Prophets and Priests

 If Molly Crabapple's Here Where We Are is Our Country offered a stirring tribute to a Jewish history of unswerving commitment to working for justice and solidarity with the marginalized and downtrodden, Angela Buchdahl's Heart of a Stranger offered a reflection on leadership in the messy here and now. 

After finishing Buchdahl's memoir on Wednesday this week, I was not surprised to learn that she and Crabapple traveled the same New York City book tour circuits. When it comes to the thorniest questions that plague the community, especially around Zionism, pluralism, and antisemitism, these two women offer a prime example of "two Jews, three opinions." 

Buchdahl, a dedicated fan of the great Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, identified two emblematic forms of biblical leadership with implications for would-be leaders in the community today: prophets and priests. 

Prophets challenge the people, calling on them to improve themselves, even if it means changing their fundamental assumptions and behaviors that have become commonplace. Priests maintain the ritual heart of the community, welcoming them into fellowship and stewarding their sacred spaces. As a rabbi, Buchdahl reflects on how she must balance these aspects of leadership, sometimes challenging her congregation to embrace discomfort for a higher purpose and other times sheltering them from the chaos beyond her synagogue's walls. 

Rabbi Heschel was a prophet. When I look back at my review of his Essential Writings from June 2023, I see that I wrote "his is both a liberation theology and a challenge to the complacency of freedom. In democracy, 'some are guilty; all are responsible.'" Buchdahl gently urges us to test the limits of our responsibility but also to embrace the circumstances of our belonging. She offers the novel interpretation of Jewish "chosen-ness" to be the embodiment of the outsider, a people who must leave home to find home. 

Buchdahl's deep understanding of Korean culture infuses her interpretations of Judaism and identity. I see Taegeuk in this paradox of leaving and returning, being a stranger and being a native, individuality and community spirit. Buchdahl also drew some novel parallels between Korea and Israel, both of which established modern states in 1948.

My Jewish star pendant, first made by my grandmother and worn by my mother, ants, me, and my daughter...

The Order of Taegeuk, a chivalric rank of the Korean Empire, given out between 1897 and the Japanese invasion of 1910

In her quiet, priestly way, Rabbi Buchdahl has offered me some valuable prophesy in this unsettled historical moment.