Monday 26 February 2024

On the Public Stage - For the Release of Hostages and for Democracy in Israel

In September, and then again in October, I had the privilege of speaking to large crowds at two events in Central London.

The first, was a pro-Democracy rally where I shared this


And then, awfully,  just weeks later at a rally for the release of all the hostages, but particularly as a Shaliach for Noam Sagi whose mother (now released) was taken on the 7th October 2023.

Posting here for anyone interested


Friday 26 January 2024

On Holocaust Memorial Day at New London Synagogue

This year Holocaust Memorial Day falls on Saturday 27th January. 

I want to pay tribute to all those who have made this day such an important occasion in our national calendar. 

 

We are all invited to place a candle in our window at 8pm this Saturday evening. Iconic buildings will be lit up purple and there is a project to light 6 million ‘digital candles’ on billboards across the country. The iconic billboard at Piccadilly Circus will display portraits of Holocaust and genocide survivors in the lead up to this national moment

Registration to join streamed curated moments from the Holocaust Memorial Day 2024 Ceremony is open here https://www.hmd.org.uk/take-part-in-holocaust-memorial-day/ukhmd/ 

 

At New London, we will be reciting a Memorial Prayer in our services this Shabbat but deferring our major commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day to next Shabbat, 3rd February. Next week marks the 75th Anniversary of the arrival in this country of our member Hannah Lewis MBE. Having survived the Holocaust in the Adampol, in the Labour Camp and in hiding, Hannah came to London – in part owing the actions of another New Londoner, Basil (subsequently Lord) Feldman, or blessed memory. The theme of HMD this year is the Fragility of Freedom and Hannah’s story – which she will be sharing from the Bimah – is a hugely important reminder of this fragility. It is also a privilege and an honour to be able to hear Hannah's story - I encourage all to make every effort to attend. 

In terms of age-appropriate or related concerns, Hannah will be focussing on her journey to London, not her direct experiences of the Holocaust as it surrounded her. We will have some more information available at the Synagogue regarding her remarkable story of survival. 

 

I want to, also, share with the community two other opportunities for engaging with this important time. 

  

The Most Precious of Goods is a theatrical performance of the French novella, translated and directed by Nicholas Kent with music from friend of the community, Gemma Rosefield (who has played cello at our recent Slichot evenings). Marylebone Theatre until 3rd February (I’ll be there on Thursday 1sthttps://www.marylebonetheatre.com/productions/the-most-precious-of-goods 

 

Revenge: Our Dad the Nazi Killer is an extraordinary new documentary about two Australian brothers who investigate their father and uncle, Holocaust survivors, and whether they might have been responsible for the mysterious deaths of Nazi war criminals who fled to their country after the war hoping to start a new life and avoid persecution. Available to stream https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001vn46/storyville-revenge-our-dad-the-nazi-killer 

 

Rabbi Jeremy 

Thursday 7 December 2023

The Chanukah Giraffe


 

Chanukah has always asked the question – are you, as a Jew, willing to raise your head above the parapet? Right back in the earliest days, the heart of the Maccabean revolt was the refusal to shrug and fall in line when the surrounding society said, “Don’t be Jewish.” The Maccabees found this intolerable. And so, here we are. 

 

Two hundred years later, the Rabbis articulated rules for the placement of the Chanukiyah. Candles, they taught, should be placed, "outside the house, or in the window overlooking the public space". People needed to see that we were here, proud of who we are and what we stand for, and proud to be different. They added, “In times of danger, it’s enough to light on your table.” Sometimes discretion is nobler than valour, but this extension of the neck has always been a Shikul, something to weigh up. As Jews, especially as Jews of the Diaspora we have long been used to marking carefully ways in which we fall in line with the expectations of our surrounding society, or raise our heads above the parapet and prove ourselves as different – at this Christmasy time of year most especially. And now, here we are, with horror along the southern border of Israel, destruction in Gaza and tension on the streets of London. 

 

There is something remarkable in the Chabad-led programme to put up public Chanukiyot … everywhere. I have cycled past three this morning. My Chabad colleagues lead the way in refusing to back down; wearing the same clothes, and the same outward commitments to our faith, come what may. 

 

This Chanukah is both something tragically new and something that has re-raised the very essence of this festival to the surface. The essence of Chanukah has never been a cute story about everlasting oil. It’s always been that it takes a certain kind of bravery – and in the language of Rabbi Steven Bayar – the neck of a giraffe to make a difference in the world. Not a foolhardy stupidity – “in times of danger, light your Chanukiyah on the table and that’s enough,” – but a refusal to back down. Rudyard Kipling, no great friend of Jews, had it right. “If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you … or being hated, don’t give way to hating.” 

 

And maybe, this is the real lesson of a flame. Candles, even ones powered by miraculous flasks of oil, need protection from the elements. They can’t be assumed to survive the wafts of societal pressure. A flame, and the heat, warmth, delight and inspiration we can derive from a flame, demands our effort. It has always been so. 

 

Happy Chanukah. 

 

Wednesday 22 November 2023

On Abortion

 I was asked by a teen congregant for Judaism's approach to abortion. I responded with this.


Judaism's position on abortion falls into neither of two main camps on this difficult issue - neither 'pro-life' nor 'pro-choice.' 

My primary teacher on this issue is a fellow classmate in the Rabbinical School where we were both ordained. She, Rabbi Dalia Kronish, carries the genetic code for dwarfism and hearing someone standing tall at four-foot-nothing explain why they think there is a problem with people doing genetic tests and choosing to abort 'non-perfect' children is one of the most powerful things I have ever heard. You might also be interested in the writing of Rabbi Danya Rutenberg on this issue, for example here https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2022/06/judaism-abortion-rights-religious-freedom/661264/
Some sources.
There is a passage in Exodus (21:22-23) which compares the debt owed by a person who hits someone who then dies with the debt owed by a person who hits someone and causes them to miscarry a foetus. The former is liable, 'life for a life,' the latter pays financial damages. 
That is to say, the Bible considers the foetus as something significant and of legal standing, but not as a full life.
The major impact of this view is discussed in the central Rabbinic text, Mishnah Ohalot 7:6. Here the rabbis consider what to do when a woman is having "difficulty giving birth" (carrying a child and certainly giving birth were, and even today remain, occasionally dangerous). The rabbis are clear that such a foetus should be "cut up and brought out limb by limb." That is to say, it is obligatory to abort a dangerous foetus, even when its limbs are recognisable. The Mishnah goes on to say, once the majority of the body has come out, you can't get involved since "one soul can't be pushed aside for another soul." That suggests that a foetus only becomes a 'soul' when it emerges from the womb.
Differing Jewish perspectives on abortion range from those who hold that abortion is only permissible when the 'difficulty' referred to in the Mishnah is clearly and immediately life-threatening (at which point it is actually compulsory, even during labour) and those who hold that 'difficulty' can include a much broader range of even psychological reasons - if a mother feels she would be unable to love a child as much as a child deserves to be loved. For those who hold the latter position - including myself - I do think it makes sense to consider a sliding scale where the most life-threatening cases should be aborted even very late-stage, but less clear-cut cases of danger should be permitted only at an earlier stage. 

Is that helpful? 

Monday 20 November 2023

And He Lifted Up His Voice and Wept - A Sermon on Shabbat Toledot

 Always a difficult Parasha

I get that we are supposed to favour Jacob over Esau and indeed find ourselves, the Children of Israel, in the narrative of our patriarch Jacob.

But … I never have.

Jacob comes across in this week’s Torah reading as a bit of a schemer, quick to do his brother out of his birthright at the beginning of the Parasha. And then quick to follow his mother’s – let it be said – desperately dishonest advice, at the end.

And I know the Rabbinic commentaries, that Rebecca knew that the covenant had to run through her favoured son, which is supposed to justify the deceit. But it doesn’t help much.

And I know Easau, the red-headed, the purchaser of red-lentil soup, is the ancestor of the Edomites who wreak such havoc later in our story and presage the terrible things done to our people by the Romans, called Edom. I know also the Rabbinic commentaries that associate every action of Easau with idolatrous wrongdoing. But it doesn’t shift me much.

I mean, I know he’s quick to sell off his birthright;

          וְיַעֲקֹ֞ב נָתַ֣ן לְעֵשָׂ֗ו לֶ֚חֶם וּנְזִ֣יד עֲדָשִׁ֔ים וַיֹּ֣אכַל וַיֵּ֔שְׁתְּ וַיָּ֖קׇם וַיֵּלַ֑ךְ וַיִּ֥בֶז עֵשָׂ֖ו אֶת־הַבְּכֹרָֽה׃

That verse is brutal in its stripped backparsimony.

He ate, he drank, he got up, he went and he spurned, did Esau, the birthright.

But Easau is not supposed to be the smart one, who dwells in the encampment studying. He’s the guy out hunting in the field and he’s, at the very least, tired and hungry.

He certainly regrets the action.

When Easau finds that Jacob has come in and taken the blessing from their father from under his nose – Bmirmah – as Isaac says it, in guile. Easau wails.

That’s another extraordinary passage,

[Esau] said, “Was he, then, named Jacob that he might supplant me these two times? First, he took away my birthright and now he has taken away my blessing!” And he added, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”

Isaac said to Esau, “But I have made him master over you: I have given him all his brothers for servants, and sustained him with grain and wine. What, then, can I still do for you, my son?”

And Esau said to his father, “Have you but one blessing, Father? Bless me too, Father!” And Esau wept aloud.

 

It breaks my heart every year.

I know people like Easau, a bit simpler than the very sharpest of men, but loyal and decent and, by the way – who wins the prize for Honouring your father in the context of this week’s Parasha?

And I do know I am one of the Children of Israel, one of the people of the God of Abraham, and for me to be in this place – this place I love, holding this heritage I adore -  I need that the Biblical story unfolds, not through Easau, but through Jacob – who is to become Israel in next week’s Torah reading, when he wrestles that angel.

But it doesn’t sit easy.

And every year, when I come to this parashah, and I read through the classic commentaries that justify the actions of Jacob and Rebekkah and Isaac, and the modern commentaries, particularly from within the Orthodox world, I’m left cold. To mix my metaphors, a little as if I’ve been given something beautiful to eat, but it’s got ashen, somehow in my mouth.

So, for those of you who have heard me preach on this Parasha before, you will have heard me preach about destabilising narratives which see me retreat behind the sense I have of what I know is right, or preaching about not falling for the assumptions of the evil of the other, or that sort of thing.

Actually, it’s not even the tale of Jacob and Easau that brings up this destabilized sense of my relationship with the Avot and Imahot of these stories – the founding parents, the archetypes and the bases of our faith.

Back a generation, as it were, there’s the story of the Hagar. Brought in to provide a child to an infertile couple and then kicked out when the couple manage their own child. Hagar is, of course, the mother of Ishmael – held to be the first Arab.

It’s almost a trop.

That we have a thread of connection that binds us to archetypes who shape everything we are, as Jews. But none of them is a paragon of perfection on the straight-forward reading of their lives. They  behave, at times, in ways that cause us and other characters in our sacred scripture distress.

The characters who suffer the behaviour of our great archetypes go down in our literary and religious history as our enemies, but when we read these tales with an open heart, they inspire empathy too. At least they do for me. Actually, it might be even more complex than that.

The great Tikvah Frymer Kensky in her book, reading the Women of the Bible, writes

Hagar is the prototype of Israel. Everything that happens to Hagar is paralleled by the story of Israel's sacred history. The liberation, the wandering in the desert, the promise from God. The unsettling nature of the story is that Sara is our mother, but Hagar is us. You sympathize with Hagar and feel uneasy about it. That is the technique of the storyteller. Hagar is the double of Israel, yet so is Sara.

We might be both sides of each of these stories; hero and antihero all bound into one.

I don’t really have an end to this sermon.

I don’t have a neat way to wrap it up and apply it to the awful bloody brokenness of the Middle East.

I certainly don’t excuse or feel anything less than utter contempt for the perpetrators of the horrors of 7th October, or anything less than utter heartbreak for those suffering.

But I can’t retreat behind only feeling for one side of this story.

Maybe there is a lesson in a Midrash which tells us how Abraham felt about his two sons – the covenantal son, the one who goes on to bear the story from his own generation into the future, Isaac, and the other son – the one to be sent away – Ishmael.

When God tells Abraham, “Take your son, your only son, the one you love, Isaac,” the Rabbis assume the conversation between God and Abraham,

“take your son,” – I have two sons

“your only son,” – they are each the only son of their respective mothers

“the one you love,” – is there a limit on how much we can love? – Says Abraham, in the mind of the rabbis of Bereishit Rabba.

Why does there have to be a limit on the amount we can love.

Or, from this week’s reading, my heart is still snagging, and ripping on that verse Easau shares, when he realises that Isaac has blessed Jacob instead of himself.

Have you but one blessing father? Bless me also father -  הַֽבֲרָכָ֨ה אַחַ֤ת הִֽוא־לְךָ֙ אָבִ֔י בָּֽרֲכֵ֥נִי גַם־אָ֖נִי אָבִ֑י:

But mainly, my heart is just with the continuation of that verse.

וַיִּשָּׂ֥א עֵשָׂ֛ו קֹל֖וֹ וַיֵּֽבְךְּ

And he lifted up his voice and wept.

Shabbat Shalom

 

Monday 13 November 2023

How to Stop Making the World Worse - Or - Do They ALL Really Hate Us?

My phone began flashing alerts late on Saturday night. Since then I have probably received over 200 expressions of concern from across the globe as well as local political and civil leadership and members of the Synagogue I serve.

A short reel emerged on Instagram and Twitter which showed a man wearing a Keffiyeh spraying green smoke into the air while he, and a man unseen in a car, waved aloft Palestinian flags. The version of the film I saw was captioned, “Pro-Hama protesters stopped by Abbey Road Synagogue in London, setting off flares and screaming at Jewish families who are leaving Shabbat service.” The Synagogue I serve as rabbi is, of course, the only Synagogue on Abbey Road.

The story was picked up by the Telegraph and the Daily Mail who carried a confirmation from the Campaign Against Antisemitism that they were “'aware' of Jewish families 'being targeted on their way out of synagogue' and had 'received multiple reports of police having to escort congregants away in groups for their own safety'” The report in the Jewish Chronicle made explicit the Campaign Against Antisemitism's claim that "Families attending the Masorti New London Synagogue on Abbey Road, St John’s Wood, in northwest London, on Saturday were "being targeted on their way out of synagogue."'

The report in the Daily Mail carried a quote from the Campaign Against Antisemitism, “‘Naturally the Jewish community is terrified.’” 

Oddly, the Twitter account where the film was posted no longer exists. And the IG reel is no longer current. Links to the original Social Media postings and press reports are all posted below.[1]

What Happened?

The location where the protestor stood with his spray can (under a sloped bough in front of a nearby house) is immediately recognisable. It’s around 50m away from the Synagogue. Stood under the same bough, I was just about able to make out a weather vane on the Synagogue roof. 



The weather vane is outlined in blue above.

Or, if a video is easier ...



On the morning of 11th November, roadworks along Abbey Road resulted in a significant backlog of traffic. The car would have been held up by these roadworks and it seems likely the man got out of the car while it was in traffic. It’s less likely that the protestor deliberately stopped 50m away from the Synagogue to target the Synagogue.

The protestor may have acted in ways I would oppose. But it is not correct to say his actions should be construed as an attack on the Synagogue.

I have also been in touch with Borough and Ward police representation, our own security leads, and contacts at two other Synagogues in St Johns Wood and three Synagogues closer to Central London and the site of the pro-Palestinian rally on Saturday. None of us is aware of police being called to escort congregants for their own safety. It may be that some group was targeted and we understand that there is a police investigation but we have found no evidence of a targeting of the building or our members.

There is nervousness among the members of the community I represent. I feel it in myself. I went down to Central London on Saturday 4th November to experience the end of the pro-Palestine march last week. There were chants, fliers and signs which, at the very least, seemed to call for the ethnic cleansing of some 7 million Jews between ‘the river and the Sea.’ Reports of injuries suffered by Police officers and video footage of angry and occasionally violent behaviour are a cause of deep concern for me, my community and, I know, all decent-thinking people in this country. There has also been an escalation of largely minor antisemtic attacks on members of the Jewish community in this country in these awful times.

But that part of the community I know best is not ‘terrified.’ And I do not wish to be characterised as such. Aside from being untrue it also suggests that those who wish to instil terror amongst us are more powerful than those who persist in trying to find ways to live together.

 



[1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12738885/Police-launch-probe-Jewish-families-leaving-north-London-synagogue-targeted-pro-Palestinian-activists-spraying-green-smoke-shouting-cars-Armistice-Day-march.html 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/11/11/protesters-extreme-anti-semitic-signs-pro-palestinian-march/

https://www.thejc.com/news/news/anti-israel-activists-target-jewish-families-leaving-london-synagogue-1AFAHdVsTKoFboS0fu8NFu 

https://x.com/Christo89092169/status/1723460969752342942?t=gvun3po7t4EvhIwTuynfpw&s=08

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CzhRCfQNUU7/?igshid=YnVkcmZmZHJzOTZn 

Thursday 9 November 2023

Sources That Ground a Jewish Military Ethic

 


Military Ethics

 

Part One – Biblical Models

a) Amalek

Deuteronomy 25

Remember what Amalek did to you on your journey, after you left Egypt— (18) how, undeterred by fear of God, he surprised you on the march, when you were famished and weary, and cut down all the stragglers in your rear. (19) Therefore, when your God grants you safety from all your enemies around you, in the land that your God is giving you as a hereditary portion, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget!

 

b) Jericho

Joshua 6

Now Jericho was shut up tight because of the Israelites; no one could leave or enter.) (2) GOD said to Joshua, “See, I will deliver Jericho into your hands—its king and warriors. (3) Let all your troops march around the city and complete one circuit of the city. Do this six days, … Thereupon the city wall will collapse, and the troops shall advance, every man straight ahead.” …On the seventh day, they rose at daybreak and marched around the city, in the same manner, seven times; that was the only day that they marched around the city seven times. (16) On the seventh round, as the priests blew the horns, Joshua commanded the troops, “Shout! For GOD has given you the city. (17) The city and everything in it are to be proscribed for GOD; only Rahab the prostitute is to be spared, and all who are with her in the house, because she hid the messengers we sent. (18) But you must beware of that which is proscribed, or else you will be proscribed: if you take anything from that which is proscribed, you will cause the camp of Israel to be proscribed; you will bring calamity upon it.

וְרַק־אַתֶּם֙ שִׁמְר֣וּ מִן־הַחֵ֔רֶם פֶּֽן־תַּחֲרִ֖ימוּ וּלְקַחְתֶּ֣ם מִן־הַחֵ֑רֶם וְשַׂמְתֶּ֞ם אֶת־מַחֲנֵ֤ה יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ לְחֵ֔רֶם וַעֲכַרְתֶּ֖ם אוֹתֽוֹ

(19) All the silver and gold and objects of copper and iron are consecrated to GOD; they must go into the treasury of GOD.” (20) So the troops shouted when the horns were sounded. When the troops heard the sound of the horns, they raised a mighty shout and the wall collapsed. The troops rushed into the city, every man straight in front of him, and they captured the city. (21) They exterminated everything in the city with the sword: man and woman, young and old, ox and sheep and donkey. (22) But Joshua bade the two men who had spied out the land, “Go into that prostitute’s house and bring out the woman and all that belong to her, as you swore to her.” … They burned down the city and everything in it. But the silver and gold and the objects of copper and iron were deposited in the treasury of the House of GOD. (25) Only Rahab the prostitute and her family were spared by Joshua, along with all that belonged to her, and she dwelt among the Israelites—as is still the case. For she had hidden the messengers that Joshua sent to spy out Jericho.

 

c) When You Go Out to War

Deuteronomy 20

(10) When you approach a town to attack it, you shall offer it terms of peace. (11) If it responds peaceably and lets you in, all the people present there shall serve you at forced labor. (12) If it does not surrender to you, but would join battle with you, you shall lay siege to it; (13) and when your God delivers it into your hand, you shall put all its males to the sword. (15) Thus you shall deal with all towns that lie very far from you, towns that do not belong to nations hereabout. (16) In the towns of the latter peoples, however, which your God is giving you as a heritage, you shall not let a soul remain alive. (17) No, you must proscribe them—the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites—as your God has commanded you, (18) lest they lead you into doing all the abhorrent things that they have done for their gods and you stand guilty before your God.

 

(19) When in your war against a city you have to besiege it a long time in order to capture it, you must not destroy its trees, wielding the ax against them. You may eat of them, but you must not cut them down. Are trees of the field human to withdraw before you into the besieged city? (20) Only trees that you know do not yield food may be destroyed; you may cut them down for constructing siegeworks against the city that is waging war on you, until it has been reduced.

 

Part Two - Self Defence

Exodus 22

(1) If the thief is seized while tunnelling and beaten to death, there is no bloodguilt in that case. (2) If the sun had already risen, there is bloodguilt in that case.

 

Sanhedrin 72a

מתני׳ הבא במחתרת נידון על שם סופו

 פטור: גמ׳ אמר רבא מאי טעמא דמחתרת חזקה אין אדם מעמיד עצמו על ממונו והאי מימר אמר אי אזילנא קאי לאפאי ולא שביק לי ואי קאי לאפאי קטילנא ליה והתורה אמרה אם בא להורגך השכם להורגו

Rava says: What is the reason for this case of the burglar? There is a presumption that a person does not restrain himself when faced with losing his possessions, and therefore this burglar must have said to themselves: If I go in and the owner sees me, they will rise against me and not allow me to steal from him, and if he rises against me, I will kill him. And the Torah stated a principle: If someone comes to kill you, rise and kill him first.

 

Milchemet Mitzvah

Eruvin   45a

Rav Yehuda, said that Rav said: ...if foreigners came with regard to lives, they may go out against them with their weapons, and they may desecrate Shabbat due to them. And with regard to a town that is located near the border, even if they did not come with regard to lives, but rather with regard to matters of hay and straw, i.e., to raid and spoil the town, they may go out against them with their weapons, and they may desecrate Shabbat due to them

 

Part Four - Optional and Compulsory Wars, Milchemet Reishut, Michemet Chovah

Mishneh Torah Hilchot Melachim u’Milchamot 5:1

A king should not wage other wars before a milchemet mitzvah. What is considered as milchemet mitzvah? The war against the seven nations who occupied Eretz Yisrael, the war against Amalek, and a war fought to assist Israel from an enemy which attacks them.
Afterwards, he may wage a milchemet hareshut, i.e. a war fought with other nations in order to expand the borders of Israel or magnify its greatness and reputation.

 

Part Five - Between Commonwealths

Mishnah Avot 4:1

Ben Zoma stated: ... Who is strong? One who conquers his inclination, as it says: "He who is slow to anger is better than a strong man, and a master of his passions is better than the conqueror of a city. (Proverbs 16)"

 

1 Samuel 16

[King David was] a mighty man of valor, and a man of war.

Sanhedrin 93

"Brave Fighter": — that he knows what to respond; "Man of War": —

that he knows how to give and take in the war of Torah.

 

Shlomo Goren, Spirit and Power in the Teachings of Judaism

The holiday of Hanukkah is also a symbol and a model of the victory of the few over the many, in light the war’s uneven nature and the specifically religious goals of the Greeks, for whom it was a war of religious persecution to make them [the Jewish People] forget their Torah. Nevertheless, the Rabbis of the Talmud did not find it appropriate to emphasize the military victories, but rather the miracle of the oil and the menorah ... . This comes to teach us to what degree the Sages opposed war and the people refrained from crowning the military heroes and the victors in battle. This was done in order to negate this type of heroism which relates to a particular individual. This is the greatest danger to the principles of faith and to the Torah of Israel — to connect heroism and physical victory on the battlefield to man.

 

Chaim Nahum Bialek 1903, City of Slaughter

Crushed in their shame, they saw it all; They did not stir nor move; Perhaps, perhaps, each watcher had it in his heart to pray: A miracle, O Lord,—and spare my skin this day! Those who survived this foulness, who from their blood awoke, Beheld their life polluted, the light of their world gone out. They crawled forth from their holes, they fled to the house of the Lord, They offered thanks to Him, the sweet benedictory word. The matter ends; and nothing more. And all is as it was before.

 

Part Six - The Third Commonwealth

Declaration of Independence

The Land of Israel was the birthplace of the Jewish people. Here their spiritual, religious and political identity was shaped. Here they first attained statehood, created cultural values of national and universal significance and gave to the world the eternal Book of Books.

 

Anita Shapiro, Ben Gurion Vehatanakh

Ben-Gurion viewed the establishment of the Jewish state "not as the continuation of life in Warsaw, Odessa, and Crakow, but as an essentially new beginning, although a beginning intertwined with a distant past, the past of Joshua ben Nun, David … and the early Hasmoneans."

 

 

 

 

 

Part Seven - Shlomo Goren – Largely based on Arye Edrei[1]

Shlomo Goren - Wikipedia The IDF Rabbi at Jerusalem's Reunification | International Fellowship of  Christians and Jews

One of the foremost rabbis to direct his attention to these questions was Rabbi Shlomo Goren. As noted, Rabbi Goren founded the Israel Defense Forces Rabbinate and served as its first Chief Rabbi for about two decades. He subsequently served as Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv and then as Chief Rabbi

of Israel. The scope of his scholarly work is very broad, encompassing numerous books and hundreds of articles, many dealing with military conduct according to halakhah (Jewish law). In his writings, he dealt with the many aspects of laws relating to the military, from technical aspects such as the operation of a military camp according to Jewish law to the broader legal and ethical aspects of war.

 

Response to War

This book of rulings is different than regular rulings in civil law and than all other books of responsa. The topics in this book do not have an ongoing tradition of rulings from generation to generation. There is nothing parallel in the Shulhan Arukh, or in other codes of Jewish law… From the time of Bar Kochba ... there were no laws of the military, of war, and of national security that had a real connection to the lives of the people. For nearly 2000 years, these issues appeared as "laws for the messiah". Even Maimonides’ Laws of [Kings and] War[s] are not capable of guiding the establishment of military procedure for the

modern day State of Israel, since they are also directed to messianic times.

 

[With regard to] the measure of legal or ethical responsibility that falls on officers assigned to take charge of the welfare and security of Jewish or non-Jewish individuals, groups, or squads ... : To what degree does the Torah view those appointed to be indirectly responsible for crimes and transgressions committed against the population for which they are accountable?

 


 

Edrie

The second source that Goren turned to is the fascinating law of the eglah arufah ("Rite upon Finding a Corpse outside Town") from Deuteronomy.64 This law relates to situations in which a corpse is found in a field outside city limits and it is not clear who murdered the person. The law states that the Priests must measure which city is closest to the place where the body was found and that the Elders of that city must slaughter a calf and declare: "Our hands have not shed this blood, neither have our eyes seen it. Forgive, Lord, your people Israel, whom you have redeemed, and suffer not innocent blood to remain in the midst of your people Israel."  The Rabbinical Sages raised the following obvious question:

[Question] And would it enter our minds that the elders of the court are shedders of blood?

[Answer] Rather, [they declare that] he did not come to our area and we allowed him to depart without food, and we did not see him and allow him to go without escort.

 

This very query, Goren argued, is indicative of the fact that the Sages viewed the City Elders as morally responsible for everything that takes place in their territory, including the welfare and well-being of both the general population and strangers.

 

Maimonides, Laws of Kings and Wars 6:7

When besieging a city in order to capture it, you should not surround it on all four sides, but only on three sides, allowing an escape path for anyone who wishes to save his life, as it says: "And they warred against Midian as God had commanded Moshe."—Based on tradition, they learned that thus God had commanded Moses.

 

Edrie

Rabbi Goren claimed that this law is relevant to the contemporary wars of Israel [specifically the siege on Beirut] and that it should be implemented in its literal sense. This position has considerable ramifications.

Rabbi Goren also referred to Rabbi Meir Simcha of Dvinsk (1843-1926), the author of the Meshech Hokhmah Commentary on the Torah, who discussed the law of leaving the fourth side open and the question of why Maimonides did not list it as a separate commandment. His conclusion was that allowing an escape route during a siege is essentially a matter of strategy, i.e., that leaving an opening for escape reduces the motivation of the enemy to engage in battle. Rabbi Goren strongly rejected this explanation, arguing that we should not even consider the possibility that the commandments of the Torah relate to military tactics. It was clear to him that the rationale underlying this law is to foster mercy for the lives of one’s enemies.

 

Part Eight - Kibiyeh

Jewish Reflections on War & Peace (ahem, me)[2]

In 1953 Palestinian terrorists launched attacks on Israel from Kibiya, a village on the then Jordanian-controlled West Bank. The Israeli military responded ferociously. The village was all but destroyed; many villagers were killed.

 

Rav Shaul Yisraeli: Takrit Kibiyeh

There is a place for acts of retribution and revenge against the oppressors of Israel. … Those who are unruly are responsible for any damage that comes to them, their sympathizers, or their children. They must bear their sin.  There is no obligation to refrain from reprisal for fear that it might harm innocent people, for we did not cause it.  They are the cause and we are innocent.

Yisraeli justified the attack on Kibiya with reference to a classic Rabbinic concept. The community of nations, he claimed, believed these kinds of military actions were permissible, therefore Israel could avail herself of this international consensus in an application of a classic Rabbinic principle dina d’malkhuta dina – the law of the land is the law.[11] ‘The foundation of dina d’malkhutah dina relates not only to what transpires within a state, but also to international matters as is the accepted custom’, claimed Yisraeli. Putting aside the issue of whether the international community would have accepted the legality of actions taken in Kibiyah, Yisraeli’s claim is that Israel should be judged by the standard of the ethics of nations at large. If the British bomb Dresden and the Americans lay waste to Hiroshima (both examples cited in support of his position), the Israelis can lay waste to Kibiya not only as a matter of military expediency, but also without religious qualm.

 

Yeshayahu Leibowitz: After Kibiyah[3]

We can, indeed, justify the action of Kibiyah before "the world." [Even though] its spokesmen and leaders admonish us for having adopted the methods of "reprisal"- cruel mass punishment of innocent people for the crimes of others in order to prevent their recurrence, a method which has been condemned by the conscience of the world. We could argue that we have not behaved differently than did the Americans, with the tacit agreement of the British, in deploying the atomic bomb… It is therefore possible to justify this action, but let us not try to do so. Let us rather recognize its distressing nature. There is an instructive precedent for Kibiyeh: the story of Shekhem and Dinah. The sons of Jacob did not act as they did out of pure wickedness and malice. They had a decisive justification: 'Should one deal with our sister as with a harlot?!'… Nevertheless, because of this action, their father Jacob cursed the two tribes for generations.

 

There is , however, a specifically Jewish aspect to the Kibiyeh incident, not as a moral problem but an authentically religious one. We must ask ourselves: what produced this generation of youth, which felt no inhibition or inner compunction in performing the atrocity when given the inner urge and external occasion for retaliation? After all, these young people were not a wild mob but youth raised and nurtured on the values of a Zionist education, upon concepts of the dignity of man and human society. The answer is that the events at Kibiyeh were a consequence of applying the religious category of holiness to social, national, and political values and interests - a usage prevalent in the education of young people as well as in the dissemination of public information. The concept of holiness - the concept of the absolute which is beyond all categories of human thought and evaluation - is transferred to the profane. From a religious standpoint only God is holy, and only His imperative is absolute. All human values and all obligations and undertakings derived from them are profane and have no absolute validity. Country, state, and nation impose pressing obligations and tasks which are sometimes very difficult. They do not, on that account, acquire sanctity. In our discourse and practice we have uprooted the category of holiness from its authentic location and transferred it to inappropriate objects, thus incurring all the dangers involved in such a distorted use of the concept. 

 

Part Eight – Reprisals/Redeeming Hostages – And Fear

Genesis 14

They also took Lot, the son of Abram’s brother, and his possessions, and departed; for he had settled in Sodom.  When Abram heard that his kinsman’s [household] had been taken captive, he mustered his retainers and went in pursuit. At night, he and his servants deployed against them and defeated them; and he pursued them as far as Hobah, which is north of Damascus.

Genesis 15

And God said to Abram, “Fear not.”

 

Bereishit Rabba 44:4

Rabbi Levi said two [interpretations],

Rabbi Levi said: Because our forefather Abraham was fearful, and saying: ‘Perhaps those people whom I killed, there was among them one righteous man, or one God-fearing man.
Rabbi Levi said another interpretation: Because our forefather Abraham was fearful and saying: ‘Perhaps those kings whom I killed, their sons will assemble multitudes and they will come and wage war against me.’

 

Part Nine - Peace

Megillah 18a

And why did they make ‘sim shalom’ - ‘set peace’ the last blessing of the Amidah, after the Priestly Blessing, as it says, ‘And the Priests will set My name on the Children of Israel and I will bless them.’ (Numbers 6) And the blessing of the Holy Blessed One is peace, as it says, ‘GOD will bless God’s people with peace’ (Psalm 29)

Ritba Megilla 18a d.v. U-Mah

And this is what we find in the Midrash, ‘the seal of every blessing is Peace. And this is what was prescribed for the end of the blessings of the evening shema, which ends ‘who spreads out a tabernacle of peace.’... And the blessings of the meal also end with Peace, ‘And “GOD will bless God’s people with peace” (Psalm 29) and also the Kaddish [which ends “May the Maker of Peace in the Highest, make peace for us.”]

 

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