I was asked to participate in a story-telling festival today (Saturday), and specifically asked to tell a story suitable for both children and adults, that addressed both the environment and greed.  I went to the library, and having looked through several books, couldn’t find a story I liked.  So, I wrote one!  No time for a blog this week.  But here is the story.  I hope you like it.

 

The Successful Brother

 

Once upon a time, there was a village, and in this village lived two brothers.  The older brother, who was older by an entire ten minutes, for they were twins, thought of himself as much more clever than his younger brother, and always proclaimed that he would be by far the most successful.  “No you won’t,” the younger brother always answered.  “Yes, I will.”  “No, you won’t!” 

 

This continued for years.  And when they reached the age of twenty, as they both now planned to leave their family home and seek work, they stood in the village square arguing.  “Yes I will!”  “No you won’t!”  The people of the village had had enough, and they went to the Rabbi and said, “Rabbi, you must do something.  There is no peace any more.  If you don’t do something, they will continue arguing for the rest of their lives. … and ours!”

 

The Rabbi thought about it a moment, and then said, “Send the brothers to me.”

 

It so happened that the Rabbi owned two parcels of land, exactly the same.  Fertile land – with room to grow vegetables and already thriving orchards of fruit trees, as well as groves of trees just lovely to walk through.  He made the brothers a deal: if they would stop arguing, he would loan each of them  one parcel of land for fifty years.  After fifty years, they could keep whatever they had gained, but must then return the land to him. 

 

“But you won’t be here,” said the older brother.

 

“You are right,” said the Rabbi.  “But my grandchild who is but a week old will be.  On my grandchild’s fiftieth birthday you will return and my grandchild will decide which of you is the most successful.”

 

Well, the Rabbi was very wise, and the grandchild was likely to be wise, and free use of a parcel of fertile land for fifty years is not to be sneered at, and so the brothers agreed.  After a few years, both brothers were married, had small homes and were making a respectable living, sowing and reaping vegetables, and harvesting the fruit.

 

One year, it so happened that the market for fruit collapsed.  And at the same time, the market for wood skyrocketed.  The younger brother struggled to get by.  The older brother cut down all his fruit trees and the groves of trees that were lovely to look at and sold the wood for a great profit.  With that profit he was able to build a fine large home, instead of the small home he and his family had been living in.  And instead of a rickety old cart pulled by one mule, he was able to buy a large carriage pulled by two mules!

 

Now the older brother realized that having spent this money, he would need to replace his income from the fruit trees he had cut down.  He did so by planting vegetables everywhere.  His younger brother warned him that by leaving no land to fallow, he would make the land infertile, but the older brother scoffed.  “By then,” he said, “I will be so rich it won’t matter.”

 

In turn the older brother laughed at his younger brother, who would not even cut down the trees that were lovely to look at.  “Fool,” he said.  “You could still make a profit.”  But too many people from the village liked to stroll through the trees and watch the squirrels and other animals.  And the brother decided he just couldn’t cut them down.

 

In time, as the younger brother predicted, the older brother’s land ceased to be able to grow a single vegetable.  The land was exhausted.  But the older brother was also right.  By then he had so much money he could buy his food.  And he did, at a low price, from his own brother.

 

Well, the fifty years passed.  Both brothers approached the Rabbi’s now fifty year old grandchild to see who was the most successful.

 

The older brother was certain it was he.  He was rich.  He could move his beautiful house from the Rabbi’s land to land he had bought.  His family wanted for nothing and wore the finest clothes.  What could be more successful than that?  Of course, the land he returned could not be given to someone else to farm for the soil was depleted.  But that was not his problem.

 

The younger brother thought that he was the most successful.  His family had a place to live and food to eat.  They could not afford to buy a large parcel of land, but they had arranged to share some land with another family, so they had a place to move their modest house.  And they could give back to the Rabbi’s grandchild a healthy farm with an orchard that could be lent to a new generation, and the village had a forest to walk in and enjoy.

 

The older brother scoffed.  “That’s nice,” he said.  “But I'm fifty times richer than you.”

 

And so dear friends.  You are the advisors to the Rabbi’s grandchild.  Which brother was the most successful?

 

(edited for typos and a few tweaks -- October 26th)

Whose Country Is It?

 

This Sunday, the day before Columbus Day and all that that day brings with it, the theme for the service will be “Whose Country Is This, Anyway?”    I’ve been struggling with how to frame it all week, as I realize yet again that as a culture, we are not geared for nuance.  Something is either right, or it is wrong.  If two people or two peoples disagree, one is right and the other is wrong.

 

I think we are wired to accept that sometimes both sides of an argument are wrong.  But what I hope to deal with, somehow, in some coherent way, is the notion that sometimes both people in a disagreement are right.

 

What then?

 

The anti-immigrant fever in this country is impossible to miss.  And the people who say that the laws should be obeyed are right.  Yet the people who say that the laws are stacked against them are also right.  We are a nation of immigrants.  Yet some would slam the door. 

 

I feel reminded of something Jesus once stated.  “Let he who is without sin, cast the first stone.”  I want to say something like, let he (or she) whose family didn’t emigrate, slam  the first door.

 

“Nativists,” so the dictionary tells us, are people who are indigenous, who are anti-immigration.  But who is truly indigenous?  Seriously.  Who is truly indigenous?

 

Archeology tells us that the “First Peoples” or “Native Americans” crossed over the Bering Strait.  They were the first to settle in what is called North and South America.  Are they indigenous?

 

If so, then are those who would slam the door shut today on immigrants from Mexico ready to pack up and go home to Europe, or Africa or Asia, or wherever their parents or grandparents came from?  Should Columbus not been allowed to land because he didn't have a "green card?"

 

And I must admit that as a Jew I shudder when I hear the complaints about people who have broken the law by emigrating here without permission.  During the second World War, Jews received the back hand of American immigration quotas.  It was against the law for more than the then “acceptable” number of Jews to get visas.  This during the height of Hitler’s rounding up of Jews for extermination.  Visas were denied to Jews desperate to get out of Germany.  After all, to let more in was against the law.

 

And then I think of the horror that is the continuing conflict in the Middle East.  Once again, the question raised is “Whose Country Is This, Anyway?”  The Israelis say it’s theirs.  The Palestinians say it’s theirs.  I say they are BOTH right.  Now what?

 

How do we live with each other?  How do we learn to respect each other?  The truth of it is that hate is so much easier than love.  War is so much easier than peace.  “Us” is so much more uplifting when we can point with condescending sneers at “them.”

 

We are such a fear-filled species.  And we have so many who are so gifted at playing upon our fears. 

 

Whose Country Is It, Anyway? becomes a metaphor.  Can we share?  Can we possibly learn to share with each other?  I wonder.  I wonder if, as a species, we are at our core incapable of sharing.  I hope not.

 

I believe in God.  I have good friends who do not, and I respect them.  But I believe in God.  I believe that God has tried to teach us to love and share for thousands of years.  I believe that God sent us Moses and Hillel and Jesus and Muhammad and the Buddha and Bahaullah and Confucius and Black Elk and Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and so many others.   We have been sent all of these prophets because the message still hasn’t been heard.  How many more prophets will it take?  How many more times must we hear it before at last it truly sinks in?

 

Love one another.  Cherish one another.  Help one another.  The message doesn’t change.  The rituals change as our cultures shift.  And we seem all to ready and eager to hate and kill each other over the differences in our rituals, but the message doesn’t change!

 

“Whose Country Is It, Anyway?”  It’s all of ours.  It is ALL of ours. 

Implications of the Interfaith Life

 

I was speaking the other day to someone about Interfaith, as opposed to interfaith.  Interfaith as a noun, not an adjective. 

 

My understanding is evolving as I ever more deeply embrace this path. 

 

Interfaith sees our spiritual traditions as equally valid, or invalid, depending upon what we do with them.  The quest is not for the perfect faith, or the true faith, or the “one” faith.  The quest is for the most helpful faith for each of us, as individual and valuable human beings, in embracing our common humanity.  The spiritual path that may better help me embrace that we are indeed our brother’s and sister’s keepers, may not be the path that best helps you.

 

But I begin to understand that this Interfaith sensibility, while it begins with our spiritual paths, in point of fact knows no boundaries.

 

If we would acknowledge our common humanity, the racial divisions humanity has erected are meaningless.  It’s not a question of tolerance.  Our racial divisions are meaningless.  There is as much relevance in dividing the world into red, blond, white and dark haired, as there is into red, yellow, white and dark skinned.

 

The question we ask continually in Interfaith is what helps us to be a more compassionate human being?  Knowing a person’s religious beliefs yields no answers to that question.  I have known saints who were Christians, as I have know horrific criminals who were Christians.  The same holds for Jews, Muslims, Atheists, Hindus, Buddhists, Baha’i, and so on.

 

And the same holds true for people of color.  Whatever the color – hair or skin.  The same holds true for gender.  Don’t bother telling me if someone is gay or straight.  I don’t care.  Tell me whether or not the person is a compassionate human being, who strives daily to embrace the Golden Rule, whichever interpretation of the Golden Rule that person’s culture observes.

 

A book-burner is a book-burner, whether s/he burns Bibles, Qur’ans, or Humanist Manifestos.

 

The time has come to realize and embrace and truly take into our hearts that the division of “them and “us” must end.  There is no “them.”

 

“Them and us” is a toxin that has poisoned humanity from our first memories as human beings.  It is a virulent poison that in truth lies within each of us, even though it may seem momentarily dormant.  It is only if we recognize it.  It is only if we name it, that we have a chance of cleansing ourselves of it.

 

I have come to believe that this is what Moses, Jesus, the Buddha, Black Elk, Lao Tse, Bahaullah, and so many others for thousands of years have tried to teach us.  They each and all have tried to provide us with soap to cleanse ourselves.  But they can only offer it.  The ultimate responsibility is always ours.

 

It is as if we have for thousands of years been arguing, fighting and much too often dying over which brand of soap to use, all the while steadfastly refusing to enter the shower to rid ourselves of the concept of “them.”

 

I suppose that is why I am so high on our new little church.  The Living Interfaith Church. 

 

We’re just starting.  It’s just a beginning.  But it is a beginning filled with huge and wonderful potential.

 

Interfaith as a way of life (Living Interfaith) embraces our common humanity, affirms our common humanity, celebrates our common humanity.  And we welcome a multiplicity of soaps.

 

As we grow, our great challenge will be to remember who we are.