Writings from Rabbi Glickman

It’s difficult, but today I must perform the painful task of criticizing a guy I’ve grown to love recently – my friend, Harry Potter. 

Now, don’t go putting up your free-speech dukes and begin accusing me of Roberstonian Swaggartry, or anything like that.  At least not until you’ve read what I have to say.  I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I did read all four of the Harry Potter books with my 7-year-old son, and I loved every one of them.  I found the plots riveting, the characters engaging, and the fantasy fantastic.  Closing each one, I found myself in awe of J.K. Rowling’s seemingly boundless imagination.

So, what’s to criticize?  Well, for those of you who have yet to be Potterized, each book tells the story of a year that Harry Potter spends at Hogwart’s School of Wizardry and Witchcraft.  Every Fall, Harry goes to the local train station and, from “Platform Nine and Three Quarters,” boards a train that takes him to Hogwart’s for yet another year of learning and adventure.  There he encounters magical and fantastic characters and creatures, all unknown to those of us in the non-Wizarding “Muggle” world.

The problem is that nobody in the Wizarding World – not even the best of the good guys – ever lets any of us Muggles know that this parallel universe of witches, wizards and warlocks even exists.  The Wizarding World is a big secret, and anyone in it who spills the beans to a Muggle is subject to severe punishment.

This theme – “There’s Something Amazing Happening Here, But I Can’t Tell You About It” – is by no means new to American pop culture.  Wilbur Post never let on that Mr. Ed could talk.  Darren Stevens never told anyone that Samantha was a witch  (neither did the other Darren Stevens).  Tony Nelson kept secret the fact that Genie was a genie – but maybe that was just because he had Barbara Eden prancing around his house in a bikini, calling him “Master,” and he didn’t want to mess with a good thing.

The point is that, in all of these cases and others, people who learn an Amazing Truth decide, for some reason, to keep it from the rest of the world.

How sad.  Imagine what we could have done with these truths.  Mr. Ed could have taught us great equestrian wisdom; Genie could have blinked Tony to the moon and saved our nation billions of space program dollars; Samantha could have wiggled here nose, and –  bing! – no more Taliban.  And Harry Potter could have performed all of these feats, and then some!

Why all the secrecy?  Do the Wizard Elders and others who are “in the know” think we’d exploit their knowledge for evil purposes?  Are they greedy?  Maybe they just think this knowledge would overwhelm us, and that we couldn’t handle the truths they know.

I guess this all rubs me the wrong way because, as a student of Judaism, I too have learned some Amazing Truths – many of them, in fact.  My tradition is filled with wisdom that would send even Harry’s brainy friend Hermione’s head spinning.  No, I’ve never learned levitate or prestidigitate or get very far off the ground on a broomstick, but I have studied the wisdom of sages ancient and modern, and they have taught me much about how to lead a life that is holy and filled with meaning.

And unlike Harry Potter’s teachers, mine forbid me from keeping this learning secret.  Moses – the very first rabbi – received Torah from God atop Mt. Sinai, only to be told that he had to hurry back down and use it to deal with his now-idolatrous followers.  Jacob wrestled through the night with an angel and, profoundly changed and all grown up, had to face his estranged brother, Esau, at dawn.  The ancient Jewish sages taught that if a teacher does not teach, it would have been better had he not been born in the first place.

Harry, you’re learning some awesome and powerful lessons at Hogwarts, and we Muggles need you!  Can’t you do your presto-chango thing and help make our world work the way it’s supposed to work?  Bring us incantations that will make us wise, magical maps that will help us find the bad guys, hexes that will transform their sneers into smiles and make them want become good.  We can handle it, Harry.  Really, we can.

In the meantime, I will commit myself to learning the Amazing Truths elsewhere.  And as I learn, I will teach.  And as I teach, I will hope – I will hope that our world will soon become one of sharing, rather than secrecy; of openness rather than fear; of faith that, unlike what your Wizarding teachers and others might think, we human beings can handle the truth.

You are a wonderful young man, Harry.  And it is for precisely this reason that the world needs to learn the many great lessons that you can teach.

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