The Tragedy Test: Making Sense of Life-Changing Loss—A Rabbi’s Journey

By Richard Agler

When tragedy strikes we want to know:
Why did this happen?
How could it have happened?
Where is life's justice and fairness?

When tragedy strikes we need to know:
What still makes sense.
What paths lead to healing.
How to deal with the timeless questions.

When Rabbi Richard Agler's twenty-six-year-old daughter Talia was struck and killed by a motor vehicle, his understanding of tragedy failed him. This book is an account of a journey, one he had no choice but to take, leading from unimaginable grief to (at least partial) recovery.
In clear and compelling language, with references to both ancient and modern sources of wisdom, Rabbi Agler offers insight for everyone who has, or who one day might, experience painful loss.
The Tragedy Test may give you enhanced clarity on some of humanity's most profound questions. It may lead you to reimagine the nature of our universe. It may fundamentally challenge your understanding of the God you thought you knew. It will not leave you unmoved or unchanged.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Oct 25, 2018
• ISBN: 9781532657948

Richard Agler

Richard Agler was ordained in 1978. He is the founding rabbi, now Rabbi Emeritus, of Congregation B’nai Israel in Boca Raton, Florida. He has taught graduate courses in mysticism and his gift for bringing complex ideas to life makes him a speaker in demand. He has published articles and letters on political ethics, interfaith relations, and baseball. Currently Co-Director of the Tali Fund and Resident Scholar at the Keys Jewish Community Center in Tavernier, Florida, this is his first book. www.rabbiagler.net.

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THE TRAGEDY TEST

Making Sense of Life-Changing Loss —A Rabbi’s Journey—

Richard Agler

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The Tragedy Test

Making Sense of Life-Changing Loss—A Rabbi’s Journey

Copyright © 2018 Richard Agler. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

Resource Publications

An Imprint of Wipf and Stock Publishers

199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3

Eugene, OR 97401

www.wipfandstock.com

paperback isbn: 978-1-5326-5792-4

hardcover isbn: 978-1-5326-5793-1

ebook isbn: 978-1-5326-5794-8

Manufactured in the U.S.A. 01/03/19

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for permission to reprint previously published material:

The Jewish Publication Society for TANAKH: The Holy Scriptures: The New JPS Translation According to the Traditional Hebrew Text. Philadelphia: 1988. (Some translations have been modified by the author.)

The excerpt from the poem Two Worlds Exist is reprinted from Two Worlds Exist, copyright © 2016 by Yehoshua November, by permission of Orison Books, Inc. www.orisonbooks.com

A portion of the proceeds from the sale of this book will be donated to the Tali Fund, Inc.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Preface

Part I—Challenge

Chapter 1: Talia Faith Agler, 1985–2012

Chapter 2: Faith: It’s Not Easy

Chapter 3: Our Explanations

Chapter 4: Faith for Difficult Times

Chapter 5: God’s Justice—Where?

Chapter 6: Holy Words

Chapter 7: Practice and Pursuit

Chapter 8: Offering Comfort

Chapter 9: Luck Happens

Part II—Response

Chapter 10: The God of Law and Spirit

Chapter 11: Reason—A Gift from God

Chapter 12: What God Is—Or Might Be

Chapter 13: Prayer and Ritual Through the God of Law and Spirit

Part III—Acceptance

Chapter 14: No Way Around It but Through It

Chapter 15: Happiness After Loss

Chapter 16: Nevertheless

Chapter 17: Conclusion

Afterword

Acknowledgments

Bibliography

For Talia

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"We cannot live in the afternoon of life according to the program of life’s morning.

For what was great in the morning will be little use at evening

and what in the morning was true, at evening will have become a lie."

—Carl Jung

Preface

Why did this happen? To me of all people? How could God let it? Why do good people suffer? Where is life’s justice and fairness? How will I go on?

These are not new questions. Tragedy, especially when it hits us personally, has challenged our understanding of the Universe, and whatever God may be in it, for millennia.

This book is a personal response to a personal tragedy. When my twenty-six-year-old daughter was killed in an accident, it shook my life and it shook my faith. I did not know what would become of either one. I only knew that I would go forward with as much strength and courage as I could muster.

At the same time this book is rabbinic—unavoidably so. Having served some thirty-five years in the congregational rabbinate, it could hardly be otherwise. I am attempting to speak here as I would to a member of the community who is seeking understanding. I am also speaking to myself.

It has been said that that which is most personal is also most universal. I believe what is written here has meaning for intrepid questioners of every faith, for people with no active faith, and even for those who may doubt faith altogether. It offers a reasoned understanding of God that faithful and skeptic alike may find helpful—and perhaps even acceptable.

Tragedy tests our faith as nothing else does. And it is in the wake of tragedy that we most need it. Sooner or later, we all experience loss. Sooner or later, we, along with our faith and our God, whatever shape or form they may take, will face questions we cannot answer. Sooner or later, we all take the Tragedy Test.

I don’t claim to have aced it. This is a record of how, by my own lights at least, I’ve managed to pass it.

I hope that this account of my journey will be of assistance to you on yours.

Part I—CHALLENGE

1

Talia Faith Agler, 1985–2012

Nothing ever becomes real ’til it is experienced.

¹

—John Keats

At about 11:40 p.m. on January 26, 2012, a Thursday night, the phone rang at our home in Florida. A strange voice asked for Mr. Agler, which let me know that it was not a rabbinic issue. Had it been, she would have asked for Rabbi Agler. I assumed it was some kind of scam, though the hour seemed late for that.

The caller identified herself as an officer of the United States Park Police and said she was calling from my daughter’s apartment in Washington, DC. How bizarre, I thought. She asked once more, Is this Mr. Agler? I answered, Yes.

Then it came. The officer told me that our daughter Talia had been in an accident, a serious one, and was in critical condition at George Washington University Hospital. She put Tali’s apartment mate on the line, who confirmed everything in a familiar voice. This was no scam. It was the phone call that is every parent’s worst nightmare.

They were able to patch through the Emergency Room doctor, who said I should get to the hospital as quickly as possible. I explained that there were surely no flights from Florida to Washington until the next morning. The doctor said that would be all right. She also let me know—with consummate sensitivity and professionalism, making references to oxygen depletion, brain trauma, and the like—that, in as many words, the chances for Talia’s survival were essentially nil.

I woke my wife Mindy with the news. As the police officer and doctor had done for me, I tried to break it to her as carefully as possible, but there was no sugarcoating the awful truth.

A series of midnight phone calls followed. The first was to our son Jesse and his wife Tovah, who lived nearby. They came right over. Next we called our daughter Sarah in New York. She would book an early flight and meet us in Washington. We called several of our cousins in the DC area to ask if they could go to the hospital to be with Tali. Every one of them said yes. Finally, we contacted the airline for seats on the morning’s first flight.

When we arrived at the hospital, Tali was on a ventilator, surrounded by our cousins, several of her dear friends, and medical staff. Although she looked peaceful, it was clear to everyone that a tragedy of the first magnitude had taken place. She was pronounced dead that afternoon.

It was a shock on every level. Talia was a vibrant, healthy, and dynamic young woman. She was bright, fastidious, and careful to a fault. She worked in the field of international development for a large company, which had, earlier on the day of the accident and unbeknownst to her, approved her next promotion. After work, she went out for a jog along the National Mall and was struck by a motor vehicle. Mercifully, the doctors emphasized to us, she did not know what hit her.

There were two memorial services—one in Washington where she lived, worked and graduated from college, and another in Florida, where she grew up. Between them, over 1500 people attended. Love, hugs, and tributes came from family, friends, teachers, and associates near and far. Thousands of hits were recorded on the websites established in her memory. In the most horrific way possible, it was beautiful.

As her parents, we had much to be proud of and a great deal to be thankful for. Still, our grief was beyond words.

During my tenure as a congregational rabbi, it all too often fell to me to be with families in similar circumstances. Though I always gave it my best—and there were those who could not thank me enough—I never felt equal to the task. Now I understood why. No one—at least no one who has not gone through it themselves—has any idea what this is like.

Her Life

Talia was born on April 9, 1985. She was the second of our three children, following her older brother Jesse by three years and preceding her younger sister Sarah by four.

She distinguished herself early on. Her first word was actually two, a question, Where’s Jess? Right away we suspected that we had a hyper-verbal and inquisitive child on our hands, and in fact, we did. Tali was loquacious and charming, her company cherished by friends, teachers, extended family, and strangers alike. When she wasn’t talking, she was reading—immersing herself in books of every description and loving the understanding and adventure she found there.

Coming of age in a rabbinic household, she absorbed the message that it is important to live for others, not only ourselves. She became passionate about social justice and was dedicated to making the world a better place.

When the opportunity to study for a semester abroad presented itself in college, she chose to do so in Nairobi, Kenya. She interned at a fledgling institution, the Centre for Domestic Training and Development, whose mission was to train impoverished East Africans to qualify for jobs as domestic workers.

This is a larger task than it may sound to Westerners. But for people who came from homes without electricity, running water or refrigeration—to say nothing of education—it was no small challenge. The CDTD became a success and has now graduated hundreds of students who have transformed their lives and climbed the socio-economic ladder.

Tali was proud to have taught there, and it left a strong impression on her. She sought work in the field of international development and was eventually hired by a major firm in Washington, who assigned her to their Africa desk. She kept in touch with the CDTD, and shortly before her death, its founder, Edith Murogo, discussed with her the possibility of establishing a rescue home for girls who were victims of trafficking and abuse. Tali enthusiastically endorsed the idea. After she died, Edith and her board named it in her honor: The Talia Agler Girls Shelter.

As an organ donor, Talia saved the lives of five people. In the process, she saved their families from the kind of loss we had just suffered. Her example inspired countless others to register and become donors themselves. Jewish tradition teaches that if you save one life, it is as if you have saved an entire world.² The number of lives that will be saved, and the family circles that will be sustained by her example, is incalculable.

A scholarship fund for college students at the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism in Washington, DC was established in her name. In addition, our family launched a foundation, The Tali Fund, to continue her work. None of this would have happened had she not been the person she was.

As befit her middle name, Talia also had faith. She enjoyed studying religious texts, both ancient and modern. She believed that faith in general—and Judaism in particular—had much to contribute to the improvement of the world. One of her college professors, unaware of her background, suggested she become a rabbi. Tali thought that one in the family was enough.

Her personal ethic was one of giving. She was constantly phoning parents, grandparents, friends, and cousins, just to say hello.

There were also what we called Tali-isms or The Rules According to Tali:

• Always look shopkeepers, wait staff, and toll takers in the eye, and smile at them.

• Always ask questions—and keep asking until you understand the answer.

• Be a vegetarian