What is this evil acid that corrodes Western humanism, and where does it come from?
By Giulio Meotti, INN Nov 27, 2023, 6:33 AM (GMT+2)
According to French philosopher Alain Finkielkraut, heir to the great liberal thinkers, from Raymond Aron to Albert Camus, “we have slipped into hatred towards our world. The woke spirit, which has taken the place of communist ideology, defines white supremacism as absolute evil and makes the Israeli the quintessence of this evil.”
Hence the assault on the history and culture of the West to dismantle and disperse them both.
And this West now hates itself to the point of generating crazy paradoxes every day. Under these circumstances, how long can our house, the increasingly divided house of the civilized world, stand?
And while in Canada – the country of Leonard Cohen, Saul Bellow and Mordechai Richler, one of the most peaceful and safe places in the world until a few years ago – Molotov cocktails are thrown against synagogues, stars of David and threatening letters are painted on Jewish homes. University of Alberta Samantha Pearson, the head of the campus’ sexual assault centre, signed an open letter denying that Hamas-led terrorists raped Israeli women during the devastating assault of October 7th.
At the same time, Gretchen Felker-Martin, the well known horror writer and transgender activist, defined the blowing up the World Trade Center as “probably the most defensible thing he (Bin Laden) did”.
The West has rotted to the point that high percentages of young people sympathize with the writings of Osama bin Laden.
The president of New York University’s “non-binary students” also defended Hamas.
Meanwhile, the third largest Norwegian newspaper, Dagbladet, of one of those countries that consider themselves rational and enlightened, managed to write that Israel had started the war, then had to add that on October 7th, Hamas had first killed 1,200 Israelis.
Meanwhile, a professor at Exeter University in England hailed the “courage of Hamas”.
What is this evil acid that corrodes Western humanism, and where does it come from?
Harvey Mansfield is a great Harvard academic, a leading scholar of Machiavelli, and in Le Figaro he told this amazing paradox:
“An Iranian student in my class told me: ‘In Iran you have to be careful about what you say in public, but in private you can say pretty much whatever you want. At Harvard it’s the opposite. It is students’ self-censorship out of fear of other students, a way to keep their thoughts and doubts to themselves, even among their peers. This is a fact of life in most American universities today, especially the most prestigious ones. Only those who are considered oppressed have the right to say an identity; the others, considered oppressors, like white men, are expected to submit (…) The strange thing is that opposition to the West comes from within the West. Islamic radicalism, for all its barbarity, invites the conscience of the West to join its fight against the West.”
Over the weekend, the great Italian monuments were stormed by the symbols of the October 7th massacres. But where is the scandal?
Former British Home Secretary Suella Braverman had only written that the pro-Hamas marches are an assertion of primacy by Islamic groups. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak fired her.
You would expect them in the square, instead of demonstrating for Ismail Haniyeh, standing in a vigil for Mahsa Amini, beaten to death for her no to a headscarf. Instead they stand with those who stone those who do not align themselves with the morality of Allah. But it must be nice in the morning to march around with a clenched fist railing against the West and Israel and in the evening to return home and dive into the reassuring well-being that the West has given you, again with all due respect to coherence.
The Austrian novelist Elfriede Jelinek condemned on October 7th: “Humanity, it could be useful for us. After the Hamas attack, I no longer know what it is about. It becomes a piece of paper on which many good and beautiful things have been written and then set on fire. Fanatics rage, for whom life has no value, and death is something worth fighting for, through which one can become a martyr.”
“The more the demonstrators affirm the legitimacy and rightness of their action by shouting and insulting, everywhere, even here, in front of St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, the more a void, an aspiring void, is established. Every exchange is reduced to ashes. We only see the black smoke that flies away and the horror that remains.”
Jelinek doesn’t say it, because she is a great writer but she is also very progressive and progressives don’t see shadows within their own world.
But horror germinates in the withered heart of the West. And it’s tangible.
Close to the First World War, the great Austrian writer Karl Kraus said that the era would soon arrive in which, in the heart of the highest Western culture, “men will make gloves from other men’s skin”.
After October 7, perhaps we will see them again, human leather made into gloves.
Giulio Meotti is an Italian journalist with Il Foglio and writes a twice-weekly column for Arutz Sheva. He is the author of 20 books, including “A New Shoah”, that researched the personal stories of Israel’s terror victims, published by Encounter. His writing has appeared in publications such as the Wall Street Journal, Gatestone Institute and Die Weltwoche. He is also a Middle East Forum Writing Fellow.
Thanks Ted.
TED-
I just sent in a response to Tanna which as once before , mysteriously vanished. I as waiting for it to be printed and it did not appear.
If you can find and post it, I’d be much obliged. Thank you.
Tanna-
I’m sure you see my point. You are quoting from and relying completely on Biblical phrases supposedly uttered by (drug taking) “prophets”. at precise times.
Facts are Facts. You are bringing in Biblical quotes of which you know not the reasons nor the circumstances in which they were uttered. Nor indeed the REAL meanings behind them.
They contain Mnemonics, poetry, acrostics, reversed phraseology, and can be a puzzle for a serious student. There are certain blocks in which the first letter of each line denotes our alphabet, for instance. The Torah contains REAL scholarship and genius, all the more in light of the times in which it was written.
They often do not mean exactly what they say, but hint at another meaning or meanings. The real meanings have been long ago lost , even as far back as 3-4-500 BCE
For example, Some of the Qumran Scrolls have been found to have certain very significant differences to the accepted version of our Holy Torah.
Scholars have long ago been scratching their heads RAW over them.
I am a realist and depend on Logic and reasonableness. I am 100% Jew, and strictly kosher as well, all my life. BUT… I face facts and deal with them as intelligently as I know how.
Tanna, don’t think I’m trying to denigrate your beliefs, I am NOT. But just engaging in a discussion interesting to me, and about which, I know something.
Maybe I don’t know as much as I think I do, but that is a human failing to which I am not exempt.
The Torah, although unchanged since the 2-3rd century BCE, underwent many corrections, series of cobbling, guesswork etc to try to keep as much continuity as possible. It is a HOLY BOOK, the history of our People and Much more, and is treated with great reverence even if it is obvious that events described there can be and have been proven to have never happened, or have been garbled.
I’m sure you know that they are produced by scribes, expert in the Masoretic text, and copied from a Torah deemed to be perfect.
But none is perfect, because there are unavoidable instances when a scribe’s eye, either “jumps a line” or retraces a line, even a mis-spelling.
Because the very pens and ink are also HOLY, they can NOT be erased as being an insult to Our Creator,
So…the corrections are inserted, but the errors are also left included.
Apropos of a point I made in my last post, and relevant to what I’ve just written above, there are actually, if you search, THREE different accounts of the “unbroken” line of High Priests straight from Zadok.
They have been broken several times, due to chaos, war, disruptions and etc, and a deal of guesswork has been used. Grandsons are mistaken for grandfathers, and generally confusion is obvious.
This not only shows that they were NOT written at the time period involved, but maybe generations after
Yet, being in the Torah they, the errors are as HOLY as the factual script.
This s getting too complicated for me to continue, and requires consultation with texts which I do not have at hand.
So let me amicably sign off on it..
Edgar,
there is no doubt that you are a knowledgeable person. You are correct, the “”lost tribes” is a misnomer, even the Rabbis speak of them this way. They are lost in the sense that they do not know where / who they are. Judea and Levi and Benjamin are known. I have met several Israelites who have the family tradition of the tribe they are from. I have never heard of anyone factually calming to be from the other 10. Yes, they were scattered to the wind due to their sin and the biblical text records where they were taken, but they have become so sifted into the nations, that the 10 tribes have lost their identity. My comment to Keelie, is that there is another opinion and Yair Dividy’s research gives one much to think on. If you’re not afraid of learning something new, maybe you should spend some time reading his site.
Is 11:11
On that day the Lord will extend his hand yet a second time to recover the remnant that is left of his people, from Assyria, from Egypt, from Pathros, from Ethiopia, from Elam, from Shinar, from Hamath, and from the coastlands of the sea.
Jer 31:8
See, I am going to bring them from the land of the north, and gather them from the farthest parts of the earth, among them the blind and the lame, those with child and those in labor, together; a great company, they shall return here.
So, if I’m reading you correctly Edgar, you would discount the two above verses because they are prophecy….. which you do not seem to place much hope in.
If your viewpoint on prophecy is true, then in your way of thinking there is no need for the end of the exile and no need for a redemption of the Jewish people back to their land. No people, no land no problem = world peace.
And if there is no prophecy telling of a coming redemption and return from the exile, then there is no need for a land, no need for a future temple and since there is no Jewish / Israelite people to redeem, since the majority of them are lost / meaning they do not know who they are, then you would be correct in your assumption that there will be no need for “the foolish concept of “The Moshiach”. Since Moshiach is to be the anointed king of Israel the son of David. since the majority of the lost tribes have already assimilated, then the other three should just go ahead and assimilate also, and the Jews can go to history like so many other people. Have you ever really thought deeply about your reasoning. It seems to me you’re reasoning your people out of existence. But I guess that is why some believe, and others are non-believers.
Have you ever given thought to the possibility that your way of thinking is feeding the Arab problem, and the Arabs might have a point that the Jews are stealing the Arab land. Think Edgar, every claim the Jews have or make is all based on a prophecy. So… no prophecy, no Jews, no fighting in the middle east……. get rid of the Jews by doing away with all prophecy and we have world peace.
the rule of this world is, might is right. The big dog gets to sleep on the porch. I would be willing to bet, that if all the nations of the world stood by and let all the Arabs / Muslims go to Holy war against Israel – the 1.8 billion Muslims could not destroy the little nation of 6-7 million Jews. You know why Edgar? because of bible prophecy!
TANNA-
You are telling Keelie that I am NOT a knowledgeable person…..Perhaps you are right, one can’t know everything, but about what I write, I DO know. Else I would not write it. The fate of the TEN TRIBES was as written.
Note; They were NOT lost, but transferred to a known area.
{Their subsequent history is known}. AND by then the tribal boundaries and social differences were totally dissolved , never to return, The exception was the Tribe of Levi, who, to this day provide our Levites and Kohanim.
However, you are entitled to your opinion.
I only had to read a line or two of your blurb to realise that it is pure conjecture and depending on “prophecy”. They are all from Torah which as you know is discussing what would have, should have, and had occurred from about 3000-2000 years ago. And many never happened. SOoo…. you. read a book about it…..????
We do not really know how factual these accounts are, , nor, importantly, when they were actually written, and/or whether a priori -or post facto as they mostly undoubtedly were. There were many spells of years when enormous turmoil was in play where NO records could be kept and a “continuity” had to be IMPROVISED from scattered reminiscences and inaccurate conjectures. I can prove this absolutely.
We DO know that throughout nearly all that period the normal state of affairs was CHAOS, WAR, DEFEAT, population transfer, Short intervals of peace and prosperity etc. These are noted as “He walked in the way of the Lord”.
There are constant attempts to rationalise why BAD things happened to GOOD people, resulting in the foolish concept of “The Moshiach”. conspicuous by his absence.. It seems that permanent proof was to be shown by his total success…as we see in the case of Bar Kocheba, and the discussion between R. Akiva and R. Tarfon/Ben Torta (??).
Bar Kocheba, regarded by Akiva as the Moshiach, was shown not to have been, by his defeat.
Also, MANY stories accepted as fact, are, “in fact” apocryphal……
So Tanna YOUR olinion, based on a book by someone or other can not be truly accepted as “fact”. just opinion..
I challenge you to turn up a SINGLE prophesy that occurred AS PROPHESIED, and I will be surprised if you can. Are you even bringing in “British Israelites”…??? (brit-ish rubbish)
The “prophecies” in Torah and elsewhere all occurred post facto, or at the very time of occurrence. There are a few which from the way things were eventuating could be confidentially assumed….like Hezkiyahu’s “THIS woman HAS conceived, and will shortly bear a son”…etc
Isaiah was the King’s close relative, and his main Court advisor, A PM. so to speak, a very perceptive and clever man. ALL his utterances were made when at court.
For instance, the mistranslation about “the voice in the Wilderness crying, make way the path of the Lord……”. if you know Hebrew and understand where the comma’s and inversions are. The “prophecy” came from Isaiah in Jerusalem, and began A Voice cries out..”In the Wilderness make way a path for the Lord””….It was a generalised comment and not really a prophesy and did not eventuate as spoken.
The famous Nostradamus, was another. He had no prophetic talents, but a visage, which, in the late Middle ages caused him to be regarded as more than a doctor. He became known as a “seer”.
He acutely had studied prophesies and realised that they were actually recurrences, according to a rough 400 year cycle where past events repeated themselves to some degree. There was also a 200 year cycle which he used profitably.. (He was NOT a Jew-as some believe.)
What has come down to us about his prophesies has been twisted beyond recognition so as to conform to present situations.
There is no cogent desire amongst intelligentsia to discuss the “merits” of “prophecies:.
Keelie, the question you ask of dreuveni is not as easy to brush off as Edgar would have you to believe. Edgar is partly correct but there is more to the story. If you’re interested learning more about the ten tribes from a knowledgeable person take a look at Yair Dividy’s work.
https://hebrewnations.com/articles/biblical-proof/list122.html
The Ten Tribes in Prophecy. Excerpts..
It was prophesied that the Lost Ten Tribes and especially Joseph
(Ephraim and Manasseh) would be immensely populous (Genesis 15:5, 22:17,
24:60, 32:12, Numbers 23:10, Isaiah 10:22, 26:15 Hosea 1:10); wealthy
with both agricultural advantages (Genesis 27:28, 49:25, Deuteronomy
33:13-16 Hoshea 2:8); and mineral resources (Genesis 49:25, Deuteronomy
33:13, 15); as well as being powerful (Numbers : 24:7-9, Micah 5:7-9,
Deuteronomy 33:27, 33:29, Jeremiah 51:20-21, Zechariah 10:7) on a world
scale. Relatively speaking they would do justice and establish
principles of righteousness throughout the world (Genesis 18:18-19,
Isaiah 42:1, 6, Amos 5:15); to be in islands (Isaiah 42:4, 49:1-6
Jeremiah 31:9-10); peninsulas (Jeremiah 31:8), and at continental
extremities (Deuteronomy 33:13, Isaiah 24:16, 26:15, 41:8-9, 49:6); to
be sea-farers (Isaiah 42:6); to gain control over strategic points
regarding their potential adversaries (Genesis 22:16-17, 24:60); to be
like a lion, and unicorn (Numbers 24:8-9); and bald-headed eagle (Micah
1:16); to be near Tarshish (Atlantic Ocean Area) Isaiah 60:9; to the
west of the Land of Israel (Isaiah 24:14, Hosea 1:10); to the North and
west of the Land of Israel (Isaiah 49:12); In the “North” Land (Jeremiah
3:18 31: 6-10); to be assocaited with Fires in the Isles referring to
Celtic Britain (Isaiah 24:15); to be in Zarephath, meaning France and
Britain, as confirmed by Rabbinical Commentators (Obadiah 1:20).
Megalithic Monuments (such as Dolmens) were to show their Pathway of
Migration from Israel to areas of re-settlement in their time of Exile.
This would serve as additional proof and re-assurance of their Israelite
ancestry (Jeremiah 31:21). They were also to be located in Australia and
New Zealand (“Land of Sinim,” Isaiah 49:12 as confirmed by Torah Codes.
https://britam.org/Tribesman/CodesAustralia.html,
KEELIE-
There were never “10 Lost Tribes”. This was a Goyisher fable
Judah was THE principal tribe and absorbed Benjamin Dan and Simeon.
Shalmaneser destroyed the Kingdom of Israel and it’s capital Samaria (about 6 Tribes) taking away many of the remaining residents , around 40,000 whom he deposited throughout Babylonia. The tribal divisions were completely dissipated after this.
()Minus those who returned under Ezra and Nehemiah, many years later.
The two famous schools of Sura and Pumbedita were established there, headed by Gaomim.,. and they became the seeds of the great learning and scholarship Centres in Torah and Talmud, They produced the Babylonian Talmud, regarded as superior to the Jerusalem Talmud and were regarded all throughout the Jewish world as the definitive authorities on Jewish practices..
And Much More.
Anyway my point is that there were never TEN Lost Tribes, but about 6 and they were not “lost”, it was known knew where they were.
They just were not in Israel.
As a biblical term the “12 tribes”( really 13) survived, as did the fable about the “10 Lost Tribes.
This latter resulted in myriads of obscure groups popping up in all sorts of outlandish places” claiming to be a “lost Tribe”. (much like the large variety of “Moshiacs”) Such a one in modern times is the “tribe” of Manassah, -of Myanmar in extreme North East India,
They have not a single drop of Jewish DNA yet that Meshuggena Freund was able to persuade (bribe??) a Rav to declare them as one of the “Lost ” Tribes.
They discovered they were “Jews” about 60 years ago, due to a “dream” of their village leader. They were actually then Christians (of a sort), previously animist, and before that cannibals.
Wonders wil never cease…maybe this was the first REAL miracle in History……….!!…….????????????????????..?
I would, in my ignorance, call it an opportunistic psychosis…LL!.
Great column from Giullio Meotti as usual. He is Israel’s best spokesman, even though as far as I know not Jewish and not an Israeli. To my mind this makes his contribution to Israel’s largely non-existent Hasbara even greater.
Fransisco Gil-White put it succinctly when he said, “The people who hate Jews are bad for all of us. Very bad.”
What we are seeing is an attempt to replace Judeo-Christian values and culture, and the Constitutional Republic of the US, with totalitarianism, immorality, moral equivalence, and evidence that those in positions of government hate the people they are supposed to represent. They have stopped the representational republic in its tracks and have substituted representation of the globalists, China and Iran, not the people of America. This has happened in Europe and the UK as well. The people are hated by whomever governs them, and those who govern attend to the needs of billionaires. They treat their people who desire liberty as if they are to be punished, labeled “far right” and doxxed or canceled or even imprisoned as those people were who basically walked quietly through the US Capitol building on January 6. The US Air Marshalls are following, that is watching the moves of EVERY PERSON WHO FLEW INTO WASHINGTON DC THAT DAY. How does that even make sense?
It makes sense like this: They are telling us that if we dare to question them or disagree with them, they will use an ALL OF GOVERNMENT approach to destroy us.
It’s the new feudalism, or the old totalitarianism brought back from Hitler and Stalin’s terror surveillance state, only with technological capacity Hitler could only dream of.
The power elites wanted mass Muslim immigration into Europe the UK and America and they got it. This Jew hatred in the streets is the result of their demonic thinking.
But the people ARE angry and ARE showing it in election after election. The tyrants are working fast, to control as many people as they can before they are thrown out. Because they see the writing on the wall now. They know their time is running short. The people ARE capable of taking their country back. In the USA we will see if this can be done or if those in control have a way to stop it. But if they stop it this time (by massive ballot fraud or some other criminal scheme) they will only make the anger worse, and it will make the consequences for the tyrants worse. It’s the twilight of the demonic era.
Neil Oliver:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llPhL1JUBnw
dreuveni … An interesting thing to say (about the ten lost tribes). What exactly do you mean?
This will probably not be well received…
However, those Western oriented white people should consider that they may be descendents of the 10 lost tribes. Chew on that for a while.
This will probably not be well received…
However, those Western oriented white people should consider that they be descendents of the 10 lost tribes. Chew on that for a while.