May 2001 Religion And Sports By Rabbi Alvin Kass Robert Lipsyte of The New York Times recently wrote a fascinating article entitled ÒThe Crossing of Faith and Big-Time Sport.Ó What triggered LipsyteÕs piece was the death of Dale Earnhardt, the well known stock car racer, who has been praised by prominent religious figures in beatific terms normally associated with pious saints. As quoted by Lipsyte, Professor William Baker, an expert on the subject of religion and sports, proclaims the similarity between big-time sport and evangelical faith: ÒBoth are win-lose mentalities. In evangelical Christianity you are either saved or lost. YouÕve gone to Heaven or youÕve gone to Hell. You win or you lose, and thatÕs what sports is all about.Ó ThatÕs quitedifferent from what I learned growing up about the value of sports: ÒItÕs not whether you win or lose that counts, but how you play the game.Ó Sports was supposed to be a training ground for the attributes essential to a civil and civilized community: discipline, team work, playing by the rules, and respect for talent. There was the understanding that you could win the game in the arena but still be a loser in the game of life if you cheated or broke the rules. The Òwin-loseÓ orientation of big-time sport is certainly alien to perspectives of Judaism, which emphasize moral living as our prime duty. The essence of the Torah is to love your neighbor as yourself. All the victories in the world canÕt approach in importance friendship, character, peace of mind,and a clear conscience. The value of a human being is determined, not by howmany trophies youÕve won, but by your worth if all your trophies were taken away. Worldly success as a sign of heavenly success is also the diametric opposite of the ÊJewish belief in the lamed-vov tzadikkim, the 36 righteous people, for whose sake the world is preserved. According tothis concept, there are 36 modest, unassuming human beings who live decent,moral lives who are the real heroes of the world. No one knows who they are. Indeed, they donÕt know who they are, but their kindness, caring and gentleness are the ultimate justification for GodÕs preservation of the universe. Popular gauges of success may, therefore, diverge sharply from the criteria employed by the Heavenly tribunal. Unlike Dale Beaver, a chaplain for Motor Racing Outreach, who preached at the memorial service for Dale Earnhardt that God used people in higher profile positions to remind people, ÒIÕm still here, IÕm not silent and I still care about you,Ó our faith suggests that the most effective reminders of GodÕs presence and concern might be found among the humble and obscure. The extraordinarily prominent role assigned to God in contemporary professional sports is troubling in other ways. Many believers, for example, maintain thatGod takes sides in athletic competitions. Thus, Lipsyte quotes Joe Gibbs, former coach of the Washington Redskins and now a very successful Winston Cup team owner: ÒI think God makes everything about everything. Does he have a hand in everything? I think he has a hand in the outcome.Ó Quite frankly, I find it hard to believe that God is a Yankee fan rather than a Mets supporter! ActuallyGod also has a lot more important issues to concern Himself with than who wins games, races, matches, etc. It would likewise scarcely be fair if God had fixed the outcome of these contests in advance. Why knock yourself out under such circumstances? Some claim that attributing a major role to God in sports also takes away the stigma of religion as a preoccupation only of effete weaklings. That, indeed, was the argument of Friedrich Nietzsche, the German philosopher, who contended that religion constituted an obstacle to superior beings (ÒubermenschenÓ) in their aspirations to advance civilization to new and unprecedented levels. Some clergy have used the platform of religion in sports to condemn homosexuality, promote white supremacy especially in stock car racing and affirm the superiority of the masculine gender. Clearly, religion is a priceless blessing to humanity. Nevertheless, it has frequently been perverted. We must, however, be careful not Òto pour out the baby with the bath.ÓÊ We must preserve the ideals, beliefs, and practices that are the essence of vital religion and at the same time remove the roadblocks to authentic faith posed by those who exploit religion for their own self-aggrandizement. IÕm afraid that a great deal of Òsports and religionÓ belongs in that latter category.