Remember your death. How appropriate an article was the one I read yesterday in the paper. On a day when around the world there are mass killings going on, how appropriate. How much more befitting could it be than if we were to remember and keep in mind the deaths of so many and our own impending death, for from the moment of our birth, we begin the dual process of both living and dying. You do not get out of this world without this tandem two.
Most religions and ethical movements remind us that we should live and behave with our possibility of death always in mind. Some stress the worldly behavior as in "Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow you may die." Other more ethical ones, state, "Where am I headed and where do I want to end up?" Some version of that question and its implications is found in just about every religion in the world. The answers vary, as we well know.
Death has been more and more on my mind. No, not desperation or depression, but simply a realization and acceptance of the meaning of the ever more rapid turning of the calendar pages. In June, one more leaf turns and I suddenly become a year older. What does that mean? How am I affected in my thinking and behavior? Can I even define that difference, if there is even one to be defined? Is there a day when I am to think that there are no more new topics for me, no more queries and investigations into new ideas? What then do I think re my new hobby of wood working which has given me such joy, an extension almost, on life?
And no matter how we strive, between diet, exercise, new habits of daily life, the body will eternally and inevitably degrade and death will be upon us. How will we meet that inevitability? How will we approach the end of our days? Will we suddenly and radically change or will we remain the same? Will we contact people we wronged or who wronged us, close the file or do we ignore it all and move forward as much as we can?
I have no answers that befit all; nor do I have the right to impose my thinking in this area on others. We each, individually, must do as we feel right, as we must by our inner urgings and perhaps, the pricking of our individual consciences.
The question of death impacts us within the world as well. It seems that there has never been a time in the history of mankind where there has not been any kind of conflict, many massive, drawing in hundreds of thousands of people into its hungry maw. And it seems, that this situation, this condition, continues right till today and certainly into the foreseeable future.
One area of particular concern to me and so many others is the conflict in the Middle East. Once again the rockets and projectiles of war are flying through the air with their goal of death and damage. Once again the world seems to focus on this inappropriate hypocritical 'equivalency' of death and dying. Why are there an x number of dead and wounded on one side and no matching figure on the other? Is that fair is the implied question. Really?
Since when has conflict been concerned with equivalency. One side must defeat the other and that means that more damage and death will impact that losing side. Do the USA and other countries not count and boast of their 'body counts' of the enemy? Does slaughter and mistreatment of so many Uighurs, Rohingya, Hazara, protesters in Myanmar, and on and on not go on, not continue and where is the rage, the oh so righteous indignation of the countries and the leaders of the world?
Where? Focused on that one little country so narrow that one can cross it up of down in a matter of a few hours. It is the one country where Jews are welcomed and as the world turns, certainly that appears to be more of a necessity, an existential necessity, than ever. Jews must die is the seeming motto of the world, left or right. More must die to counterbalance the dead Arabs on the other. Until that happens, evidently Israel must stop defending itself and its very existence.
"From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free." The chant of the Palestinians as they demand a new reality of no Israel anywhere in the world, preferably, no Jews either. The desire of anti Semites throughout history. No different here, no matter the excuses made up. Jews are attacked all over, as the war extends into the world and oh, the crying over the dead in Gaza, some of whom they kill with their own incompetence, or with their use of civilians as shields. But the world remains quiet on their flaws and cracks and focuses on Israel. The same Israel that makes phone calls to tell people to get out. The same Israel that makes it, by law, a requirement of new construction to have safe rooms, for shelters to be available to people in the streets where all are welcome within. The same Israel that is first in place at areas of destruction and disaster, all over the world.
Think of death we are told? Well, imposed death from the human enemies rather than by nature, has been the status quo of Jews for millennia. We thought that it was done, the violence of that hatred over with, but Hitler proved us wrong, and evidently, once we defeated all the opposing armies in 1967, despite the abandonment of the world, we were then to become the target of rage as we forgot our role - to serve as the scapegoat of the world, to accept our imposed deaths of hatred and go quietly, never to protest, never to fight back. At the very least we should allow for equivalent deaths!!
Well, screw that outlook and philosophy, for Jews are finished with going quietly. They are finished with accepting their fate to be consigned to death chambers or fight to the finish in embattled areas of cities, forests, and deserts too. Enough. It will defend itself and its citizens, whoever they are, and if more die on the opposing side, on the side of the enemy shooting thousands of rockets deliberately into civilian areas, well, so be it. We are done with dying in numbers that please the world.
Individual approaching and inevitable death is one thing. Death by violence of an entire nation - no go!!We Jews always have Memento Mori with us. The world allows us no peace in that area.
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