At times I think we all, pre-birth, pass through a tunnel of possibilities. Some average, some not, some awful, while others sing of beauty and glory. Others are poised on brinks, edges, a multitude of them, each having a future left open for discovery, interpretation, and adaptation. At that moment we come face to face with a major tenet of Judaism, one contradictory in nature, never truly understood nor explained, at least not to my satisfaction and clear understanding.
The tenet: Man has free choice, makes his own decisions, opts for a choice, one or another of those presented, always having the opportunity to unmake and remake choices, hence consequences. Too often humanity makes the grossly wrong, misinformed, misshapen one. Then there is that look of puzzlement, confusion, as to how the hell we got here. These are the times when ugliness comes home to roost, lies at the feet of the perpetrator or crushes the shoulders of one who will have to bear the burdens of results. Most collapse under the weight, unable to withstand the ugliness, the hopelessness, the gore which far too often, are the consequential results.
The other side of the tenet now comes into play. Given freedom to choose, we are also told G-d knows your choice before you do. If so, and if the results will be ugly, the balloons of good fortune, of peace, of goodness lost in the voyage of life, well then why are we not somehow nudged into the right choice, the correct path? Why does G-d not strut His stuff, help the so very challenged creatures of His making, burdened and confused, find their way home, or at least discover and tread that path that can bring them to home base, safe from tormentors and stalkers, safe from those who would wreak existential harm to them. Where is my freedom of choice if it is preprogrammed. Why must I pay the dues forthcoming, if actually I was merely flowing with the current, unable to escape its grip.
I argued this in class, in private, in high school, college, postgrad, in teachers' rooms, among family, upsetting some who were convinced I was going directly downstairs at the appropriate time. Maybe so - but it is my choice to question, to demand answers, but perhaps it is G-d's responsibility to answer. And act.
One cannot, should not, create, and then discard the results if they are imperfect. Obviously not the fault of the damaged creation, and why can the creator not redo, recover, repurpose, reconfigure? Is it to be our fate to indeed be discarded for failure, even as we truly cannot take 100% ownership of deficits within and without, for we did not create ourselves.
And maybe here is the answer that somehow can successfully be meshed together with the other precepts of this theory. Perhaps we can remake, reconfigure, repurpose ourselves. The deadliest assigned fate can be ameliorated, we are told, by three things: true atonement, prayer from the heart, the soul, and tzedakah, actions of altruism for, towards others.
We do have an important degree of control over our lives and can initiate changes in decisions, reevaluate ethics and morals which should be guiding our lives. We can relight the smothered lights of candles, chase the darkness away, from the world and from ourselves. It will take hard work, great amounts of seemingly useless toil, despair at seeds that did not thrive. There is no alternative.
The faults and the flaws, the promising possibilities, are all within our grasp and of our making. G-d cheers us on albeit we do not always win or even hear the cheers. We fall into despair, into a murky soup of pessimism. We lose our momentum, and we must fight against that state of mind. We can make a difference, can demonstrate to ourselves our true strength, moral, physical, and we can make it so.
We are presently at a time of great peril. Our futures are challenged everyday by a weak confused lost its way GOP, still infected by the virus known as Donald Trump. His incompetence, his criminal ventures, his ugliness of soul, poison the nation, paralyzing it, and only regression is present rather than productivity and forward movement. This retrogression infects the Democratic Party as well, its infamous 'progressives' doing their best to share in the destruction, the dismantling of America, spreading hate and bigoty, particularly a virulent antisemitism. Their supposed progressiveness is actually a return to a terrible past, ugly and soaked with bloodshed. It is truly retrogressive. Our Supreme Court, our entire judiciary system is an ugly blot upon the nation, replete with Justices who now serve as examples par excellence for greed and corruption, for partisanship, for a total vacuum, a huge void, where morals and morality are supposed to reside.
As a Jew in this rather ugly, rancid, stinking world, I am frightened, more than ever. I am desperate for Israel, my home just as much, perhaps even more so, than America is at present. The angry hurtful, acidic voices of hate raised on college campuses, corrupted by the hate emanating from right and left, from those who do know better, from self-hating, self-immolating young Jews who flock to the enemy, blind to the knives at their backs and throats, a cacophony of vile, toxic hatred. Egged on by false professors, purveyors of hate and antisemitism raised to the nth degree, who call Hamas butchers heroes, who call their savagery, their inhumanity "exhilarating and refreshing".
Once again, I, my people, are hunted, slaughtered, denied any right to exist, to be an independent, sovereign nation whose rights are equal to all nations, with inalienable right to defend itself, to adhere to its morals and values, and certainly determining its own actions, decisions, - no other nations being subject to this. Judged and criticized by countries who openly slaughter for decades.
All efforts to destroy us are doomed to fail, as they have for millennia. We have been persecuted by powerful empires, always a David to the Goliath, but they are gone, and we are here. They come to destroy while we remain to build and rebuild.
We always remain. We always survive. We are here to stay until the good Lord calls us home. Until the world realizes and accepts that we will not roll over, not play scapegoat, nor play the name game, the blame game.
I am a Jew.
I am an American.
I am an Israeli.
I am a human being.
I do not have much remaining, realistic hopes for a world united in togetherness, in recognition of shared humanity.
However, we can remain together for those who so need that from us, including my Yitzy. Please keep that going. He is almost at the point of evaluation, scans, etc. We hope and pray for good results. We pray, along with you.
(Please note at the end a list of 16 people who would not support a House resolution to support Israel. Instead, they support lies and bloodshed.
Get them out of office!! Ther is no place for them within a democracy dedicated to do what is right.)
HEAL YITZY!
Yitzchak Elimelech ben Chana Sarah
May he be granted refuah shelaymah bimheyrah beyameinu.
AMEN. AMEN
AM YISROEL CHAI.
"May the Omnipresent One have mercy on our brothers the whole House of Israel who are in distress or captivity, whether on sea or land. May He lead them from distress to relief, from darkness to light, and from oppression to redemption, now, swiftly and soon - and let us say: AMEN.
Here are the 10 lawmakers who voted against the resolution:
- Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York
- Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri
- Rep. Andre Carson of Indiana
- Rep. Al Green of Texas
- Rep. Summer Lee of Pennsylvania
- Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky
- Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York
- Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota
- Rep. Delia Ramirez of Illinois
- Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan
And here are the 6 lawmakers who voted "present:"
- Rep. Greg Casar of Texas
- Rep. Joaquin Castro of Texas
- Rep. Chuy Garcia of Illinois
- Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington
- Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts
- Rep. Nydia Velázquez of New York
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