On the Threshold of Greatness: Who Speaks to Israel?

By Tuvia Brodie

Today, five voices speak to Israel: Edom, Yaacov, Yishmael, Persia and ONE. Each voice is distinct. Each reveals a truth. Do you understand these voices? More important, can you see the truth revealed?

Edom, whom we commonly identify as Europe and America, calls upon Israel to abandon ancestral Jewish homeland. Edom speaks with a singular voice. She is firm: Israel must give land to the Arab. Edom knows what she wants. She wants peace.

Yaacov, whom we commonly identify as the Jew, has two voices. One voice agrees with Edom: we must give away land. We have no choice. We must do as Edom demands. The other voice says we cannot do that. We cannot obey Edom. We cannot give land away, this voice says, because that land does not belong to us. It belongs to the LandLord—G-d.

Edom hears these two voices of Yaacov. She grows angry: give land, she demands, so we can have our peace.

The third voice which Israel hears belongs to Yishmael, whom we commonly identify as the Arab. Yishmael, like Yaacov, also speaks with two voices. But his voices are consistent. They do not conflict. They are like music--two melodies within the same song. The first voice of Yishmael agrees with Edom. Yaacov must give to Yishmael. That is justice. Edom says there must be two states between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. This first voice of Yishmael, speaking in English, tells the world that Edom speaks the truth.

Edom hears the first voice of Yishmael. Edom is pleased.

But Yishmael has a second voice. It is a voice, in Arabic, that says there cannot be two states. There can be only one state-- ‘Palestine’. There is no place for Yaacov. This voice calls for only one people to populate the land between the River and the Sea—the Arab people. Yaacov, this second voice of Yishmael sings, must be cleansed from the land.

Edom hears this second voice. She remains silent. She turns to Yaacov and says, ‘Why do you delay? Who do you think you are to say no to Yishmael? Because of you we have no peace.’

The fourth voice that calls to Israel is the voice of Persia, whom we commonly identify as modern Iran. Today’s Persia is angry. Yaacov, she says, is a cancer. He must be removed. Persia will excise this cancer--with an atom bomb.

Edom tells Persia she cannot have a nuclear weapon. Persia laughs. She threatens. Yishmael hears the threat. He fears Persia’s wrath. Yishmael asks Edom for help. Edom understands. She sends Abraham Lincoln—one of the world’s most powerful warships—to sit at Persia’s shoreline. In response, Persia threatens Edom. She will cut off Europe’s oil; she will drive oil prices so high as to destroy Europe’s already weak economies; and she will send suicide ships after Abraham Lincoln. Her rockets can reach Europe. They will soon reach America.

For Yaacov, Edom threatens. Yishmael threatens. Persia threatens. Nations with hating hordes and atomic weapons-to-be—all threaten. Incredibly, they threaten each other because they threaten Yaacov.

The fifth voice that calls to Israel is the voice of ONE. It is a different voice—abstract and difficult to grasp. Yaacov recalls this Voice every day in his prayer—‘Hear oh Israel, HaShem our G-d, HaShem is ONE.’ In this prayer, we find the Name of G-d (‘HaShem’), who is called, simply, ONE. Our heritage teaches that, within this Holy ONE, we discover G-d’s name, His Voice, His Mercy-- and (as we learn in our written and oral texts) our Destiny in the land called Israel. It’s not simple. But it’s all there—past, present, future; and this future, our Destiny, does not depend upon obeying Edom, Yishmael or Persia. It depends upon the ONE.

For Yaacov, ONE stands alone. There is no other. Edom, Yishmael and Persia do not accept that. They choose others. They want to separate Yaacov from Israel, to demonstrate that G-d-is-ONE lied when He claimed that the bond between Himself-Israel-Yaacov is eternal. They may even believe that if they destroy Yaacov, they remove the non-visible ONE from existence; for without Yaacov, who will speak of ONE? With Yaacov gone, there would be no ONE to distract the nations of the world.

Will Edom then have her peace? Will Persia and Yishmael?

Five voices: which do you believe? Each appears in the Jewish Heritage [Mesorah]. This 3,800 year-old inheritance predicts how this story unfolds—and to this date, if you keep score, the predictions are eleven-for-eleven (see, “The MOST important video about Israel you’ll ever see”). The ONE is complete, eleven-for-eleven-with-no-imperfection. He is perfect—and He is wedded to Yaacov.

Stay tuned.