This talk was delivered at Friendship Missionary Baptist Church on Tuesday, September 9, 2025 at a Soul of Philanthropy Program exploring Black philanthropy and Jewish philanthropy.

I thought I didn’t care about money.

As a teenager, I lived for nearly two years on a Kibbutz in Israel—a communal farm built on ideals of shared labor and collective ownership. Later, I spent five years as a graduate student, living on a shoestring budget in Jerusalem, Los Angeles, and New York. Through it all, I believed money didn’t matter.

And for a while, it didn’t—until the day it did.

It was Thursday night, December 11, 2008. I got one of those calls you where you remember exactly where you were when the phone rang. My sister told me a man named Bernie Madoff had just been arrested for orchestrating a $50 billion Ponzi scheme. He had stolen from stock portfolios, endowments, nonprofits, and retirement accounts—including the one my late father had built, over a lifetime of service, for my mother.

My father—a rabbi—dedicated 46 years to serving others. His personal financial goal was simple: ensure that my mother, a widow for eight years by then, would be financially secure. But with that call, we learned her retirement savings were gone.

That was the moment I realized: money does matter.

It matters when someone you love doesn’t have enough to live on. It matters when basic needs become questions instead of assumptions.

It matters in our daily lives, and in how we build and sustain our communities. It matters for institutions like the remarkable Friendship Missionary Baptist Church, built up through the exceptional vision and leadership of Dr. Jones. It matters for the New Generation of African American Philanthropy, so powerfully led by Valaida Fullwood. It matters for the Jewish Federation of Greater Charlotte, supporting Jewish communities locally and globally. It matters for Queens University, where many students—the first in their families to attend college—receive an education that fuels the highest rate of upward mobility in Charlotte.

Money matters.

The way we use it reflects our values. The way we give it reflects our faith. And the way we trust that we are enough—even in scarcity—reveals our sense of fulfillment.

As a Jewish community, we’re entering our most sacred season—the High Holy Days. The ten Days of Awe stretch from Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, beginning the evening of Monday, September 23, through Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, on Thursday, October 2.

This is a time of cheshbon hanefesh—an accounting of the soul. Not balancing our checkbooks, but reckoning with our spirits.

This program today—so thoughtfully crafted by my colleagues—is not just about generosity. It’s about self-reflection. It invites us to ask: What is my relationship with money?

Money isn’t inherently good or evil. But when the pursuit of it becomes central to our lives, it can lead us astray.

We live in a culture of algorithms designed to make us want more. Ads follow us from screen to screen whispering: “You need this. You don’t have enough.”

Aesop tells of a man who was granted a wish—with a twist: whatever he received, his neighbor would get double. First, he wished for a house—his neighbor got two. Then, a horse—his neighbor got two. Finally, consumed by envy, he wished to be blind in one eye… so his neighbor would lose both.

In Genesis, when Jacob and Esau reunite after 20 years apart, Jacob offers his brother a generous gift. Esau declines, saying in Hebrew, Yesh li rav—“I have enough.” But Jacob insists: Yesh li kol—“I have everything.”

Esau had plenty. Jacob had peace—wholeness, through reconciliation.

What would it mean to look at the ads popping up in our lives and repeat the mantra, Yesh li kol—“I have everything.”

Lynne Twist, in her book The Soul of Money, writes: “There is enough. We have enough. We are enough.”

She tells of a day with two fundraisers for The Hunger Project. In the morning, she received a $50,000 check from a corporate office—easy money given to repair public image. In the afternoon, in the basement of a Harlem church, people gave five and ten dollars they could barely spare. The first to give was an elderly woman who stood tall and said:

“Now, I ain’t got no checkbook and I ain’t got no credit cards. To me, money is like water. For some folks it rushes through their life like a river. For me, it comes like a little trickle. But I want to pass it on in a way that does the most good. I see that as my right, my responsibility, and my joy. I have fifty dollars in my purse from doing a white woman’s wash, and I want to give it to you.”

In Jewish tradition, we teach children about tzedakah (giving) from the earliest age. We give our little ones tzedakah boxes to collect coins meant not for spending—but for giving.

In Hebrew, tzedakah doesn’t mean “charity.” It means “justice.” Generosity isn’t optional—it’s a commandment, an obligation.

Giving is justice because there are inequities in society. Giving enables others have what they need – a roof over their heads, food upon their table, healthcare to sustain their bodies. The Bible and Rabbinic teachings sets the bar of tithing at 10% of your yearly income if you have adequate funds and if you have above adequate funds, give 20%

The rabbis ask: “Is it better to give one dollar a day, or $365 in one day?”

They teach that daily giving cultivates a generous spirit.

Money matters—not just in how we live, but in how we give.

Recent cuts to federal programs mean millions are losing access to healthcare, housing, food, and mental health services. The need for philanthropy—large and small—is greater than ever.

And giving heals more than just society—it heals us.

John D. Rockefeller was a millionaire by 23, a billionaire by 50. But at 53, he was dying. In constant pain, unable to eat or sleep, joyless.

Then, he began giving—donating to hospitals, public health, and medical research. He helped fund penicillin and malaria treatments. And as he gave, he recovered. He lived not to 54—but to 98. Giving renewed his body and soul.

If only generosity guaranteed long life—but I’ve know and I have seen that it does lead to a good one.

Sandra Levine and her husband, Leon of blessed memory, two of Charlotte’s most generous philanthropists, live the value of philanthropy. (A shout out to the four staff from the Levine Foundation are here.) 

The Levines once said: “Some people look at wealth as a way to feel better about themselves. They focus on owning things. That’s fine—for a while. But eventually you ask: What do these possessions really mean? They’re just things. What matters is whether you’re helping someone.”

In 2023, I was honored to deliver Leon Levine’s eulogy. I spoke with Michael Marsicano, former CEO of the Foundation for the Carolinas. Michael once asked Leon why his name appeared on so many institutions.

Leon replied, “Because it’s a Jewish name. People think it’s about me, but it’s not. It’s about lifting up the Jewish community.”

When we give—whether as Jews or as Black Americans or as people of faith—we say: We belong. We are part of something greater.

We are here today as member of the Jewish community and members of the Black community to learn from each other, to be inspired by each other, and to understand how we can best lift up each other.

Even the geography of the land of Israel has a lesson to teach us about giving.

There are two seas in Israel. The Sea of Galilee teems with life, fish, and joy. It receives water—and lets it flow onward.

The Dead Sea, in contrast, only receives. It hoards. And nothing lives there.

The difference? The Sea of Galilee gives. The Dead Sea doesn’t.

So it is with us: when we give, we live.

Seven is holy number in Judaism. The world was complete and whole in seven days, so to sum it up, I close with seven Jewish teachings on tzedakah, on Jewish righteous giving:

1. How you give matters.
   Maimonides taught there are levels of giving. Anonymous giving is noble—but putting your name on a gift, if it inspires others, also has value. Giving cheerfully is better than giving reluctantly. The highest form is giving that helps others become self-sufficient.
2. Giving is for everyone.
   Even recipients of tzedakah are expected to give something—however small—to others.
3. We are responsible for our own.
   The Talmud teaches: Kol Yisrael arevim zeh bazeh—All Israel is responsible for one another. As Jews, we are 0.02% of the global population. Two out of every one thousand people are Jewish. If we don’t care for our community, who will? I’d say the same for the African American community. We must each start our giving by supporting our own communities but we do not end there.
4. We are responsible for others.
   The prophet Jeremiah said: “Seek the peace of the city where you dwell—for in its peace, you shall find peace.” We cannot be at peace when our neighbors or our city is struggling.
5. Make giving part of your home.
   Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson taught that you should affix a tzedakah box to the wall of you home — so that your home itself becomes a vessel for giving.
6. Give your time.
   Tzedakah isn’t just about money. It’s time, energy, presence.
7. Giving saves from death.
   Maybe not always physical death, but spiritual death—from apathy, from disconnection. When we don’t give, our hearts harden to the world around us. Giving literally saves others from physical death.

In 2020, with support from the Jewish Federation of Greater Charlotte and Queens University, I helped create the Charlotte Black/Jewish Alliance. I invite you all to join our bridge building efforts.

One of our which, our Circle of Humanity: Monuments for Unity and Remembrance you’ll hear about later on in this program. It is a project that lifts up our MLK Memorial Statue and creates a New Holocaust Memorial Sculpture, connecting them, and making them an educational and tourist and community destination.

If we think back to the Civil Rights Era, of the many white Americans who joined the Civil Rights Movement—registering voters, riding buses to desegregate them, marching for voting rights, being jailed to advance justice —the majority were Jews. We share deep and powerful roots as Black and Jewish communities in our commitment to righteous giving and healing our communities and in our religious drive for liberation and justice.

Today, I serve as Sklut Professor of Jewish Studies at Queens University and as Executive Director of Spill the Honey—an organization serves as a national hub producing arts and educational content that empowers the Black-Jewish alliance today in combating antisemitism and racism.

This program is about spilling the honey.
There is deep richness in Black philanthropy—as shown by Valaida’s book, exhibit, and leadership. And there is beauty in Jewish philanthropy. Together, we can heal, lift, and inspire this city.

Giving is wholeness.
As Jacob said: Yesh li kol—“I have everything.”

May we all have enough.
May we give enough.
May we build a culture not of “you or me,” but of “you and me—we.”
May money matter—by the difference we make with what we have.

Amen.