Sometimes being Jewish has a particular impact on a TV and Film star’s actions which enters the stuff of legends. Take the case of Leonard Nimoy – who played Mr Spock the Vulcan in every early episode of Star Trek and most of the film series, joined on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise by the also Jewish William Shatner, playing Captain Kirk. Leonard Nimoy was a Yiddish speaking Boston Jew who was active in the Jewish community throughout his life. In the first episode of the second series of Star Trek Mr Spock was to greet the Vulcan matriarch T’Pau. Since Vulcans came from a planet full of people who were able to communicate telephathically by touch as had been established in the first series of Star Trek, Leonard Nimoy, the actor reasoned that Mr Spock would be very unlikely to greet anyone by shaking hands or kissing. So during the filming Leonard Nimoy had to come up with an alternative non-physical contact way of greeting. What he did was to remember something from the pulpit of his childhood Synagogue.
On major festivals a particular group of the men at his Orthodox synagogue – the Cohanim – those who claim descent from the original priests of Jewish Temple times, would stand on the Bimah of the Synagogue at a particular point in the festival services and lift their hands up both arms held horizontally in front, at shoulder level, with hands touching, covered by their tallitot to form the Hebrew letter “shin.” This stands for the Hebrew word for “Shaddai”, meaning “Almighty [God].”
Nimoy modified this gesture into one hand held upright, making it more like a salute. So, technically, the Vulcan greeting is not the same thing as the ceremonial Jewish blessing called in Yiddish, duchenen. Still, the resemblance is close enough to evoke instant recognition among knowledgeable Jews. When making this gesture Leonard Nimoy as Spock would say “Live Long and Prosper – a bit like saying Ud Meah v Esrim, may you live to 120, or even ‘I wish you long life.’ What the Cohanim at the front of the Shul would say is a bit more detailed and comes straight from our Torah portion today, Naso.
There God instructs Moses to teach Aaron a special three part blessing which Aaron and the priests are to use to bless the people of Israel throughout the existence of the Jewish people
May God bless you and keep you!
May God look kindly upon you and be gracious to you
May God reach out to you in tenderness and give you peace.
The men who stood at the front of Leonard Nimoy’s Synagogue to duchen did not gain the status of being a Cohen because they were particularly competent at making offerings in the Temple. Rather the Cohen status is simply passed from father to son, patrilinealy, as a right of birth. Though there are certain actions that you can do in your lifetime to exclude you from Cohen status, you can’t do anything to merit it. In our Talmud Class we are currently studying what this means – and all of us bar one are regular Israelites and not Cohanim.
So much was Cohen status not a matter of merit or ability that the Mishnah (Yoma) records the priests having to be taught every year how to do the Yom Kippur offerings, by having the animals that they would sacrifice shown to them and the techniques retaught again and again. What was important was that the right person had that status by birth.
As we celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elisabeth II you might have thought that to be a King or Queen was also just a matter of birth. But that was not the way that Judaism saw it. In the Book of Deuteronomy the Israelites are given a stern warning about what a King or Queen might be and why they might not want to install a monarchy. (Deuteronomy 17:14-20)
The concern is that a King or Queen without the right policies so to speak would be disaster for the people. He or she would just tax them, take their property and even potentially sell them back into slavery. For this reason the Torah mandates a process of monarch education – the King or Queen is to be taught Torah all the days of their life so that “his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel.”
The prophet Samuel keeps up the warning when the Israelites demand their first King, at the end of the period of the Judges, of which Samson, the Nazirite whose birth we heard about in our Haftarah portion, was one of the best known. Samuel warns (1 Samual 8:11-18): ‘He will take your sons and force them to drive his chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and to his servants. He will take your male servants and female servants and the best of your young men and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves.’
The people insist though that they want a King and their first Saul, has his merits but is mostly a disaster. And a lot of what the prophet Samuel warns is exactly what happens with both King David and King Solomon, despite what they achieved.
The later kings and queens of Israel were a mixed bunch, some terrible, some effective, until they effectively became client Kings of the Roman authorities in the Hasmonean period. There is a deep cynicism about monarchy core to Judaism. We expect our Kings and Queens to rule by merit and ability, but we didn’t normally get it.
As we heard earlier in the service, the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations, wrote a loyal prayer to our Queen. At the front of this Synagogue and pretty much every Synagogue there is a prayer for her said every week.
The Board of Deputies of British Jews was established in London in 1760, when seven deputies were appointed by the elders of the Sephardi congregation of Spanish and Portuguese Jews to form a standing committee and pay homage to George III on his accession to the throne.
In the same year as King George III’s Jubilee, a newly published edition of the siddur of London’s great Synagogue called for the “blessing, preserving, guarding, assisting, exalting and highly aggrandising of King George the Third, Queen Charlotte and their children”.
We certainly hope that our Queen will be a good queen, with God on her side.
In the Pirkei Avot, the Sayings of the Sages (4:13), we are told that Rabbi Simeon Bar Yochai used to say: There are three crowns: the crown of Torah, the crown of priesthood and the crown of royalty, but the crown of a good name a shem tov, exceeds them all.
And that is why the Jewish communities of Britain celebrate the Platinum Jubilee. Not only because the Queen has the status of monarch, but also because she wears the crown of a good name, of 70 years of steady, balanced and effective exercise of her role as our Queen. At the age of 96 to say ud mea v esrim, may, you live to 120 may seem excessive, but we certainly hope as a Jewish community that she will continue to live long and prosper.
We are entitled, says our Torah to have high expectations of those who rule over us. But we should also appreciate, have gratitude to and celebrate when our rulers do their best for us.
