Return to the Jewish Mission
Saul Singer, an opinion columnist who appears in the Friday Jerusalem Post, wrote on 7 March about the Jewish mission. The article was entitled, “From survival to purpose.” Here are some of the pieces of his article that I found particularly interesting:
To modern Jews, the idea of a Jewish mission is either antiquated, messianic (in the sense of unreal) or radical. Many Jews have a vague notion that they had a mission. They are roughly cognizant that monotheism, a strange notion when it burst forth in the ancient pagan world, has triumphed through Judaism’s daughter religions, Christianity and Islam. They are less aware that Jews, by introducing the idea that history has direction, invented the concept of progress that became the basis of Western civilization and therefore of the modern world as we know it.
But even if they are aware of this history, Jews tend not to project it into a current sense of mission.
…At the Pessah Seder, Jews recall how “in every generation [they] rise up against us.” The Talmud states that potential converts should be warned that Jews are subject to persecution, as if this is a permanent facet of the Jewish condition.
The modern era has certainly not given Jews reason to believe that this aspect of their situation has changed. Not only has this era witnessed the Holocaust, but the persecution of Soviet Jewry, the vilification of Israel and the current rise of an openly anti-Semitic strain of Islam.
Yet … except for some tiny communities, the era of oppressed Jewry is over. Almost all Jews live either in Western nations, or enjoy both freedom and sovereignty in Israel.
This means that, whatever threats remain, the exilic period is over, and we are deep into a period that is more like that of Ancient Israel, when Jews lived both under their own sovereignty and in a Diaspora where they enjoyed a high degree of influence and success. During this period, from about 200 BCE to 70 CE, the Jews not only seeded their ideas of monotheism, ethics and progress, the Jewish population grew from half a million to eight million (according to historian Salo Baron).
Historians debate the scope of this growth and whether it was accomplished through active missionizing or simply an open-door approach. What is not arguable is that the Jews grew because they offered something that was attractive and compelling to the world around them. “Survival” was not an issue, let alone a goal. The Jewish purpose was alive.
Today, we cannot let Hamas or any other enemy distract us from renewing our purpose: to finish the job we started before we were so rudely interrupted.
Israel has already demonstrated that it is possible to build a democratically vigorous, economically booming state while under attack. There is nothing stopping either the Israeli or North American poles of world Jewry from asking themselves: Now that we can aspire to more than survival, what is our purpose in the modern age?
…So what is our modern purpose? The context of our ancient purpose was the global struggle to conquer adversity. Though tyranny and poverty are still with us, the challenge of the modern world is increasingly to cope in a world that lacks physical adversity and faces instead a crisis of meaning and community in the face of frayed societal bonds.
If the Jews can show that they produce more ethical people, more cohesive families and the only religion that is also a coherent people (there is no Christian people or Muslim people, but Christians and Muslims), I believe we will be able to attract both disaffected born Jews and a small but significant fraction of non-Jews to join our cause. If we continue to let our enemies fool us into thinking we are only about survival, the only “continuity” we will experience is on a path toward obscurity and decline.
I found this a refreshing piece, especially after a particularly depressing week. It’s easy, especially after a terror attack like that on Thursday at Mercaz HaRav, or the less reported daily missile attacks on the Israeli town of Sderot and nearby kibbutzim and moshavim, to fall into survival mode and think that’s all Judaism is about these days. One of the rabbis on my Beit Din warned me that the Jews “are not a popular people.” Anyone who studies history or reads the headlines can see that. Singer downplays the permanence of this condition, yet makes a valid point about our proven ability to build, thrive, and prosper despite the adversity we face. I appreciate his demand that we return to our original sense of purpose. Perhaps by pursuing the seemingly small-scale goals of showing that we are a unified people, that we’re more ethical, and that our families are more cohesive, we can lead the way to a more just world.
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Hey Shimshonit,
Thanks for posting this piece, it’s really interesting. I agree with your sentiments completely, and I believe it is true that maybe if we focus on our duty as Jews more, maybe we’d focus on our differences less. What if more people around the world saw us not as a big dysfunctional family constantly pummeling each other, and started seeing us as a wonderfully diverse family that is a prime example of how human beings can live and love and help G-d renew this world humanity has been less than careful with.
Maybe after catastrophes like the one at ישיבת מרכז הרב is the precise time we should most try to remember our purpose as a people. I wonder if such a focus could sort of quell the fires of revenge a little. Not that such thoughts are unjustified, particularly in a barbaric attack on teenage students, but often they lead us to take steps we normally wouldn’t. What if, as a People, as עם ישראל , we were so dedicated to our purpose and to our unity that in response to horrible situations we responded with grace and really reflected Torah values. The ones obvious even to non-Jews. Wouldn’t it be something if our collective השקפה (Jewish worldview) really reflected our broader purpose?
Anyway, thanks for this post, it was a good read!
kol tuv,
Yair
Thanks for your comment, Yair, and especially for the thoughts about Jewish unity. I think the conversion controversy that’s been discussed a lot (particularly in Chavi’s recent post) particularly points to the need for unity in the Jewish world.
I’m not sure what kind of reaction the slaughter at Mercaz HaRav has elicited in the U.S., but I am, as always, impressed with the restraint that the Israelis show in the face of violence and disasters like these. The papers here are full of biographies of the boys and eulogies by rabbis, and the chat lists are full of messages about getting rides to funerals and shivas, requests from the mourning families, etc. There is very little revenge going on here. What is happening is putting the security situation under scrutiny inside Israel and in Palestinian-governed territory and seeing if there are ways to keep Israelis safer.
In general, Israel can more readily be accused of letting down its guard and absorbing excessive violence rather than the opposite. I think perhaps the Israeli governments’ defense of the right of the murderer’s family to erect a mourning tent in their village to honor their son/brother whom they view as a "martyr" and "hero" goes as far toward exhibiting "grace" as anyone could expect. (Jordan, in contrast, forbade the murderer’s relatives to put up a tent or publicly celebrate his deed. No doubt that is in better taste, but Israel refuses to legislate good taste.)
The closest I’ve been to any sign of revenge has been the report I heard of our rabbi’s dvar Torah last Shabbat where he examined the story of Jacob returning to meet Esau. To prepare for this reunion, Jacob amassed gifts, prepared for war, and prayed to Hashem. Our rav said our gift was Gaza. And given the results of that,… then he began the prayer for the soldiers. (Maybe not as graceful-sounding as allowing the murderer’s family to celebrate his deed, but certainly in keeping with Torah values.)
Combining Singer’s piece with current reality leads me to the conclusion that we as Jews must continue to multi-task. We cannot let down our guard with regard to our own survival (giving gifts with no thought to self-defense has not brought Israel peace), but if we lose sight of our mission, we’ll forget the reason we’re striving to survive.
I’m not trying to be overly dense today, but what *is* the purpose
according to the author of the piece? I can’t make the link work
and can’t find the original on the Jerusalem Post site. Is it to " produce more ethical people, more cohesive families and the only religion that is also a coherent people"? Or to cultivate holiness in the world (which is one of the answers in much of the reading I’m doing right now on Judaism)?
SFMichele,
Thanks so much for your comment. I don’t think your question indicates density. Singer spends most of his time in this article focusing on why we shouldn’t spend as much time on survival as on purpose. But one paragraph I cited is his assessment of the current crisis in contemporary life: Though tyranny and poverty are still with us, the challenge of the modern world is increasingly to cope in a world that lacks physical adversity and faces instead a crisis of meaning and community in the face of frayed societal bonds.
Your reading points to the Torah’s stated goal for the Jews of bringing holiness into the world. That’s my impression of the Jews’ mission too. But even that is a bit vague, especially when one of the ways in which the Jewish people are supposed to demonstrate holiness is to keep kosher. (Not the clearest sign of holiness, at least in the eyes of the rest of the world.) Singer mentions the goal of tikkun olam (repairing the world) in his piece, but his focus on ethics and a high premium on family cohesion in large measure work in a practical way to achieve this same goal. If there is justice in the world, if we endeavor to work together, to rear our children with strength of character, a dedication to the Torah, and a sense of shared purpose, that is a good chunk of the battle right there.