanket of love on a cold winter’s night. Ahavat Olam, Sh’ma, V’ahavta.
Loving our neighbor also comes with a recipe for creating a moral and civil society. The holiness code, in which “Love your neighbor” is included tell us: You should keep Shabbat. That’s what we are doing now. You should leave the corners of your field for the widow, the orphan and the stranger, the most vulnerable amongst us. We do that with our community garden. You should revere your mother and your father. You shall not steal, lie, seems right out of the 10 commandments that we read tomorrow. The wages of a laborer shall not remain with you until morning. You shall not insult the deaf, or place a stumbling block before the blind. That’s why we try to have an accessible building as possible. You shall not stand idly by while your neighbor bleeds. That’s why we sponsor blood drives. You shall not render an unfair decision: do not favor the poor or show deference to the rich; judge your kindred fairly. You shall have just weights and measures.
You shall not hate your kinsfolk in your heart. Reprove your kindred but incur no guilt on their account. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against members of your people. Love your fellow as yourself: I am GOD.
A recipe for love. A blanket of love.
Then there is loving the stranger. We got hints of it in this passage teaching us how to be holy. Giving us that recipe to create a civil society, a holy group, a kehila kedosha.
And 36 times the Torah tells us, according to the Talmud that we should, have to, take care of the stranger. We need to love the stranger. Why? Because we were strangers in the land of Egypt. We know what it is like to be marginalized. To be enslaved. To be othered. So we must not do that to others. That is a Jewish value. A Jewish imperative. A moral imperative.
What the world needs now is love, sweet love.