Tikkun
Olam
The mitzvah of tzedakah requires both G'milut Hasadim and Tikkun Olam. G'milut
Hasadim refers to those acts of loving-kindness, generosity and helpfulness
that come from the caring heart of a nurturing community. We will support
one another as we face 
life's passage, sanctifying important moments in our
lives within the framework of our shared Jewish tradition.
Tikkun Olam refers to the imperative to repair the world, so that it reflects
the divine values of justice (tzedek), compassion (hesed), and peace (shalom).
Our ethic as a people is grounded in our collective memory of slavery and
exodus, oppression and liberation. The Torah repeatedly emphasizes that our
experience as slaves teaches us that we have a special responsibility to
the stranger and the powerless, "You shall not oppress the stranger
for you know the experience of strangers having yourselves been strangers
in the land of Egypt."
The Torah creates an Exodus morality that sees
the Jewish people as a covenanted people, bound together by a common commitment
to be an ethical nation, a people in the image of God. This morality requires
us to oppose the enslavement and subjugation of others and to fulfill mitzvot
that help transform the structures of oppression.
Our historical experience of victimization has reinforced this moral commitment
as an essential part of our collective consciousness as Jews. After the Holocaust,
the Biblical commandment "Do not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor" assumes
a new and urgent meaning. As a people who suffered so much as a result of
the indifference and passivity of others, we must actively oppose injustice
and oppression wherever it occurs. To be neutral on issues of justice is
to side with the oppressor.
Our passion for justice as well as our sense
of peoplehood impel us to oppose anti-Semitism wherever it exists. However,
our passion for justice must be applied not only to Jews but to all peoples,
as has been reflected in our historical involvement in providing sanctuary
to Central American refugees. If we are not for ourselves, who will be for
us; if we are only for ourselves, what are we? Our moral tradition, and the
linking of G'milut Hasadim and Tikkun Olam guide us individually and collectively
in the expression of our activism.
As a community of faith, we are often challenged in our ability to repair and transform (tikkun) a broken and unjust world. We hope that we will have the faith and courage to be a voice for tikkun olam in the Jewish community and the community at large.
