I am rick powell, the president of the temple. We are thrilled you are here tonight. For security reasons, we are a little slow getting people checked in. First, let me wish all of you a happy and most importantly healthy new year. I would like to have our current trustees, past trustees and current president please stand up. That will be you, howard. Thank you all for being here tonight. I am excited about this new year and all the wonderful things the kids will be doing. We are continuing to grow and we want the temple to be a welcoming hand to you. You are a part of your large family and we embrace each and every one of you. May our helping hand be extended to anyone in need. That is the great message that this temple brings to each and every one of you. As members, we each have a responsibility to ourselves and each other. We are so grateful to all of you for your continued support and commitment to helping us degree and be more effective each and every day. Tonight is one example of the diversity of experiences we bring to our members and friends. You are in for a treat tonight. Without further ado, let me introduce the director of adult programs rabbi susan annis. [applause] thank you and welcome, everyone. Speaking of community, i must acknowledge a few of our amazing partners for the program. We are in partnership with the usc cast and institute. And the United States hall Holocaust Memorial museum. And this entire program is sponsored by the jerome n toper fund and ms. Ruth tober is here in the front row and we would like to thank her. News week called him the most influential rabbi in america. The Jerusalem Post named him one of the 50 most influential jews in the world. He is the scholar and author of eight brooks, he is an educator teaching at the jewish theology university, hunter college, and ucla. His columns have been published by numerous newspapers and websites including the new york times, the los angeles times, and the washington post. He has appeared on the today show, face the nation, abc this morning, cbs this morning, pbs, a e, History Channel and discovery channel. He is the senior rabbi of sinai temple. He is our colleague and friend. Tonight we are honored to have him in conversation with our guest speaker. Please welcome rabbi david wolpe. [applause] bernardhenri levy is so well known to the french they call him by his initials. Dashing, charismatic and is a unique figure. An action driven moralist, an International Thought Leader to moves fast, writes fast, and is listened to with respect. Recently i heard someone call him the mcjagger of intellectual. He is the author of many books. He is a playwright, journalist, filmmaker, defender of causes across the global cofounding the anti racist groups sos racism. Known as a provocter he has counseled word leaders and served on Diplomatic Missions for the french government. He has been called a tribal sage, a visionary and perhaps a profit speaking out in defense of israel and against the return of anti sem item. And his books are world renowned. After this program, we will have time for questions as well as book sales and signing. But for now, please welcome bernardhenri levy. An anti [applause] i want to begin by addressing comments. The first is because we are being taped by cspan it is important you laugh at the appropriate places and also we have asked our guest instead of addressing answers to me which is the natural thing to do but to look out at you. The second is i am going to try to as explicit and careful i can in my question because even though as you will hear our guest speaks magnificent english, none the less, i think to conduct an interview in ones second or third laj language is not an easy endeavor. I hope you will be patient with us as we explore this remarkable book, the genius of judaism. I want to begin with asking you the following. You are more than familiar with the work of one of your french predecessors John Paul Saul and know his book anti semite and jew. That book was criticized because it suggested the antisemite gets to define what the jew is. I wonder why you chose to begin a book about the genius of judaism instead of talking about judaism itself. It is the best question to start with. Let me say first of all how happy i am toob to be here. I said it to a group for us. For me to be hosted in this place, in this Wilshire Temple is more than a joy. It is a great honor and it was a dream of my life. It is my dream to be here, to sit here and have this honor to speak in this place which is such a denial of the stupid theory of the opposition between jewishness and hawk, which is such a more complicated thing than what say some of our enemies. Such a treat, such a joy, and such an honor to be here with rabbi david wolpe who is, in america, an anglo saxon world in general a legend. And i am really honored to be here on this stage sharing it with rabbi wolpe. [applause] so, to your question, it is a question which i ask myself when i began the writing of this book. It is true that the jew has not come into this world to discuss an an an anti symptemitissemitism. To try to understand the reasons is something absurd and disgusting. By the way, it is not what i do in this book. The chapter about antisemitism which is the first chapter of the book is not devoted to that. I dont try to answer reasons. I try to say, because antisemitism is in progress because it is a proceeding on every front and not only in europe but in america. I could not start this book without mentioning and without saying how i conceive the stance of it. Not how to con since the antisemitism. I dont care about them. Most of them are illiterate, stupid people. If i compare the antisemitism today in france it is antisemitism could brag to have some great writers bearing the flag. Paul hall was a great writer, of course. Today there is nothing really. Rednecks of the south, really stupid nonthinking women and men. So, i dont delete the chapter about antisemitism. It is devoted to reply to the question how to contain, how to resist, and how to win and prevail about antisemitism. How to be stronger than them. The only questions which the antisemitism addresses to me, to you rabbi, and to all of you, is how to do in order to be stronger than them. We are not going to cure them. We are not going to understand them. We are not going to convince. We just have to be stronger. And in these stages of the beginning of the book, i try strong of my experience, strong of what rabbi wolpe just said; this very bad season. This very bad age in the history of jewish history. This idea i was a jew only because a nonjew sold me as a jew saw me was a horrible day. It consistent in transforming the jew into nearly nothing. A shadow. An effect of the look of the others. So, my idea in this chapter is to try in my modest way. I am a little jew. I am a little jew trying to know more. Trying to get into the secrecy, the mystery and greatness of judaism. But the little jew i am has a little experience and a little knowledge about how to be strong enough, to be stronger than them. This is what i try to say in this chapter. Understanding we suffer from a low quality antisemitism today in fact what you do here is incredibly important and i found had helpful and i dont doubt you will too and that is you try to address the best arguments of antisemitism. You dont address Holocaust Denial which is stupid but you do address why the holocaust cant be compared in some ways to any other tragedy in history. Would you tell us something about that . What makes it different and what should we know because the analytical power of that is very potent . This question is very important because one of the pillars of the new antisemitism is the holocaust denying. It is one of the pillars. There is a way to say the jews are horrible beings because they traffic, accelerate, or invent what should be the most sacred thing for them which the memory of their this is how the denial of the holocaust fell into antisemitism. It is a portrait of the jew able to the works which is making up sand the most sane memory. The question is really i try faithfully and thoroughly to raise the question of what is at the end of the day the unity of the holocaust. Why is the holocaust a massacre, unprecedented, and until now without any really following . Why is it so special . It is not a question of number of that. It is not a question of planning as it is sometimes said. There was some genocide which have been the reason of the massacre and genocide in rwanda has the recall of the speed of the massacre. It is not i take a few generally said reasons of this incident and i reach two things which make the genocide of the jews, the holocaust, absolutely number one, the holocaust made the world, the entire world, trap all the jews. Entire world. Even for an armanian there was a chance of escaping to vietnam. You could escape from the desert of syria he was save. For the jews, there was no safe place in the world. The project of each was to eradicate, to kill the jews and the project again was to make the entire world a trap for the jewish prey. So, no recourse. The second thing, mathematical. It is not a creed but it is a fact that it is the only genocide which has been supposed to be which was supposed to be without rest, without any peace of the body remaining safe. All the other genocides, as cruel as they could be, had i would not say a limit but in some case they decided to spare the old people or in other cases they decided to spare the children. In other cases, they did not care about the books or the memory, they did not care about the dead, for example. Nothing had to be set. No, human body and not even this other leading body which is a letter to the world of the book had had to be erased. These are the two specificity of this genocide and this is what entitled them. It would be so better if it wasnt the case but it is that it is what the man can do to the other man and far from discouraging the world to take care of the other massacre this way of thinking is an invitation you see the first signs and are able to resist. I show in the book. It is not a creed. It is a fact. I am of the age of myself to see and think each time in our history. Each time that the smell of genocide has come back. Those who went first are not the jews, but those who had in their heart, memory and intelligent this idea of the specificity of the holocaust. It was that in bangladesh, it was the race in rwanda. This specificity of the holocaust keeps to those with who take it seriously that they are the first to know and to fight. One of the arguments of the new antisemitism is to say if you give too much to the jews you will have nothing left for rwanda. One of the arguments is there is not enough space in the human heart to have sympathy for the jews and others. It is the opposite. It is a wonderful prelude to what i want to ask you next. It also reminds me of the writer cythia ozik who says the show far has a broad end and narrow end. In the narrow end if you start out you get a sound everyone can hear. What made you, is it your jewish legacy, understanding of the holocaust, what made you continually throughout your life go to places where people were in danger and thereby endanger yourself since you could have lived a very comfortable and renowned live without travelling in france, there is a dividing line between those that accept facism and those who refuse it. This is why i love and admire america so much because america was at the end of the day the physical and spiritual of those who in my country refused it. It happened that my father was one of these young heroes who when he was 17 years old decided to enlist himself and commit himself to the physical fight against fascism. It is in the international bregade and in the three army of france. He was one of the most decorated hero in monte casino. He had a terrible problem that fascinated me especially when i was in the cristo was to go beyond the line and fire of the enemy and take companions who were wounded. This is the most difficult task in a battle to go under fire beyond the line to take your friends who are heavy wonder. I suppose that in the back of my mind, all of my life, i had the first as any little jew. After that there were there were the memory of the holocaust and it was quoted in which i went and when i heard it was an absolute commitment to myself to grow on his foot steps and to honor and celebrate his name, if i say it exactly as i did before was the name of course. I did the same for many. Unnamed dead without graves all over the world. This idea of a bunch of women and men dead without graves, without name, without number and without memory, without leaving a trace in the memory of mankind, it is true that this idea has made me all my life crazy and ill. Nothing gives back the name or the trace to just figure the proper number to these outnumbered debts. This is one thing. And another thing is more deeply to what is poplar to judaism. More accurately related to what i call the genius of judaism. For me to be a jew means in a way which i try to express in this book to care about the other. People ask me about my jewish identity. I am also embarrassed about this idea of identity. I am not sure that judaism is a matter of identity when means to be the same of the self. The real challenge for the jew, the real stake, the real work is the relation not with the id but with the other. For me, the most challenging way to relate to the other is the way in which the most prophet in my eyes and he deal with that and he speaks to that, he tries to say that this city for me. For me, being a jew means all my life, at least all the part of my life what felt jew has consisted in fighting, in trying to be worked again. Not of the memory of my father but this time to be worth the inner age, the message, the lesson of the prophet jonah. I am a little jew faithful to the prophet jonah and this book is a praise to jonah. It is an attempt to unfold. A tiny drop of ink in the commentary of jonah. My life has consisted of doing that and this book is a summary of my life has been an attempt to express that. Something i would like to preface my next question is because you may not know because you have not had a chance to read the book is the same sense of force you hear in bernardhenri levy speaking actually comes through in the book as well. It is written in a vatic prophetic style and you will have that experience when you read the book just as january you are grateful. He runs this foundation that was started by rabbi that passed away las year and he said like the rest of us he only ran away from god once. Does the jewish tradition, part of the genius judaism is the teach teacher. It is about the other as opposed to to being about the one. It is more than an optic. Optic meaning look to practice. One of his concerns was to get rid as much as possible of the religion. He had judaism is not a religion. They want to reduce the quantity of religion in the world. Probably one of the most important germanspeaking master of judaism in the 20th century wanted to stick in front of his little houses and say i am irreligious. He said that to the rabbi. He was one of the inspires i modestly follow in this book. The world is devoid of god and then says the rabbi, then begins the question of what do the men have to do if the god retracts itself . If god quits in a way on the world . If there is a reason for the world to consume god then what do the men and women have to do . This is a real jewish question. His reply . Is of the house, to pray, it is the holy text and the world which will be like the wooden chap of the world. That the world will hold against this threat and imminence of this collapse because of the stu study, probably because i am not familiar with the rituals so important in the jewish life. But my feeling is that one the differences, lets say it this way. One of it differences between christianity and judaism is that for a jew the biggest requirement, what is required more than anything from a jew is to believe and to study and to understand and to bring an addition of religion to the world. The christians believe this but the christian has nothing more important than to jump on the belief and make the economy follow the steps or the scales which the jews never avoid. A christian says lets forget all these details. Lets jump to the bet. The great french pas cal said there was a beauty in stopping thinking and just waiting and jumping. My feeling is that the jew does not jump. A new doesnt jump, a jew doesnt beg, a jew never stops commenting, studying, adding a paradox to another paradox and so on. He was asked one day by one of his students, rabbi, if you had to chose between on one side a lazy student who is never here but who believes and a hard worker student who uses and abuses all of his mind and sometimes his body, who really dies on the work of the commentary, who would you chose . Of course, he would prefer not to have to chose. But if he had to, he would prefer the hard worker who devotes his life to the commentary and to revive and make more and more vibrant the letters of the text. But he doubts the lazy one who believes. This for me is one of what i call in this book the genius of judaism. I am going to ask you a very pedestrian question that a rabbi would ask. The idea judaism is about studyerstudy, text, ideas and searching is a beautiful idea and i dont think anybody can object. But can it survive if people dont know hebrew, keep the sabbath, do rituals which are specifics to judaism which ethics are not. Nobody who prays in hebrew isnt jewish. Or very few. I wonder if in an attempt to grab we are not loosing the everydayness that maintains places like this. You are right. That is enough. No, no, no, you are half right. The jews have specifically a certain way of eating, of meeting, and of speaking. When i say i am a little jew, i mean twaen other things that i am so disappointed at myself to be still so remote to the language. I dont agree to say everyone take care of the otherness. I believe there is a very jewish way, comparable to nothing else, to put his own shadow. The christian commands who have beaten those who are faithful to that but there is what being a jew means also having a very special way of commenting. They would like to take one example which is in the book, which makes a few pages of the bo book, commenting to us, saying that the torah has to be read as if it had a face. The verse means three things which are very specific to jews which you will not find in a christian com comment. It means the verse, the text, is a living body. It is never dead or frozen and has nothing to do with a dead letter. For example, opposed to the vibrant spirit. The letter is living as itself. Letters are living beings number one. Number two, this face of the verse has to be taken even more seriously and literally. Literally. The face is a face he said. A face is a face of the text. The face is the face of the reader. And this versus has to be understood in a way that does the woman or the man who reads the verse finds his own faith in the process of the reading. To be a jew means to believe that when you read the verse, when y