A Light Unto Our Nation

Every year they are fewer. Every Yom Hashoah I am saddened by what I see at our city's Holocaust Remembrance – an annual commemoration at Mount Vernon's City Hall. It is not so much the diminution in the count of survivors. I expect their numbers to decrease with time. It is now seventy years since the liberation of the death camps, and the few who survived are diminishing. That some of those, who endured the horrors of the camps and the starvation and rigors of both the camps and the hiding and running of those attempting to avoid capture, are still alive is a miracle – one that we cannot expect to be reenacted forever.

But what is troubling is the attrition among the rest of us, who were fortunate to have been living in safety. Perhaps we did not know or do enough to support our brothers and sisters; perhaps we could have done more. Now, however, there are too many of us who cannot even spare the time to remember. Our generation is passing as well, but our loss of interest seems to be a prominent reflection of our attitude; and a greater contributor to the diminishing attendance than our thinning ranks. We don't want to remember.

Even so, there is something more lamentable. It is the absence of younger generations from the commemoration. As time passes people choose to forget. We feel compelled to commemorate events of two millennia ago, rushing through them on Yom Kippur and Tisha B'Av. They are the subjects of sterile recitations of traditions which have little meaning to us, but they're tragedies that those who compiled our prayer books won't let us dismiss. Sadly we find it easier to ignore our recent history; to forget the suffering that occurred when a mad man tried to wipe out our people. That was so long ago, and it's so depressing, that we gain nothing by recalling it.

Another part of the reason is a desire in this modern society to reject our religion and all that is associated with it. Especially in this setting of comfort and acceptance, too many of our children have lost interest in the history and the traditions that formed them. Or, at least, in some of them. They may glory in the liberal position of Judaism, but they interpret that idea to mean that they are no different from anyone else, and the Holocaust was a universal tragedy rather than one that has a specific meaning to Jews as Jews. People are dying all over the world – people of all religions and races – and to focus on our own pain is a denial of the suffering of others. If they have any responsibility at all it is to help those others.

They are not to blame however. We are. Too many in our generation, and the one that preceded it, not only emphasized a liberal, universalistic outlook, but were enamored of the concept of a melting pot. They rushed to adopt the mores of their new home, and forget the customs of their ancestors. And they encouraged their children to do so as well: perhaps not by word, but by example. And as their children distanced themselves from their people they distanced themselves from Israel, their people's homeland. For some of the parents, even though they understood, this was not the result they sought, yet they did it themselves. Many of them regret that Israel is not as liberal as they believe it should be. And the philosophy is more important than the physical reality. They are very concerned about Good and Evil as concepts, but they don't always relate them to the world in which they live. And by their reluctance to go beyond a condemnation of Evil as an idea – to fight it, if only by remembering, as it applies to actual horrors – they insure its continuance. After the Holocaust we swore “Never again,” but, unhappily, we have forgotten both the oath and the reason we took it.

Three times Isaiah spoke of Israel as “a light unto the nations” – in 42:6, 49:6, and (with some variation) 60:3. In the spirit of a people who have a message that will heal the world, who can be an example for others, we try to spread the concepts of social justice to others. We look to the nations to follow our lead in conquering the ills that have beset humanity. But in doing so we have neglected our own children – the ones for whom we want to make the world a better place. We have not educated them to their own history. We have not shed adequate light on their identity. It is not sufficiently important to us, so why should it be important to them?

It is said that you must love yourself first before you can love anyone else. But the same idea can be extended to other traits as well. You must understand yourself and your history – you must know who you are and what you stand for – before you can help others understand the values by which we must all live. For us, that means we must know our history, understand our religion, and educate ourselves and our children to our roots before we can hope to enlighten the nations.

First we must be a light to our own nation.