Resisting Empire on Easter and Passover

When the empire wants to crush you - how do you resist? Today we weave the biblical stories of Daniel, Jesus and a lesser known Judean leader named Nachshon, to raise up our collective spirits of resistance to despair - in the face of historical and current human cruelty and political domination.

For thousands of years, as empire rose and fell, the answer on the lips and in the hearts of countless people with different faiths and convictions was and is the same - trust in powers greater than the human force, de jour, bigger than a king or crown, general or president. Courageous defiance in the face of human hubris is not always about faith in a higher power - it’s often about faith in the human power to resist evil, the courage of simple people who refuse to let despair and fear get in the way of decency, humanity, justice and love.

Today on the Jewish calendar we celebrate the Seventh Day of Passover - when according to our tradition the Hebrew runaway slaves on their first week of the Exodus crossed the Sea of Reeds. And though according to Torah it is the miracle of the sea opening with Moses stretching out his arm and God splitting the sea — in the rabbinic imagination and the mythic legends it was a man named Nachshon who refused to wait for the Egyptian army or for God and jumped first into the waves. And as soon as he jumped in — the waves parted. And then the people followed. The legend of Nachshon son of Aminadav of the tribe of Judah is about a leap of faith — the courage to defy fear, risk life, and stand up to the empire no matter the price.

On the Christian calendar today is Good Friday - the awful day on which Jesus was crucified, branded the King of the Jews for his visions of messianic justice and defiance of Roman rule. His last words were prayers, from the Psalms, and like other martyrs before and after he reminds us of what it takes to believe in powers higher than flesh and blood rulers and their temporary hold on us. His brutal killing by the Roman Empire would be forever hailed as a self sacrifice of love.

As Jews celebrate the move from oppression to liberation, with the leadership of Miriam, Moses and Aaron - the Christian journey from crucifixion to resurrection is also about the transformation power of resistance and persistence, the rise from death to life, transcending trauma into the power so much greater than the gun or the sword.

These biblical heroes meet another one today.

On our Below the Bible Belt journey we are halfway through the Book of Daniel. This young Judean was taken captive by the Babylonian empire and ends up in the royal court as dream interpreter and advisor to kings. But he never gives up on his Jewish way of life, even at the price of death. In the famous chapter we read yesterday Daniel is thrown into a den of lions for his crime of praying to his Jewish God - for facing the east, where Jerusalem, his hometown was no longer standing, a city and temple in rubble, and yet turned to ad the ultimate direction of the sacred, with yearning for its restoration, renewal and repair. For this crime of praying with his windows open to the sky and not submitting to the empire he is thrown into the cave of hungry lions who lick him as a brother and leave him alive. Daniel’s courage convinces the king that there are powers greater than his. But Daniel is one lucky brave faithful when too many have died for their faith in the hands of too many pharaohs and tyrants, stone-hearted rulers and elected officials - through out history and right now.

Maybe what we get to learn from Daniel, Nachshon and Jesus, among so many other brave souls who stand up to tyranny and insist on justice— is that our voices, and choices always matters, our truth and our values matter - sometimes, even at the price of our freedom, dignity, and life.

That’s what the Bible is reming me today, on this holy day, in the midst of these difficult and heartbreaking days. Resist. Persist. We will overcome.

May Easter and Passover help us all deal and hope, rise and risk, with wise love, for peaceful days—for all.

Thank you for joining me - Below the Bible Belt.

Shabbat Peace שלום سلام