Draft Parshas Vaysihlach, 15 Kislev 5783
Interview: A Moral Question
In an interesting interview with Benjamin Netanyahu, Jordan Peterson asks: what is the moral justification for the state of Israel?
Jordan Peterson and Benjamin Netanyahu are thoughtful and eloquent thinkers of great courage.15 December, 2022. Youtube: https://youtu.be/4OcaMRLTyGI. Dr. Jordan B. Peterson and Israel Prime Minister-Elect Benjamin Netanyahu discuss the history of Israel, its status as an embattled nation, the importance of the struggle for statehood, why and how the PM came back from political demise, and his vision for the future. Benjamin Netanyahu was recently reelected as Prime Minister of Israel, having previously served in the office from 1996–1999 and 2009–2021. From 1967–1972 he served as a soldier and commander in Sayeret Matkal, an elite special forces unit of the Israeli Defense Forces. A graduate of MIT, he served as Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations from 1984–1988, before being elected to the Israeli parliament as a member of the Likud party in 1988. He has published five previous books on terrorism and Israel’s quest for peace and security. He lives in Jerusalem with his wife, Sara. In his newest book “Bibi: My Story” the newly reelected prime minister of Israel tells the story of his family, the story of his people, his path to leadership, and his unceasing commitment to defending his country and securing its future. They have not allowed themselves to be indoctrinated by the modern psychological disorder of woke leftism (which is the fastest growing religion in the west). So let’s discuss the interview more for clarity than agreement.
Elephant in the room?
In the interview, the Bible is mentioned. Moses is mentioned.
But, there is an elephant in the room — an ultimate issue — that never makes it into the conversation. An issue that goes to the fundamental reason and purpose of the cosmos itself, an issue relevant to all mankind.
What is omitted is the Existence and Unity of God and the truths of His Torah.
For, if God exists and the Torah is true, then there is a very different story to be told.
By the word “God”, we mean, at the very least, a supremely good and wise Being, powerful enough to to bring the universe into existence and Who governs and supervises its historical development in accordance with His Will. Only such a Being has the power to preserve Jewish identity through the vicissitudes of exile where we were persecuted and yet survived, though small in number.
We are not talking about a view according to which the world might have existed apart from God but simply happens not to do so. In the classical monotheism of the Torah, the fact that there is any world at all is something that could not even in principle have obtained in the absence of divine creative action.2The arguments for this view may be found in Emuna V’Deos (Rav Saadiah Gaon), Chovos Halevavos, and Moreh Nevuchim (also the beginning of Mishnah Torah)
A second axiom is that part of our covenant with God requires Jews to keep His Torah. The nations will be punished for anti-semitism, but Jew hatred may also have some benefit: it is a wake-up call that may cause us to question whether broadly secular values are the right ones. At any rate, we ignore the God factor in world history at our peril
There are serious consequences to the errors in the secular views that pervades contemporary thought. These errors affect our understanding of ourselves, our institutions and our history. They becloud our thinking about moral good and evil (such as the right of Israel to exist), free-will, and our happiness. We will now attempt to trace where these errors arose and how to remedy them.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s passionate story
What is the core of the moral justification for Israel as described by Benjamin Netanyahu?
Benjamin Netanyahu, at about 6:43 minutes: Herzl was what I call our modern Moses. But, I’d actually start with the original Moses. The Jewish people have lived in the land of Israel (what is now the state of Israel) and have been attached to this place for about 3,500 years (three and a half millennia). For the first two millennia (roughly) of that time we were living in what is described in a text commonly known as the Bible: the Jewish people lived on this land, were attached to this land, fought off conquerors sometimes were conquered but stayed on their land. And that continued for a very long time until roughly the sixth seventh century … the Romans who were conquered by the Byzantines did a lot of bad things to us but they didn’t really exile us (contrary to what people think).
The loss of our land actually occurred when the Arab Conquest took place in the 7th century. The Arabs burst out from Arabia and they did something that no other conqueror did (not the Romans, not the Byzantines, not the Greeks before them under Alexander the Great) .. they [the Arabs] actually started taking over the land of the Jewish farmer; they brought in military colonies that took over the land and gradually over the next two centuries the Jews became a minority in our land. So it is under the Arab Conquest that the Jews lost their Homeland. The Arabs were the Colonials; the Jews were the natives dispossessed … [nevertheless the land lay barren] and we [the Jews] never gave up the dream of coming back to our ancestral Homeland. So, generation after generation, Jews could be in Warsaw, they could be in Yemen, they could be in in China, and they said next year in Jerusalem; we’ll come back next year in Jerusalem
But, Destruction and Exile occurred Twice
But, as a matter of history, the Muslim Arab invasion was not the first to persecute and expel the Jews.
Prior to Islam, the Tanach and the Talmud record that the whole Jewish nation was exiled from their land twice (accompanied each time with horrific persecution and the destruction of the Temple, the Bais Hamikdash):
- the first time by the Babylonians (for a period of 70 years),
- and the second time by the Romans.
If Josephus’ numbers are to be believed, 1 million Jewish men, women and children were slaughtered by by the Roman army under Titus. Tens of thousands of Jews were transported to Rome as slaves. As many as 70,000 Jewish slaves may have suffered and died building the Colosseum, and later slaughtered in vicious gladiator combat.
The Arch of Titus in Rome (81 CE) shows the Roman triumph awarded to Emperor Vespasian and to Titus, his son and heir, for their victory in the Jewish War (66-74 CE). The most historically important element of the Arch’s iconography is the display of spolia from the war, including such sacred vessels from the Jerusalem Temple as the seven-branched Menorah and the Table of the Showbread. Josephus describes the triumph and the deposition of these artifacts in Rome, and they are also mentioned in later Rabbinic literature. The menorah on the Arch of Titus was chosen as the symbol of the State of Israel in 1949.
“The ravages of the long and bloody war against Rome had materially reduce the Jewish population of Judah. The Jewish population throughout the rest of the Roman empire also declined significantly. At the beginning of the common era historians estimated the Jewish population in the Roman empire numbered at least 10,000,000. Two centuries later, fully two thirds of this number were either dead, assimilated into Roman society, or, in increasing numbers Christian.3Rabbi Beryl Wein, Echoes of Glory, 350 BCE to 750 CE, Shaar Press, 1995 p178E.
After the fall of Jerusalem, Rabban Yochanan ben Zakai and his colleagues began the task of rebuilding the Jewish people and moved the Sanhedrin to Yavneh which became the center for Torah scholarship.
The Romans called the land Palestine. When the Bar Kochba revolt began in 132 CE, Jerusalem was a Roman colony. Tensions were high between the Jewish people and the Romans, led by the cruel Roman emperor Hardrian (ruled 117-138 CE), who turned Jerusalem into Aelia Capitolina, a Roman city dedicated to the pagan god Jupiter, according to the book “A Short History of the Jewish People: From Legendary Times to Modern Statehood” ( Raymond Scheindlin, professor emeritus of medieval Hebrew literature, Macmillan General Reference, 1998).
After the Romans crushed the revolt, they unleashed a reign of terror on the Jews of Judea. The Romans deported the remaining Jews there, sending many of them northward to Galilee and selling others as slaves. So many captives were sold, that it was said that the cost of a slave was depressed to that of a horse, Scheindlin wrote.
Estimates by Sergio DellaPergola (2001), drawing on the work of Bachi (1975) indicate that by the 5th century Jews were in the minority in the land of Israel. The devastation and exile was complete.4https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history_of_Palestine_(region): Pergola, Sergio della (2001). “Demography in Israel/Palestine: Trends, Prospects, Policy Implications” (PDF). Semantic Scholar. S2CID 4578245.
The transition point was in about 200 CE when the Talmudic scholars Rav and Shmuel established their great Yeshivas in Babylonia. The mantle of Torah scholarship passes to Babylonia which becomes the intellectual center of the Jewish world. About 250 years later, Ravina and Rav Ashi complete the Babylonian Talmud, thus ensuring that the Torah and its students remain eternal.
Prophetic predictions
But, more to the point, all this was predicted by God in detail in the Torah:
- once in Vayikra (Leviticus), and
- once in Devarim (Deuteronomy).
Included in these prophecies are the horrors of the destruction, exile from the land to the four corners of the earth, that the land will lie fallow until the Jews will one day return.
The horrific destruction and exile was not an accident of history, but due to our disloyalty to God (and the truths of His Torah). Famously, the second Temple was destroyed because of sinas chinam (unwaranted hatred).
This destruction and exile from our homeland is
- a punishment for abandoning G-d and His Torah, and
- the suffering is a sign to Jews to do teshuva (think of Tisha B’Av).
- The long exile is an opportunity to rectify our mistakes, to restore our Jewish identify — so that when we return to our land we will once again show our loyalty to G-d and His Torah.
At the time of the Roman destruction, Jerusalem and the Temple had become a hotbed for extremists as many powerful sects vied for control of the Temple and its treasury including Herodians, Sadducees, Hellenists and early Christians.5Rav Avigdor Miller zt”l writes: The New Testament is an example of the hatred towards the Torah Sages of the Talmud (“Pharisees”). If you want a textbook which is full of venom against the Sages, that’s the New Testament. Because the New Testament is full of great anger, endless anger against the Pharisees. The New Testament calls our Sages vipers and snakes. Now, who are the Pharisees? The schools of Hillel and Shamai. The Pharisees are Rabbi Dosa ben Harkinus, Rabbi Eliezer ben Hurkinos, Rabban Gamliel Hazaken and his son Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel, Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakai. All these famous names; they are our luminaries, our teachers. Their lives we study. It’s their words that inspire us. Anyone suspected of surrendering to the Romans were killed by the Zealots.
Once Jerusalem fell, all these corrupt sects disappeared from the body of the Jewish people.
When Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakai met with the Roman general Vespasian (Talmud, Gittin 56b) just before the fall Jerusalem, Rabbi Yochanan said that he and the other good Jews wanted to surrender and accept Roman rule, but the “biryonim” (zealots) did not allow it. Vespasian said: “If a poisonous serpent coils itself around a keg of honey, do we not break the keg in the process of killing the serpent?” He meant that despite Rabbi Yochanan’s desire for peace, he could not call off the war because he had to defeat the zealots, and it would be impossible to do so without destroying Jerusalem and the Temple. Rabbi Yochanan was silent. He saw in Vespasian’s words a deeper and prophetic meaning of which the general himself was not aware. The Jewish people had been plagued for 150 years by the heretical Sadducees and the tyrannical Herodian monarchy. They had trampled on the people and on the Torah. Jerusalem and the Temple had become their political center and source of wealth; they were coiled around it like a serpent. One cannot shake off the serpent without destroying the keg, and so the destruction of Jerusalem was Hashem’s way of getting rid of them. Indeed, after the destruction, when there was no longer any political power or money to be had, these two groups were never heard from again. They assimilated, intermarried and went lost among the gentiles.6Rav Avgdor Miller, zt”l.
Once again in our time, we find ourselves with the same challenge: what shall be the identity of the Jewish state?
Amazing Predictions
So contra Benjamin Netanyahu it is not the case that “[T]he loss of our land actually occurred when the Arab Conquest took place in the 7th century.”
The loss of our land was much earlier and for very different reasons.
It is amazing that the destruction and exile was predicted in the Torah, long before the Roman empire dominated the world! The ancient nations of antiquity such as the Babylonians, Greeks and Romans are no longer with us. Only the Creator of the universe and its Guide can make detailed predictions that display His Knowledge of the future, and supervision of history to ensure the survival of the Jews.
The secular claim is weak
“Herzl was what I call our modern Moses” (Mr. Netanyahu in the interview).
This is hardly the case. Moses led his people to the moral goodness of classical monotheism, something that the modern atheist fails to grasp just like the old-time pagan.
Zionism is atheistic revolt against God and His Torah
“Zionism was, among other things, a revolt against the Orthodox Jewish religion, that was associated with the Diaspora which Zionists contemptuously call Galut (“exile”). All the founding fathers of Zionism – Theodor Herzl, Max Nordau, Chaim Weizmann, Ze’ev Jabotinsky and the rest — were convinced atheists. …People of my age can remember the situation. Ben-Gurion, like all of us, believed that the Jewish religion was about to die out. Some old people, who spoke Yiddish, were still praying in the synagogues, but with time they would disappear. We, the young new Israelis, were secular, modern, free from these old superstitions.” [Uri Avnery, 2011.]
Avnery was a journalist at Haaretz, Member of the Knesset, and founder of the left wing Gush Shalom movement in 1993, which he continued to lead. In 2005, he was voted the 128th-greatest Israeli of all time, in a poll by the Israeli news website Ynet to determine whom the general public considered the 200 Greatest Israelis.
In addition to the suggestion that the Jews would settle for Uganda, Herzl also urged his fellow Jews to convert to Christianity: “I wanted to solve the Jewish question, in Austria at least, with the help of the Catholic Church. I wanted to assure myself first of all of the help of the princes the church, and through them to obtain an audience with the Pope, to say to him as follows: ‘Defend us against the anti-Semites, and I will found a strong movement are Jews converting to Christianity, proudly and of their own free will. The leaders of the movement, myself in particular, will remain Jewish and it will be as Jews that we will advise and recommend willing acceptance of the dominant faith. The mass conversion will take place at high noon of a Sunday amid the pomp of a ceremonial parade and the ringing of the church bells of Saint Stephen’s – not furtively and with humiliation as Jews have converted today, but standing tall and proud! All of this on condition that the leaders will remain as Jews; accompanying the people to the threshold of the church, they themselves will remain outside; this will add stature to the proceedings, which will acquire the aura of a great revelation. We strong ones will be a transition generation. We ourselves will remain within our faith, but we will convert our small children to Christianity before they reach in age to decide these things for themselves“.7http://toriah.com/pdf/Secular-Zionism.pdf.
In the wake of the Dreyfus affair, Herzl’s main idea idea was that if the Jews had a homeland of their own, this would solve the problem of anti-semitism.
But, there is now a strong state of Israel, and yet Jew hatred is at an all-time high, whether in the halls of the public universities, the UN, or the militant Islam of Iran whose leaders seek to use weapons of mass destruction against Israel.
Further, the secular claim for Israel is weak in other ways. Why should Israel have a “law of return” favouring only those of Jewish descent; why should Shabbat, Kashrut and Jewish marriage and divorce laws be imposed on citizens of the state? Perhaps Israel should be a democratic country with open borders like Sweden and America with equal laws of justice guaranteed for all its citizens? In fact, this is the argument of Jewish leftists in the State of Israel and elsewhere. In short, in the modern era, in what sense does Palestine “belong to us” (as Mr. Netanyahu puts it); why should the state even have a Jewish identity?
If Israel has a moral right to exist — with a Jewish identity — the answer lies elsewhere.
The Jewish claim to the Land of Israel
Our claim to the land is not based only on the fact that we are the sole nation of antiquity still around as its indigenous inhabitants.
The first verse in the Torah states that “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth”, ex nihilo, i.e. there was nothing (literally no-thing), i.e. no space, no time, no galaxies, no laws of nature.
The world was brought into existence solely by the word of God alone.
Shabbat is the commemoration of that great act of Creation from n0-existence at all — to a world buzzing with Plan and Purpose. Thus, a loyal Jew in our time is called Shomer Shabbos — one who carefully and joyously guards the sanctity of Shabbat.
The world was created for the sake of the Torah/Israel
Rashi is the premier commentator of the text of the Torah. Expand the block to see his comment on the first word of the Torah.
The Torah starts as follows:
בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית בָּרָ֣א אֱלֹהִ֑ים אֵ֥ת הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם וְאֵ֥ת הָאָֽרֶץ׃
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
Rashi on Genesis 1:1
בראשית ברא IN THE BEGINNING GOD CREATED — This verse calls aloud for explanation in the manner that our Rabbis explained it: God created the world for the sake of the Torah which is called (Proverbs 8:22) “The beginning (ראשית) of His (God’s) way”, and for the sake of Israel who are called (Jeremiah 2:3) “The beginning (ראשית) of His (God’s) increase’’.
As Rashi explains, the first word of the Torah is בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית, which means “in the beginning”. But, it can also mean “for the sake of (בְּ) that which is first (= רֵאשִׁ֖ית)”. What are these “first”, or ultimate entities that are implicated in the purpose of creation?
- Torah,
- Israel (now, the Jewish people)
Is this ethno-centric? No, not if it is the Creator speaking. After all, Judaism is a revealed religion based on authentic prophecy — when God spoke to the whole Jewish Nation at Sinai. The Torah is God’s communication to us about world history (as even a superficial read will show) — which revolves solely around Israel.8Torah Judaism is not racist. Any gentile may join our ranks if he or she is willing to pay the same price as the Jews at Sinai: Mikvah, Bris Milah and Kabbalos Hamitzos (i.e. acceptance of the corpus of Jewish laws and beliefs).
Rashi on Genesis 1.1: בראשית IN THE BEGINNING — Rabbi Isaac said: The Torah which is the Law book of Israel should have commenced with the verse (Exodus 12:2) “This month shall be unto you the first of the months” which is the first commandment given to Israel. What is the reason, then, that it commences with the account of the Creation? Because of the thought expressed in the text (Psalms 111:6) “He declared to His people the strength of His works (i.e. He gave an account of the work of Creation), in order that He might give them the heritage of the nations.” For should the peoples of the world say to Israel, “You are robbers, because you took by force the lands of the seven nations of Canaan”, Israel may reply to them, “All the earth belongs to the Holy One, blessed be He; He created it and gave it to whom He pleased. When He willed He gave it to them, and when He willed He took it from them and gave it to us” (Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 187).
רש”י על בראשית א׳:א: בראשית אָמַר רַבִּי יִצְחָק לֹֹֹֹֹא הָיָה צָרִיךְ לְהַתְחִיל אֶת הַתּוֹרָה אֶלָּא מֵהַחֹדֶשׁ הַזֶּה לָכֶם, שֶׁהִיא מִצְוָה רִאשׁוֹנָה שֶׁנִּצְטַוּוּ בָּהּ יִשׂרָאֵל, וּמַה טַּעַם פָּתַח בִּבְרֵאשִׁית? מִשׁוּם כֹּחַ מַעֲשָׂיו הִגִּיד לְעַמּוֹ לָתֵת לָהֶם נַחֲלַת גּוֹיִם (תהילים קי”א), שֶׁאִם יֹאמְרוּ אֻמּוֹת הָעוֹלָם לְיִשְׁרָאֵל לִסְטִים אַתֶּם, שֶׁכְּבַשְׁתֶּם אַרְצוֹת שִׁבְעָה גוֹיִם, הֵם אוֹמְרִים לָהֶם כָּל הָאָרֶץ שֶׁל הַקָּבָּ”ה הִיא, הוּא בְרָאָהּ וּנְתָנָהּ לַאֲשֶׁר יָשַׁר בְּעֵינָיו, בִּרְצוֹנוֹ נְתָנָהּ לָהֶם, וּבִרְצוֹנוֹ נְטָלָהּ מֵהֶם וּנְתָנָהּ לָנוּ:
As Rashi explains, why does the Torah start with creation rather than the first mitzvah?
The Jews will always be accused by the nations that they have stolen the land. But, we Jews must understand that it is G-d, the Creator and Owner of the land, who is the only One who can grant title to the land of Israel.
It is not the UN or the nations of the world that give us this right.
It is amazing that this question was asked by Rashi a millennium ago when the land lay fallow and was sparsely populated. And Rashi’s source is even earlier (the Sages of the Talmud).
God created the universe — and continues to keep it in existence — and providentially guides it here and now. He is therefore the ultimate Owner of the world, and it His to give or to take.
No Jew should have a guilty conscience feeling that the land belongs to others. The Torah begins with the history of the world, the other nations rejection of God, and the loyalty of the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The promise of the land is to their progeny who will study and follow the teachings of the Torah:
Genesis 18:17-19: Now the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do [to the evil city of Sodom], since Abraham is to become a great and populous nation and all the nations of the earth will be blessed thorough him? For I have cherished him, because he will instruct his children and his posterity to keep the way of Lord by doing what is just and right, in order that the Lord may bring about for Abraham what has been promised him”.
בראשית י״ח:י״ז-י״ט וַֽה׳ אָמָ֑ר הַֽמְכַסֶּ֤ה אֲנִי֙ מֵֽאַבְרָהָ֔ם אֲשֶׁ֖ר אֲנִ֥י עֹשֶֽׂה׃ וְאַ֨בְרָהָ֔ם הָי֧וֹ יִֽהְיֶ֛ה לְג֥וֹי גָּד֖וֹל וְעָצ֑וּם וְנִ֨בְרְכוּ־ב֔וֹ כֹּ֖ל גּוֹיֵ֥י הָאָֽרֶץ׃ כִּ֣י יְדַעְתִּ֗יו לְמַ֩עַן֩ אֲשֶׁ֨ר יְצַוֶּ֜ה אֶת־בָּנָ֤יו וְאֶת־בֵּיתוֹ֙ אַחֲרָ֔יו וְשָֽׁמְרוּ֙ דֶּ֣רֶךְ ה׳ לַעֲשׂ֥וֹת צְדָקָ֖ה וּמִשְׁפָּ֑ט לְמַ֗עַן הָבִ֤יא ה׳ עַל־אַבְרָהָ֔ם אֵ֥ת אֲשֶׁר־דִּבֶּ֖ר עָלָֽיו׃
Genesis 35:9-12: God appeared again to Jacob on his return [to the land of Israel] from [the house of Lavan] in Paddan-Aram. God blessed him, saying to him, “Your name is Jacob, you shall be called Jacob no more, but Israel shall be your name.” Thus he was named Israel. And God said to him, “I am El Shaddai [with a sufficiency of power to bless]. Be fertile and increase; a nation, and congregation of nations, shall descend from you and kings shall issue from your loins. The land [of Israel] that I gave to Abraham and Isaac I give to you, and to your offspring after you will I assign the land.”
Back to Ultimate Issues
We started this post with the elephant in the room — an ultimate issue — that never makes it into the discussion: the existence of God and the truths of His Torah.
At the mountain of Sinai, the whole Jewish Nation witnessed God giving the Torah to Moses. This was a national revelation experienced simultaneously by so many hundreds of thousands of people:
Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch: (שמות פרק יט ד) אַתֶּם רְאִיתֶם אֲשֶׁר עָשִׂיתִי לְמִצְרָיִם וָאֶשָּׂא אֶתְכֶם עַל כַּנְפֵי נְשָׁרִים וָאָבִא אֶתְכֶם אֵלָי “You have seen what I have done to Egypt while I bore you aloft on eagle’s wings and brought you to myself” (Exodus 19:4).
The basis of your God-awareness and self-awareness is not faith, for faith allows an element of doubt. Rather, the basis is the firm evidence of your own senses, what you have seen with your own eyes, what you yourselves have experienced.
In exactly the same words Scripture says (below, 20:19), referring to the fact of God’s revelation at the Lawgiving: אַתֶּם רְאִיתֶם כִּי מִן הַשָּׁמַיִם דִּבַּרְתִּי עִמָּכֶם. The two fundamental truths on which all of Judaism rests – יציאת מצרים and מתן תורה, the exodus from Egypt and the Lawgiving – stand entirely on the basis of the actual evidence of your sense; and since they were seen, heard, felt, and experienced simultaneously by so many hundreds of thousands of people, any possibility of deception is ruled out.
These two fundamental truths accordingly share the highest degree of certainty; they transcend the bounds of mere opinion and belief. They belong to the realm of knowledge; they are irrefutable facts. They as certain as our own existence and as the existence of the material we see about us, and they should serve as cornerstones of all our knowledge.
You have seen what I did to the Egyptians and did for you at one and the same time: them, the greatest human power on earth, I threw to the ground, because they opposed Me by force; while you I brought to Me. You were helpless and downtrodden, but because you trusted in Me and faithfully devoted yourselves to Me, I raised you high above the reach of all your enemies and brought you into direct relationship with Me. You have seen that I am the only One Whom man should trust.9Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, The Hirsch Chumash, translated by Daniel Haberman, Feldheim 2005, p316-317.
Even David Ben Gurion?
David Ben Gurion (the first prime minister of Israel) was an ardent secularist, but there were certain basics he never denied. Here is an excerpt from the speech he made in front of the Peel Commission in 1936:10https://www.jewishhistory.org/ben-gurion-peel-commission/
“300 years ago, there came to the New World a boat, and its name was the Mayflower. The Mayflower’s landing on Plymouth Rock was one of the great historical events in the history of England and in the history of America. But I would like to ask any Englishman sitting here on the commission, what day did the Mayflower leave port? What date was it? I’d like to ask the Americans: do they know what date the Mayflower left port in England? How many people were on the boat? Who were their leaders? What kind of food did they eat on the boat?
“More than 3300 years ago, long before the Mayflower, our people left Egypt, and every Jew in the world, wherever he is, knows what day they left. And he knows what food they ate. And we still eat that food every anniversary. And we know who our leader was. And we sit down and tell the story to our children and grandchildren in order to guarantee that it will never be forgotten. And we say our two slogans: ‘Now we may be enslaved, but next year, we’ll be a free people.’
“. . . Now we are behind the Soviet Union and their prison. Now, we’re in Germany where Hitler is destroying us. Now we’re scattered throughout the world, but next year, we’ll be in Jerusalem. There’ll come a day that we’ll come home to Zion, to the Land of Israel. That is the nature of the Jewish people.”
“Jewish history is not only facts and dates, scholarship and academic disciplines. It is, more importantly, inspiration and faith, guidance and hope, vision and destiny. It is ironic that there are those in the Jewish world who, for whatever unfathomable reasons, have attempted to deny the entire narrative of the Exodus from Egypt.”
All of Jewish history and Jewish survival itself puts the lie to such attempts and theories. Judaism is based upon the simple notion that our Bobbas and Zeidas were not liars on so vital an issue.
Yes, there are deniers of the Exodus and Sinai, but we are witness to the fact that many truths, such as the Holocaust, can spawn a denial industry.
Denial will not change the truth. Knowing the true Jewish story and its significance for world history is itself a high point in our preparations for special days such as Shabbat (creation ex nihilo), Pesach (the miracle of the Exodus) and Shavuot (revelation of the Torah).
The existence of G-d and the truths of the Torah
So is the Torah true?
We have already mentioned the main lines of evidence that should be explored (in detail, in book length). Briefly, they are:
- When we look at nature we see a world buzzing with Plan and Purpose.11E.g. see https://toriah.com/pdf/Plan-and-Purpose.pdf Intelligent Design is implicated, and if there is Design, there is a Designer. Thus, a Being of enormous wisdom and power transcending space and time is the most reasonable explanation for the existence of the Cosmos. That Being is God.
- At the mountain of Sinai, God communicated His Torah to the whole Jewish Nation (and appointed Moses as His Messenger). This was preceded by the Ten Plagues and the splitting of Sea in a miraculous salvation from the horrors of the Egyptian enslavement.
- There is a detailed mechanism of transmission of the Torah. This includes the Tanach, the Mishna and the Gemora with a detailed chain of transmission from the leaders and teachers of each generation to the next, and from parents to children (think of the Pesach Seder).
- The predictions of the Torah have come true, including the prediction that we would be exiled, persecuted, small in number, the land would lie fallow. And yet — one day we would return to the Land of Israel.
- We are the only nation of antiquity still around to tell the tale. Mark Twain described it as follows:
Mark Twain: Concerning The Jews, Harper’s Magazine, March, 1898: To conclude. – If the statistics are right, the Jews constitute but one per cent. of the human race. It suggests a nebulous dim puff of star-dust lost in the blaze of the Milky Way. Properly the Jew ought hardly to be heard of; but he is heard of, has always been heard of. He is as prominent on the planet as any other people, and his commercial importance is extravagantly out of proportion to the smallness of his bulk. His contributions to the world’s list of great names in literature, science, art, music, finance, medicine, and abstruse learning are also away out of proportion to the weakness of his numbers.
He has made a marvellous fight in this world, in all the ages; and has done it with his hands tied behind him. He could be vain of himself, and be excused for it. The Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Persian rose, filled the planet with sound and splendor, then faded to dream-stuff and passed away; the Greek and the Roman followed, and made a vast noise, and they are gone; other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for a time, but it burned out, and they sit in twilight now, or have vanished.
The Jew saw them all, beat them all, and is now what he always was, exhibiting no decadence, no infirmities of age, no weakening of his parts, no slowing of his energies, no dulling of his alert and aggressive mind. All things are mortal but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?
In The Meaning of History Russian political philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev (1874 – 1948) attempts to revive the philosophy that history laid the foundations for Russian national consciousness. Along the way, Berdyaev touches on Judaism:
I remember how the materialist interpretation of history, when I attempted in my youth to verify it by applying it to the destinies of peoples, broke down in the case of the Jews, where destiny seemed absolutely inexplicable from the materialistic standpoint… Its survival is a mysterious and wonderful phenomenon demonstrating that the life of this people is governed by a special predetermination, transcending the processes of adaptation expounded by the materialistic interpretation of history. The survival of the Jews, their resistance to destruction, their endurance under absolutely peculiar conditions and the fateful role played by them in history: all these point to the particular and mysterious foundations of their destiny.
The Meaning of History, Joe Kanofsky Tradition Online, June 3, 2021.
Rav Shamshon Rapahel Hirsch asks12Nineteen Letters, Feldheim p126-128., is it conceivable that the nations of the world appear to have learnt nothing from all this? Could they fail to recognize that the higher power preserving Israel throughout its experiences is the One Alone, and the loyalty to Him demonstrated by Israel is the task of all humanity? This is a timeless message expressing the wonder of Jewish survival.
Even Jordan Peterson?
Dr. Jordan Peterson, is a Canadian psychologist, and owner of one of the most listened-to podcasts in the world. In an impassioned talk, (Thursday 7 October 2022), he tearfully pleaded with thousands present at the International Convention Center in Jerusalem to protect the holy city. Peterson said13https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/360906. Renowned Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson told a 3000-strong crowd ‘We need Jerusalem’ with tears in his eyes.:
“As Jews in Israel, are you telling the greatest story ever told? Well, you decide that by how you live. And what you do will affect the world – for one reason or another, it’s not so easy to understand, everyone looks here to see, well, how are you actually doing, under this tremendous assault of adversarial criticism, as this little, tiny people in the middle of no man’s land in some real sense, as a -what would you say – cardinal model of the nation-state and the city on the hill. You have a tremendous moral responsibility, like you have, perhaps, for your entire history, for reasons that are very difficult to understand, and I think it is true, in some real sense, that the fate of the world depends on the decisions of the people of Israel. Just as the fate of the world depends on the decision of every individual, so you make yourself a shining light on the hill, right? You attract people here because of what you’re capable of doing. You show the world what the holy city could look like. Because we need it. We need it, and it’s up to you to do it. Thank you very much.” Video below.
“For reasons that are difficult to understand“, he tearfully says, “the fate of the world depends on the decisions of the people of Israel“. It is indeed difficult to understand without the following: there could not even be a universe without the existence of G-d and the truths of His Torah.
The Challenge — struggle for Jewish identity
I write this as we are about to read parshas Vayishlach (5783) which describes the last stage of the saga of the twin brothers Jacob and Esau. Esau might have been a participant in the Jewish enterprise, but that was not to be. Esau acts disloyally thereby changing his destiny.14Esau and Jacob struggle within Rivka’s womb during her pregnancy. Rivka seeks Hashem to find out what is going on. She goes to the yeshiva of Shem and Ever. They told her she had two entire nations within her. She is about to give birth to two powerful individuals who will give rise to two powerful nations. These nations will struggle with each other throughout history. The Sages explain that these two nations, Rome and Jerusalem, represent two views of looking at the world. The world can be dominated through physical might or through spiritual might. The world cannot be controlled by both simultaneously. These philosophies are mutually exclusive. When one nation ascends, the other one is in decline. Who controls this see-saw? The older will be ruled by the younger. Jacob by his actions of loyalty to God and His Torah controls the see-saw.
Esau is the father of the nation Edom, the Torah tells us, and descendants of Edom become founders of Rome. Rome destroyed our Temple and exiled us to the four corners of the world. Rome became the Holy Roman Empire, i.e. Christianity (Russia, Europe and America) and hence Western civilization. We have lived under its domination for almost two millennia. Western civilization is currently in the process of destroying all the Biblical values on which it was originally constructed. Its decadence has assimilated vast number of Jews away from their roots.
There are about 15 million Jews worldwide of whom 13 million are no longer observant. Many of those, especially the younger generation, have assimilated the destructive values of the west and intermarriage is at an all time high. There is very little interest in Yiddishkeit or in Israel.
This article is written in the month of of Kislev leading up to Chanukah. In the second century BCE, the Holy Land was ruled by the Seleucids (Syrian-Greeks), who tried to force the people of Israel to accept Greek culture and beliefs instead of mitzvah observance and belief in G‑d. Many Jews assimilated and became Hellenists joining the forces of darkness.
Against all odds, a small band of faithful but poorly armed Jews, led by the Hasmoneans under Judah the Maccabee, defeated one of the mightiest armies on earth, drove the Greeks from the land, reclaimed the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and rededicated it to the service of G‑d.
When they sought to light the Temple’s Menorah (the seven-branched candelabrum), they found only a single cruse of olive oil that had escaped contamination by the Greeks. Miraculously, they lit the menorah and the one-day supply of oil lasted for eight days, until new oil could be prepared under conditions of ritual purity. To commemorate and publicize these miracles, the sages instituted the festival of Chanukah.
Under the Hasmoneans, Jewish independence was reclaimed for about 130 years, but ended tragically. The Hasmoneans’ early triumphs were soon shadowed by their corruption and disloyalty to the Torah. The Romans eventually took control over the land of Israel ending with the loss of our independence, persecution and exile.
We have lost our independence before and we can lose it again. With the re-establishment of the state of Israel post-holocaust, the battle of Jewish identity is the real challenge once again.
The left under Lapid and the outgoing government (December 2022) have attempted to diminish (and even to destroy) the observance of Shabbat, Kosher Certification and Conversion standards. They have attempted to disrupt Torah studies in the Yeshivas. The Israeli Supreme Court is corrupt and anti-democratic.
On the other hand, there is much growth in the observant public, and the growth of Torah learning is phenomenal.
The purpose of life is not only to develop a Silicon valley in Tel-Aviv. That alone will not bring blessing to the Jewish people and the world. That is what we have learned from the history of our people.
The purpose of life is to develop an awareness of God and to infuse our lives with that awareness. Torah learning and Torah living.
Jeremiah 9:22-23. Thus said the LORD: Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom; Let not the strong man glory in his strength; Let not the rich man glory in his riches. But only in this should one glory: In his knowledge and awareness of Me. For I, the LORD, act with Kindness, Justice, and equity in the world; For in these I delight —declares the LORD.
We started this post with the elephant in the room. The ultimate issue is that the world was created to develop and live with an awareness of God and the truths of His Torah.
What has ensured our survival is not the strength of our armies or our economy. For almost two thousand years we did not have a country.
In fact, it is the Torah that goes to the heart of “what it means to be a Jew”.
To quote the famous statement of Rav Saadia Gaon: “The Jewish nation is a nation only by virtue of the Torah.”
It is the Chosen People’s timeless heritage through the ages from the time they accepted it at the foot of Sinai. And study it they have – with relentlessly passion, with personal sacrifice, and with vigour and happiness. And this loving dedication to God and His Torah, as a continuous pursuit lasting throughout a Jew’s life span, has not been abandoned despite all his foes’ attempts to separate him from his precious heirloom.
The Joy of Yiddiskeit
Earlier this month, there was a joyous communal dinner to celebrate 50 years since the establishment of Kollel Toronto. The highlights may be viewed here. It was a revolutionary idea at the time that transformed Torah learning and living. It set a new trend in North America and abroad building a partnership between a core group of talmidei chachmim (Torah Scholars) and the working community of men and women, enriching the lives of all.
The psychological state of contentment is the experience of getting what we want. That should not be conflated with the true happiness that comes from the moral quality of a life well-lived. The joy of Yiddiskeit ultimately comes with the challenge of studying and living the wisdom of the Torah. That wisdom is transformative.
Zephania 3.9: For then I will change the nations to purity of speech, so that they all invoke the LORD by name, and serve Him with one accord.
צפניה ג׳:ט׳: כִּֽי־אָ֛ז אֶהְפֹּ֥ךְ אֶל־עַמִּ֖ים שָׂפָ֣ה בְרוּרָ֑ה לִקְרֹ֤א כֻלָּם֙ בְּשֵׁ֣ם ה׳ לְעׇבְד֖וֹ שְׁכֶ֥ם אֶחָֽד׃
The prophets made it abundantly clear that there is an end purpose to history which will occur in the Messianic era under the leadership of Mashiach ben Dovid. All mankind will recognize and accept the absolute sovereignty of God. This recognition is the pinnacle of human achievement, and brings with it material blessing, success and happiness. Every man, woman and child who lives on this earth will stand together before the One God Who created us all.
Mesilat Yesharim 1:1-2
The foundation of piety and the root of perfect service [of G-d] is for a man to clarify and come to realize as truth what is his obligation in his world and to what he needs to direct his gaze and his aspiration in all that he toils all the days of his life. Behold, what our sages, of blessed memory, have taught us is that man was created solely to delight in G-d and to derive pleasure in the radiance of the Shechina (divine presence). For this is the true delight and the greatest pleasure that can possibly exist. The place of this pleasure is, in truth, in Olam Haba (the World to Come, the Afterlife). For it was created expressly for this purpose.
מסילת ישרים א׳:א׳-ב׳
יסוד החסידות ושרש העבודה התמימה הוא שיתברר ויתאמת אצל האדם מה חובתו בעולמו ולמה צריך שישים מבטו ומגמתו בכל אשר הוא עמל כל ימי חייו. והנה מה שהורונו חכמינו זכרונם לברכה הוא, שהאדם לא נברא אלא להתענג על ה’ ולהנות מזיו שכינתו שזהו התענוג האמיתי והעידון הגדול מכל העידונים שיכולים להמצא. ומקום העידון הזה באמת הוא העולם הבא, כי הוא הנברא בהכנה המצטרכת לדבר הזה.