Thanksgiving Day is based on the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. While in many ways these two celebrations are very different, both of these holidays encourage the inviting of guests.
Judaism’s tradition of ushpizim calls for us to invite special people to our dinners in the Sukkah. The seven traditional guests are Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses Aaron, Joseph and David.
The Halpern Sukkah was also visited by guests, but these visitors included Karl Marx, Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud, just to mention a few. In addition, there were three guests we always invited together to our Sukkah because they carried the same important message, but from very different perspectives.
One of these three was protest singer Phil Ochs, who died in 1976, never having reached the age of 40. While truly a secular Jew, there was an undeniably strong Jewish message to Ochs’ music – all you had to do was listen.
While few may remember Phil Ochs, I seriously doubt that anyone has ever heard of Moshe Yess or Rabbi Shalom Levine or their singing careers as Megama, which ended with their deaths just last year. They sang as devoutly Orthodox Jews of the need to live by basic Jewish values – the same underlying values that permeated Phil Ochs’ music.
Both Ochs and Megama would point out that if on THE Thanksgiving Day we share our food with those less fortunate, what should we be doing during the rest of the year?
All three of them would say that all year long we need to make our lives ones of thanksgiving by practicing Avodah – the worship of the Divine — by dedicating our lives to acts of loving kindness, to Tikkun Olam, the bettering of the world.
Sharing food may be wonderful, but it is not enough.
If we provide food but no justice, we have not worshipped God. If we provide food but not a society filled with love and compassion, we have not worshipped God. And if we provide food but no peace, we have not worshipped God.
I do not feel comfortable inviting Ochs and Megama right now. How do I possibly explain the sad state of our communities, of our country and of the world to those who have committed themselves to something better?
I guess there will be three fewer chairs at the table this year.
B’Shalom
Rabbi Stanley Halpern