Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: A US-Israel Initiative”
Passover Hymn, Da’ye’nu:
-
“How many degree of beneficence hath the Almighty conferred upon us?! If He had brought us forth from Egypt, and had not executed judgment upon the Egyptians, it would have sufficed (Da’ye’nu)… If He had inflicted justice upon them…, it would have sufficed (Da’ye’nu’)…”
If Israel were merely the most effective battle-tested laboratory available to the USA, the source for over 600 modifications of the F-16, and thousands of cutting-edge modifications in hundreds additional US military systems, enhancing US national security, while providing the US defense industries a unique mega-billion dollars competitive edge in the global market, expanding US employment, research & development and export infrastructures – Da’ye’nu (it would have sufficed to crown Israel as a unique two-way-street ally of the USA);
If Israel were merely the source of breakthrough battle tactics, which were the first to penetrate/jam/destroy the most sophisticated Soviet/Russian surface-to-air missile batteries and radar systems, in addition to transferring to the US the first Soviet MIG-21 and 23 and other Soviet military systems, which tilted global balance of power in favor of the USA, providing the US defense industries with mega-billion dollars bonanza – Da’ye’nu;
If Israel were merely the source of intelligence – shared with the USA – which exceeds the scope of intelligence received by the US from all NATO countries combined (according to Senator Daniel Inouye, former Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and current Chairman of the full Appropriations Committee) and is equal to five CIAs (according to retired General George Keegan, former Chief of US Air Force Intelligence) – Da’ye’nu;
If Israel were merely the country which destroyed Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981 (in defiance of global opposition), thus providing the USA a conventional option in the 1991 Gulf War, sparing the US a potential traumatic nuclear confrontation – Da’ye’nu;
If Israel were merely a source of battle-proven experience and military systems – combating IEDs, car bombs, suicide bombers and generic terrorism – shared with US Special Operations units, which battle Islamic terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan, thus minimizing US losses – Da’ye’nu;
If – as stated by the late General Alexander Haig, former Supreme Commander of NATO and former Secretary of State -Israel were merely the largest American aircraft carrier which does not require a single American personnel, which cannot be sunk, which is the most battle-tested and cost-effective, and located in a region, which is critical to vital US economic and national security interests – Da’ye’nu;
If there would not be an Israel in the eastern flank of the Mediterranean, and the US would have to deploy to the region real aircraft carriers with tens of thousands of American servicemen, costing the US taxpayers $20BN annually and possibly dragging the US into local and regional conflicts – all of which has been spared by the existence and capabilities of the Jewish State – Da’ye’nu;
If there would not be havoc in Arab lands, highlighting the Jewish State as the only stable, reliable, credible, capable, predictable, democratic and non-conditional ally of the USA – Da’ye’nu;
If Israel were not the place where- according to Warren Buffett – hundreds of major American companies and investors shop for innovative ideas, which they transform into technologies, products and manufacturing lines, benefitting both American and Israeli employment, trade, research & development and exports – Da’ye’nu;
If Israel were not the source of hundreds of revolutionary medical device, healthcare, telecommunications, Internet, laptops, cellular and social networking technologies/products.- enhancing quality of life in the US and throughout the globe – Da’ye’nu;
If US-Israel covenant were not uniquely based on shared values (dating back to the Pilgrims and the US Founding Fathers), joint interests and mutual threats – Da’ye’nu (It would have sufficed to crown Israel as a unique two-way-street ally of the USA).
Happy Passover!
OK, Dweller. I think we are playing with semantics.
In a nutshell, in Judaism’s opinion, free will is where the battlefield is. Classic example: smoking. Complicate the example: smoking on the Sabbath, forbidden to Jews, being that it’s a Torah violation of the Sabbath. (Yes, smoking during the week is another Torah violation of the obligation to guard one’s health – but this is a classic example).
I don’t smoke. I chose not to. But I don’t do battle with myself to make that decision. If there’s an anti-smoking war going on, I am personally way behind the battle lines on the victorious side. I cannot hear the guns at the distant battlefield, though every once in a while, the smoke wafts past my nostrils to remind me of others not so fortunate.
A Torah observant smoker usually has lost the weekday battle and is complacently victorious on the Sabbath battlefield. Ask him to stop smoking during the week and he’ll tell you to first stop breathing. But come Sabbath, a final puff, then 25 or so hours of cold turkey, then an immediate light-up. During those 25 hours, different observant smokers have various degrees of craving, from none to insanity. There are 2 main attributes affecting the craving and control: 1) physical addition; 2) level of Torah observance (deeper meaning: level of love and/or fear of G-d).
Take someone who’s both a smoker and is waning in his Torah Observance – or vice versa – a smoker who is becoming more observant and the battle lines are closer to the dark nicotine side.
This is generally the Torah’s concept of free will, fighting for right on the battlefield you are on now, not one where you cannot possibly win because you do not yet have the bigger guns needed to defeat the enemy in their home territory. However, there are exceptions to the latter and it could be compared to an extreme paratrooper drop at a weak point in the enemy’s capital city.
If we truly had free wills, we would not be compulsive.
I grant you that we were meant to have free will, but the evidence that we don’t is painfully apparent.
(The legal system operates as if we did, but that’s because it couldn’t function otherwise.)
The unconscious anxiety generated by the guilt of sin — which is usually a lot more subtle than people assume (because it can entail wrong motives, or mixed motives, even for doing the right thing) — creates a need to “take the edge off” of that anxiety.
That’s a prime set-up for the entry of bad habits.
I would submit that, throughout all of human history, very few persons have ever been possessed of a truly free will:
e.g., our first parents, Adam & Eve — before their Fall,
Hanokh [Enoch],
maybe Eliyahu [Elijah],
HaNitzri. (Sorry. Don’t mean to be pulling your chain, but I won’t pretend to not believe it just for the sake of shalom bayit.)
And also others, no doubt, who perhaps aren’t even mentioned in scripture.
In fact, for all we know, any one of us may have unknowingly encountered one or another of them from time-to-time.
But there can’t have ever been many of them,
and whoever they were, they weren’t born that way.
They didn’t get that way [i.e., possessed of a genuinely free will] without coming a helluva distance in
divesting themselves of compulsiveness.
One man’s opinion, of course.
Quite so; and thank you for the excerpt from Ezekiel 37.
It is particularly pertinent for the frequency of its usage of language like
“forever,” and
“everlasting.”
It may well be that this is the only way we’ll get our friend, AE, to actually read the Book;
i.e., a chunk at a time.
This is rich. You take a whole para to ask one question and demand I answer in one word. LOL. The answer is, Plenty. How about you?
Your dots are poppycock, i.e. straw men, so your connections are, ipso facto, also poppycock.
Much of the Bible is allegorical. Readers pick and choose what is important to them. None of what is in the Bible should be used to justify political conclusions, because such an approach will be bogus and self-serving by definition. The Islamic radicals are a good example of falsely using a religion for political purposes – as are some Jews and Christians who pick and choose passages from either the Bible or the Qu’ran to justify whatever they want to. If you behave badly, I don’t give a crap what your religion says or what the Bible or Qu’ran says, I will oppose you.
Of course HE is. We will only know for sure once we die. Wise up.
Horse pucky is what you are writing. The truth is that no one knows for sure. Tossing a coin to answer a question was not a random decision. The result may have been.
I think we’ve already established that you have little common sense and a selective knowledge of history. You just believe whatever you want to and then look for ways to justify your beliefs.
For anyone with real common sense, quoting what Jews have said they believe is not “speaking for them”.
I can smell your dog-poo a mile away.
Of course you are, which is why you are always looking to the Bible for support.
God gives us the “free will” to have bad habits, or not to.
Not true. It’s what Ezekiel says that God said.
That’s right. Copyrights are documents written by men.
What the hell are you reading? I never said Christians “own” God. Just the opposite. I said there is only ONE God, by definition, and HE is the God of all creation, not just of Jews. Just because Muhammad wrote a cockamamie version of his dreams reflects on him, not on God.
More poppycock. I never complain about “Jews” in general. Just the opposite. I do complain about the liberal Jews who I believe are delusional renegades. How can any sane and self-respecting Jew, a Semite, vote for an anti-Semite like Obama by misconstruing him as wanting to help the downtrodden and being a strong supporter of Israel? I only bring up details of the religion in response to religion being made the basis of a political conclusion or when Christianity is attacked. I have no problem with Jews believing whatever they want to believe or practicing rituals they want to follow. If you leave religion out of political discussions I have no reason to bring it up.
Here we go again. Spouting religious poppycock to justify a political conclusion. The evangelicals believe that every detail in the Bible is the literal word of God as if God had dictated it in modern English. The New Testament makes much of the Torah obsolete in their view.
That’s what I just said. Everyone is entitled to their own view – just leave your view out of political discussions that involve many people with different views.
Is there any end to Ted’s poppycock? I “accept” everyone, including all Jews. I simply politically oppose that I believe harm the interests of freedom and democracy in the US and Israel. Pro-Obama Jews in my opinion are worse than other pro-Obama Americans because they should know better – that he is anti-Semitic.
All true. My only problem with liberal Jews is that they helped elect the worst president in US history from a domestic and international viewpoint when they should have known better. Not one them can answer “Yes!” when I ask them if they would hire him as CEO of their own business. Case closed.
Yaaaay! Good for you, Ted! My sentiments exactly. So, then, Ted, why are you picking on me while you allow the anti-Christian bigots like Yamit, Yonatan, Shy Guy free rein on religious issues on this forum? If they leave religion out of political discussions, so will I.
No, I think G-d said it.
Ezekiel
Chapter 37
Thus says the Lord GOD:
I will take the children of Israel from among the nations
to which they have come,
and gather them from all sides to bring them back to their land.
I will make them one nation upon the land,
in the mountains of Israel,
and there shall be one prince for them all.
Never again shall they be two nations,
and never again shall they be divided into two kingdoms.
No longer shall they defile themselves with their idols,
their abominations, and all their transgressions.
I will deliver them from all their sins of apostasy,
and cleanse them so that they may be my people
and I may be their God.
My servant David shall be prince over them,
and there shall be one shepherd for them all;
they shall live by my statutes and carefully observe my decrees.
They shall live on the land that I gave to my servant Jacob,
the land where their fathers lived;
they shall live on it forever,
they, and their children, and their children’s children,
with my servant David their prince forever.
I will make with them a covenant of peace;
it shall be an everlasting covenant with them,
and I will multiply them, and put my sanctuary among them forever.
My dwelling shall be with them;
I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Thus the nations shall know that it is I, the LORD,
who make Israel holy,
when my sanctuary shall be set up among them forever.
Why do “bad habits” preclude “free will”?
Got any bad habits?
i.e., any habits that (without stating what they are) you’d personally prefer you didn’t have?
A simple “yes” or “no” will suffice, for the purposes of this exchange.
I repeat: Do you have any bad habits? Yes or no?
“Free will” indeed.
A simple matter of connecting the glaring, neon-bright dots, bubbeleh.
Spoken by someone who rather obviously hasn’t read that part of the scriptures. (You might want to check it out & then tell us if it sounds like an “allegory” to you.)
So, then, I guess Jesus is ALSO just part of something “written by well-meaning men based on their dreams and closely held beliefs.” (That’ll give your assorted nemeses on this site a good laugh, for sure.)
And I guess that goes for God as well; He’s just a concoction of well-meaning minds, dreams, etc., too?
Tell me, AE, do “well-meaning men” — in your view — make a practice of telling deliberate lies?
I don’t think they do.
But then, that’s just one man’s opinion, isnt it?
So God operates in a strictly random context?
We already covered this, Eagle; it was horse pucky when you first wrote it, and it remains horse-pucky now. Merely repeating an assertion doesn’t thereby render it any more true than it was before it was made.
Didn’t you read what I wrote about Justin?
If you don’t trust what I wrote, look him up for yourself.
Pure common sense, if you know anything about the ancient world. (Do you?)
Also inevitable, if you have any understanding at all of human nature.
Not all evidence has to be probative for it to be legitimately persuasive, AE.
Firstly,
Unlike the RCC, nobody may presume to “speak for the Jews.” Even Maimonides wouldn’t make such a presumption.
Secondly,
You acknowledge that Christ was/is a Jew.
Yet he didn’t claim that they were special because of himself
OR because of Moses.
He said they were special because of God.
You’ve stumbled so much over these last few exchanges, I’m inclined to seriously doubt that you can see straight,
let alone, that you might have any kind of a handle on what you call “poppycock.”
You think I’m the sort of person who “waits to be told” what to think?
That’s rich.
AE is insufferable. His arrogance knows no bounds.
Judaism has a copyright on God. We put him on the map and defined Him with our Torah. For a Christian to come along now and say they own God and define him in ways that our contrary to our copyright is theft. Jews have the right to define God as they see it. Similarly Christians can do the same, but neither of us should impose their interpretation on the other. For a Jew, God is how we define him. We have absolutely no interest in how Christians define him.
AE likes to complain about Jews. He constantly attacks the 78% of Jewish Americans, who are liberals and Democrats, who voted for Obama. Lately he has attacked religious Jews for following “picayane practises” which he sees no value in. This was first popularized by Paul who denied the law and said “salvation by faith alone”. Paul also backed everything he said by adding “according to the scriptures”. Since then Christians have created a theology based on their interpretation of scriptures which differs substantially from interpretation by Jews and based on Roman dictates. The evangelicals have abandoned Roman Catholocisum and are more and more embracing their roots, the Torah. That is bringing us closer together. This misinterpretation according to the Jewish view, justified their identification of Jesus as the messiah. Once again they are entitled to their belief system but so are the Jews.
So are there any Jews that AE accepts? perhaps anti-Obama non orthodox-Jews. A small percentage indeed.
But there is more. He has put forward, in contrast to the “picayane practices of Jews”, the wonderful values exhibited by Christians such as love, good will toward others, universalism, charity and so on. Don’t look now but these are the values that the liberal Jews, who voted for Obama, espouse. Furthermore, Jews liberal or orthodox, give more charity by far, per capita, than any other people including Christians. They also led the civil rights movement, the multicultural movement, social justice movement and labour rights. All values embraced by Christians.
While Jews deny the idea of Judeo-Christian values, I don’t. These Jews are far too technical for me. I see common values in practice and that’s all that matters. We don’t agree on everything but agree on enough.
Did you escape from your straitjacket? That’s what they do to those who laugh for no reason or from obvious ignorance:-))
Yamit, are you having as good a laugh as me? 🙂
Poppyucock. Jews claim they are God’s “chosen people.” I say they have made this up out of whole cloth because God does not play favorites because he has no reason to be biased in favor of one miniscule community at the expense of all his other creations. The only exception is the one that created Christianity from a Jewish base, the messiah that has been rejected by the Jews.
Another unsubstantiated observation made out of whole cloth.
It was written by well-meaning men based on their dreams and closely held beliefs.
There is no actual evidence that HE actually said this. The Scriptures are filled with allegories.
Unsubstantiated. You have no way to know this for sure.
I’ve done enough to recognize poppycock when I see it.
HE either tossed a coin or decided the Jews more than anyone else needed to be taught to love, tolerate, forgive and realize that substance is far more important than form. BTW, the Jews reject that they are special because of Christ – they prefer to believe Moses.
About as sure as you are that there was.
I know because I use it several times a day, every day, for decades now. I can use my common sense. Unlike you, I don’t have to wait to be told what some holy men have to say or dream or believe.
The fact that you find no ‘reason’ to be ‘apparent’ (and feel no need to discover it) says more about YOU than about God, or bias, or the Jews. But if you’d rather console yourself with your alternative proposition that YoursTruly must be “unfamiliar with the English language,” then I guess you’ll just have to believe that, won’t you?
Oh, please. It’s rather obviously eating you up from the inside out, and for a long time apparently.
So the scripture is a fabrication?
So, why did he tell the Samaritan woman that “Salvation is of the Jews”?
Was that a fabrication too?
His public ministry went on for somewhat over three years.
If you know anything at all about the ancient world, or human nature generally, then you know that that three years was an extraordinarily long time for such a ministry as Christ’s to have endured.
Among any other people of the era,
and I mean
ANY other people,
He wouldn’t have lasted
three months.
I honestly can’t help feeling terribly embarrassed for you, Eagle. It’s excruciatingly obvious that you haven’t done your homework.
Again.
There was nothing unusual about Christ’s criticisms of daily life in Judea. He was good at getting to the heart of a matter, and his use of language, verbal imagery is superb. Yet throughout the biblical age, the prophets were constantly berating the people and/or the govt for their/its shortcomings.
But not because the Jews were ‘worse’ than other peoples.
This was one of the major errors of the first non-Jewish Christian theologian, Justin Martyr.
And now you are repeating it.
Previous Christian thinkers before Justin were Christian-Jews; they had all had Jewish backgrounds, and understood the context & spirit of the “Old Testament” scripture which provided the basis and backdrop for the Gospels, etc.
Justin had no such background. He was the son of a Roman soldier apparently stationed in Sh’khem [“Sychar,” “Nablus” today], and was in many ways clueless as to the nature and import of what he was reading.
He assumed that because the Tanakh was so thoroughly laced with great thunderings against hypocrisy, sanctimony, corruption, unkindness — unlike the writings to be found amongst OTHER peoples, which never “washed the household laundry in public” (if they even acknowledged that it needed washing)– that this constituted prima facie evidence of the unusually foul or egotistical or unjust nature of the Jews —
whom Justin contrasted with gentile believers who, having NO such tradition of societal self-criticism, could more easily been seen as just naturally more, uh….. ‘christian’…..
But this was because — among all the peoples of the ancient world — only the Jews maintained a steady & ongoing TRADITION of self-criticism, and were willing, moreover, to put it in writing.
(The Hittites apparently did a little of it on isolated occasions, but there was no established tradition.)
Nope, you have YET to satisfactorily answer my question as to why God chose the Jews to bear and raise the Messiah. It’s a very important question, Eagle, but what you’ve handed me is sheer, boiler-plate shlock; the stuff of Replacement Theology. You’ll have to do better.
If you can.
You’ve said, on multiple occasions,
that he only thing that makes Jews special is that Jesus was a Jew,
that the Jews ‘rejected’ him,
and that logically there is
nothing left of their
‘chosenness’
or, consequently,
their Covenant with God.
That’s the only place one can go with what you said.
I did not mistake you, AE.
You’re fond of saying that you “connect the dots.”
You thought you were the only one who knew how to do that?
Get real.
Are you absolutely sure there was no further chosenness?
“…waiting now for 2,000 plus years for a Messiah that could very well have come and be long gone, at least for now.”
Not so sure as you sound, are ya?
(You saved it for last, I see.)
Really?
Who told you that you had “free will?”
Where does it say that?
Unless you are unfamiliar with the English language, being “chosen” over everyone else for no apparent reason DOES signify bias.
I swallowed but there was no bile.
You have no point because there is no evidence that HE did any such thing, other than to choose Jews as the community in which Jesus was born on this earth.
I can’t have a beef with HIM for something he couldn’t have done as an unbiased Creator. My beef is with those with the pious delusions of “chosenness”. Actually, it isn’t serious enough to be a called a “beef” – it is more like a reason for being amused at the hubris and pretension.
I think it was to show “them” that they were so far off the right track with their pretensions of exclusivisity and their hubris, their intolerance, their hate-filled vengeance and their self-righteous claims that form is more important than substance in daily life, which was all the very opposite of what a humane God would want for his Son’s community. What better way to show them the right path than for HIS Son to show them the way?
I never said that God was through with the Jews – I said that THEY rejected him as the Messiah. Wise up.
Unfortunately for your pathetic attempt to make something out of nothing, there was no chosenness other than as the community in which HIS Son was born – who was then rejected as the Messiah, which shows that God gives us the free will to screw up and keep waiting now for 2,000 plus years for a Messiah that could very well have come and be long gone, at least for now.
Choosing doesn’t signify bias.
Look, Eagle, “chosen” is not necessarily a conclusion of comparative value.
Chosen IS (necessarily) a conclusion of suitability to a Chooser’s purpose.
Swallow your bile — and track with me for a moment, ok?
When David, youngest of the sons of Yishai [Jesse], asks to take on the terrifying Goliath in single combat, Sha’ul haMelekh [King Saul] is so impressed, and even humbled, at the offer — albeit dubious as to this pisher’s likelihood of survival (let alone, success) — that he gives David his own body-armor to wear for the encounter.
David politely “goes thru the motions” of trying it on.
He was recently made the King’s personal armor-bearer, so he’s already had the experience of shlepping the stuff around wherever Sha’ul goes — and he knows damned well that he’d have an easier time going for a swim in that cumbersome paraphernalia than to try doing combat in it.
Finally he takes it off, and respectfully hands it back, saying that he can’t use those things, because “I have not proved them.”
That was a delicate way of telling the King, “Look, you big galoot, this stuff fits you, not me.”
Sha’ul was a big guy.
Not weirdly gigantic, like Goliath — but big.
Big for a non-“hormonally-challenged” person.
Sha’ul stood head & shoulders above everybody else in the southern Hebrew tribes.
David was implicitly telling his King,
“Get a clue, pal. This is my life on the line here. I didn’t ask to sacrifice myself. I asked to fight. If I wear this clunky crap, Goliath won’t have to do anything to kill me. All he’ll have to do is sit back, picking his teeth, waiting for me to suffocate in the heat of the day. My chances are way better if I’m free to move & maneuver. So, thanks — but no, thanks.”
He turns down the equipment NOT because of any quality issues or value considerations that he might attach to it. (As the King’s own body-armor, it was arguably the very best anybody could hope for.) He turns it down because of its unsuitability for his purposes.
The point?
The Master of the Universe chose the Jews
NOT because they were more numerous than other peoples;
NOT because they were stronger than other peoples;
NOT because they were smarter — or OTHERWISE more talented — than other peoples;
NOR because they were in any other sense ‘better’ than other peoples.
He chose them because they were suitable to His purposes.
And He knew they would suit His purposes, because He SUMMONED them — quite literally, summoned them — into existence, and moulded them expressly FOR His purposes. Nobody else could’ve filled that bill.
Therefore: If you begrudge them their chosenness, then your beef is with Him,
not them.
Yeah, you got that right
……. although, curiously enough, you neglected — both this time and in the other thread in which you made the same assertion — to say why THEY, rather than some other people, were chosen even for that. (Have you never wondered why it was they?)
But your most glaring & conspicuous error — as shown in that other thread — was in assuming (and stating at the time) that God was “through with the Jews” once that was done (i.e., once Christ had “arrived”).
Even conventional Christianity has largely abandoned that old, arthritic chestnut.
John Paul II’s remarks — to cite just one example — firmly rejecting the notion (of an ‘end’ to God’s covenant with the Jewish People), several years before his death, are illustrative of the fact that even as slow-moving an old boat as the Vatican is struggling to divest itself of that tiresome, Jews-as-museum-piece, supersessionist pig-poop.
Get over yourself, AE.
To accept the principle of Chosenness does not mean to concede ‘superiority,’ or ‘supremacy.’ (Only God gets to be superior.)
To accept the principle of Chosenness simply means to acknowledge that the Chooser has a Purpose.
And to open-heartedly seek to know that Purpose
……and your own place in it.
I take Him at His word.
It’s recorded — again & again — in a book (collection of books, actually) that those who call themselves “Christians” purport to take seriously; it’s known as haTanakh (though they like to call it the ‘Old’ Testament).
And they take Him at His word too, insofar as they understand it.
And in the interests of understanding it, they make a practice of reading it.
Which is more than one can say for some.
If you regard what you find in there as “biased,” then I would respectfully suggest that
you are judging the One who created you,
and judging Him, moreover, by your standards,
without even trying to discover His.
If, as you imply, you don’t take the scripture seriously, fine; no problem. It’s not required.
But, under the circumstances, you really can’t call yourself “Christian.”
Unless, of course, you’re suggesting that the Bible is a none-too-clever forgery?
(Now, that would be amusing.)
Yoni, kol haKavod you’ve caught his true essence.
The “written word” was written by men, not by God. So was the New Testament. So was the Qu’ran. Each to express their own POV.
The only thing that counts on this earth is not some “word” but how members of a religion BEHAVE towards each other and their fellow humans who do not believe as they do. ACTIONS are what count, not WORDS.
That’s where people like you as well as the Muslim terrorists, fail miserably. Wise up.
Have already tried the written word on you and they were found to be as useless as the Popes dingaling
Of course it does. The Pharisees back in the day rejected Jesus as the Messiah for personal reasons – because he made them look like self-righteous, self-serving hypocrites, which they clearly were. Then, to cover up, they used their influence to brainwash your forefathers. Now the rest of you are still waiting patiently 2,000 plus years later when the Messiah may well have come and gone.
This would show the extent to which some of you have been brainwashed.
Oh, but HE did. You are just too blind to see it, just like the Pharisees back in the day and probably for the exact same reasons.
On a practical level, the exclusivity, intolerance, vengeance, form over substance that you all cling to as if it is a badge of honor makes so little common sense to most people when compared to the alternative of love, tolerance, forgiveness, redemption and substance over form.
Yep the difference of opinion revolves around whether you are a Jew or not. The Jews I know debate whether he even existed, with the majority opting for the no. Whether he existed or not is immaterial – he didn’t fulfill his mandate if he was who you say he was.
But, but, but, he taught me how to think!
It looks like Yamit has decided that Israpundits are unable to read.
AmericanEagle says: I was talking about Yamit, Yonatan, Shy Guy and other orthodox Jews, not you specifically.
AmericanEagle says: See what I mean? This is what Yamit believes. I think he’s a disgrace to Jews. None of the Jews I know are rabid bigots like Yamit and some of his friends, whom you are likely to hear from soon. The Jews I know acknowledge there is a difference of opinion on whether Jesus was the Messiah or not.
Yamit, thanks for emphasizing what I said about you being terrified that Christian missionaries in Israel may show some of your fellow Jews what 2.1 billion Christians worldwide know – that love, tolerance, forgiveness, redemption and the importance of substance over form in daily life may make a lot of sense.
If you think God made Jews his “chosen people” and gave them a specific “promised land” you are accusing HIM of bias relative to all the millions of other human beings HE created. Q.E.D.
This is false. The REAL truth is that I think God is unbiased and did not make any such promises – they were made up out of whole cloth by men for their own purposes or based on their dreams. However, God did choose Jews as the community for Jesus to be born on this earth.
I was talking about Yamit, Yonatan, Shy Guy and other orthodox Jews, not you specifically.
See what I mean? This is what Yamit believes. I think he’s a disgrace to Jews. None of the Jews I know are rabid bigots like Yamit and some of his friends, whom you are likely to hear from soon. The Jews I know acknowledge there is a difference of opinion on whether Jesus was the Messiah or not.
Rabid bigotry is now being described as exasperation. Good one, Dweller. Perhaps you have missed all the vile things Yamit has written about Christians, including calling the Christian missionary woman who was brutally murdered in Israel a few months ago, a terrorist. He seems to have a pretty low opinion of his fellow Jews – he seems terrified that some of them may see the relative beauty and common sense in Christianity as have 2.1 billion people worldwide.
Not helpful, Yamit.
This is vile and stupid, Yamit.
What’s more, I don’t think it really represents quite so much what you really think
as it does your exasperation with AE.
And, yes, I understand the exasperation,
but this [“Not enough”] does not help.
I don’t accuse Him of ‘bias.’
That’s your take on what I said.
I simply respect His right to His prerogatives.
Truth is, Eagle, that you resent Him — even more than you resent Jews.
I’ve never made any such claim. You’ve created a straw man.
Before Christ was even born Jews and the Roman Empire had already been around for hundreds of years.
In a test of basic intelligence you would score lower than a box of rocks.
No Christians at that time?
509/510 was an important date in Roman history because that’s when the republic was established.
The end is sometimes placed at 4 September AD 476, when the last emperor of the Western Roman Empire, Romulus Augustus, was deposed, and not replaced. However, Diocletian, who retired in AD 305, was the last sole Emperor of an undivided Empire whose capital was the City of Rome. After the division of the Empire by Diocletian into East and West, each branch continued to style itself as “The Roman Empire.” The Western
Roman Empire declined and fell apart (see Decline of the Roman Empire) in the course of the 5th century. The Eastern Roman Empire, centered on Nova Roma (founded by Constantine I on the Greek city of Byzantion), which would later adopt Greek as its main language, known widely today as the Byzantine Empire, preserved Greco-Roman legal and cultural traditions along with Hellenic and Orthodox Christian elements for another millennium, until its eventual collapse with the conquest of Constantinople, as Constantine’s city become known, at the hands of the Ottoman Empire in 1453.
(The above from Wikipedia)
I keep saying you are stupid and you keep proving it with each new comment.
Not enough 🙁
During the Roman Empire, the Jews constituted 9% of the population. Simple demographics tell us that without the Crusades, the pogroms, the Holocaust, assimilation…the Jewish people today would number well into the hundred millions.
We’ve lost 90 to 95% of our nation. We keep diminishing and diminishing, yet we’re still bouncing up and down there, barely hanging on, at the bottom of the graph. Demographically, we should just pack it in. Why don’t we?
“And you shall remain few in number among the nations to which God shall lead you.” (Devarim 4:27)
Despite the fact that our tiny size would almost guarantee the failure of the prophecy of an eternal nation, the Torah predicts precisely this. Yes, you’ll be persecuted, yes, many of you will be wiped out, but you’ll remain a nation.
The Torah tells us, “Zechor yemot olam.” Keep your eyes on history. And when you do, you begin to perceive that something or someone is pulling the strings. It doesn’t matter if the world hates you, persecutes you, scatters you throughout the globe…somehow you’re going to remain with your identity intact, even if you’re the tiniest nation in existence.
The Prophesy
Deuteronomy 4:25-31
25 When thou shalt beget children, and children’s children, and ye shall have been long in the land, and shall deal corruptly, and make a graven image, even the form of any thing, and shall do that which is evil in the sight of the LORD thy God, to provoke Him; 26 I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that ye shall soon utterly perish from off the land whereunto ye go over the Jordan to possess it; ye shall not prolong your days upon it, but shall utterly be destroyed. 27 And the LORD shall scatter you among the peoples, and ye shall be left few in number among the nations, whither the LORD shall lead you away. 28 And there ye shall serve gods, the work of men’s hands, wood and stone, which neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. 29 But from thence ye will seek the LORD thy God; and thou shalt find Him, if thou search after Him with all thy heart and with all thy soul. 30 In thy distress, when all these things are come upon thee, in the end of days, thou wilt return to the LORD thy God, and hearken unto His voice; 31 for the LORD thy God is a merciful God; He will not fail thee, neither destroy thee, nor forget the covenant of thy fathers which He swore unto them.
What else you got?
Nice try, Dweller, but witless spin won’t work. Facts are facts, and facts tell the tale. Only 13.4 million after having a head start of hundreds of years. Try not insulting the Allmighty by accusing HIM of bias against all his other creations, and claiming that HE DEMANDS of his “chosen people” exclusivity, intolerance, vengeance and form above substance in daily living and you may be more attractive to more people.
This is one of the more spectacularly witless statements (in an admittedly tight field) to arrive on this site attached to your handle, AE.
Judaism isn’t a missionary faith.
Furthermore, it has been estimated that, worldwide, of all the Jews to have ever lived — in the perhaps-200 generations spanning the 40 centuries since Abraham — fully half of them have died violently at the hands of their fellow men: one out of every two.
(Even so, the numbers of Jews have in various ages constituted somewhat greater proportions of the world than those you see today. For example, Josephus estimated that as many as a tenth of all Roman citizens in his own day were Jewish.)
Being Jewish isn’t easy, and — unlike other clergy — the Rabbis don’t promote conversion; in fact, while conversion to Judaism isn’t, by any means, ‘forbidden,’ there is a distinct tradition (though not a rule, as such) of actually discouraging it.
Christianity and Islam, on the other hand, ARE both oriented toward actively spreading their respective universalistic and (theoretically) anti-particularist creeds.
Islam had covered an area exceeding that of the Roman Empire (at its height) within less than a hundred years after “The Prophet”‘s death — and if you think it managed to ‘attract’ those many millions of adherents by preaching “peace and love,” then I’ve got some choice Arizona beachfront property to sell you for a song.
Nor was (self-styled) ‘Christianity’ itself , from-time-to-time, above making use of the sword “to save a soul…” so to speak… when it suited…. [Google: Charlemagne (just for starters)].
Anybody can play the numbers game, Eagle, but you can do better.
The idea of a significant moral distinction betweeen Judaism & Christianity is a crock.
As I noted in #13, the metaphysics may differ, but the morals don’t.
(And even the metaphysics rarely diverge in practice — because so-called “Christians” more often than not haven’t a clue as to how to IMPLEMENT the metaphysical teachings; they just strap themselves into an emotional straitjacket (as it were), and mouth rote phrases as if they were magical mantras.
The myth of a superior Christian ethic is one which acquired purchase as developing Christianity —- having, after AD 135, lost its Jewish roots (and with it, arguably, its authenticity) and, in place of that loss, acquired a pagan overlay in its bid for broader acceptance -— was seeking to promote itself as a separate, fresh and distinctive faith: the “new & improved” rendition of Judaism and “inheritor” of the original article (and “heir,” as well, to the much-vaunted Promises attendant thereto).
Convenient (if not essential) to the narrative was that the “demise and dispersion abroad” of the Jewish People were evidence of the Almighty’s final displeasure with, and ultimate rejection of, His original choice for the Chosen –— notwithstanding that “the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” [Rom 11:29] -— whereby of course the field could now be seen as open for a new ‘choice.’ Or in the name of universalism (an easy way of denying His authority and purpose), no choice.
Handy, to be sure.
Therein lay the basis for Replacement Theology [AKA “Covenant Theology”]: Supersessionism, which (operationally) holds that the Infinite Intelligence and Creator of the Universe is really no better, in the end, than His finite creation, man — when it comes to keeping His word…. (‘God as Indian-giver’ -— no offense to our Native American friends).
Either that, or that “everlasting” doesn’t mean everlasting:
At the outset of of Gen. 17 the Almighty identifies Himself by the name of El Shaddai [“Almighty God”] -— and for the first-time-ever in the scripture, of the 48 such usages of the name. (Until now, He has been referred to only as Adonai [“the Lord”], or Elohim [“God”], or Adonai Elohim.)
He then proceeds promptly to explain and establish His Covenant, which He bases not on the performance or non-performance of anyone other than HIMSELF. There is no ”if you, then I” -— it is strictly and entirely (and repeatedly) “I will.” Full stop.
No fewer than 13 times in Gen. 17 alone does the Almighty use the term b’rit [“covenant”]. While commands & directions to Avram/Avraham -— and his anticipated descendants -— are also clearly in evidence here, they are not provisional to His Covenant and its Promise, which is flatly unconditional and explicit toward Avraham (and his line through Isaac).
In three of those 13 instances -— Gen. 17: 7, 13, 19 -— He characterizes His intention as b’rit o-LAHM, “an everlasting covenant.” (And in the same discourse, makes [17:8] one of His oft-repeated promises of the Land, la’ah-khuZAHT o-LAHM, “as a possession” likewise “everlasting,” reserved to Avraham & heirs.)
At bottom, Replacement Theology is an attempted end-run around that pesky Commandment forbidding the indulgence of…. covetousness.
Somehow, though, it does seem inescapable (if a little tiresome, by now) that every new cult, communion or creed that comes down the pike will take a crack at asserting its entitlement to supplanting the Jews -— as those to whom the celebrated assurances of the Most High were committed -— while setting about getting its feet on the ground. Some versions of faith of course (and/or their respective votaries) have never outgrown that species of acne, no matter how far past adolescence they’ve gotten.
The truth is that what is called Christianity was (for better or for worse) the vehicle, however crippled & confused, by which the ethics of the Jews were imported into the broader world.
How well or poorly….. is the stuff of which Sociology texts — and newspaper headlines — are written.
Bubkis in Hindi is gobar, which also means cow cakes. Surely you know all the rules about how food should be prepared, wearing skull caps, what can and cannot be done between dawn and dusk, etc. etc. etc. Nice brainwashing techniques which do not address the exclusivity, intolerance, vengeance that has restricted the growth to 13.4 million worldwide.
Very good, Yamit. That’s what socialism has done to India’s most intelligent and enterprising people – sent them to America, where four key sectors of the economy would now collapse without them. You should know about intelligent brains draining – half the Jews in the world live in America, Israel’s only ally and underwriters of Israel’s security.
You are confusing Indians with Jews. Indians are the top ranking ethnic community in America based on family income. Physicians probably top the list of Indians on a per capita basis. The American health care system would collapse without them. If you knew anything about America you would know all this.
Your Dad was clearly an American patriot and hero. But look what happened to you? Tsk, tsk, tsk.
Trust me – they were selfless heroes. None of them were like the modern political liberals. The split started in the 60’s and led to the politically correct war in Vietnam and the withdrawal forced by the liberals which then led to the killing fields where some 3 million innocent Vietnamese and Cambodians perished.
Actually, it is faux-Americans like you who give Jews a bad name to the delight of your handlers who run Gaza.
Whatever else liberal American Jews did, they, all Semites, gave us Imam Obama as president, the most anti-Semitic and anti-American president in history.
Ethnic Indians now dominate the American economic spectrum and four key sectors would collapse without them – the universities, hospitals/health care, IT and hospitality. Two of our 50 state governors are ethnic Indians.
What else you got?
To one with an earnest, long-standing and well-developed appreciation for both the faith of the Jewish people AND the individual whom you call Christ, it is startlingly apparent, Eagle, that you know nothing about Judaism
and less-than-nothing about the Jesus of Nazareth of the Gospels.
For what it’s worth, and notwithstanding the smug mouthings of some who like to call themselves ‘Christians,’ and despite, as well, the obnoxious bellowings of others who arrogate to themselves the role of ‘gate-keeper of Judaism’ — the fact is that there is nothing (I repeat, and I stress: NOTHING) about the moral teachings of Jesus that cannot be found elsewhere in Jewish civilization — both before AND since the advent of HaNitzri.
It may not always have been as well stated or as masterfully crystallized & refined from the perspective of phraseology (the boy had one helluva way with words) — but it’s there if you bother to look
before you judge.
His metaphysical teachings (by contrast with the strictly moral ones) — such as the ones about praying for one’s enemies, etc. — may have been less well-known before his time, but this is largely because metaphysical teachings are in their nature a lot more esoteric than strictly moral ones. So they are less likely to be written down.
But the truth is that Christ’s unique mission had nothing to do with providing the Jews (or anybody else) with a ‘new’ moral teaching. In fact in many ways his teaching was only peripheral to the core of his mission. Nor was he the least little bit interested in the founding of a new religion (that is one of many accidents of history).
Jesus was born a Jew, and was raised as a Jew.
He lived as a Jew, and was quoted as saying to a gentile that “Salvation is of the Jews.”
When he died, it was as a Jew — and when he was resurrected, it was as a Jew.
It is unmistakably clear that he loved the Jews
profoundly and steadfastly.
So anybody who hates or resents the Jews
hates HIM.
On the blessed the day that the Messiah comes — whoever that may be — it will be to the Jews specifically that he comes.
And whether that arrival is for the first time or the second (you can ask him, if you’re still standing, at that point),
it will ALSO be as a Jew.
Bubkis in Hindi is gobar, which also means cow cakes. Surely you know all the rules about how food should be prepared, what can and cannot be done between dawn and dusk, etc. Nice brainwashing techniques which do not address the exclusivity, intolerance, vengeance that has restricted the growth to 13.4 million worldwide.
Very good, Yamit. That’s what socialism has done to India’s most intelligent and enterprising people – sent them to America, where four key sectors of the economy would now collapse without them. You should know about intelligent brains draining – half the Jews in the world live in America, Israel’s only ally and underwriters of Israel’s security.
You are confusing Indians with Jews. Indians are the top ranking ethnic community in America based on family income. Physicians probably top the list of Indians on a per capita basis. The American health care system would collapse without them. If you knew anything about America you would know all this.
Your Dad was clearly an American patriot and hero. What happened to you?
Trust me – they were selfless heroes. None of them were like the modern political liberals. The split started in the 60’s and led to the politically correct war in Vietnam and the withdrawal forced by the liberals which then led to the killing fields where some 3 million innocent Vietnamese and Cambodians perished.
Actually, it is faux-Americans like you who give Jews a bad name to the delight of your handlers who run Gaza.
Whatever else liberal American Jews did, they, all Semites, gave us Imam Obama as president, the most anti-Semitic and anti-American president in history.
Ethnic Indians now dominate the American economic spectrum and four key sectors would collapse without them – the universities, hospitals/health care, IT and hospitality. Two of our 50 state governors are ethnic Indians.
What else you got?
AE:
There is an estimate that 3% of the american population was jewish and 4.32% of the army was american jews. They say 550,000 jews were in the army during WWII
MUST SEE: How US & Israeli Soldiers Celebrate Rosh HaShanah (WWII to Present)
Purim 2011 & How Jewish U.S. Soldiers Celebrated in WWII
The Jewish Fighter in World War II Many if not most were liberal Jews.
About 1.5 million Jews participated in WWII as soldiers fighting against the Nazis in the Allied forces. They were on every front, in every branch of the forces, held every position and every rank. Most of them knew that they were fighting not only as citizens of the Soviet Union, the United States, Britain, or any other country, but also as Jews. The comrades at arms also realized this and expressed their appreciation in a variety of ways.
No one knows how many Jews were killed fighting Nazis during WWII. A careful estimate brings us close to the 300 000 mark, almost a third of a million. It is hard to be exact when discussing Fighters killed in combat, but for now we have no other recourse. We have no exact figures. And yet, it is certain that alongside the six million who were killed by the Nazis, we must remember another third of a million fallen in combat. And they are all worthy of being written into the history book of the Jewish people.
Whether you like or disagree with Liberal Jews, the jews of America have paid their dues and given back to America s much if not more than they received. Ethnic Indian Americans? Make your case!
Explain in some detail what you mean by “picayune rule after picayune regulation which mean bubkis“? What is bubkis in Hindi?
I always thought it meant Indians? You know those untouchables.
To the best of my knowledge The Chinese to this day don’t have such a caste system. They have real poverty but nothing compared to what I’ve seen in India, and I’ve been to both countries.
What is India’s largest and most profitable export? Indians.
How many as a % of ethnic American Indians have served and are presently serving in the US military? Besides paying taxes what have ethnic Indians contributed to America? I can’t recall seeing a single Indian in uniform when I served. Maybe it’s different today. There are over 10,000 Jews serving today, most are probably those hated liberal Jews of yours. How many Indians have died for America?
Could it be that the 5% of American MD’s of Indian ethnicity make up such a relatively large % due to the fact that they are willing to work for less and in institutions that other Americans avoid?
By the way You should see these:
This is part 4, see 1-3 if you can stomach it. These are the barbarians you support over Gaddafi?
Libya Rebels (pt4) Execute, Behead, Mutilate Gaddafi Army who Surrender! Where is CNN now?
Jewish American Soldiers on Passover in WWI, WWII (in Pics & Postcards)
My dad fought for three years in the European Theater in WW2, was in the first American platoon to cross the Rein into Germany. He was what you call a fairly liberal Jew as were most who fought the Nazi and Japanese.. I really hate you armchair patriots who cheer on others to protect your cowardly asses. No one asked are cared if those who served and paid the ultimate price whether they were liberal or conservative and on their grave markers there is no reference to political or ideological orientations. You give real Americans a dirty name and anyone who is a normal person reading your comments might just vote for the black guy out of fear that those who support his opposition might be like you.
Ezekiel 29 6-7
6 And all the inhabitants of Egypt shall know that I am the LORD, because they have been a staff of reed to the house of Israel. 7 When they take hold of thee with the hand, thou dost break, and rend all their shoulders; and when they lean upon thee, thou breakest, and makest all their loins to be at a stand
Not obvious to some of the ignorant bigots who lurk in the weeds around here, one of whom wrote:
So, what do you call all the obsession to elevate form over substance in daily life, picayune rule after picayune regulation which mean bubkis to being a better person?
I don’t think he was ever ON the wall.
Hebraic in origin would mean exclusivity, intolerance, vengeance and obsession for form over substance in daily life. What’s so great about that? It makes so little common sense that after thousands of years of a head-start it has only attracted 13.4 million adherents worldwide, most of them terminally brainwashed. Christ showed that that was destructive and counterproductive and taught a far more constructive paradigm of love, tolerance, redemption and forgiveness, and the importance of substance over form in daily living.
It doesn’t? Then why is it taking it for decades now?
Oh, really? How many Jews does China tolerate?
Is this why they are the least anti-Semitic? Just asking.
So, the Chinese see themselves as similar to Jews, do they? The Chinese are survivors, are they? From whom, I wonder? LOL. Are you sure you want to go down this road? Are you aware that the great Chairman Mao made Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot all look like Boy Scouts?
It’s about time that the relationship paid off with more than intel.
Are you confusing American Jews with Israelis? I’m sure you know by now that 78% of them voted for your boy, Obama.
Since pretty much every American comes from somewhere else, you could say that about several countries. I don’t think there is a single American business sector that would collapse if all the Jews left and went to Israel. There are four American sectors that would collapse if all the Indians left and went back to India.
I wonder why Joe is unable to see the difference between democracies like the USA and India versus an oppressive communist dictatorship that has killed more of its own people than any other tyranny in the history of mankind in order to maintain its political power?
Hi, Joe.
Forgive me for echoing Yamit in most of this; but I don’t see Israel cozying up to China and abandoning the US any time soon. Obama has done a fruit-basket upset of international relations in his two short years in office: He insutled the British, then backed them in the Libyan adventure, then deserted them. He fed Mubarak’s coffers, then turned on him. He punished the Libyans, who willingly surrendered their nuclear capabilities, and has given the Iranians a free pass to become nuclear bullies. He sided with the North Koreans against the South — who, along with our presumed allies Japan (to whose emperor Obama had bowed), were ready to go to war against the North for their blatant aggression. He bowed to the leader of Saudi Arabia, filled his war chest, then pissed him off so royally that he hates America. Of course, he has treated Israel like dirt, making Netanyahu go without dinner while he and his wife ate. The Middle East is in turmoil; the world is in an economic crisis; but one thing remains sure: Netanyahu will NEVER, NEVER, NEVER abandon his false trust in the President of the United States.
Is China a natural ally of Israel? I don’t see that. India? Perhaps. China? Their main economic interests, it seems, are in Africa and South America. Of course, they are also married to the United States because of our incredible debtor/lender connection with them. The Chinese people I know (my daughter lives there) are friendly and enterprising; and have a peaceful, orderly society. In matters of foreign policy, though, I still get the impression that they are living, at best, in the Ming Dynasty:
Even in Ming times, Chinese interest did not extend to Israel. The United States, on the other hand, contains half the world’s Jews. That’s quite a contrast.
Israel doesn’t need the credits (not aid) which the US provides yearly. American antisemites ,most of whom probably pay little if any taxes, always greatly exaggerate the amount of what they totally inaccurately describe as direct transfer of funds to Israel (which are credits to buy American made weapons i.e. made in the USA and thus providing jobs for Americans. Israel is probably losing money from these credits. The US stopped Israel from selling weapons to China. I’m sure Israeli profits from arms trade from China would at the very least equal any “savings” Israel gains from US credits. American credits to purchase arms made in the US harms Israel’s indigenous defense industry. As is, Israel’s defense related exports rank third in the world. China which is the main rival of the US, would greatly benefit from trade with Israel. However, in the interest of loyality to Israel’s main ally, Israel has refrained from trading with China . Of course, the US has no such reciprocal loyalty and doesn’t hesitate to supply weapons to enemies of Israel. China although it has been somewhat hostile to Israel in the past is actually a natural ally of Israel. Of all the world’s nations , China is definitely one of the least antisemitic nations in the world. The Chinese who are reported to have a mean IQ slightly above white Christians, do not have the usual hostility to Jews’ success. Although most Chinese know nothing about Jews, the educated class admire Jews especially Albert Einstein. They see themselves as similar to Jews in the following areas : both are peoples who have survived relatively intact for 3 millenia. Chinese’ relatively high IQs have subjected them to somewhat similar persecution due to envy. In Indonesia, Chinese residents were subjected to progroms by Indonesians. If the US cut off all aid to Israel, China could partially fill they void. Other areas which Israel assists the US is in defense. The Arrow 3 which will be the most effective anti ballistic missile defense system is mainly an Israeli development. However, it is a joint venture . Therefore, the US will enjoy the product of Israeli research in this crucial . Although, the moronic, naive Obama, believes Iran is not a threat to Israel, they are working on developing missiles which will eventually be able , possibly, to reach American cities. The US will be able to utilize Israel technology to protect it’s cities from intercontinental ballistic missiles from rogue Jihadist states. In non defense areas , US corporation have made tens of millions or more, in profits from innovation developed by Israelis working for US corporation in Israel. In the book “Start Up Nation” there are several chapters which document the enormous benefits US corporations have gained from Israel.
Ought to be, yes.
However, there is no denying — or ignoring — the fact that much of what passes for Christianity is indeed pagan, rather than Hebraic, in origin. Some of that is constructive, Bland, but much is pernicious. Until Western civilization manages to sort out the rot from the real, the basis of America’s Christian heritage will remain, regrettably, cloudy.
Yamit said,
In that case, John Hagee ought to be the leader of the “Christians for Greece” organization. Yamit, you’re really off the wall here.
Americas Christian heritage comes from Greek Hellenism and Roman Jurisprudence and religions. RCC!
Idolatry, Blasphemy & Art
Western culture can be summed up as a cult of aesthetics. The only culture than did not elevate aesthetics is Israel.
“The cult of aesthetics cannot stand, its identity cannot endure a people or nation that stand outside its magic circle, which deny the universal validity of its meticulously constructed identity: its fragile “artifice of eternity.”
The notion that one can “bless G-d” with images or worship of “strange” or alien things, generally in feminine form (zayin-resh-hei, zarah) turns the putative blessing or garland into a curse. This may be the logic within the euphemistic expression of the prohibition of blasphemy as “not to bless G-d” following a “strange” or “foreign” service in feminine form. Thus Jeremiah’s warning to husbands who follow their wives in exile and “burn incense to the queen of heaven,” a paradigm of image-worship in many cultures. In the attempt to play or bind G-d, individuals find horror:
“Israel will thrive if it can become itself: “a nation that dwells apart… secure; even his heavens shall drip with dew.” It will attain its identity when and if it distinguishes itself from the image-project of the hybrid and Dionysian West: when Jacob expels from himself the dazzling and insidious imperialism of Esau.”
Israel is a small country on the Mediterranean Sea, far away from the US. It’s not unusual, for countries far apart from one another to have a good relationship. The British Empire is another very good example. By the same token, it’s asking quite a bit, to expect Americans to be interested in such a faraway place, or for them to be interested in us; but there is such an interest, and it is not due to the largely clandestine military sharing between the two: It is because America’s Christian heritage comes from Israel. That ought to be obvious to everyone here.
All this support from Israel is largely unknown to the American public thanks to the incompetence of both the American Jewish leadership and the Israeli government. Now if Israeli leaders could ever develop a little Jewish self respect and stop groveling to Obama and cast off the American choke collar our two peoples could enjoy a normal relationship.