Kol Nidre 5786/2026
Beth Emet: The Free Synagogue
The Talmud poses the following scenario:
“Two people were walking on a desolate path and there is a jug of water in the possession of one of them. If both drink from the jug, both will die, because there is not enough water.
But if only one of them drinks, he, alone, will live and reach a settled area. What should the person holding the water do?[1]”
An impossible scenario, it seems. Tragic, for sure, and yet we ask ourselves:
What would we do, if we are holding the water?
Sometimes we face complex situations in which our values do not offer clear guidance, sometimes even conflicting with each other. In every outcome of this parable, someone will die. There is no clear right or wrong answer.
Even our Talmud couldn’t agree, and so it includes two opinions:
“Ben Petora taught: It is preferable that both of them drink and die, and let neither one of them see the death of the other. Rabbi Akiva, on the other hand, taught that…if you are holding the water, you should drink it all and save your life, because your life takes precedence over the life of the other.[2]”
Like our Talmud, we don’t always have clear answers about our most complex situations, and unless we are holding the water jug, it’s OK to admit we don’t know what to do.
The politics of Israel are so complex, so deeply rooted in thousands of years of conflict, entangled in issues of people, religion, nationality, politics and land, that the most moral outcome is not clear. This has led to the possibility of multiple, conflicting outcomes:
Some conclude that Israel should remain as a Jewish State, or a Jewish and Democratic State. Or perhaps two states, or just one state, Jewish, Palestinian or bi-national. Some feel that we must unconditionally support Israel as the only safe haven for Jews while others want to free marginalized people living under oppression at any cost.
Even though we are mostly arguing about a hypothetical future, we have become so entrenched in our perspectives that we engage in vicious arguments in our homes, schools, and synagogues. These arguments have ended with people cutting off their friends, neighbors, or even parents, siblings and children. Some have left their synagogues and communities in search of other communities who agree with their perspective rather than continuing to wrestle with complexity.
Others of us are filled with conflicting emotions and values, and as we agonize over the current situation, we don’t arrive at a clear answer.
Our Torah teaches us to save lives, to love both the neighbor and the stranger who live with us and to treat the stranger as one of our own. These values don’t conflict and both sides must do more to prevent loss of life and create equity. The Israeli government must stop the Jewish extremist terrorism of Palestinians in the West Bank and prevent any more deaths. Hamas and Hezbollah must disarm, ending their reign of terror over the people of Gaza, Israel and Lebanon. Israel must provide dignity to Palestinians living in Israel, wherever her current boundaries extend.
Yet few of us have the power to change the future of Israel or Palestine, leaving us arguing over a hypothetical situation.
And researchers[3] have found that hypothetical challenges rarely predict the future[4] because, “Genuine ethical thought requires engagement with social context, relationships, and political complexity rather than purely abstract thought.[5]” Those who argue the loudest often refuse to others’ perspectives, and to acknowledge the deep complexity of the issues.
Amid the complexity we find plenty of Israeli Jews and Palestinians who want to live in peace together, and who are building relationships. In 2024, as the war raged in Gaza, I went to Israel to find any glimmer of hope. I visited Kibbutz Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam, which since 1972 has maintained a 50/50 balance of Jews and Palestinians. Kibbutz members shared stories of peace, tolerance, and compromise as they work together to create a shared future. Yet instead of hope I walked away with sadness – both sides had given up so much of their identities to coexist that I doubted if others would be willing to do the same. It was all too complex.
I did find hope when we met Galit, an Israeli Jew whose son was killed in a terrorist attack and Ahmed, a Palestinian man living in the West Bank whose teenage sister was killed in an IDF raid. Instead of seeking revenge, they both joined the Parents Circle – Families Forum, a “joint Israeli-Palestinian organization of bereaved family members. Despite their profound grief, they transformed their pain into a force for reconciliation, dialogue, and peace.[6]” They choose to wrestle with complexity because they recognize in each other a shared humanity.
As we work to reconcile our hypothetical arguments with the complex reality, we turn to our ancient tradition. Judaism provides us a tool for living and acting with uncertainty: teshuvah. Teshuvah is our sacred process of reflecting on our actions or thoughts with the clarity of hindsight, admitting when we judged too fast, dug in too hard, or fractured a relationship over a conclusion we came to regret. We act and argue without knowing the full picture so often that we began our Yom Kippur service tonight with the Kol Nidre prayer, asking God to forgive us for the promises we will fail to keep the coming year. Fortunately, Teshuvah allows us to seek and share our truths, to act when necessary, even when we don’t know the complete picture, and to change our minds and behavior when we recognize we were wrong or caused harm. Judaism teaches that when we miss the mark, we can always make amends and try again. This flexibility allows us to speak our inner truths. However, Mussar cautions us that “Truth is delicate… Truth can be simple, but more often it is deceptively complex, and not always singular…Truth involves not only speaking accurately, but even more important… seeing accurately. And since truths are often multiple so must be our perspectives.[7]”
Our founding Rabbi embraced multiple perspectives. Rabbi David Polish was an ardent Zionist throughout his life, founding the American Reform Zionist Association, and Kibbutz Lotan, a Reform Kibbutz in the Negev. Even though Rabbi Polish maintained a steadfast devotion to Israel he didn’t blindly support the Israeli government. In 1971, as President of the Reform Rabbinate, he taught, “that while the American Jewish community has … demonstrated its … concern for Israel, ‘this concern rarely rises above the adulation for Israel’s’ power which, by itself, ‘can result in a Jewry that is dangerously self-deceived, arrogant, desensitized and ultimately a danger to Israel itself.[8]’” Rabbi Polish’s quest for truth meant learning new perspectives and speaking new truths. He demonstrated that Zionism does not mean remaining silent.
Unfortunately, few listened to Rabbi Polish or followed his example, and when I came of age in the 90s the absolute truth I inherited was blind faith in Israel. I watched Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat shake hands on the White House lawn and thought Middle East peace had arrived. I spent 6 weeks in Israel as a teenager, reveling in the history, infusion of Judaism into Israeli culture, and, of course, the food. We sailed from Athens to Haifa, reenacting the post-Holocaust Exodus journey while I devoured Leon Uris’s narrative about the formation of the Jewish State. “Am Yisrael Chai, the people of Israel live,” I chanted. I was ready to fight for Israel’s future because Israel represented the best of Judaism.
Or so I thought. Not once do I recall learning that others were disenfranchised and worse during Israel’s early years, or about the great disparity of Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank. By the time I started learning about the depth of the conflict in the early 2000s, it felt like a rug had been pulled out from under me.
I landed on my feet because I never stopped questioning, learning and experiencing even as I found myself lurched into a state of moral ambiguity.
As Palestinian perspectives and narratives became easily accessible to American Jews with the internet, countering the dominant Israeli victimhood narrative, the idea of a singular “Truth” about Israel evaporated.
Everyone suffered over the last century, and everyone fought for their freedom.
Even as I question and wrestle with Israel’s future, my deep, existential connection to our homeland remains, the connection that our ancestors prayed about for over 2000 years. Israel’s history is our history; it is part of our story.
I love Israel like I love a sibling – we are and will always be connected, whether we talk daily or only when our parents remind us. I yearn to return and I plead with God for her to represent the highest of Jewish values. Our futures are intertwined through a connection I cannot fully articulate. On October 7 it felt like Hamas had attacked my family, as though my children had been taken hostage. “Kol Yisrael aravim ze ba ze,” we learn, “all children of Israel are mixed up together.[9]” Like a sibling, I am quick to rebuke, but in the end, I always return to love, which is why the reprehensible actions of extremist Israelis and Israel’s government fill me with so much sorrow.
While I’m unclear about Israel’s future, I am not willing to give up on the Jewish State. It’s OK if you agree or disagree with me and please know that as I wrestle, I want to hear your perspectives and your truths, and I hope that you will open yourself to do the same. Today our truths about Israel might be right, or they might be wrong. Only time will tell. But that’s why we have teshuvah – because none of us knows the absolute truth.
In my quest for truth I constantly push myself, often into uncomfortable situations, to discover new perspectives and new truths. I read and listen to Israelis, American Jews, Palestinians, and others.
In 2024 when I returned to Israel for the first time in 12 years, I dove into complexity. I spent a day in Tel Aviv, eating shakshuka on an empty Mediterranean beach just as I had when I lived in Israel, only this time the Boardwalk was plastered with pictures of the hostages. I then made my way to Hostages Square to join in the protest protests.
The next day I went to the West Bank with former IDF soldiers to witness the occupation first-hand.[10] And there we encountered Israeli settlers building a new outpost and met Palestinian villagers refusing to leave their homes in the face of violent threats. We visited the combined Jewish and Palestinian kibbutz and then returned to hostages square to meet with the cousin of Carmel Gat, z”l, who at the time was a hostage in Gaza and was murdered two months later. Everywhere I turned, from the graffiti on the walls, to the menus in the restaurants, the message was the same – bring them home now.
I will never forget leaving Israel that summer. As I sat in a window seat, listening to “Tachzor, return” by Idan Raichel, I looked out the left side of the aircraft as the plane banked over the Mediterranean, flying along the coast. From that height, the haunting darkness of Gaza was absolute—a sharp, pitch-black void outlined by the lights of Israel to the North and West, Egypt to the South, and the pale reflection of the moon on the water. By this point, tens of thousands of people had already been killed. Tears rolled down my face—tears for the hostages still trapped in the tunnels, for the innocent Gazans caught in the crossfire, and for how intensely complex this place, my homeland, had become.
Eight months ago, I returned to Israel on a JUF rabbinic mission. We visited the Nova memorial site filled with pictures of faces of the young people killed, smiling back at us. And we visited Kibbutz Nir Oz, where we walked from house to house, stepping over broken glass, touching torched walls and feeling the pleas of the men, women and children killed in cold blood.
As we moved from house to house, empty vessels that were once homes, we saw one adorned with blood red graffiti. “Netanyahu,” the words screamed, “you are responsible for the death of this family. While in the background we heard the rumble of construction equipment, tearing down the old and broken and building the new. If these broken-hearted Israelis have the capacity and courage to hold love, anger, grief, and hope, shouldn’t we?
In just over a month, on October 27, Israelis will offer their first true referendum on Netanyahu’s government and the extremists Itamar Ben-G’vir and B’tzalel Smotrich. This is perhaps the most important election in Israel’s history and I pray for change.
Back at home I began a relationship with a first-generation Palestinian neighbor and got to know the Israel deputy consul general as I officiated at her son’s bar mitzvah. Next week, I am meeting one on one with the Israeli Consul General. Only through relationships and listening can we move forward. I continue to read countless articles, and I listen to anyone in our community who wants to share their truths, as some of you have already done.
Listening and learning never ceases, and I hope that you will wrestle with the complexity with me. In November we will welcome Rabbi Arik Ascherman, an Israeli Reform Rabbi who dedicates his life to protecting Palestinian farmers living under constant harassment and threats. I’m grateful to the Israel committee for organizing a post-election debrief and then inviting my a Northwestern Professor to speak later this year. Together we will continue to seek perspectives that both support and challenge our views and sometimes make us feel uncomfortable because that is what Judaism calls us to do.
It’s OK to form truths, and it’s OK to embrace moral ambiguity in complex situations, so long as we continue to learn, evaluate, make amends if we caused harm, and try again.
Beth Emet was born to wrestle with truth. And as we wrestle with truth we will commit to doing so with love and respect for each other because nothing is more important than community, even when we disagree. This is why our Talmud includes multiple opinions on the toughest issues. Israel is only one piece of our Judaism, and as we face complexity everywhere, including in our own lives, we need community now more than ever.
Consensus might seem impossible, but we must never forget that we share one unifying goal – we all want peace. Peace for us, peace for our neighbors, and peace for everyone. Together, we invoke the 2500-year-old words of the psalmist, “Pray for the well-being of Jerusalem, and may those who love her be at peace.[11]”
G’mar Chatima Tova, as one community, may we continue to turn and return to righteousness, hope, and love.
[1] Talmud Bavli Bava Metzia 62a, https://www.sefaria.org/Bava_Metzia.62a?lang=bi
[2] Talmud Bavli Bava Metzia 62a, https://www.sefaria.org/Bava_Metzia.62a?lang=bi
[3] Virtual Reality, transitioning from moral judgement to moral action https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0164374&utm_source=gemini#:~:text=In%20the%20footbridge%20dilemma%2C%20when%20faced%20with,the%20majority%20of%20people%20will%20approve%20%5B5%5D.
[4] Of Mice, Men, and Trolleys: Hypothetical Judgment Versus Real-Life Behavior in Trolley-Style Moral Dilemmas https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29741993/
[5] Kutz, Christopher. Trolleys, Drones and the Deadly Effects of Scientistic Ethics https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/CA51B987A6822B3EA82040C7F39A7B0B/S0031819125100892a.pdf/trolleys-drones-and-the-deadly-effects-of-scientistic-ethics.pdf#:~:text=It%20has%20become%20a%20philosophical%20phenomenon%2C%20with,of%20organ%20failure%20to%20do%20so%20by.
[6] https://www.theparentscircle.org/en/about_eng-2/
[7] Morinis, Alan. Everyday Holiness: The Jewish Spiritual Path of Mussar (p. 166,168). Kindle Edition.
[8] https://www.jta.org/archive/pincus-assails-ccar-rabbis-for-criticisms-of-israel-american-jewry
[9] Talmud
[10] https://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/about/organization
[11] Psalm 122:6-9
