בעה''י
The Jewish Weltanschauung and its Implementation
“When a person does not see others or want to see them, there is darkness in the world.” - Ktav Sofer
I. The Lost Voice
Rav Y.B. Soloveitchik, zt”l, wrote that there are three alternative interpretations of the history of Western civilization - the Islamic, the Christian and the Jewish. The adherents of each are unshakably committed to its fulfillment, and each vision is mutually incompatible with the others. In the end, only one worldview will be demonstrated to be truthful, accurate, and correct; only one worldview can account for all the historical data without the need to disregard or gerrymander inconvenient facts. There are no stakes higher; the worldview that prevails will hold the pen that writes the final chapters of the history of Western Civilization.
Non-Jewish Worldviews As sojourners in Christian and Moslem cultures, we are well acquainted in the tenets of Christianity and Islam. Our host cultures communicate their dogmas in both explicit and subliminal ways. A Jew cannot grow up in the United States without exposure to the major signposts of the Christian calendar. Your day-timer has a little “A.D.” on it, and includes reminders for Halloween, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Mardi Gras, Ash Wednesday, Lent, Easter Eggs and jelly beans. Sundays are shaded to signify the Christian day of rest. There’s Mother Mary coming to me, hocking my cheinik to “Let It Be”, Kyrie Eleison telling me there’s a road that I must travel, and of course, Christmas carols ad extremis, culminating in the Hallelujah Chorus of Handel’s Messiah.
With the ascension in recent years of miltant Jihadist Islam, all non-Moslems are quickly learning about the key tenets of orthodox Islam, of the Sunni/Shi’a schism, of dhimmitude, of the jizya, of hudnas, of the Mahdi and the writings of the Koran and the Hadiths. We are being forced to acknowledge that a significant subset of Islam (perhaps as much as 50%, according to Islamic scholar Dr. Daniel Pipes) subscribes to the radical expansionist Islamic worldview which motivates the Jihadists. The adherents of this worldview are committed to waging violent Jihad against all non-Moslems to establish the global Caliphate under strict Sha’aria law. Jews, we are informed, descend from pigs and monkeys, and the idea of an independent Jewish State on ancestral Jewish land is anathema. As George F. Will once observed, it is not “that Israel is being provocative, but that Israel being is provocative.” According to R’ Soloveitchik’s view, the Jihadists are not waging war against Western Civilization as much as waging war for the domination of Western Civilization.
(It is an interesting philosophical question whether the modern secular ethos is merely a derivative of Christianity, as Rav A.Y. HaCohen Kook zt”l argues, or if it is a form of avodah zara [idol worship] in its own right. Either way, it seems to be distinct from the other three, and carries with it a full array of postulates, prejudices, morals and behaviors.)
Jewish Worldview is MissingBut what of the Jewish worldview? In these extraordinary times, where is the clarion call of the Jewish Weltanschauung? Who is advancing our unique understanding of history and current events, and our role, relative to the roles of others, in the shaping of those events? Why do we not hear expression of the Jewish worldview in the great marketplace of ideas? Where are the voices of our Gedolim, our Manhigim, in the mainstream media? We certainly hear the views of others in great abundance. Why are Am Yisrael content to sit on the sidelines of the public debate and watch world events unfold without public comment? I refer not to isolated public pronouncements on specific policy issues, like school vouchers or euthanasia; I refer to a comprehensive articulation of the Jewish ethos on all facets of cultural life. Where is the proud, cogent, passionate articulation of the Jewish Strategic Vision for mankind? This question is especially pressing at a time when the Jewish Weltanschauung has so much to contribute to the vigorous public discourse and to the greater common weal.
Of the three worldviews, only the Jewish worldview can point to concrete historical developments that corroborate its understanding of Western history. The Torah promises first and foremost that despite our disobedience and subsequent exile, the Jewish People would never be completely eradicated from the face of the earth; it promises a re-establishment of the Jewish Commonwealth and the return of the Jewish exiles from the ends of the earth. Israel was a forgotten wasteland for millenia. Today, in fulfillment of Torah prohesies, Israel sprouts forth with such verdant lushness that astronauts from space could clearly demarcate the "Green Line" between lands under Jewish and Arab control. The Talmud teaches us that this is the surest sign that the final redemption is near (Sanhedrin 98a). All of this has come to pass. Yet, even in Jewish circles, these phenomenal events to which our generations bear witness are rarely ever discussed in their proper context.
To articulate the Jewish worldview requires nothing less than a comprehensive cheshbon nefesh - a rethinking of what it means to be Jewish in these times, in these days of the atchaltah d’geulah.
II. The Aberration of Galut Throughout the Torah, we are repeatedly adjured to be kedoshim, and to rise to our Divine calling to be mamlechet kohanim v’goy kadosh (a Kingdom of Priests and a Holy Nation - Exodus 19:6). This is the only reason for our bechirah. It is our Divine mission; it is to permeate our every act, infuse our every utterance. In the dark world of three millennia ago, Judaism alone held up the banner of morality, of compassion, and of hope against polytheism, chaos, nihilism and frank evil. So impeccable was to be our example of righteousness that the Umot HaOlam (the 70 Nations) would declare “Happy is the Nation who has Hashem as their Gcd!” (Psalm 144:15) Through our passionate deeds and words, Hashem would be sanctified in the world - mekadesh ba’olam. But to our unending sorrow, we stumbled in that mission: “mipnei chataeinu galinu me’artzeinu, v’nitrachaknu me’admotaeinu…” ("...because of our sins we were exiled and distanced from our land... - Festival Mussaf) Within a few hundred years of entering Israel, the Jewish Commonwealth had been split in two, and the persistent pagan cults of ba’al and asherah were never successfully uprooted from the fields and minds of the Jewish common folk. Jew fought Jew, Torah observance lapsed, and the storm clouds of Assyria, Babylonia and Rome darkened our skies. Exile followed, and we have lived with the sequellae of the churbanot without interruption since that tragic time; indeed, we feel its rumblings down to this day.
Since Yavneh, Jews loyal to Torah have been forced to sacrifice our higher mission for the imperatives of mere survival, and we have been focused ever since on issues of preservation. The extraordinary act of committing the oral Torah to paper was itself an incredibly courageous act of preserving the unbroken chain of mesorah for future generations facing a very uncertain future. In perhaps the most painful consequence of our transgressions, the task of educating the world to the existence of the Gcd of Israel passed to the Christian and Moslem. It was not the Jew who exposed the Gaul, the Goth and the Celt to the Gcd of Abraham, it was the Catholic Church. And it was left to the Mohammedan to speak of the One Creator to Africa and Asia. We were too pre-occupied with issues of meager survival, and marginalized by the host cultures in which we lived. The Rambam says that Hashem intended Christianity so that people would have a concept of mashiach (lit., the Savior, but more broadly, the concept of the history with purpose and direction). But weren’t they supposed to learn that from us?
The leitmotif of our galut existence can been seen as one of survival and preservation - of our faith, of our morals and of our dedication to Torah & mitzvot in the most difficult and disparate social conditions and environments, and in the face of terrible persecution and suffering. Exiled, without power or means, we were forced to abandon our calling and withdrew from an active role in shaping the course of human events; in exchange for being allowed to survive, our worldview was ruthlessly suppressed. While a long succession of “New Israel’s” expropriated our Torah, twisted our morality, and undermined our calling, we were content to be left alone; we were sustained by the promise of Jeremiah that Hashem would not abandon his "Treasured People," and that our galut would not be permanent. So for most of the last 1900 years, and under this most unlikely set of circumstances, Judaism miraculously endured in the face of determined attempts to eradicate both it and its worldview from the face of the planet.
Then came the spiritual tsunami of the Haskalah (Enlightenment). To be charitable, perhaps it can be said that the first generation of reformers were genuinely motivated by a desire to preserve Judaism in the face of massive assimilation on the one hand, and the apparent, imminent extinction of Torah-based Judaism on the other. Sadly, 200 harsh years of history have shown us they accomplished the polar opposite: the liberal Jewish reformers are largely responsible for accelerating assimilation and intermarriage, i.e., undoing our 19 century-long survival success story.
The American Jewish Establishment has been controlled from the beginning by liberal Jews. How has the American Jewish Community fared under their leadership? The demographics are pretty sobering: In 1970, there were 6.7 million Jews in the US, according to the Brittanica Book of the Year. By 1990, according to the National Jewish Population Survey (NJPS) of that year, there were 5.5 million Jews. According to the Year 2000 NJPS, there are 5.2 million Jews in America. And of the 5.2 million who self-identify as Jews, only about 3 million are Jewish according to the settled standards of Jewish Law. The Maskilim have failed by any objective measure.
In light of the false predictions of the demise of Torah Judaism on the one hand, and the responsibility for the destruction of diaspora Jewry on the other, intellectual integrity on the part of the Maskilim should demand a vidui; a disbanding and return to the values and behaviors that have sustained us throughout the dispersion. While such a declaration is unlikely, history will nevertheless adjudge the modern dissent movements as mere footnotes to Jewish history, with no appreciable legacy or significant contribution to Jewish thought. They are spawns of the galut, little more than historical aberrations, and are destined to wither there.
But look at the havoc they have wrought! The American galut is unlike any other. On the one hand, we have enjoyed, for the first time in our galut experience, five generations of heretofore unimagined personal liberty and wealth. American Jews have witnessed the miraculous re-establishment of the Jewish State and the beginning of kibutz galuyot (ingathering of the exiles); we have helped nurture the renaissance of Torah Judaism after the Holocaust. On the other hand, 90% of American Jews spurn traditional Jewish values, living as "un‑Jews." We stand at the threshold of a new era, where we are being shown, before our very eyes, that the moment of geulah (redemption) is at hand. Indeed, like the Egyptian galut of yore, American Jews stand on the precipice of the 49th stage of tumah (spiritual distancing from Gcd); if we are not redeemed soon, we, too, will be irredeemable, ch”v. We, the awake ones, cannot allow this to happen.
How has the atherosclerotic Jewish Establishment responded to these unprecedented challenges? By not responding at all – ‘to keep doing what we did before’, to ‘go with what we know’ and to stick doggedly to our aberrant galut survival leitmotif. We continue to view survival a.k.a. “Jewish continuity” a.k.a. the preservation of Jewish identity to be our highest priority – for it's own sake. The American-Jewish canoe is almost over the falls, and the Establishment response is to re-pack the picnic basket between the thwarts.
The true mission of the Jew - our higher calling to kedushah (holiness) and to be mashpia on the world - have been long ago discarded as an irrelevant, inconvenient, politically incorrect anachronism. The centrality of Israel to Jewish life (read: aliyah/return to Israel) has been nullified. Like terrorized ghetto-dwellers, American Jews hope that if they are silent enough, invisible enough, they will be left alone, unharrassed by the greater world. Tzitit in, kippah off, head down. The scandalous, unspoken truth is that Jews are happy with this trade-off: straddling two cultures, gleaning from both, committing entirely to none. Jews are quite content navigating the murky paradoxes and ambiguities of American Jewish life, and rather enjoy the galut existence. So like a modern-day Jonah, we run from the tzav Hashem (Divine Imperative). Rav T. H. Weinreb once said with regard to North American aliyah and Eretz Yisrael: “It is as if Hashem threw Am Yisrael a party, and no one attended.” Jonah couldn’t hide from Hashem, and neither can we. Portentous world events are unfolding so quickly and ominously that we are being compelled to examine our deeds and the predicates of our very lives. Jews are so focused on the activities perceived to be so critical to survival, we have forgotten that all of Western history, as Rav Kook says, is but a preamble and preparation for Geulat Yisrael. The tools that served us so well in galut are obstacles to the geulah, and the geulah is at hand.
III. Mamlechet Kohanim
Lih’yot mamlechet kohanim v’goy kadosh: In the same way that the Cohanim and Leviim ministered to Hashem on behalf of Klal Yisrael (lichaper ba’ado, u’vaad beito, uva’ad kol k’hal Yisrael [for the High Priest to atone for himself, for his household, and for all of Israel - Leviticus 16:19]), Klal Yisrael’s mission is to minister on behalf of the 70 Nations of the world. In the same way that the Cohanim were the ba’alei mesorah, the mechanchim, the teachers of Klal Yisrael, so, too, are Klal Yisrael the light-bringers to the Nations. And in the same way that the Cohanim had specific mitzvot that were not incumbent upon Klal Yisrael, so, too, Klal Yisrael has mitzvot that are not incumbent upon the other peoples.
Were the Cohanim “better Jews” or dearer to Hashem than stam Yisraelim by virtue of their of their avodah (service in the Temple)? Of course not. They simply have a different role to play; a different voice in the complex fugue that is avodat Yisrael. Are Jews intrinsically “better human beings” than other people? We are not. But we have a different role to play; a role that requires the careful and enthusiastic observance of the Tarya”g (613) mitzvot. Our great commission is the urging of the Nations to join us in the holy task of being metaken olam b’malchut Sh-adai (rectifying the world in preparation for the Kingship of the A-lmighty). Nothing is more timely or critical.
I use the word ‘urging’ deliberately. One of the axioms Hashem built into His created Universe is the unfettered free will of every person to choose between right and wrong, between good and evil. Free will is the fundamental prerequisite of genuine religious faith; no “believer” can coerce a non-believer into belief. Therefore, any authentic voice of Torah MUST work to preserve the unfettered ability of each individual to choose between good and evil, belief or disbelief, mitzvah or aveirah, even though it perforce means suffering skeptics and unbelievers in our midst. (Perhaps this is another understanding of why we say “B’yeshivah shel ma’alah” before Yom Kippur.)
A gedanken experiment: let us suppose that we could somehow abduct every irreligious Jew, and drug them and strap them to a cot for 25 hours, and by such coercive means ensure that they could not desecrate Shabbat. Would such an act be pleasing to Hashem? Of course not. Hashem wants the avodah of all His flock from their own free will.
Rav Chanan Morrison expounds an idea of Rav A.Y. HaCohen Kook zt”l on the Mei Merivah (Waters of Strife - Numbers 20): in the time of mashiach, we will again be able to speak to the rock, using words and logic and persuasion, and rectify the hitting of the rock which created a paradigm of force and coercion in human affairs. That is why we must urge, advocate, influence, encourage, support - but never compel – either our fellow Jew or the Nations to goodness. Hashem, the Font of all Good, Who's name is "GOOD" and is described as Kulo Tov (completely good) wants only good for his creations. The existence of the possibility of evil in the world is necessary to preserve absolute free will. However, we must recognize that while Hashem created the possibility of evil, the evil we experience in the world is of our own making, not Hashem’s. The hard truth is that we inflict most of our pain on ourselves by our own boneheaded choices.
I see a world where all people come to recognize, without coercion, manipulation or force, that all good emanates from Hashem, Creator of heaven and earth, the Eternal One, Gcd of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the One who wants for us only good. It is the natural state of the human soul, the spark of the Divine, to connect with its Source. For Christians, belief in Gcd is inextricably entwined with belief in their Jesus. So when people have difficulty accepting elements of Christian dogma, they feel distanced from Gcd. This state creates tremendous angst in the world. We Jews must show them that their angst is unnecessary, and that there is another path. To the 70 Nations we must declare that the Jewish People convey a tremendous message of hope! First, know that there is a compassionate Gcd – Elokei Avraham, Elokei Yitzchak, v’Elokai Yaakov - Who created us all: Moslem, Christian and Jew; Who loves us all; and Who has assigned each one of us a specific task in the great and holy work - our common goal - of perfecting the world together. The very existence of the Jewish People bears testimony to this Truth. You were born to your specific family for a reason; you were born to accomplish a specific task in the great creative endeavor called tikkun olam (perfecting the world). Gcd doesn’t want you to become Jewish; Gcd wants you to be who you are, to choose the path of the GOOD, as defined in the Torah by the Seven Noahide Laws. Each one of us must struggle to discover what our particular mission is, so that we can join together, Jew and Gentile, shoulder to shoulder, to complete the work that Hashem left for us to complete on this earth.
Jewish liberals, who have discarded authentic Torah values, have substituted in their place jingoisms like ‘social justice.’ "Tikkun Olam" has has morphed into "redistribution of wealth." The authentic Jewish urging is not an appeal to socialism, or feminism, or gay rights, or gun control, or any other over-exploited, feel-good political agenda, but rather a clarion call to genuine goodness and to compassion; a call to the heart that penetrates the layers of cynicism and transcends the superficial. It is a call to Truth and service and love. The very survival of the faithful remnant of Yisrael, the nation that bears His name within its own, is tangible proof that Gcd exists, and that He keeps His word, and that His Torah is true.
Second, unlike faiths that threaten eternal damnation to non-believers, we proclaim the inclusive, universal message that Gcd accepts all good people in heaven (i.e., keepers of the basic elements of human justice and compassion as embodied in the Seven Noahide Laws, irrespective of race, creed, or color. There is no place in Gcd’s world for racism or exclusion. Thirdly, the Gcd who calls us to His Goodness is the Gcd who bequeathed the land of Israel to the people of Israel.
Israel is in the headlines every day - out of all proportion to her size (she ranks about 125th in size out of 180 countries) and population (100/180). The Torah says that it is the place that Hashem watches “from the beginning of the year to the end of the year”; so, apparently, does the rest of the world. Why? Yerushalayim and the Har HaBayit (Temple Mount) are the spiritual epicenter of the world, as the place chosen by Hashem lishaken Shmo sham (for His Name to dwell there). The Jewish/Arab conflict in the Middle East is not about the relative merits of Jew or Arab to live on the land; there is enough land in what was once known as “Palestine” for all. Rather, the ongoing war in Israel is the fulcrum of the intellectual/spiritual conflict between the worldviews that oppose Gcd’s rule on earth, and it’s manifestation through the return of the Jews to the Land.
Amru: l’chu v’nach’chidem migoy, v’lo yizacher shem Yisrael od. Ki no’atzu lev yachdav, alecha brit yichrotu. Ahalei Edom v’Yishmaelim, Moav v’Hagrim. G’val Amon v’Amalek, Pleshet im yoshvei Tzur. Gam Ashur nilvah imam, hayu zro’ah livnei Lot, selah.
They say: "Come, let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel will be remembered no more. The consult together with a united purpose; against Hashem do they make a covenant. The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites, Moab and the Hagrites. Gival, Ammon and Amalek; Philistine and the residents of Tyre. Assyria is also joined with them; they have become an appendage of the children of Lot, selah. (Psalm 83)
A sovereign Israel is a threat to the adherents of Christian & Moslem replacement theologies; it shakes their worldviews to the foundations. The continued survival of the Jew puts the lie to his system of beliefs. The destruction of the State of Israel and the re-expulsion of the Jews are critical to Christian and Moslem worldviews, in order to correct the “aberration” of kibutz galuyot. Therefore, all efforts to hobble and constrict the State of Israel, to push her back to indefensible borders, to murder Jewish women and children, especially new immigrants, are important milestones toward their ultimate goal. But Israel and the settlement enterprise will endure because it is the mitzvah she’kol ha’mitzvot t’luyin bah (i.e., living in the Land of Israel is the mitzvah upon which every other mitzvah is predicated). Witness the miracles in the battles of 1948, 1967, 1973. Nowhere in the Prophets does it say that Hashem will return us to our land only to be expelled again.
Disparate and difficult headlines - Iranian nuclear weapons, increasing worldwide anti-semitism, assimilation and intermarriage, the global jihad, the Vatican’s unceasing call to wrest Jerusalem from Jewish control, the Arab war against Israel, the prying away of Eretz Yisrael from the Jews by degrees, the blackmail of the Petrodollar – can all be cohesively understood through the prism of Geulat Yisrael. The vested interests of the galut will stop at nothing, including, terror, coersion and mass murder to prevent the realization of the Jewish Weltanschauung. Such people cannot be reasoned with; the intellectual battle can only be engaged.
The 70 Nations must decide on which side of history they wish to be aligned. It is most notable that many Evangelicals intuitively support Israel and the Jewish claims to the Land, because they believe the promise of Gcd to Abraham and his descendants: mivarechicha baruch, um’kallelecha arur (Those who bless you will be blessed, and those who curse you will be cursed and all the peoples of the Earth will be blessed through you. - Genesis 12:3).
To our fellow Jews, we must agitate for an internal revolution. We must cultivate a mindset of manhigut (spiritual leadership), and behave in a manner that reflects our noble calling. We must cultivate the absolute Ahavat Yisrael so famously embodied by R’ A.Y. HaCohen Kook, zt”l, while simultaneously and equally strongly rejecting unholy behaviors. Notwithstanding the earlier harsh assessment of the movements of Jewish dissent, our argument is with ideologies and the behaviors that extend from them, not individual Jews. First and foremost, we must shed our reflexive survival leitmotif.
Try this experiment: go to a Jewish high school and ask a teen: “Why be Jewish?” A simple enough question. Yet how many could give a cogent answer? How many Jewish adults or educators could give a cogent answer?
This question is the crux of the matter: in a world of limitless (although ultimately meaningless) choices; in a materialistic/pornographic society where the 24/7 MTV block party seductively beckons, where everyone is on the endless search for the ultimate buzz and self-gratification, why should a kid opt-in to be Jewish? After all, it’s such a drag, so many rules. Besides, what’s so wrong with today’s prevailing morals and values? If you answer that teen with a vague reference to the memories of Bubbe and Zayde and “Jewish survival,” you have no answer at all.
If, on the other hand, we can speak of mission, of purpose, of calling; if we can kindle the fire of youthful passion in the disseminating of all that is holy and good, of priesthood and of leadership, our children and our children’s children will remain faithful to Knesset Yisrael (Rav Kook’s concept of the Jewish “collective unconscious”). We will not only survive, we will thrive.
We must join hands and scream out in unison, “Yehe Shme Rabba Mevorach…” - understanding “mevorach’ like the shoresh of “breichah” i.e., Hashem’s Great Name should spread out throughout all the worlds and spheres of existence! – and thus, the gemara teaches, annul the gezerot ra’ot, the evil decrees planned by our accusers.
We must root out insidious materialism and consumerism, break from the addictions of the galut, and make immediate aliyah. Halevai! If there were one million religious/Zionist North American olim, the political dynamic in Israel would be transformed overnight. We must recognize and tap into the inherent mystical synergy of Am Yisrael b’ Eretz Yisrael im Torat Yisrael (People of Israel/Land of Israel/Torah of Israel). Ki Mitzion Tetzeh Torah, u’Dvar Hashem m’Yirushalayim. (From Zion shall go forth Torah, and the word of Gcd from Jerusalem - (Isaiah 2:3) The pasuk says Tzion, not Monsey; Yirushalayim, not Lakewood.
In order to stem the tide of assimilation and preserve the remnant of Jews in the Galut, the Diaspora leadership must re-rank its communal priorities. It must shift the emphasis on bloated bureaucracies and outdated and ineffective survival paradigms, and focus instead on authentic Torah education, command of Hebrew, and facilitation of aliyah. The American Jewish community is still sufficiently wealthy that it can afford to guarantee a Torah education to every Jewish child.
We must shatter apathy, perform our mitzvot with passion and dedication, and strive to perceive the mission behind the mitzvah. We must read the words of the Siddur as if reading it for the very first time, with depth and meaning. Wake up brothers and sisters! Why do you sleep? The time is at hand. We must learn Torah, not just lilamed, but k’dai la’asot. There is a variant girsa of Avot 4:6 that reads:
Rabi Yishmael bar Rabi Yossi omer: HaLomed al m’nat l’lamed, AIN maspikin b’yado l’lmod ule’lamed; v’haLomed al m’nat l’asot, maspikin b’yado l’lmod u’lelamed, lishmor v’la’asot.
Rabbi Yishmael son of Rabbi Yossi said: One who learns in order to teach, will not succeed either in teaching or learning; but one who learns in order act, will succeed in learning, in teaching, in observing (the mitzvot), and in doing.
Lastly, we MUST take a stand in the culture wars, and be the voice of Emet (Truth) in a world of institutionalized sheker v’hevel (falsehood). Through these actions the Jew, the Priest to humanity, the Prometheans of the Gcdly light, will help lead the entire world from the dark place of pain, despair, cruelty, ignorance and narcissism to a place of brotherhood, authentic spirituality, tranquility and Gcd's peace.
The Chatam Sofer taught that the Jewish People are likened in the Torah to the stars of the sky, because we were given the responsibility to illuminate the otherwise dark and cold void that is the world. Through the re-introduction of the long suppressed Jewish world view, this Klaxon of Truth, we can begin to banish cynicism and pain, give our confused neighbors context and clarity to our seemingly chaotic times, and bring the world a quantum step closer to the vision of Zechariah: “bayom hahu yihyeh Hashem echad u’shmo echad.” (...on that day, Gcd will be One and His Name One.)
To rise to this calling, we must re-invent ourselves, our families and our communities. The time to act is now.
Thursday, May 3, 2007
The Jew in the Mirror
בעה''י
[First Published July 3, 2002]
I received my first Neo-Nazi hate mail this week. As a writer, one strives to communicate ideas, hopefully true and worthy ideas, though you never really know who you reach with your pen. Well, now I know.
Where does blind, irrational Jew-hatred come from? why is it so tenacious? and should we even care?
Of course, we thought we had it cured. The Enlightenment promised a quick death to anti-semitism, but when we embraced emancipation, they hated us for our liberalism. Assimilation pledged to slay anti-semitism, but when we converted, they reviled us for contaminating the Christian race. Socialism declared the blind brotherhood of all workers, but when we joined the great class struggle, Stalin murdered the Jews first. Zionists tried to solve “the Jewish problem,” but were accused of treason and treachery by their host nations. Even the Holocaust, that apocalyptic paroxysm of Jew-hatred, and the eventual establishment of a sovereign Jewish State did not eradicate the scourge of anti-semitism from the face of the earth, only forced it back into dark corners for a while. And in our own day, little girls are gunned down in pizza parlors and synagogues are razed by those who demand “justice for occupied Palestine.”
Who are we Jews, the objects of perpetual vilification? Who is the Jew you see in the mirror?
Open a siddur (prayerbook) and see who is reflected in it’s pages. The Jew, first and foremost, lavishes endless praise on the Creator: “Ilu pinu maleh shira kayam...”
“Even if our mouths were full of song as the sea, and our tongues as full of joyous song as it’s multitude of waves; were our lips as full of praise as the breadth of the heavens, and our eyes as brilliant as the sun and the moon; were our hands as outspread as eagles’ wings, and our feet as swift as hinds - we still could not thank you sufficiently, our Gcd and Gcd of our forefathers”
We are the people who wish only to cling to Gcd and His precious Torah:
“...instill understanding in our hearts to understand and elucidate; to listen, learn, teach, safeguard perform and fulfill all the words of Your Torah’s teaching with love”
We are the people that pray three times a day for insight, repentance, forgiveness, redemption, life and healing, justice, and, above all, peace. Pretty venal stuff so far.
We are the people who, “because of our sins, were exiled from our land.” We are sustained by that one little promise Gcd made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and we are acutely aware that, were we to be adjudged upon our own merits, we would have been long ago consigned to the dustbin of history.
But here we are, against all odds. Players on the world stage. Israel consistently receives more column-inches of news coverage than just about any other single country, issue or conflict. For two millennia we have wanted, above all else, to be left alone by the greater world, unharrassed to study Torah, to deepen our connection to Gcd, and for 2,000 years, the world hasn’t given us a moment’s peace.
There is a screaming dissonance between the way we understand ourselves - devotional, introspective, long-suffering, faithful keepers of Gcd’s light - and the way in which we are perceived by others.
Sample some of the comments posted recently on the website:
“We don't want to pay for your dirty war with our tax dollars. We don't want another hit from terrorists on account of YOUR DIRTY WAR AGAINST THE PALESTINIANS! A Jewish state based on ethnic cleansing and discrimination is immoral!” - Wendy Campbell
“How about Zyklon-B on the Jewish terrorist state?” - Hoeft
“you lot should be fu....ing shot.you have been like this for 3 thousand years killing anybody that is not a fu...ing jew, and you will be persecuted for another 3 thousand years. that's for sure. hitler was right,hitler was right,hitler was right you are not from human race! you have not evolved to human race yet.”
- John Sankho
“Forcing a defenseless (they have no army) people to live in what amounts to a concentration camp, and firing upon them with great frequency, stripping them of any human rights and dignity is what has created their willingness to do whatever it is they are able to do to fight back. Anyone in their position might resort to the same actions.” - anonymous
“In the name of Peace, sacrifice is sometimes necessary! Wouldn't it be easiest to simply eradicate the 14 million jews on this planet, instead of facing unending war and terrorism, caused by rightfully angry Pals and Muslims? After all, you jews started the terrorism when you erected your contemptible little dirt-State: stealing land and homes from the rightful owners; murdering many; then abusing the remnant for decades... Don't be fooled, when enough American Whites learn all the facts, you jews are going to get what you have coming to you. Death to Israel. Death to the jews.” - Mr. Tsun
“There is one simple solution to the end of Martydom [sic] operations - leave the land that Prophet Mohammed NEVER promised you, yet indeed you stole. There will never be any peace in the region where you and your father, the dirty American and British governments interfere.” - Abdullah
“No wonder Hitler did what he did to you. And I think you deserve even more.” - A Moslem
“Yeah, and Sharon, what, he killed only maybe 20,000 people in Lebanon.... nah, that's not a big deal! You people are so AMORAL.” - anonymous
“Let's execute every family member of every American who has ever supported the terrorist state of Israel. It is not only those responsible for the continuing invasion, occupation and ethnic cleansing of Palestine who ought to be murdered, but also all of their innocent relations.” - Kevin Barrett
“The present actions of the Israelis and American jews are already turning blind U.S. support into skepticism and sheer revulsion. When the American public finally decides that unquestioning, blind support of Israel is immoral and suicidal, the situation will come to a head. I'm starting to wonder if Adolph Hitler perhaps knew something that we're only now starting to realize...” - Joe Sixpack
Clearly, we have a public relations problem on our hands. Recent studies prove that such virulent ideas are widely held. We are misunderstood at best, and reviled at worst. Anti-semitism is nothing if not consistent, and every artifice to address it in the past has failed. We must confront it though, because it is our Divine mission to influence the world for good.
We live in a world that confuses technological progress with human advancement. We live in a world that rejects absolutes, and gaily bobs amid a vast shifting sea of relativisms. We are the still, small voice of conscience in a world that has no use for morals. We are the light keepers. No matter how much we are beaten, maimed and scorched, we always get back up to bear witness to the Great Truth. Our very existence puts the lie to every dogma that purports to have supplanted us.
So we are marginalized; we are impugned with the crimes of our accusers; we are repressed; and we are murdered. There is no substantive difference between an innocent 15 year-old girl murdered in a café in Herzliyah, and an innocent 15 year-old girl murdered in a gas chamber.
How do we explain that the good and loving Gcd sees all, reckons all, and has a place in heaven for ALL good people of the earth, regardless of race or creed? How do we explain that Gcd does not stand aloof from His creations, but is invested - every moment of every day - in our lives, urging us on to holiness? How do we explain that, despite our imperfections, the Jews are still Gcd’s “kingdom of priests,” consecrated with the responsibility to bring the Gcdly light into a very dark world? How do we explain that our bechirah (selection) imposes additional restrictions and responsibilities, not additional privilege? How do we explain that there is Divine guidance to human history, meaning that all will be good in the end? How do we explain that the continued existence of the Jewish People, the ingathering of exiles and the renaissance of the Jewish State bear eloquent witness that Gcd keeps his promises for all humanity? How do we urge all mankind to invest the mundane with sanctity, and act upon this imperfect world in goodness?
For two centuries, we have attempted to mitigate Jew-hatred by purging ourselves of our objectionable “Jewishness,” and in this we have utterly failed. It is time to stop fighting our true nature and once and for all embrace our Divine calling. The Jew-haters are wrong: there has never been an international Jewish conspiracy to rule the world. But maybe there should be an international Jewish summons to holiness; then, perhaps, the Jew in the mirror will more closely resemble the Jew in the siddur.
[First Published July 3, 2002]
I received my first Neo-Nazi hate mail this week. As a writer, one strives to communicate ideas, hopefully true and worthy ideas, though you never really know who you reach with your pen. Well, now I know.
Where does blind, irrational Jew-hatred come from? why is it so tenacious? and should we even care?
Of course, we thought we had it cured. The Enlightenment promised a quick death to anti-semitism, but when we embraced emancipation, they hated us for our liberalism. Assimilation pledged to slay anti-semitism, but when we converted, they reviled us for contaminating the Christian race. Socialism declared the blind brotherhood of all workers, but when we joined the great class struggle, Stalin murdered the Jews first. Zionists tried to solve “the Jewish problem,” but were accused of treason and treachery by their host nations. Even the Holocaust, that apocalyptic paroxysm of Jew-hatred, and the eventual establishment of a sovereign Jewish State did not eradicate the scourge of anti-semitism from the face of the earth, only forced it back into dark corners for a while. And in our own day, little girls are gunned down in pizza parlors and synagogues are razed by those who demand “justice for occupied Palestine.”
Who are we Jews, the objects of perpetual vilification? Who is the Jew you see in the mirror?
Open a siddur (prayerbook) and see who is reflected in it’s pages. The Jew, first and foremost, lavishes endless praise on the Creator: “Ilu pinu maleh shira kayam...”
“Even if our mouths were full of song as the sea, and our tongues as full of joyous song as it’s multitude of waves; were our lips as full of praise as the breadth of the heavens, and our eyes as brilliant as the sun and the moon; were our hands as outspread as eagles’ wings, and our feet as swift as hinds - we still could not thank you sufficiently, our Gcd and Gcd of our forefathers”
We are the people who wish only to cling to Gcd and His precious Torah:
“...instill understanding in our hearts to understand and elucidate; to listen, learn, teach, safeguard perform and fulfill all the words of Your Torah’s teaching with love”
We are the people that pray three times a day for insight, repentance, forgiveness, redemption, life and healing, justice, and, above all, peace. Pretty venal stuff so far.
We are the people who, “because of our sins, were exiled from our land.” We are sustained by that one little promise Gcd made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and we are acutely aware that, were we to be adjudged upon our own merits, we would have been long ago consigned to the dustbin of history.
But here we are, against all odds. Players on the world stage. Israel consistently receives more column-inches of news coverage than just about any other single country, issue or conflict. For two millennia we have wanted, above all else, to be left alone by the greater world, unharrassed to study Torah, to deepen our connection to Gcd, and for 2,000 years, the world hasn’t given us a moment’s peace.
There is a screaming dissonance between the way we understand ourselves - devotional, introspective, long-suffering, faithful keepers of Gcd’s light - and the way in which we are perceived by others.
Sample some of the comments posted recently on the website:
“We don't want to pay for your dirty war with our tax dollars. We don't want another hit from terrorists on account of YOUR DIRTY WAR AGAINST THE PALESTINIANS! A Jewish state based on ethnic cleansing and discrimination is immoral!” - Wendy Campbell
“How about Zyklon-B on the Jewish terrorist state?” - Hoeft
“you lot should be fu....ing shot.you have been like this for 3 thousand years killing anybody that is not a fu...ing jew, and you will be persecuted for another 3 thousand years. that's for sure. hitler was right,hitler was right,hitler was right you are not from human race! you have not evolved to human race yet.”
- John Sankho
“Forcing a defenseless (they have no army) people to live in what amounts to a concentration camp, and firing upon them with great frequency, stripping them of any human rights and dignity is what has created their willingness to do whatever it is they are able to do to fight back. Anyone in their position might resort to the same actions.” - anonymous
“In the name of Peace, sacrifice is sometimes necessary! Wouldn't it be easiest to simply eradicate the 14 million jews on this planet, instead of facing unending war and terrorism, caused by rightfully angry Pals and Muslims? After all, you jews started the terrorism when you erected your contemptible little dirt-State: stealing land and homes from the rightful owners; murdering many; then abusing the remnant for decades... Don't be fooled, when enough American Whites learn all the facts, you jews are going to get what you have coming to you. Death to Israel. Death to the jews.” - Mr. Tsun
“There is one simple solution to the end of Martydom [sic] operations - leave the land that Prophet Mohammed NEVER promised you, yet indeed you stole. There will never be any peace in the region where you and your father, the dirty American and British governments interfere.” - Abdullah
“No wonder Hitler did what he did to you. And I think you deserve even more.” - A Moslem
“Yeah, and Sharon, what, he killed only maybe 20,000 people in Lebanon.... nah, that's not a big deal! You people are so AMORAL.” - anonymous
“Let's execute every family member of every American who has ever supported the terrorist state of Israel. It is not only those responsible for the continuing invasion, occupation and ethnic cleansing of Palestine who ought to be murdered, but also all of their innocent relations.” - Kevin Barrett
“The present actions of the Israelis and American jews are already turning blind U.S. support into skepticism and sheer revulsion. When the American public finally decides that unquestioning, blind support of Israel is immoral and suicidal, the situation will come to a head. I'm starting to wonder if Adolph Hitler perhaps knew something that we're only now starting to realize...” - Joe Sixpack
Clearly, we have a public relations problem on our hands. Recent studies prove that such virulent ideas are widely held. We are misunderstood at best, and reviled at worst. Anti-semitism is nothing if not consistent, and every artifice to address it in the past has failed. We must confront it though, because it is our Divine mission to influence the world for good.
We live in a world that confuses technological progress with human advancement. We live in a world that rejects absolutes, and gaily bobs amid a vast shifting sea of relativisms. We are the still, small voice of conscience in a world that has no use for morals. We are the light keepers. No matter how much we are beaten, maimed and scorched, we always get back up to bear witness to the Great Truth. Our very existence puts the lie to every dogma that purports to have supplanted us.
So we are marginalized; we are impugned with the crimes of our accusers; we are repressed; and we are murdered. There is no substantive difference between an innocent 15 year-old girl murdered in a café in Herzliyah, and an innocent 15 year-old girl murdered in a gas chamber.
How do we explain that the good and loving Gcd sees all, reckons all, and has a place in heaven for ALL good people of the earth, regardless of race or creed? How do we explain that Gcd does not stand aloof from His creations, but is invested - every moment of every day - in our lives, urging us on to holiness? How do we explain that, despite our imperfections, the Jews are still Gcd’s “kingdom of priests,” consecrated with the responsibility to bring the Gcdly light into a very dark world? How do we explain that our bechirah (selection) imposes additional restrictions and responsibilities, not additional privilege? How do we explain that there is Divine guidance to human history, meaning that all will be good in the end? How do we explain that the continued existence of the Jewish People, the ingathering of exiles and the renaissance of the Jewish State bear eloquent witness that Gcd keeps his promises for all humanity? How do we urge all mankind to invest the mundane with sanctity, and act upon this imperfect world in goodness?
For two centuries, we have attempted to mitigate Jew-hatred by purging ourselves of our objectionable “Jewishness,” and in this we have utterly failed. It is time to stop fighting our true nature and once and for all embrace our Divine calling. The Jew-haters are wrong: there has never been an international Jewish conspiracy to rule the world. But maybe there should be an international Jewish summons to holiness; then, perhaps, the Jew in the mirror will more closely resemble the Jew in the siddur.
Truth or Dare
בעה''י
[First published June 27, 2002]
For 35 years, the Arab world has whined that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip is at the root of the Mideast conflict. Force Israel back to the 1949 Armistice lines, they insinuated from behind their kaffiyehs, and the Israeli/Arab conflict might end. Israeli leftists and Jewish liberals cheered from the sidelines, all too willing to convict themselves in a frenzy of self-flagellating guilt; and the world at large, unable still to square an ascendant Jewish State with their own waning fortunes, gleefully picked up the cudgel of Palestinian victimhood to beat the renascent Jewish State.
So in this week’s Mideast policy address, President Bush dared the Arabs to prove it. In exchange for the promise of an imminent sovereign Palestinian State, he called upon the Arabs to embrace Truth: to eschew terrorism absolutely, to reject their current corrupt leadership, the embezzlers of billions and architects of this campaign of terror, to establish a genuine democracy with meaningful separation of powers, and to establish a culture which cultivates peaceful co-existence with their Jewish neighbor.
There are those who have been stridently critical of the President’s address, claiming that any promise of Palestinian statehood rewards the current campaign of terror. Let us remember, though, that Mr. Bush has come a long way in two years. He inherited a foreign policy that bullied Israel into Oslo II, Hevron and Wye, disregarding Arafat’s consistent violations of earlier agreements. During the 2000 Presidential campaign, George Bush was conspicuously reticent about the Middle East, and upon assuming office, adopted a policy of no policy at all. When, after the Dolphinarium massacre, he was forced to become engaged in the Middle East, he consulted with the likes of James Baker and Dad, people not known for their effusive pro-Israel sympathies.
But to his enduring credit, Bush recognized certain hard truths about the Middle East conflict. President Bush saw that it was Yassir Arafat and not Ariel Sharon’s Temple Mount stroll that let slip the dogs of war. He acknowledged Israel’s superhuman restraint in the early days of the current pogroms. He stood up to recognize Israel’s sovereign right to defend herself in a community of nations that was pounding its collective fist for more Jewish blood to feed the altar of Arab nationalism. He accepted Israel’s documentation that Arafat and his thugs were the organizers of the violence. He internalized the reality that Islamic Jihad, Hamas and Hezbollah were working hand in glove with the Palestinian Authority, understood the Al-Qaeda and Iran connections to the PA, and froze their funds in the US. He understood the implications of the Karin-A, and the PA pay stubs to known terrorists. He recognized the irredentist Arab claim to the ‘right of return’ for what it is - a death sentence for Israel. And, as a man of faith and conscience, he was distressed by the appalling living conditions of the Arabs under PA occupation, and has watched their lives deteriorate even further over the last few years. These truths are embodied in his policy address this week, and that is both unprecedented and portentous.
No Arab state has openly differed with Bush’s new policy, but the Arab response has been tentative at best. A century ago, when German Chancellor Bernhard von Bulow disagreed with Kaiser Wilhelm II on foreign policy (which was most of the time), he never disagreed with him openly. A grand master of the diplomatic arts, he would enthusiastically embrace petulant Wilhelm’s latest ‘inspiration,’ and then begin to systematically undermine it with an endless litany of “yes, your Highness, except...” Invariably, Wilhelm’s callow interests drifted elsewhere, his passion would abate, and von Bulow was thus able to manage the ship of state into deeper waters.
We are already beginning to see ‘von Bulow diplomacy' from the Arab world and their allies. Yassir Arafat has already declared that the Palestinian people are proud of their democracy just the way it is. Collin Powell already envisions a figurehead role for Yassir Arafat, the Johnny Appleseed of modern terror, and if the Palestinian Arabs elect him President again, Powell says the US will have to deal with that too. So much for new leadership. Powell also acknowledged that the violence will probably never completely stop, implicitly granting the terrorists carte blanche to continue.
Let us also ponder for a moment the realistic prospects of a genuine democracy in the Arab world. Rather an ambitious task for a culture in which byzantine intrigue, equivocation and self-denial are integral components of interpersonal, and by extension, international relations. A vibrant Arab democracy with an educated electorate is a far more serious threat to the billionaire bedouin petro-pashas than any Islamist insurgency. Does anyone seriously believe that in three years the Palestinians are going to be magically transformed into...Canadians?
It’s truth or dare for President Bush as well. If President Bush resolutely sticks to the truth and holds Arab feet to the fire, then the terrorist war is likely begin in earnest, both in Israel and in the United States. And if he capitulates to Foggy Bottom and dumbs down the requirements for Palestinian statehood, then Israel’s strategic situation will grow unsustainably worse, and regional war will be the certain result.
In his policy address, he got it mostly right; there are only two more things he must grasp. First, the fast of the 17th is upon us, and it teaches us that not all problems are given to diplomatic resolution. There is an Unseen Hand controlling the pieces on the chessboard, and it is masochistic to suggest that we are the unbridled masters of our destiny. Second, the two states he envisions must be divided by a particular muddy brook and a certain salty lake.
I am counting on George Bush. He has come a long way in two years, and I believe he has the courage to stand by his convictions. Educating George takes time. At this point, perhaps he believes that the issue is land; inevitably, though, he will come to learn the Arabs are far less interested in creating a state than in destroying one.
Given time, he will come to realize that the crux of the Middle East conflict is not the destiny of a few barren hills. The outcome of this conflict will send shock waves around the world. For my dear, honest George, what is at stake here is nothing less than who will grasp the pen that writes the final chapters of the history of Western civilization.
[First published June 27, 2002]
For 35 years, the Arab world has whined that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip is at the root of the Mideast conflict. Force Israel back to the 1949 Armistice lines, they insinuated from behind their kaffiyehs, and the Israeli/Arab conflict might end. Israeli leftists and Jewish liberals cheered from the sidelines, all too willing to convict themselves in a frenzy of self-flagellating guilt; and the world at large, unable still to square an ascendant Jewish State with their own waning fortunes, gleefully picked up the cudgel of Palestinian victimhood to beat the renascent Jewish State.
So in this week’s Mideast policy address, President Bush dared the Arabs to prove it. In exchange for the promise of an imminent sovereign Palestinian State, he called upon the Arabs to embrace Truth: to eschew terrorism absolutely, to reject their current corrupt leadership, the embezzlers of billions and architects of this campaign of terror, to establish a genuine democracy with meaningful separation of powers, and to establish a culture which cultivates peaceful co-existence with their Jewish neighbor.
There are those who have been stridently critical of the President’s address, claiming that any promise of Palestinian statehood rewards the current campaign of terror. Let us remember, though, that Mr. Bush has come a long way in two years. He inherited a foreign policy that bullied Israel into Oslo II, Hevron and Wye, disregarding Arafat’s consistent violations of earlier agreements. During the 2000 Presidential campaign, George Bush was conspicuously reticent about the Middle East, and upon assuming office, adopted a policy of no policy at all. When, after the Dolphinarium massacre, he was forced to become engaged in the Middle East, he consulted with the likes of James Baker and Dad, people not known for their effusive pro-Israel sympathies.
But to his enduring credit, Bush recognized certain hard truths about the Middle East conflict. President Bush saw that it was Yassir Arafat and not Ariel Sharon’s Temple Mount stroll that let slip the dogs of war. He acknowledged Israel’s superhuman restraint in the early days of the current pogroms. He stood up to recognize Israel’s sovereign right to defend herself in a community of nations that was pounding its collective fist for more Jewish blood to feed the altar of Arab nationalism. He accepted Israel’s documentation that Arafat and his thugs were the organizers of the violence. He internalized the reality that Islamic Jihad, Hamas and Hezbollah were working hand in glove with the Palestinian Authority, understood the Al-Qaeda and Iran connections to the PA, and froze their funds in the US. He understood the implications of the Karin-A, and the PA pay stubs to known terrorists. He recognized the irredentist Arab claim to the ‘right of return’ for what it is - a death sentence for Israel. And, as a man of faith and conscience, he was distressed by the appalling living conditions of the Arabs under PA occupation, and has watched their lives deteriorate even further over the last few years. These truths are embodied in his policy address this week, and that is both unprecedented and portentous.
No Arab state has openly differed with Bush’s new policy, but the Arab response has been tentative at best. A century ago, when German Chancellor Bernhard von Bulow disagreed with Kaiser Wilhelm II on foreign policy (which was most of the time), he never disagreed with him openly. A grand master of the diplomatic arts, he would enthusiastically embrace petulant Wilhelm’s latest ‘inspiration,’ and then begin to systematically undermine it with an endless litany of “yes, your Highness, except...” Invariably, Wilhelm’s callow interests drifted elsewhere, his passion would abate, and von Bulow was thus able to manage the ship of state into deeper waters.
We are already beginning to see ‘von Bulow diplomacy' from the Arab world and their allies. Yassir Arafat has already declared that the Palestinian people are proud of their democracy just the way it is. Collin Powell already envisions a figurehead role for Yassir Arafat, the Johnny Appleseed of modern terror, and if the Palestinian Arabs elect him President again, Powell says the US will have to deal with that too. So much for new leadership. Powell also acknowledged that the violence will probably never completely stop, implicitly granting the terrorists carte blanche to continue.
Let us also ponder for a moment the realistic prospects of a genuine democracy in the Arab world. Rather an ambitious task for a culture in which byzantine intrigue, equivocation and self-denial are integral components of interpersonal, and by extension, international relations. A vibrant Arab democracy with an educated electorate is a far more serious threat to the billionaire bedouin petro-pashas than any Islamist insurgency. Does anyone seriously believe that in three years the Palestinians are going to be magically transformed into...Canadians?
It’s truth or dare for President Bush as well. If President Bush resolutely sticks to the truth and holds Arab feet to the fire, then the terrorist war is likely begin in earnest, both in Israel and in the United States. And if he capitulates to Foggy Bottom and dumbs down the requirements for Palestinian statehood, then Israel’s strategic situation will grow unsustainably worse, and regional war will be the certain result.
In his policy address, he got it mostly right; there are only two more things he must grasp. First, the fast of the 17th is upon us, and it teaches us that not all problems are given to diplomatic resolution. There is an Unseen Hand controlling the pieces on the chessboard, and it is masochistic to suggest that we are the unbridled masters of our destiny. Second, the two states he envisions must be divided by a particular muddy brook and a certain salty lake.
I am counting on George Bush. He has come a long way in two years, and I believe he has the courage to stand by his convictions. Educating George takes time. At this point, perhaps he believes that the issue is land; inevitably, though, he will come to learn the Arabs are far less interested in creating a state than in destroying one.
Given time, he will come to realize that the crux of the Middle East conflict is not the destiny of a few barren hills. The outcome of this conflict will send shock waves around the world. For my dear, honest George, what is at stake here is nothing less than who will grasp the pen that writes the final chapters of the history of Western civilization.
I Met Jabotinsky This Week
בעה''י
[First published June 20, 2002]
I met Zev Jabotinsky this week at the Likud Party Meeting, held at the Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv. You know who I mean: THE Zev Jabotinsky, founder of Zionist Revisionism and the Independent Zionist Organization, Rosh Betar, founder of the Jewish Legion, the Haganah and patron saint of the Irgun. It was kind of like an Elvis sighting. He died in 1940, but a 20 foot portrait of him stood on the bimah of the Likud Central Committee meeting last Sunday night. He cast his rather stern, imposing gaze upon the assemblage, dwarfing the small men sitting at the rostrum.
“Jabo,” I asked, “as the person who contributed so much to the advancement of modern spoken Hebrew; you, who spoke so poetically about the inherent lyricism of the Hebrew language; tell me, Jabo, what thinketh you of the crude discourse and raucous shouting we have witnessed in the hall tonight? Does this meeting reflect your concept of hadar?” Jabotinsky did not respond.
“Jabo,” I asked again, “as the person who called for large scale capital investment and industrialization of the Jewish economy in Palestine; you, who constantly fought the socialist, agrarian central planners who had a stranglehold on economic development; what is your view of a Likud-led government, purporting to speak in your name, which has just approved another round of punitive tax hikes on an economy already in deep recession?” Jabotinsky did not respond.
“Jabo,” I persisted, “as the person who first spoke out so forcefully for Jewish Self-Defense against Arab violence in 1920 and 1929 and again in 1936; you, who sat in Akko prison and was later banished from Palestine for the crime of defending innocent Jews; you, who endorsed Irgun action in the face of Haganah ‘restraint;’ tell me, Jabo, how do you respond to a Likud Prime Minister who purports to speak in your name when he declares that ‘restraint is strength?’ What say you to a government that is comfortable with a daily quota of several murders or attempted murders of Jews at the hands of Arab terrorists? ” Again, Jabotinsky did not respond.
“Jabo,” I asked a little louder, “as a secular Jew who insisted on preserving what you described as ‘the sacred treasures of Judaism;’ how can you countenance a government led by your party that forbids Jews access to the Temple Mount and the Cave of Machpelah?” Jabo was silent as stone.
“Jabo,” (I was shouting this time,) “as the person who stated unequivocally that the goal of Zionism is a Jewish majority straddling both sides of the Jordan river; you, who challenged the world superpower of your day by organizing large scale illegal immigration of diaspora Jews; you, who split from a World Zionist Organization that was content to abide by the British White Papers; what say you to a Likud Prime Minister, purporting to speak in your name, who is capitulating to a modern-day world superpower and is prepared to recognize an Arab sovereign state west of the Jordan?”
As I stared into his serious, determined eyes, waiting for an answer, I realized that Jabotinsky had already left the building.
[First published June 20, 2002]
I met Zev Jabotinsky this week at the Likud Party Meeting, held at the Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv. You know who I mean: THE Zev Jabotinsky, founder of Zionist Revisionism and the Independent Zionist Organization, Rosh Betar, founder of the Jewish Legion, the Haganah and patron saint of the Irgun. It was kind of like an Elvis sighting. He died in 1940, but a 20 foot portrait of him stood on the bimah of the Likud Central Committee meeting last Sunday night. He cast his rather stern, imposing gaze upon the assemblage, dwarfing the small men sitting at the rostrum.
“Jabo,” I asked, “as the person who contributed so much to the advancement of modern spoken Hebrew; you, who spoke so poetically about the inherent lyricism of the Hebrew language; tell me, Jabo, what thinketh you of the crude discourse and raucous shouting we have witnessed in the hall tonight? Does this meeting reflect your concept of hadar?” Jabotinsky did not respond.
“Jabo,” I asked again, “as the person who called for large scale capital investment and industrialization of the Jewish economy in Palestine; you, who constantly fought the socialist, agrarian central planners who had a stranglehold on economic development; what is your view of a Likud-led government, purporting to speak in your name, which has just approved another round of punitive tax hikes on an economy already in deep recession?” Jabotinsky did not respond.
“Jabo,” I persisted, “as the person who first spoke out so forcefully for Jewish Self-Defense against Arab violence in 1920 and 1929 and again in 1936; you, who sat in Akko prison and was later banished from Palestine for the crime of defending innocent Jews; you, who endorsed Irgun action in the face of Haganah ‘restraint;’ tell me, Jabo, how do you respond to a Likud Prime Minister who purports to speak in your name when he declares that ‘restraint is strength?’ What say you to a government that is comfortable with a daily quota of several murders or attempted murders of Jews at the hands of Arab terrorists? ” Again, Jabotinsky did not respond.
“Jabo,” I asked a little louder, “as a secular Jew who insisted on preserving what you described as ‘the sacred treasures of Judaism;’ how can you countenance a government led by your party that forbids Jews access to the Temple Mount and the Cave of Machpelah?” Jabo was silent as stone.
“Jabo,” (I was shouting this time,) “as the person who stated unequivocally that the goal of Zionism is a Jewish majority straddling both sides of the Jordan river; you, who challenged the world superpower of your day by organizing large scale illegal immigration of diaspora Jews; you, who split from a World Zionist Organization that was content to abide by the British White Papers; what say you to a Likud Prime Minister, purporting to speak in your name, who is capitulating to a modern-day world superpower and is prepared to recognize an Arab sovereign state west of the Jordan?”
As I stared into his serious, determined eyes, waiting for an answer, I realized that Jabotinsky had already left the building.
The Sound & The Fury
בעה''י
[First published June 20, 2002]
Dear friends,
This week’s essay is dedicated to the memory of the 25 Jews murdered this week in Jerusalem. Please join me in adding this to your “Refaena” prayer in the Shmoneh Esrei:
Yehi ratzon milfanecha Hashem Elokeinu v’Eilokei avoteinu shtishlach meheira refuah shaleimah min hashamayim, refuat hanefesh u’refuat haguf lakol hanifgaim, u’lamishpachot hanirtzachim, she’nifge’u v’nirtzechu b’piguei terror, she’masru nafsham al kiddushat Hashem b’milchemet mitzvah b’artzeinu b’toch sha’ar cholei Yisrael
May it be Your will Hashem our Gcd and Gcd of our forefathers that you dispatch a speedy and complete recovery, a physical and mental healing, to all the injured and to all the families of the murdered, who were injured and murdered in terror attacks; who sacrificed themselves to sanctify Your Name in this Milchemet Mitzvah for the holy Land of Israel, among the other sick of your people Israel.
************************************
Tuesday morning sounds of the daily birchat hacohanim still ringing in my ears cause His face to shine upon you and grant you peace the smell of a newly minted day wafting on the wind walking noises the swish of my tallis bag against my shirt the controlled fall of my shoes as I jaunt down the steep hill Gcd I love this walk the perfect endless azure sky the seismic BOOM heard walking home from shul echoing from Gilo through the canyons of the Judean Hills my silent prayer of hope that maybe it’s just a sonic boom from an overhead jet the rhythmic squeaksqueaksqueak of the park swings full of kids waiting for the bus screaming ambulances and shrieking car horns the whispering pines sharing secrets with one another maybe the whispers are messages for us the pounding pounding POUNDING of my heart rushing me home the perky morning kiddie shows tooting and tinkling on the TV the screechy modem as I scramble to get the latest news giggling children at play in the living room behind me grim politicians’ voices, clucking their tongues and shaking their heads - but careful not to mess up the hair quotesquotesquotes the horrific pictures from this murderous act carried out by Palestinians, the horrific images that we see here, are more powerful than any words this is a terrible calamity, a tragic day for Jerusalem and a tragic day for Israel blahblahblah Hazaa el-Rol, the proud papa of the suicide bomber responsible for this morning's bus bombing attack, gloating over the mass murder perpetrated by his boy flags flown at half-mast snapping fluttering in the breeze, totally oblivious so that at least they can still be proud the words of David from the deepest depths I cry out to you OH GCD the thunderous drum beat of our enemies on every continent singing paeans to and constructing a world which will once and for all finally be Judenrein the pusillanimous Jewish capos of our day who assist them who willingly load boxcars with others to buy another day for themselves and the incomprehensible redemptive slow inexorable crawling sound that can’t be shouted down of Ezekiel’s bones dragging themselves through the sand knitting themselves back together cladding themselves anew in flesh and skin what does this sound like sounds like the daily birchat hacohanim cause His face to shine upon you and grant you peace
[First published June 20, 2002]
Dear friends,
This week’s essay is dedicated to the memory of the 25 Jews murdered this week in Jerusalem. Please join me in adding this to your “Refaena” prayer in the Shmoneh Esrei:
Yehi ratzon milfanecha Hashem Elokeinu v’Eilokei avoteinu shtishlach meheira refuah shaleimah min hashamayim, refuat hanefesh u’refuat haguf lakol hanifgaim, u’lamishpachot hanirtzachim, she’nifge’u v’nirtzechu b’piguei terror, she’masru nafsham al kiddushat Hashem b’milchemet mitzvah b’artzeinu b’toch sha’ar cholei Yisrael
May it be Your will Hashem our Gcd and Gcd of our forefathers that you dispatch a speedy and complete recovery, a physical and mental healing, to all the injured and to all the families of the murdered, who were injured and murdered in terror attacks; who sacrificed themselves to sanctify Your Name in this Milchemet Mitzvah for the holy Land of Israel, among the other sick of your people Israel.
************************************
Tuesday morning sounds of the daily birchat hacohanim still ringing in my ears cause His face to shine upon you and grant you peace the smell of a newly minted day wafting on the wind walking noises the swish of my tallis bag against my shirt the controlled fall of my shoes as I jaunt down the steep hill Gcd I love this walk the perfect endless azure sky the seismic BOOM heard walking home from shul echoing from Gilo through the canyons of the Judean Hills my silent prayer of hope that maybe it’s just a sonic boom from an overhead jet the rhythmic squeaksqueaksqueak of the park swings full of kids waiting for the bus screaming ambulances and shrieking car horns the whispering pines sharing secrets with one another maybe the whispers are messages for us the pounding pounding POUNDING of my heart rushing me home the perky morning kiddie shows tooting and tinkling on the TV the screechy modem as I scramble to get the latest news giggling children at play in the living room behind me grim politicians’ voices, clucking their tongues and shaking their heads - but careful not to mess up the hair quotesquotesquotes the horrific pictures from this murderous act carried out by Palestinians, the horrific images that we see here, are more powerful than any words this is a terrible calamity, a tragic day for Jerusalem and a tragic day for Israel blahblahblah Hazaa el-Rol, the proud papa of the suicide bomber responsible for this morning's bus bombing attack, gloating over the mass murder perpetrated by his boy flags flown at half-mast snapping fluttering in the breeze, totally oblivious so that at least they can still be proud the words of David from the deepest depths I cry out to you OH GCD the thunderous drum beat of our enemies on every continent singing paeans to and constructing a world which will once and for all finally be Judenrein the pusillanimous Jewish capos of our day who assist them who willingly load boxcars with others to buy another day for themselves and the incomprehensible redemptive slow inexorable crawling sound that can’t be shouted down of Ezekiel’s bones dragging themselves through the sand knitting themselves back together cladding themselves anew in flesh and skin what does this sound like sounds like the daily birchat hacohanim cause His face to shine upon you and grant you peace
The Vanishing American Jew
בעה''י
[First Published on June 17, 2002]
30 years - that’s all I ask to prove to you that the American Jewish community is dying.
I am not referring to the recent NY Post article which reveals a string of Islamic fundamentalist attacks against the Jewish community over the last 12 years; nor I am referring to the near pogrom at San Fransisco State University, or even the admission by Ahmed Rahman Yassin that the original target of the 1993 WTC bombing was Jewish neighborhoods in Brooklyn. No, American Jews are not being murdered to extinction, we are committing suicide.
There, I’ve said it. I have broken the taboo that community leaders know and dread to utter. For 100 years or more, five full generations, American Jews have experienced a vacation from Jewish history: unfettered freedom, complete civil liberties, economic opportunity, the virtual absence of anti-semitism, and social mobility. But what have we done with our advantages? Let’s take a dispassionate look at the condition of the American Jewish community.
In 1970, there were 6.7 million Jews in the US, according to the Brittanica Book of the Year. By 1990, according to the National Jewish Population Survey (NJPS) of that year, there were 5.2 million Jews. And although the results of the 2000 NJPS have been delayed (tremulous fear, perhaps?) Some estimates put the current figure at 4.3 million. If current demographic trends hold (and there is nothing on the horizon to suggest that they won’t), within 50 years there will be perhaps 1.5 million Jews, mainly Chareidim, and mainly in New York.
Concomitantly, the power and size of the Arab-American community is growing. They currently number approximately 6 million, and are taking careful notes on how the American Jewish community organizes and exerts it’s electoral clout. What are the implications of this counter-phenomenon?
Many American Jews point proudly to their pro-Israel lobbying efforts, and argue that large-scale aliyah of American Jews would jeopardize US support of Israel. However, when there are 10 million Arab-Americans and only a million Jews, which lobby will carry the day in the corridors of power? David Bonior is not a singular pro-Arab Congressman from Michigan; he is the harbinger of the future. There is another democratic country, once strongly pro-Israel, which now hosts a population of 6 million Arabs and only 600,000 Jews. Ever heard of France? Study it well, my American friends - the synagogue bombings, the attacks upon Jews, the public policy, all of it - for that is the road you are treading.
Let’s look a little deeper. By virtue of it’s size, Conservative Judaism has been popularly regarded as mainstream, normative Judaism; and by virtue of its position, it claimed to moderate between the Reform on the left and a small but indomitable Orthodox community on the right. Since the direction of American Jewish communal life has largely been steered through the influence of the Conservative Movement, it is instructive to see how the Movement is doing.
At the recent Conservative Movement Convention, which claims a membership of 2.1 million Jews, Dr. Neil Gillman, a Professor of Philosophy at the Jewish Theological Seminary, noted the absence of “Gcd talk” within the Movement. Rabbi Jerome Epstein, Executive Vice President of United Synagogue, admitted publicly that “...large numbers of Conservative Jews do not live the life or values we teach.” Conservative Jews tend to either drift left, towards the Reform, or, if they do live Jewish values, tend to develop into Orthodox Jews. There is also a push within the Movement to invigorate the liturgy, which is widely regarded as stultified and devoid of meaning.
Finally, Rabbi Silverstein, by urging the Movement to be more “demographically pro-active,” hinted at the great, unspoken spectre that haunts the Conservative Movement: the average age of the Conservative congregant is skewed into the 60s or 70s, and there are few young people entering the Movement to replace them. So 50 years hence, their 800 congregations will be churches, mosques or bingo halls. The Conservative Movement has no direction, no mission, and - very soon - no congregants; in short, the Movement is not self-sustaining.
The Reform Movement, on the other hand, is thriving for now; and why shouldn’t it? As the Judaism of “individual autonomy,” it demands nothing of it’s adherents, except of course expensive dues and building fund pledges. According to recent estimates, only 50% - 60% of Reform Jews are halachically Jewish. Reform Judaism will continue the drift to the left, resembling Christian Unitarianism, only with Jewish iconology. It will aggressively advocate political action in the realms of diversity, radical feminism, militant gay rights and socialism.
So the Reform will continue to thrive in American life for a while, as the only address in the Jewish community that destigmatizes intermarriage and positively celebrates and accelerates assimilation. Eventually, though, the Reform will so successfully divest themselves of the vestiges of Jewish identity, that they will find their pews empty, too. More church buildings available at bargain prices.
American Orthodoxy is also not without it’s problems. Increasingly, secular values and images, the seductive culture of youth, and the appeal of instant self-gratification have made insidious inroads into even the most august observant homes. We seem unable to convey to many of our children the Jewish notion of ritual fused with meaning; unable to answer convincingly, against a backdrop of unlimited choices, why a teenager should choose to be a committed Jew in this day and age.
To avert this disaster, we must return to our Divine calling.
“V’Ata Kadosh, Yoshev Tehilot Yisrael” “And You are Holy, enthroned upon the praises of Israel.” Yoshev - suggests Yishuv Eretz Yisrael
Tehilot - suggest Torah
Yisrael - Klal Yisrael
The living interconnection between the Land, the Torah and the People is the great secret of Jewish survival. They are the tripod of Gcd’s throne, as it were, and a stool with only two legs is no stool at all. American Jewry is self-destructing because we have attempted to base our Jewish identity on any two, or sometimes only one of them. Our liberal Jewish brethren who have discarded both Torah and the Land find it difficult to understand why their adherents can’t find much use for the People, either. Our Orthodox communities emphasize Torah and Klal, but attach almost no significance to Yishuv Eretz Yisrael. And our secular Zionist brethren have demonstrated the abject failure of the People and the Land without Torah.
We point to our impressive institutions, Federations and synagogues, built out of necessity, with such painstaking effort and at such staggering cost. But we are like the proverbial castaway who, when offered the chance of rescue, is reluctant to return to civilization; reluctant to leave the crude instruments of survival he engineered and so lovingly built with almost superhuman effort. We are reluctant to abandon our desert island for a life in Israel where being Jewish is normative, where Jewish continuity is taken for granted, where the ground, the air, the water is suffused with the spirit of Gcd.
We can no longer afford to ignore the historical imperatives that drive us towards our destiny: the People, loyal to Gcd and Torah, living on the Land forsworn to our ancestors, fulfilling the mission of bringing Gcd’s holiness into a weary world desperately in need of it.
Those few diaspora Jews who happen to find themselves in a shul this Shabbat will hear the story of the meraglim, the 12 spies, who made a pilot trip to Israel but preferred their life in chutz l’aretz. In closing, consider the words of Gcd directed at those who rejected the Land of Israel:
“And your young children of whom you said they will be taken captive [in Israel], I shall bring them; they shall know the Land that you have despised. But your carcasses will drop in this wilderness.” Bamidbar 14:31, 32
Think about that before you sign up for that fat 30 year mortgage.
[First Published on June 17, 2002]
30 years - that’s all I ask to prove to you that the American Jewish community is dying.
I am not referring to the recent NY Post article which reveals a string of Islamic fundamentalist attacks against the Jewish community over the last 12 years; nor I am referring to the near pogrom at San Fransisco State University, or even the admission by Ahmed Rahman Yassin that the original target of the 1993 WTC bombing was Jewish neighborhoods in Brooklyn. No, American Jews are not being murdered to extinction, we are committing suicide.
There, I’ve said it. I have broken the taboo that community leaders know and dread to utter. For 100 years or more, five full generations, American Jews have experienced a vacation from Jewish history: unfettered freedom, complete civil liberties, economic opportunity, the virtual absence of anti-semitism, and social mobility. But what have we done with our advantages? Let’s take a dispassionate look at the condition of the American Jewish community.
In 1970, there were 6.7 million Jews in the US, according to the Brittanica Book of the Year. By 1990, according to the National Jewish Population Survey (NJPS) of that year, there were 5.2 million Jews. And although the results of the 2000 NJPS have been delayed (tremulous fear, perhaps?) Some estimates put the current figure at 4.3 million. If current demographic trends hold (and there is nothing on the horizon to suggest that they won’t), within 50 years there will be perhaps 1.5 million Jews, mainly Chareidim, and mainly in New York.
Concomitantly, the power and size of the Arab-American community is growing. They currently number approximately 6 million, and are taking careful notes on how the American Jewish community organizes and exerts it’s electoral clout. What are the implications of this counter-phenomenon?
Many American Jews point proudly to their pro-Israel lobbying efforts, and argue that large-scale aliyah of American Jews would jeopardize US support of Israel. However, when there are 10 million Arab-Americans and only a million Jews, which lobby will carry the day in the corridors of power? David Bonior is not a singular pro-Arab Congressman from Michigan; he is the harbinger of the future. There is another democratic country, once strongly pro-Israel, which now hosts a population of 6 million Arabs and only 600,000 Jews. Ever heard of France? Study it well, my American friends - the synagogue bombings, the attacks upon Jews, the public policy, all of it - for that is the road you are treading.
Let’s look a little deeper. By virtue of it’s size, Conservative Judaism has been popularly regarded as mainstream, normative Judaism; and by virtue of its position, it claimed to moderate between the Reform on the left and a small but indomitable Orthodox community on the right. Since the direction of American Jewish communal life has largely been steered through the influence of the Conservative Movement, it is instructive to see how the Movement is doing.
At the recent Conservative Movement Convention, which claims a membership of 2.1 million Jews, Dr. Neil Gillman, a Professor of Philosophy at the Jewish Theological Seminary, noted the absence of “Gcd talk” within the Movement. Rabbi Jerome Epstein, Executive Vice President of United Synagogue, admitted publicly that “...large numbers of Conservative Jews do not live the life or values we teach.” Conservative Jews tend to either drift left, towards the Reform, or, if they do live Jewish values, tend to develop into Orthodox Jews. There is also a push within the Movement to invigorate the liturgy, which is widely regarded as stultified and devoid of meaning.
Finally, Rabbi Silverstein, by urging the Movement to be more “demographically pro-active,” hinted at the great, unspoken spectre that haunts the Conservative Movement: the average age of the Conservative congregant is skewed into the 60s or 70s, and there are few young people entering the Movement to replace them. So 50 years hence, their 800 congregations will be churches, mosques or bingo halls. The Conservative Movement has no direction, no mission, and - very soon - no congregants; in short, the Movement is not self-sustaining.
The Reform Movement, on the other hand, is thriving for now; and why shouldn’t it? As the Judaism of “individual autonomy,” it demands nothing of it’s adherents, except of course expensive dues and building fund pledges. According to recent estimates, only 50% - 60% of Reform Jews are halachically Jewish. Reform Judaism will continue the drift to the left, resembling Christian Unitarianism, only with Jewish iconology. It will aggressively advocate political action in the realms of diversity, radical feminism, militant gay rights and socialism.
So the Reform will continue to thrive in American life for a while, as the only address in the Jewish community that destigmatizes intermarriage and positively celebrates and accelerates assimilation. Eventually, though, the Reform will so successfully divest themselves of the vestiges of Jewish identity, that they will find their pews empty, too. More church buildings available at bargain prices.
American Orthodoxy is also not without it’s problems. Increasingly, secular values and images, the seductive culture of youth, and the appeal of instant self-gratification have made insidious inroads into even the most august observant homes. We seem unable to convey to many of our children the Jewish notion of ritual fused with meaning; unable to answer convincingly, against a backdrop of unlimited choices, why a teenager should choose to be a committed Jew in this day and age.
To avert this disaster, we must return to our Divine calling.
“V’Ata Kadosh, Yoshev Tehilot Yisrael” “And You are Holy, enthroned upon the praises of Israel.” Yoshev - suggests Yishuv Eretz Yisrael
Tehilot - suggest Torah
Yisrael - Klal Yisrael
The living interconnection between the Land, the Torah and the People is the great secret of Jewish survival. They are the tripod of Gcd’s throne, as it were, and a stool with only two legs is no stool at all. American Jewry is self-destructing because we have attempted to base our Jewish identity on any two, or sometimes only one of them. Our liberal Jewish brethren who have discarded both Torah and the Land find it difficult to understand why their adherents can’t find much use for the People, either. Our Orthodox communities emphasize Torah and Klal, but attach almost no significance to Yishuv Eretz Yisrael. And our secular Zionist brethren have demonstrated the abject failure of the People and the Land without Torah.
We point to our impressive institutions, Federations and synagogues, built out of necessity, with such painstaking effort and at such staggering cost. But we are like the proverbial castaway who, when offered the chance of rescue, is reluctant to return to civilization; reluctant to leave the crude instruments of survival he engineered and so lovingly built with almost superhuman effort. We are reluctant to abandon our desert island for a life in Israel where being Jewish is normative, where Jewish continuity is taken for granted, where the ground, the air, the water is suffused with the spirit of Gcd.
We can no longer afford to ignore the historical imperatives that drive us towards our destiny: the People, loyal to Gcd and Torah, living on the Land forsworn to our ancestors, fulfilling the mission of bringing Gcd’s holiness into a weary world desperately in need of it.
Those few diaspora Jews who happen to find themselves in a shul this Shabbat will hear the story of the meraglim, the 12 spies, who made a pilot trip to Israel but preferred their life in chutz l’aretz. In closing, consider the words of Gcd directed at those who rejected the Land of Israel:
“And your young children of whom you said they will be taken captive [in Israel], I shall bring them; they shall know the Land that you have despised. But your carcasses will drop in this wilderness.” Bamidbar 14:31, 32
Think about that before you sign up for that fat 30 year mortgage.
Loshon Koidesh
בעה''י
[First Published June 17, 2002]
Dear friends,
I wrote the following before news of the latest piguah in Itamar. 3 teenaged boys were shot dead for being basketball-playing ‘obstacles to peace’ on Tuesday evening.
I have decided to send this essay anyway, because if I were to stop writing - if we, as a people, were to stop functioning, growing, fulfilling our historical mission every time there is a piguah, then on some level, the terrorists have won. In my essays, I share the perspectives of an American family replanting our lives in Eretz Yisrael. In the final analysis, that is the ultimate, enduring response to this frank evil: YISHUV ERETZ YISRAEL.
So this week’s essay is dedicated to the memory of those three boys:
Avi Citon, age 17
Gilad Stiglitz, age 14
Netanel Riachi, age 17
as well as to the memories of a Bubbe and her granddaughter murdered in Petach Tikvah:
Ruthie Peled, aged 56
Sinai Keinan, aged 1-1/2
Hashem Yinkom Damam (May Gcd Avenge their Murders).
*******************************
I could not believe my ears. Straining from behind my closed office door, I listened to what seemed to be the voices of my three older daughters speaking amongst themselves in Hebrew. In life’s grand scheme, perhaps this is a small milestone, but their halting, pigeon Hebrew was the most beautiful sound I had heard since our arrival. In only four months, the girls were making themselves understood in Hebrew. As the wave of pride crested within me, I was taken back to thoughts of...my Bubbe.
Bubbe? Yes, my Bubbe. Let me tell you why.
Born to Russian immigrants in Brooklyn in 1911, she grew up in a house where Yiddish was the spoken language, and the high priest of their faith was Leon Trotsky. One might say they were more Yiddish than Jewish; the Yiddish theatre, the Yiddish press, Yiddish literature and Yiddish music were the stars in their constellation.
Bubbe was a luminary in her own right - Beatrice (Bessie to her friends) was ebullient, bright and beautiful. Despite her elegant, mellifluous Yiddish, her future father-in-law was convinced she was a ‘shikse’ - she didn’t have the demure ta’am (style) of a Yiddishe maidel. For her part, she was more than a little afraid to marry such a religious boy, but they married anyway; she eventually grew to be profoundly religious in her own right. In the end, my great-grandfather described her as the most precious of all his daughters-in-law.
She had a sanguine determination that she brought to everything she did, whether it was her 40-year-long nursing career or her work for the synagogue Sisterhood. She once nursed a gravely ill infant boy through the night when the doctors had given up all hope and had gone home, expecting the child to be dead by morning. But thanks to her round-the-clock care, the baby cheated death, and went on to eventually recover. Thirteen years later, out of the blue, Bubbe & Zayde received an invitation to his Bar Mitzvah.
One day, in her mid-sixties, this remarkable woman decided to begin learning Hebrew.
She signed up for the weekly “ulpan” offered by the synagogue, girded with notebooks, pencils, books and notes. She must have attended that beginner’s ulpan class 6 years running, but she never quite managed to matriculate to the next book. This never dismayed her, and with her signature resolve, she kept plodding along towards her goal. For example, she insisted that we sing the Birkat HaMazon aloud on Shabbos, and at a slow enough pace that she could sound out every syllable - a 45 minute ordeal. This went on for the rest of her life. But Bubbe was a force of nature, and there was no denying her this accommodation.
She never quite acquired the language, but she ardently believed in it. She saw the majesty of speaking the language in which Gcd created the heavens and earth, in which the prophets spoke, and which, with only slight modifications, has been the living language of the Jewish people for 4,000 years. She intuitively understood the organic connection between the Land of Israel and the Language of Israel, how Hebrew was the glue that binds the Jew to the Land.
How is your spoken Hebrew? About one hundred years ago, Ze’ev Jabotinsky led a spirited campaign to make Hebrew the language of instruction in all Zionist schools in Europe. I will probably meet with the same howls of derision from the Jewish Establishment that he did when I suggest that the same should be true in every Jewish day school, yeshivah, and Talmud Torah in America today. Hebrew should be the language of instruction in every course of study - math, science, literature, and of course limudei kodesh (religious studies).
The sad truth is that many, perhaps most, Jews today can read Hebrew but have no earthly clue what the words mean. Fluency in Hebrew is the portal into the collective consciousness of the Jewish people, the intuitive stream of experience that connects us to all Jewish generations before and after. Perush Hamilim brings focus and direction to the passion of our prayer. Unfortunately, for most Jews, Hebrew is acknowledged as our common language more in the breach than in the speech.
When Bubbe died of a heart attack at the age of 76, we lost the moral beacon of our family. Rabbi Levovitz wept openly for this endearing, insouciant woman who for 40 years dared speak up to him when she was convinced he was wrong. So dear was she to him that he permitted no other hesped but his own.
Despite the passage of 15 years, our family has still not recovered from her loss. My daughters never met my Bubbe, were never smothered in one of her legendary hugs. But they know her though the stories and teachings that keep her memory alive. And if, as the gemara in Brachos says, the dead observe the events in our world, then Bubbe is surely kvelling that her great-granddaughters are ascending the path that she paved for them with the bulky bricks of her Aleph-Bet.
[First Published June 17, 2002]
Dear friends,
I wrote the following before news of the latest piguah in Itamar. 3 teenaged boys were shot dead for being basketball-playing ‘obstacles to peace’ on Tuesday evening.
I have decided to send this essay anyway, because if I were to stop writing - if we, as a people, were to stop functioning, growing, fulfilling our historical mission every time there is a piguah, then on some level, the terrorists have won. In my essays, I share the perspectives of an American family replanting our lives in Eretz Yisrael. In the final analysis, that is the ultimate, enduring response to this frank evil: YISHUV ERETZ YISRAEL.
So this week’s essay is dedicated to the memory of those three boys:
Avi Citon, age 17
Gilad Stiglitz, age 14
Netanel Riachi, age 17
as well as to the memories of a Bubbe and her granddaughter murdered in Petach Tikvah:
Ruthie Peled, aged 56
Sinai Keinan, aged 1-1/2
Hashem Yinkom Damam (May Gcd Avenge their Murders).
*******************************
I could not believe my ears. Straining from behind my closed office door, I listened to what seemed to be the voices of my three older daughters speaking amongst themselves in Hebrew. In life’s grand scheme, perhaps this is a small milestone, but their halting, pigeon Hebrew was the most beautiful sound I had heard since our arrival. In only four months, the girls were making themselves understood in Hebrew. As the wave of pride crested within me, I was taken back to thoughts of...my Bubbe.
Bubbe? Yes, my Bubbe. Let me tell you why.
Born to Russian immigrants in Brooklyn in 1911, she grew up in a house where Yiddish was the spoken language, and the high priest of their faith was Leon Trotsky. One might say they were more Yiddish than Jewish; the Yiddish theatre, the Yiddish press, Yiddish literature and Yiddish music were the stars in their constellation.
Bubbe was a luminary in her own right - Beatrice (Bessie to her friends) was ebullient, bright and beautiful. Despite her elegant, mellifluous Yiddish, her future father-in-law was convinced she was a ‘shikse’ - she didn’t have the demure ta’am (style) of a Yiddishe maidel. For her part, she was more than a little afraid to marry such a religious boy, but they married anyway; she eventually grew to be profoundly religious in her own right. In the end, my great-grandfather described her as the most precious of all his daughters-in-law.
She had a sanguine determination that she brought to everything she did, whether it was her 40-year-long nursing career or her work for the synagogue Sisterhood. She once nursed a gravely ill infant boy through the night when the doctors had given up all hope and had gone home, expecting the child to be dead by morning. But thanks to her round-the-clock care, the baby cheated death, and went on to eventually recover. Thirteen years later, out of the blue, Bubbe & Zayde received an invitation to his Bar Mitzvah.
One day, in her mid-sixties, this remarkable woman decided to begin learning Hebrew.
She signed up for the weekly “ulpan” offered by the synagogue, girded with notebooks, pencils, books and notes. She must have attended that beginner’s ulpan class 6 years running, but she never quite managed to matriculate to the next book. This never dismayed her, and with her signature resolve, she kept plodding along towards her goal. For example, she insisted that we sing the Birkat HaMazon aloud on Shabbos, and at a slow enough pace that she could sound out every syllable - a 45 minute ordeal. This went on for the rest of her life. But Bubbe was a force of nature, and there was no denying her this accommodation.
She never quite acquired the language, but she ardently believed in it. She saw the majesty of speaking the language in which Gcd created the heavens and earth, in which the prophets spoke, and which, with only slight modifications, has been the living language of the Jewish people for 4,000 years. She intuitively understood the organic connection between the Land of Israel and the Language of Israel, how Hebrew was the glue that binds the Jew to the Land.
How is your spoken Hebrew? About one hundred years ago, Ze’ev Jabotinsky led a spirited campaign to make Hebrew the language of instruction in all Zionist schools in Europe. I will probably meet with the same howls of derision from the Jewish Establishment that he did when I suggest that the same should be true in every Jewish day school, yeshivah, and Talmud Torah in America today. Hebrew should be the language of instruction in every course of study - math, science, literature, and of course limudei kodesh (religious studies).
The sad truth is that many, perhaps most, Jews today can read Hebrew but have no earthly clue what the words mean. Fluency in Hebrew is the portal into the collective consciousness of the Jewish people, the intuitive stream of experience that connects us to all Jewish generations before and after. Perush Hamilim brings focus and direction to the passion of our prayer. Unfortunately, for most Jews, Hebrew is acknowledged as our common language more in the breach than in the speech.
When Bubbe died of a heart attack at the age of 76, we lost the moral beacon of our family. Rabbi Levovitz wept openly for this endearing, insouciant woman who for 40 years dared speak up to him when she was convinced he was wrong. So dear was she to him that he permitted no other hesped but his own.
Despite the passage of 15 years, our family has still not recovered from her loss. My daughters never met my Bubbe, were never smothered in one of her legendary hugs. But they know her though the stories and teachings that keep her memory alive. And if, as the gemara in Brachos says, the dead observe the events in our world, then Bubbe is surely kvelling that her great-granddaughters are ascending the path that she paved for them with the bulky bricks of her Aleph-Bet.
The Farmer & The Wolf - A Parable
בעה''י
[First Published June 10, 2002]
Once upon a time, a man and his family moved back to their long-abandoned ancestral farm. After much backbreaking work, the man reclaimed the fields from the overgrown weeds, and re-introduced the bleating of sheep and the mooing of cows to the lonely prairie. He patched up the roof of the stately old farmhouse, and settled in to the bucolic life of the farmer.
One morning, he awoke to find his fields trampled and his lambs dead. “Who could have done this?” he asked aloud.
“I did,” said a wolf standing not far away.
“Why?” the farmer asked the wolf.
“Because I destroy, that is how I survive. Before you returned, we wolves had the entire untamed prairie to ourselves. ”
“But my farm is only a small corner of the prairie. Surely we can find a way to live together in peace.”
“We cannot live in peace. You have brought order and beauty to the land. You are not welcome here. Only when the prairie is chaotic and untamed can we rule.”
As the farmer reached for his shotgun, Brother Shimon, who was standing in the safety of the stately old farmhouse, said to his father, “the poor wolf is not our natural enemy. He is hungry and does not understand our ways. Let us bring him into the house, feed him, and warm him by the fire. Then he will understand, and we will share the prairie in peace.”
The farmer thought about this idea for a moment. He certainly didn’t want his crops ruined and his livestock murdered; after all, he had returned to the family farm to live the bucolic, peaceful life of a farmer.
The farmer said, “ein breirah,” ("What choice do we have?") so they invited the wolf into the stately old farmhouse. They fed him their table scraps and more besides. At the end of the evening, they tucked him into a cozy dog bed by the warm stove, and bid their new friend a good night.
The farmer awoke in the morning to find the furniture demolished, his table smashed, and his porcelain shattered. “Who could have done this?” he asked aloud.
“I did,” said the wolf, standing not far away.
“Why?” the farmer asked the wolf.
“Because I destroy, that is how I survive. Before you returned, we wolves had the entire untamed prairie to ourselves. ”
“But my farm is only a small corner of the prairie. I thought we were trying to find a way to live together in peace.”
“YOU were trying, not me. We cannot live in peace. You have brought order and beauty to the land. Only when the prairie is chaotic and untamed can we rule.”
“Then leave my house!” demanded the farmer.
“You have invited me in, so I am not leaving,” said the wolf. “It is you who are not welcome here.”
Brother Shimon said to his father, “this destruction is really our fault, not his. We have failed to explain the clear advantages of our ways. Anyway, he will not leave, and we cannot throw him out, or he will go back to killing our sheep. Our only choice is to domesticate him. Then he will understand, and we will share the prairie in peace.”
“Ein breirah,” the farmer sighed. That night, they tried harder. They gave him a place at the table, served him their best food and warmed him by the big fireplace in the den. At the end of the evening, they tucked him into a beautiful four-poster bed with fine satin sheets, and bid their new friend a good night.
The farmer awoke in the morning to find the wolf leaning over the baby’s crib. His snout was red with fresh blood. “How could you have done this?” he shrieked at the wolf.
“Don’t you listen? I told you before: I destroy, that is how I survive. Before you returned, we wolves had the entire untamed prairie to ourselves. ”
“But my farm is only a small corner of the prairie. I thought we were trying to find a way to live together in peace.”
“Don’t you listen? We cannot live in peace. You have brought order and beauty to the land. Only when the prairie is chaotic and untamed can we rule.”
“Then leave my house!” demanded the farmer.
“I am now a domesticated wolf,” he said, “and this is now my house. It is you who are not welcome here.”
So the farmer called the local game warden, who also happened to be his ol’ Uncle George, to come remove the wolf. When Uncle George arrived, the farmer explained, “we returned to the family farm to live the bucolic, peaceful life of farmers.”
“I know,” said ol’ Uncle George.
“Then this wolf arrived, trampled our fields and killed our lambs,” continued the farmer.
“You’re right,” said ol’ Uncle George.
“Then he destroyed my peaceful home and killed my child,” said the farmer.
“Terrible,” ol’ Uncle George said, slowly shaking his head.
“This is unreal! It must come to an end!” screamed the anguished farmer.
“You’re right again,” nodded ol’ Uncle George.
"So you agree to get rid of the wolf, Uncle George?”
“Oh, no - can’t do that. State law against it, besides we’d have those PETA people down our backs. Nope, “ein breirah.” What you need is a better class of wolf. The only way the resolve this is...to teach that wolf some manners, so that the two of you can share the house in peace. I can arrange for lessons at Monsieur Jacques’ finishing school for wayward wolves...
Dear friends, who will write the end of this story - the farmers or the wolves?
[First Published June 10, 2002]
Once upon a time, a man and his family moved back to their long-abandoned ancestral farm. After much backbreaking work, the man reclaimed the fields from the overgrown weeds, and re-introduced the bleating of sheep and the mooing of cows to the lonely prairie. He patched up the roof of the stately old farmhouse, and settled in to the bucolic life of the farmer.
One morning, he awoke to find his fields trampled and his lambs dead. “Who could have done this?” he asked aloud.
“I did,” said a wolf standing not far away.
“Why?” the farmer asked the wolf.
“Because I destroy, that is how I survive. Before you returned, we wolves had the entire untamed prairie to ourselves. ”
“But my farm is only a small corner of the prairie. Surely we can find a way to live together in peace.”
“We cannot live in peace. You have brought order and beauty to the land. You are not welcome here. Only when the prairie is chaotic and untamed can we rule.”
As the farmer reached for his shotgun, Brother Shimon, who was standing in the safety of the stately old farmhouse, said to his father, “the poor wolf is not our natural enemy. He is hungry and does not understand our ways. Let us bring him into the house, feed him, and warm him by the fire. Then he will understand, and we will share the prairie in peace.”
The farmer thought about this idea for a moment. He certainly didn’t want his crops ruined and his livestock murdered; after all, he had returned to the family farm to live the bucolic, peaceful life of a farmer.
The farmer said, “ein breirah,” ("What choice do we have?") so they invited the wolf into the stately old farmhouse. They fed him their table scraps and more besides. At the end of the evening, they tucked him into a cozy dog bed by the warm stove, and bid their new friend a good night.
The farmer awoke in the morning to find the furniture demolished, his table smashed, and his porcelain shattered. “Who could have done this?” he asked aloud.
“I did,” said the wolf, standing not far away.
“Why?” the farmer asked the wolf.
“Because I destroy, that is how I survive. Before you returned, we wolves had the entire untamed prairie to ourselves. ”
“But my farm is only a small corner of the prairie. I thought we were trying to find a way to live together in peace.”
“YOU were trying, not me. We cannot live in peace. You have brought order and beauty to the land. Only when the prairie is chaotic and untamed can we rule.”
“Then leave my house!” demanded the farmer.
“You have invited me in, so I am not leaving,” said the wolf. “It is you who are not welcome here.”
Brother Shimon said to his father, “this destruction is really our fault, not his. We have failed to explain the clear advantages of our ways. Anyway, he will not leave, and we cannot throw him out, or he will go back to killing our sheep. Our only choice is to domesticate him. Then he will understand, and we will share the prairie in peace.”
“Ein breirah,” the farmer sighed. That night, they tried harder. They gave him a place at the table, served him their best food and warmed him by the big fireplace in the den. At the end of the evening, they tucked him into a beautiful four-poster bed with fine satin sheets, and bid their new friend a good night.
The farmer awoke in the morning to find the wolf leaning over the baby’s crib. His snout was red with fresh blood. “How could you have done this?” he shrieked at the wolf.
“Don’t you listen? I told you before: I destroy, that is how I survive. Before you returned, we wolves had the entire untamed prairie to ourselves. ”
“But my farm is only a small corner of the prairie. I thought we were trying to find a way to live together in peace.”
“Don’t you listen? We cannot live in peace. You have brought order and beauty to the land. Only when the prairie is chaotic and untamed can we rule.”
“Then leave my house!” demanded the farmer.
“I am now a domesticated wolf,” he said, “and this is now my house. It is you who are not welcome here.”
So the farmer called the local game warden, who also happened to be his ol’ Uncle George, to come remove the wolf. When Uncle George arrived, the farmer explained, “we returned to the family farm to live the bucolic, peaceful life of farmers.”
“I know,” said ol’ Uncle George.
“Then this wolf arrived, trampled our fields and killed our lambs,” continued the farmer.
“You’re right,” said ol’ Uncle George.
“Then he destroyed my peaceful home and killed my child,” said the farmer.
“Terrible,” ol’ Uncle George said, slowly shaking his head.
“This is unreal! It must come to an end!” screamed the anguished farmer.
“You’re right again,” nodded ol’ Uncle George.
"So you agree to get rid of the wolf, Uncle George?”
“Oh, no - can’t do that. State law against it, besides we’d have those PETA people down our backs. Nope, “ein breirah.” What you need is a better class of wolf. The only way the resolve this is...to teach that wolf some manners, so that the two of you can share the house in peace. I can arrange for lessons at Monsieur Jacques’ finishing school for wayward wolves...
Dear friends, who will write the end of this story - the farmers or the wolves?
Whence the Sakanah? (Danger)
בעה''י
[First Published June 6, 2002]
As it happens, Shaul Goldstein, the mayor of the Gush Etzion, sits next to me in shul. He is a very approachable person, and extremely hard working. He is continually greeting solidarity missions from America and does a superlative job representing the Gush Etzion. Occasionally, he invites me to tag along to offer my observations as a new American oleh.
Almost inevitably, I am approached after my comments by people expressing incredulity at our decision to come on aliyah - not just coming at this time, but davka (specifically) to this place. “How,” I am asked, “do you drive on the Tunnels Road every day?” “How do you deal with security?” “Your ideals are commendable, but how can you justify raising your children in a makom sakanah?”
After a few of these encounters, I have discovered the source of these concerned and anxious queries. It seems that, in order to introduce a wide-bore I.V. into your wallet, the spin doctors that drag these solidarity missions around the country weave a picture of daily life in Israel that is more befitting of 1943 Stalingrad than modern-day Jerusalem.
First, these whirlwind tours are designed to be so short, and the schedules so overbooked, that all the participants are tired, harried, disoriented and eminently suggestible. You are dragged from hospital to hospital, visiting victims of terror attacks, listening to their heart-wrenching personal stories, forced to re-live the terror with palpable immediacy.
Before you can recover from that emotional bloodletting, it’s off to the widows and orphans. Like a seedy voyeur, you sit in their cramped living rooms and are encouraged to witness their tears. Go ahead, hold her hand, tell her that ‘we stand with you.’ What a nechamah (comfort)! Give her a quick hug, and then it’s back on the comfy air-conditioned bus to important meetings with high-level politicians.
Bad news...the cabinet-level minister you were promised had to cancel for pressing reasons of State. The good news is that a sub-undersecretary of the prestigious Ministry of Potholes has stepped in on short notice (so you should be grateful.) He solemnly tells you that Israel is in the struggle of her life, and without your generous financial support, Israel could...face the unspeakable. Oops! Sorry to cut you short, but we’re late late late and we can’t miss the gift shop and then its back to the airport for the trip home...
What a spectacle! Not that any of this is new, mind you. After Ben-Gurion came to grips with his shattered expectations of large scale North American aliyah, he decided that if he couldn’t have the chickens, he’d take the eggs. But after the checks are written and the purses are snapped, what lingers on the palette is an aftertaste of Israeli life so utterly skewed, so totally unbalanced, that it reinforces all the poisonous justifications for remaining in exile, and trust me, those justifications don’t need any reinforcing.
Notwithstanding my lampooning, solidarity missions are very important, and those who are motivated to participate are to be commended. Ken Yirbu (May they multiply). Just understand that over the course of a few well choreographed days, it is impossible to pick up the tempo and timbre of daily life here. The internal, organic rhythm of the Jewish calendar. The solemn emptiness of Highway 60 on Shabbat. The echoing laughter of clusters of teenagers freely roaming about the yishuv after 10 pm on a Friday night. A Shabbat afternoon walk on Derech Avot, the pilgrimage path that connects Hevron to Jerusalem. The quantum difference in your davening and learning.
You may be able to capture the incomparable beauty of the Gush Etzion on film, but can you absorb it with the same foreknowledge as a settler of the Land...as one who knows that this will be home for the rest of his life, and IY”H, for his children and his children’s children? How do you capture on video the serenity of living in harmony with the Ratzon Hashem (Will of Gcd)?
This is not to say that we don’t have nebach (tragically) far too many terror victims, widows and orphans; we do. And this is not to dispute the grave situation Israel finds herself in; we are not delusional. And yes, we do take far-reaching precautions to minimize the sakanah to ourselves and our families. However, when you read the alarming headlines, remember this: 5 million Jews hit the snooze button every morning, go to work and school, shop and eat, and come home in the evening to do it all over again tomorrow. Also understand that if 10 million Jews were waking up in Israel every day instead of 5 million, there would be no sakanah.
The real sakanah is the golusdik kopf that weighs the relative safety of this place or that. Because while we are asking ourselves where it is least dangerous to live, we are avoiding this blunt reality: it is dangerous to live anywhere as a committed Jew, because the world is intent on stifling the Jewish mission of proclaiming Hashem’s message of historical fulfillment, hope, and geulah. That is why your self-imposed exile endangers Jews everywhere.
The only question is when, in our own shikul daas (evaluation), we will realize that living in the Jewish Land, under the protection of the Jewish Army, and tachas canfei hashchinah (under the canopy of Gcd's Presence), is preferable to going it alone in exile. The best kept secret of Jewish life today is not that Israel needs you or your money. Today more than ever, you need to live in Israel.
So come, already; you can help me talk to the next wave of solidarity missions.
Shabbat Shalom from the Gush Etzion, where we are living your dreams.
[First Published June 6, 2002]
As it happens, Shaul Goldstein, the mayor of the Gush Etzion, sits next to me in shul. He is a very approachable person, and extremely hard working. He is continually greeting solidarity missions from America and does a superlative job representing the Gush Etzion. Occasionally, he invites me to tag along to offer my observations as a new American oleh.
Almost inevitably, I am approached after my comments by people expressing incredulity at our decision to come on aliyah - not just coming at this time, but davka (specifically) to this place. “How,” I am asked, “do you drive on the Tunnels Road every day?” “How do you deal with security?” “Your ideals are commendable, but how can you justify raising your children in a makom sakanah?”
After a few of these encounters, I have discovered the source of these concerned and anxious queries. It seems that, in order to introduce a wide-bore I.V. into your wallet, the spin doctors that drag these solidarity missions around the country weave a picture of daily life in Israel that is more befitting of 1943 Stalingrad than modern-day Jerusalem.
First, these whirlwind tours are designed to be so short, and the schedules so overbooked, that all the participants are tired, harried, disoriented and eminently suggestible. You are dragged from hospital to hospital, visiting victims of terror attacks, listening to their heart-wrenching personal stories, forced to re-live the terror with palpable immediacy.
Before you can recover from that emotional bloodletting, it’s off to the widows and orphans. Like a seedy voyeur, you sit in their cramped living rooms and are encouraged to witness their tears. Go ahead, hold her hand, tell her that ‘we stand with you.’ What a nechamah (comfort)! Give her a quick hug, and then it’s back on the comfy air-conditioned bus to important meetings with high-level politicians.
Bad news...the cabinet-level minister you were promised had to cancel for pressing reasons of State. The good news is that a sub-undersecretary of the prestigious Ministry of Potholes has stepped in on short notice (so you should be grateful.) He solemnly tells you that Israel is in the struggle of her life, and without your generous financial support, Israel could...face the unspeakable. Oops! Sorry to cut you short, but we’re late late late and we can’t miss the gift shop and then its back to the airport for the trip home...
What a spectacle! Not that any of this is new, mind you. After Ben-Gurion came to grips with his shattered expectations of large scale North American aliyah, he decided that if he couldn’t have the chickens, he’d take the eggs. But after the checks are written and the purses are snapped, what lingers on the palette is an aftertaste of Israeli life so utterly skewed, so totally unbalanced, that it reinforces all the poisonous justifications for remaining in exile, and trust me, those justifications don’t need any reinforcing.
Notwithstanding my lampooning, solidarity missions are very important, and those who are motivated to participate are to be commended. Ken Yirbu (May they multiply). Just understand that over the course of a few well choreographed days, it is impossible to pick up the tempo and timbre of daily life here. The internal, organic rhythm of the Jewish calendar. The solemn emptiness of Highway 60 on Shabbat. The echoing laughter of clusters of teenagers freely roaming about the yishuv after 10 pm on a Friday night. A Shabbat afternoon walk on Derech Avot, the pilgrimage path that connects Hevron to Jerusalem. The quantum difference in your davening and learning.
You may be able to capture the incomparable beauty of the Gush Etzion on film, but can you absorb it with the same foreknowledge as a settler of the Land...as one who knows that this will be home for the rest of his life, and IY”H, for his children and his children’s children? How do you capture on video the serenity of living in harmony with the Ratzon Hashem (Will of Gcd)?
This is not to say that we don’t have nebach (tragically) far too many terror victims, widows and orphans; we do. And this is not to dispute the grave situation Israel finds herself in; we are not delusional. And yes, we do take far-reaching precautions to minimize the sakanah to ourselves and our families. However, when you read the alarming headlines, remember this: 5 million Jews hit the snooze button every morning, go to work and school, shop and eat, and come home in the evening to do it all over again tomorrow. Also understand that if 10 million Jews were waking up in Israel every day instead of 5 million, there would be no sakanah.
The real sakanah is the golusdik kopf that weighs the relative safety of this place or that. Because while we are asking ourselves where it is least dangerous to live, we are avoiding this blunt reality: it is dangerous to live anywhere as a committed Jew, because the world is intent on stifling the Jewish mission of proclaiming Hashem’s message of historical fulfillment, hope, and geulah. That is why your self-imposed exile endangers Jews everywhere.
The only question is when, in our own shikul daas (evaluation), we will realize that living in the Jewish Land, under the protection of the Jewish Army, and tachas canfei hashchinah (under the canopy of Gcd's Presence), is preferable to going it alone in exile. The best kept secret of Jewish life today is not that Israel needs you or your money. Today more than ever, you need to live in Israel.
So come, already; you can help me talk to the next wave of solidarity missions.
Shabbat Shalom from the Gush Etzion, where we are living your dreams.
Monday, April 30, 2007
The Pain & Joy of Lag B'Omer
[First Published on May 1, 2002]
Lag B’Omer, Neve Daniel - This has certainly been a week of extremes. Last Sunday, I joined about two hundred other people at the cemetery in Kfar Etzion to commemorate the yahrzeits of of Kobi Mandel & Yosef Ish-ran, HY”D. You remember them - the two 14 year-olds from Tekoa who were guilty of the capital offense of playing hooky on an irresistible spring day one year ago. Yosef was a student at the Azori school where my girls attend. Instead of detention, they had their brains splattered against the boulders of the cave where they were trapped, had their ears slashed off, and suffered other unspeakable mutilations. Perhaps worst of all, Yosef was forced to witness the butchery of his best friend, aware that there was no hope of escape.
As I stood there, overlooking the kvarot, all I could think about was what must have been going through Yosef’s mind in those last moments of his precious life, watching his best friend murdered, unable to prevent it. How do you even attempt to imagine what he saw and felt? And what of their families? As I stood there, I tried to scrutinize the faces of the parents, trying to understand where they find the strength to continue. As a father, I cannot even begin to imagine the depths of sorrow the parents of these holy boys have endured and continue to endure - it is plainly beyond my ability to comprehend. How do they sleep at night? Will they ever sleep again? How do they comfort their other kids? How do they make themselves whole again?
I could not sleep; that is why we made aliyah. I could not sleep knowing that the future of Klal Yisrael was being decided here, while I sat, bound and gagged, in heiligeh Baltimore. I could not sleep knowing that 5 million Israeli Jews are shouldering the responsibility that should properly be borne by all 15 million of us. I could not sleep knowing that if 500,000 or a million American Jews stopped fighting it and made aliyah already, that the retzach would stop, that maybe - maybe - Kobi & Yosef would be alive today.
And then, almost suddenly, was the chagigah of Lag B’Omer. There was once a time when the thought of a bonfire instantly elicited haunting images of Nazi book burnings - chalk it up to my Yiddesheh kopf, I guess. Tonight, though, as I strolled through our yishuv, visiting, well-wishing, singing, toasting, and nibbling at numerous bonfires/barbecues, I recognized that fascinating mental process when new information overwrites old. Images of Lag B’Omer medurot have supplanted the golusdikeh images I carried around in the past. Our older girls came home well after midnight, faces full of soot and stomachs full of charred hot dogs and marshmallows, voices hoarse from singing, legs aching from dancing. It is a good thing indeed that there’s no school the next day!
On Lag B’Omer day, we had the most soulful Hachnasat Sefer Torah I have ever attended. Hundreds of people attended, singing dancing, and escorting the new Torah behind a big American pick-up truck with a live band in the back. The dancing, the joy, lasted well past dark. Afterwards there was a lavish seudat mitzvah, hosted by the donor families, and open to all. What a way to end Lag B’Omer!
I will thus end this epistle on that happy note. From the Gush Etzion, where we are living your dreams.
Lag B’Omer, Neve Daniel - This has certainly been a week of extremes. Last Sunday, I joined about two hundred other people at the cemetery in Kfar Etzion to commemorate the yahrzeits of of Kobi Mandel & Yosef Ish-ran, HY”D. You remember them - the two 14 year-olds from Tekoa who were guilty of the capital offense of playing hooky on an irresistible spring day one year ago. Yosef was a student at the Azori school where my girls attend. Instead of detention, they had their brains splattered against the boulders of the cave where they were trapped, had their ears slashed off, and suffered other unspeakable mutilations. Perhaps worst of all, Yosef was forced to witness the butchery of his best friend, aware that there was no hope of escape.
As I stood there, overlooking the kvarot, all I could think about was what must have been going through Yosef’s mind in those last moments of his precious life, watching his best friend murdered, unable to prevent it. How do you even attempt to imagine what he saw and felt? And what of their families? As I stood there, I tried to scrutinize the faces of the parents, trying to understand where they find the strength to continue. As a father, I cannot even begin to imagine the depths of sorrow the parents of these holy boys have endured and continue to endure - it is plainly beyond my ability to comprehend. How do they sleep at night? Will they ever sleep again? How do they comfort their other kids? How do they make themselves whole again?
I could not sleep; that is why we made aliyah. I could not sleep knowing that the future of Klal Yisrael was being decided here, while I sat, bound and gagged, in heiligeh Baltimore. I could not sleep knowing that 5 million Israeli Jews are shouldering the responsibility that should properly be borne by all 15 million of us. I could not sleep knowing that if 500,000 or a million American Jews stopped fighting it and made aliyah already, that the retzach would stop, that maybe - maybe - Kobi & Yosef would be alive today.
And then, almost suddenly, was the chagigah of Lag B’Omer. There was once a time when the thought of a bonfire instantly elicited haunting images of Nazi book burnings - chalk it up to my Yiddesheh kopf, I guess. Tonight, though, as I strolled through our yishuv, visiting, well-wishing, singing, toasting, and nibbling at numerous bonfires/barbecues, I recognized that fascinating mental process when new information overwrites old. Images of Lag B’Omer medurot have supplanted the golusdikeh images I carried around in the past. Our older girls came home well after midnight, faces full of soot and stomachs full of charred hot dogs and marshmallows, voices hoarse from singing, legs aching from dancing. It is a good thing indeed that there’s no school the next day!
On Lag B’Omer day, we had the most soulful Hachnasat Sefer Torah I have ever attended. Hundreds of people attended, singing dancing, and escorting the new Torah behind a big American pick-up truck with a live band in the back. The dancing, the joy, lasted well past dark. Afterwards there was a lavish seudat mitzvah, hosted by the donor families, and open to all. What a way to end Lag B’Omer!
I will thus end this epistle on that happy note. From the Gush Etzion, where we are living your dreams.
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