Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 3 Day 11
“Dissent is indigenous to Judaism. The prophets of ancient Israel who rebelled against a religion that would merely serve the self-interest or survival of the people continue to stand out as an inspiration and example of dissent to this very day.”(Essential Writings pg.106)
On this 2nd day of war in Israel, we see what happens when the world does not rebel against terrorism! All people of faith have to say NO to the terrorist activities, NO to the support of terrorism whether in Israel, in Ukraine, in the United States. We have the power to dissent, we have the power to stop the making these terrorists of Hamas into heroes, into ‘freedom fighters’. This is not about the causes of terrorism, this is not about who is right and who is wrong, this is not about the ‘poor Palestinians’, this is about saying NO to lawless ways of Amalek, attacking a people for being Jews in their weakest spots. While in Arabic the word could mean ‘zeal’, in Hebrew the word means violence and is one of the root causes of the Flood in Genesis.
It is time for the world to stand up and rebel against ‘moral equivalence’, it is time for the world to stop these terrorists from the plans to make peace in the Middle East, it is time for the world to punish the Iranians who support the terrorist groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, etc. It is time for the world to come together and honor the pledge made in 1947 for the establishment of the State of Israel, it is time for the world to acknowledge we are in this situation because the Arab nations first made war against Israel in 1948. It is time for the world to use all of its resources to bring to heel these terrorist organizations who call for the destruction of Israel. In a democracy, like Israel and the United States, there is a necessity to dissent against ways that people believe the governments are straying from the path of the founding documents, it is called free and fair elections. Terrorists do not honor free and fair elections and use fear, hatred, weapons to upset them, to overturn them, to kill the very spirit of freedom and democracy that we all have fought so hard and so many times to preserve.
This is not to say that Israel, the United States and all democracies in the world cannot and should not do better, this is not a whitewash of Netanyahu and his policies, this is not extolling the far-right parties in the United States nor in Israel, France, England, etc.; I am rebelling against terrorist actives, I am saying we have to have a powerful dissent against kidnapping people, killing innocent civilians, attacking a country on their Holy Days, trying to annex property and land just because we want to like in Ukraine. There is plenty of dissent in Israel and always has been, there is dissent in America and always has been, our dissent cannot and should not turn into terrorist activities like what is happening in Israel right now. Terrorists make the mistake of believing the dissent of the prophets that we practice today makes a country, a people, a city, a state ripe for the pickings. They believe their own lies that they are ‘fighting for the people’ when they are really terrorizing for their own power, for their own wealth, for their own egos. What Israel and the world is saying to the terrorists of Hamas today and we need to say everyday is: You will not win, You will not kill our democracy, You will not split us as a nation, as a people. Just as with 9/11, Israel will defeat these enemies in this war and we, as a global community have to defeat terrorism as a way of life!
The worst result from terrorism is when we, good people, lose our resolve and our way of being is disrupted. We, the people, have to meet these terrorists with power, we have to show them that their nihilism is not going to overtake us, their death wishes will not cause us to lose our humanity. While we have not been able to follow the command to “blot out Amalek”, we need to stop Amalek in it’s tracks, we have to defeat Amalek and bring it to heel to decency, to being human. It is a difficult task, one we have been wrestling with for the ages, and we have to keep stopping terrorism in its tracks. Just as we did with Hitler, so too do we have to do with Hamas, with Hezbollah, with Iran, with Putin and every other terrorist organization whether government sponsored or just within a country, like the White Supremacist movement here in the US, like the chaos makers in our country and across the globe.
I am praying for Israel to wipe out the terrorists, I am praying for the myriad of people who will be killed and hurt because they follow the dictates of their oppressors, Hamas. I pray for the dead and the wounded in Israel, I pray for a world devoid of terror. While difficult, I try to see the Divine Image of the terrorists as well. “Now is the time for all good people to come to the aid of” Israel, of democracy, and freedom. Stand with Israel, stand against terrorism, God Bless, Rabbi Mark