Charlton Heston’s Two Weapons
17 Shevat 5771 / 22 January 2011
Rabbi Daniel Cotzin Burg
When it comes to Torah (as in most cases), I recommend reading the book before seeing the movie. Although, in this particular case, I have to say that the movie was pretty good too. You know the movie I’m talking about. It’s the one whose images creep into our heads each year when we listen to Torah portions like today’s. It’s that cast of thousands, technicolored masterpiece that introduced so many of us, not only to the incorrect notion that Moses’ mother was named “Yoshabel,” but that also brought the Bible to life in a way that could only be done by the likes of Cecil B. DeMille. And it was The Ten Commandments that introduced much of the world to Charlton Heston who, larger than life and with his resonant voice, literally was Moses as he stood before Pharaoh and cried out “Let my people go!”
But there is another role, of course, for which Heston was perhaps equally famous: from 1998 to 2003 he served as president and spokesman for the National Rifle Association. Over the course of his term, he helped to champion Second Amendment rights, raising enormous amounts of money and securing the NRA’s place as one of the most successful lobbying groups on Capitol Hill. Heston’s posthumous legacy, of course, includes two Supreme Court rulings one in 2008 and another this past June through which the NRA achieved its leading goal: to establish a firm link between the Second Amendment and the individual right to bear arms.
And so, today, I would like us to consider two images of Charlton Heston. The first is from the movie The Ten Commandments, Heston standing, beard flowing, staff in hand, arm outstretched, and parting the waters of the Red Sea. The second image, equally iconic perhaps, is that of Heston holding a Revolutionary War musket over his head and proclaiming, “From my cold dead hands!”
So let’s think about that second image a bit. We are now just two weeks removed from the shootings in Tucson, Arizona, in which six individuals lost their lives and another thirteen were injured. Much has been said in the aftermath of this violent act. There is, of course, no simple answer to the question of why a deeply troubled young man would commit such a horrific crime. But, I would humbly suggest to you that if we are not having a serious conversation about guns and gun violence in this country, we are not doing right by the memory of those who perished. There were 170 gun-related homicides in Baltimore last year. The victims of 74 of those were twenty-five years old or younger. The day after the killings last week, 263 handguns were sold in Arizona. That’s a 60% increase from the same day one year ago. Sales of the Glock 19, which Jared Loughner used in his shooting rampage, have doubled. And sales of extended 33-bullet magazines were up almost 400%. Nationally, too, there has been a slight increase in handgun sales since January 8th (Guardian 1/12/11). There are approximately 350 million guns in this country. That’s nearly one for every man, woman and child. The U.S. has the largest number of firearms in private hands of any country in the world. We, I think it’s fair to say, are a nation in a love-affair with guns.
You might be wondering if Jewish tradition can help us to navigate this challenging subject. Does halacha provide any guidance here? The Torah, obviously, does not specifically mention firearms. But, our Jewish tradition does approach the issues of violence and weapons with a great deal of anxiety and caution, Jewish law coming to mitigate against what it views as our baser human instincts. For example, the Torah limits vigilantism by establishing arei miklat, specific cities of refuge, offering protection from blood vengeance. The Talmud is clear in its discomfort with Roman games that glorify violence, and later Jewish law codes go into great depth with regard to the sacred value of human life. Even defensive killing is forbidden unless one is fairly certain that his or her life is in imminent danger. It is interesting to note that if you were to look at artistic depictions of the four sons in various haggadot, you would discover that it is the rasha, the wicked son, the villain not the hero, who is most often portrayed with a weapon in hand.
And yet, in a manner of speaking, the scene from the Torah and the movie, of Moses at the Sea of Reeds depicts, no less, Heston with a “weapon” in his hand, than the scene of him at that NRA convention does. God says, “And you raise your staff and lift your arm over the waters and split them…and the Children of Israel will walk through the waters on dry land.”
The staff of God becomes the instrument of salvation, enabling the survival of an entire people. But the other side of that equation is the reason we diminish our cups every Pesach, we do not rejoice at the downfall of our enemies. The same staff that permitted the Hebrews’ escape sealed the Egyptian army’s fate as well.
Why then do many of us feel more comfortable, even proud of the staff in Heston’s hand but uncomfortable with the gun? To put a finer point on it, let me ask you this question: How would you feel if someone walked into your neighborhood Starbucks, a machine gun slung over his shoulder? Frightened? Panicked? Now consider the same scenario at a coffee shop on Ben Yehuda Street in Jerusalem. My bet is that if you’ve spent any time in Israel where off-duty soldiers carry guns all the time, you would barely notice; you might even feel safer. But in Mount Washington? One explanation is that we know Israeli citizens face a real danger to their very existence each and every day. Guns in Israel, with few exceptions, are not about glorified violence, firing bullets into the air in a show of false machismo. The pride we feel when we see an Israeli soldier with a weapon goes hand-in-hand with the knowledge that somehow that weapon helps secure the Jewish homeland from the kind of persecution and violence that our people have endured for centuries. The Israeli army, not accidentally, is called “Tzva Haganah L’Yisrael,” the Israeli Defense Forces. In a very real way, the Israeli with a gun can more easily be likened to the first image of Charlton Heston, burnishing the staff of God to ward off an ensuing attack, to save his people at a critical moment. The hope (albeit the somewhat naïve hope, but the hope of Israel nonetheless) is that guns in the hands of responsible and trained individuals are a last resort. This is what the IDF calls “Tohar Haneshek,” purity of arms – a flawed policy from a strategic perspective, an aspiration unfortunately not always achieved, but no less than an essential mandate in the eyes of God.
Now, I want to be careful here, because there are plenty of American gun enthusiasts who have nothing but respect, even awe, for their firearms. These gun owners have a deep appreciation for human life, they hunt sober, they use trigger locks and keep their weapons unloaded and the bullets locked away when not in use. It is not fair, accurate or helpful to portray all (or even most) gun owners, certainly in this country, as gangbangers, rednecks or savages. But, neither can we forget about nine-year-old Christina Taylor Green, or the children who are lost every year in this city and the hundreds of young people who are killed by guns every year in this country. Make no mistake. A weapon may be used appropriately and for self defense, but the purpose of a gun is to kill. When it comes to human life, particularly the lives of children, Jewish tradition enjoins us to do pikuah nefesh, to save lives, not to put them unnecessarily at risk.
So, with your permission, I want to share a personal story from my own childhood, one about which I have rarely spoken. When I was a teenager, right around today’s Bar Mitzvah boy’s age, I was hanging out at a friend’s house. We were bored with video games and looking for something else to do, so my friend went to his father’s night stand and pulled out his dad’s 45-caliber semi-automatic pistol. He passed it to me and we took turns playing with it. I remember, vividly, the weight of the weapon in my hands, the texture of the grip, the tension against my finger as I pulled the trigger. I am fairly certain, that had that gun been loaded, had my friend’s father forgotten to remove the clip or a bullet from the chamber, one of us would be dead.
My friends, pikuah nefesh, saving lives, sometimes means that the use of a weapon is called for, even necessary. But Moses was not just any man, he was the only man who could wield that particular weapon on that particular day, when few choices remained and a people stood on the brink of extinction. Remember the staff in the hand of Moses was raised with a heavy heart, not a barbaric shout! If that other Charlton Heston were here today on this Shabbat having read the sixth commandment, I might say to him: It is true that guns don’t kill people. But it is equally true that people kill people a lot easier and faster when they are carrying lightweight polymer-based semi-automatic weapons with extended magazine capacity. Just ask the families of those killed at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois and Fort Hood and in a strip-mall in Tucson, Arizona.
To do the good is also to make it more difficult to commit evil. If life is of supreme value then we had better be doing everything we can to preserve it.
There is a story told (Talmud Megillah 7b) of two rabbis, Rabbah and R. Zeira, who had a Purim feast together. They got especially drunk and Rabbah killed R. Zeira with his knife. The next day, in his sobriety, Rabbah realized the terrible crime that he had committed. He prayed for mercy and God restored R. Zeira to life. The next year at Purim time, Rabbah again invited his friend R. Zeira over for a feast. But R. Zeira had learned his lesson and declined the invitation. Miracles may happen, he said, but we cannot rely on them.
You’ve probably heard that Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was moved to a rehab facility in Houston yesterday. Many are calling her survival and her recovery a “miracle.” Certainly we celebrate that miracle, and we pray for Gabrielle bat Sarah to make a full recovery. But, as the Talmud teaches us, we don’t rely on miracles. We learn from our mistakes, and we take steps to make the world safer. And we don’t, through irresponsibly permissive laws, make it easier to put lethal weapons in the hands of underaged or ill-trained individuals, particularly those with a history of violence or erratic behavior or mental illness.
Hevre, I honestly don’t know how we might best address the pervasive gun-culture and gun-violence in this country, perhaps weapons-bans, trigger-locks or buy-back programs. This comprehensive approach might also include banning high capacity clips. Legislation to this effect was just introduced to Congress. Or, more likely, it is some combination of all of these. Certainly, we must address the issue through education and advocacy, ferreting out the root causes of violence in America in order to create any sort of lasting change in our cultural conscience. But, in the wake of Tucson we must not stand idly by. The Torah teaches us to preserve life. Pick your favorite approach and start making phone calls, writing letters or raising money. Let’s just not sit back and rely on future miracles.
One man who could inspire Americans to action was President John F. Kennedy who delivered his inaugural address 50 years ago this week. In it, he charged a nation to remain strong and hopeful and to remember that America’s true enemies are those systemic challenges that make it easier for bad people to do terrible things.
Now the trumpet summons us again, he said, —not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled we are—but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle, year in and year out, “rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation”—a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.
…And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man. Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citizens of the world, ask of us the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which we ask of you. With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God’s work must truly be our own.
Not three years later, Kennedy was gunned down in the same state where congresswoman Giffords now makes her recovery. Fifty years after Camelot, it is time again to ask what we can do for our country. Of the two “weapons” once clutched in Charlton Heston’s hand, only one remains. The time of prophets has passed and we are left with the cruder tools of war. It is up to us to make sure that these, too, are used in the pursuit of the holy, to defend life and to be used only when necessary. This Shabbat, let’s renew our commitment to President Kennedy’s charge. Let’s work for a more peaceful nation and a more peaceful world. If a movie can mobilize a cast of thousands to bring our ancient stories and values to the forefront of this nation’s consciousness, can we not do the same?
Shabbat Shalom