The Choice to Remain Silent

The Choice to Remain Silent

Like most writers, I am also a reader. My favorite books bring me to times gone-by and far-away places. They introduce me to people living lives and making choices I may never experience.

The Rabbi and the Reverend is a picture book about community action, friendship, and history. Adults will also recognize it as a book about choices. Terrible, difficult, critical choices. I am certainly not the first person, or Jew, to wonder how I would behave were I living in Hitler’s Germany during World War Two; just as people of all colors and ethnicities have wondered what they would have done if confronted with the histories their ancestors endured. I will cut this part of my essay short and simply say I’m not at all sure I would have acted with courage or valor. I cannot imagine how such fear, helplessness and terror would have affected me. I am not proud of this response, but I know I am not alone in feeling this way.

What I am sure of is that there were, and are, many people who find their finest moments in circumstances of fear and danger. We call these people heroes. The Rabbi and the Reverend is a story about two such heroes, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and Rabbi Joachim Prinz.

Researching and writing this book was one of the most meaningful experiences of my professional life. A writer’s research is deep, even if she is writing a book aimed at young readers. I learned many details about the history and personal lives of my protagonists. My research left me with the greatest respect for the choices they made. I believe that by better understanding people like Rabbi Prinz and Dr. King, we are given the opportunity to push ourselves a little harder, to take risks that we might have dismissed in the past as too scary, inconvenient or out-of-fashion.

Just like the rabbi and the reverend, we are all the product of our upbringing and early-life experiences. We take what we receive as children and use it to survive, maintain or change the world we grow into. Whether the world hands us a time of peace or war, feast or famine, hardship or ease, each of us chooses how we will live our lives based on our experiences, values, dreams, and opportunities. The most important concept here is choice. We choose.

Both Dr. King and Rabbi Prinz chose the paths for which they are known. They chose dangerous and often unpopular paths to make the changes in the world that they believed were necessary. They were not afraid to call out the one factor they believed sustained the success of their adversaries: the silence of good people. They insisted that when good people watch injustice and cruelty visited upon others and do nothing to stop it, their behavior is as bad – and perhaps worse- than those committing the crimes.

Eighty years after WW2, this concept is well-known among advocates of change for peace and equality. Still, we are challenged every day. I am personally challenged every day and so are you, to examine our choices, act bravely, and speak out in the face of injustice as we witness it in our neighborhoods, our country and on our planet.