Thank you, Rabbi Billet, for inserting the short but unfortunately true pasuk reminding us, warning us that our worst enemies will come from within, vipers within the nest. Unfortunately, this has been true Since the beginning of time One can cite the incident of Joseph being sold into slavery by his brothers, to the Arev Ra of the time of exodus. To Israelites and/or Jews who cooperated with our enemies to further their own situation. Converts to other religions who spoke ill and with great lies of their former neighbors and friends and family. Ghetto police and Jewish Kapos. Ancient Israelites who helped our enemies find ways to get into Jerusalem, destroy our Temples and exile our people from our homeland.
We have had Jews from right to extreme left outspoken against the resurrection of our homeland for religious reasons, for selfish reasons and through a fog of misunderstanding, and ignorance of history, Our history, your history, ours forever. These days, we find you immersed within, swallowed up or displayed in the front lines of people protesting the fight of Israel to survive, to defend its citizens, to create a peaceful and prosperous Middle East. You stand there and chant for your death, for the death of your families, for the death of each and every Jew upon the face of this earth. With your grossly erroneous behavior nations now feel free to tear off the fragile curtains behind which they hid their antisemitism. Now look around and see what you have done. Yes, you, perhaps mistakenly thinking you were doing the right thing, but so manifestly the wrong, and it is time for you to understand exactly what you have done.
Praised the slaughter of innocents of October 7 and before and after and ever ongoing. You have colluded with our enemies to starve and torture our own; look at the pictures of our Holocaust survivors of today and know that this is what you have done. Watch the family and the video of October 7, the two young boys seeing parents killed before their eyes, pleading for their lives and begging, shouting, they wanted to go home. See and understand what you have done and continue to do. You have turned in your dangerous misthinking and actions against the very nation which watches over you and all of us round the world, a haven over the years for persecuted Jews.
Others who know better have equally taken the wrong road. The recent letter of purportedly Modern Orthodox Rabbis condemning Israel using the words of our enemies, who would cheerfully and viciously see you and yours dead - Chilul Hashem to the nth degree. You have failed your congregations. You have failed the classes you teach, be they child or adult. You have failed your people, and you are among those false leaders in our history who did us massive, major harm. For sure there are major bones to pick with you. But I also do have a bone to pick with Michael for his comments about modern orthodox. Claiming they're lacking a great deal, bringing them down to a level of not being good Jews in observance and feeling, even perhaps one can interpolate the comments to the point of accusation of not worshipping their Lord properly with the correct mindset.
This dangerously supports the condemnation that we, as Jews, are facing today, and in particular, that the Modern Orthodox are facing today. First we have lost our own sense and definition of what it means to be modern orthodox, even and especially modern orthodox of my time, those who sang joyfully in the synagogue, where women attended synagogue every Shabbat and brought the children with them from infants in arms to pre bar mitzvah, unless the children had already gone with their father. Judaism and worship are and always have been and are meant to be a family activity where children are welcomed to learn of the joy, of the obligations, of all that it means to be Jewish, and to join in the post prayer mingling, to be of the Jewish community. These Modern Orthodox are those who delighted in observing the rituals, those who shared with their friends the joy of the keeping of the mitzvot.
That joy is missing in many of those calling themselves Modern Orthodox today, for there is less joy, almost no singing, children are almost deemed contraband, interfering with the prayers, even as the minyans, the group of worshippers these days often praise the faster one, even on the Shabbat, the special day of rest and worship. Today's modern orthodox unfortunately have begun to copy customs and rules and regulations, adopt practices, which actually have nothing to do with religion and the joys of the holiday. Observances have become too often matters of display sending wrong lessons down the line.
Those who refuse to follow that path and who try to remain as such are denigrated by those of other sects of Judaism, from yeshivish to Chassidic and back again all the way to the barely there Jew. Told they are doing too much or too little and then feeling guilty and so small, insufficient and incorrect in their observance of Judaism. And they begin to believe what they are being told. I believe that we would all be better off if we all minded our own business, do what you believe and let others do as they believe. It should be a live and let live without harm and leave all consequences, if any, to the final Judge of all.
We, all of us, from Chasid to Humanist Jew, have forgotten what it means to be a Jew. The joy and the responsibilities, the ancient long and proud history, the deep, sincere and true knowledge that we have an eternal homeland and the injunction upon us to fight the wars we must, to defend ourselves and to defeat the enemy. At times of crisis there is an injunction upon us to defeat the enemy to the last one and when we do not follow that injunction we are asking for trouble in the future. We did not listen to that command when we fought Amalek and that one survivor brought forth upon the Jewish nation horror, hate, death and destruction in every generation.
We are Jews. First, last and always, no matter what disguise we don, no matter where we live, always, no matter our accomplishments and contributions. If one forgets that fact he will surely be reminded by others. The rabbis are incorrect in their opinion, misquoting or ignoring complete injunctions Equally as many rabbis as bright, equally as erudite, can come up with all of the verses within the entire Bible, the Tanach, and refute their erroneous letter. Yes, welcome the stranger within their midst but not to welcome their enemies, not to make their enemies feel at home. Give charity, help those in need, of all denominations and ethnicity, walk in the ways of the Lord but not to commit suicide by strengthening the enemy or by ignorance of the necessity to fight all those who wish to have us gone - forever. Peace - yes but after the victory.
So it was yesterday; so it is today; let us hope it is not so tomorrow.
Am echad, Lev echad.
Hinei mah tov oohma'naim,
shevet achim gam yachad.
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