DATE: Saturday, October 11, 1997            TAG: 9710110475

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY TONY WHARTON, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:   98 lines

YOM KIPPUR SERMONS: A MEANINGFUL CHALLENGE A HIGH HOLY DAY GIVES RABBIS CHOICE OF ISSUES.

Diversity. The politics and struggles of the peace process in Israel. The meaning of Promise Keepers. The present condition of Judaism. Most important, atonement.

For a rabbi writing a sermon, a holiday as important as Yom Kippur, which Jews are observing today, is a challenge and an opportunity: a challenge because the rabbi must find a fresh perspective on the holiday every year, and an opportunity because the rabbi always has a larger audience than usual.

This week, rabbis around Hampton Roads found time, among their other duties, to think a little longer and harder about some of these questions in preparation for services Friday night and today, the ``Day of Atonement.''

Rabbi Lawrence Forman, at Ohef Sholom Temple in Ghent, said, ``There is this tension between the practical reality of what's going on in the real world and standing in the pulpit before a thousand people at each service and expressing some meaningful ideas they can take away with them.''

The ways they strike that balance are as diverse as Judaism.

Rabbi Arthur Ruberg, of Norfolk's Beth El Temple, said he'll talk in part today about the psychiatrist, writer and philosopher Viktor Frankl.

``He died the same week as Mother Teresa and Princess Diana, but you heard far less about him,'' Ruberg said. ``I think his death causes us to look back on how one person, particularly a Holocaust survivor, dealt with the meaning of life. His works help people deal with that.''

Like most rabbis, Ruberg uses the several opportunities of the holiest days of the Jewish year to touch on multiple topics. Another, he said, is the subject of ``what is required for the continuing survival and vitality of the Jewish people.''

``It seems to have hit the general media this year,'' Ruberg said. ``Why now? Why is this being talked about?''

Rabbis feel differently, sometimes strongly, about the question of timeliness, or addressing issues in the news.

``I consider talking about politics and these issues such an unfortunate waste,'' said Yosef Friedman, rabbi of B'nai Israel Congregation in Norfolk. ``This is not just an opportunity to make use of a captive audience. I'm here to inspire them, to make the day meaningful for them.''

Friday night he addressed the need to drop personal defenses and make genuine contact with others.

``Part of what we give up, or should give up, is the mask we wear all year long,'' Friedman said. ``This is the time to strip off our masks and tap into that self.''

Today, he'll delve into a historical topic mentioned by many rabbis, the 15th-century Spanish Inquisition, when Catholic interrogators tortured Jews and others. Friday night many synagogues chanted the ``Kol Nidre,'' a prayer with roots in that period.

Jews who had been forced to pledge their allegiance to the Catholic Church later chanted the Kol Nidre in atonement.

For Friedman, the inquisition helps him ``develop this idea that the whole history of the Jewish people is so dreamlike, so fantastic, it makes no sense. The only thing which explains our survival is that God means to keep us here, and to hold up our end of the bargain we have to go on doing what we're asked to do.''

The Kol Nidre is a starting point for many rabbis, but it leads them in different directions.

Israel Zoberman, rabbi at Congregation Beth Chaverim in Virginia Beach, will concentrate on the theme of religious tolerance, and connect it to the Promise Keepers, the Christian men's group that rallied in Washington, D.C., last weekend.

One of the Promise Keepers' promises, Zoberman said, is to spread the gospel, even converting those of other faiths - an ambition Judaism does not share. When that many men with that purpose gather, he said, it worries Jews.

``We acknowledge the pain and broken dreams brought to that gathering, and the effort to address those through prayer,'' he said. ``But we cannot ignore other purposes. And it is only in a diverse, pluralistic society that Jews can feel comfortable.

``If we just say, `Well, we have to follow Jesus Christ, that is the only solution,' who does that leave out? Yom Kippur is a day of affirming that we are also promise keepers to our own heritage.''

Zoberman has no qualms about addressing issues that are in the news: ``I believe that Judaism is a religion of this world. It is best expressed when we apply biblical ideals to the contemporary scene and learn from history.

``I speak my mind come what may.''

Forman is known for delving into texts other than the Torah. Earlier this year he used a novel called ``Einstein's Dreams'' as a starting point for a sermon about love and time.

``If I can pull something out of Shakespeare, the great works of literature, or a contemporary novel, that's fine with me,'' he said.

But he also expects to touch on a topic on the minds of many Jews, the turmoil in Israel. He is concerned about religious extremism among both Arabs and Jews.

``People are so frightened they turn to religious fundamentalism and literalism, which is really a reaction against modernity, and technology, and change,'' Forman said. ``This is true in Christianity, and the Muslim world, as well as fundamentalist Judaism.

``People who are attracted to that are people who have lost hope, who are hopeless. Well, it's one thing to feel hopeless, but it's another to drag others down with you.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

Rabbi Arthur Ruberg...

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