Joe Lieberman Passed Away
I saw the notification on my phone from the corner of my eye. “Joe Lieberman, former Senator and Vice Presidential candidate passed away at 82.”
My first reaction was, “Wait what! He couldn’t have died.” And then, “82? Since when is he 82?”
Growing up, Joe Lieberman was quite a role model for me and my peers in religious Jewish day school. There were the famous stories about him walking to congressional events on Friday night, with secret service by his side—not riding in a car, to follow the laws of the Sabbath.
When he ran as Al Gore’ s vice presidential candidate, it was quite exciting. Some wondered if a Jew in office would spur anti-Semitism but most were schepping nachas—super proud to have an Orthodox Jew in such as an honorable position.
Many of my high school peers even knew his family personally, since they were from his town of Stamford, CT.
Joe Lieberman is frozen in time in my mind to those high school years when he was Al Gore’s running mate. It was the election with the hanging chads, the election that I watched late into the night with my dad on CNN, going to bed still not knowing what was to be concluded and it would end up taking days with the recount, etc.
In my young adulthood, I reacquainted myself with Joe Lieberman in his book, The Gift of Rest, in which he shares heartfelt stories of the Sabbath and how it infuses his life with meaning, while elucidating the meaning of the prayers of the spiritually elevating and poetic Sabbath evening service. He also discussed presidents who were religious Christians. As I recall, it was James Polk who wouldn’t open the mail on Sundays (don’t quote me on that!).
It was and is a great book. Capturing the heart and soul of Judaism, in a way that was accessible to someone no matter their level of religious observance, and no matter their religion.