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- Havdalah #21: Olive Trees, PINE Trees, & the Voice in the Wilderness
Havdalah #21: Olive Trees, PINE Trees, & the Voice in the Wilderness
17 Sivan, 5784 / June 22, 2024
White Rose RI
June 22, 2024
Dear Neighbors,
I did not spend the solstice the way I had hoped. I did not have energy to get myself outside to sit and soak in the bright sunshine. I did not have the focus to gather myself for a quiet moment of reflection, despite my best efforts. Sometimes something inconsequential hits a nerve, and I let it derail my whole week.
But the week is ending, and with the new week, I am embracing a new opportunity to reorient to my priorities and values. To any of you who need it, I’m wishing you the freedom of a fresh start too.
In solidarity,
Lee
Providence Ordinance 45610
Summary: Ordinance 45610 would ensure that the City of Providence refrains from investing city funds in sovereign bonds from the State of Israel.
Our Position: FOR / IN SUPPORT OF
How You Can Help: If you live in Providence, please contact your city councilor and tell them to support this ordinance when it comes up for a vote in July.
Resources: Jewish Voice for Peace RI wrote up a longer summary of this ordinance in their recent newsletter, and created a Google form to help you contact your city councilor:
Lunch & Learn: Land Back
When: Monday, June 24, 12:00pm-1:00pm
Where: virtual
Join the Tomaquag Museum for an enriching Lunch & Learn program as they delve into the Indigenous connection to ancestral lands and the land back movement.
Where Olive Trees Weep Screening
When: Wednesday, June 26, 7:00pm-9:00pm
Where: Red Ink Community Library, 130 Cypress Street, Providence, RI 02906
Jewish Voice for Peace RI is hosting a free screening of Where Olive Trees Weep. Space is limited and registration is required. Film to start promptly at 7:00pm. Where Olive Trees Weep offers a searing window into the struggles and resilience of the Palestinian people under Israeli occupation. It explores themes of loss, trauma, and the quest for justice.
Traditional Ecological Knowledge Walk
When: Saturday, June 29, 10:00am
Where: Blackstone Field (across from the Narragansett Boat Club), 2 River Drive, Providence RI 02906
Join the Blackstone Parks Conservancy and Lorén Spears, executive director of the Tomaquag Museum, for this traditional ecological knowledge walk around Blackstone Park. Explore the rich heritage of the Narragansett people by discovering the uses of Indigenous plants.
Katherine (she / her)
This Tuesday, June the 24th, is the feast of John the Baptist — but who is he really?
He was a wild man of the desert, eating insects and calling for repentance; a first-century revivalist preacher, baptizing Jesus in the Jordan; a prisoner in a decadent court, his head presented on a platter to Salome after a salacious dance. But all these images, all these events, could belong to entirely different people. So, who was John the Baptist, son of Zechariah, descendant of Levi? A prophet, a religious radical, a political prisoner, and cousin to Jesus himself.
His father Zechariah was a Jewish high priest, who served in the innermost parts of the temple, the Holy of Holies. Zechariah’s wife, Elizabeth, was barren, and both were aged and childless. When Zechariah was serving his turn in the temple, an angel appeared to him and told him that he and his wife would have a son, marked by the Holy Spirit from birth, and he would be a prophet to the nation of Israel. His conception, born to a woman past childbearing age and foretold by an angel, had echoes of numerous other stories in the Old Testament, of Isaac and Samuel, patriarchs and prophets from Jewish history.
Elizabeth conceived, to her and her husband’s joy, and during her pregnancy, Mary, who was pregnant with her own angel-foretold child, Jesus, went to visit her relative Elizabeth. No reason was given, but it’s easy to imagine why. Elizabeth was older, past her childbearing years, and would have been glad of the helping hand of a younger woman. As for Mary, taking the chance to get away from whatever rumors were circulating about a suddenly pregnant young woman who wasn’t quite married yet was more than understandable. Did Elizabeth and Mary stay in contact as they grew older, swapping stories and concerns about their God-haunted sons, surrounded by prophecy and angels? Did Jesus and John play in the streets of Jerusalem when all the faithful came to the holy city for Passover; did they watch the pilgrims and tell tales and build castles in the dust in the shadow of the Temple? There’s no way for us to know, but I hope so.
When John was grown, instead of following in his father’s footsteps as a priest in the temple, he became a prophet in the desert by the Jordan. This was no small thing in the time in which he lived, for sons followed in their father’s footsteps, and the position of priest to the Temple was prestigious; it would have put John among the religious and political elite of Judea. Instead, John went to the wilderness, to dress in camel’s hair and eat locusts and wild honey; he made himself into a prophet in the mold of Samuel and Elijah and Jeremiah, people who existed outside of and in opposition to the corrupt power structures in place, and who derived their authority from God-given revelation rather than hierarchy or bloodlines.
John, like them, preached repentance and reform, lest calamity befall Israel, and he did so to everyone — soldiers serving under the occupying armies; Jewish tax collectors who collaborated with Rome; religious leaders; the common people. And this was no safe thing to do. First century Judea was a hotbed of revolution and revolt, lying unhappily under the control of the Roman Empire. The people in power — King Herod and his dynasty, the religious leaders in Jerusalem — ruled by the good graces of imperial Rome, and only on the condition that they kept the peace by whatever means necessary. A charismatic blue-blood rabble-rouser who preached a morality and repentance outside their control was a threat, to them and to their community. John must have known that, and he chose to preach all the same. He is described as the voice of one calling out in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight, an echo from Isaiah; John is surrounded by prophecy still. And as he preached, he baptized people in the Jordan, and predicted that someone greater than himself was coming.
And in the midst of this revival, this ministry, Jesus came as one of the multitude to his relative to be baptized. Perhaps it was a reunion after years of childhood friendship, and John hoped for the chance to catch up with his little cousin that he had once played ball with in the shadow of the Temple; perhaps John was estranged from his poor provincial relative, who worked with his hands and came from the backwater of Nazareth. Perhaps he didn’t even know that Jesus was there, until John saw him in the line of people who had come to be washed clean in the Jordan; perhaps John barely had time to register him there before the sky cracked open and the voice of God spoke. Something new came into the world by the muddy banks of that river, in the form of his perhaps-childhood playmate, at once familiar and terribly, terribly strange. John understood he had been waiting for someone. Could he have imagined it to be someone he knew? Did he view Jesus with the loving contempt we so often keep for our families, where we hold them so dear and familiar in our hearts that we can’t imagine them truly touched by the divine, simply because we watched them learn to tie their own shoes?
After Jesus’ baptism, John’s narrative becomes disjointed. At some point before Jesus’ execution, John was arrested and killed by King Herod, Tetrarch of Judea, a Jewish client ruler under the Romans. The reason for John’s arrest was his denunciation of Herod’s second marriage, to his own sister-in-law, illegal under Jewish law. John was imprisoned but not tried; Herod knew he had caught the tiger by the tail. If he released John, he undermined his own authority and validated John’s denunciation of him. If he tried and punished John, he risked an uprising from the population who considered him a prophet.
It was in this limbo state of untried political prisoner that John wrote Jesus a letter from prison, asking him if Jesus was indeed the person he had been expecting. It’s not hard to understand why; John had spoken truth to power and been punished for it, had been dedicated from birth to ritual purity beyond what was expected even of observant Jews, had thrown away all his born privilege. Even with a visitation from the heavens, what was he to think of this cousin of his, who drank with prostitutes and ate with Roman collaborators, who went to wedding feasts and flatly refused to turn his ministry into politics? If John ground his teeth, there in prison, waiting and waiting for Jesus to do something, to speak on his behalf, who could blame him? And who could tell if he found Jesus’ answer — look at what I have done, what miracles have been performed, trust me and wait — at all convincing, or saw it as just an abdication of responsibility, an expression of apolitical apathy. Perhaps he understood that Jesus could hardly say much else, with John in prison and under supervision, lest Jesus end his own mission prematurely in a cell next to John.
The last thing we know of John is his death. At some point in the ministry of Jesus, Herod had John killed. This was not by lawful trial and execution, but by a rash promise and an extrajudicial killing. Even after being imprisoned, John had not renounced his views or stopped his denunciation of Herod and his marriage. While Herod was content in that state of affairs, or at least had yet to find an acceptable way out of the situation he had put himself in, his wife (and former sister-in-law) Herodias was less resigned to the status quo. Her power was her husband’s, after all, and so when he refused to put John to death outright, she forced the issue. When her daughter danced at a celebration of Herod’s, to the enjoyment of him and his guests, Herod rashly promised the girl any prize she wished. She went to her mother for advice and her mother supplied the answer — John the Baptist’s head. Herod was unhappy with the request, but to him his word was more important than legal proceedings — or a man’s life. John’s head was duly delivered on a platter to Herodias.
We don’t know if there was a show trial, or if John was simply taken from his cell in the middle of the night, or if he was even told what was happening. He didn’t live long enough for Jesus’s own execution, only marginally more “legal”, and he certainly didn’t live long enough to see Jesus resurrected, or the seed of Jesus’ seemingly non-political mission blossomed into full revolution. We don’t know if he died in despair, seeing all he worked for end at an executioner’s ax, or in hope, remembering God’s intercessions in his and Jesus’ lives.
So, who was John the Baptist? A political dissident and firebrand who paid the ultimate price; a religious leader who walked away from an easy and prestigious life to live shockingly with God; a man who watched himself be eclipsed by a younger, less qualified, less dedicated (or so it seemed) relative, and had to accept it. John is an awkward figure, a precursor to Jesus who didn’t get to see the end of the road he began, a road he started to make straight. He is, in a way, all of us; called to start the work, to speak out against corruption, to call for repentance, without knowing if we’ll see the end of what we’ve begun, or even understand how God is working in our lives, having to hope and trust in Him by faith.
Mind how you go.
A version of this essay was originally published online in the magazine Earth & Altar.
Needle Drop: “Our Happy Home”, David Crowder Band
My Girl, My Girl, Don’t Lie to Me: Pines Popping Up More Frequently in Rhode Island
On Thursday, June 13th, Steve Ahlquist published an alarming piece on his Substack: “The Pine Tree Flag is popping up on the desks of RI senators. What does it mean?”
We strongly recommend reading that article; Ahlquist, as always, does an amazing job presenting his case that, contrary to what these senators claim, this symbol demonstrates an affiliation with — if not a commitment to — far right ideologies and groups.
An additional layer that further contextualizes this phenomenon is alluded to in our third issue of Havdalah, in Fash Watch: the imagery of the pine tree, and its ostensible history as a “patriotic” symbol, has been used by a local Neo-Nazi organization for the explicit purpose of propagandizing in favor of turning New England into a white ethnostate.
With this in mind, please be on the lookout for the Pine Tree Flag and other similar imagery.
As always, if you come across stickers, leaflets, flyers, or other propaganda materials for white supremacists or other hate groups, we advise that covering them works better than attempting to remove them, and is generally safer; Nazis are known for hiding razors underneath stickers. If you encounter any flyers or leaflets, please collect and destroy them thoroughly before disposing of them.
Please do not post pictures on social media of any white supremacist propaganda. Nazis partially rely on the backlash generated by their materials to proliferate through the Internet; sharing images of their stickers and leaflets, even in outrage, is still participating in the dissemination of their content. However, we do encourage you to reach out to Steve Ahlquist, Uprise RI, the SPLC, and / or our tip line at [email protected] if you do find Nazi or fascist ephemera out and about. These are far more helpful ways to combat white supremacist harassment and recruitment.
Patriot Front Pulls an Alex Jones and Is Handed a Default Judgement in Lawsuit
Speaking of throwbacks, we have an update for the lawsuit mentioned in our inaugural Fash Watch:
Patriot Front and Thomas Rousseau, through their own dipshit non-compliance, have been handed a default ruling in Murrell v. Patriot Front! Cue whistles and airhorns from the studio audience!
It took months and multiple different people traveling to multiple different addresses to successfully serve Thomas Rousseau, Patriot Front’s leader, and, according to court documents, he was finally served while he was in jail. The biggest, reddest clown shoes in the circus, Tommy.
There’s still some things up in the air at the moment, such as damages, the identities of defendants “John Doe 1-99”, and to what extent the discovery process will be able to identify and locate those men. However, this is a step closer to Mr. Murrell attaining some restitution for the brutal assault Patriot Front members inflicted upon him two years ago.
News Round-Up: Local
Mayor Smiley is intensifying his war on unhoused people (Steve Ahlquist, June 17, 2024)
News Round-Up: (Inter)National
Immigrants’ Rights Groups Sue Biden Administration Over New Anti-Asylum Rule (ACLU Press Release, June 12, 2024)
No need for ‘Jewish values’ in the fight for Palestine (Anna Rajagopal for Mondoweiss, June 13, 2024)
Why the fight for Palestine is the fight against U.S. imperialism in the region (Adam Hanieh for Mondoweiss, June 14, 2024)
What’s next for the Uncommitted campaign? (Michael Arria for Mondoweiss, June 18, 2024)
Deep Dives & Series
Blinken’s lies about Hamas rejecting a ceasefire reveal the Biden administration’s true intentions (Mitchell Plitnick for Mondoweiss, June 15, 2024)
Anatomy of a Mistrial (Molly Conger in The Devil’s Advocates, June 18, 2024)
Nowhere to go but Church (Joshua Hill in New Means, June 20, 2024)
The policies of Mayor Smiley are sickening and killing unhoused people — maybe that’s the point (Steve Ahlquist, June 20, 2024)
Exile and the Prophetic (Marc H. Ellis for Mondoweiss)
Pod Rec: Molly Conger on It Could Happen Here
Tiki Torch Mistrial (June 20, 2024)
Break the Bonds Block Party
When: Saturday, June 29, 1:00pm
Where: Burnside Park, 40 Kennedy Plaza, Providence, RI 02903
Join JVP RI in advocating for Ordinance 45610, which would ensure that the City of Providence refrains from investing city funds in sovereign bonds from the State of Israel. This is a commonsense measure that would protect our city from the risk associated with providing unrestricted loans to a foreign military and government. Sovereign bonds of the State of Israel or “Israel Bonds” — direct loans to the Israeli treasury — provide unrestricted funds for the Israeli military and government with no guardrails, meaning our city has no way of ensuring that our public funds are not being used to violate human rights and international law.
Continuing Actions for Palestine
Jewish Voice for Peace Weekly Flyering
When: Every Wednesday, 5:00pm-6:00pm
Where: Providence Train Station, 100 Gaspee Street, Providence, RI 02903
JVP RI invites all to join them in their efforts to spread the word about their work and simple actions people can take to demand an end to the genocide in Palestine. They meet on the Statehouse side of the train station.
Weekly Kaddish
When: Every Sunday, 1:00pm-1:30pm
Where: Michael Van Leesten Pedestrian Bridge, Providence, RI 02903
Jewish Voice for Peace RI and allies will be hosting a weekly gathering on Sundays to recite the Mourners Kaddish and communally grieve the Palestinians murdered by the Israeli military. You need not be Jewish to attend; all are welcome to participate.
Power Half-Hours for Gaza
When: every day, Monday through Friday, 3:00pm EST
Where: online
Jewish Voice for Peace is holding Power Half-Hours for Gaza every day — join us as we channel our fury and sorrow into collective action to stop genocide.
Ceasefire Today Toolkit
This toolkit has a variety of links, including call scripts, groups accepting donations, phone banks, petitions, and more
News Coverage
As always, especially when getting news from social media, be aware of who is sharing information and why they’re doing it.
Al Jazeera Coverage of the War on Gaza has continued to be a reliable source
