On 2nd January 1928, Time Magazine inaugurated its very first ‘Man of the Year’ issue (The award is now titled ‘Person of the Year’). The initial recipient was Charles Lindburgh who had famously ‘made the first non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean on May 20-21, 1927 in his ‘Ryan NYP Spirit of St. Louis’
(https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2019712_2019703_2019658,00.html)
President
Donald Trump was last year’s choice (and a glance at the list of runners-up is
also worth checking out).
Time’s
Wikipedia entry describes this edition as:
‘featuring a person, group,
idea, or object that "for better or for worse ...has done the most to
influence the events of the year".
With this
in mind, I have decided to focus my High Holidays Drashot/Sermons on
individuals or groups who have, paraphrasing this entry, ‘done the most to
influence the events of my year’. All three of my Drashot are therefore
entitled ‘People of the Year’.
Rosh
Hashanah is our annual opportunity to both reflect on the year that has just
ended whilst praying for a trouble-free future. As we read in the Unetaneh
Tokef prayer at Musaph (please feel free to follow on Page 147 of the Routledge
Machzor):
‘On the
first day of the year (Rosh Hashanah) it is inscribed and on the Day of
Atonement the decree is sealed, how many shall pass away and how many shall be
born, who shall live and who shall die….’
Omer Shem Tov was kidnapped by Hamas on 7th
October from the Nova Dance Festival and held hostage in Gaza for a total of
505 days, of which 50 were spent 40 metres under the ground crouched in a tiny,
locked tunnel cell in solitary confinement in pitch-black darkness for most of
the time. He survived on a single daily biscuit and a little salty water.
On the first day of Rosh Hashanah last year, which
equates with 3rd October, he had been in captivity for 363 days or
11 months and 27 days. Whilst we were reciting Unetaneh Tokef in this beautiful
Synagogue, Omer was imprisoned in a tunnel not knowing whether the New Year of
5785 would be his last.
Following the horrific attacks of 7th
October, the Board of Deputies initiated a campaign to have Synagogues ‘adopt a
hostage’. My community of Staines chose Omer. For the duration of his
captivity, we attached a photograph of ‘Our Omer’ to a seat in the prayer hall.
We placed a framed picture bearing the hashtag ‘bring him home now’ on a table
in the entrance hall in front of a pinboard where we displayed updates on his
situation. Our members wrote emails to numerous MPs including Michael Gove and
Kwasi Kwarteng who was the former Member of Parliament for Spelthorne. We
prayed and prayed for Omer but were met with what seemed like interminable
silence. Little did we know what would transpire.
On Shabbat, 22nd February (which also
happens to be my daughter Talia’s birthday), ‘Our Omer’ was released and we
were overjoyed.
You can imagine our delight when we heard that he was
going to be visiting this country in June. We were asked by Staines to
represent the community and it was arranged that Stephnie and I would be the
only people allowed to meet him (from amongst over a thousand attendees). JNF
UK organised a special event at St John’s Wood Shul and they could not have
been more willing to help and accommodating to our requests.
However, as we know, it turned out that for the first
time in nearly 50 years, direct flights between Israel and Iran took place (I
wish I could take credit for that line!) over a twelve-day period. Omer was
unable to leave Israel due to the conflict.
Proceedings could have taken place online but being
the kind of person he is, he decided to postpone his trip so that he could
attend in person which he did in July.
We arrived early and were ushered into a room where
Omer was sitting with his father, Malki and a documentary filmmaker, Yoram Zak.
You can see a video interview between Dana Zohar who
organised the evening and Yoram at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfAP9OYvP1I.
I can’t adequately describe the emotions I felt when
I met Omer. Words fail me, but the first thing I asked was if I could hug him
and he willingly obliged! In fact, we talked and hugged at least three times. I
presented him with a beautiful book containing copies of the emails I described
as well as the photographs of the Synagogue (including his framed picture). He very
kindly recorded a heartfelt video message for the members. I told him that to
us, he was ‘Our Omer’ and that as far as we were concerned, we had adopted him
for life!
Which brings me back full circle to Rosh Hashanah. On
this day, Gd looks upon the entire world
and judges every living creature on its own merits. Chazal, our Rabbis tell us
that He opens three ‘books’ – the first for the righteous, the second for the
wicked and the third, for the rest of us who fall in-between the two. He
measures out our good deeds against our transgressions (or in Hebrew
terminology, Mitzvot and Aveirot) and He makes a decision that will impact our
year.
‘On Rosh
Hashanah it is inscribed and on Yom Kippur the decree is sealed…’
Last
year, Gd made the decision to inscribe Omer Shem Tov and everyone sitting here
today in the Book of Life. At the same time, He decreed that two people in this
room would have their lives impacted by meeting a third. I wrote the following
in my preface to the book we presented Omer which is taken from Pirkei Avot/
Ethics of the Fathers:
“Rabbi
Shimon said, “There are three crowns: the crown of Torah, the crown of
priesthood and the crown of kingship – the crown of a good name surpasses them
all.” As you may have gathered, ‘shem tov’ means ‘a good name’.
When he
was in captivity, Omer connected with Gd and had daily conversations with Him,
calling Him ‘Aba – daddy’. He would start by asking Gd ‘how He was’!
Since being released, he lays tefillin every
day (except for Shabbat and Yom Tov) and in fact, the reason why we had to wait
to meet with him was that he was doing exactly this whilst everyone around him
was busy preparing for the evening.
He is an
extraordinary human being in so many ways and meeting him has been
inspirational. He has brought home to us the enormity of what has been taking
place in almost two years of the nightmare that began on that Shmini Atzeret
morning. Just as importantly, his courage and bravery in extremely challenging
situations has been inspirational in a way that I can’t fully describe. That he
happens to have a great sense of humour is all the more remarkable considering the
trauma he has experienced.
Which is
why, to me, Omer Shem Tov is my ‘Man of the Year’.
We are
about to embark on a new adventure on the ‘good ship’ we call ‘5786’.
o
A year where we fervently pray that more Omers will
return to their loved ones.
o
That Israel and the Jewish People will find the
genuine and meaningful peace we are so desperate to achieve.
o
That our enemies will be judged on what they did and
will be held accountable by both heavenly and terrestrial courts. May their
evil plans and machinations against us be frustrated.
o
And finally, that someone as worthy as Omer Shem Tov becomes
my Man of the Year for 5787.
May we all be blessed
with a happy, healthy and peaceful new Year. Shanah Tovah Umetukah to you and
yours from Stephnie and myself.
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