But what if you believe, like I do, that the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in ancient times was, from a historical point of view, the best thing ever to happen to the Jewish people?

Had we remained a temple cult, we would probably have long ago been relegated to the dustbin of history by now, like so many other sacrificial cults. Had we not internalized our culture and our faith, built a temple in the mind and carried it around the globe, the greatest achievements of the Jewish people would never have occured. And of course, we are no longer in exile. Any Jew who wants to go move to Israel (for now…of course, the Orthodox Rabbinate in Israel might problematize the whole notion of who gets to be a Jew pretty soon).

So why do we mourn?

Anshel Pfeffer argued in Haaretz last week that we shouldn’t. He wrote:

Mourning on the Ninth of Av in this day and age flies in the face of both secular Zionism and religious Zionism. It contradicts the right of Jews around the world to decide where they prefer to live. The exile is over, and the temple has not been rebuilt because we don’t want to do it.

There is plenty to mourn in the world for Jews and non-Jews alike, although the Exile is no longer one of those things. I believe Diaspora is a blessing, for all peoples. It made me who I am. It made my parents and grandparents. It made artists and thinkers and scientists and cultures. It is not a thing to grieve.

We can mourn violence. We can mourn the continued abuse of our planet and our neighbors in defiance of God and common sense. We can mourn that Israel, the nation to which we returned, is far from perfect, but to mourn that which made us a global people is to mourn that which created me.

I am a product of Diaspora. I just can’t bring myself to mourn my own existence.

Anyway, much thanks to James Oppenheim for the shout out and I couldn’t agree more with his answer to the question of the miracle of cultural survival, Jewish or gentile:

“existence, co-existence, life, and joy.”

Ethiopian Jews celebrate Sigd, “a festival in which Ethiopian Jews gather on high ground to mimic an episode that was recorded in the Book of Nehemiah — the recommitment of the Israelites to Torah in the fifth century BCE, upon their return to Jerusalem after the First Exile.”

“The essence of being Israeli isn’t to leave behind your traditions, but to make your traditions part of Israel’s,” [Tzipi] Livni said.

A new synagogue is slated for completion within 30 days. The Faith to Faith gala and silent auction at First United Methodist Church in Springdale brought community members together to help pay off the debt…Like everything connected with the project, the gala was truly an interfaith affair. Prayers from the Jewish, Muslim and Christian traditions helped bless the meal. Muslim poet Mohja Kahf read a poem, while the keynote address was delivered by Nolan Richardson, a Christian and legendary basketball coach. [read the whole article here]

One of my favorite aspects of this story is the contractor, Fadil Bayyari, who grew up in the West Bank and has offered his services to for free. With so much political mistrust in the Israel/Palestine issue, it’s an inspiration to see individuals of faith planting the seeds for a better future.

“This is it,” [said] Henry Paris, 79, who has led Beth El’s High Holy Day services for the past 39 years. “We can’t continue to have a temple for four people. This is it.” [Read the whole thing.]

It is a sad thing when one community fades, but the richness of Jewish life goes on, with new communities growing, as in Bentonville, Arkansas or Mbale, Uganda or Igboland in Nigeria. But this is an occasion to note that right now, over 80% of the Jewish people live in two countries–the US and Israel–and within the US, most of the Jews are concentrated around cosmopolitan centers-LA, San Francisco, New York, Chicago and so on. This is not surprising. Young people go where there is excitement, potential, and economic opportunity.

It says more about Lexington, Mississippi that their community of Jews has not been able to go on than it does about Jews. As ever, the fate of Jewish communities is tied to the fate of the communities in which we live. Jewish Communities have never existed in a vacuum. Our liturgy talks often of the stranger and of other tribes and groups, of outsiders and insiders and the relations between them. This relationship, I believe, is essential to the Jewish people and the Jewish religion.

The shuttering of one Jewish community is not a loss for the Jews–its children will find Jewish life elsewhere if they seek it. It is a loss for the community of Lexington, Mississippi, and I hope that their town will endure. It’s a little bit of twisted analogy, but might Jews be like the canary in the coal mine for communities and nations-when they begin to disappear, there’s trouble for all coming.

“And seek the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you and pray to the Lord in its behalf; for in its prosperity you shall prosper”-Jeremiah 29.7

This week I’m blogging over at The Jewish Book Council and on My Jewish Learning (same blog, I mean that they’re cross posting). The first post:  Celebrating the Global People

Recently, Tel Aviv’s Museum of the Jewish Diaspora announced that it “will completely overhaul its exhibitions in an effort to put Diaspora Jews on an equal footing with those in Israel.” Part of that effort even means that museum is getting a new name: The Museum of the Jewish People.

This development acknowledges that the mindset in Israel has shifted from “the negation of exile,” to the reality that the Jewish People are a geographically and culturally diverse people, a global people. (read the rest)

The Jewish cemetery in Herat, Afghanistan

So I’ve posted on the last Jew in Afghanistan before, but the New York Times, continuing its interest in far-flung Jewish communities, has a piece up on Herat’s Jewish past.

I was heartened to read this passage:

“It’s important that Heratis understand for future generations that this was a very rich society in the sense of its religious diversity and it’s pluralism,” he added.

and this:

The Taliban, though responsible for harassing the family at times, resisted damaging the graves.

“The Taliban were not the worst of our problems. We had neighbors who would try and desecrate the graves or steal the stones, they were the worst, but we would tell them to stop and tell them what they were doing was unIslamic,” Abdelaziz said.

“We knew all of the families here … If they wanted to visit here they could, but they don’t.”

While this community will probably never return to Afghanistan, it is nice to see their synagogues restored for the history of Afghanistan, and while there are old Jewish communities vanishing all the time, new one’s are sprouting up as well, in unlikely places, and this story certainly tells that there is nothing incompatable with Jews and Muslims living harmoniously side by side. It is, though the story is complex, the norm in their history, and in the present.

It was terrifying and hilarious, and more than a little strange, but I made it through the two-minute, American Idol style auditions for the Jewish Book Network, and enjoyed meeting a lot of the programmers from around the country and the other authors pushing their titles. It definitely added to my reading list.

I was there to talk about Far From Zion, which comes out in October, and I had a good time, much to my surprise. So hopefully, I’ll be busy this fall/winter spreading the word and coming to a community near you!

Also, in the biggest diplomatic news in decades, Iranian and Israeli government officials might just be at the same Fourth of July events at U.S. Embassies around the world. This is a major thawing of US/Iran relations, but I do wonder if anyone at the State Department has considered that neither the Iranian Muslims nor the Israeli Jews can eat the hotdogs they plan to serve? Or perhaps they’re going with Hebrew National brand? I want a photo of an Iranian ambassador chowing down on a Hebrew National frank!

So the Chinese have forged Israeli fruit, sold it to Iran, where authorities discovered it and became briefly outraged that some of their own would do business with Israel. The situation has resolved itself, but it does suggest the absurdity of both the mistrust between Israel and Iran (Zionist fruit?) and the really weird inclination for forgery and fraud in the Chinese economy. On a more scary note, Iran has apparently arrested several people for preparing terrorist attacks around the June elections, and is accusing them, as usual, of being “Zionist Agents.” Iran does tend to accuse everyone of being Zionist agents, but still, a scary development, especially considering the other prisoners they are holding at Evin Prison.

Amnesty International says that prison holds hundreds of the thousands of political prisoners in Iran. In 2003, Zahra Kazemi, a Canadian-Iranian photojournalist, was beaten to death there.

In other “fruit” controversies, the 11th Annual Tel Aviv Gay Pride Parade is coming up, and two couples (one gay men, one lesbians) will get married at the parade, even though their union will have no legal standing. Though Right-wing foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman has “come out” in favor of civil unions because they serve his main constituency, Soviet immigrants, many of whom are not considered halachically Jewish and have trouble marrying thanks to the religious authorities choke hold on marriage in Israel (Israel does recognize same-sex marriages performed outside the country), his proposal doesn’t do much to help to help the gay community, as it wouldn’t really make marriage a civil affair, and the Orhtodox rabbinate would maintain control (though perhaps they’ll come around on the gay thing one day).

Today there are around 600 million Pentecostals worldwide, the vast majority of them in developing nations, and Africa is a hotbed. Pentecostalism is not so much an organized religion — it has no central authority — as a set of beliefs and practices that can be adapted by local entrepreneurs. It is perfectly suited to harness the modern forces of global crosspollination.

The article explores the global ambition of movements like the Nigerian Redeemed Christian Church of God which seek to break all national, racial, and ethnic boundaries to ensure that “the church will one day claim an adherent in every family on earth.”

Compare this with the also rapid growth of the indigenous Jewish community in Africa, emanating from Uganda, but growing in Nigeria and South Africa (not to be confused with the African-American Jewish community, which is also growing). The largest number of converts to Judaism, Rabbi Bradley Artson of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies notes, come from the 7th Day Adventists. While the Christian iteration of rapid religious growth in Africa has growth as its goal, the Jewish version has no stated goal, like Judaism everywhere, does not seek converts, and seeks only the resources to sustain itself. If the passionate, conservative, and wealthy Christian movement in Africa reflects the future of global Christianity, then perhaps the evolving, and growing, Judaism of the Abayudaya of Uganda reflects the most sustainable form of Judaism, being deeply committed to interfaith cooperation and mutual respect for all faiths. This model of Jewish living, non-nationalistic, committed to Torah, but by no means dogmatic, might just provide the tools for an awakening among disenfranchised Jews in America, if its lessons can be harvested.

Lastly, for another NY Times piece about the tiny Jewish community in Manama, Bahrain, and how the King has taken unprecendented steps for an Arab ruler to reach out to Jews and to try to bring back expatriates.

“This seems to be very much to us a country that stands against extremism and against the threat of a nuclear and terrorist-sponsoring Iran,” said Mr. Isaacson, of the American Jewish Committee.

There are many such small and beloved Jewish communities around the world, though few so deeply embraced by their country’s leaders. The question this raises of course, is one of power. Is it easier for gentile nations to treat their Jewish communities well when they have no power? Is it when Jews weild power that anti-Semitism rears its head? Are we loved only when we are weak?