Goodbye to a Prophet

This week we read Parashat Noach. We encounter two great stories — the Tower of Babel (that we just read) and the Flood. When God sees the wickedness of humanity, the decision is made to begin again, saving only Noah, his family, and the animals in the ark.

But why Noah? The Torah tells us:

נֹחַ אִישׁ צַדִּיק תָּמִים הָיָה בְּדֹֽרֹתָיו אֶת־הָאֱלֹהִים הִתְהַלֶּךְ־נֹחַ

“Noah was a righteous man; in his generation, he was above reproach; Noah walked with God.” 

The phrase in his generation may suggest, as Rashi teaches, that Noah’s righteousness was relative — that he was good compared to the wickedness around him. And perhaps this is what Hillel meant in his timeless words, bemakom she’ein anashim hishtadel lihyot ish — “in a place where no one behaves humanely, be a mensch.”

To be righteous in a place where people have forgotten their humanity is, in itself, an act of holiness. Sometimes we have the strength to remain untouched by the corruption that surrounds us; sometimes we are pulled down by it. To be tzaddik bedorotav — righteous in one’s generation — may not mean perfection, but persistence: the refusal to surrender our humanity, even when others do. It may mean being beinoni, standing on that moral tightrope, choosing — again and again — to walk with God.

Some of the most important contemporary Jewish leaders — each in their generation — have taught us, through both their ideas and their actions, that being a tzaddik means standing up against the moral corruption of one’s time. I first learned this when I was studying to become a rabbi. It was 2018, my first year of rabbinic studies. Like so many new students in the age of the internet and social media, I began following people I admired in the Jewish and rabbinic world. In a moment of boldness, I sent a Facebook friend request to one of the most well-known rabbis alive — and to my astonishment, he accepted. Moments later, he asked for my email so that we could talk. I could hardly believe it. Only a few weeks earlier, I had written a paper naming him as my modern prophet.

A prophet, as we had just studied, is not merely a visionary or a moral critic, but a person who sees the world through the lens of divine concern. The prophet perceives injustice, corruption, and idolatry with painful clarity — and cannot remain silent. Our teachers remind us that the prophet looks upon the world with extraordinary passion and leads others towards justice. And as Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote, the prophet’s heart is torn between love and anger — love for humanity and outrage at its failures. The prophet stands outside structures of power, guided not by authority but by moral urgency — seeing the world both as it is, and as it ought to be.

When that first email arrived, it was, in every sense, prophetic. He wanted to talk about the Amazon rainforest. He was already deeply concerned for its future, and for the survival of the Indigenous peoples who lived there — years before the scale of the devastation became public. This week, surrounded by his family, he said goodbye to this world — and became a blessed memory.

His name was Rabbi Arthur Ocean Waskow. He was a prophet in the truest Jewish sense: one who combined profound spiritual insight with a fearless moral vision. He denounced injustice, corruption, and the desecration of the earth — not from a place of power, but from deep compassion and love for humanity. Like the prophets of old, Waskow perceived the world’s suffering with painful sensitivity and translated that anguish into action. His writings, activism, and leadership embodied the prophetic qualities of courage, humility, and devotion to justice. For him, the moral and ecological crises of our age were not merely political or social issues — they were sacred concerns demanding spiritual awakening and collective transformation.

Born in Baltimore in 1933, Waskow’s journey from historian to rabbi reflected a life steeped in both intellect and empathy. From his early protests against racial segregation and the Vietnam War to his later interfaith and environmental work, he stood as a voice of conscience in turbulent times. Through The Shalom Center, which he founded in 1983, he inspired generations of Jews and people of all faiths to see peace, ecology, and justice as intertwined expressions of divine will. For Waskow, prophecy was never a relic of the past but a living vocation. His voice joined that of Heschel and other modern prophets who understood that to pray is also to act — and that love of God must manifest as love for the world. In his unwavering commitment to tikkun olam — the repair of the world — Rabbi Arthur Waskow became a bridge between ancient revelation and modern responsibility, a prophet whose legacy still challenges and inspires us.

And this week, as we remember Rabbi Waskow, we also mark the yahrzeit of another extraordinary prophetic voice: Rabbi Sheila Shulman, of blessed memory, observed in the Jewish calendar on Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan. I must confess that I did not know of Rabbi Shulman before moving to London. It was one of my teachers — and a member of our own community — Rabbi Judith Rosen Berry, who first introduced me to her work. Rabbi Shulman was a radical lesbian feminist theologian who transformed Jewish life, creating spaces of belonging for those who had long felt excluded from synagogue and community. As the founding rabbi of Beit Klal Yisrael — the first politically driven Jewish community in the UK — she inspired more people to enter the progressive rabbinate than any other rabbi in our history. A beloved teacher at Leo Baeck College, she shaped generations through her intellect, her poetry, her humour, and her unwavering commitment to feminist politics and justice. Her life was a testament to courage, authenticity, and faith in transformation. Like Rabbi Waskow, she modelled a prophetic Judaism — one that speaks truth to power, loves fiercely, and believes that change is not only possible but sacred.

Drawing on Maimonides’ laws of teshuvah — repentance — every person carries both merits and deficiencies. One whose merits outweigh their faults, even slightly, is called a tzaddik, a righteous person; one whose faults outweigh their merits is a rasha, wicked; and one balanced between the two is a beinoni, a person in between. Yet Maimonides surely knew that righteousness cannot be measured like a sum. To be beinoni is to live on the cusp — a tightrope walker between good and evil — aware that a single choice can tip the balance for ourselves, our nation, and even the world. The Talmud deepens this insight, teaching that one mitzvah can tilt the world towards goodness, while one wrongdoing can pull it away. Our tradition calls us to recognise that each of us holds the moral equilibrium of creation itself — and, as Hillel taught, that our task is not to calculate our goodness, but to live it: one deliberate, compassionate act at a time.

From Noah, from the prophet Arthur Waskow, and from Rabbi Sheila Shulman, we learn that righteousness is never static — it is a balance constantly recalibrated by our actions and by the times we live in. Each of them, in their own way, teaches that we have the power to tilt the scales towards compassion, justice, and renewal. May we strive, in our generation, to be menschlich where others may not. May we be inspired by the prophets of our time — to act with courage, to speak truth, and to repair what is broken. And may the memories of Rabbi Arthur Waskow and Rabbi Sheila Shulman always be a blessing and an inspiration — calling us to continue their sacred work of transforming and redeeming reality.

Shabbat Shalom.