8 | MAY 6 • 2021 

Dear Danny,
I wholeheartedly appreciate 
your comments on the Derek 
Chauvin guilty verdicts. 
My heart 
rejoiced when 
Judge Cahill 
read those 
guilty verdicts 
… unlike in 
1992 when four 
white police 
officers were 
acquitted in the videotaped 
beating of Rodney King. I 
lived in Los Angeles at the 
time and watched the city 
go up in flames in the worst 
civil unrest in the history of 
Los Angeles. So, the Derek 
Chauvin guilty verdicts gave 
me a sense of justice. 
However, this cannot be 
the conclusion of the matter. 
There are still three other 
former Minneapolis police 
officers who must be held 
accountable in the George 
Floyd murder. Other police 
officers must be charged 
and held accountable for 
the murders of Breanna 
Taylor, Daunte Wright and 
now Andrew Brown Jr. 
in Elizabeth City, North 
Carolina. 
Time and time again, too 
many African Americans are 
dying at the hands of white 
police officers, and, in most 

instances, they are unarmed! 
Something must be done now 
to change the climate and 
correct these gross miscar-
riages of justice!
Therefore, we must lobby 
Congress to pass the George 
Floyd Justice in Policing Act, 
which, if passed, will hold 
police officers accountable for 
their criminal actions against 
African Americans in partic-
ular and all people in general. 
We must change the 
mindset of white police 
officers in particular and 
all police officers in general 
that African Americans and 
Latinos deserve the same 
courtesy and respect as their 
white counterparts. If we 
believe that all police officers 
are not bad, then we must 
also believe that all African 
Americans and Latinos are 
not bad! We must promote 
community policing in which 
police officers know the 
residents and are not so trig-
ger-happy to shoot first and 
ask questions later.
Let us forge ahead together 
and bring about justice in 
our community. Let us get 
to know one another better 
… police and community 
… and establish a bond of 
respect and understanding 
and friendship. Let us work 
together hand in hand until 
“Justice rolls down like water 
and righteousness like a 
mighty stream” (Amos 5:24). 
We shall overcome! 

Rabbi Daniel Syme is rabbi emeri-
tus at Temple Beth El in Bloomfield 
Township. Rev. Kenneth J. 
Flowers is pastor of Greater New 
Mount Moriah Missionary Baptist 
Church in Detroit.

Dear Ken,
I must confess I had 
misgivings about that verdict. I 
knew what I had seen. I knew 
what I felt was so 
obvious. And yet, 
American history 
had conditioned 
me to be 
cautious about 
my optimism.
I listened to 
Judge Cahill read 
the verdict: “Guilty! Guilty! 
Guilty!” And I felt enormous 
relief. But at the same time, I 
felt profound sadness, sadness 
that a verdict that seemed so 
obvious could be a source of 
celebration in the United States 
of America. 
My thoughts drifted back 
to August 1963. I was 17 
years old when my father of 
blessed memory, Rabbi M. 
Robert Syme, returned from 
participating in the March on 
Washington with Dr. Martin 
Luther King Jr. and told me, 
“Danny, America is on the 
road to justice, but it is your 
generation that will bring us 
there.
”
Dad was a bit too optimistic. 
But it was a 17-year-old girl, 
Darnella Frazier, who turned 
on the video on her cell phone 
and filmed the entire horrific 
murder because, as she said, “it 

was wrong, and I wanted to do 
something.
” 
Darnella did something, 
and the entire world saw. 
This young woman, perhaps 
unknowingly, was living out the 
words of Torah: “Justice, Justice 
shall you pursue” (Deuteronomy 
16:20).
So here we are today, filled 
with hope tempered by a 
profound sense of uncertainty. 
For during the Chauvin trial 
itself, another young black 
man, 20-year-old Daunte 
Wright, was shot and killed by 
the police, only 10 miles from 
where George Floyd died. A 
16-year-old Black girl was killed 
by police in Columbus, Ohio, 
during jury deliberations. And 
Andrew Brown Jr. was killed 
by police in North Carolina the 
day after the verdict.
The verdict was a historic 
first step, but only a beginning. 
There is so much more to do. 
So today, I again reach out my 
hand to you, my beloved friend, 
and promise you that I will do 
all in my power to strengthen 
your resolve.
There is no way for me to 
understand fully the challenges 
we face. So, I will depend 
on you to guide me and to 
reinforce my understanding. 
God bless you and may this be 
God’s will. 

PURELY COMMENTARY

guest columns
A Conversation About 
Justice Between Friends

Rabbi Daniel 
Syme

Rev. Kenneth 
Flowers

Editor’s Note: Pastor Kenneth J. Flowers and Rabbi Daniel Syme 
have shared a close friendship and brotherhood that has extended 
for some 25 years. They have laughed together, cried together 
and prayed for one another’s healing. And yet, Rabbi Syme 
cannot think of any moment in their bond that has been more 
impactful than the reading of the verdict in Derek Chauvin’s trial 
for the murder of George Floyd. The two friends exchanged their 
thoughts and agreed to share them with the Jewish News.

JN FILE PHOTO

Rabbi Syme and Rev. Flowers in 2016

