Rav Nachman Kahana on Parashat Shelach 5771

BS"D Parashat Shelach 5771

A fundamental principle in Halachic observance, perhaps the most fundamental, is

לא בשמים היא

that after the written and oral forms of the Torah were presented to the Jewish people at Mount Sinai, all further halachic decisions would no longer be in the jurisdiction of the spiritual world (angels or prophecy), but would be decided on by one of three methods:

1- For textbook perfect cases, we follow what is found in a written Halachic source, which for us is the Shulchan Aruch and its accompanying commentators.

2- For non-textbook perfect cases, we rely on our scholarly rabbinic leaders to implement the principles of Halacha.

3- In the absence of such Halachic authorities, we follow the accepted the precedents as practiced by the majority of Jews in their respective places. And where there is no Halachic authority and no previous precedent, we are in Halachic limbo and do what we can and pray that HaShem will not let us falter.

However, the miraglim (scouts) episode poses a challenge to the above.

Let’s assume for a moment that we are part of the 600,000 men from the ages of 20 to 60 who were present when the miraglim returned from their mission to Eretz Yisrael. All our possessions are packed for the grand entrance into the land, and we are straining our ears to hear the technical data from the miraglim regarding the points of entry and what we will find upon crossing the Jordan River.

Silence passes over the all the assembled people as the 12 great rabbis who were chosen by HaShem to be the miraglim ascend the podium to deliver their report. It is an unexpected report. 10 out of the 12, to the exclusion of Yehoshua Bin Nun and Calev Ben Yefuneh, gave a terrifying account of what they saw. "The land is occupied by men of great physical height and strength, making our chances of surviving a military conflict almost nil, and certainly there is no chance at all of uprooting them from the land."

After the detailed military report, the last two miraglim, Yehoshua and Calev, rose up to speak. They did not deny the basic realities of the enemy’s strength, but they said that HaShem would perform miracles, as he had done before.

Now, we as innocent bystanders, have to make the halachic choice with whom to go. The great leaders of the tribes who constituted the majority and their dire warning of a holocaust if we were to enter the land; or the two rabbis who encourage us to believe that HaShem would make us victorious. As the moments pass, more and more men are accepting the pessimistic appraisal of the majority, until it appears close to a unanimous decision to refrain from entering the land, except for Moshe, Aharon and his sons, and Yehoshua and Calev.

So, we who were present at this time have to make the hard choice. However, our halachic training says that we must go with the determination of the majority of rabbis, and certainly when that opinion is upheld by 600,000 men.

So when HaShem declared that all those who chose the Halachic way would not enter the land, but would end their days during the next 38 years in the desert, we were confused and frustrated at the "injustice" of our lot.

So where indeed, lies the Halachic justice meted out by HaShem to that generation of 600,000 men?

I submit:

A group of hikers is lost at night in the thick jungles of Africa, but they know that they must continue in a northerly direction. The experienced guide says that north is to the right, but your expensive military compass that always points to magnetic north points to the left, which do you follow?

If you value your life you will follow the compass, for it is the most objective. HaShem built into the Torah a compass - it is called Eretz Yisrael. A Halachic decision that will draws one closer to the Holy Land, is the true one to follow; a decision that draws one away from Eretz Yisrael is fallacious and disastrous to one’s Jewish soul.

Our "innocent bystander" - one of the 600,000 who had to determine whether to follow the majority who said not to enter the land, or the minority who said that we must rely on HaShem’s miracles and enter the land - was not so innocent. He should have known that the majority view would distance the Jewish people from taking root in the Land set aside for them by the Creator of heaven and earth. He ignored the Torah’s compass and followed the crowd.

Here one might argue that the intention of the miraglim was indeed to distance the Jews from Eretz Yisrael, but their motive was highly spiritual - to remain in the desert under the leadership of Moshe Rabbeinu. This is a convincing, rational, frum, yeshivashe point of view. But the problem with it is that HaShem disagreed.

Six hundred thousand Jewish men, who had stood at the foot of Mount Sinai when HaShem said, "I am the Lord your God who has taken you out of Egypt", were to die on the ninth of Av over the next 38 years, because they did not follow HaShem’s compass of Eretz Yisrael.

The magnetic north of a compass is an inhospitable place, and at times HaShem’s compass point of Eretz Yisrael can also be an inhospitable, dangerous place. But that is immaterial! Because the only border crossing between heaven and earth is Eretz Yisrael, and it is only here that HaShem makes Himself known to the world through His relationship with the Jewish people on the national level. Before Medinat Yisrael was established, the majority of the world’s population never heard of Jews or Judaism. Today, the entire world has an intense interest in the tiny land of the Jewish people where miracles seemingly never cease to occur. And with the miracles comes the name of Hashem Echad.

How unfortunate are those Jews who are today under the influence of the proteges of yesterday’s miraglim. The very presence of a Jew in chutz la’aretz diminishes the Holy Name, as stated by the prophet Yechezkel. Dialectic pseudo Halachic explanations of why it is essential to remain in the galut, which the Almighty knows are only cover-ups of spiritual weaknesses cultivated by various cults and sects there, will drag many galut Jewish individuals and communities down with them, in a repeat of what happened in the desert 3500 years ago.

And no man is immune to the spiritual poisoning of the Jewish soul in the galut. For who is greater than our father Ya’akov? In parashat Vayaitze, Ya’akov, while asleep on the Temple Mount, dreamt of Angels ascending and descending from heaven and heard HaShem speaking to him; but the same Ya’akov, after his sojourn in a foreign land, dreamt of sheep and goats.

Next week, on the 19th of Sivan, my wife and I will BE"H enter our 50th "Jubilee" year in Eretz Yisrael. There is no way we can express our gratitude for the brachot that HaShem has showered upon us. In all these years, we did not have the spectator feeling that we were witnessing great historic events, because we were part of the people making those events happen.

From day one, we became part of Israeli society and felt the huge brotherhood that was here, regardless if our fellow Israeli was a Torah observant person or not. Ivrit was our language. Torah learning and writing occupied me from dawn to dusk, with the huge co-operation of my wife. Military service. Teaching in yeshivot and writing sefarim, with a stint of serving as the assistant to the Minister for Religious Affairs. The liberation of Yerushalayim, the Yom Kippur War, all the ups and down of our relations with foreign powers. Children, grandchildren, great grandchildren. Who can enumerate the joys of being part of HaShem’s great masterplan for His people in Israel.

While growing up in Brooklyn, I had my share of miraglim and their teachings. And if not for the grace of HaShem, I too could have fallen victim to their sweet, seductive promises of Paradise if I would only remain in the galut of America.

As we enter our Jubilee year here, I call out to all young Jews, men and women, "Make a life for yourself. Return to the source of who you are - HaShem’s nation, chosen to sanctify His name in the Holy Land, as we continue to write huge chapters of Jewish history and continue along the golden path towards the final redemption of our people and the world."

Shabbat Shalom

Nachman Kahana

Copyright © 5771-2011 Nachman Kahana

History, Israel, Redemption: Are They Connected?

By Tuvia Brodie

As I read the news across the globe, I see an increasing number of stories that paint a dark picture: destructive storms in the US, locusts swarming in Russia, earthquakes in Japan, volcanic eruptions in Iceland and Chile, an anti-Israel UN--and a non-Jewish Glenn Beck talking repeatedly on American TV to two million viewers daily about Israel at the center of a world-wide battle.

Are these signs that our Jewish Redemption story is getting so close to a tipping point that we can see global signs that something significant is occurring?

I don’t know. But it makes me wonder: how should we think about the Jewish Redemption story?

I know about two major Jewish Redemption narratives. The first posits that our ultimate Redemption will come only through Divine Mercy and Divine intervention. In this narrative, history is mostly irrelevant. Modern Israel is irrelevant. We have only one job: to increase our individual commitment to our religion through Torah-study, mitzvah observance and repentance. There is little or no positive connection between human action and Redemption. In fact, we may be forbidden to attempt to accelerate or bring about that Redemption through our actions.

The second narrative begins with a similar foundation: our Redemption arrives only through Divine Mercy and Divine intervention, and our job is to dedicate ourselves to Torah-study, repentance and mitzvah-observance. But with this second narrative, history counts. It is part of the Redemptive process. History records and instructs, teaching us how and in what direction we grow within a Divine Time-frame. History seems the linear petri dish within which our religious destiny unfolds.

Time: it seems to me that those who believe in the first narrative, where history and historical fact appear irrelevant, may miss something—they may fail to account for Time in the Redemption narrative.

This is an intriguing oversight because time is so important to our religion: many of our laws are tied to a specific time, and our Talmud focuses on analysing ‘time’—the time to sanctify the new moon, the time to celebrate Festivals and Holy Days, the time for prayer, etc.

For any religious Jew, time is truly ‘of the essence’. If ‘time’ is so important, how can one dismiss the importance of ‘Time’? Our Tanach and our Talmud suggest the reality of a Divine Time-line. We don’t typically see it that way, but one level of discussion in our religion is religious-destiny-in-Time, beginning with Creation.

From our religious texts, we learn two fundamentals: we learn about our relationship with our Creator; and we discover how our national religious progress moves from darkness to light, from slavery to Redemption and, most important, from one spiritual level to a another and back again.

The very first Rashi commentary in our Torah announces that the purpose of our Torah is to teach, and the very first national commandment is about, you guessed it, time (identifying the new moon—a time issue). Our Torah is clear: the lessons we are to learn concern time and, by definition, these all unfold within Time.

As we look at our history from Abraham to Solomon, we see our national religious history developing from Divine Promise to one level of Divine Fulfillment. We see the Creator acting within human history for a Divine purpose using a Time-line that is both human and Divine.

From these stories, we see history moving forward like a wave, with national and spiritual ups and downs, from Beginning to an ultimate, promised Completion.

Religious Jews generally do not learn our Tanach and Talmud as history—as is proper—because neither is a history text, built on chronology. Nevertheless, history is not absent or irrelevant. The history is hidden so we can focus on the lesson, not the story.

But, since King Solomon, we have seen both prophecy and history—the promise and fulfilment of ups and downs-- and we can see that Time may not just be something our Talmud studies in order to determine a religious action or obligation; time is also history, where we chart the course of our religious destiny.

Perhaps our religious history is a hidden footprint within our tradition-- the only recorded shadow of the complete Divine Time-line-- a footprint we must search diligently to find, identify and understand.

Perhaps the purpose of this history is to teach lessons and give encouragement, so we can find the strength to stick to the Time-line and push forward towards our ultimate religious destiny.

Our exile from Israel and our ingathering have been prophesied—and validated by history. To many Jews, our historical record proves nothing; but to others, it proves everything: today, for the first time in 2,000 years, there are more Jews in Israel than in any other country; without the establishment of modern Israel, 800,000 Middle East Jews might never have become refugees (between 1948-1957) and then absorbed into the new state; it is highly unlikely that perhaps 230,000 Anglo Jews would have made aliyah to a non-state; and, how many Russian Jews have come to Israel?

The ingathering continues. History unfolds--and Israel validates its role in the Divine Time-Line.

Is it possible that Jews who disconnect from Israel make the same mistake the spies made in this week’s Torah portion? As you may know, that spy story was about two groups—those who chose to disconnect from Israel, and those who chose to connect.

Perhaps we should learn a lesson from our Torah’s spy story: don’t make the wrong choice.

Our Children and the False Gods of the Academic Left

By Tuvia Brodie

As news stories accumulate discussing the danger of being Jewish at Left-leaning American colleges, perhaps we should consider the Left on Israel’s campuses.

The academic Left is a small but potentially powerful force in Israel. It is they who lead the Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement here; they celebrate international condemnation of Israel; and they promote an openly anti-Israel agenda.

By definition, this group is articulate. They are some of the best educated among us, and some are the most honored educators we have. Our college-age children—impressionable and eager to please those who control their grades—are attracted to them like iron particles to a magnet. Whatever kool-aid they offer, our children drink.

The academic Left seem to enjoy almost unlimited freedom. To a large extent, they do as they please. They create rules which few dare question. If you have gone to an Israeli college, you understand the power they exert over our children.

If you have gone to a faculty gathering, you also understand that academe is not a world of equals. In fact, there is no equality. Instead, there is an unequal class structure: the tenured professor; the tenure-seeking professor; the non-tenure-track teacher; the part-time teacher; and the graduate assistant. As with all class-based societies, everyone here has his place and everyone knows his place.

The elite are the tenured. They live with the freedom and the arrogance that come to those called ‘first –class.’

The anti-Israel academic Left is populated, primarily, by two groups, the tenured elite and the untenured wannabees, some of whom will get their tenure because they sing the right songs.

Today, those ‘right’ songs are about creating another state for Arabs—at Israel’s expense. The songs are about ‘social justice’ and ‘equality’. According to this political gospel, the rights of the Arab supercede the rights of the Jew, capitalism is poisonous, and religion is fascism. Our children worship at their feet.

But there is a troubling problem here, because both the call of Academic Left—and the Academic Left itself—is built on hypocrisy.

Haven’t you noticed? While Leftist academics celebrate equality, they themselves benefit from an elitist world that is fundamentally unequal, a world that favors the chosen—the tenured—above all others. While they promote equality and justice through the power of the government over the individual, they demand for themselves the kind of individual freedom you can only find in an unequal world.

Perhaps it is hypocrisy that makes the call of the Academic Left seem so dangerous—the promotion of ‘equality’ and ‘justice’ as the cure for what ails us; for if you do not admit that the world you love rejects the world you promote, can you really admit that the causes you support are toxic?

To understand this question, consider a recent Jonathan Rosenblum essay about America (and Israel): it is not equality that made America wealthy, he argues, but freedom—specifically, the freedom to pursue one’s own economic dream. Equality did not make America great; enhanced freedom did. Interestingly, this is exactly what the tenured academic Left has—almost unlimited freedom; but freedom is exactly what the academic Left rejects for others.

If your children wish a proper grade, they must think the ‘proper’ (anti-Israel) way; the same is often true for those who seek tenure. That is not freedom.

As Rosenblum points out, it is the emphasis of freedom over equality that has made Israel and America number one and two in the world (in that order) for ‘per capita rate of business formation’, which lies at the foundation of successful national wealth; but the academic Left has chosen to sell the reverse--equality over freedom. Our children drink every word.

A case might be made that the value that promotes the most freedom for the most citizens is exactly this value: the belief in individual freedom to create personal wealth. Arab nations seem to have no clue about this—and, you’ll notice, they have few freedoms. It may be no accident that America has such a high rate of business formations; but it is both astounding and predictive that Israel is number one in the world in that category—it astounds because Israel is so small and so restrained by intense security needs, and it is predictive because, based on America’s experience, Israel’s future wealth potential is enormous.

But the academic Left rejects this. Living with unprecedented freedom-- and inequality-- they prefer to seduce our children with songs of an equality and a social conformity their own lifestyle rejects. They promote false gods—and our children worship them.

Certainly, not all academics are Leftists--and not all of our children drink the kool-aid. We should remember that. But as the academic Left sells its false gods to our children, shouldn’t we worry about our children?

Read your Tanach. Do your children understand the consequences of worshipping false gods?

Do you?

Torah as Jewish Culture

By Moshe Feiglin

Jaffa market mincha prayers If you ever go to the Jaffa flea market in the afternoon, you will be treated to a unique experience. At a designated moment, the peddlers stop hawking their wares, the shoppers stop inspecting the merchandise heaped in piles on the sidewalks and all gather for an open-air mincha (afternoon prayers) session. I love this marketplace prayer. It has a special grace. I always prefer to pray with working-people who stop in the middle of their toil to praise G-d than to recite the prayers in the synagogue. When the Torah becomes our national way of life, a culture that bursts forth far from the walls of the study hall, it carries the whisper of redemption on its wings. The Scroll of Ruth that we just read on the holiday of Shavuot this Wednesday is the story of the Jewish People living their Torah culture in their Land. Boaz is not a yeshiva head or a famous rabbi. He is a Jew who works his land. The working people in the Scroll of Ruth remain in their Land despite the famine and abandonment by their leaders. They conduct themselves according to the cultural code of faith and loving kindness that they absorbed from the Torah and that is part of their lives. That is also our goal; to turn our Torah into our culture. "You know," said one of the senior managers of the Knesset channel after I finished an interview there, "all sorts of religious MK's come through our studio. I am secular - I try to understand them, but I just can't. You are the only person with a kippah on his head that I can understand." I do not think that he meant that the religious MKs are not expressing themselves with enough eloquence. I think that he sensed the connection that Manhigut Yehudit makes between Judaism and reality. The Scroll of Ruth teaches us that this authentic connection bears the secret of redemption. Many we merit to bring it soon! Shabbat Shalom

Rav Nachman Kahana on Parashat Be’Ha’alotcha 5771

BS"D Parashat Be’Ha’alotcha

The reading of parashat Be’ha’alotcha this Shabbat, three days after the holiday of Shevuot, is not a common occurrence, but when they do appear in close proximity it has more than symbolic importance.

Shevuot is the day when HaShem designated the Jewish nation to be His "chosen people" and gave us the holy Torah with its many laws, requirements and restrictions.

And the first mitzva in our parsha - lighting the menorah as part of the daily sacrificial service - "sheds light" on the essence of Shevuot.

The parashat begins:

וידבר ה' אל משה לאמר: דבר אל אהרן ואמרת אליו בהעלתך את הנרת אל מול פני המנורה יאירו שבעת הנרות:

And HaShem said to Moshe. Speak to Aharon and say to him, when you raise up the candle, the seven stems should point in the direction of the menora

Rashi explains the unusual use of the term "when you raise up the candle" which should have been "when your light the candle".

שצריך להדליק עד שתהא שלהבת עולה מאליה

Aharon was directed to light the candle until he will be certain that the flame will rise up by itself.

The Torah is HaShem’s directives to His people Israel, from cradle to grave. There is no aspect of human life that does not fall within a Torah mitzva. The laws are stated in the Written Torah, expounded upon in the Oral Torah, Halachic decisions appear in the Shulchan Aruch, and are put into practical application in the responsa literature.

Question: Was it HaShem’s desire to create "Halachic" robots, where the written word is king, and like good disciplined soldiers we fulfill its dictates in a mechanical fashion. To daven when the Halacha says we should, whether or not we understand what we are saying. To give our 10% to charity not really feeling the pain of the recipient. To cry on Tisha Be’Av over a Bet Hamikdash no one really misses, and put away the kinot (lamentation) booklets in the knowledge that we will need them again next year.

Or is there more to being a Torah observant Jew?

I believe that Hashem "had in mind" a very elevated purpose for all the mitzvot.

I will explain:

The Gemara (Ketubot 110b ) records:

ר' חייא בר גמדא מיגנדר בעפרה שנאמר (תהלים קב,טו): 'כי רצו עבדיך את אבניה ואת עפרה יחוננו'

Rabbi Chiya ben Gamda would roll in the soil of Eretz Yisrael, in abidance with the verse (Tehilim 102:15):

כי רצו עבדיך את אבניה ואת עפרה יחננו:

For her children desired her stones and favored her soil

Rashi in his commentary on the actions of Rabbi Chiyah ben Gamda simply repeats the verse:

כי רצו עבדיך את אבניה ואת עפרה יחננו:

For her children desired her stones and favored her soil

What is Rashi, the great teacher and commentator, telling us by simply quoting the verse?

Rashi in his great wisdom is alluding to the most profound idea in Yiddishkeit.

If you look carefully you will see that Rashi quotes the verse from Tehillim as stated in the Gemara’s text, while omitting the essential word:

שנאמר

in abidance with the verse

Rashi is in effect saying, that if one loves Eretz Yisrael because that’s the requirement of the law as stated in the verse, than that is tantamount to respecting and being in awe one’s parents just because the Torah says so. In both cases love that is adjudicated by law is a contradiction in terms; one cannot be compelled to love. Love is beyond the law which stops at the gates of one’s heart.

Aharon was directed to light the menorah until the flame "will rise up by itself". So too is the goal of Shavuot, that the mitzvot were initially presented to us by Hashem as compelling requirements, with the purpose that as we grow in spirituality the mitzvot will become a reflexive part of the Jewish personality. And just as one becomes elevated from the fundamental command to respect and be in awe of one’s parents to the level that it is self evident that this is what should be, so too must it be with regard to all the other Godly commands in the Torah. The mitzvot have to merge into a Torah personality where truth, justice, compassion, love of God and fellow Jew and all else that the Torah demands become ingrained into a natural reflex of the individual Jew.

Rashi is telling us that Rabbi Chiya ben Gamda rolled in the soil of Eretz Yisrael not because the verse instructs one to love the land, but because he himself was aware of the profound kedusha (sanctity) inherent in the Land of Israel.

A short story to illustrate the above.

Two Yeshiva students - in the United States of Brooklyn or Monsey - were comparing their individual private meetings with the rosh yeshiva.

Moshe discussed with the rosh yeshiva the matter of his desire to live in Eretz Yisrael, and Chaim brought to the rosh yeshiva his intention to marry a young lady he was seeing.

The conversation went on as follows:

Moshe: The RY said that as long as I am learning so well there is no reason to leave, especially when there is no imperative mitzva to live in Eretz Yisrael, although one does have a mitzva when doing so.

Chaim: The RY said that as long as I am learning so well there is no reason to stop and get married, especially when there is no imperative mitzva to marry just now, although I would have a mitzva if I would marry her.

Moshe: The RY also said that it is easier to make a living in the US than in Eretz Yisrael, so plan to stay here.

Chaim: The RY also said to me that getting married would require me to work in support of my new family, whereas now I am free of such responsibilities in order to learn.

Moshe: The RY also said that there is little kedusha in the land where the initiatives for its resettlement came from people who were not dati.

Chaim: The RY also said that since I met the young lady through my cousin who is not religious, even though she is very much so, no good can come from such a marriage.

Then Chaim looked at Moshe and said to him with a great smile on is face, "Do You Know something Moshe. I’m going to marry her, because I love her".

Shabbat Shalom

Nachman Kahana

Copyright © 5771-2011 Nachman Kahana

Gilad Shalit is Still in Captivity Because of Us

By Moshe Feiglin

6 Sivan, 5771
June 7, '11

Translated from the article on Ma'ariv's NRG website

The lineup of ex-generals and security officials who over the past few weeks have demoralized the country by urging us to roll up our sleeves for the cyanide shot - hundreds of murderers to be injected straight into the bloodstream of Israeli society in exchange for Gilad Shalit - raises some grave questions. Is there some sort of ideological filter on the way up the ladder to the senior command posts in Israel? How could it be that so many senior security officials hold views that are so antithetical to Israel's security?

We all know that the hundreds of terrorists released in the 2004 Tannenbaum deal have sown death and destruction in Israel. So how could people who are supposed to be responsible for our security encourage the same scenario all over again?

Plainly, Gilad Shalit's release is not a military issue. It is simply a question of the willingness of Israeli society to pay the price. The army may not know where Shalit is - a damning admission in and of itself. But it does know the whereabouts of the Hamas leaders responsible for his captivity.

We could make those Hamas terrorists desire to release Shalit. But we do not want a rocket war here and we do not want international pressure, either. That is why Shalit is still in captivity. We could cut off their electricity, but we do not want demonstrations throughout the world and pictures of the hospitals in Gaza working by candlelight. We do not want to pay that price, so Gilad is still in captivity.

We do not want to face off against the bleeding hearts in our justice system, so Israel's Hamas prisoners will continue to receive visitation rights, academic studies and deluxe conditions that they could never dream of getting elsewhere. That is why Shalit is still in captivity. And possibly the most amazing fact of all: We insist on continuing our payments and monthly salaries to Gilad's captors. That is why Gilad is still in captivity.

With just a bit of creativity, we could employ countless actions that would bring Gilad Shalit home without firing a single shot or endangering a single Israeli soldier. But every action bears a price and Israel's leaders assume that our society is not willing to pay it. That is why Gilad Shalit is still in captivity.

The easy solution is to surrender and release terrorists. It seems, though, that Israeli society is beginning to wake up and understand that the release of terrorists also carries a price that it is not willing to pay.

The Shalit campaign has finally understood that they must change their strategy. We are beginning to see some of those changes in the demonstrations that they hold and we can only hope that they will not stop. After all, Treasury Minister Yuval Steinitz has already clearly stated that it is possible to stop the cash flow from Israel to the Hamas. He even stopped it for a short period of time after the unity agreement between the PLO and Hamas.

Now, Steinitz should explain to the Shalit family why he does not withhold that money on a permanent basis until their son is released. Is it because of some sort of ultimatum of the Hamas? A threat to continue to fire missiles at Israel?

Can our leaders explain what price they are not willing to pay to free Gilad?

The time has come to switch strategies. Block the Brinks trucks carrying money for Gaza. Cut off the electricity to Gaza. Cut off the water. Protest against visitation rights for jailed terrorists. Announce it in public and encourage the huge crowds that participated in pointless marches to get involved. This is the type of activism that the entire nation - both Right and Left - will join.

When Israel's leaders will understand that the people are willing to pay the price of Gilad's release but are not willing to send hundreds of others to their deaths in his stead, we will finally see real action to bring him home.

Obama Toying With American Jewry over Pollard?

By Hillel Fendel

(from IsraelNationalNews.com)

The Long Island-based Jewish Star has published a particularly bold editorial regarding Jonathan Pollard – less about Pollard himself than about the U.S. treason inherent in its refusal to release him.

Entitled “Our America and Pollard,” the paper asks: “What is the sentence for a nation that commits treason against all its citizenry [in failing] to carry out justice without prejudice?”

The paper starkly compares the plight of Pollard with others who have been incarcerated: “As Russian spies in the U.S. are sent back to their homes in Russia within hours of capture, and as Israel has negotiated the release of thousands of terrorists from its prisons, and as Gitmo inmates are sent to the Bahamas with U.S. dollars in their pockets, and as murderers, pedophiles and rapists leave U.S. jails, one Jew sits in an American maximum security prison for 26 years.”

Warning to American Jewry
It then warns American Jewry that it is, essentially, unprotected: "…we should not discount for a moment the gravity of the [U.S. government’s] offense on each and every Jew who thinks he is entitled, as an American, to equal justice by the law that governs the rest of the society of this country.”

“There is an equitable set time of detention for an individual who commits a non-violent crime against his country,” the Jewish Star writes. “What is the sentence for a nation that commits treason against all its citizenry for its failure to carry out justice without prejudice? … [The fact that] our America allow[s] him to languish for decades in prison most certainly diminishes this nation's very essence, strength, foundation and security.”

Congressman Asks: Pollard Worse than Lockerbie Bomber?
At the same time, another prominent American has joined the ranks of those asking U.S. President Barack Obama to release Pollard – and taking a novel approach to this end. Rep. Allen West (R-Fl.), a former U.S. Army lieutenant-colonel who fought in several wars, wrote to Obama, ““If [your government] can consent to the release by the British of the Lockerbie Bomber back to Libya due to health concerns, how can we justify keeping Mr. Pollard behind bars when his crimes were clearly not as serious as a terrorist who murdered hundreds of Americans?”

An Election Ploy?
Another recent article on the topic calling for Pollard’s release stated that Obama needs to take measures to improve his standing among Jewish voters –and that the most concrete step to this end would be to free Pollard.

Farley Weiss, second-vice president of the National Council of Young Israel, wrote in the Arizona Republic that one of Obama’s options, “one that would correct an injustice, would be to release Jonathan Pollard from prison. Pollard has been incarcerated for more than 25 years for having passed classified information to an ally - Israel. He committed an offense for which the average sentence is two to four years. He has expressed remorse for his actions and cooperated with the government. More than a dozen prominent former American governmental powerbrokers, including former secretaries of State George Shultz and Henry Kissinger and Sen. McCain, have publicly stated they favor his release.”

In the event that Weiss, a longtime Pollard supporter, is correct, Obama is liable to wait at least another year - shortly before the next national elections in the U.S. - before actually signing Pollard’s release papers. American Jewry would thus be well advised to wake up to the warnings of the Jewish Star, and ensure that Obama is not led to believe that he can succeed in toying treacherously with them, and with Pollard, to gain Jewish votes.

Apartheid, the Mahdi and the Surprise

By Tuvia Brodie

Once again, the official Palestinian daily Al Hayat al-Jadida has printed yet another Arabic propaganda attack, calling Israel “the Israeli apartheid state.”

Apartheid is a dirty word. It suggests oppression and institutionalized hatred.

Arabs –and their friends—have adopted the word as a fashionable description for Israel.

Jews don‘t agree with this characterization. But that’s not news: Arab and Jew don’t ever seem to agree.

But there is one thing they might agree to: there will be no apartheid in the new ‘Palestine’.

At first glance, the white-only National Party of 1940’s South Africa and the Hamas-Fatah alliance in the Palestinian territories seem similar: both share a strident, even vicious animus towards a homogeneous group each sees as impure and tainted: the black in South Africa and the Jew in Israel.

But as similar as they might appear, a closer look reveals that they are different.

To understand the difference, consider that—while this is not commonly noted-- an ‘apartheid’ political system, such as the prototype in South Africa, will have two major, easily identifiable components. First, there will be laws and regulations designed to force a specific group to remain subservient; and second, those laws and regulations will be supported by a persistent and aggressive propaganda-style attack from both national media and national religious leaders.

The laws and the negative propaganda will be omnipresent—in the churches, the media, the schools, the legislature, the neighborhoods and the marketplace.

There is no respite.

Generally speaking, if only one of these two components is active, the label, ‘apartheid’ may not fit. This is why, for example, the laws and regulations in Arab countries that keep women subservient are typically not called ‘apartheid’: the propaganda-style attack is absent, and the oppressive laws are simply considered to be unique to local culture.

In my opinion, it is not just the existence of repressive law that creates the ugliness called apartheid; it is the public, religious and omnipresent demonization that goes with it, that transform the legal restrictions into something so ugly.

So while white South Africans wanted to oppress blacks with both these components to enforce political repression, the modern Arab Muslim is not interested in treating the Jew this way, for an important reason: he sees the Jew as being reserved for a different consideration altogether.

What appears to separate the National Party of the 1940’s South Africa from the modern Arab is intent: the white-only South Africans wanted only to oppress; the Arabs want to eradicate.

The Arab intent for the Jew has nothing to do with political animus. It has nothing to do with apartheid. It is religious.

Islam, like Christianity, believes in a Messianic era, with a ‘Final Days’ period preceding the Messianic period. For Islam, the key Messianic figure is the twelfth Imam, also called the Mahdi. As with Christianity, evil plays a role in the Islamic Messianic vision, and for much of today’s Islam, Israel and evil are connected. Iran President Ahmadinejad made this clear recently when he said that the return of the Mahdi is near, but the major blocking point is Israel; the evil stain called Israel must be removed before the Mahdi can come. As William Wagner, senior professor at the Golden Gate Baptist Theology Seminary has said (as quoted on CBN.com), Israel must be destroyed in order to usher in the Mahdi.

That’s the script. There’s even proof that the days leading up the Mahdi are already here: the UN is turning against Israel; the US now toys with Israel the way a cat toys with a mouse before dining; the PA is about to create another Muslim state where Jews will be expelled —and best of all, nobody objects to any of this, not the UN or the US or the EU; indeed, not even Israeli leaders seem to object.

It could take a few more years before Ahmadinejad gets his nuclear arsenal—to help move things along-- but by then there should be six million Jews in Israel, and the prospect of killing six million Jews excites: the Nazis killed six million but nothing happened; Iran can kill six million and the Mahdi will come!

This is an epic story. The Palestinian Authority is so excited that they have begun printing maps showing their ‘ Palestine’ in place of Israel.

In one sense, Israel is already gone.

The beginning of the end has begun. Why should the Arabs be concerned about apartheid?

They bring good news: there will be no apartheid in the new Palestinian state.

The UN will love that.

Of course, there is a problem here. There always is with big ideas.

Along with the good news, there is, for the Arab world, also bad news.

The bad news is, this movie has a surprise ending: the Jews win.

The Temple is Beyond Religion

By Moshe Feiglin

Illustration courtesy of the Temple Institute

Sometimes I think that if those called "secular" would understand the essence of the Temple, they would run to build it despite the outrage of the "religious." The Temple is the quintessential expression of the direct connection between man and his G-d. Religion only developed when the Holy Temple was taken from us. All the authenticity lacking in ceremonial religion, the aversion that attacks the secular Jew when he sees the 'meaningless' routines, as it were, in the 4 cubits of Jewish law that are all we have left since the Temple was destroyed - all the disconnection between religion and life are a byproduct of the loss of the Temple.

If the seculars would only know that they could really live - not through ceremonies, but really live the entire length and breadth of their personal, national and universal lives, with G-d literally with them - physically and metaphysically - they would run to build the Temple.

And the religious? They would oppose rebuilding the Temple, of course. Not only because they wouldn't manage to determine the Jewish law pertaining to how much, what, when and where exactly; but simply because they have become accustomed to religion. They have become comfortable with the dichotomy between faith and life. They are used to the parallel lanes that will never intersect - except for the rabbinical discourses that always end with "May the Temple be rebuilt" - but not by us, of course.

G-d, however, has His own ways to bring our redemption, the redemption of the entire world, upon us. During the period between Independence Day and Jerusalem Day let us remember that we did not return to the Sinai, Golan or Nahariya because we chose to. In the same vein, the Temple will surely be rebuilt - and it will carry us on its shoulders even though it will be we who will build it.

Shabbat Shalom