Post by Cary Friedman on Jun 28, 2007 2:29:31 GMT -5
Mishpacha Magazine
June 27, 2007
Gavriel Horan
The FBI was seeking the right man to head a specialized task force that would build up the moral fiber of law enforcement officials whose work with the basest elements of society had sapped them of whatever spirituality they possessed. Finally, they found him in Rabbi Cary Friedman.
WANTED BY THE FBI
Rabbi Cary Friedman, then a congregational rabbi in Linden, New Jersey, was delivering a eulogy at the request of a local funeral home. As customary in such instances, he agreed as long as the burial was conducted strictly according to Jewish law. Since the departed and his family were unaffiliated Jews, Rabbi Friedman kept the speech fairly simple, offering the family much comfort by speaking in universal terms that everyone could understand.
As the service concluded, a man approached Rabbi Friedman and introduced himself as a friend of the family who had come to pay his respects — and also as a senior officer in the FBI. He had been very impressed with Rabbi Friedman’s eulogy, he explained. It was very spiritual, yet simultaneously universal and nonjudgmental. For some time, he said, the FBI had been looking for a man who could speak in just such a way. “Could you duplicate that on a regular basis?†he asked. Rabbi Friedman said that he could. “Then I think you’re the man we’ve been looking for,†the agent told him. “We need someone to teach spirituality at the FBI Academy.†Rabbi Friedman stood there, baffled, wondering, Why does the FBI need to learn about spirituality?
In G-d We Trust Intrigued by the challenge, Rabbi Friedman consulted with his former rosh yeshivah, Rabbi Yehudah Parnes, currently rosh yeshivah of Lander College for Men, who pointed out that the United States legal system fulfills one of the Seven Noachide Laws: providing courts of law. Therefore, it would be a mitzvah to help them continue to do so, especially if they were made aware that this is one of their biblical obligations. It would also be an opportunity to discharge a debt of gratitude that the Jews of the United States owe to the police force. And it would be a kiddush Hashem.
Rabbi Friedman accepted the job immediately, and then began an extensive training process at both the FBI and National Academies in Virginia. For months, he studied their training methods and spoke to hundreds of officers, while reading everything he could find on the psychology of law enforcement. His goal was to put together a curriculum, so that every police officer — regardless of religious belief — would have tools to prepare and strengthen him to handle the problems that would arise.
“We have this image of police officers as gruff, uneducated, power-seeking bullies who have very little regard for the citizens they’re sworn to protect,†Rabbi Friedman says. “That’s really not the case. Most police officers don’t start out that way. Many enter law enforcement motivated by very noble, spiritual values, most often moved by a belief in G-d. People go into police work for many of the same reasons that one would go into the clergy. Many, many police officers have told me, ‘I was thinking of becoming a priest, but I decided to become a policeman, instead.’ There’s a certain relation between the two fields.â€
Downward Spiral Unfortunately, the bitter truth of life as a police officer quickly does away with even the best of intentions, leaving the officer in a very dangerous mental and emotional state, which leads to all sorts of negative behaviors, both self destructive and abusive.
In the course of their job as first responders, they encounter horrible accidents and tragedies every day, events that look completely random. They may not be able to articulate theological
questions about why bad things happen to good people or why evil exists, but doubts accumulate and eventually take their toll on them.
After a few years on the job, Rabbi Friedman explains, police officers are overcome with so much stress and negativity that they’re almost completely drained of their original high ideals. In short, the negative image we often have of police is what happens after they’ve become victims to the evil they are sworn to fight against.
“After even one year on the job, they realize that they’re not really making a difference in the world,†says Rabbi Friedman. “By five years on the job, they’ve gone into spiritual overdraft; they’ve depleted all the spiritual resources they came in with, and they’re spiritually bankrupt. They confront a world where G-d is seemingly missing. Where is He? How can people behave so wickedly? What hope is there for the future? So they quickly lose any sense of optimism.â€
Spiritual Tune-Up The FBI sought a way to help police officers replenish their spiritual reservoirs. They realized that they needed more resources for this than the average psychologist could provide. A psychologist can help officers to process the trauma of their daily experiences, but he can’t provide answers for the existential questions that arise from them.
Rabbi Friedman compares it to a car engine that needs a regular tune-up in order to keep in working order. Psychology can help officers to process their trauma, to keep their mind functioning, in working order. But without gasoline, the car won’t move; it needs fuel to propel it forward. In the same way, he says, no psychologist can tell a police officer why he should keep getting up in the morning to do his job. Because the best thing police officers could do for their own psychological well-being is to quit. “Every single day of their career they’ll be confronted with things that are really ugly, and they need to battle against the psychic toxins that this brings into them,†Rabbi Friedman explains. “A psychologist with any integrity should say, ‘You shouldn’t be in this job.’
“Why are they in the job, in the first place? That’s the gasoline. They’re in it ‘to protect and to serve’; they want to help the world. Deep in their soul is the desire to do good.†Only spirituality can provide that motivation, and the proper tools are needed to continue to justify and enhance that initial drive.â€
Rabbi Friedman was well suited to explaining complex spiritual concepts to the relatively uninitiated. He and his wife had done outreach at Duke University in North Carolina, following several years of learning and teaching in various yeshivos and seminaries in Israel. He is also the author of several books, including two on marriage.
At the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, where Rabbi Friedman taught, the position was traditionally filled by a priest or chaplain, but the FBI found, says Rabbi Friedman, that they often used the post as an opportunity to push their own religious ideologies. Rabbi Friedman, on the other hand, doesn’t proselytize, although according to certain Rishonim (Tosafos), Jews are obligated to teach non-Jews about the Seven Noachide Laws.
Letter of the Law Rabbi Friedman didn’t feel comfortable teaching spirituality without mentioning G-d — especially since, according to the Rambam, a non-Jew is not eligible to be considered a Righteous Gentile unless he keeps the Seven Noachide Laws, as stated in the Torah. But what did United States law say about this?
He spoke with several law professors and discovered that American law allows mention of G-d, as long as it follows the guidelines known as the civic religion of America. This “civic†religion permits the invocation of G-d as the Creator, as we find so often throughout the American legal system, for example, “In G-d We Trust†or “One Nation under G-d.†Rabbi Friedman learned that he would be on safe ground teaching the Noachide Laws as Divinely ordained laws of ethics incumbent on all of humanity.
A year later, Rabbi Friedman had developed a curriculum which he then expanded in his book Spiritual Survival for Law Enforcement. His approach is based on a commentary of the Meshech Chochmah, Rav Meyer Simchah of Dvinsk, in Bereishis, explaining that when a person knows that what he’s doing is a mitzvah, a fulfillment of the Creator’s will, and intends it as such, this protects him and gives him Divine assistance to survive the dangers involved.
Hashem tells Adam and Chavah to eat from all the fruit of the garden except for the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. The Meshech Chachmah says that if Adam and Chavah had known that it was indeed a mitzvah to eat of the other fruits, they would have had Divine protection to help them withstand the temptation to eat of the forbidden fruit. So too, if we’re aware that our job is Divine service, whether in law enforcement or Law enforcement, we’ll be given extra strength to overcome life’s challenges. Indeed, the police force motto of “to serve and protect†roughly translates into l’avdah u’l’shamrah, “to till [the Garden] and to guard it†— the commandment that G-d gave to Adam and Chavah when He placed them in Eden.
Eradicating Evil That was six years ago. Today, Rabbi Friedman and his wife Marsha live with their six children in Passaic, NJ, where he teaches at several local college campuses and still makes frequent trips to various police academies, lecturing to officers, and educating police trainers. His children have had the rare opportunity to witness the power of Torah in this unusual setting, which has greatly increased their appreciation of the incomparable gift we possess. The Friedmans’ oldest son, Elisha, nineteen, recently published his first book, Chanukah Illuminated (Feldheim), a project he took on during one of his brief vacations from yeshivah.
Rabbi Friedman’s book Spiritual Survival for Law Enforcement has enjoyed great success. Some police academies have started awarding copies of it to police academy graduates. The New Orleans Police Department distributed 1,000 copies to their officers, who were subjected to overwhelming stress during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when marauders roamed the streets, wreaking even more havoc on the already devastated city.
How did the police react to the recent Virginia Tech mass murder?
“I hear police officers debate the technical questions; for example, the issue of gun control. While losing sight of a far more fundamental question: What is happening to our society that such acts of wickedness can exist and are increasing? That is a question that does not belong to the world of the police officer, but, rather, confronts every member of our society, especially Torah Jews.
“Police officers play a very specific role in the world, They perform damage control, and arrive on the scene to clean up the mess caused by people who are devoid of Torah values. And, every time I see it, I am reminded that we Torah Jews have a far more important and comprehensive role to play in the world: to introduce Torah into the world and to work for the eradication of evil in the world. We can look to no one else to play that role for us.â€
Seeing the Positive The key to Rabbi Friedman’s teaching success, both for the FBI and in kiruv, is his awareness that at the core of every Chazal is a truth both about how the universe works and about the inherent contradictions in the human condition. “This makes sense to us,†he says, “because we recognize that the Author of the Torah and the Creator of the universe and humanity is One and the same.†But to those unfamiliar with Torah, this concept is a great innovation and explaining this to someone in the line of fire requires great finesse.
A typical case that came up involved a police officer who was forced to shoot and kill a would-be bank robber. He was devastated by the experience and could not stop crying over the incident. His chaplain approached Rabbi Friedman to inquire how to help take away his pain. Rabbi Friedman gave the chaplain techniques to help ease the officer’s guilt by strengthening his sense that what he did was ethically and morally right, despite the pain it inflicted.
Another challenge that arises is that police officers practice what’s known as “officer safety,†essentially the strategic assumption that everyone around them is dangerous, hostile, and poses a grave threat to them. This is an essential strategy to ensure the safety of police officers on the job, but, obviously, wreaks havoc on one’s ability to function in the world when off duty.
Rabbi Friedman addresses this concept in his book, describing how with a belief in G-d, the world is in truth essentially a safe, good place. He points out that even though every accident or crime scene shows the evil of the world, one can also notice how much good is present as well, namely all of the helpful emergency workers and concerned bystanders who are there doing whatever they can to help.
At the same time, the spiritual tools cannot compromise the defensive awareness that the police officers acquire during their training. “We must deal with police officers and put them in touch with their spiritual sides without weakening their resolve and producing a bunch of uniformed wimps,†Rabbi Friedman explains. “We’re not dealing with social workers; we’re dealing with police officers, and any spirituality awareness we peddle must not threaten their image or culture or self-perception of invincibility. Spiritual interventions must strengthen them and their resolve to do the job, not weaken their resolve in any way. These newfound infusions of spirituality must energize, not enervate, them.â€
Torah-True Way Rabbi Friedman stresses to everyone that everything he’s teaching comes straight from Torah. Clergymen often come up to him and say, “It’s so clear that you guys have the truth.†Once, a police officer got up after a lecture and announced, “Rabbi Friedman is my rabbi. Because, although none of you know this, I’m Jewish.â€
As spiritual advisor to the FBI, Rabbi Friedman is asked all sorts of questions, like how to deal with mourning among police officers. He went through laws of shivah and used some of the ideas behind the rituals to help them to mourn. A secretary in one of the police agencies read a copy of the book, which was lying around, and phoned Rabbi Friedman months later to tell him that it was the only thing that could console her after her husband’s death and that it had given her a whole worldview with which to process her loss.
His ultimate goal is to effect a fundamental change in the law enforcement world, by using these ideas in the police training academies as pre-crisis prevention, long before the officer has encountered the horrors of the career, as opposed to after the officer has succumbed to stress. In this way, the police officers will be fortified and prepared to face the challenges that they will inevitably face.
“Armed in advance, and taught to anticipate these stresses and challenges, when they inevitably come they will be less devastating and shocking,†says Rabbi Friedman.
Sidebar:
Before hiring Rabbi Friedman, the FBI asked him if he had any experience with law enforcement. He told them that he'd been a prison chaplain for four years, in the Butner Federal Correctional Institution, where, incidentally, he had a chavrusa with Jonathan Pollard.
Although he doesn't like to speak publicly about Jonathan Pollard, Rabbi Friedman considers the four years he spent with Jonathan as some of the most meaningful, significant times of his life.
Additionally, Rabbi Friedman gave the FBI a manuscript for what later became his book, Wisdom from the Batcave (Compass Books), which he describes as a "dynamic mussar sefer," meaning that it's exciting and will speak to a person who would not ordinarily be exposed to Torah concepts.
The book developed from notes he took developing classes he taught while doing kiruv at Duke University. Seeking new ways to interest people in discussions of Torah concepts of ethics and philosophy, he hit on the idea of using his childhood obsession with Batman comics as a way to attract students to his classes. Only later did he realize how those comics had given him much inspiration on how to live a heroic life. In class, he would use a particular comic strip as a way to illustrate a Torah idea.
Unlike most comic book superheroes, Batman has no supernatural abilities. He's an ordinary person, who decides to apply his normal human potential to the highest degree, in order to help fight crime and make the world a better place. Rabbi Friedman sees him as a metaphor for what we're all trying to become - "superheroes," the best people we can be. The book presents many basic Torah ideas in a lighthearted way that anyone can relate to and has been an effective tool for kiruv, teaching Jewish values both to those who are unfamiliar with them and to those drifting away from them.
Ironically, when Rabbi Friedman was invited to visit the FBI Academy, it was on condition that he never mention Batman or other "juvenile" ideas. He was told that he would be dealing with real-life crime fighters, who weren't interested in hearing about a fictional character! But Spiritual Survival is filled with references to many such characters, helping to make complex ideas more easily understandable. Rabbi Friedman took great joy in getting to meet firsthand so many real-life heroes, and to use his childhood favorite to help convey some important lessons to help them in their task.
Thank you, Gavriel and Mishpacha Mag!
June 27, 2007
Gavriel Horan
The FBI was seeking the right man to head a specialized task force that would build up the moral fiber of law enforcement officials whose work with the basest elements of society had sapped them of whatever spirituality they possessed. Finally, they found him in Rabbi Cary Friedman.
WANTED BY THE FBI
Rabbi Cary Friedman, then a congregational rabbi in Linden, New Jersey, was delivering a eulogy at the request of a local funeral home. As customary in such instances, he agreed as long as the burial was conducted strictly according to Jewish law. Since the departed and his family were unaffiliated Jews, Rabbi Friedman kept the speech fairly simple, offering the family much comfort by speaking in universal terms that everyone could understand.
As the service concluded, a man approached Rabbi Friedman and introduced himself as a friend of the family who had come to pay his respects — and also as a senior officer in the FBI. He had been very impressed with Rabbi Friedman’s eulogy, he explained. It was very spiritual, yet simultaneously universal and nonjudgmental. For some time, he said, the FBI had been looking for a man who could speak in just such a way. “Could you duplicate that on a regular basis?†he asked. Rabbi Friedman said that he could. “Then I think you’re the man we’ve been looking for,†the agent told him. “We need someone to teach spirituality at the FBI Academy.†Rabbi Friedman stood there, baffled, wondering, Why does the FBI need to learn about spirituality?
In G-d We Trust Intrigued by the challenge, Rabbi Friedman consulted with his former rosh yeshivah, Rabbi Yehudah Parnes, currently rosh yeshivah of Lander College for Men, who pointed out that the United States legal system fulfills one of the Seven Noachide Laws: providing courts of law. Therefore, it would be a mitzvah to help them continue to do so, especially if they were made aware that this is one of their biblical obligations. It would also be an opportunity to discharge a debt of gratitude that the Jews of the United States owe to the police force. And it would be a kiddush Hashem.
Rabbi Friedman accepted the job immediately, and then began an extensive training process at both the FBI and National Academies in Virginia. For months, he studied their training methods and spoke to hundreds of officers, while reading everything he could find on the psychology of law enforcement. His goal was to put together a curriculum, so that every police officer — regardless of religious belief — would have tools to prepare and strengthen him to handle the problems that would arise.
“We have this image of police officers as gruff, uneducated, power-seeking bullies who have very little regard for the citizens they’re sworn to protect,†Rabbi Friedman says. “That’s really not the case. Most police officers don’t start out that way. Many enter law enforcement motivated by very noble, spiritual values, most often moved by a belief in G-d. People go into police work for many of the same reasons that one would go into the clergy. Many, many police officers have told me, ‘I was thinking of becoming a priest, but I decided to become a policeman, instead.’ There’s a certain relation between the two fields.â€
Downward Spiral Unfortunately, the bitter truth of life as a police officer quickly does away with even the best of intentions, leaving the officer in a very dangerous mental and emotional state, which leads to all sorts of negative behaviors, both self destructive and abusive.
In the course of their job as first responders, they encounter horrible accidents and tragedies every day, events that look completely random. They may not be able to articulate theological
questions about why bad things happen to good people or why evil exists, but doubts accumulate and eventually take their toll on them.
After a few years on the job, Rabbi Friedman explains, police officers are overcome with so much stress and negativity that they’re almost completely drained of their original high ideals. In short, the negative image we often have of police is what happens after they’ve become victims to the evil they are sworn to fight against.
“After even one year on the job, they realize that they’re not really making a difference in the world,†says Rabbi Friedman. “By five years on the job, they’ve gone into spiritual overdraft; they’ve depleted all the spiritual resources they came in with, and they’re spiritually bankrupt. They confront a world where G-d is seemingly missing. Where is He? How can people behave so wickedly? What hope is there for the future? So they quickly lose any sense of optimism.â€
Spiritual Tune-Up The FBI sought a way to help police officers replenish their spiritual reservoirs. They realized that they needed more resources for this than the average psychologist could provide. A psychologist can help officers to process the trauma of their daily experiences, but he can’t provide answers for the existential questions that arise from them.
Rabbi Friedman compares it to a car engine that needs a regular tune-up in order to keep in working order. Psychology can help officers to process their trauma, to keep their mind functioning, in working order. But without gasoline, the car won’t move; it needs fuel to propel it forward. In the same way, he says, no psychologist can tell a police officer why he should keep getting up in the morning to do his job. Because the best thing police officers could do for their own psychological well-being is to quit. “Every single day of their career they’ll be confronted with things that are really ugly, and they need to battle against the psychic toxins that this brings into them,†Rabbi Friedman explains. “A psychologist with any integrity should say, ‘You shouldn’t be in this job.’
“Why are they in the job, in the first place? That’s the gasoline. They’re in it ‘to protect and to serve’; they want to help the world. Deep in their soul is the desire to do good.†Only spirituality can provide that motivation, and the proper tools are needed to continue to justify and enhance that initial drive.â€
Rabbi Friedman was well suited to explaining complex spiritual concepts to the relatively uninitiated. He and his wife had done outreach at Duke University in North Carolina, following several years of learning and teaching in various yeshivos and seminaries in Israel. He is also the author of several books, including two on marriage.
At the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, where Rabbi Friedman taught, the position was traditionally filled by a priest or chaplain, but the FBI found, says Rabbi Friedman, that they often used the post as an opportunity to push their own religious ideologies. Rabbi Friedman, on the other hand, doesn’t proselytize, although according to certain Rishonim (Tosafos), Jews are obligated to teach non-Jews about the Seven Noachide Laws.
Letter of the Law Rabbi Friedman didn’t feel comfortable teaching spirituality without mentioning G-d — especially since, according to the Rambam, a non-Jew is not eligible to be considered a Righteous Gentile unless he keeps the Seven Noachide Laws, as stated in the Torah. But what did United States law say about this?
He spoke with several law professors and discovered that American law allows mention of G-d, as long as it follows the guidelines known as the civic religion of America. This “civic†religion permits the invocation of G-d as the Creator, as we find so often throughout the American legal system, for example, “In G-d We Trust†or “One Nation under G-d.†Rabbi Friedman learned that he would be on safe ground teaching the Noachide Laws as Divinely ordained laws of ethics incumbent on all of humanity.
A year later, Rabbi Friedman had developed a curriculum which he then expanded in his book Spiritual Survival for Law Enforcement. His approach is based on a commentary of the Meshech Chochmah, Rav Meyer Simchah of Dvinsk, in Bereishis, explaining that when a person knows that what he’s doing is a mitzvah, a fulfillment of the Creator’s will, and intends it as such, this protects him and gives him Divine assistance to survive the dangers involved.
Hashem tells Adam and Chavah to eat from all the fruit of the garden except for the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. The Meshech Chachmah says that if Adam and Chavah had known that it was indeed a mitzvah to eat of the other fruits, they would have had Divine protection to help them withstand the temptation to eat of the forbidden fruit. So too, if we’re aware that our job is Divine service, whether in law enforcement or Law enforcement, we’ll be given extra strength to overcome life’s challenges. Indeed, the police force motto of “to serve and protect†roughly translates into l’avdah u’l’shamrah, “to till [the Garden] and to guard it†— the commandment that G-d gave to Adam and Chavah when He placed them in Eden.
Eradicating Evil That was six years ago. Today, Rabbi Friedman and his wife Marsha live with their six children in Passaic, NJ, where he teaches at several local college campuses and still makes frequent trips to various police academies, lecturing to officers, and educating police trainers. His children have had the rare opportunity to witness the power of Torah in this unusual setting, which has greatly increased their appreciation of the incomparable gift we possess. The Friedmans’ oldest son, Elisha, nineteen, recently published his first book, Chanukah Illuminated (Feldheim), a project he took on during one of his brief vacations from yeshivah.
Rabbi Friedman’s book Spiritual Survival for Law Enforcement has enjoyed great success. Some police academies have started awarding copies of it to police academy graduates. The New Orleans Police Department distributed 1,000 copies to their officers, who were subjected to overwhelming stress during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when marauders roamed the streets, wreaking even more havoc on the already devastated city.
How did the police react to the recent Virginia Tech mass murder?
“I hear police officers debate the technical questions; for example, the issue of gun control. While losing sight of a far more fundamental question: What is happening to our society that such acts of wickedness can exist and are increasing? That is a question that does not belong to the world of the police officer, but, rather, confronts every member of our society, especially Torah Jews.
“Police officers play a very specific role in the world, They perform damage control, and arrive on the scene to clean up the mess caused by people who are devoid of Torah values. And, every time I see it, I am reminded that we Torah Jews have a far more important and comprehensive role to play in the world: to introduce Torah into the world and to work for the eradication of evil in the world. We can look to no one else to play that role for us.â€
Seeing the Positive The key to Rabbi Friedman’s teaching success, both for the FBI and in kiruv, is his awareness that at the core of every Chazal is a truth both about how the universe works and about the inherent contradictions in the human condition. “This makes sense to us,†he says, “because we recognize that the Author of the Torah and the Creator of the universe and humanity is One and the same.†But to those unfamiliar with Torah, this concept is a great innovation and explaining this to someone in the line of fire requires great finesse.
A typical case that came up involved a police officer who was forced to shoot and kill a would-be bank robber. He was devastated by the experience and could not stop crying over the incident. His chaplain approached Rabbi Friedman to inquire how to help take away his pain. Rabbi Friedman gave the chaplain techniques to help ease the officer’s guilt by strengthening his sense that what he did was ethically and morally right, despite the pain it inflicted.
Another challenge that arises is that police officers practice what’s known as “officer safety,†essentially the strategic assumption that everyone around them is dangerous, hostile, and poses a grave threat to them. This is an essential strategy to ensure the safety of police officers on the job, but, obviously, wreaks havoc on one’s ability to function in the world when off duty.
Rabbi Friedman addresses this concept in his book, describing how with a belief in G-d, the world is in truth essentially a safe, good place. He points out that even though every accident or crime scene shows the evil of the world, one can also notice how much good is present as well, namely all of the helpful emergency workers and concerned bystanders who are there doing whatever they can to help.
At the same time, the spiritual tools cannot compromise the defensive awareness that the police officers acquire during their training. “We must deal with police officers and put them in touch with their spiritual sides without weakening their resolve and producing a bunch of uniformed wimps,†Rabbi Friedman explains. “We’re not dealing with social workers; we’re dealing with police officers, and any spirituality awareness we peddle must not threaten their image or culture or self-perception of invincibility. Spiritual interventions must strengthen them and their resolve to do the job, not weaken their resolve in any way. These newfound infusions of spirituality must energize, not enervate, them.â€
Torah-True Way Rabbi Friedman stresses to everyone that everything he’s teaching comes straight from Torah. Clergymen often come up to him and say, “It’s so clear that you guys have the truth.†Once, a police officer got up after a lecture and announced, “Rabbi Friedman is my rabbi. Because, although none of you know this, I’m Jewish.â€
As spiritual advisor to the FBI, Rabbi Friedman is asked all sorts of questions, like how to deal with mourning among police officers. He went through laws of shivah and used some of the ideas behind the rituals to help them to mourn. A secretary in one of the police agencies read a copy of the book, which was lying around, and phoned Rabbi Friedman months later to tell him that it was the only thing that could console her after her husband’s death and that it had given her a whole worldview with which to process her loss.
His ultimate goal is to effect a fundamental change in the law enforcement world, by using these ideas in the police training academies as pre-crisis prevention, long before the officer has encountered the horrors of the career, as opposed to after the officer has succumbed to stress. In this way, the police officers will be fortified and prepared to face the challenges that they will inevitably face.
“Armed in advance, and taught to anticipate these stresses and challenges, when they inevitably come they will be less devastating and shocking,†says Rabbi Friedman.
* * * * * * * * * *
Sidebar:
Before hiring Rabbi Friedman, the FBI asked him if he had any experience with law enforcement. He told them that he'd been a prison chaplain for four years, in the Butner Federal Correctional Institution, where, incidentally, he had a chavrusa with Jonathan Pollard.
Although he doesn't like to speak publicly about Jonathan Pollard, Rabbi Friedman considers the four years he spent with Jonathan as some of the most meaningful, significant times of his life.
Additionally, Rabbi Friedman gave the FBI a manuscript for what later became his book, Wisdom from the Batcave (Compass Books), which he describes as a "dynamic mussar sefer," meaning that it's exciting and will speak to a person who would not ordinarily be exposed to Torah concepts.
The book developed from notes he took developing classes he taught while doing kiruv at Duke University. Seeking new ways to interest people in discussions of Torah concepts of ethics and philosophy, he hit on the idea of using his childhood obsession with Batman comics as a way to attract students to his classes. Only later did he realize how those comics had given him much inspiration on how to live a heroic life. In class, he would use a particular comic strip as a way to illustrate a Torah idea.
Unlike most comic book superheroes, Batman has no supernatural abilities. He's an ordinary person, who decides to apply his normal human potential to the highest degree, in order to help fight crime and make the world a better place. Rabbi Friedman sees him as a metaphor for what we're all trying to become - "superheroes," the best people we can be. The book presents many basic Torah ideas in a lighthearted way that anyone can relate to and has been an effective tool for kiruv, teaching Jewish values both to those who are unfamiliar with them and to those drifting away from them.
Ironically, when Rabbi Friedman was invited to visit the FBI Academy, it was on condition that he never mention Batman or other "juvenile" ideas. He was told that he would be dealing with real-life crime fighters, who weren't interested in hearing about a fictional character! But Spiritual Survival is filled with references to many such characters, helping to make complex ideas more easily understandable. Rabbi Friedman took great joy in getting to meet firsthand so many real-life heroes, and to use his childhood favorite to help convey some important lessons to help them in their task.
* * * * * * * * * *
Thank you, Gavriel and Mishpacha Mag!