(lift
up hands over head)
“Hands
Up, Don’t Shoot!”
Last
Shabbat afternoon, eleven CBSRZ members, including 5 kids and one teenager,
joined a march that made its way through the North End of Hartford, ending with
a rally in Keney Park. We were part of a crowd that grew from 200 to 500
people, protesting the recent decisions of Grand Juries in Missouri and New
York to not indict police offers who had killed unarmed Black men – Michael
Brown and Eric Garner.
For
our young people, this was the first time they had been a part of an action
like this – walking side by side with people of all colors and all faiths, calling
for justice, equality and human rights. Some of our kids had been studying the
Jewish value of “Btzelem Elohim,” that all humans are created in God’s image
and that all lives are therefore sacred and equal. This was an opportunity to
put those values into action. When we asked our kids how it felt to be a part
of this action, Ziv said, “I felt like I wasn’t a little boy anymore. Like my
voice was a part of a big powerful voice.”
Sadly
the issues of inequality in our justice system and of police brutality are
nothing new. The first time I was part of such a protest, was 15 years ago in
New York City in the winter of 1999.
Four off-duty police had shot 23 year old Amadou Diallo, a West African
immigrant with no criminal record, on the stoop of his New York City building,
striking him 19 times. They said they thought he had a gun. It was a wallet. The
officers were acquitted of 2nd degree murder charges and went back
to their jobs. The chant back then was “it’s a wallet, not a gun!” His last
words, to his mother, before he left their apartment in the Bronx, were, “Mom,
I’m going to college.”
As
Jews, we know what it means to be targeted and profiled and feared. We know
what it is like to not trust the authorities who are supposed to protect
us. As a Jewish community in this
country, we are also becoming more diverse racially and ethnically. And so, we are
moved to march in solidarity with our brothers and sisters of color.
However,
as members of a mostly white community in America, we are also aware of our
privilege. Watching our Jewish students marching with their hands up, chanting,
“Hands Up, Don’t Shoot!” alongside African American kids of similar ages, I
felt equal measures of pride and uneasiness. My kids will likely never have to
face a situation in which their very lives are in the hands of the police,
while for African American kids, boys especially, and for their parents, this
is a daily fear. As I lifted my hands above my head and chanted, my chest
exposed, I felt a tinge of vulnerability that is an ever present experience of
terror for Black Americans.
This
week’s Torah portion tells the story of brothers who do not feel that
solidarity with each other. Privilege poses a serious challenge to their
ability to see that they are connected to and responsible for each other. Joseph’s
brothers are jealous of him, because he is the favored son of their father
Jacob. Jacob had given Joseph a decorated tunic to further emphasize his
status, and then things got worse when Joseph started having dreams about his
brothers bowing down to him, and sharing those dreams with his brothers. One
day Jacob sends Joseph to check on his brothers who are shepherding a distance
away near another town. As he approaches, the brothers plot to kill him. After
Reuben intervenes, trying to save Joseph from them, they agree to just throw
him in a pit out in the wilderness. As we know, Joseph is eventually sold into
slavery in Egypt.
In
this story, Joseph seems to be incapable of recognizing what his privileged
status is doing to his relationship with his brothers. He is so blind to this
dynamic that he shares his dreams with them, which only damages the
relationship further. At the same time, the brothers, as a group, have great
power over Joseph. And they abuse it. What grabbed me this week was a verse
that we often overlook. After the brothers strip Joseph of his tunic and cast
him into the pit, we are told, “The pit was empty; there was no water in it.
Then they sat down to a meal.” These men are somehow able to throw their own
brother into a pit in the desert and then sit down and eat and drink.
As
mostly white, privileged people in America, we Jews could sit down and eat and
drink in comfort without paying much attention to those distant pits of
despair. We are not the ones who need to
fear, for ourselves or for our children. Garbed with a privileged status, we
trust that law enforcement and the justice system are there to protect us and
will treat us fairly. Knowing this, we can separate and shield ourselves from
the suffering of others in not-so-privileged groups.
So,
why is it important that we were there at that protest, when this particular
injustice is not our personal experience or problem? Because, as the Dr. Martin
Luther King taught, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
Or
as a sign at the march in Hartford read, quoting African American writer Angela
Davis, ““If they come for me in the morning, they will come for you in the
night.”
Or
as our Midrash teaches, “One who sheds blood is regarded as though he had
diminished the image of God.”
When
the image of God is diminished or in pain, I am diminished and I am in pain and
I am threatened. We are all human beings, we are all Americans. The suffering
and the injustice done to one American is a shared suffering and a shared injustice.
Lifting
my hands above my head to chant “Hands up, don’t shoot!” was not a simple thing
– it was actually hard. This is a terrible posture – a powerless posture – a
shameful posture- a painful posture.
When
I feel that powerlessness and that pain, I remember that we are all connected.
And when my brothers and my sisters are hurting, I am too. I will never be free
as long as we all are not free. I hope
that our kids felt this truth in their hearts and in their bones, as they
lifted up their hands on that Shabbat afternoon in Hartford.
I
want to invite you now to rise and sing this Civil Rights era song with Belinda
and me. Tonight I see this as a prayer that someday people will no longer have to
raise their hands in the air, over their heads in fear. It envisions freedom
and justice and love up over our heads, in the air.
Over My Head:
1. Over my head, I see freedom in the air (3x)
There must be a God somewhere
2. Over my head, I see justice in the air (3x)
There must be a God somewhere
3. Over my head, I see love in the air (3x)
God's love reaches everywhere
