[Previous sermon: "Bereshit - October 9, 2004"] [Next sermon: "There Are Two Nations in Your Womb - November 12, 2004"]

Superman - October 15, 2004

Now that the last of the debates is behind us, one particular issue remains the primary concern of this election: who can lead America more capably into the uncertain times ahead of us. Is our country safer and better off not switching horses in the middle of a war, or can we not afford to ride this horse for a moment longer. With so much at stake, it seems a nearly impossible task for anyone to measure up to the kind of leadership we are demanding. We want our President to be someone who is decisive and will not relent on his ideals, and will proceed in accordance with his promises. But we also know how important it is that he is able to change courses if the overwhelming evidence suggests that his chosen course is wrong. Many of us want our President to be someone to have a deep respect for religious faith, but we don't want his personal faith to get in the way of governance. We want someone who appears steady and steadfast.

But we also know that the President of this country has to be someone who is flexible, who will successfully work with members of different parties to not only create but put into action policies that will better our country, and who will effectively deal with any crisis that might shake us to our foundations and force a new kind of response. In many ways, we are looking for a resident to be a Superman.

This week, our country lost our celebrity Superman. Christopher Reeve, who played Superman in the four hit movie versions of the 1938 comic strip, died this week at the age of 52 due an infection linked to his paralysis. When he accepted the role of the super hero in 1978, no one could never have imagined his success- not only at being the movie hero, but the real life one. As an actor, I understand Reeve took being Superman very seriously - he prepared for 2 solid weeks for his screen test, experimenting with makeup and costume changes for both Superman and bespectacled bumbling Clark Kent. By the fourth Superman picture, Mr Reeve was helping to write the original story for the film.

In addition to acting, Reeve was also a serious activist. Before his accident in 1995, he was speaking out on many important issues of social concern from campaign finance reform to garbage recycling in New York City. He traveled to Santiago Child to demonstrate on behalf of 77 actors threatened with execution by the Pinochet regime.

During Memorial Day weekend in 1995, the course of Reeve's life took a dramatic turn, when he went over a 3 foot jump without his horse, and fell on his forehead, causing multiple fractures of his cervical vertebrae which left him unable to move his limbs or breath without a respirator. There were days immediately after the accident that Reeve contemplated suicide, but he was inspired to hope by the love of his family. And so Reeve transformed himself again, into Superman. He not only moved into the area of directing movies that would earn him nominations for Emmy awards, but then also won the Screen Actors' Guild Award for best actor for a remake of Rear Window. He penned two autobiographies, one in 1998 called Still Me and another in 2002, called Nothing is Impossible: Reflections on a New Life. [And no one called him a flip-flopper.]

And he rose to the challenge of continuing his passion for activism, this time for the causes and issues that related to his new life- stem cell research and spinal cord injury research, for which he personally raised 46.5 million dollars. The obituaries in the New York Times attest to the important contributions he made not only in the realm of acting and film, but also in how he was a force for human good, inspiring hope for others with spinal cords injuries. For 10 years, he was unrelenting in pushing the boundaries by experimenting with treatments and undertaking campaign to educate others, raising awareness and money for research. How easy it could have been and what a loss it would be for us if he had chosen to give up, or worse to just fade away into the shadows of the limelight and live out his final years in the privacy of his own home.

When we think of the super men of the Bible, we may or may not think of Noah, from this week's Torah portion. He was after all, God's pick, to be the leader of the post-flood generation. The Torah says of Noah: "Ish tzaddik tamim haya bedorotav- [he was ] a righteous man of his generation." (Gen 6:9)

The Sages of the Talmud debated about whether this description of Noah's character is a compliment or qualified praise. Rabbi Yochanan claimed that what the Torah implied was that Noah was righteous only in relation to the wicked corrupt people of his time. And in a more respectable age, he would have been no better than average. For Resh Lakish, Yochanan's sparring partner, Noah was indeed extraordinary in that anyone who had the moral backbone to be a good person in such an immoral society would have been an even better person in a generation that encouraged goodness. Rather than the judgment our Sages make about Noah in particular, the more interesting teaching is what they are saying about societies. On one hand, following Yochanan's view that Noah was only good relative his society, we are invited to contemplate how great the power of society is to shape the behavior of its members. On the other hand, following Resh Lakish's argument that Noah was all the more righteous because he set himself apart from the corruption of other in his time, we are reminded of the extraordinary power of individuals to withstand the pressures of their society.

And what do these teachings have to do with the elections and Christopher Reeve? Rabbi Jochanan's perspective reminds us that each and every one of us determines what kind of society we live in. And like the Noah he saw, we cannot justify our standards relative to the lowest common denominator of those around us. We cannot accept average, even if it seems everyone else is content with it, because then average is all we will get. We have always had the power and still have the power to decide what kind of society we are going to live in: by the values we impart to our children at home- the importance of education, teamwork, faith, and achieving one's goals while making friends along the way. We contribute to the content of our society in the way we behave as we are driving, by the way we treat salespeople who are helping us, by the honesty we display in the workplace and the marketplace. And we determine the kind of society we are building by voting our deepest conscience, by electing officials who will translate more of these human values into public policy, so that more of us may enjoy the blessings we do.

And Resh Lakish reminds us that there are people, like the Noah he saw and the Christopher Reeve we knew, who are going to be extraordinary, who will stand out and stand up to the sense of values even when they are the lone voice in a crowd. And these people, too, must be nourished in our midst for our society to grow and remain strong. And we must continue to demand these qualities in our leaders. Our President should be a Superman. Not a man with extraordinary powers to lift buildings and prevent earthquakes. But someone with extraordinary powers to lift the human spirit and prevent degradation in our country and in our world. God's promise to Noah in the rainbow was never again would he destroy our world. And we have never been so reminded of our own powers of destruction than in recent days. Let us not be likened to the generation of the flood. Let this year be one of blessing and peace.

Amen.

Rabbi Batsheva Meiri