Intro: [Music] Sa'ed Atshan: And so my dearest closest friends all became Jewish, so being welcomed into their world for holidays meeting their families, etc. I found that there was something in their homes, the warmth, the generosity, that reminded me of my own. Intro: [Music] Deborah Waxman: I'm Rabbi, Deborah Waxman, and I'm so happy to welcome you to Hashivenu, a podcast about Jewish teachings on resilience. Deborah Waxman: Today's conversation will be a little bit different because we will be talking about Judaism, but we'll be doing it through the lens of multifaith encounter. Deborah Waxman: I am so happy to welcome as my guests today, not one but two people. The first is my friend and my teacher, Rabbi Nancy Fuchs Kreimer, she is a Professor of Religious Studies at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, where she directs our multifaith studies department. And she is the visionary leader of a wonderful branch we have working on campus chaplaincy for a multifaith world. And we are joined also today by Dr. Sa'ed Atshan, who is a Professor of Peace and Conflict studies at Swarthmore College. I'll ask him to talk a little bit more about himself, but he is a Palestinian Christian who is also a Quaker. And Nancy and Sa'ed are wonderful and powerful partners together in multifaith conversation. Thanks to both of you for being here today. Welcome. Sa'ed Atshan: Thank you Deborah. Nancy Kreimer: Thank you. Deborah Waxman: I'd like to ask you to begin by helping us to frame our conversation today. When I started speaking initially to Nancy, I've seen both from her example and learned from her teachings and at her invitation have experienced myself how much conversation across faiths can be a deep form of engagement, an invitation for transformation, and powerful spiritual practice. She agreed, obviously, and thought that the richest way to proceed would be to model it in this very conversation. And so we invited Sa'ed to join us. So, can I ask both of you to reflect a little bit about multifaith encounter as a form of practice that can cultivate resilience and much more. Nancy Kreimer: I'll start, Deborah. For me, multifaith has been one of the great gifts of my life. Because I have been on this journey of encountering people of other faiths, I have the opportunity to meet people like Sa'ed. People whose light shines and who I get to sit around and talk to them about what does their faith mean to them. Or do the practices that cultivate them being in the world in that way that I so admire, as I watch them walk through their lives. So, it's just a huge opportunity for me to be here and be in conversation with Sa'ed and wanted to say that first. Nancy Kreimer: So, the frame that I would give to my work is [a] simple, very simple frame. But I'm going to start by telling you a story. Back in 2003 or 2004, we had a grant to bring together Muslims and Jews who were emerging leaders. To talk about all the hard issues that are in our communities and between our communities. And I ran a retreat, at a retreat center, north of New York City, with 20 young Muslim and Jewish, very smart people. And we had a hard, difficult time together. We spent three days just talking about what's hard in our communities. This was 2006, felt like a hard time then, looking back it looks like a pretty good time compared to what we're living in now. But then it was a hard time and we were ... Jews and Muslims, are not known as either group for being particularly happy. [chuckles] Nancy Kreimer: So, there was another group meeting at the conference at the same time and it was a group of happiness researchers. And we kept watching them, they looked pretty straight, normal people. But one of them was wearing saffron robes, it turned out it that was Matthieu Ricard, who is known as the happiest man on earth. So on the last day my people said to me, "You know, can we stop talking about all this hard stuff and just go hang out with Matthieu, and find out why he's the happiest man on Earth." And we did. And, I'm telling you this story though because for me all the ground rules that we set when we sit down together and we say, "Now, only make 'I statements'", and do this and do that. Some of that takes some of the joy out of it. Nancy Kreimer: And what I've learned is that we ... I've tried mostly when I think about interfaith, not to talk about the rules for dialogue but to talk about what are the grounding virtues. How do we begin this work from a sense of gratitude, from a sense of joy, from a sense of possibility, curiosity, wonder. And how do we move from there as we do the work, the hard work, of listening to difference. How do we bring up these traits that are so necessary -- the humility, to bring the loving kindness that we have, the attentiveness, the awareness? And I'm talking about Matthieu Ricard because he didn't become attentive overnight. He didn't become happy overnight. It happened because he spent a whole lot of time practicing. So, practices, I'd be really curious to know Sa'ed, because I so admire you and the work you do. Do you also resonate to the idea that practices of cultivating virtue is really a way to begin to talk about all this? How does that work in your life? Sa'ed Atshan: Yes, thank you so much Nancy. It's an honor to be able to serve as your interlocutor, and I'm thrilled that Deborah was able to extend this invitation to us. The question you posed and the question that Deborah posed earlier really resonates, whether it's regarding virtues or this idea of multifaith experiences as being very spiritually grounding. And, these kind of conversations across religious differences helping anchor us in our own traditions and to see our humanity and the humanity of others. Sa'ed Atshan: I think that growing up as a Palestinian in Israel/Palestine, which is a part of the world that, whether you like it or not, you have to accept the fact this piece of land is holy to all three Abrahamic faiths. And, it's significant to Jewish Israelis, it's significant to Palestinian Christians, such as myself, and it's significant to Palestinian Muslims, and we have to find a way to coexist and to understand that the same spaces that we inhabited are just as profound and just as laden with spiritual values for all of us. And so, how can we have more spaces for more conversations? Sa'ed Atshan: I think that the Quaker tradition has really resonated with me very deeply. The idea that there is a light of God in every human being that we see a spiritual worth and we see a spirit in everyone regardless of what tradition that they personally identify with. So I love that radical openness within the Quaker tradition. And what's that done is that it's allowed the Quaker community actually to integrate all kinds of members. Whether it what we call Birthright Friends, you know people who were born into the tradition, or what are called Convinced Friends, people who later came to embrace the tradition. Those Convinced Friends come from traditions and they bring those practices with them. And so you know, there are Jewish Quakers, there are fewer but there are Muslim Quakers, there are Hindu Quakers, etc. And then some cases they may leave that tradition behind and they may embrace a new set of theology, doctrine, etc. Or sometimes they actually want to synthesize those in very, very powerful ways. And I find that it's incredibly inspiring when people are able to integrate those traditions in such a powerful way. And that we're able to create spaces where that's possible. Sa'ed Atshan: This is just in a nutshell some of the thoughts that came to mind after hearing the questions that you and Nancy posed. Deborah Waxman: That's lovely, and I think for sure, an incredibly important teaching for me, was very much parallel to the Quaker tradition that you raised up, is that mandate from the book of Genesis that talks about every human being was created betzelem elohim, in the image of God. That also impels me to listen, and to talk, and to be open to, and to reach for empathy, and to reach for understanding in every encounter. I don't always rise to it, but I strive towards it. Deborah Waxman: I would like to talk a little bit more about grounding virtues. You both touched on some of those principles. Nancy, I think the framing of toward happiness, toward connection, and toward joys, and towards virtues, is such a different approach than either solely being grounded in story or solely being grounded in the limits and then the barriers. Can each of you reflect a little bit more about that? Nancy Kreimer: Well, I would like to say something about Abraham Joshua Heschel at this point. Only because he has been such an important teacher to me. Before I ever heard of Brene Brown and her viral TED Talk about vulnerability ... If you don't know, which I'm sure you do, that she teaches that leadership, and human relations, and parenting, everything, goes better when you start from a point of vulnerability. So long before Brene Brown, I learned from Heschel that interfaith dialogue has to start at the place where we don't know. And where none of us know. And where we meet each other in our fear and our vulnerability and our longing. And it's from that place that we build the relationships. So that's been really helpful for me as a grounding. Nancy Kreimer: I went to a conference recently where they asked me to speak on the topic of "what I want non-Jews to know about Judaism. "And I thought, wow, really? That's what I'm supposed to talk about? I don't want to lecture them about what I want them to know about me. I want to sit there and talk to them about how none of us know what we need to know right now to live in this world. Because we are in really challenging, if not alarming, times. And, I feel like it's so important now for us to gather around our not knowing and also around the practices that some of us do know from different traditions that help us to sustain us. Nancy Kreimer: What you're talking about in this podcas,t Deborah, and what I've been learning from Buddhist and from Muslims and from Christians, there is a revival of interest in disciplines, in spiritual practices. Christians are talking about the Ignatian exercises. Everybody's talking about mindfulness meditation. Many, many kinds of embodied practices are becoming more interesting and important. And I do a practice called Mussar, which is a traditional Jewish practice that's having a revival. Nancy Kreimer: Anyway, one of the most exciting things for me, Sa'ed, is hanging out with people who are not Jewish and sharing that. So, I would like you to talk very specifically, if you don't mind, about what is your discipline? What is your practice? What do you do to help exercise the muscles that allow you to then, when you are in those hard places, show up that way? Sa'ed Atshan: Yes, I think that being a professor makes a lot easier in terms of, I just have a captive audience, so to speak. In my classroom I have students, at Swarthmore, our students come from all fifty states, they come from all across the globe, every single continent, so many different religious traditions. And that's represented in and outside of the classroom. And so having to model that in the classroom to create a space that everyone feels welcome, everyone is a first class citizen, everyone can use I statements, everyone can speak from [inaudible 00:12:49] of deep listening. And that empathy, and that compassion, and that intellectual curiosity about the other. And not going in from this position that I want to lecture, I want to enlighten you but to also be open and receptive to being changed, toward having that be a dialectical or reciprocal kind of exchange. Sa'ed Atshan: We do have an interfaith center on campus. When I was a student at Swarthmore I was an interfaith intern and now as a professor I really support our interfaith center, the work that they do, and also we have storytelling, story sharing where we create a space where students from different traditions come together and we assign students a certain number of minutes to speak and to share one particular story. And then we open it up and part of the practice is that once you share you're suppose to remain silent and you're suppose to actually receive the feedback and comments from those who were around you and they share what resonated with what you shared. So now, you're listening to how your personal narrative has reverberations for others. So this is becoming an increasingly popular space and activity that we have on campus. And I think that, it would be wonderful if we could model that in the world outside of academic spaces as well. The kind of spaces that are not so heterogeneous because so often we find ourselves in these silos intellectually, politically, spiritually. And to push ourselves outside of our comfort zone. It seems hard, hard work but it's the value. Nancy Kreimer: Yes, that's a beautful practice. Deborah Waxman: I think one of the things you're both kind of pointing towards is ... I think one of the challenges that we face is there are so many people in the world who are so certain at this moment. Nancy Kreimer: Yes. Deborah Waxman: So certain of their analysis, and they're certain of their prescription. And one of the things that I think we're talking about here is, backing away from that certainty and committing more toward relationship and more toward the potential for transformation. And I think that -- and listening, and openness, and empathy, are really critical elements of that. I think one of the things that I really struggle with as a communal leader is how to be muscular about this kind of progressive approach that is about easing off of certainty in the face of so many people who are so loudly certain. So, I love that this practice that you just put forward, and I think you're exactly right that's very much what we have to be modeling and promoting. I've been really excited by the rise of something like The Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom, which is about eating together, and about being together rather than about conventional dialogue. Let me talk first, then you respond. It seems, it's toward building community and connection more than toward the lecturing that you're talking about. Nancy Kreimer: Well I would just say in The Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom, we also are doing text study, which is very exciting, and that's actually a new frontier. You're absolutely right. The Jewish and Muslim women in our 125 chapters, for the last 2, 3, 4 years, have been building up through relationship building, eating together, children, etc. But, we are now developing a text study program for them that I'm doing with Dr. Homayra Ziad, whose my Muslim counterpart, friend, colleague. And we're going to be doing Jewish and Muslim sacred text and developing a way of reading them actually based on a Christian model of lectio divina, sacred listening and reading, that we're going to teaching to the chapters, so that they can study text together. Just wanted to share that. Sa'ed Atshan: Oh wow, that's wonderful. Deborah, just to go back to what you were saying about certainty and people who are so certain about their convictions. I think they need to resist that, I absolutely agree. I cannot more. One of the challenges is how we do that and how we strike that balance. In the political context of "alternate facts" and this kind of post-truth moment now where everything was contested. There are certain lines that we have to draw and I, and that's okay to do so. The idea of Holocaust denial for example- Deborah Waxman: Right. Sa'ed Atshan: There does get to a point where you have to be careful not to enable this notion that everything is contested and everything is to be questioned. That can be a slippery slope. There are fundamental principles that we- Deborah Waxman: Right. Sa'ed Atshan: ... can hold dear andwe can hold on to very, very passionately, and in some ways we must, in this political climate that we are living in. But at the same time I think that maintaining that openness and maintaining that humility and being open to uncertainty and being open to understand that all of us are evolving, all of us are transforming, all of us are changing. None of us are static. I, at the age of 33, am not the same person that I was five years ago or five years before that. And so that's really what gives me the patience to do this kind of work. To look at my own journey but also to see another's potential for growth and potential to [crosstalk 00:18:28] may not see the results immediately. But I've had so many cases where the people have come, even several years later, and said, "Well I'd like to apologize," or "there's something that you said and only now has it finally registered, looking back". And those conversations can be so beautiful. So I never ever dismiss anyone. I see potential in everyone. Deborah Waxman: Wow, that's amazing. Sa'ed could you tell us just one thread of your story and how you've come to embrace the evolution and potential so deeply? Sa'ed Atshan: Yes, absolutely. Well I, to give you an example, when I mentioned arriving at Swarthmore as a student. And so I started in the fall, 2002. I grew up in Palestine and I had limited encounters with Jewish individuals. The only ones I was familiar with were soldiers or settlers in the West Bank, etc. And so, I arrived in a community that has a very significant Jewish population. Sa'ed Atshan: And I remember the head of the Jewish student organization wore a kippah, and when he would see me -- we didn't know each other. In my first year, and he would pass by me, always had this big beautiful smile. Very, very, very warm. And I remember, it kind of threw me off. First, I was thinking, why is he smiling so much? Why is he being so effusive? I was being perplexed. It was something I was accustomed to. And one day he just knocked on my door in my dorm. Sa'ed Atshan: And he introduced himself and said, "I'm Michael," etc. And I started to learn more about him, that he identified as Orthodox, but socially he was very progressive. He was for LBGTQ rights. And politically he was very progressive as well. And it had never occurred to me that how it was even possible that you could be Orthodox and socially progressive and even politically progressive. And so we became very good friends, very, very dear friends. We both went on to Harvard together for graduate school. We are very, very, very close, and my best friend in college ended up being Ben Schwartz, who was in my class, whose also from a Jewish family. Sa'ed Atshan: My dearest, closest friends all became Jewish. Being invited to their homes, being welcomed into their world for holidays, meeting their families, etc. I found that I could connect to them much more than I could to my traditional WASP classmates and friends, I found that there was something in their homes, the warmth, their generosity, there was something about their parents, their mothers that reminded me of my own. Seeing those parallels so strongly in terms of affect, in terms of emotion, in terms of intensity, in terms of body language right now ... It was just so much there. Sa'ed Atshan: When I was 15 I could never imagined that day would come. If someone said, "When you get to college in the U.S. your friends are going to be Jewish." I could've never ever imagined being their best man in those weddings, etc. But I'm, in many ways I think that, being open to that was ... I feel so blessed that I was receptive to it. And also that they had the generosity of the spirit to engage me as well. Deborah Waxman: I mean, I have tears in my eyes. I feel like you just kind of described a little bit of a messianic potential. And it sounds like that experience shaped your whole life, your vocation, your professional and academic interests. Sa'ed Atshan: Absolutely. Nancy Kreimer: I just want to say, Sa'ed, that I love you that you said that you're 33. Because, I am 66 and I wouldn't want to be one week younger. If I were one week younger, I wouldn't have had the last week I've had which was at a conference at Howard University, that I've never been to Howard University, and hanging out with people talking about Black Panther, the movie, with whole lot of black Americans that I've never met before. So, I'm moved by your story and I think we make interesting book ends. Deborah Waxman: I mean Nancy you began by saying that you felt like multifaith work has been a great blessing in your life. Is there a story that you want to tell? We are actually going to be winding down, so this would be a powerful way to end. Nancy Kreimer: Well I guess what I would say is just how things change. I mean, I got into this work because I was moved by Christians who were so concerned about the Christian complicity for the Holocaust that they wanted to rethink Christian theology. And these Christians were so impressive to me, I was so, I just couldn't believe how their moral fervor was so great that I wanted to go study with them, and learn with them. And I majored in Jewish Christian relations. Nancy Kreimer: And then, along came 2001, and I realized, wow, I spent all these years telling Christians how they need to clean up their act. And now the shoes on the other foot a bit. Because now I'm an American non-Muslim looking at how Jewish tradition and my American tradition needs to understand something they don't understand very well, which is Islam and Muslims. And I'm making this much shorter, but basically I saw my work with Muslims as a kind of way of honoring my Christian teachers. Because they had taught me that the responsibility of someone who gets something from a tradition is also to clean up the tradition, and to make that tradition as good as it can be. Nancy Kreimer: So I, I guess what I learned and gotten from this work, is just, I'm going to say Reconstructionism, but that's the movement that I come from, that's the movement you are part of, you lead. What I learned from Mordecai Kaplan was that a tradition doesn't just hang out, it needs to continuously evolve. Multivocal, multivalent traditions that need to respond to the moral challenges of the times they're in. And I've watch Christians do it, I've been part of a movement now of Jews and Christians, we're trying to do that in relationship to Islam. And it's just been an enormous strength for me. Nancy Kreimer: You talked, Sa'ed, of seeing God in everybody, and what I've learned from Reconstructionism is there's truth in all the traditions. That we're not the chosen people, we don't have a chosen legacy. Our tradition doesn't have a truth with a capital T. And so my mantra has always been, "Hey, if there is someone out there, who knows something about God, knows something about how to live well in this world, knows something about finding meaning, I'm all ears. " Nancy Kreimer: And because I've had that openness, because I grew up in that tradition of Reconstructionism that said, you know what we're all in this together. And there's no one tradition that has a better take on this. We have one that we treasure, one that we love. And multifaith workers help me love it even more. But it's also given me the opportunity to really enjoy watching change. Something you said, Sa'ed, I really was moved by, the way you talked about change in yourself. I, in talking about change in my tradition, and the tradition of Christianity, that I watched change post-Holocaust. I'm watching it now with young Muslims, whose tradition is changing because they're in America and they're learning different kinds of things and changing. So all of that is so inspiring in terms of living your own life and changing. Deborah Waxman: [crosstalk 00:26:12] Yes, it's very beautiful. And you said, Reconstructionism doesn't believe that we haveTruth with a capital T. And as Sa'ed, I think it's very important to talk about, we do believe, I think, in truths, with a small T and an S on the end. And multiple pathways, which hold us accountable the way Sa'ed was telling us. I think, when I think about Reconstructionism too, I love how you talk about it, Nancy. Of late I've been talking a lot about how deeply relational I think Reconstructionism is, so that it's not just the ideas, and not just the theology, or the practices. But also good, ultimately, it's grounded in the relationships and in the community, and in the people. And this work, I think, pushes us, we are called to do it within our communities and we are called to do it beyond our communities. That's part of the core insight of living in two civilizations, the Jewish civilization, and the American civilization. And I think in the 21st century it's also about looking beyond and looking to other communities. Deborah Waxman: I am so grateful to both of you for the work that you do in the world, for the modeling, and for the conversation, and for the relationship with Nancy. It's a long standing relationship. Sa'ed I hope this is the beginning [crosstalk 00:27:34] of a long relationship. I'd like to thank my guests Nancy Fuchs Kreimer and Sa'ed Atshan for our wonderful conversation on multifaith encounter. For more information, for a lot of resources, you can go to our website Hashivenu.fireside.fm or to our larger website, ReconstructingJudaism.org. Thanks so much for being with us today, I'm Rabbi Deborah Waxman and you've been listening to Hashivenu: Jewish Teachings on Resilience. Music: [Music]