Reliving the 20th Century -- Reliving Our Lives
Day 1 Rosh Hashanah - September, 1999

As we celebrate the new Jewish year 5760, we are also focused on a landmark new secular year that follows in just three months: the one with all the zeroes, the year 2,000. Looming over the arrival of the new millennium is a possible technological glitch that could make January 1, 2,000 a nightmare. By now we have all heard of the Y2K problem better known as the "millennium bug." This is the dreaded scenario: a moment after 11:59 p.m. on December 31, devices operating with micro-chips might start doing the wrong thing. The reason is that most computers recognize only the last two digits of a year. Therefore, once 1999 rolls into 2,000, the computer, recognizing only the last two zeroes will assume the date is 1900. For reasons the technologically challenged among us can only surmise, lots of things we have come to depend on may then start to function in bizarre ways. Governments, hospitals, banks, industries and the stock market have all supposedly made corrections at the cost of billions of dollars. We can only hold our breath and hope they work. But I don't know if our synagogue computers have been fixed so that the yahrzeit notices the office sends out will be right or that the lists that tell us the ages of children for the purpose of assigning bar and bat mitzvah dates will be accurate. And who knows if dues statements will be issued correctly. You may get a request for your dues for the year 1900. I suspect that you won't mind at all -- as long as they are calculated according to turn-of-this-century rates.

It seems to me that there is a simple fix for the millennium bug that could spare us a lot of anxiety and also save millions of dollars in the continuing costs for dealing with the Y2K problem. Instead of adjusting our computers, let us adjust our calendars. Judaism already possess a paradigm that can be effectively copied. You are familiar with the month of Adar in which Purim falls. Well, every couple of years we insert Adar 2. In effect we repeat the month of Adar.

What I am suggesting is that we have a second twentieth century and set the secular new year about to dawn as 1900. Not only will this adjustment give us 100 more years to work on solutions to the Y2K problems and ensure that we fix them properly, but it will give us an opportunity to relive the 20th century and hopefully, this time, do it much better.

I am certain that historians will conclude that in many ways the 20th century is not one of which humanity can be proud. Yes, we have made remarkable medical break-throughs, significant technological advances and, overall, have taken giant steps forward in human rights and liberties. But the past 100 years have also been drenched by blood shed in wars from one end of the century to the other. This is the century that brought us the holocaust and Hiroshima, the gulag and killing fields. It has raised terrorism to a frightening level of destructiveness. It holds up the dreadful scenario of crazed individuals or groups using lethal biological and chemical concoctions to wipe out population masses.

These are but some of the reasons that we could benefit from a second take on this century. Several weeks ago, I rented Steven Spielberg's masterpiece, Saving Private Ryan. The main conceit of the movie is a general's decision to spare a mother, who has already lost three of her sons in war, from losing her remaining child. Wouldn't it be an unparallel achievement if, in a second time around at the 20th century, human beings and nations everywhere on earth learned how to settle disputes without resorting to killing those with whom they have a conflict. How many mothers and fathers would then be saved from grief by the violent death of a precious son or daughter?

Several Sundays ago, 60 Minutes devoted one of its segments to a summer camp with a difference. This camp, in New England, brought together bright and articulate teenagers from Israel and Arab countries to live together for a period of weeks. When the season was over, the campers still held their same beliefs that their side was right, but they came away knowing that the supposed enemy had a face and that they had a point of view that was not demonic but worthy of consideration. Hopefully, these bright young men and women will grow up to become advocates of the view that dialogue with opponents is a saner route to conflict resolution than guns and bombs.

In redoing the 20th century, perhaps we could fix some other problems as well. Perhaps we could find solutions to the spiritual malaise and daily anxieties that lead so many people to abuse drugs and alcohol as a way of coping with their insecurities and despair. Perhaps, we could find ways of evening out a bit the economic disparity between the richest nations and the poorest and between the wealthiest individuals and the most impoverished. A midrash states, ‘Nothing in the world is more grievous than poverty, the most terrible of all sufferings. . . as our rabbis said, "If all the sufferings and pain in the world were gathered on one side of a scale and poverty was on the other side, poverty would outweigh them all." Despite the international efforts of governments and volunteer organizations to help poor nations develop their economic resources and to raise their citizens above mere subsistence living, significantly reducing poverty has eluded solution during our first try at the 20th century. Hopefully, we could do better at it, given a second chance.

There are others problems we might resolve if given a new opportunity. For those of you who face rush hour on the LIE each morning - don't you think it would be great if we could go back to the moment the automobile was invented in order to plan transportation more intelligently. Perhaps this time we wouldn't dig up and pave over the trolley tracks that cris-crossed many cities in the early part of this century. Maybe we would invest more money in improving public transportation and less in widening highways. Surely, there must be a more rational way to get people from their homes to their jobs than a car which usually contains only the driver?

Repeating the 20th century means we get to live our lives again. Wouldn't it be a great gift if we could go back to our infancy and start afresh. Knowing what we know now, would we have chosen the career we did? Are we receiving the satisfaction from it that we anticipated? Now that we see that there are work opportunities we never dreamed of when we selected our profession in our early 20's, might we opt for something different if granted the opportunity? And what about our family life? Are the priorities we have chosen for our children and for ourselves the same ones on which we would base our lives if we could start anew? Or would we seek instead more time for community service and for involvement in the synagogue and the Jewish community? Is our balance between work and family one we are satisfied with, or, given the chance, would we configure work obligations, family time and outside interests differently?

It's an appealing fantasy to think we could relive the 20th century and our lives. But we can't do it. We can't sweep this 20th century under the rug and get rid of its many tragic chapters. The blots on the record of human conduct during the past ten decades will remain forever. Yet, we are not without powerful options. Thomas Edison said after 10,000 unsuccessful experiments with a storage battery, "I have not failed. I have just discovered 10,000 ways that do not work," and he went on from there to success. So, too, we can set out to live the 21st century more wisely, having learned through our mistakes what doesn't work and leads only to human misery and suffering. With our mistakes as our starting point, we can pursue fresh ways to dealing with conflicts between nations, with economic disparity, environmental threats and severe societal ills such as racism, drugs and crime.

Just as we can't relive a century, we can't relive our lives from the beginning and obliterate the paths we have taken and the choices we have made. But though we can't start out from infancy a second time, we can launch a new vision of our life's course. Rosh Hashanah's message is that the past and the present need not be the future. We can take what has already happened and turn ourselves and our lives around. The key word for this holiday season is teshuva which usually is translated as "repentance." But teshuva really means "to return," to take a few steps back and see where new initiatives could change our lives for the better. For example, we needn't be stuck in a career choice that no loner brings personal fulfilment. We can reeducate ourselves or apply our already honed skills in new arenas that might be more meaningful. Gail Sheehy updated her best-selling book, Passages, with a new one called New Passages. In it, she describes a life-change incurred by a Wall Street trader who was laid off in a market crash in the early part of this decade. Before he lost his job, this individual was earning a million and a half dollars a year. After dusting off his latent entrepreneurial talents, he started his own business -- marketing a health care product. While grossing far less in his new business than he did as a Wall Street trader, he is excited by having more control over his life. He became interested in working with foster children and volunteering to help the homeless. He felt energized by a more satisfying balance between work, family and volunteer activities. The loss of his previously all consuming job has left him feeling more fulfilled spiritually.

We don't have to lose a job to enter into work that is more personally rewarding. We can plan our transition slowly, investigating what is out there while still gainfully employed. We can take courses that will give us the skills we will need in a new career or volunteer our time in an area that might give us entree into a paid position. Our work should not keep us trapped in a daily routine we have come to dread. There are challenging options out there for us if we are flexible and a bit daring.

Neither do we have to be stuck in a rut with our marriage. A new year offers new opportunities, renewed hope. The "Book of Life" is on a fresh page, offering every husband and wife a chance to fill it with caring acts, loving deeds, romantic experiences and shared moments that will strengthen their marriage and make it more fulfilling and rewarding. If there are issues that need to be resolved, hurtful incidents that must be overcome, there are corrective measures we can make if we but take the time to reflect on what is transpiring between us and our mate. And, of course, there are professionals who can help us sort out the problems and help us devise a plan for constructively dealing with them.
Similarly, we don't have to feel boxed in if relations with our children are not as cohesive or as happy as we wish them to be. Here, too, professionals can help us. But there are many initiatives we can take on our own that will bring us and our sons and daughters closer together. We can seek out ways to achieve harmony and personal satisfaction for all family members.
Marian Wright Edelman, founding president and director of the Children's Defense Fund, wrote a best selling book, "The Measure of our Success." In it, she deals with the issues of being a parent, especially a busy professional woman holding important public positions. The title she gives to one chapter is: "A Letter to My Sons." It includes the following remarkably frank paragraph.

"I seek your forgiveness for all the times I talked when I should have listened; got angry when I should have been patient; acted when I should have waited; feared when I should have been delighted; scolded when I should have encouraged; criticized when I should have complimented; said no when I should have said yes and said yes when I should have said no. I did not know a whole lot about parenting or how to ask for help. I often tried too hard, wanted and demanded too much, and, mistakenly, sometimes tried to mold you into my image of what I wanted you to be rather than discovering and nourishing you as you emerged and grew."

I suspect that most of us who are parents easily identify with that litany of parental errors. For me, every line of Marian Edelman's letter brings back moments in my children's lives that I wish I had to do over again and do it right this time. And all three of my children are present in the sanctuary this morning and willing to testify that I am not exaggerating my failings. Similarly, many of you have children here who, without much prompting, will verify that Marian Edelman's sins are also yours.
But the errors we made are not irreparable. We can start listening more carefully. We can examine the rules we have set for our children and see if they contain enough room for our children to fly in addition to also providing sufficient protection so that they are safe. We can try to be more patient and understanding. We can try to find a balance between motivating them to do and be their best and pushing them so hard they feel they can never make us happy. We can find a way to give them guidance without molding them in the image of what we want them to become. Rather than see them as extensions of our own egos, we can help them develop into what they want and are able to be. It is not too late to be a more effective parent. And the time to start is now.

The theme of our prayers on the High Holidays is not the unrealistic hope that we can relive our lives or a century and do it better a second time. The message of this holy day is not that when we fall short of the goals we set for ourselves or that our religious teachings establish for us, we have failed the test of life. The theme of our prayers is teshuva. It beckons us to assess and evaluate our actions and our priorities and change what needs to change. Mistakes are not an unsurmountable catastrophe but a lesson - albeit sometimes a very bitter one - by which to grow. The Bible is filled with accounts of men and women who failed, but who also overcame their failures and succeeded in living holy and worthy lives. A colleague has written: "the eye has a white and black element. Our vision comes through the dark part." Sometimes it is the very darkness that enables us to see more clearly. From the depths of our failure, we can pull ourselves up not just to the rung we were striving for but even higher. The very essence of Jewish thought is the belief that there is a better time and a better world that we can create in partnership with God. As we enter a new year in our religious calendar and, shortly, a new millennium in our secular one, let us strive to pull ourselves and our society a rung higher in the ongoing pursuit of personal perfection and a more just, compassionate and peaceful world.

L'shana tova. May God bless you and your efforts in the new year.