(RNS) — More than 40 years ago, as I prepared to ascend the pulpit to deliver my first High Holy Days sermon as a rabbi, one of the elders of my congregation, dear old Arthur Leibowitz, pulled me aside.
“Rabbi,” he said to me, “Preach the Dickens at ’em.”
“OK, Arthur,” I replied. “Just please don’t have any great expectations.”
Charles Dickens, in the opening words of “A Tale of Two Cities,” describes the mood in Europe on the edge of the French Revolution:
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way.
American Jews already know, intuitively and rationally, that they are living in the “worst of times.” The rise of antisemitism, in the United States and abroad, and the still unfolding horror of Oct. 7 and its aftermath make that all abundantly clear.
But let me pull back the curtain and show that in some ways, we are living through the best of times.
Several months ago, we marked the death of Sen. Joseph P. Lieberman. He was the first Jew to run for vice president and to aspire to the American presidency itself. As I noted, Sen. Lieberman was a “Jewish Jew” — an observant Jew who kept his Jewish identity at the forefront of who he was.
Now, as we face the upcoming presidential elections, let us note something that some of us have ignored: Both major-party candidates (assuming that Vice President Kamala Harris will, as expected, become the Democratic candidate) have Jewish connections.
Former President Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka is Jewish, as are his son-in-law and Ivanka’s children. Harris has a Jewish husband, Douglas Emhoff, who is proudly and affirmatively Jewish and who has been outspoken against antisemitism. (President Joe Biden has a Jewish daughter-in-law, as well.)
Moreover, among those Harris is considering for her running mate is Joshua Shapiro, the governor of Pennsylvania. Shapiro is not only Jewish, but seriously so. He is a Conservative Jew who attended the Akiba Hebrew Academy (now, Jack Barrack Hebrew Academy) in suburban Philadelphia. His children also attend a Jewish day school — for which he was attacked by his Christian nationalist opponent, state Sen. Doug Mastriano, in the 2023 gubernatorial campaign.
There are reportedly other Jews, and Jewish “adjacents,” on Harris’ vice presidential short list: Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, whose wife is Jewish.
But let’s circle back to the Shapiro possibility.
Sixty years ago, the humorist Wallace Markfield said: “The time is coming when the wearing of a yarmulke and tallis will no longer be an impediment to the White House. Unless, of course, if the person wearing them happens to be Jewish.”
This is apparently no longer so. Twenty years ago, Lieberman’s candidacy did not arouse more than a blip of antisemitism. (Neither did the presidential ambitions of Sen. Bernie Sanders, whose Jewish identity was peripheral.)
In fact, some have suggested that Lieberman’s Jewishness — and his Judaism — contributed positively. Americans have been a deeply religious people, and they tend to respect people who have a religious faith (as long as that faith emphasizes ethical behavior and good works).
That was more than 20 years ago, you may say. Times have changed, massively and malignantly.
You would be right.
But here are the lessons.
First: Consider the term “WASP” — white Anglo Saxon Protestant. The term itself was invented by the late sociologist E. Digby Baltzell, himself a prototypical WASP. For some 300 years, white Anglo Saxon Protestants had ruled American life and its institutions.
No longer. That theological and cultural glass ceiling was broken, more than 60 years ago, by President John F. Kennedy. Since then, numerous non-WASPs have been both presidential contenders and presidents.
With the possibility of a woman of color becoming the next president, you can now consider that ceiling not only cracked, but nonexistent.
Which makes many Americans crazy with fear and anger. Prepare yourselves for a campaign season that features a toxic stew of misogyny and racism.
But it should not make the Jews fearful or angry. Quite the opposite: It should make us realize that, despite dark and notorious setbacks, America continues to live up to its best perceptions of itself.
Which leads to the second lesson: Some Jews — perhaps many Jews — are afraid of what a Shapiro candidacy would mean. In our darkest imaginations (and these are not far-fetched fantasies), his candidacy could pull the bigots out of the woodwork.
But this is where I counsel not caution, but engagement. It is far too late in the American Jewish story for American Jews to crave powerlessness and invisibility. We cannot have it both ways. We cannot simultaneously exert influence in America and want to crawl back into the background.
We have a Democratic presidential hopeful who has a Jewish husband.
We have a Republican presidential hopeful who has a Jewish daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren. It is possible that Trump will be present at the b’nai mitzvah ceremonies of those grandchildren.
It is almost impossible to imagine that happening in any other country. Almost: Victoria Starmer, the wife of Great Britain’s new prime minister, Keir Starmer, is Jewish. The family has Shabbat dinners. The president of Argentina, Javier Milei, has a particularly close relationship with a rabbi, Shimon Axel Wahnish, and might be rightly described as a philo-semite who studies Torah and attends Shabbat dinner.
Dickens was right.
These are the “best of times and worst of times.”
We are not powerless in deciding which version of Dickens will prevail.
