By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal
SAN DIEGO — I live, to my misfortune, in the 52nd Congressional District. Even if you live in another congressional district you cannot help but be aware of the bitter election battle between incumbent Scott Peters and challenger Carl DeMaio. You can’t turn on your television (in the San Diego media market) without seeing their attack adds against one another. Every day my mailbox is filled with pro and con brochures. We rarely sit through dinner without one of their minions calling our home.
I usually ignore all of it. I fast forward the television commercials and throw out the campaign mail without reading it. The political shouting and attack ads do nothing to sway my opinion except to be annoyed at both candidates. IMHO, it is all a bunch of babel.
This brings me, oddly enough, to this week’s Torah portion. Even though the parasha begins with the story of Noah and concludes with the birth of Avraham, in the middle is the tale of the Tower of Babel. According to the Torah, after the Flood the entire world population spoke the same language and lived in a valley in Shinar.
The residents of Shinar challenged God by building a tower that would reach heaven. God did not suffer their arrogance. God confused their speech and scattered them over the face of the earth. The tower would not be finished.
The story of the tower explains why there are so many different languages in the world. The story is also the origin of the word “babel,” which means “a confused mixture of sounds or voices” or “a scene of noise and confusion.” The residents of Shinar could no longer build their tower to heaven because they could no longer understand each other.
It is worth noting that it is possible to “babel” even when everyone speaks the same language. When people don’t listen to one another or shout over each other, it is also babel, “a scene of noise and confusion.”
There is a lot “babel” going on in the 52nd Congressional race. Each camp shouts at and defames the other. There is no attempt at civility or to find common ground.
However, in a way this is good. Whoever wins will have sufficient practice to hold his own once he joins the babel that is so prevalent in Washington these days.
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Rabbi Rosenthal is spiritual leader of Tifereth Israel Synagogue. He may be contacted via leonard.rosenthal@sdjewishworld.com