Question
Sirs/Mesdames:
The heretical question submitted below is
raised by a “Hebrew-speaking gentile” like myself, who, as the result of various
experiences during those dark days of Nazism on the one hand and the state of
affairs in our region on the other, finds it difficult even today to settle his
account with the Creator. Furthermore, this writer was educated on the knees of
Western rationalism, i.e. empirical thinking according to which the conclusion
is drawn on the basis of the data rather than vice-versa. All this led this
writer to consider the issue cited below.
The question, along with some of the
answers received will appear (in Hebrew) in the 100th issue of
NATIV (September 2004). We are presenting the question (in English) here, in
NATIV ONLINE along with a selection of the responses we have received so
far.
We invite our readers – if you find it worthy of response –
to do so. Send your response to us at
ariel.center@gmail.com. (Please try to keep the answers no longer than the
question.)
Thank You,
Arieh Stav
Who Is a Jew and Primarily – Why?
Will You Sign?
It is the year 0; you have the opportunity
to travel in a time machine, which enables you, a tour of the next two thousand
years. It goes without saying that the future, like the past, i.e. the
destruction of the First Temple, does not bode well. Already at the start of the
journey you are shocked at the sight of the horrible massacre perpetrated by
Titus in Judea, and which will be remembered in eternal disgrace in the history
of our people as the destruction of the Second Temple; as the journey continues,
you are witness to a long series of pogroms, expulsions, massacres, riots,
Holocaust. As you approach the year 2000, you discover to your great surprise
that there are only about 13 million Jews in the world, while the number of
Italians approaches 70 million. Surprising, because when you set out on the
journey, the number of Jews in Israel and the exile numbered 6 million, while
the number of Romans was 4 million. Thus, proportional to the Italians, there
should have been over 100 million Jews in the world today. Among the 90 million
missing, the great majority was destroyed. On a personal level the implication
is the loss of nine out of every ten members of each family, i.e. the Binding of
Isaac nine times over. However, this time no as a metaphor but as a grim
reality.
As the journey continues, you are present
at the establishment of the State of Israel and recall the statement written by
Herzl in the foreword to his book, The Jewish State, “Immediately upon
the establishment of the Jewish state anti-Semitism everywhere will cease.”
However, the opposite is true. Israel, that charred remnant of the fire of the
Holocaust must struggle for survival in the face of an unending series of
attempts to destroy it by Hitler’s erstwhile allies; in Europe, anti-Semitism
once again rears its head in the guise of anti-Zionism; the de-legitimization of
Israel leads 6 out of every 10 Europeans to claim that Israel stands at the head
of the list of places endangering humanity, and since it is only reasonable that
threats to humanity should be uprooted, the conclusion to be drawn is obvious.
The combination of the de-legitimization of Israel as a state and the
de-humanization of the Jew in the Arab and Muslim world, returns the Jew to the
late thirties in Europe. Just as the Germans provided the Jew with only one
alternative, i.e. physical annihilation, a significant portion of humanity today
offers him only one alternative: Loss of the right to political sovereignty.
At the conclusion of the exhausting journey
in the time machine, when you return, a bit stunned, to the year 0, you are
invited to the office of INRI, Jesus, son of Joseph, where you are offered, with
the pious courtesy characteristic of missionaries from time immemorial, the
Christian alternative. It goes without saying that in the course of your journey
you became aware that it is the greatest social success of the last two thousand
years. From 0 adherents in the year 0, all of the Christian denominations
multiplied and it now numbers 2.5 billion adherents populating the democratic
world and beyond. Not only is Christianity not in any danger, certainly not
existential danger, it, by means of what is called Western culture, sets the
international agenda.
During a conversation, which you conduct
with the INRI Chief of Staff (Jesus himself is busy changing the existing order,
i.e. turning over booths in the Mahane Yehuda Market), you play the moral card
of absolute justice. Come what may, you claim, we, the Jews, compiled the Ten
Commandments and redeemed humanity from idolatry. Thus, it is only natural that
the Hebrew, who inscribed, “Thou shalt not kill” and even more so “Thou shalt
not commit adultery” on its banner, would be despised and persecuted and that is
the essence of the idea behind the status of “the Chosen People”. However, the
Chief of Staff, who also occasionally goes on guided tours in the time machine,
is familiar with that moral argument, beginning with the Prophets, through the
dicta of our sages culminating with Yehezkel Kaufman and George Steiner. He then
cites Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles of Faith, which he has prepared for
circumstances just like this, and invites you to peruse the eleventh principle,
which states: “I believe with complete faith that God, blessed be He, gives
reward to one who obeys the commandments of the Torah and punishes one who
violates its prohibitions”.
Thus, if one were to take the statement of
Maimonides at face value, it becomes clear that if the Creator indeed “punishes
one who violates its prohibitions”, and since there is no nation, which compares
to the Jewish people, which is repeatedly punished in the sense of “in each
generation they rise against us to obliterate us”, and since the scope of the
punishment is proportional to the scope of the sin, the conclusion from
Maimonides’ statement is that there is no nation, which compares to the Jewish
people, who violates its prohibitions; i.e. there is no nation as iniquitous.
It is doubtful whether there exists a
clearer illustration of the Maimonidean paradox than the comparison between the
Jewish State and Germany. Throughout the history of humanity, there has never
been a nation as worthy of bearing on its forehead the collective Mark of Cain
identifying it as a collection of criminals. It was Lukanus, the Roman, who
warned, back in the first century of the Common Era, against Furio Teutonicus
– Teutonic madness. And behold Israel, “a tiny strip of sand on the
Mediterranean coast”, in the words of George Steiner, which was designed to
grant a safe haven to those fleeing the sword of the “evil kingdom of Ashkenaz”,
is the one standing “on the brink of oblivion”, in the words of Natan Alterman.
Germany, in contrast, after it was reunited, is one of the wealthiest, most
serene and secure nations in the world.
Thus, since the upshot of all this is that
there is no deterministic curse in the history of nations more terrible than the
one accompanying the “Chosen People”, hated by both man and God (!), the
question is – what is the secret of the Jew’s adherence to his Judaism, and is
there not a sarcastic element to the blessing: “Blessed art Thou o Lord our God
Who hast granted us life and sustenance and permitted us to reach this season”?
It goes without saying that the emphasis is on “this season”, i.e.: the
auto-de-fe stages of the Inquisition, against the murderous brigades of
Chemlinizki, at the gates of Auschwitz etal.
While you are contemplating events of that
sort, the Chief of Staff, who reads your mind quite well, asks to add a few
words. “My brother”, he says, “historical determinism” is entirely Jewish. There
is no other nation in the history of man whose fate is the very embodiment of
determinism. As a result, and in order to avoid causing you to despair, I prefer
to spare you continuing your time travel beyond the year 2000. However, on the
basis of rational deduction, there is no reason to assume that the future will
be any different than the past. And that, in my opinion, is the upshot of the
saying, “everything is predestined and free will is given,” and it is possible
that for that reason Rabbi Akiva was tortured and died as a martyr. One way or
another, the “permission” is granted to you and you are the one who must decide.
At this point, the Chief of Staff presents
you with a registration form appropriately embossed with a cross. Will you sign?
And if not, why not?
Responses
Below is a selection of responses
to the above question
by:
Why I Am a Proud Jew
David Bukay
The historiosophic analysis is
indeed impressive, and the challenge is indeed inviting, however, to my mind
only very few Jews will opt for the proposed alternative, very few, weak of
character, misguided and disoriented, it should be added.
It is imperative to deeply
analyze, what is the question? What is the challenge? What is that enticing
offer, which will induce the Jew to abandon his religion and convert to the
victorious religion – Christianity? An orderly analysis of the proposed text
leads us to the analytical assessment that the Jews have historically failed,
and they are a minority, persecuted to the extent that even their new country
cannot provide them with security.
And here is the difficult
question. Which is the victorious religion? What is the reason that a Jew should
convert? The proposed proof is merely numerical: The Christians today constitute
a majority of the world, with merely an arbitrary choice of the parameters of
the time travel: Only from the year 0 until the year 2000. There is no
additional logical assertion as to why a Jew must convert, other than the fact
that he will be part of a majority, perceived as victorious. However, does the
fact that you belong to the majority determine that you are the victor and
therefore successful? That is even incorrect in evolutionary terms for two
reasons: First, the Jews crossed and traversed all the pogroms, persecutions and
holocausts and they stand proudly on the stage of history, even if they are
small in number. Second, it is true that Western civilization is primarily
Christianity. However if we analyze the matter in depth, we will find that the
Jews are located at the forefront of all historical, scientific, cultural,
social and economic developments and innovations of what is referred to as the
“West”. In that sense, the Jewish contribution was and continues to be the most
critical.
The proposal and challenge that
the Jew accept Christianity, never was relevant and to a great degree is
tautological. The correct question is: Did they want to be the majority? The
answer is a big no. Judaism is not a missionary religion like Christianity and
Islam; it wants to neither absorb others nor assimilate among them. The Jews
chose in advance, in a calculated, detached decision, to be a “people who shall
dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations”. And why? Precisely
because they are the best and the most successful. Their small number, their
physical isolation and their distance from others were the objective the Jews
aspired to in the first place. True, they neither anticipated nor desired to be
persecuted and destroyed, however, they did not want to be the majority, they
didn’t want to emerge numerically victorious or conquer the world and become a
majority. As awful as this sounds – they didn’t want to “ruin the genius”, in
the sense of live and let live. If so, why would that alternative be attractive
today?
This, perhaps, is the Jewish,
and, to a certain extent, humanity’s tragedy. Imagine where the world would have
been today, to what apexes human civilization would have reached – if the Jews
had not been persecuted and destroyed, certainly if they would have transmitted
their universal, moral values to everyone? Despite their small number and their
existence as a persecuted majority, the Jews are the most loyal messengers of
human history, even from an evolutionary perspective. They have a destiny and a
role, the continuation of human development. And from a religious perspective,
they are the proof of the existence of the true God, the God of Israel, as “in
each generation they rise against us to destroy us, and the Holy One, Blessed Be
He saves us from them”. Persecuted, but still thriving.
Furthermore, the proposal to stop
being a Jew and convert to Christianity is problematic in another sense. Judaism
is not only a religion. It is a monumental civilization and culture. Therefore,
the question on the agenda is: When the Jews convert to Christianity, will they
cease being Jews in terms of their contribution to the development of humanity?
What will happen to the Jewish genius? Will they become Christians and the
Jewish genius will disappear – I am not so certain that the Christian Chief of
Staff will raise the proposal before the Jews. Can anyone contemplate the
ramifications for the future of human society, when there will be no more Jews?
On that day, the world will be totally different, and its course will be
uniform. Thus, those Christian communities are correct in their traditional
support of Israel, as it is a world interest to cultivate and sustain it.
To be Jewish does not only mean
to be a religious person who believes in Judaism, but so much more. It is to
belong to the most ancient monotheistic faith in the world that brought the
universal values of morality to the world as well as, even if it was not done
willingly it was certainly owing to its character, the other religions –
Christianity and Islam. To be a Jew means to belong to the smartest, most
“advanced” people in the world, whose place is at the forefront of human
creation in every social and spiritual area throughout history. If so, in the
words of the comedian – “why change”?
And, one must add, a bit
apologetically, that to be the best exacts a price – they hate you, are jealous
of you and therefore, they persecute you. Since you are the original, the phony
will always try to destroy you, as you and your existence constitute a perpetual
reminder of the fraud. This is probably the most significant reason,
historically, for the fact that Jews were always a persecuted minority.
The discussion initiative is also
praiseworthy in that the proposal to the Jews was to convert to Christianity and
not Islam. As, if you choose the point in time from the beginning of the 20th
century, Islam is the numerically victorious religion, which has astounding
momentum throughout the world, even relative to Islam. And thus, perhaps, as
tragic as it may be, the burden and yoke of the Jews for civilization: God in
his tortuous path of wisdom, wants the Jews, and Israel in particular, as a
barrier for humanity, as the modern world’s forward line of defense against the
waves of the Islamic invasion, which is seeking to restore humanity to its
anarchist, desert past.
At this point, the readers are
prepared to understand my approach: I am proud to be a Jew, because I am a
descendant of “from Moses to Moses there has no one like Moses” – of the father
of the Jewish nation, Moses our Teacher, and a descendant of the greatest of
its, and perhaps all of humanity’s, wise men, Maimonides, about whom Rabbi
Yehuda al-Harizi said, during his lifetime: “You are an angel of God, and were
created in the image of God…It was because of you that God said: ‘Let us make
man in our form and our image’”. Indeed, Maimonides is the “chief spokesman
everywhere”, “by whose light all Israel from east to west, walked”, and upon
whose death it was said: “Honor has been banished from Israel because the ark of
God has been taken”, and on his first tombstone it said: “the best of the human
race”.
I am proud to be the descendant
of him, who established the Jewish nation, Moses our teacher, and of him, who
consolidated Judaism nationally and religiously, Maimonides, in whose two
prodigious books – Mishneh Torah and The Guide of the Perplexed, established
Judaism from a Jewish law and philosophical perspective, unified faith with the
sciences, and whose huge historic and educational personality, is an asset for
any society and country throughout the ages.
With all due respect to
Christianity, my ancestors were the origin of all human wisdom – and to a large
part of human knowledge. I will not relinquish an original work in exchange for
a facsimile. As our rabbis said: “Be rather a tail among lions than a head among
foxes.”
Why
Remain a Jew?
Elyakim Haetzni
The equation between the populations of
Jews and others in the world at the beginning of the question is problematic
because the Italians of today are not the Romans of yore. The Romans exist no
longer; the Canaanites exist no longer; the Babylonians exist no longer; the
Assyrians exist no longer; but the Jews survived. And here is the paradox: The
Romans and the Canaanites survived physically in place, however, they lost their
cultural and national identity, while we suffered through exile and destruction
and maintained our identity. Thus, the appropriate answer to the question is:
Who can be described as “existing” – one whose body is whole but his
consciousness has been eradicated, or one whose body has been ravaged and
destroyed, but his consciousness remains whole?
The questioner ascribes the question to
INRI – Jesus Nazarenus Rex Judaeorum (as the Romans wrote on his cross):
Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews. Which proves that the man died as a Jew. He
was executed for revolt against the government, not as a heretic who had
renounced his Jewish identity. And if Jesus died as a Jew, it was not he who
presented us with the choice to move to the course of the “greatest social
success of the last two thousand years”. It would have been more appropriate to
attribute the question to Saul of Tarsus, who became Paul, the “apostle to the
nations”. He separated Christianity from Judaism, freed it of the practical
commandments, elevated Jesus to divine status and established the theory of
“original sin”, which cannot be rectified by means of good deeds and repentance,
but only through the divine mercy, which the “savior” granted by his sacrificial
death to those who believe in his divinity.
The second century CE, after the fall of
Bar-Kochba, the period during which Christianity began separating from Judaism,
was the first intersection at which Jews were required to choose between being
a “people that shall dwell alone” and joining an alien “success story”. 200 years
earlier, the Jews were invited to become Hellenists – to excel in the gymnasium
instead of the study hall, and hundreds of years before that they were tempted
by the priests of the Baal and the priestesses of Ashtoreth. And again, 500
years after Paul and the apostles, the Jews were given another opportunity to
join an up and coming power, which descended from them – the Moslems. However,
they refused. Again and again and again. And to this day, they are paying full
price for their refusal.
Through all this, we have not yet mentioned
the original, decisive choice, the one where it all began. The choice of Abram,
son of Terah who – as Rabbi Yehuda interpreted his appellation “Hebrew” – “the
whole world was on one side – and he was on the other”; there the choice was
made.
The Pursuit of Happiness
Does the questioner intend to confront
every value in the world with the “pursuit of happiness” – earthly success? If
that is the question, our forefather Abraham is certainly the starting point, as
he did not hesitate to stride into Nimrod’s fiery furnace – the first in a
series of numerous future furnaces – in order to transmit to the idolaters the
abstract concept of one invisible God, whose very singularity imposes upon man
the unbearable burden of absolute morality accompanied by the absolute
obligation to distinguish between good and evil, between permissible and
prohibited – a yoke of a kingdom of the spirit, which cannot be grasped by the
senses. Had we asked Abraham, was it “worthwhile”, relative to a good, peaceful
life in the land of Naharayim for him and his descendants – the answer is in his
actions.
I do not assume that the questioner
intended in his question to reassess the entire history of humanity and ask
Prometheus whether it was worthwhile to give humanity the gift of fire and pay
the price required in order to replace darkness
with light. I assume that the questioner chose the crossroads of the parting of
ways between Judaism and Christianity, based on the assumption that Peter’s
wagon was not as empty as Nimrod’s, although less full than our heavy wagon.
Thus, the question is, whether that particular difference was worth the price?
Christianity and
Judaism
Is that Christianity, which the Jews
rejected, different from Judaism only in nuance, but in essence they are one,
Judeo-Christian? Or is the gulf so wide that the Jews had no choice but to
reject the new-Pauline Christianity. What was it that the Jews rejected?
-
They were unable to accept the abrogation
of the practical commandments, and in that rejection they underscored the
difference between the daily sanctification of life by means of the
commandments and their secularization by restricting a sanctity to the
church, where salvation is granted as an act of mercy;
-
They rejected the pagan elements of the
“trinity”, rejected the fact that God took human form – was born and died and
was revived like Tammuz and Dionysus, a God who has a “holy mother”;
-
They could not accept the elimination of
a cornerstone of their moral doctrine – that a person can achieve reform and
repentance from within, that there is a way and hence also an obligation to
make good and to ”return” (“Teshuva”). The Jews could not exchange that
individual obligation for the atonement that the “son of God” granted from
without as a gift of mercy by virtue of his death, a sacrificial death. Rabbi
Shulweiss of Los Angeles correctly emphasizes that in the Binding of Isaac,
the Jews rooted out any idea of human sacrifice, and what is the crucifixion
in the eyes of the Christians if not God sacrificing his son?
-
The Jews also could not accept the
Christian saints (canonization, beatification). Priests, prophets and kings –
yes; saints – no.
Thus, what we have here is not two versions
of one essence but rather a total estrangement and polar opposites.
Furthermore: Judaism not only positions the
individual before his God; it embraces individual, nation and land. To
reform the universe, shaping the life of the individual is not enough,
collective life too must be shaped and this requires a nation, which is “a
peculiar treasure unto me above all people”, which was chosen not “because ye
were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people”, but
rather as the bearer of a mission, upon whom the “commandments, statutes and
judgments” were imposed as a collective. Only after such a nation is established
and it becomes an exemplary society in the land of its destiny, which will be
sanctified due to the sanctity of their life within it, will this nation be able
to be a “light unto the nations” a light, which will shine on “the mountain of
the Lord”…”for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from
Jerusalem”.
Christianity sought to deny that special
mission from the Jews. No wonder that they reached the conclusion that nothing
remained from their uniqueness as Jews, bearing with them, as individuals and as
a nation, inimitable, characteristic values. Inevitably, the Jews again found
themselves in a situation familiar since the days of Abraham: The whole world –
pagan-Nimrod, pagan-Canaanite, pagan-Greco-Roman and Christian – on one side,
and the Jew on the other. On that side, the characters are always changing, but
on this side, the eternal Jew always remains solitary.
Subsequently, on that side Mohammed and
Islam and Luther and the Reformation were destined to appear, both of whom
courted the Jew to finally move to the other side and participate in “dictating
the international agenda”. However, each time the Jew saw the chasm separating
the sides – he became frightened. It was said “you have chosen us from among the
nations”, but, truth be told, the Jews are the ones making the choice, on a
daily basis. Millions of them have been murdered in thousands of terrifying
deaths and nevertheless, the survivors continue to affix to their flesh the same
signature, which is liable to sentence them to a similar fate. It is as if they
said: The choice, which we make today, we would also have made in previous
trials, thousands of years in the past.
Above the Abyss
To tell the truth, not all of
them made that choice. The Israelis who worshipped the Baal, the Hellenists, and
the “heretics” during the Roman period – chose the alternative. They flowed with
the current, survived physically, but as a culture-bearing nation – they
disappeared. In modern parlance, they conformed;
they found it more worthwhile materially. They
rejected the dictum “life is not the supreme value of life”.
There were
approximately a million Jews in Spain and Portugal, however after 100 years of
persecution, only one-quarter of them left with the intention of remaining Jews;
after the Holocaust, many chose to conform and cease to be Jews. That was the
lesson they derived from the Holocaust. Mixed marriages are eating away at the
Jewish people throughout the world, and that is also marching towards the other
“side”.
Nevertheless,
the Jews are singular and unique because there always remains a minority, which
refuses to go over to the other side. No minority of that sort exists in any
other nation in the world. And also, wonder of wonders, in each and every
generation the Jewish people has encountered new adherents from among the
nations of the world, and in many of those instances – the best of them, who
required the moral strength, willpower and determined character to leave the
warm bosom of their nation and faith, to leap over the abyss and adopt not only
another religion, foreign and strange, but also another nation, as there is no
Judaism outside of the Jewish people – another unfamiliar and incomprehensible
phenomenon in the world. This two-way “traffic” continues to this day.
Comments by
Gentiles About Jews
And yet we have not answered the question:
Was it worthwhile? In this we prefer to hear what gentiles, viewing us from
without and from a distance have to say:
-
Friedrich the Great asked his
priest for proof of the existence of God. The answer was “the survival of the
Jewish people”.
-
Mark Twain asked: “…The Jews
constitute but one-quarter of one per cent of the human race…however his
importance is extravagantly out of proportion to the smallness of his bulk.
His contributions to the list of great names in literature, science, the arts,
music, economics, medicine, and abstruse learning are very out of proportion
to the weakness of its numbers…The Egyptians, the Babylonians, and the
Persians rose, filled the planet with much sound and splendor, and then faded
to dream-stuff and passed away. The Greeks and Romans followed and they are
gone; other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for a time but it
burned out and they sit in twilight now or have vanished.. The Jew saw them
all, outlasted them, and is now what he always was, exhibiting no decadence,
no infirmities of age, no weakening of his parts, no slowing of his energies,
no dulling of his alert and aggressive mind. All thing are mortal but the Jew;
all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?
-
Winston Churchill wrote: “But no
thoughtful man can deny the fact that they are beyond any question, the most
formidable and the most remarkable race, which has appeared in the world”.
-
Tolstoy said: “The Jew is that
sacred being who has brought down from heaven the everlasting fire and has
illuminated with it the whole world. He is the religious source, spring and
fountain out of which all of the other peoples have drawn their beliefs and
their religions”.
-
Thomas Cahill (in his book, The
Gifts of the Jews, 1998), writes: “The Jew gave us…our inner life. We can
hardly get up in the morning or cross the street without being Jewish. We
dream Jewish dreams and hope Jewish hopes. Most of our best words…history,
future, freedom, progress, spirit, faith, hope, justice – are the gifts of the
Jews”.
-
Paul Johnson (A History of the
Jews, 1987) summarized: “The Jewish vision became the prototype for many
great designs for humanity – both divine and man-made... The Jews, therefore,
stand at the center of the perennial attempt to give human life the dignity
of having a purpose”.
The answer to the question is embodied in
this statement. Because whichever way you look at it: If not, in the words of
Ecclesiastes, “all is vanity”, if there is at all a universal meaning to the
difference between the caveman and the person seeking purpose in his life, then
it is “worthwhile” to remain a Jew. And notice: All of these non-Jewish
observers are speaking of Jews of their times, the Jews who chose to remain
Jews, not those who throughout the generations decided to join the powerful.
These praises were not accorded to the Jews who preferred to withdraw from the
Jewish fate. And even today – half-Jews and former Jews like Caspar Weinberger,
Arthur Schlesinger, Madeleine Albright, William Cohen and John Kerry – the lives
of their descendants are guaranteed, but not that additional Jewish “input”.
Ultimately, it all depends on how the
questioner assesses “social success”: Is the test to reach 2.5 billion adherents
and to dictate the international agenda, or is it something else altogether?
Olive Schreiner, a South African
writer (quoted by Rabbi Hertz in his A Book of Jewish Thought, 1966),
answers the question:
Indeed it is difficult for all other nations of the world to live
in the presence of the Jews. It is irritating and uncomfortable. The Jews
embarrass the world, as they have done things, which are beyond the imaginable.
They have become moral strangers, since the day that their forefather, Abraham,
introduced the world to high ethical standards and to the fear of heaven…They
gave the world the Bible and even their savior. Jews taught the world as it
is but to transform it, yet only a few nations wanted to listen. Moreover,
the Jews introduced the world to one God, yet only a minority wanted to draw the
moral consequences…while their subconscious tries to remind them of how Western
civilization is framed in terms of concepts first articulated by the Jews,
they do anything to suppress it. They deny that Jews remind them of a
higher purpose of life...and do anything to escape its consequences. It is
simply too much to handle for them, too embarrassing to admit and above all –
too difficult to live by”...
I emphasized what was said regarding the non-acceptance of
the world as it is, the struggle to change it, and the granting of purpose to
life – characteristic Jewish traits throughout their history.
A Different System
of Values
Thus we can say that the very establishment
of the “Hebrew” phenomenon, of one who is on the other side, is an act of
conscious decision not to search for great “social success” in rendering
billions of believers to dictate the “international agenda”, but rather in a
totally different sphere, a spiritual one. It was not a matter of the Jews
betting on the wrong horse, but rather a game on a totally different playing
field, ascribing totally different weight and value to “social success” or the
aspiration to dictate the world agenda. The Jew’s right to live as a Jew, and
the acceptance of the suffering, which that necessarily brings along with it,
must be measured based on the degree of his success in reaching the particular goal, which
he set for himself, not the objectives set by others for themselves.
This story from the days of the Mandate
tells it all:
The British imposed a curfew on the Meah Shearim quarter in
Jerusalem, and in the middle of the neighborhood stood a tank from which the
upper half of the body of a British officer, resplendent in his uniform, with
his crop under his arm, emerged…An ultra-orthodox Jew, with his beard and his
sidecurls, passed the tank on his way to taking his son to heder. “Moishele”, he
said to his son: “Do you see that gentile? If you don’t learn, you’ll end up
like him”…
Israeli and Jew
The choice process for the Jewish people
never stopped even for one day, and it is ongoing here and now. There is
tremendous significance to Shimon Peres’ “Freudian” slip, when asked in the wake
of his election loss to Binyamin Netanyahu: “Who won?” and responded: “The Jews
won, the Israelis lost...”
To whom was Peres referring with the
appellation “Jew”? Apparently to the religious, the settlers, the nationalists –
in that order. And it turns out that his profile of an “Israeli” is a person of
Jewish origin who would prefer to be “born again” as a cosmopolitan
universalist, a person whose connection to the heritage of his fathers like his
earthly affinity to his homeland are beneath him. A person whose sympathy and
understanding is given to foreigners and the role models, whom he seeks to
emulate, are foreigners. The “enlightened Israeli” asserts to his “primitive”
brother the claims of the apostle of INRI: All guide posts of success
point left; the train towards acceptance by the gentiles travels in that
direction, the glory and the chance to survive are there, popularity and
applause are there, beginning in the Foreign Ministry offices through the
international press and the Israeli media. Only very few of the Jews who conform become “Israelis” out of ideological conviction; the great majority
has taken the road to disengagement for the sake of simple comfort. It is not a
longing for the birthplace of their parents, which overcame those waiting on
line at the entrance of the consulates of Poland, Romania, Hungary, Germany and
the other valleys of death, but rather the advice of INRI’s disciple to
join “the greatest social success” of our times – the hundreds of millions who
hold the desired European Union passport. When they choose innocent names for
their children like Tom or Natalie, it is only the foreign transliteration that
interests them.
Yes, there are “Jews” in the Jewish state
who, even if they are not literally persecuted, are silenced and
discriminated against by the dominant “Israeli” elites. In this case too – these
are on one side and those are on the other side. Relinquishing parts of the Land
of Israel to strangers, demolishing blocs of Jewish settlements, dispossessing
Jews from their places in the Land of Israel – all these, beyond their declared
political or security purposes, have a much broader significance: Diverting
the ship of state from ideology to materialism, from the eternal to the here and
now, from the “Jewish people”, to the individual “me”, from the roots of the
past and the patrimony to the detached present, with no yesterday and no
tomorrow. And here too, one who goes with the flow, one who conforms – is
immediately rewarded, while one who “bow not”, like Mordecai the Jew, pays full
price, as the Jews are accustomed to paying, generation after generation.
Thus, that question is posed to us today as
well, hour by hour: It is easy to guess, what one who chooses to identify today
as a Jew and as a loyalist to the Land of Israel would respond to the question
posed above: An absolute no.
A Final Comment
I lack the knowledge and authority to
respond to the theological question, why has God, who according to Maimonides
“rewards those who fulfill his commandments”, brought so much misfortune upon
the Jews? Are we really so bad, worse than the worst of the gentiles, whose fate
has been so providential?
I give my answer as a non-religious Jew,
and in that sense it is perhaps more difficult for me than for one answering on
the basis of Jewish halacha, which, no doubt, has a direct
straightforward answer. My retroactive choice to be a Jew, 2000 years in
reverse, in the spirit of the questioner’s question, was taken without
anticipating any direct, material, compensation. Therefore the questioner cannot
push me into the corner of Maimonides’ 11th principle, although I
doubt whether even a Jew who observes the 613 commandments would interpret
Maimonides’ statement literally, and would consider compensation solely
within immediate, materialist parameters.
I am certain of one thing: The blessing
“Who hast granted us life and sustenance and permitted us to reach this season”
contains no sarcastic inference. On the contrary, one who was persecuted all his
days, he, his ancestors and his descendants, one whose life is hanging in the
balance, day and night, only he is capable of giving thanks and uttering a
blessing for the miracle of his/her remaining alive until that moment.
The gentiles have no such blessing – don’t
wonder why.
Why Not?
Raphael Israeli
The success of the Romans-Italians and the
cry of victory of the Teutonic rage, quantifiable in human numbers and economic
figures in the autumnal (or Stav’s) fateful question, specifically point to the
objection, “why not? The difficult and tormenting Jewish question, has been why
not accept the offer, which has been rejected for so many generations by the few
who have brought us to this point, and not the overly simple, painfully easy
question, why surrender and commit spiritual suicide in order to preserve the
physical body? The Marranos throughout the generations, who apparently
surrendered in order to survive, were also troubled by this question. However,
in fact, they outwardly relinquished life in this world and its vanity, in order
to clandestinely preserve the eternity of the world to come. The defiance of the
Jewish existence specifically challenges the “why not”; while everyone is asking
– the chosen people exhausts itself in choosing a different path, opposite of
the logical and empirical one, the only possible path for the eternal people, as
opposed to the unbearable lightness of the pragmatic path of compromise and
self-negation before the great and powerful. The Romans and the Teutons often
celebrated under arches of triumph, swept continents and conquered nations, to
the point that their quantity became their quality and they were so successful
in convincing the conquered peoples of their unlimited power that they were
moved to identify with their oppressors and assimilate among them. Ultimately,
they ceased to exist, not only as entities and cultures, but as memories as
well.
The Jews gradually dwindled in number and
no one would consider that a success nor would they long for so dubious an
advantage; however, if the alternative was total assimilation or diminution, it
is clear that the Hellenist fringe abandoned first, while the core, which was
strong and desirous of the tradition of its forefathers, continued to exist and
in any case, their ranks decreased and depleted. This is not a sign or
indication of deterioration or demise, but rather of unparalleled resilience.
After two destroyed Temples, years of systematic persecution followed by the
destruction of the Holocaust, enough strength remained to again rise up and
rebuild and to succeed in an almost miraculous manner to reach the forefront of
the world in terms of technology, agriculture, health, the military and standard
of living, to the point that we became a role model. Imagine what we would have
accomplished had all of those terrible troubles not been visited upon us.
This is not the arrogance of the
successful, but rather the survival of the few, which according to Stav’s logic,
indicates that the surviving minority are the extract of the good ones who did
not remain standing and eroded. Would we have taken credit for our affiliation
with the regnant western culture, which attempted to do away with us generation
after generation without success? Or worse yet, with the culture of the Moslem
majority surrounding us today, which inherited or cultivated for itself
horrifying aspirations, which it is incapable of fulfilling? If any spark of the
Chosen People remains within us, it is because we did not follow in the
footsteps of the large nations surrounding us and we maintained the cultivation
and preservation of human traditions, and even among the nations where we
remained we became the leaders of the elite human spirit in the sciences, the
arts, ethics and in major advances in the social, economic and political realms.
Thus, if we haven’t become like Sodom, we
ought not be asking why we are not tempted into crossing the lines to the warmth
of the majority and the security, which it provides, but rather to wonder why
they are scheming against us, and to strengthen our rejection of historical
determinism and the component of “freedom [of choice] is given”, which has
always been a basic fundamental of our success, after we survived, when we
survived. For each step on this difficult path of suffering, there was a process
of choice, which many did not survive and became converts, including some of our
finest like Shabbetai Zvi, who aspired to redemption and attracted masses of
enthusiastic Jews, until they lost hope and became apostates. And it is no
coincidence that just as many of the Jewish apostates throughout the Christian
world are seeking to right themselves, an indication of their durability and
their moral uniqueness, which has persevered, so too, I am told, that there is a
revival among the descendants of the Shabbetai movement in modern-day Turkey.
And we return to the disturbing question,
which we, and especially the gentiles, cannot avoid. What is the nature of the
unbridgeable gap between our self-perception and particularly the gentiles’
perception of us, and their indefatigable efforts to harm us? For, truth be
told, our greatest enemies include and perhaps even are primarily, those who
recognize, and perhaps fear, our uniqueness and our strength, which seems to
them to be satanic. It is not merely that our survivability is a great annoyance
to them as we shattered all of their expectations to assimilate us, disappointed
all of their hopes to destroy us and rebuffed all of their efforts to conquer
us, we clearly displayed, over time, that we are capable of persevering, against
everyone, which exacerbated their anger at us and exacerbated their perception
of our satanic quality, which is indecipherable in their eyes. The greatest
anti-Semites not only despised the Jews, reviled them and expelled them, but
they also attributed to them superhuman deeds, control over world economic and
advertising centers, the genius to generate revolutions, both communist and
capitalist, God forbid, to engage in acts of sorcery, to aspire to world
domination, to weave hidden conspiracies and to bring about coup d’états
at will.
Only an extraordinarily talented, gifted
people, the likes of whom the world has never experienced would be inclined to
generate wonders of that sort, but amazingly, instead of feeling thanks and
admiration, being impressed with us, to aspire to act like us, they oppose us
and bring evil upon us.
There is something pathologically ill about
any intelligent person, who discerns a nation with abilities in the areas of
innovation and achievement, but instead of rising to his level, aspires to
annihilate him. We do not wish to be affiliated with the disturbed people who
believe and act this way, and therefore there is no question why we don’t join
them, but rather we will retell the world, and ourselves why not. And so that
they themselves do not lose their minds over the lack of connection between the
diagnosis and the medicine, which they prescribe, they turn the Jewish genius
into something satanic and fraught with danger: The Jews devise blood worship,
murder children (in the past it was in
their forays out of the ghettos in Europe, today in the Palestinian refugee
camps), terrorize the gentiles (in the past by poisoning wells and bringing the
plagues upon Egypt, today by bombing the Twin Towers, using depleted uranium in
ammunition, poisoning the Arab children’s candy, planting explosives among
children’s toys and, heaven forbid, disseminating chewing gum in Islamic
countries in order to arouse the sexual appetites of the modest Moslem women in
order to corrupt them.
The Jews are incorrigible and therefore all
defensive actions on their part are aggression, any self-justification is
propaganda, any good act is a cover for intrigue and conspiracy, any success
camouflages failure, freedom therein is imaginary and is merely a cover for
oppression and cruel treatment, they lack love, kindness, good intentions or
decent acts. And occasionally, our own people in Israel and abroad, not only
fail to scornfully reject those repulsive stereotypes, but, like their
predecessors, who became marginalized and ultimately left, shoulder the false
allegations, engage in slander, beat their and others’ breast in contrition, in
the thought (or instinct) that the more they confess their sins, which they didn
’t commit, the pressure on them will ease, they will cleanse their troublesome
consciences and will bring redemption to themselves and the world. Thus, they
unwillingly find themselves allied with the most hostile among our enemies, who
revel in them as in a treasure and widely cite them in European and Islamic
countries in support of their defamatory statements.
An additional sick aspect of the revulsion,
which we arouse around the world, and is at times tied to our enemies’
inability to solve their problems or even to deal with them, is also not new.
Anti-Semites already made use of this tried and true method in the past, when
they would send the Cossacks into the ghettos any time the Czars or any other
government were incapable of dealing with problems of hunger and deprivation.
Attacking Jews is always convenient as a distraction, as an alternative victim
to abuse or rob in order to garner funds unjustly. In our times, any
Palestinian, Arab or Moslem failure is immediately attributed to the war with
Israel, which consumes all good portions, destroys their assets and dispossesses
them as if Israel was the one, which initiated the wars, negated its neighbors’
existence or refused to lend a hand in promoting development and progress.
The very existence of flourishing, advanced
and powerful Israel among them who are at the low end of the chain of
development, and the gap between them is gradually widening, not only poses the
challenge of a role model, but also displays their shame and impotence before
all.
Therefore, if I have the choice, I would
prefer to stand on the moral high ground and look amusedly and laugh beneath my
mustache (which I don’t have) in light of my awareness that although my path is
strewn with obstacles, it is noble and worthwhile to expend effort for it.
Instead of contemplating joining my enemies in order to rid myself of their
enmity, I would reflect upon the recommendation of our rabbis that a person who
wants to achieve greatness should build himself a hill rather than digging a pit
for his rivals in order to surpass them. I prefer to join the Jewish prayers
regarding the prophecy of Isaiah and world peace for all nations, than to
capitulate to the exhortations of hate and animosity of our enemies who seek to
destroy us, or to join the descendants of the Romans and the Teutons applauding
them. And a redeemer will come to Zion.
Who Is a Jew, and Especially Why?
Daniel Shalit
Rational vs. Existential Decisions
Ostensibly, it would be possible
to summarily dismiss the question for two good reasons.
First, because whether or not to
be a Jew is not a cost-benefit consideration and is not at all a rational
decision, but it is rather a different type of decision, an “existential
decision”. I believe that Sartre brought as an example of this type of decision
the choice made by a young person, whether to stay with his sick mother and care
for her or to join his comrades in revolution against a tyrannical regime. These
two choices are not connected to any consideration of benefit or success, but
rather a profound obligation between the person and himself, and there is no
“profit” in fulfillment of these obligations; on the contrary, they are measured
specifically when they command a steep price.
And what about considerations of
reward and punishment? Is the decision to be a Jew tied to considerations of
compensation? Why does Maimonides, in his eleventh Principle of Faith, write,
“the Creator rewards those that fulfill His commandments and punishes those that
violate His commandments”? (And of course, Maimomides is merely summarizing and
citing a central principle, the principle of reward and punishment, which exists
throughout the Bible and rabbinic thought). Maimonides himself determines in
“The Guide of the Perplexed” that the entire principle of reward and punishment
is nothing more than a didactic-pedagogic technique and with a person’s
maturation; he understands more and more, “the reward of a commandment – is a
commandment”; that the value of the commandments is existential and not
instrumental.
A second reason for dismissing
the question is the use of the concept “time machine”. The very use of the
concept “time machine” assumes that time is ostensibly an open, transparent
tunnel, in which one can freely travel forward and back. However, psychological,
historic time does not work that way. Historic time is one-directional and
irreversible. Time flows, for example, from childhood to old age, however it is
impossible to reverse the direction and have time flow from old age to
childhood. Biological time and historical time are irreversible. Therefore, at
any given point in time, the view of the future is totally obstructed, because
it is dependent on free, existential decisions, which have not yet been made.
Free decisions are the building blocks of human time. Thus, the question whether
or not to be Jewish was decided by each generation for itself and not for all
subsequent generations.
The Existential Question
To this point, we have discussed
how it would have been possible to dismiss Arieh Stav’s question. However all of
the reasons for dismissal are not important, as they only relate to the
“narrative framework”, the rhetorical construct in which Stav chose to
articulate his question. To what it this similar? Someone who would dismiss the
book of Job due to the problematic wager at its beginning between the Creator
and Satan, as well as the miraculous redemption of Job and his property,
including the birth of sons and daughters. (And what about the sons and
daughters who died? What was their sin and why were they not recompensed for
their suffering and their deaths?) And in fact, the “framework narrative” of Job
is nothing more than a dramatic-literary framework for the eternal question
regarding the disparity between human suffering and the divine eternal
perspective.
So too in our matter, it is more
correct to quibble neither with the rhetorical framework nor with the rational
claims regarding the transaction, and to lovingly accept the time machine – and
to listen to the question, or the existential protest behind the question: How
is it possible? A “chosen people”, an “elected people”, a people close to its
God, children and beloved – and this is their fate? What a failure? This sort of
rejection by humanity as a whole? This type of continuous destruction? And if
you will: Faithful and Merciful Father and King – what justifies this sort of
cruelty on His part? Or how is it possible to love Him?
We encounter this type of protest
by the most devout believers, each in his own way, among them, Jeremiah, our
rabbis, The Maharal, Reb Levi Yizhak of Berditchev and, in modern times, Uri Zvi
Greenberg.
And what is the answer?
The Riddle is More Significant than the Solution
Perhaps the answer is very good.
However, the question is better. Consider asking it powerfully, to elaborate
upon it and profoundly consider it. Arieh Stav asks it carefully, with restraint
and from a distance, a bit sarcastically, a bit elegantly and a bit cynically –
in any case briefly and subtly, assuming that everyone understands just how
serious this matter is. But it is not certain that everyone does, in fact,
understand. And therefore, it is worthwhile adding two types of Jewish distress,
which he didn’t mention: The moral defamation, the depiction of the Jew as
corrupt and subhuman – parasitic, money hungry, hedonistic, covetous,
treacherous and hypocritical. With an image of that sort, it had to be a nation
commanded and striving to purify its character traits from morning to evening.
An additional distress: The
theological distress. At first the Romans granted the single nation, which
introduced monotheism to the world, the sobriquet “Mercy of God” and
subsequently the Christians used the title “God-killer. In our times we have
become a bit insensitive to insults like those. However, in any case, instead of
recognition of our role as teachers of humanity, we received various wreaths of
thorns.
Thus, this is no longer just a
common failure of an enterprise, which did not succeed. There are many
unsuccessful enterprises and they are of no interest to the public at large. The
point is that this enterprise was supposed to have been the enterprise of human
salvation by the nation designated for that purpose by God! And this failure is
a ridiculous comedy, an insane farce – or a call for meaning, for significance.
In our day, we know that to the
extent that data is further from being accidental, it becomes more meaningful.
The less the probability of its appearance, the more it is significant. Simple
failure is as predictable as simple success. However, the combination of
potential for salvation of the world together with such an appalling failure; of
so important a message with such perpetual and continuing proximity to oblivion
– it is so far from accidental, so unlikely! There is something saying,
screaming to us, but with a vague and muffled voice; this is a world-class
riddle, with no solution.
There are two possible reactions
to a riddle: Dismiss it or examine it closely. The tendency of the mind is to
“solve” the riddle and to thereby dismiss it – the wondrous rainbow is nothing
more than white light refracted into its components by the atmosphere. However,
it is possible to continue to observe and to enhance the wonder more and more –
how wondrous the light as it contains something as wonderful as the rainbow! The
same is true of the Jewish issue. The mind tends to deconstruct the problem into
its components, causes and effects and to “solve” it. While the alternative is –
to examine it further and further, and see to what degree the wonder
intensifies.
Now for the promised answer,
which, as mentioned above, is a bit overshadowed by the question.
Limited Consciousness and Expanding the Horizon
Our consciousness is only
partial. It is clear and lucid, however the price, which it pays is –
partialness, segmentation. Our consciousness knows to peel, to filter a small
part of the infinite reality, to process the particle and present it before us;
we call that particle: World, man and history. On the other hand, the particle
is significant: We exist in it, we rejoice and suffer and more importantly: In
it we are able to perform the good and the evil in the world.
There are those whose
reality-segment seems quite pleasant to them. Especially if they happen to be
young, good-looking, healthy, successful and rich, and it would also be
preferable to live at the end of the nineteenth century. In all other cases and
times, the “world” (in rabbinic literature, “This world”) is a gloomy place,
filled with spiritual and physical suffering, in brief: Defective and flawed.
The wise men, prophets, the
founders of the faiths and religions always brought a degree of
horizon-expansion each from his own place and in accordance with his own
doctrine. Expanding horizons mean viewing our entire system – world, man and
history – as partial, and as open to a more comprehensive reality. In that very
connection, there is already enlightenment and solace. However, even without our
having a firm grasp of a broader consciousness, the expanded consciousness
begins from the moment in which the world as it is seems hard-edged from all
sides, problematic, not explaining itself and insufficient for its own needs, in
brief: As a riddle, a parable and a hint.
*
What happened to Job at the end
of his tale of suffering? What changed his mind, what tempered his pointed
protest, after he forcefully rejected again and again the entire scholarly
theology of justification, which his friends stated before him. The Divine
Revelation, which Job experienced, is what rendered all of his suffering
irrelevant in his eyes: “I had heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now
my eye sees thee; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes”.
We have testimonies from modern
times, and from all periods, of people who experienced an otherworldly moment of
brilliance breaking into their partial consciousness, rendering all of their
suffering irrelevant to them. I will cite a segment from the testimony of a
prisoner of Zion, who was subject to attempts to break his spirit in the gloomy
stench of the Russian KGB’s solitary confinement cell:
…It was as if my cell split: A
glorious wave of sublime happiness swept over the existence and over me. Every
strand of the tomb of suffering quaked with a joy so super-human that I,
overflowing with joy, fell prostrate on the floor in a warm prayer, blending
Hebrew and Russian words into one mixture…I had never in my life before, and
probably never will again know anything that even approaches that impossible
experience of pure, sacred joy. It was the gust of eternity in which all traces
of evil disappear…Neither cold, nor pain, nor evil, nor death existed for me.
Not only did I not need anything, on the contrary, I didn’t know to whom or how
to impart my joy, which completely filled me. Only a few days later, when I had
but a modicum of that experience remaining, I remembered my hunger, and how good
that diluted mixture with the coarse grits tasted!…After completing my
punishment in solitary confinement…they took me to the interrogation room… They
expected to find a broken, submissive man, easy prey. Instead they encountered a
happy prisoner…freely proclaiming that he had nothing to say to them. (Aryeh
Wodka, The Memory of an Aberrant Land, Sunny Sale Publishers,
1990, p. 15).
There are those for whom even
consolation of that sort is not enough, as during long periods of limited
consciousness, the evil is horrible and never-ending, and how can the subsequent
good period undo what preceded? However, according to the Kabbalah, the
consciousness is raised to such a point that it penetrates the past as well,
shows that the past evil was indeed necessary, as part of the configuration of
good, as a “footstool” for good, and is therefore like good itself.
The Importance of the Limited Consciousness
To this point – we have discussed
expanding consciousness by means of the revelation of something beyond it. At
this point, we can understand why the riddle is more important than the
solution: It is specifically the limited consciousness, not the expanded one,
which is important because it facilitates choice. In the state of limited
consciousness, the eternal, guiding and consoling view is hidden from our sight
- it is only present as a latent internal point, as a vague possibility; the
orientation in life becomes uncertain, all directions seem equal; the
difficulties, suffering and atrocities become clear and harsh, and they
completely envelop the consciousness. Superficial successes (“the success of the
evil”) appear astounding and convincing.
Only then, in the state of
limited consciousness, there is a possibility to make a choice, which has value,
a choice despite everything, a choice in darkness, a choice, which is not a
transaction, which does not pay off immediately. A choice of that sort is a
choice, which clarifies and establishes the difference between superficial and
profound, between appropriate and inappropriate. Thus, the limited consciousness
is the attribute of kindness. The attribute of justice is the kindness. (This
concept, that limitation (justice) is actually kindness, is brought in the
“Tanya” [the fundamental Habad book; Part Two, Chapter of Unity and Faith] as an
interpretation of the verse “The Lord is God” [Kindness is Justice: Kindness, in
order to function, envelops itself in Justice]). While still in the state of
limited consciousness, a person can better analyze and better discern the evil
extant in the world – and nevertheless turn to and perform acts of good; and –
to love the source of good, who is totally good. In this way, the dark
conditions were utilized in the most efficient manner.
These repeated choices, again and
again, shape the personality in a manner that will enable it to reconnect one
day with the part of the broader consciousness, and at that point be capable of
containing it.
A Jew in Darkness
What is true regarding the
suffering of the individual is true regarding national suffering as well,
especially regarding the fate of the Jew. There is one nation whose hour of
success is not defined only by national and economic strength but also by a time
of expanded, heightened consciousness, which means for it – proximity to God,
His wisdom, his kindness and his might; and that is also their uniqueness among
the nations. And like the height of its peak so to the depths of its nadir: Not
only national deterioration, destruction and exile, but also a period of limited
consciousness and absconding of the Divine Presence, while forces of darkness
are torturing it from within and without.
And it is specifically under
those circumstances that he remains true to his inner calling, incomprehensible
under the circumstances, to survive as a Jew. To what purpose? There are those
who said that Jewish survival is vital for the survival of humanity. In the
midrash of our rabbis and in Kabbalah, the worship of the Jewish people,
specifically in exile, sustains the mundane and sublime worlds.
In the conditions of the blinding
darkness extant here and now, it’s hard to know.
*
It is indeed difficult to fulfill
the Jewish mission. And indeed, millions have abandoned and continue to abandon
it. I am not certain that nine out of every ten Jews was actually murdered as
Arieh Stav wrote. To my mind, it is more likely that they assimilated,
integrated and abandoned the struggle to exist as Jews, and therefore the
default option went into effect and they became what they became. Even those who
sustained their Judaism, did not always do so in full awareness of the horrible
reckoning. The consciousness of exile is concerned with the small struggles over
rights versus edicts, and bottom line, it sums up the situation – “it’s not so
terrible”. It is possible to survive another minute.
Only at rare climaxes in history
do the thunder roar and the lightning flash, and the total, fearful, frightful
picture becomes visible. The destructions, the major deportations, the Crusades
and the Holocaust were moments of that sort. And in our information-rich era,
the terrible bottom line is more available to those willing to observe it than
at any other time in history. All the others can continue saying: It’s not so
terrible, it is possible to survive and even to, here and there, live a little,
to solve occasional problems and enjoy gift packages.
I would say that anyone capable
of bearing the awful burden of the generations – is already connected, even if
not consciously – to the greater, comprehensive consciousness.
*
It is only in this manner that a
group like the writers for Nativ, most of whom are rationalists,
secularists, academics, realists and well-versed in history, who are capable of
doing the reckoning and understanding that it is a bad deal - will nevertheless
choose, despite everything, to remain Jews, to fight and to be tormented for it
– and lose out on pats on the back,
establishment grants and embraces, approval, status and money.
And they will continue to do so even if the
present symposium leads to the conclusion that after the trip in the time
machine, there is no earthly reason or consideration to remain a Jew.
To Perfect the World Under
the Rule of G-d
Jay Shapiro
Before addressing the question,
several preliminary comments are in order.
First, in the introduction to the
question, the interrogator introduces himself self-deprecatingly (and perhaps
jocularly) as a “Hebrew-speaking gentile”. This definition does not prevent him
from being counted into a quorum for prayer nor does it allow other Jews to
evade concern and responsibility for his welfare. This is because the Jews are
an extended family and each member is an integral part of the whole. And,
additionally, as far as Jews are concerned, history, particularly in the
twentieth century, has taught us that when it comes to Jews, self-definitions
don’t help in extremis.
Second, the interrogator notes
that he “finds it difficult to settle his account with the Creator”. That is a
common problem, and for believers perhaps even more so. Anyone who claims to
have settled his account is either not working on the problem or is truly a
saint. Saints are rare.
Third, Christianity is defined as
“the greatest social success of the last two thousand years”. Social success is
not a criterion when discussing universal values and the perceived missions of
nations. The various dynasties in Egypt, for example, did quite well in this
category for 3,000 years and nothing is left of them today other than the Sphinx
and a number of equally silent mementos of their greatness. So this criterion
need not be addressed in my response.
Having said the above, I find
that I would not sign the registration form presented to me by the INRI Chief of
Staff for the reasons briefly given in the following paragraphs.
I believe that a conscious being
created the world – for simplicity we will refer to this being as God. And, for
reasons of His own (as stated in Deuteronomy 7:7), God chose the descendents of
Abraham (“Jews”) for a specific task – to perfect the world under the rule of
G-d. In other words, to spread ethical monotheism to the world and to live
as a moral light unto the nations. Jews introduced the concept of a God-given
universal moral law into the world. Our chosenness confers neither privilege nor
superiority, only obligation. And, unfortunately, it also includes suffering,
because throughout our history, Jews, by performing their mission, have
consistently denied some of the most revered beliefs, core values, and
allegiances of their neighbors.
The question of anti-Semitism was
raised and answered almost offhandedly 1,500 years ago in the Talmud (Tractate
Sabbath 89B) using a play on words: Rabbi Hisda and Rabba said that the mountain
upon which the Torah was given to Israel is called Sinai because it was there
that hatred (sina) of the Jews entered the world. In other words,
anti-Semites have hated Jews because Jews are Jewish, because Judaism is
distinctive and represents a challenge to other systems of belief. There are
many ways to describe the essence of Judaism and why it is hated. Maurice
Samuel, for example, postulated that anti-Semitism was based on the fact that
Jews believe in and work for the diminution and elimination of force as the
basis of human relationships. The bottom line is that, as noted by a 20th
century Catholic bishop, “the Jews carry the burden of God in history [and] this
has never been forgiven.”
And in this brief response to the
question being addressed I will repeat what was said to me by a United States
Marine colonel. He was stationed in Israel for several years as part of a
project that the Marines were doing together with Israel Aircraft Industries. He
had never known any Jews before coming to Israel and we became quite friendly. I
invited him to my son’s wedding and, as he observed the ceremony and the
dancing, he said to me “I understand the Jews now, I know who they are.” To my
smiling response “I am one of them and I am not sure that I understand them,” he
said “The Jews are the Marines of the world. They are few in number, they are
proud of being who they are, they get the toughest assignments, they suffer the
most losses, they get the job done, and they are Semper Fidelis – always
faithful.”
My Marine friend summed it up
more concisely and accurately than many philosophers and theologians.
Our source literature predicted
in detail both our fate when we fail in our mission and the ultimate redemption
of the world through us. Three years after the ovens were shut down at
Auschwitz, this long-suffering people re-established sovereignty in our ancient
God-given homeland. Maybe we are finally doing something right.
The Secret of the Jew’s Adherence
to His Judaism
Eliav Shochetman
To the question: What is the secret of the
Jew’s adherence to his Judaism despite everything that the Jewish people has
experienced and continues to experience since becoming a nation, many answers
are possible. Below, I will attempt to express my personal point of view, as one
who is guided in his way of life and beliefs by the Torah of Israel and the
vision of the prophets of Israel.
The Jew and His Destiny
To the question, Who is a Jew? One might
answer in a traditional manner, that a Jew is one who was born to the Jewish
people, or one who joined the Jewish people of his own volition. However, beyond
that formal definition, Jewish identity also carries with it a calling. This
calling contains within it a destiny as well. The realization of this destiny is
both a personal mission, incumbent on each and every individual who belongs to
the Jewish people, and a national mission, incumbent on the entire Jewish people
as a collective.
On the personal level, the prophet Micah
expressed the destiny of the Jew in the world in a short statement, “He has
showed you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do
justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah, 6:8).
Thus, the destiny is, realization of the values of justice and morality in
society.
The realization of these values is a direct
result of the Jew’s obligation to adhere to the ways of the Creator, as the
prophet Jeremiah said,
Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, let not the mighty man
glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him who
glories glory in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who
practice steadfast kindness, justice, and righteousness in the earth; for in
these things I delight, says the Lord (9:23-24).
Maimonides, at the end of his book, The
Guide of the Perplexed (Part 3, Chapter 54), viewed that verse as expressing the
purpose of the Jew in the world. Knowing the ways of the Creator, which are,
performing kindness, justice and righteousness in the world, and following that
path in one’s practical life.
According to the philosophy of Judaism,
“kindness, justice and righteousness” are not abstract concepts, which each
individual will interpret as he sees fit. “Kindness, justice and righteousness”
are concepts whose concrete content are the 613 commandments over which the
covenant between God and the Jewish people was made at Mount Sinai 3,316 years
ago. The fundamental assumption of the Jewish faith is, that ever since the
declaration, “we will do, and we will be obedient,” the Jewish people is
obligated as a collective and each and every one of its members as an
individual, in fulfilling the system of Torah and the commandments.
The fulfillment of the 613 commandments –
some of which are commandments incumbent upon the individual and some of which
are commandments incumbent upon the collective and its elected officials – can
lead to the realization of the ideal “and you shall be to me a kingdom of
priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:6), i.e. an exemplary society for the
entire human race. The realization of that ideal, will transform Israel into a
light unto the nations. The place where this exemplary society is supposed to be
established and to be a light unto the nations is the Land of Israel.
The Covenant and the Consequences of Its Violation
According to the Torah
philosophy, the right of Israel to its land is contingent upon its fulfilling
its destiny, which is, fulfilling the commands of the Torah, and performing
kindness, justice and righteousness in the land. Lack of fulfillment of that
destiny and violation of the covenant are liable to cause the land to be lost,
the exile of the people and its destruction, heaven forbid.The Torah warns “that
the land vomit not you out also when ye defile it as it vomited out the nation
that was before you” (Leviticus 18:28).
Twice the Jewish people have lost
their land and were forced into exile in foreign countries. Our rabbis taught us
that the reason for the two exiles was the non-fulfillment of the covenant, in
both the religious and social senses. Therefore the Jew says in his prayers,
“Because of our sins, we were exiled from our country and banished far from our
land.” All the troubles, which have been visited upon the Jews since their exile
from their land, are inscribed as admonitions in the Book of the Covenant. The
harsh Jewish fate is a direct result of the disregard of the Jewish people, as a
collective and as individuals, for the content of those admonitions.
The Jewish people is unique among
all the nations of the world in that the covenant was made with it, and it was
entrusted with the mission, as explained above, and thus, all of the harsh
admonitions written in the Torah regarding one who fails to fulfill the
covenant, are directed exclusively to it. That does not mean that other nations
are not liable to be punished for their abominations, and the Torah addresses
that as well (Deuteronomy 2:20-23). However, the punishments meted out to other
nations are not the direct result of violation of the covenant, because only the
Jewish people entered into the covenant with God. The difference between the
fate of the Jewish people as opposed to the fate of other nations is that if
annihilation is decreed on one of the nations, it is liable to disappear
completely because of its evil ways and the Creator has no responsibility
towards that nation. On the other hand, the Creator has a responsibility
vis-à-vis the Jewish people, based on the covenant, not to obliterate it,
and after it repents – with the process of returning to Israel a component of
that repentance – the promise will be fulfilled. “Then the Lord your God will
restore your fortunes, and have compassion upon you, and he will gather you
again from all the peoples where the Lord your God has scattered you”
(Deuteronomy 30:2). The reason for this is that the fulfillment of the destiny,
with which it was charged based on the covenant, is immutable, and despite all
of the blows, which it absorbs – the obligation incumbent upon it to fulfill its
destiny remains and this obligation will never be rendered null and void.
Therefore, other nations upon whom an edict of obliteration was decreed,
disappeared from the stage of history, while the Jewish people – despite all of
its problems is alive and kicking, and even two thousand years of exile did not
lead to its ultimate demise. “And also the eternity of Israel will not lie nor
repent” (Samuel I, 15:29).
The Meaning of Adherence to Judaism
What is the explanation of the Jew’s
adherence to his Judaism, if it just brings upon him such harsh and terrible
misfortune? First of all, this adherence is not characteristic of all of the
Jews; many of the members of the Jewish people sought, in other religions,
refuge from the Jewish fate. Thus, the question relates to those Jews who
resisted the temptation of the improved material conditions, the superior
self-confidence, which other religions could offer. What is the secret of their
adherence to Judaism?
The answer is, that the Jew’s adherence to
the religion of his father’s and his willingness to continue to be affiliated
with the most battered nation on the face of the earth over thousands of years
of history, is not affected at all by the uncommonly violent blows to which his
people have been – and unfortunately continue to be – subjected. Furthermore: It
is specifically the special fate of his people – a fate, unparalleled among
other nations, which reinforces his adherence to the faith of his fathers. The
reason for this is, that all of the incidents befalling the Jewish people
throughout the years of its long history confirm the accuracy of the promises
and the admonitions written in the Torah, and etched in steel in the words of
the prophets of Israel. According to the Jewish perception, all of the incidents
befalling the Jewish people are not coincidences, but rather a direct result of
the actions and failures of the Jewish people, as a collective and as
individuals. These actions and failures – to the degree that they contravene the
covenant between the Jewish people and the God of Israel, bring about the severe
reactions of Divine Providence – reactions inscribed in the Book of the
Covenant, as will be explained below.
The Admonitions of the Torah and Their Realization
The Torah promises that if Israel fulfills
its destiny: “If ye walk in my statutes” (Leviticus 26:3) – then, “You will
dwell in your land safely. And I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie
down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will rid evil beasts out of the
land, neither shall the sword go through your land...and establish my covenant
with you” (ibid., 5-9).
And on the other hand: “But if ye will not
hearken unto me...so that ye will not do all my commandments, but that ye break
my covenant” (ibid., 15), the reaction will be extremely severe,
And I will set my face against you (Rashi: I will abandon all of
my concerns in order to afflict you), and ye shall be slain before your enemies:
they that hate you shall reign over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth
you... And I will bring a sword upon you, that shall avenge the quarrel of my
covenant... And ye shall perish among the heathen, and the land of your enemies
shall eat you up... and have brought them into the land of their enemies...The
land also shall be left of them (ibid., 15-43).
The Torah does not suffice with an
admonition regarding defeat, loss of the land, the anticipated exile and the
loss of national identity. The Torah explicitly speaks of the most terrible of
all: destruction. And so it warns, “When thou shalt beget children, and
children's children, and ye shall have remained long in the land” (Deuteronomy
4:25-27), in other words: If you are peaceful and serene in the land and you
will imagine that you will reside securely in your land forever, “and shall
corrupt yourselves” – you shall corrupt your ways with idolatry and other severe
sins,
I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that ye
shall soon utterly perish from off the land...ye shall not prolong your days
upon it, but shall utterly be destroyed. And the Lord shall scatter you among
the nations, and ye shall be left few in number among the heathen, whither the
Lord shall lead you.
This harsh fate will befall Israel in exile
as well: “But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken...all these curses
shall come upon thee, and overtake thee... The Lord shall send upon thee
cursing...until thou be destroyed, and until thou perish quickly” (ibid.,
28:15-20). “The LORD shall smite thee with a consumption, and with a fever...and
they shall pursue thee until thou perish” (ibid., 22). “Moreover all these
curses shall come upon thee, and shall pursue thee, and overtake thee, till thou
be destroyed” (ibid., 45). “Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies...and he
shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck, until he have destroyed thee” (ibid.,
48). “Also every sickness, and every plague, which is not written in the book of
this law, them will the LORD bring upon thee, until thou be destroyed” (ibid.,
61).
In this portion, which is the portion of
the covenant made on the plains of Moab before entering the land, and in which
Israel was commanded regarding mutual responsibility, there are additional
admonitions worth noting:
-
An admonition regarding the humiliating
standing of the Jewish people during its exile: “And thou shalt become an
astonishment, a proverb, and a byword, among all nations whither the Lord
shall lead thee” (ibid., 37).
-
An admonition regarding the numerical
diminution of the Jewish people instead of the natural increase, which was
supposed to be its lot if it had not gone into exile: “And ye shall be left
few in number, whereas ye were as the stars of heaven for multitude” (ibid.,
62).
-
An admonition regarding the fate of the
wandering Jew, who will not find respite anywhere, and he is going to wander
from one exile to another: “And among these nations shalt thou find no ease,
neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest” (ibid., 65).
An additional admonition, which carries
with it good tidings for Israel is, “And I will bring the land into desolation:
and your enemies, which dwell therein shall be astonished at it” (Leviticus
26:32). Nachmanides explained, “It is good tidings, heralding to all of the
exiles that the land will not receive our enemies...for ever since we left it,
it has not received any foreign nation, and they all try to settle it, with no
success.”
These harsh admonitions were not written in
at the height of the events, or adjacent to them. These admonitions were written
3,316 years ago – long before the Samarian Exile, and the concurrent absolute
loss of the Ten Tribes (most of the Jewish people during the First Temple
Period); long before the destruction of the First Temple and the Babylonian
Exile; long before the destruction of the Second Temple and the Roman Exile;
long before the Crusades, the exiles, pogroms and other calamities during the
dark days of the Middle Ages; long before the decrees of 1648-1649 in Poland,
which led to the demise of hundreds of Jewish communities; long before the 19th
and 20th century pogroms in Eastern Europe; and long before the awful Holocaust,
which in our generation, annihilated one-third of the Jewish people and led to
the destruction of the most significant center of Jewish life in modern times.
Everything, which befell the Jewish people
over the course of its long history, was written as an admonition, and detailed
precisely in the Torah – the Book of the Covenant. If that wasn’t enough, the
prophets came along and admonished time and again regarding the fate, against
which the Torah had previously warned. Already Joshua, successor of Moses, who
led the Jewish people into the Land of Israel, warns before his death,
That as all good things are come upon you, which the Lord your
God promised you; so shall the Lord bring upon you all evil things, until he
have destroyed you from off this good land which the Lord your God hath given
you. When ye have transgressed the covenant of the Lord your God, which he
commanded you (Joshua, 23:15).
Isaiah warns, “If ye be willing and
obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land. But if ye refuse and rebel, ye
shall be devoured with the sword” (1:19-20). And Jeremiah, the prophet of
destruction, warns “I will scatter them also among the heathen, whom neither
they nor their fathers have known: and I will send a sword after them, till I
have consumed them” (9:16). These, of course, are merely examples.
These admonitions, regarding the fate
awaiting the Jewish people if they fail to fulfill the covenant and fail to
realize their destiny, are perhaps likely to be upsetting due to their extreme
and severe nature, however, it is impossible to dispute the fact that these
admonitions all came to pass, and their absolute truth was confirmed again and
again throughout history. A profound analysis of the history of our people from
their entry into the Land during the days of Joshua through this generation, on
the basis of the admonitions included in the covenant portions of the Torah and
the words of our prophets, will not only fail to discourage one who adhered to
Judaism, but the opposite is true: This analysis only confirms the sixth and the
seventh of the thirteen Principles of Jewish Faith articulated by Maimonides,
according to which, “all words of the prophets are true” and “ the prophecy of
Moses, of blessed memory, is true” – which in turn strengthens the ninth
principle: “That this Torah will never be replaced and there will not be another
Torah from the Creator, may His name be blessed.” Truths, which have withstood
the test of thousands of years of history, can only strengthen the Jew’s
adherence to his people and the faith of his fathers. This adherence stems from
the profound consciousness that the Torah of Israel, and it alone, is the Torah
of truth, and all other doctrines and theories of all types, which oppose it,
will ultimately be recognized as invalid and will pass from the world.
This adherence, on the basis of the Torah
of Israel, and on the basis of the vision of the prophets of Israel are – in the
eyes of the Jewish man of faith – the only guarantee of our survival as a nation
and a state, in the region surrounding us.
Our Hold on the Land
Since the root of all of the Jewish
people’s troubles stem from the curse of the exile, it is vital to ensure that
the third destruction not come to pass. How can this be accomplished?
Classic Zionist philosophy, which viewed
the Land of Israel as a “safe refuge” for the security of the persecuted Jews
throughout the world, led, and continues to lead, us to a dead end. If the Land
of Israel is not a value in and of itself, but rather a means to the end of
guaranteeing the security of the Jews, then “security” considerations of one
sort or another can lead to the conclusion that, to the extent that control over
certain districts in the Land of Israel threatens the security of the Jews, they
should be relinquished for the sake of security. It is clear that the
fulfillment of that philosophy is liable to lead, ultimately, to the loss of
Jewish control over all parts of the Land of Israel, and thus bring an end, for
the third time, to the Jewish people’s sovereignty over its land. Rabbi Abraham
Isaac HaCohen Kook, in the nascent stage of Zionism, already foresaw that if the
pioneers, the builders of the land – who risked their lives in order to redeem
the land – perpetuate the nationalist approach while severing themselves from
the Torah fundamentals of Jewish nationalism, they will ultimately be
transformed from lovers of Zion to haters (Etz Hadar, Jerusalem 5746, p. 16).
It is worth noting that many of the leaders
of the Jewish settlement in Israel in years past, considered settling in all
areas of the Land of Israel an independent value, which must be defended at all
cost. In the wake of the Tel-Hai episode, Berl Katzenelson (Yalkut Achdut
Ha-Avodah 27, 3 Adar 5680 [1920]): “We are going because we are fulfilling our
mission, because it is a matter of the honor of the settlement and its existence
depends on it, because this is not a question of a tract of land and a little
Jewish property, but rather the Land of Israel is at stake here. Because leaving
and withdrawing is the decisive symbol of our weakness and insignificance and
because the only proof of our right to our land, on the unity of Rosh Pina and
Metulla, is our making a resolute and desperate stand without looking back”.
Against those who then claimed that it is wrong to endanger lives and therefore
it is wrong to maintain a settlement, when doing so involves danger, Yosef Haim
Brenner, the writer (may God avenge his murder), said (Yalkut Achdut Ha-Avodah,
p. 212): “If we hurry and abandon every point where there is danger, we must
abandon everything, withdraw from all points, and to where?” And David
Ben-Gurion similarly said in his memoirs: “In my opinion, the settlement in the
Land of Israel is not a reason for negotiation, but rather it has a value in and
of itself. What should we do when we are attacked? If we flee highwaymen – we
will be forced to leave, not only the Upper Galilee, but the entire Land of
Israel...As long as we are capable of defending – it is our obligation to defend
and not to leave our places”.
Unfortunately, this ethical outlook is no
longer shared by a significant number of public leaders today, who are certainly
not guided by the immortal truths of the Torah of Israel.
In contrast to the current widespread
approaches among a significant number of public leaders, the approach bequeathed
us by the Torah of Israel, is, as is well known, that the Land of Israel is a
value, and that settlement within it, all parts of it, is fulfillment of a
commandment: “And ye shall dispossess the inhabitants of the land, and dwell
therein: for I have given you the land to possess it” (Numbers, 33:53). Genuine
security will only be achieved through taking hold of the land, not through the
abandonment of all or part of the land. The Torah warns: “But if ye will not
drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you; then it shall come to
pass, that those which ye let remain of them shall be pricks in your eyes, and
thorns in your sides, and shall vex you in the land wherein ye dwell” (ibid.,
55). Rabbi Haim Ben-Atar interprets this admonition, in his commentary “Or
Hahayim”, in the following manner: If the Jewish people do not actualize their
right to all parts of the land of Israel and allows the gentiles to control
parts of the Land of Israel, in the hope that by doing so they will live
peacefully in those areas, which they do control, the result will be that not
only will they not live in peace in those areas, but those gentiles will
continue to embitter the lives of the Jews with the uncompromising demand that
they also evacuate those areas, which they control (ultimately losing the land
in its entirety).
Like the other admonitions of the Torah,
this admonition regarding the dire consequences stemming from our willingness to
cede parts of the Land of Israel to foreigners is also coming true, with amazing
accuracy before our very eyes. The Arab side of the conflict, guided by the
jihad doctrine, is not willing today, and will never be willing to cede any
territory in the Land of Israel. The willingness of the Arab side to enter into
negotiations with Israel has but one purpose: To subdue Israel and to extort
from it the maximal possible concessions at the negotiating table, intending to
garner the rest in an extended terrorist war, which will, they hope, exhaust the
State to the point where it will completely lose its desire to fight for its
existence, which will lead to its ultimate liquidation.
The only chance to save the nation and the
state from this path to oblivion is by means of a return to the truisms of the
Torah of Israel, whose credibility has been proven countless times throughout
the generations. Thus, adherence to Judaism is the only way to prevent the
process of another destruction, Heaven forbid, whose consequences can not be
foreseen.
The Power of a Leader
Leadership plays a decisive role in
determining the fate of a nation, for better or for worse. The guidance of the
Torah of Israel is that the King of Israel – and in fact every leader – must
adhere to the laws of the Torah, and he may only act – even if he is king – in
accordance with those laws (Deuteronomy 17: 18-20). The purpose of the entire
Book of Kings is to indicate the blessing, which those kings who followed the
straight path and acted in accordance with the laws of the Torah, brought to
their subjects and on the other hand, the severe consequences stemming from the
actions of those kings who were evil and did not follow the straight path –
consequences, which ultimately led to the loss of the land and the exile of the
Jewish people from their land. One of the lessons is that the price for the
failure of a king, who contravened the law, is liable to be paid by the entire
nation.
A conspicuous example of this can be culled
from the episode of the war between Ahab and Ben-Haddad, King of Aram. As it
recounted (Kings I, 20:26), Ben-Haddad went to war with Israel in Afek (in the
Golan). The Aramite army was routed in battle, “and the children of Israel slew
of the Syrians an hundred thousand footmen in one day” (ibid., 29). Ahab was
supposed to kill Ben-Haddad, who remained alive, due, among other reasons, to
the humiliations, which he caused him before the battle and because it was he
who initiated the war against Israel. Instead, Ben-Haddad acted with cunning and
proposed to return to Ahab cities, which had been conquered by his father
Ben-Haddad I, and in addition – to grant Ahab commercial rights in Damascus
(ibid., 32). Ahab swallowed the bait and made a treaty with Ben-Haddad. This,
despite the fact that the Kings of Aram had more than once battled against
Israel and had violated their commitments before. The prophet’s pronouncement as
to what Ahab and his people could anticipate as a result of that act of folly
soon followed (ibid., 42), “Because thou hast let go out of thy hand a man whom
I appointed to utter destruction”, in other words: Since you freed Ben-Haddad,
despite the fact that he deserved to die and should have killed him, “therefore
thy life shall go for his life, and thy people for his people.” That means that
you will pay the price with your life, and your nation shall pay the price as
well. According to one of the interpretations, the nation was supposed to pay
for the fact that it did not protest against Ahab, as the treaty was certainly
made in the presence of the officers of Israel and with their approval.
The message arising from this is that not
only the leader himself but also the nation in its entirety are liable to pay
for the leader’s shortcomings, due, among other reasons, to the fact that his
officers – today they are elected officials – did not protest and allowed him to
act against the law and against the interests of the Jewish people, which he and
they are supposed to defend.
A Jew who adheres to the faith of his
fathers and internalizes the messages included in the prophecies of the prophets
of Israel, knows quite well that only leadership guided by the Torah of Israel
is likely to lead the Jewish people in the proper manner, while leadership
guided by considerations and interests not based on foundations of justice, is
liable to bring the entire nation to the verge of destruction.
Epilogue
The Jew’s adherence to his Judaism despite
all of the misfortune befalling his people does not stem from masochism. This
adherence stems from love of the truth and from the profound belief that all of
the troubles, which befell the Jewish people over the generations could have
been prevented, had the Jewish people acted according to the norm of performing
acts of kindness, justice and righteousness in the land. This adherence stems
from the belief that if the Jewish people returns to its sources and its essence
and will guide itself in all of its ways in accordance with the principles of
the Torah of Israel and in light of the visions of the prophets of Israel, it
will thereby also ensure its independence, its sovereignty over its land as well
as the fulfillment of all of the ideals, about which the Torah spoke and the
prophets of Israel prophesied. Thus the bloody history of our people is not a
reason for deterioration in our adherence to the faith of our fathers, but on
the contrary – it is the reason for the strengthening of the adherence to the
only path, which is the true path and to the implanting of the faith that an
alternative is possible. It all depends on us!
An Attempt to Answer Your
Question
Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto
This was a very interesting and difficult
question – I will analyze it from a slightly unconventional angle, point by
point:
It would not be a revelation for me to say
that the Balfour Declaration altered the idyll of “The Jewish State”, the lack
of Jewish response, even in light of the failures of the Mandate, altered the
declaration and the lack of Jewish response during the War of Independence
altered a potential situation. Where are the million-and-a-half Jews who fought
in the Allies’ armies? Where is the effort, primarily of American Jewry, from
1947-49 to build a home for the refugees? Where is the stream of Jews in the
wake of the Six-Day War, etc.? The weaknesses that led to Oslo. Israel after the
Oslo Accords is no longer the Israel that was before. The time and the
concurrent events are all moving in jut one direction. There is no turning back
– there is a reform, which could include a tactical withdrawal.
* It does not mean that the end is upon
us. Not at all. It means that there are certain tactical maneuvers, or even
withdrawals and there might be some treaties and additional efforts before the
lava becomes basalt.
* International circumstances are working
in our favor and the new century, the century of intellect (a resource found
among the Jews) instead of the previous century, which was primarily about
material and power, is also working in our favor. However, we must resolutely
extend our hands and take action. Otherwise, there will be additional
withdrawals.
* As far as your question regarding the
proposal of Jesus’ Chief of Staff is concerned, let us relate: INRI Chief of
Staff, please apprise your readers the meaning of the abbreviation: Iesus
Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum, meaning Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews. If you
wipe away the filth, in which various faiths that are identical in any case,
wrapped Jesus centuries after his death, you will find him to be another Jew,
like us.
* Jesus was engaged in turning over
tables in the Temple? In the absence of anyone else to prevent the
commercialization of religion and morality, it was good that a Jew took action.
We could use someone like that today.
Arieh, if my criticism of my people seems
to border on anti-Semitism, here is a short story:
In 1955-6, I flew with the RAF in training
to establish a combat squadron to fly at night and in bad weather. Life in the
officers club in northern England was very pleasant and collegial, especially
with those my age. Nevertheless, there was one old colonel there, a pre-WWII
pilot, who called me over one day to call my attention to the fact that it was
written in the newspaper that most of the organized crime in London was
controlled by Jews. Unfortunately, that was apparently the case.
I wanted to hit him, but that was not why I
was sent there. So I said that even if we assume that the report is true, the
distortion of the Jewish character was the work of the gentiles; their pressure
caused the distortion. “Zionism,” I told him, “is not only a territorial
solution for the Jews, it is also the creation of conditions to rehabilitate
those distortions, which you caused. What would you prefer – to deal with the
Jews like Hitler, or to facilitate their rehabilitation?
The colonel was silent for a while and you
could see the rusty wheels turning in his head. Suddenly, he broke the
traditional silence of the gentleman’s club and almost screamed: “By Golly,
Captain, I thought that I am anti-Semitic and found out that I’m a Zionist. You
are certainly right.”
Since then he became such a good friend,
that he offered me his daughters to accompany me in London. Even if I don’t
ignore my people’s shortcomings, I am a Zionist. Not only a Zionist, but an
avowed optimist. One who played a role in the victorious War of Independence,
can be nothing other than an optimist, otherwise he would have psychological
problems. If we won with the weapon of motivation alone, we will win with our
considerable might until Arabia will be silent for four hundred years and the
anti-Semites will fade into nothing more than a footnote in the history books.
(And you know that I am writing at a time when I am engaged in a difficult war
against the distortion of the governmental system in the Jewish state; also a
deformity, which is a legacy of the exile.)
