The Movement for Reform Judaism

Fair Trade - Shabbat Vayikra 5762 - NWRS

Bat Mitzvah of Deborah Tamir

Those of you who have known me for many years know how I try, as a rule, to link my sermon to the Torah portion.  So it is particularly nice to be invited to give the sermon, on a week when there is such a lot in the Torah portion which lends itself to a really great sermon - relevant and extremely useful stuff like how to make a meal offering (you never know when you’re going to need that!), how to dash blood everywhere (those of you who would like to stay after the service, I’m giving a demonstration!), and most useful of all, how to remove lobes and fat from kidneys (prospective butchers, take note).  I hope you have all been listening carefully!

Of course, I’m being ironic, and a little irreverent. The beginning of Vayikra, Leviticus, the book we began today, is dense, complicated, obscure and alienating, and it makes us rather uncomfortable. Our tradition teaches us that there are 613 mitzvot (commandments) in the Torah.  Out of these, about half of them relate to sacrifices and the Temple. Although they are no longer operational this does not stop some people still taking them very seriously indeed. I remember sitting in a class in a yeshiva in Israel where we were discussing the correct way to do melika - pinching the head off a bird before sacrificing it. But for my part, I found it very surreal - in fact I think I remember getting the giggles.

And yet, at another level it is, as Deborah said, very interesting to try to make sense of it all.  And I have enjoyed working with you on that, Deborah, and I have appreciated how seriously you have struggled with it.  That depth and seriousness shines out of you, as you chant your Torah portion, and it shows what an impressive person you are.

The book of Leviticus as a whole is in fact a remarkable book.  Because it is about holiness - being holy - it is about what we do to bring us closer with God.  At the centre of the whole book, indeed at the centre of the whole of Torah, is what is known as the “holiness code”, Leviticus chapter 19, in the sidra called kedoshim, holiness.  And the whole book is an attempt to delineate laws and types of behaviour which will bring us near to God, and those which will cause us to be “cut off” from our people.

Firstly, although the stuff about sacrifices might well feel alienating, it also has a deeper sympbolic meaning, because as Deborah said, it is about connecting with God.  This is evident in the very word for sacrifice, the word korban, which comes from the root k-r-v which means to come close.  The korban was a way of coming closer to God, or a way of bringing God closer to them. 

And all the other laws in the book of Vayikra are based on the same premise - there are things we do which are holy, acceptable to God, and there are things which push us away from God.  Among these, are ways we behave to each other, and in Kedoshim, in the holiness code, at the centre of the book of Vayikra, contains in it the most central holy act of all - v’ahavta l’re’echa kamocha - love your neighbour as yourself (Lev.19:18).

If you take away 300 Temple laws, it leaves about 300 operative mitzvot.  Of these, more than 100 are about our relationship with our neighbour -  in matters to do with money and commerce.  So over a third of all the mitzvot which we can still do, are teaching us about how to conduct our business ethically, and in a holy way, acceptable to God.  For example, the last commandment at the end of Leviticus 19, the holiness code, is the commandment: lo ta’asu avel ba’mishpat - you shall not falsify - ba’midah ba’mishkal u’va’m’surah - measures of length, weight or capacity moznei tzedek, avnei tzedek, eiphat tzedek v’hin tzedek yihyeh lachem - you shall have an honest balance, honest weights, an honest ephah and an honest hin (Lev.19:35-36). So fairness in trade and commerce has been important to Jews, a matter of justice and being a goy kadosh, a holy people, right from our beginnings.

Some years ago, a young man, who shall be nameless, but who  was youth director (here) at the time and who happens to be closely related to an extremely talented director of music (who will also be nameless) - this young man came into my office upstairs for a meeting.  Now this young man, known for his many talents, but not necessarily for his reticence or tact, took one look at my tray of tea, coffee, sugar, and exploded with a guffaw.  “You shouldn’t be buying that, you know,” he said (accusingly), pointing at my little jar of Nescafe.  I wasn’t sure what he meant.  “Well” he explained “shouldn’t you be buying Café Direct?  Especially as this is a synagogue.”

For those of you who don’t know what Café Direct is, it’s a coffee which is produced and distributed in a more ethical way than most coffee.  I thought a lot about what Ed - I mean, that young man, said that day.  Actually, I was buying Café Direct from time to time, for home, but he made me think about two issues.  Firstly, that it was not just a matter of personal choice, but that there was a wider ethical issue there as well.  And secondly, that as a place of  worship we should be demonstrating that ethical awareness.  I also wondered what effect it might have on congregants who visited my office, if I had Café Direct, rather than Nescafe, on my tray.

Why am I talking about this today?  Because this weekend marks the end of national Fairtrade Fortnight, two weeks of trying to make people more aware of issues to do with ethical trading in the world.  As Jews we take business seriously, some of the best businesses in the country, indeed the world, have benefitted from great Jewish business minds.  So ethical trading, being ethical consumers and being ethical business people, is something which as Jews we should take very seriously indeed.  Fairtrade Fortnight has been co-ordinated by the Fairtrade Foundation, and supported by a coalition of development agencies, women’s organisations, supermarkets and Fairtrade product suppliers.  The Reform Movement has marked it by launching a project promoting purchase of Fairtrade products, and examining wider aspects of fairness and justice in trade, business and investment.

Rabbi Tony Bayfield teaches us that in the week we are reading about the ancient system of giving sacrifices, we should remember that the concept of sacrifice, offering something up for a higher  purpose, still operates today.  We can reflect on what we ourselves are prepared to offer up, of our own resources, in order to take seriously the repair of the world.  He asks: “Are we willing to make the very small economic sacrifices that will enable others to receive a fair wage for their labour and to escape the evils of exploitation and pollution?”

So what does ethical trading mean for us, the individual Jewish shopper, as we shop in our local supermarket?  It means being more concious about what things cost, and the conditions under which they are produced and imported.  Top of the list of these products are tea, coffee and cocoa; coffee for example is produced from the developing world but is being sold far too cheaply to ensure a living to their producers.  As coffee prices have fallen dramatically, millions of small-scale producers have been devastated and their lives ruined.  By choosing to buy a Fairtrade coffee, it might mean paying a little more, if necessary, but it also means the possibility of making a significant difference to people’s lives.

And there are other issues too.  For example, we know that some products are available to us because 8 year old children are exploited to produce them, deprived of all schooling and working most hours of the day.  We should know about this, we should let others know, we should make sure we don’t buy them.  Gerald Rothman, from the Jewish Association for Business Ethics, teaches us about the law - again, from Leviticus 19, the holiness code, lifnei iver lo titen michshol - do not place a stumbling block before the blind (Lev.19:14).  He writes that the rabbis “understood it as prohibiting any behaviour which would assist or encourage someone else to do something which was wrong, even if they could not see - were blind - that it was wrong.”

The Fairtrade people encourage us to make a difference to Third World traders, by buying products with their mark on - a capital F and the word Fairtrade, in a black box.  The Fairtrade products currently on offer are tea, coffee, bananas, chocolate, cocoa, snack bars, biscuits, honey, sugar, orange juice and mangoes.  Many of the supermarkets now also sell Fairtrade products.

We are the guardians of our world, as we are taught in the midrash Kohelet Rabbah (the midrash on the book of Ecclesiastes), that God says: “see my works, how fine and beautiful they are - I have created them for you.  Think upon this, and do not corrupt or desolate my world.  For if you corrupt it, there is no one to set it right after you.”  Our fine and beautiful world is currently one where the exploitation of land and people rule.  Globalisation and technology - both of which could be great forces for good - currently work far more in favour of the rich and powerful than the disempowered and dispossessed. We live in an increasingly alienated and alienating way; and if we do not care, then our children will care even less.

Deborah spoke about how the sacrifices were a way of connecting with God. Buying one jar of coffee rather than another may not seem a major act of ‘Tikkun olam’ - healing the world, but it is, in a small way, a sacrifice, an attempt to behave in a holy, godly way in the world, and to come closer to God.

AMEN

Rabbi Lee Wax

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Rabbi Tony Bayfield & Gerald Rothman are quoted from the booklet produced by RSGB/ULPS Social Action for Fairtrade Fortnight

Other source information taken from the booklet, with my thanks

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