One hundred years ago one month from today, probably right around this time, a fire blazed at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York. 146 immigrant workers’ lives were lost, most of them women averaging 19-years-old. The exit doors had been bolted shut allegedly to prevent workers from taking unnecessary breaks. When the fire broke out, there was nowhere to go. As Jo-Ann Mort writes, “March 25, 1911, became a Sabbath like no other. Scores of young immigrant Jewish women who couldn’t afford a day of rest went to work at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, a newfangled high-rise factory on the eighth, ninth and 10th floors of the Asch building, near Washington Square Park in New York City’s Greenwich Village. Their employers, Isaac Harris and Max Blanck — known throughout the burgeoning shmatte business as “the shirtwaist kings” — had managed to beat back unionization attempts by the fledgling International Ladies Garment Workers Union. This was the era when Jews were both owners and workers.”
First in Wisconsin, now also in Indiana and Ohio, protests and shutdowns abound as the right to collective bargaining is called into questions. Few would doubt that the changes that came about because of the Triangle Factory victims’ experience were a step in the wrong direction. But the conversation around collective bargaining today is a different one. It isn’t news to anyone that many states, including Minnesota, are in budget crises and have to find ways to balance the budget. Some would propose cutting spending. Others propose increasing revenue. The reality is that the solution probably lies somewhere in between. The proposed cuts in Governor Dayton’s budget fall short of the funds needed.
A budget is a moral document. Whether it is your household budget, a synagogue’s budget, or the government’s budget, a budget defines our values and priorities. Each year I get a report from my credit card on where I have spent my money over the past year. When I got my report last month, I was pleased to see that much of my spending last year benefited social justice causes and ethically and sustainably produced food, both values that I say I believe in and that my spending supports. In Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana, or even here in Minnesota, we have to ask if our state budgets uphold the values that we support. There is no doubt that both Governor Scott Walker and his supporters and labor unionists and those who support them want Wisconsin to succeed. The question is, what is their intention and are they going about it the right way. I’m not going to answer that question fromthe bimah. That’s for you to discuss.
What I am going to do is talk a bout how we answer that question. In this week’s Torah portion, Vayakhel, we continue reading about the construction of the Mishkan, the Tabernacle in the wilderness. When the Mishkan was constructed, the text tells us that only those whose hearts moved them were to contribute to construction of the Mishkan. This contrasts the creation of the golden calf that had total participation from the Israelites while Moses was up on Mount Sinai talking to God. Why the difference? The Israelites gave of themselves for both the golden calf and for the Mishkan, but it appears as though more people were invested in creating the golden calf. We have to wonder why.
There is a possibility that they each gave to the creation of the golden calf because none of them knew where their money was going. But when they saw the result of their spending – it didn’t match their morals – they were less willing to give for the creation of the Mishkan, nervous about how their money would be used. Another possibility is tied right into the name of this week’s Torah portion, Vayakhel. Vayakhel comes from the Hebrew root qof-hay-lamed, which is the same root for the word kehillah, community.
There are two different types of community represented. The golden calf represents blind group solidarity. There is no sense of separate individuality. The people are a nameless, identity-less multitude. But when the Mishkan is created, Moses assembles the people – Vayakhel Moshe et-kol-adat b’nei Yisrael, Moses assembled the entire Israelite people – and addressed them as a community. He detailed the needs and then those who were willing gave to the cause.
The Mishkan is not the work of one person’s hands. Though one artisan, Bezalel, headed up the labor, it collectively involved the work of all of the Israelites. Each person had the opportunity to leave his or her mark on the structure. Tradition tells us that the women brought their copper mirrors to be used in the Mishkan. One would think that use of something that had previously been intended for vanity would have been an unwanted addition to this dwelling-place for God. Instead, the women’s willingness to dedicate one of their most prized possessions for one of their highest values, worshiping God, made their gift worthy. Their identities, and the identities of all of those who gave, remain central to the notion of the Mishkan. They created a sense of shared ownership, of collective responsibility.
The community worked towards a collective vision, but not at the cost of the parts and people that made up that community. In Pirke Avot (2:2), Rabban Gamaliel teaches that all those who work for the community do so with a spiritual motive, working with the community. The question in Wisconsin, in Ohio, in Indiana, in any place where we create a budget, is whether or not we are acting with a spiritual motive. Do our actions and our budgets reflect our values and morals? Do we blindly participate and put our own pursuits ahead of the community or are we inspired by our values and seek to bring God’s presence into our community? We can only hope that we consider our place in our communities and act with a spiritual motive creating a mishkan in our own time, a dwelling-place for God in our lives.
Shabbat Shalom.
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