Winter 1984 - 1985 - Quarterly Review

HOMILETICAL RESOURCES
Karaitic opponents that its tradition was as much Torah as the written
word of the Bible. Judaism as we know it today is testimony to the
success of such efforts.
Other issues confront the Jewish community today and, of course,
generate theological sermons as well as books and essays. We
confront again the ongoing religious problem of evil, having endured
the Holocaust. We re-evaluate the theological significance of the Holy
Land because of Israel's rebirth. We re-examine the idea and meaning
of Jewish chosenness as we confront religious pluralism as a serious
reality in American society. Indeed, the very meaning of God becomes
an urgent sermonic issue in an age that has spoken of God's "death"
and in a time which has questioned the meaningfulness of almost
everything. Jews, like all others who are part of a community of
believers, cannot avoid the theological task when the moment
demands a theological response. Hence, we have a renewal of the
theological sermon in the synagogue as age-old Judaism seeks to
speak of God in the contemporary world. New demands and new
inquiries lead to new midrash. The process goes on, and we "renew
our days as of old" (Lam. 5:21).
Finally, as part of this introduction and orientation to the Jewish
homily, I believe it is important to note the significance of
particularism and universalism as factors in Jewish life and thought.
Judaism has not been a missionizing faith for well over a millennium,
nor has it been a "majority" faith at any time. This has meant that
Jewish teachers have directed their message inward toward the
Jewish community for a long time. This reality has shaped the
language, form of expression, and contents of the Jewish homily
making it a particularistic work, a work best understood by Jews. Side
by side with this particularism there has always been a strong current
of Jewish universalism. It expresses itself in the hope for the "days of
the messiah"" in the future and legislation "for the sake of peace" (BT
Gittin 59a, 61a) in the here and now. Jewish liturgy, especially during
the High Holy Days in the fall, prays for the entire world's sustenance
and safety. Similarly, Jewish lore explains the seventy sacrifices of the
Sukkot festival (Num. 29), which were offered when the temple
stood, as offerings on behalf of the "seventy nations" which
constitute the human family.
This mixture of the particular and the universal makes the Jewish
homily a partly accessible and partly inaccessible communication to
the non-Jewish world. In each of my attempts to share what a Jew
would teach about the Hebrew Bible sources of the lectionary for
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